Originally Posted by LaurieMarlow:
“It's not preferential treatment so much as astute business sense. Because she's been on the show Lauren will get bums on seats in a way that an unknown couldn't hope to. It just shows what the programme can do for a career - prior to SOTR there is no way Lauren would have been seen for Sandy. (Or even if she had a pushy agent and was seen, there is no way she could hope to get the part).
For those already in the business, winning the show is completely immaterial. Careers are transformed by getting to the live shows. Look at Daniel Boys and Rachel Tucker - both extremely talented, but were very far from establishing themselves as stars. Post show they were offered parts that would never have come their way if they hadn't had the exposure.”
I think it helps get them in to the running but many of the girls ended up in roles they had some particular quality for and in those niches they seem very good candidates anyway. There doesn't seem to be many people who can play Roxie around or they would have a lot more new Roxies instead of tried and trusted ones - they seem to find it easier to find new UK Velmas. Rachel did a belting role and the spoof of Wicked after IDA and clearly was made to play the role she now has. You can look at Siobhan and Sam and see why they would get Grease or Eponine (in both cases you want someone with a distinctive strong vocal in the right age bracket) Niamh as Fleck makes perfect visual and vocal sense. There's been some imaginative casting that has worked well too - Siobhan as Sally and Jessie as Anne are not obvious. Lauren doesn't look that obvious for Sandy's character to me but I suspect she will do a Siobhan and become it too and she's going to nail the vocal which is why I would go and see Grease anyway.
The problem area is when they start casting people for roles they can't act to get the name (and there may be more casting to sing rather than act going on too) I would be very annoyed if I had spent 3- 4 years training and ended up watching someone from TV take the roles I could sing and act better. There's a couple of shows now I would love to see but am avoiding because they have cast a popular name who I would pay to avoid. Thats only one bit of the problem though as some people seem to get some jobs anyway regardless of whether there's other people who could play it better from ALW shows or anywhere else.
It all seems a rather random business - in one sense it would be better if they auditioned lots of possibles with a level playing field. In another I think they would do better than they do if they knew and understood and deployed a few known people better . It seems today there may be a closing the show vacancy for Nancy in Oliver - should it go to someone who survives an audition process, a big name or someone we saw on the ALW show who from what we saw will do it about as well as it can be done? I can think of two straight off .
