Quotes & Sayings About Auditions

Every audition, I still get nervous. I still get sweaty palms. I don't think that ever goes away. You just get accustomed to it. — Tanc Sade

I don't like auditions. I feel like they're a very unnatural setting and it's a very unsettling experience. Because you can't help but walk in and feel like you're trying to prove yourself to people. And you should just walk in and be. — Sharni Vinson

Auditions are so much fun. A lot of people dread auditions; they think they have to do it in order to get the job. I don't really mind if I don't get the job, as long as I get to do something interesting in the audition. It makes me feel more creative as a person. — Chris Geere

Auditions are an opportunity to play and go in there and bring the character to life. The writers have it stuck in their head and haven't seen it jump off the page. — Jodie Sweetin

In today's world, everything seems like some sort of long audition. — Bob Fosse

The hardest part was when I was in high school not having a job and always being broke. I had to get to auditions without a car. I either took the bus or walked. — Cuba Gooding Jr.

Adults were constantly auditioning, but for what? — Alison Espach

When you go out and audition, you're going to hear a lot of 'No's.' As weird as it may sound, you almost have to love hearing 'no' because you're going to hear it way more than you hear 'yes'. — Jay Ellis

You start at a young age, going on auditions, and you think you did a good job and expect to get that role, and you don't, and it's a letdown, a disappointment. So you tell yourself to just do the work and disconnect, because you have no control over the outcome. — Michael B. Jordan

Plow through the weeds. Go to the auditions and go to the meetings and be on time. Stop looking to the left or the right. Keep your head down and keep moving. — Tika Sumpter

I'm just terrible at auditions. I don't know how anyone does it. — Tom Riley

It just so happens that when I was, like, 19 or 20, I got a couple of auditions and got a couple parts with good people. Of the thousands of auditions where you don't get the part, I've done a couple of jobs where you do it and you're like, "Okay, this is good." — Paul Dano

I went for endless auditions for tiny parts in obscure plays, and never got one job until I was in 'Four Weddings'. — Anna Chancellor

You might look at my CV and see I've had 12 jobs, but I've been to over 450 auditions so I've heard 'no' a lot more than I've heard 'yes'. So if I go in looking only to meet my own standards, then that will make taking that rejection a little bit easier. And when I do get that job it will seem like icing on the cake. — Wentworth Miller

I have friends that are much better actors than I am that had to quit the business because they couldn't survive the auditions or the rejections, or people just didn't realize how good they were. — Robert Englund

It's true; I have a skill and it's ... it has not related to acting, it's not related to auditions, it's not related to studios, not related to public whim. It's whether I'm funny or not and whether I can entertain people. — Tim Allen

My agent called me and said, "You have an audition for James Bond. They're looking for the girl." And I told him, "Listen, it's all in English. I'm not an actress. I'm not going to go." He thought I was kidding with him. — Gal Gadot

I've been doing American auditions for a while, and it always felt sort of like sending these audition tapes off into the ether. So just hearing anything back from anyone was kind of startling. — Xavier Samuel

I was 20 when I moved to Los Angeles. I went on probably 600 commercial auditions and couldn't book any of them. — Dax Shepard

I did my first play in fifth grade. This same fifth grade teacher asked me several years later what I wanted to do when I grew up. I knew the most fun I'd had was doing the play in her class, so when I told her that, she began to take me to local theater auditions and became my mentor and friend, and to this day continues to be. — Heather Hemmens

With acting, it [auditioning] is very frustrating. I'm not very good at auditions. Sometimes I audition for a role and I'm like, I'd be really funny in that role, but I'm not good at auditions so I guess I'm not getting that role. It's a very frustrating job. — Jim Jefferies

I totally heard by chance that they were doing the casting for a James Bond movie, and that one of the auditions was taking place in Paris. So I tried myself to contact every name involved in the movie I could possibly find on the IMDb! — Berenice Marlohe

I used to wear sweats and a T-shirt to auditions, but my agent would yell at me and tell me I had to look nice and presentable. So I had to drop that habit. — Kellan Lutz

Well, this movie I've been working on for a while. I had the idea for the movie like twenty years ago when I was doing 'Empire of the Sun' in 1987 because at that time that's when all these Vietnam movies were being made and my friends and I were going on auditions for these Vietnam movies and my friends were getting them and going away to fake boot camps. — Ben Stiller

