Interview

Be prepared. They don’t come around like this too often.

Be yourself, but don’t bore them with the minute inner workings of your ENTP/Taurus Sun/Scorpio Moon/Leo Rising mind. Don’t mention astrology. Or Freud. They’ll think you're a tarot card nut. Mention Jung only if the opportunity organically presents itself.

Don’t overly rehearse what you’re going to say in the mirror. They’ll think you’re Ted Bundy. Don’t drink more than one cup of coffee or you’ll be distracted by your jittery legs and semi-concerning heart palpitations… maybe lay off the coffee altogether.

Leave the backpack at home. It doesn’t scream ‘I cook well rounded meals for myself every evening and look down on adults who still eat toasted potato waffles with ketchup for dinner’. You are an adult now. You certainly don’t eat potato waffles for dinner thrice weekly anymore.

Your notebook and pen can be left home alone for the day. You can take notes on your phone if inspiration strikes. Map the bus route in advance- way in advance- because you’re guaranteed to get lost and flustered and then you’ll arrive sweaty and stressed and they’ll think you’re an unholy, untrustworthy mess before you’ve even opened your mouth. 

Arrive ten minutes early. Run through the names of the former company CEOs in your head again and try to forget that you’ve calculated the percentage who’ve left their wives for younger blondes (73%) and certainly don’t mention the percentage who look like Warren Buffett and Michael Bloomberg (100%).

When you enter the room, wait until someone on the panel makes a move to shake your hand. Don’t instigate it. You may be a boss, but you’re a beta here. When you take a seat, tuck your tailbone in and pull your shoulders back and down. Level with them, but not too much.

Breathe.

Anchor to something pleasant in the room. A cheery houseplant perhaps, or the sturdy-looking blue mug on the panelists’ table in front of you. Hold the smile in your eyes even after your initial introductory grin has waned. Be quietly charming. Tell them about your fulfilling experience at university, about how keen you are to rise to the top of the cream of the capitalist crop after an in-depth education in all-things-smarketing.

Wax lyrical about business analytics and stock market predictions. Talk about where you see yourself in ten years. Project yourself into their lives as the fresh faced graduate they never knew they needed to turn this company around. Be the version of themselves they wish they’d been at your age.

Don’t mention your university’s drama society, where you spent double the amount of time you spent taking notes in lectures. Don’t tell them you tried to switch your degree to creative writing, that your parents threatened to cut you off if you did. Instead, tell them about your sheer self-determination and dogged perseverance to see projects through until the end. Be the sturdy blue mug, the stable presence in the room they can always rely on to get IT done.

Omit the fact you spend all your disposable income on attending plays, or that you have zero interest in Friday night team drinks. Instead, ramble a bit about how you’ve been known to be a dark horse on the golf course and catch the roundest, palest male panelist’s eye with a knowing wink.

Don’t tell them that sitting in a dark auditorium is the only place you’ve ever been able to cry freely. Or about the lump you felt catching in your throat when writing the closing scene of your first play. Express how eager you are to ascend the rungs of their corporate ladder, but don’t let them in on how much more invested you are in observing your characters progress in life than in witnessing your own mundane existence unfold.

Try not to think too much about the other interview, the one you’re missing.

Your play was good, they said, good enough to make the shortlist. Push down the memory of the deafening silence that met your ears when you told your mother over the phone. Writing plays isn’t a valid livelihood, darling, especially not for men. You’ve come so far, don’t squander all we’ve done for you now.

Breath.

House plant. Blue mug. Lump in your throat.

Think about the kindly worded email you received from the theatre’s artistic director; the writing software you taught yourself to use when you should have been neck-deep in final year exam prep; the blood you felt pumping behind your eyes while reading over your final draft. Project yourself into the packed auditorium of your first opening night.

Sold out.

The red velvet seats, the perfume hanging in the stuffy air.

Two actors emerge.

A young man behind you sobs quietly as the lights fade out.

Silence.

Applause.

When you prematurely stand and the panelists look perplexed, smile politely. Shake their hands if you feel like it, or don’t. You’ll never see them again so who cares if they think you’re stepping out of your lane?

Stepping out of your lane is what you do best.

Don’t waste any more breath telling them about yourself. Thank them for their time, reach forward to sip the last of the tea from the blue mug, and run.

If you catch the next bus, you’ll be ten minutes early.