The 90-Second Job Interview

It’s not your typical job interview.

For more than 30 years, the Unified Professional Theatre Auditions have brought actors and production companies from around the country to Memphis with the aim of finding the right fit. 

Actors who are available to work throughout the year can come and give it their best shot at landing a job with an organization looking for talent. The scope of production outfits is wide, with more than 80 companies ranging from Playhouse on the Square to cruise lines to Disney to children’s theaters to Shakespearean presenters to touring shows.

Playhouse on the Square (POTS) is always part of it, since it hosts this annual event that’s held at the theater, the Sheraton Memphis Downtown Hotel, and the Renasant Convention Center. Buses shuttle actors and production reps back and forth for four days as they run through the process that might seem chaotic, but is in fact a well-oiled gig machine.

The producers get to see something like a thousand actors who are ready to go to work. And each actor has exactly 90 seconds to make their case. Not at all your typical job interview. But for many of those actors, the minute-and-a-half is just the first step. Callbacks, interviews, and some song and dance often follow in a whirlwind of activity.

Michael Detroit is the impresario who organized the event when it first happened at Playhouse in 1995. He’d joined the organization in 1989 as a resident company actor and brought with him considerable administrative skills. He would become executive producer in 2018, succeeding Jackie Nichols, who founded the company.

Before that, however, it was Nichols who had been going to combined auditions around the country looking for talent to bring to POTS, and in the mid-1990s, realized that there needed to be a somewhat different approach. He was looking for actors who would be available year-round, not just in the summer and not going to school. Nichols enlisted Detroit to cobble together what they called the Unified Professional Theatre Auditions — everyone calls them the UPTAs — and the first one got underway.

It was held at the old Playhouse on the Square, which now is the Circuit Playhouse. The nearby French Quarter Inn was where people stayed and where callbacks and notifications were done. Some 200 actors and 25 companies attended. This year, there were 850 actors in person over four days, plus another 600 who registered but couldn’t get in. They still got to submit headshots and resumes, but didn’t get that moment-and-a-half to be on stage all by themselves, hoping to knock it out.

There were 83 companies registered, most of which were in attendance, some remotely. They’d typically send several representatives sharing the duties of watching the auditions, deciding on callbacks, checking out which dancers had the right moves, holding interviews — for four days straight.

When the UPTAs started on Friday morning, February 6th, the first group of actors were in the audience at POTS. Detroit came to the stage to give them the rundown on how things would go.

While many of the actors throughout the four-day event had been to the UPTAs before, this group was all new, mostly students who were about to graduate and looking to get a professional engagement right out of college.

Detroit has given this presentation dozens of times before and he kept it light. It helped when Elvis came on stage to welcome the attendees. He was portrayed by Michael J. Vails, who handles facilities work at POTS and was the region’s Ronald McDonald back in the day.

But then the information came at a rapid pace. Volunteers and POTS staff members were everywhere, available to answer questions and calm the nerves of actors who were about to lay it all on the line. Actors would have time to warm up, check their wardrobes, and take deep breaths. They gathered in the green room, some calm, some twitchy, all listening for when they were called.

When the time came, they’d go to the stage and sit by accompanist Jose Simbulan while the actor who was on before them walked to center stage to begin their 90 seconds. If the actor on deck planned to sing, they’d give Simbulan the music and discuss where they wanted to start and stop. The accompanist has been doing the UPTAs for years and probably knows every piece of music ever written. Nothing fazes him. Earlier, he’d also spoken to the crowd, telling them what to expect and assuring them that everyone wanted them to succeed.

As an actor finishes his or her audition and heads back offstage, the next one strides to the center, mustering up all possible courage to deliver 90 electrifying seconds to 80-plus potential employers. No pressure, none at all.

They announce their name, the number they’re wearing around their neck, and any changes in availability. And then it’s showtime. There’s a volunteer with a timer in the front row and a camera operator videotaping at the back. The actor might start out with a dramatic monologue, segue to a witty Shakespearean bit, and end with a tune. Most of the time, the song has a razzle-dazzle ending, something memorable for those companies who need a performer that can razzle and dazzle.

And then the 90 seconds are up, the actor says thank you, repeats their name and number, and walks off stage. To no applause. It’s OK, nobody gets applause. The next actor is already making their move to center stage.

Meanwhile, the company reps are spread around the Playhouse auditorium with laptops aglow, power cords snaking everywhere. They’re looking at resumes and headshots, making notes. There are usually several people from each company, most of them there for the four-day duration. They take shifts and compare notes. They also have rooms at either the Sheraton or the Renasant Center, where they’ll see actors they like for callbacks or interviews.