I'm just used to leaving and being like, "I feel like I wasted their time and I definitely wasted my own time." I often leave auditions thinking that that person is now permanently mad at me. — Jon Gabrus

It's funny because when I first met with Carmen, she said, "Have you ever thought about doing TV?" And I was like, "No, not really, but I'd audition for TV." And she said, "That's where the roles are for women now. That's where you can go and get a really great part." — Eve Hewson

You're going to a bunch of auditions, and most of the time you're just getting denied, but just staying in there and keeping my head and being determined helped. Growing is what's challenging; you have to constantly practice your craft. — Natalie Martinez

I knew the story of 'War Horse' very well. I had read the book even before I did the auditions. I'm a big fan of Michael Morpurgo. — Celine Buckens

I was actually away in Africa doing 'Generation Kill' while everyone was auditioning for Twilight. They all had, like, five different auditions: I was so lucky that I came back from Africa just in time and the actor who was playing Emmett fell through, lucky for me! — Kellan Lutz

What's so kind of beautiful about the whole thing was that everything that made me not right for all of those hundreds of commercial auditions that I went on and no one ever wanted me for is what made me perfectly right for 'Real Women Have Curves'. — America Ferrera

I've never played Scots or got the chance to do my Scottish accent. I'm always trying it out in auditions, but they always say no. I'd love to act in a Scottish accent for once. — Callum Keith Rennie

It's interesting - years ago, I had such bad stage fright during musical theater auditions that I just gave up. And now I'm on Broadway. — Tom Lenk

I've grown up seeing the pros and cons but I love it and I've always wanted to act. Throughout all the rejections at auditions, and especially when I finally did get something, both my parents have been so supportive and always told me it is all about passion and, if I was doing it because I love it, there's no wrong choice. — Lily Collins

When I went to L.A., I started modeling, hoping to travel and learn from photographers. It led to auditions to do commercials. — Beth Riesgraf

As an actor, when you go for auditions, there are certain roles that come along and you think, 'I really want that one,' and Prince Arthur was definitely one of those. — Bradley James

I didn't have a stage mom at all. I was the one who planned out my auditions and drove myself an hour and a half into the city. — Nina Dobrev

I got some pilot scripts and auditioned for a couple other ones, too. It was just a standard audition, where I kept going in to read and went up the ladder, in terms of people who you're performing for during those auditions. Each step of the way, I was happy with that level of audition. — Tim Kang

I used to be a wonderful auditioner. When I was living in New York, I'd audition every day. And I like to audition. But then it got to a point where I didn't like it anymore. So once it got to there and I also knew more about the business and I thought, "I can't do this anymore." — Ed O'Neill

I don't really get nervous for auditions, because I just see them as mini acting classes. There's no need to have an attachment to the outcome because it's out of your hands after that. — Isabel Lucas

I have been reading scripts, going to auditions and looking for the right opportunities. — Kevin Richardson

I wouldn't have made it past the first round of American Idol auditions. It was months before our first song was recorded. The guys were like, 'Just seeng!' And I was like, 'I don't know how to seeng! Can't I just play the triangle?' — Malin Akerman

I used to audition for 'NYPD Blue' quite a bit, so I had this stock New York detective character that I would bring in for all their auditions. — Mark Valley

I secretly went to auditions, to open calls. I was ashamed. Anytime I mentioned I wanted to be an actress, my friends were not that supportive. — Kathrine Narducci

If you're an English actor and turn up in America, they don't have an opinion about where you sit. They have no idea what auditions to send you to, so they send you to everything. — Eddie Redmayne

I love the acting process. What I don't like is what's around it. The auditions and being rejected every other day. The look thing. That you have to lose weight, that you have to do Botox. — Julie Delpy

Many times during auditions, I was told that I couldn't carry a note with a bucket, and that I sure couldn't play the piano. — Ray Charles

Just getting auditions was rough. But also just learning how to act - when I did my first role, in a film I did which was a favour to a friend, I realised I was really bad at it. — Dave Bautista

Her voice was trained, supple as leather, precise as a knife thrower's blade. Singing or talking, it had the same graceful quality, and an accent I thought at first was English, but then realized was the old-fashioned American of a thirties movie, a person who could get away with saying 'grand.' Too classic, they told her when she went out on auditions. It didn't mean old. It meant too beautiful for the times, when anything that lasted longer than six months was considered passe. I loved to listen to her sing, or tell me stories about her childhood in suburban Connecticut, it sounded like heaven. — Janet Fitch

