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“Omaha” lead John Magaro was 28 when he bombed on his audition for David Chase’s “Not Fade Away,” the actor said during a fireside chat at the IndieWire Studio, presented by Dropbox. Well, actually, his original tryout went very well — it was the callback that was a disaster. Why? Magaro says he failed by doing “the worst thing you can do” as an auditioning actor.
“I was continuing to do the same thing. I was doing what I thought you were supposed to do as an actor — what other people were doing,” Magaro said. “And at the time, there was a thing — and I don’t know if they do this anymore — but I remember getting casting notices, like— you would get an audition from the casting director and [it would read]: ‘Jesse Eisenberg-type.’ ‘Michael Cera-type.’ And I’d be like, well just cast them.” Don’t say that. It’s the worst thing you can tell an actor because then all you’re gonna do is go in there and try and do that. It’s just shit.”
But Magaro wasn’t just doing impressions of other specific actors — the ones they really wanted — he applied the misguided approach to genre auditions as well.
“It’s a spy movie, or whatever. And you’re like, well, this is how they act in spy movies, so I’m gonna do it this way,” he said. “It’s the worst thing you can do. You’re not offering anything new, you’re not offering yourself, you’re not being honest. That’s when I realized that honesty was my focus, and I didn’t give a shit anymore. I wasn’t working anyway, so I might as well change the formula because what I was doing wasn’t working.”
Well, OK, so he still gave a shit.
“It’s so glib to say ‘don’t give a shit,’ because that’s not what it is,” Magaro self-corrected. “It’s basically: Do what you need to do. Look at the words and make them your own. Don’t do what you think you need to do. Let yourself be surprised.”
“At the heart of it it’s about being open,” he continued. “That’s what it’s really about.”
So much time had passed between his first (good!) audition and second (terrible!) for “Not Fade Away” that a new casting director convinced Chase to give Magaro one last chance. Fortunately, that six-month gap was the same span in which Magaro stopped giving a shit started being open with himself.
Not only did Magaro get the role of Douglas in the 2012 film, he was later cast as Young Silvio in Chase’s “The Soprano’s” prequel movie “That Many Saints of Newark.”
After getting the nod from Chase, Magaro won the approval of Celine Song (“Past Lives”), Kelly Reichardt (“First Cow”), Adam McKay (“The Big Short”), Todd Haynes (“Carol”), and others. In the conversation with IndieWire’s Chris O’Falt, Magaro acknowledged his career “momentum.” But he hasn’t forgotten about the struggles.
“There’s many times I’m thought about calling it quits. That time in particular I was looking at becoming a cab driver,” Magaro recalled. “That’s when cabs were still around in New York City, I guess now you’d be an Uber driver. But I was looking at how can I get taxi-cab training, and get a medallion and all that kind of stuff. Because I was like, I’m not making money [acting], this isn’t working.”
These days, it’s working and he’s making money. Just, you know, indie money.
Watch the full interview with Magaro above.
“Omaha,” written by Robert Machoian and directed by Cole Webley, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. It is seeking U.S. distribution.
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