Auditions for
Class Act 2 started in da Mudda City this weekend - the initial auditions were on Saturday (5th) and the callbacks on Sunday.
I hotfooted through to the callbacks for us to see what was going on, chatted to hopefuls and amongst them was:
* Chase Downs *
As he visualises himself in his first movie poster.
As soon as he mentioned his name I was like: "Ha! Is it real??" - it sounds so poster perfect it seemed impossible.
Turns out it is. Because he changed it, legally.
Up until 16 he was Chad Downs. He decided that he wanted to be an actor, thought there were too many people called Chad in the world so he went through the whole rigmaroll of having it changed and he's been Chase ever since - for the past six years.
I was tickled by the story, most espesh for two reasons:
1) The name itself. There's something about it being a movie poster before a name that's cool.
2) I've known two people who legally changed their names. Suddenly, out of the blue, they announced that they were someone else.
They didn't do it for an acting career but rather because they felt that their parents named them incorrectly. The changes were radical like from Melanie to River.
Once they'd done it though they hit a problem: people who knew them before kept calling them their original names, finding it bizarre to call them River natch.
The trouble was, they felt their new names were more suited to their personality so when people referred to their previous names they got irritated. Feeling they weren't being accepted for who they were.
I asked Chase about it ...
Tashi: Do you feel changing your name changed you as a person?
Chase: Definitely, I definitely do. Chase is this sort of movie star character that Chad created. I have this kind of duality where Chad's a shy, sensitive guy and Chase is the one that goes out into the world.