My parents were really, really cool about supporting what I wanted to do at a really young age. I think I was about 10 when I caught the bug. They would drive me down to New York if there were auditions. When I was 12, I did this show on Broadway called 'High Society,' so we moved to New York for the run of that. — Anna Kendrick

I did auditions at a club called the Comedy Connection. They wanted nothing to do with me. But one night they were doing a night of all women comics, and they invited me to do that. — Paula Poundstone

I have to just go in and audition, like everyone else, and fight my way to the top. — Madeline Zima

I've gone into auditions and I think they have an assumption about me when they see my photo and then I open my mouth and they say, 'Where exactly are you from? And you were born in Ethiopia? But you're Irish, but you also kind of sound English. That's really strange.' They want to put you in a box in LA, that's how they tend to do it there, so if you don't fit in that box, it makes it more difficult. — Ruth Negga

I'm not in a position where I get to pick and choose roles. I usually go on auditions in long lines and embarrass myself in front of casting directors, and with a lump in my throat and my ears burning, I walk past reception and smirking actors as I go to the parking garage and go back on the highway. — Henry Rollins

I didn't want to be known as the reality-show star trying to be an actress, so I kept a lot of the failed auditions to myself. — Jamie Chung

I've never gone through an audition process or anything. In most of my decisions like that, I just kind of feel it out: You know, do I feel comfortable with this person? — James Mercer

Don't be afraid to fail. You're going to go on a million auditions, and most of them you won't get. It's very easy to think, 'This is not going to work for me,' but keep at it. It's very generic advice, but you have to be willing to keep yourself in the game. — Ike Barinholtz

I'm always nervous doing auditions - to be honest, I hate it. I always envy the actors who are so cool and cold-blooded when they go in for an audition, especially if it's for a part that you would really love to play. — Daniel Bruhl

Most of the time, I get auditions for deaf characters where the scene has them communicating in really convoluted ways, like reading lips from across the room when the other person's back is turned or having other people parrot what they say. — Shoshannah Stern

I didn't have big movie offers, or any big agents wanting to work with me. I had to go grassroots, start at the bottom and go on 150 auditions before someone finally gave me a shot. — Donnie Wahlberg

When I was younger, I would go to auditions to have the opportunity to audition, which would mean another chance to get up there and try out my stuff, or try out what I learned and see how it worked with an audience, because where are you gonna get an audience? — Al Pacino

We chose the actors thru a series of auditions when we started the show. — Craig McCracken

I have had so many bad auditions. — Ethan Hawke

'Orphan Black' tends to, for their auditions, shroud it in secrecy and change names. — Ari Millen

Instead of being on teams at school, I was preparing for auditions. — Shawn Ashmore

I hate auditions. — Andie MacDowell

With all the auditions you do, there is a lot of rejection you have to take as well. You get used to that. — Olivia DeJonge

You've got to be dedicated and throw yourself into parts and auditions in a way that is completely selfless. — Sophie Kennedy Clark

Being a director, whether you're in rehearsal or you're in auditions or you're in a creative meeting, is so much to me about being present in the moment. There's a sense of time stopping. — Diane Paulus

I'd done two years' worth of extra work, and all my friends who I would go on auditions with went to school for acting. These were kids who knew when they were 14 years old that this was what they wanted to do with their lives, and they prepared for it, and they're getting canned at every audition. — Michelle Rodriguez

My oldest step-son wants to direct or produce. As far as being an actor, I've already told them they have to wait until they're 18; I won't take them to auditions. — Elizabeth Perkins

With 'Carrie,' I did, like, seven auditions. I'd never done a movie, so they wanted to make sure I wasn't going to ruin it. I don't blame them. — Ansel Elgort

You've got to audition! It's tough out there, no matter how well-known you are. — Cassie Ventura

I did work hard at auditions, and three years at RADA isn't like a walk in the park. And then it takes a lot of sacrifices, giving certain things up in order to audition, in order to do a play, whatever it may be. — Andrew Buchan

Oh, yeah, I'm a smoker now.
Well, I'm not, but when Ruby said she was, I just went with it. It was something for us to bond over. Plus, I knew most of the people at the auditions smoked, so it seemed like the thing to do. Also, my mother would have hated it.
All good reasons to take it up. — Leisa Rayven

