Holy Moly! It has been a long day and I was just cut but I did not walk away empty handed. An ANTM casting director told me I was pretty enough!! DUUHHH! The whole day was not a waste; in fact I enjoyed it immensely. I would do practically anything for validation. SOOO, Here is how my day began……
5:30 Wake up and beautify! I sprawled my many beauty necessities out on the bathroom sink and began to make myself look naturally amazing. Not to much makeup, just enough hair pulled from my awesome pony, and cloths chosen especially for today. I looked awesome!
6:30 Pack up and leave the hotel.
6:48 Arrive at the audition. Where is the line? OHHH! Where is the end of the line? Nope, not there. Nope, not there. Ahh, there it is. Runway walk to the clear back of the line while being stared down by hundreds of pretty girls.
The location of the audition was not announced until late last night but luckily it was just down the road from our hotel! Line up started at 6:00 and doors opened at 7:00. I was there just before the doors opened but the line was already wrapped clear around the building!
6:50 Start making friends, total BFF potential here and there would be A LONG TIME to test the water. Observation #1: There were lots of divas in front of me. Observation #2: Most of the girls were skinny and beautiful. A surprisingly small number should have been told to stay home. Observation #3: As a Caucasian I was in the minority.
The line was moving pretty quickly once I got in but girls were piling up behind us just as quickly. Some of them started talking about ANTM and several were quoting from the waiver that was posted online. Most pretended that they had not seen very many episodes of the show but as the chatter continued it was clear that they were VERY familiar with all the previous contestants. Some discussed if Tyra or Twiggy would be inside. Absolutely NOT, why would Tyra, queen of the world, waste her time here? Several Chicago girls insisted that Tyra is so GHEHH-TOHHH and would love Chicago.
As we got closer to the building entrance we were put in groups of two helping the line move quicker. Brittany was my buddy and Keisha was in front of me. Brittany was adorable and I certainly thought she had potential. Keisha was 5’11”. I felt bad that she spent the day there when the guidelines CLEARLY said they were looking for girls 5’7” and under. She thought she was “all that” and was banking on the one line at the bottom of the waiver which gives the judges the right to bend all rules. Keisha would be the worst person to room with ever! The girl behind me drove 10 hours with her husband and three kids to be here. Someone should have sat her down beforehand.
8:30 we entered the building. I was so happy to be out of the cold. My hands and feet felt like ice cubes. Cameras and phones had to be turned off here. We were herded into a horribly rigorous security check point with a beeping wand and everything (they did not find my pepper spray though) then up an elevator to another long line in a hallway. We continued moving slowly and past the first girl’s room. Some stopped but most would rather die then possibly loose their place in line. I was among the rather die group. We shuffled through hallway after hallway and finally saw a door to turn into. As the door got closer girls began to strip off their jackets and primp. The primping spread like wild fire as compacts and lip gloss were whipped out. We finally went through the illusive doors to find nothing but another hallway and another door. Once through the second door we were given a wrist band, the wristband was stamped and we were assigned numbers. 1082!!! WOW, there were almost 1,100 girls in front of me and a bazillion more behind me.
8:50 The auditorium. Once we were numbered we were seated in a huge auditorium by number and told to wait until called in groups of 50-75. They were only calling the 600s when we sat down so I took this opportunity to go to the tinkle room. Going into the bathroom was so intimidating, there were girls packed around every inch of sink space doing every kind of primping imaginable and I mean every kind! I quickly did my business then went back into the auditorium. News crews were getting the sluttish girls to talk to them and having mini competitions. Lame. I am on the Left side on the group in the video HERE.
Lots of girls had brought photos of themselves just in case. We passed the photos around and told the girls how ahhh-mazing they looked. WHATEVER! I saw everything from the worst swimsuit Polaroid imaginable to professional modeling shots. These girls were insane and looking at those pictures I was shocked that some thought it would be helpful. Keep your clothes on girl!
10:20 Our group is called. FINALLY! I was so nervous and it did not help that the auditorium was freezing. We were ushered out of the auditorium keeping in numerical order and brought into a smaller conference room where we were shoulder to shoulder around the walls of the room. A male casting director walked in and asked us to quickly state our name, height and age. After all 50 of us were through he had us chit-chat with each while he walked around. I’m normally the best small talker alive but after four hours with the same group there was not a lot to say. Small talk was painful but we did as he asked. Finally he picked up his notes and started calling numbers. My number was the 7th called of 13. The other 37 girls were sent home. There was crying, girls tried to hug and congratulate me….. Spare me. Once the ugly girls were gone the casting director told us that the beauty part was over. We were all pretty enough to be on ANTM but in the next room we would be asked to do the same thing and add a blurb about ourselves on camera to get a glimpse of our personality. We all practiced our blurb “I am a Mormon from Washington who sticks to my values and I wanna be on top!” with each other before being moved into a holding room.
10:31 More waiting. The chairs in the holding room were all full with other “pretty-enough” girls so they made us sit on the floor, not fair. We shuffled around several times and were told over and over that if you were out of the room for a simple shuffle you would loose your place. I saw several girls go to the restroom but only after much debating. They had to take all their belongings with them just in case they were not allowed back. The thought of not being able to pee made me want to but I would never take the risk.
11:20 The final moments. Finally I and about 200 other pretty girls were brought into a medium conference room and packed around the walls. We were like sardines in a circle hugging the walls. In the front was the main casting director who has cast every season from season one. She had a camera set up and a computer. She explained they were overwhelmed by the amount of people in attendance and were pressed for time. Instead of letting us do our personal blurb we would only get to say our name, age and height again. WHAT! I came all this way because I have the best personal blurb ever!
11:50 After saying our name, height and age quickly in front of the camera eight of the 200 girls were chosen to continue. Divas were crying and hugging the ones asked to continue (like we care about them anyway) but the saddest part was walking out. Our wristbands were cut from our arms and thrown away while girls were tossing their 15 page application in the trash never having a chance to share it with anyone. I was proud of my application! It was amazing and my only recommendation to ANTM to prevent such a cry-fest would be take the applications from the girls 3 hours before the first cut. Label them with the numbers and file them away. You do not have to read them; you can throw them away two seconds after we leave. Just don’t let the girls leave with their application in hand hating the show. Poor strategy, these hysterical girls are your fans and the least you owe them the allusion that you care.
It was sad when it all ended but I am still beaming knowing that I am 100% pretty enough. I guess that was all I wanted to hear since I did not want to wear the smutty outfits anyway. It would have been fun though to be the girl who had a break down over having to be a slut and quits the show. I could have absolutely provided that for them.
Evelyn;s advice to future auditioners: Plaster the three words that describe you or your personal blurb on your body. Maybe a tee that has them written on it so that they look at you and can’t help but absorb a piece of your personality. Auditions are random. At any time they could have chosen 20 girls from the audience and had a great show. They know they do not need to be picky so you need to force your personality as much as you can without being obnoxious. Go for it, maybe like me you will be told that you are pretty by an ANTM casting director. So worth it!!
Check out the Chicago Tribune's review of the day!
Please come home so that I can hear this all from your mouth!
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