Just had an old memory surface. My mum tried to get me acting jobs when I was a very young child, and I was 100% on board and very enthusiastic about it.
She took me to an audition for the part of a newspaper seller in a movie set in Germany. Once the casting people explained the role and the lines they wanted me to deliver, I became distressed. How could my mother have made such a fundamental error?
The casting people were very nice and polite, repeatedly explaining to me that it was perfectly ok that I didn't speak German. That even though the characters were in Germany and spoke German, the film was English language, so I didn't have to learn a new language for this part, and no, I didn't even have to learn the words "get your papers here" in German.
I became increasingly distressed.
Bring a very bright child, I had of course instantly figured out that they were just being nice to me, that my mum had messed up by not realizing this was going to be a German language film. I also knew that didn't matter. I didn't want to let her down and I just had to convince them to tell me what the line was in German. If they did that, I could prove that I could deliver it authentically. Their persistent refusal to do so meant that they had made up their minds, but they shouldn't be so hasty to dismiss me.
Obviously they wouldn't film a movie set in Germany with German speaking characters and have them all speak English. What a ludicrous idea! They expected me to believe this pleasant lie (concocted in the moment to let my poor foolish mother save face for her mistake) because I was just a child. They wanted me to deliver the line in English so they could politely bring this charade to an end and usher us out and bring in a nice German child to take my role. I would not let this happen. I would refuse to deliver the line in English until I'd had a chance to do it properly. Then they would see I was right for the role.
I was not taken for any more casting interviews after this.