I'm a natural blonde. But when I started acting, I would go to auditions and they didn't know where to put me because I was voluptuous and had the accent, but I had blonde hair. It was ignorance: they thought every Latin person looks like Salma Hayek. — Sofia Vergara

We watched these auditions and could only pick one. Sometimes we would add new characters 'cause we wanted to use another actress. There were so many people who were just waiting for something like this. — Jenji Kohan

I'd been auditioning for parts for years. I never got any better at it. I'm crap at auditions. I know there are people who can walk into those rooms and make those lines sing on the page and get the job immediately. I wasn't one of them. I'm still not one of them. — Jamie Dornan

I had done a couple of auditions for 'Amistad' and didn't feel it was going to go any further - and then the call came about heading to Los Angeles to work with Steven Spielberg. It was surreal: exciting, challenging, overwhelming. — Chiwetel Ejiofor

When I was about 6, my cousin was very active in a Filipino repertory company, doing musicals and plays. Her aunt was one of the founders of the company, and she told my mom that there were these auditions for 'The King and I,' and that they needed kids. I auditioned, got in and the love affair started from there and just kept going. — Lea Salonga

When I was going on auditions, it was nerve-racking. I'd always say to my mom that it would be awesome if I could get a series. When Modern Family came along, I said, 'You know what, Mom? I believe I'm going to get this role.' — Rico Rodriguez

When I was starting out, I didn't know what the hell I was doing and my person who was helping me out, I didn't even have an agent, got me five or six big auditions for leads in movies in 1986 that I had no business auditioning for. I think I ran out of three of them before I'd even finished. — John Corbett

If you fail to prepare, prepare to fail. — Steve Prefontaine

It's a guy thing, playing the guitar. Being a female and trying to go to the same auditions as the guys, it's pretty hard. — Orianthi

It's not every day people fly you to New York for auditions. — Samantha Bee

People think that I can just walk into a room and get a job, but of the 200 interviews and auditions I go through a year, I may get three yeses. I just have to use my sense of humour to get me through. — Oona Chaplin

You don't train for only the 100-meter dash and you don't practice only the excerpts. When I prepared for auditions, I spent most of my time each day on scales and exercises to be my best in basic musicianship, and only a half-hour or so on the actual excerpts I'd be playing. — Jim Rogers

Anybody auditions for X-Factor it's because they want to be famous, not because they are artists. — Bruce Dickinson

I never thought I'd get [a 'Pitch Perfect 2'] audition because the film was just so massive. — Chrissie Fit

I put a tremendous amount of pressure on myself. I felt like I shouldn't have to audition for anything and all that. And that energy did not serve me at all. — Hank Azaria

I was really awful at auditions. There's something about sitting down and saying into the camera: 'I'm Nina and this is the name of my agent.' That makes me just die inside. — Nina Conti

If the script's good, everything you need is in there. I just try and feel it, and do it honestly. I also don't learn things for auditions, because I feel like it's just a test of memorizing rather than being real. Maybe every other actor would think that was terrible, I don't know. But it seems to have worked for me, so far. — Olivia Colman

I'm not going to pursue it the way that actors pursue it which means going to all of the auditions and getting a job and all that stuff, because I don't really need to get a job because I have a job as a writer/director. That's how I make my living mostly now. So I don't need to make a living as an actress. — Julie Delpy

I was doing auditions and meetings during the day and going to culinary school at night. And then 'NCIS' happened. So I dropped out of culinary school. — Eric Christian Olsen

When I know I'm not doing any auditions, I go to the skate park on my scooter or my bike. — Kodi Smit-McPhee

I came to Los Angeles and did auditions for television. I made a terrible mess of most of them and I was quite intimidated. I felt very embarrassed and went back to London. I got British television jobs intermittently between the ages of 23 and 27, but it was very patchy. — Michael Fassbender

A lot of the time, I won't read the script until my second or third audition just 'cause a lot of the scripts are the same and the characters are the same. — Kay Panabaker

Because I was a dancer, I started going to auditions for musical theater, which forced me to sing. — Madonna Ciccone

I can record auditions from my office in my home. — Jason Marsden

It's just been a lot of hard work and lot of auditions. A lot of ups and downs, but a lot of ups, and I'm really happy for my downs, too. I'm really thankful. — Bresha Webb

When you go out on auditions for big movies, and you're not a big star, you get used to getting close but not getting the part. — Craig Sheffer