ust back from completing the casting for Cabaret. A lot of people ask where our actors come from. Through the course of a season about half come from Portland, and the other half come from Seattle and New York. Which immediately conjures images of our sitting through cattle calls of thousands of actors with numbers on them.

While we do hold general auditions in Portland as well as outside (New York, Chicago or LA every year), when we are casting a specific show in NYC – we use a wonderful casting director, Harriet Bass who, with the help of Eileen her trusted assistant – call in several actors who they know have the chops for the role we are looking for.

In the case of Cabaret, Joel Farrell, our choreographer travels with me – and begins the session by teaching the dance combination to the assembled group.

Once we get a sense of which dancers are strong enough to compete, then we narrow the group and hear them sing, and read. It’s actually one of the great pleasures of my job – sitting in a room with a bunch of really talented people singing, dancing and acting their hearts out.

Our production will run here in Portland through October, and then move to Geva Theater in Rochester, NY for a run after the first of the year. Mark Cuddy, Artistic Director at Geva (photo below), joined us for the callbacks. As we narrow the pile, the group of us weigh in. Often there is clear agreement, and occasionally wide disparity.

Next step: When we finalize our list of choices, Rose Riordan (Associate Artistic Director) calls the actors agents and makes an offer. We keep our fingers crossed that they accept.