Most people don’t think about the terrifying things that happen before an actor could even make it in front of the camera. One of them being auditioning. It’s a nerve-racking experience, especially when you consider these seven actresses and their horror stories.
1. Jenny McCarthy was pressured to get nude.
While auditioning for Under Seige 2, the actress claims Steven Seagal was pretty unprofessional with her, according to The Richest. “Stand up, you have to be kind of sexy in the movie and in that dress, I can’t tell,” he reportedly said. Jenny did so, then Seagal continued, “Take off your dress.” The actress refused then he insisted the role requires nudity. Jenny however said that wasn’t true or else she wouldn’t have showed up. Seagal denies that he did this.
2. Gwyneth Paltrow was pressured to do more than audition.
Someone also tried to pressure the Shakespeare In Love actress to do more than she was comfortable with. “When I was just starting out, someone suggested that we finish a meeting in the bedroom. I left,” Paltrow told Elle. “I was pretty shocked. I could see how someone who didn’t know better might worry, ‘My career will be ruined if I don’t give this guy a bl** j**!’”
3. Lucy Hale’s awkward Fifty Shades Of Grey audition.
The young actress gave the role of Anastasia a shot, but realized it wasn’t for her. “That audition was so uncomfortable! It’s exactly what you thought it would be: a big monologue but very, very sexual,” Hale told Cosmopolitan. “There were some things that I was so embarrassed to be reading out loud, but it’s one of those things where you have to commit wholeheartedly or you’re going to make a fool of yourself.”
4. America Ferrera totally blanks.
What happens when you go into an audition after staying up all night? This! “They were adding season regulars to Boston Public and I went in and knocked ’em dead. Had a great audition and they called me back the next day to read for David E. Kelley [show creator]. I had a paper due that day and I spent the entire night up writing the paper and I turned in the paper and drove from the San Fernando Valley to Manhattan Beach in a rush looking at my lines. It was paragraphs of lines I was trying to memorize. I get there and David E. Kelley is sitting there and all the producers and I just totally blanked.”
5. Drew Barrymore had to give her finger a bj.
This probably tops doing a very sexual monologue. “They called me in on a Sunday with a casting assistant. They didn’t think I was worthy enough of even reading with the casting director. They did it in the basement, and it was a scene where I have to do this oral thing with this guy’s hand, and no one was there so I had to do it to myself. It was by far the most humiliating experience. I thought, ‘They think I’m such s*** that I’m here on a Sunday with the assistant, giving myself a finger in the mouth.”
6. Elisha Dushku pulls out a knife.
Tumblr/20th Century Fox Television
Going above and beyond probably hurt the actress more than it helped. “I pulled a knife on a director in one audition. I know he didn’t like that very much, but I felt good about it because it seemed like it was in tune with the character. But I think I got a little too close for comfort with my prop for that director’s taste. They went with, like, Natalie Portman. That was not a good one.”
7. Thandie Netwon’s abuse was filmed.
The actress revealed that when she was just a teenager a casting director told her to sit down with her legs apart in front of a camera while wearing a skirt, according to The Daily Mail. Three years later she found out the video circled around to other people in the business.
