I got one of the best phone calls of my life today. I’ll explain.

Today I was offered a contract with the Nebraska Shakespeare Festival! This may not sound like a big deal (Nebraska, who cares, it’s just a festival). But! It’s a huge deal for an actor to get work, especially well-paying work in his hometown that also gets him EMC points!

EMC stands for Equity Membership Candidate, which is a very good thing. Once you get 50, you become Equity, which means employers have to follow certain rulesets for rehearsing, paying, and employing you in general. Also, you get precedence on auditions in New York, as opposed to waiting in line for hours on end. However, you can reap a lot of benefits just by having points at all. EMC people still get a certain degree of precedence for auditions, and have some other perks as well. It’s a nice thing, and I really wanted it before auditions for summer stock shows second semester of next year.

I want to give a special shout-out to Scott Plate, who helped me prepare for this audition like crazy, came up with the idea for me to go do it, and supported me throughout! And to Anna Maria for increasing my dance ability for that dance call… I owe a lot to the one and a half semesters I have here already, and it just makes me so excited to see where I’ll be in 4 years!