A Look Behind the Curtain: Brecksville Theater on the Square Holds "A Nightmare of Crime" Auditions

On Monday night, two men walked in the door of Brecksville Theater on the Square at Blossom Hill. After double-checking the proper paperwork was handled, they headed to one end of the short building. Here, on old, cream floral couches, they prepared for what was ahead: auditions for “A Nightmare of Crime.”

Auditions for the play, written and directed by Jack Winget, were held Sunday and Monday night in hopes of finding the perfect actors to portray Nazis, prisoners and Sonderkommandos. These are prisoners that were forced to act out duties as Nazis, such as killing other prisoners. He plans to surround the audience with barbed wire and other props to create an atmosphere of being contained in an internment camp. A large screen with changing images will be on stage, also. 

“It was to reveal a horror that occurred in our society,” he said. “The more people that see it, perhaps it won’t be repeated.”

The somber theme had Winget looking for committed actors, both emotionally and in the sense of time commitment.

Once the first two men were ready to audition, they entered the cheery blue and yellow room to meet Winget. As a very straightforward man, he grabbed a folding chair, sat directly across from them and began to discuss his somber play.

“It’s one that you could get really emotionally involved in in the message you’re trying to manage,” Winget said.

After each grabbed a script, the men studied their first lines on pages 11 and 12 as Winget and his four colleagues sat waiting at one end of the room. After the other man ran through his first lines, 18-year-old Nick Royak sat cross-legged on the ground. His face contorted into one of a man writing a letter back to his separated family, and he placed an imaginary pen atop the script booklet.

“My dear woman and daughter, I had the great joy of receiving your letter. It was like balm in my sad days,” he began to read. “I read it again, and again…”

Body language is one way to get rid of any leftover nerves during an audition.

“Physical choice breaks the ice of any mental fear,” Royak said. He also concentrated on the play’s deep theme of concentration camps to get into character.

Winget studied both men as he gave them numerous pages to read and more accents to attempt. Leaning forward and holding his fingertips together as if praying, he gave them his rapt attention. Every time brought out a new character from each man, and Royak seemed to nail his role changes.

About 30 minutes later, Winget asked both men to return to call-backs Tuesday night. After, Royak described his feelings on auditions.

“Everyone auditions in a different way, and everyone has a different confidence level,” he said.

He does have four productions under his belt and has his own way to prepare for auditions: Royak sings the production’s songs in the car on the way to auditions or listens to '80s rock and roll.

If Royak appears on stage Feb. 25, opening night of “A Nightmare of Crime,” he’ll know his tactics were successful.