Actors’ Equity Association is opening a new audition center this month as the union looks to expand its influence in Los Angeles.
Some members were worried its western presence could fold without a permanent brick-and-mortar presence (the union was previously leasing space near Hollywood and Highland). But with an eye toward expanding its membership roster and regional influence, the union recently bought a $5.2 million building in North Hollywood and poured $1.5 million into its renovation.
“We’re clearly in L.A. to stay,” said Steve DiPaola, Actors’ Equity’s assistant executive director for finance and administration. “We’re not going to be looking to close the Los Angeles office five years from now. This is an area we’re committed to.”
A recent tour of the sparkling new facility, which is located at 5636 Tujunga Avenue in North Hollywood, revealed soundproof rehearsal spaces, dressing rooms, and a 900-square-foot main studio complete with a sprung floor that can accommodate dance, singing, and spoken-word auditions. There’s also a roomy waiting and check-in area that comes with the audition space rental.
The plush space is meant to host auditions for Broadway touring productions, which the union has been working to get moved from New York to its regional centers in Chicago and Los Angeles. “This is an issue that we’re always talking to the producers about,” DiPaola said.
Asked if the audition center will help create Equity jobs in the city, DiPaola said it was part of a “multifront approach.
“It does help in order to try to get members from the West hired for shows that are touring and that will be passing through,” he said.
The first auditions could be held in the space in October.
Meanwhile, Equity will continue to monitor several audition centers around L.A., said DiPaola. “But the belief of the members is that when we run an audition center we have the greatest control over the quality of the audition experience, both for the members and for the casting personnel.
“We’ve run an audition center in New York for more than 30 years. We bought a building in Chicago five years ago and that was one of the goals there, to develop one, and it was one of the goals here.”
Equity looked at some 300 buildings before deciding on the North Hollywood location, which had previously held a movie poster production facility. “We needed parking, we needed a certain kind of construction,” he said.
The union also needed it to be close to its membership. “When we started this process we did an extensive map of where our members live and where our members look for work, and what we found was this was really centrally located to both,” he said.
The new building, which houses the union’s 22 regional staffers, will be officially unveiled at a grand opening Sept. 8. Officials hope it will be a milestone in the union’s more than eight-decade history in the region.
“This is part of a push to increase our profile here in the Western region, specifically in Los Angeles,” said DiPaola. “It’s no mystery that this is a film and television town. We want people to know that there’s good theater. We have 7,000 members here; it’s a theater town, too.”
Want to learn more? Check out “12 Things You Didn’t Know About Actors’ Equity Association.”