YOUR OPPORTUNITIES
THOSE of you who are perfecting yourselves for a stage career are naturally giving consideration to your future as you advance in the courses, and are wondering just how you will go about it to get well placed in your chosen line of work.
I am going to tell you how some have tried to do this, and then tell you the best, surest and safest way. And do not for a moment think that I am guessing about what I tell you. I know the theatrical world and theatrical ways and methods, and I know the managers, the producers, and all the principals connected with our profession, and they know me. So I am not guessing when I say that your personal interests in all matters connected with the stage will be best conserved by entrusting them to me.
In our classes here in the studio there is apt to be one or more dominating spirits who become anxious to go around the booking offices and seek for a tryout and an engagement.
It is true that to go to any office and say that you are a recent or prospective graduate of the Ned Wayburn Studios is a good recommendation, and you may get a hearing and a tryout on the strength of it. But please be advised by me and let me give you the tryout first when I am sure you are ready for it. Your teacher should first be given a chance to see what you can do individually. His advice is invaluable and impartial. When he reports that you are advanced sufficiently to deserve consideration for a solo role, then come and dance for me. I am glad to have you do this, and shall always give you my decision honestly and fairly, and let me add, freely—no charge whatever. If I see that you are deficient in any way, I will be frank and tell you so, and will also suggest what you should do to correct your fault. In other words, you will get constructive criticism, and kindly advice, in my office, whereas anything short of perfection shown to a booking agent or possible employer would be apt to insure abrupt dismissal. They would give you no helpful advice, and you would prejudice yourself, for your effrontery, in their eyes for any future engagement you might seek.
So be advised by me. I respect an ambition that prompts you to go out and hunt an engagement, but, believe me, yours is not the best way. There are agents and agents. Some would do right by you, and perhaps some would be unscrupulous. I am not going on record in this book with any details that would seem to reflect in the least on anyone, so I'll not enlarge upon this subject here. But I will tell you more about this if you come to my office and ask me to.
Now if any pupil in the school asks you to go around the theatrical agencies, please don't do it, but come and tell me. Perhaps some day you both will come to me and say "Thank you."