It’s happening on a rolling basis throughout. When a cluster of 25 actors finishes their auditions, company reps fill out forms saying who they want to see again. It is, of course, different for all of them. People from children’s theater organizations are looking for talent who will be animated with kids. Cruise line reps want a lot of energy. A company that’s got some musicals lined up for the coming season will be listening for great singing voices. The lists of callbacks are shuttled back to the Sheraton along with the actors. UPTA volunteers sort through the paperwork and post notices in a large room on the ground floor of the Sheraton. The actors swarm in, checking to see if any of the company reps have been wowed enough to want to see them again.

And there’s more — because it’s not just about delivering great lines and singing big music. As Detroit puts it, “Can you walk and chew gum at the same time, plus one? There’s a ballet and jazz combination, and then there’s a tap combination.” That’s the dance component. It used to be that actors could get that call and come in and take a quick 20-minute class in how to do all that. But now, “we’ve sent all of those routines out to all the talent already, so they’ve already had a chance to learn it,” Detroit says.

So now, if the reps want to see if you can move, you have to figure that into the lineup of callbacks and interviews and all you can do is hope you have so many that you have to do some world-class schedule-juggling.

And if you get there, it’s only because your 90-second audition had enough gumption to make it happen.

Playhouse Looks for the Winner

Playhouse on the Square always has someone at the UPTAs looking for new talent. This year, Dave Landis, Claire D. Kolheim, and Drew Sinnard were taking turns in the Playhouse auditorium, watching and evaluating as hundreds of actors marched across the stage and gave their all in 90-second segments.

Playhouse has a resident company as well as associate company members. Landis says they look for talent that will complement and fit with who already is on board. Every year, though, is different. “Sometimes we don’t know what we’re looking for,” he says, “but it all comes down to casting the season.” The upcoming season will have some big musicals, so POTS will need talent that can sing, dance, and act. “We’re always looking for strong singers. And we’ve been specific this season, this year with looking for people with dance experience. It can modify from season to season.”

Landis has been part of the UPTAs since the first one, and he’s seen some actors more than once. “That’s the beauty of it every year,” he says. “I’ve seen people this year on the stage that I’ve called back multiple times before when the season was right for them and they wound up not coming here, but that’s okay. It’s nice to see some of these people keep coming back because they keep getting work.”

Each company does callbacks and interviews their own way, whatever works best for them. Not every actor will necessarily come to the callback. Maybe they don’t want to go to a particular location. Possibly they don’t want to do a cruise ship. Perhaps they only want to do Shakespeare.

But most will respond, if for nothing else than to grow their network and lay some groundwork for future years. Landis says that when Playhouse calls someone back, “they sign up for a time to meet with one of the Playhouse staff members who then give them about a 10-minute talk on what it’s like to work at Playhouse. What we tend to look for is how the casting might work and if they’re interested, we ask them to submit more than what we saw in their 90-second audition.”

He says that since Covid, actors have gotten good at putting together media packages. Landis says he’ll tell them, “Well, you sang a ballad in your audition and you did a serious monologue, so I would like to see something more comedic and see something a little bit more upbeat.” And that setup is usually ready to go.

Landis says that Playhouse has probably called back just under a hundred actors over the course of the four days. “Some of those people we never see,” he says. “They read about Playhouse or they come and get the little chat with us and then we never see them again. But at least we reached out to say, this is who we are. I think we’ve interviewed quite a few people over the course of the weekend. And then, like I said, we encourage them to touch base with us via email, and then I will respond back to them individually with answers to their specific questions because it’s a whirlwind for them too. They come here, go to these callbacks, and then go back home or go back to college and start thinking about the end of their college career. So, they don’t always ask all of the questions while they’re here because it just can be so overwhelming.”

But over time, the younger actors become more seasoned and their networks grow. “There are some people who have come to the UPTAs year after year after year. Now they’re at that point that they don’t need to because the network is so tight for them that they can get on the phone or reach out to somebody and say, ‘Hey, what are you doing this season? Can I send in a tape?’ As opposed to coming to here.”

The UPTAs are good for actors and good for production companies and that’s why it’s an ongoing success. Over the years, it’s gotten support from sponsors and companies such as Red Bull (which explains the ongoing energy), Hershey, Memphis Travel, Princess Cruise Lines, and Suncoast Broadway Dinner Theatre.

But Memphis gets a solid benefit from the economic impact of people, most of whom come in from out of town and for four days use hotels, restaurants, transportation, and more. Plus it’s in February, which is typically a slower month for the hospitality and convention sectors.

Detroit says that the economic impact each year is between $600,000 and $1 million. “We’re very much aware of what we at Playhouse on the Square are doing as a small business, a nonprofit organization infusing money into the local economy,” he says. “It’s not always just about putting on plays, although that’s certainly the biggest part for us. It’s about being good stewards of our city, showing it in a better light.”