Saratoga News

Broadway singer and actor Jeanne Smith returns to Saratoga to teach an auditioning workshop at West Valley College.

Broadway star teaches local workshop

Former Saratogan gives audition hints

By Shari Kaplan

Former Saratogan Jeanne Smith's road to theatrical fame has taken her on an 18-year trip around the United States. In November, Smith takes a detour to Saratoga for a new role--that of local girl makes good.

On Nov. 1 and 2, Smith returns to West Valley College, which she attended for two years before transferring to Santa Clara University, to teach an interactive workshop about musical theater auditions.

Smith says the workshop met with success in Los Angeles, where she currently resides. It consists of a lecture the first day and a complete re-creation of a Broadway audition the second day.

The secrets of what to bring, say and do at auditions to make the best impression on casting directors are common knowledge to Smith, who now has dozens of roles under her belt. It is not easy for newcomers, Smith says from experience.

"I was painfully shy when I was younger," she says, recalling how she considered many less-extroverted professions and put her interest in acting on the back burner. It wasn't until she took a class from Ginger Drake, the head of West Valley College's drama department, that Smith's latent interest bubbled to the fore.

"In the back of my mind, I always knew what I wanted to do, but I didn't act on it. Ginger has such gentleness and compassion that I couldn't believe I was actually going up and speaking in front of people," Smith says with a laugh. "At that moment, it was instantly clear to me what I wanted to be doing. I really started to come out of my shell."

Following her degree from SCU in theater arts with a concentration in acting, Smith says her career in acting and singing has been nonstop. In 1984, she moved to New York City and soon got a part in Can't Buy Me Love, an off-Broadway comedic play by Jason Milligan.

"I spent the next four years living out of a suitcase, traveling the country doing numerous plays and musicals at various theater companies," Smith says. "I'd literally finish with one company and get on a train or bus or plane and go right to the next one."

Recommendations from various producers or directors helped her network and find out about upcoming auditions and openings. Among her favorite roles have been Fanny Brice in Funny Girl, Rita in Educating Rita, Bianca in Taming of the Shrew and Angel in The Rink, whose West Coast premiere was performed by Palo Alto's TheatreWorks.

Her most challenging role was Helen Keller in Monday After the Miracle, a sequel to the Miracle Worker. To gain empathy for Keller, Smith spent one week living at the Helen Keller Deaf and Blind Institute in New York, where she wore a special earplugs to eliminate sound, as well as a blindfold.

Since the late 1980s, Smith's performance credits include a run of Nunsense with Phyllis Diller as well as two productions of Les Miserables, in which she alternately played the mother and daughter roles of Madame Thenardier and Eponine. During this time, she also co-starred in an episode of NBC's "Midnight Caller."

Currently, Smith has been commuting to New York to participate in workshops for a new rock opera, Pilgrim, scheduled to play on Broadway in the fall of 1998. In terms of its innovative and engaging presentation, Smith says that "for lack of a better description, it's kind of like Le Miz meets Cirque du Soleil."

She is also preparing for the release of her first CD, an eclectic collection of tunes--including some original numbers--called Discretionary Eyes. Her brother Ed Smith, a 1977 Saratoga High School graduate, produced the CD. Another SHS grad from the 1970s, John Boswell, played piano on some of the CD tracks.

In teaching her workshop at WVC, Smith hopes to inspire some Broadway hopefuls the same way Drake inspired her so many years ago.

"It's more geared toward those who have little or no experience with auditioning for musical theater but who are intrigued by it. It's totally meant to be a fun and learning experience, and not intimidating," she says.

The cost of the two-day workshop is $50; enrollment is limited. For information, call 741-2462.

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