The Disney Story (based in reality but the conversations are fiction because it happened so long ago that I can't remember the exact words):

Once upon a time Carlyn Davis Casting was hired as part of a nationwide search for a Disney movie about gymnastics. Carlyn asked Meegs to lead the project. Meegs scoured the land looking for gymnasts who could act. Meegs interviewed girls from sunrise to sunset. Some were obnoxious, and some were nice, some were quality actors and some were quality gymnasts, and some should never have been allowed in the door, but not a single one was just right.

One day, Meeg's friend Twilla called her friend Maddy from college. Maddy was a schoolteacher in North Carolina with lots of roomates. When Maddy was younger she was an elite gymnast but in college her focus turned to acting. Twilla thought Maddy should meet Meegs, not only because she was a gymnast/actor, but also because she was a cool person. So Maddy drove for hours and hours to the magical land of Washington D.C. and the offices of Carlyn Davis Casting.

Meegs was very tired that day. Tired of dumb little girls who wanted to be famous. Tired of phone calls from stage moms saying she should meet all ten of her children because they were destined for stardom. Tired of threatening emails from psychos in Portugal who said they would kill themselves if Meegs did not tell them how to be movie stars. She was about to give up on her quest, when Maddy came in to the casting studio and began to read. The bleary eyed Meegs looked up from the mountain of headshots at the video screen and was amazed.

"Do that again." said Meegs with what was left of her voice. So Maddy put down her script, stood up and acted out the scene with the lines memorized. Meegs was speechless... Maddy's pantomime was so specific that when she mimed the telephone she pulled the little antenna out of the phone with her teeth.

"Who ARE you?" asked Meegs in wonder.

"I am Twilla's friend, Maddy" she replied.

"I love Twilla." said Meegs with a newfound energy. "Do you do improv?" Meegs asked, wondering where the awesome miming skills came from.

"Yes I do. Twilla told me that you do improv too and that you're moving to Chicago."

"Thinking about it..." said Meegs, remembering her plans, lack of money, and dissapointing letter from The Second City Conservatory. "I'm signed up for a summer class at Improv Olympic"

"Really?" Maddy asked, excitedly. "I've heard about them! I was thinking about doing that too!"

"Wow! You know... " but then Meegs was interrupted by a noise in the lobby. Peeking out she realised that the place was now packed. She had to speed things up.

"Damn. I wish Carlyn was here. She needs to see you. I know you live like 5 hours away, but if I can convince Carlyn to meet with you, would you be willing to come back?"

"Absolutely!" Maddy exclaimed, "It's no trouble at all, do you think I have a chance?"

"Well I'll be honest" Meegs replied sadly, "Sometimes I feel like these nationwide searches are just publicity stunts. I've heard of a few people getting cast this way, but it's a one in a million chance that the head casting people at Disney will even watch the tape we send them."

Meegs sighed - but then continued thoughtfully, "But... you were by far the best actress I have seen today... I don't want to get your hopes up... but let's videotape you doing all the scenes you practiced and I PROMISE that Carlyn will see this tape."

So the girls video taped many many scenes. The lobby overflowed with teenage wanna be stars. Finally Meegs walked Maddy to the door thanking her for coming all the way from NC. Maddy said, "No problem, it was fun... I'm definitely going to look into taking that summer class in Chicago!"

"That would be great!" Meegs said, "It would be so nice to have a friend in a new city."

"Maybe we could be roomates!" Maddy suggested, excitedly.

"Unless you get this movie part..." Meegs joked.

"Ha ha... yeah. Unless I become a movie star."

"Ok it's a deal then. If you don't become a movie star in the next few months, we are both moving to Chicago to study improv!"

"It's a deal!"

The new friends giggled about what a silly though that was and hugged goodbye. Maddy went back to her school to teach, and Meegs went back to the fame-hungry wolves.


The next day Meegs showed Carlyn what she had found. In her interviews with about 300 girls she only found around 10 that she wanted to see again. Her top two pics were Morgan, a former Olympic Gymnast, and her new friend Maddy. Carlyn was very excited about the Olympian, but they both worried that her acting ability needed a little work.

"Disney is going to love this!" Carlyn exclaimed. "If they did cast her they would hire an acting coach to work with her... but - Wow! - Meegs! We found an olympic gymnast!"

"Yeah! I was totally starstruck by her! ...but I want to show you one more girl, who is only one step below the olympic level. This is Twilla's boo, Maddy... " Meegs said as she forwarded the tape.

Carlyn watched... "Hmmm... she's cute but..."

Meeg's interrupted "I've decided that she's my boo, too"

(Perhaps an inside joke should be explained... when we first started working together casting extras for XXX2: State of the Union, Twilla and I built a friendly competition where we each had a favorite actor that we tried to get into the movie. We started referring to our top picks as "my boo." This carried on to other big projects. My boo's always do well.)

"Well she can definitely act... and she's cute. Do you think it's worth it for her to drive up here again so I can meet her?" Carlyn asked with a healthy dose of reality in her voice.

"I already asked her if she would and she said yes." Meegs replied.

Carlyn told Meegs a sad story about a casting long ago when she found THE perfect actor for a major film, but the tape never made it to the head casting director. It was found under the desk of a rival several months later. "I know Disney will be excited about the Olympics girl, but how can we get them to look at your boo?"

They thought and thought. Finally Meegs said, "Can we put her in front of the Olympics girl on the tape?"

"It's a DVD, they could skip... but we'll give it a try." Carlyn said. Meegs could almost see the wheels turning in Carlyn's head. "See if you can schedule them to come back at the same time. We'll tape them together."


Maddy did come back... again... and again... and was finally flown out to L.A. to meet the director. And they all lived happily ever after... but not in Chicago!