Our kids need to be a little more careful

By Troy Dodds

Over the last few months, I've been working on a special investigative story focused on auditions and the risks our children are put at. With the advent of the Internet, auditions are now publicised to the world. It's a great thing on the surface, and is a cheaper option for shows and companies and allows a wider range of potential actors to check out what's out there and how it all works.

The special investigative story will be online shortly - at the moment, we're speaking with industry experts to get their view on what could very well be a crisis waiting to happen.

Let me give you a scary hypothetical situation. An unsavoury character places an audition notice on the internet (something anyone can do) announcing there will be "auditions by appointment only". A 14-year-old child responds to the notice, and is told a time and place they can audition. Now, we all know what teenagers are like - parents are often the last people to find out what they are up to. So lets say the 14-year-old, thinking all of this must be legit, turns up to this "private audition" by themselves. Now, who is to say what happens next? Who is to say this "private audition" is not an elaborate scam to pray on children?

Let's hope that hypothetical situation never happens, but without regulation or rules surrounding auditions - and with most not specifying that adult accompaniment is needed - it's a can of worms that could potentially be opened.

Personally, I don't want such regulation - but I do want our kids to be more careful.

You only have to look at theatre message boards right across the web to know that young aspiring actors often don't listen properly, don't read properly and don't pay attention. We created a touch of angst during this special investigation when we posted an audition notice, just to see how many under-age people actually respond to such notices. Within a few hours (and after many responses) we posted a notice saying that the particular message was part of a special AussieTheatre.com investigation. But even weeks later, kids were still replying to the original message, on the very same forum, without reading the many replies to it or our original explanation.

The point here? Kids need to be more careful. If you're a young person doing the audition circuit, particularly with independent and amateur theatre, make sure you take precautions. When you hear what our industry experts have to say in our upcoming story, I am sure you will understand what we mean. The internet has created a new dimension of "Stranger Danger" and while most, if not all, current auditions are certainly above board, the potential is there for something to go awfully wrong one day.

If you're young - don't take too many chances. Explain to your parents or somebody responsible what you are doing and get them to come up with you. At your age, the audition panel should respect such a decision.


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