Scene 7

Scene 7. Audition^[1] is the seventh chapter of Act-Age manga series.

Summary

Chiyoko announces that Stars Agency's latest film "Death Island" will star 24 young actors, half of whom will be from Stars and the other half will be selected via auditions open to the general public. A month later, the third round of auditions gets underway at a Stars location with 500 people all with the chance to be selected. The auditions are hosted by Yukiji Tezuka, the director for Death Island, as he greets the participants one young man bursts out from next to Kei and yells loudly at Tezuka to thank him and say he looks forward to working with him. This is Takemitsu Karasuyama an eighteen-year-old from Okinawa. He says he is ready to be discovered and Tezuka wishes him the best.

Takemitsu notices Kei looking at him in confusion and asks what the matter is, to which she responds that she was merely surprised at his loudness. He explains it is just a habit of his and Kei says that must be rough for him but from behind her, another participant explains it is a way to make oneself stand out and increase their chances of being selected, albeit with some drawbacks. He continues and says if actors didn't stand out from the crowd at such large auditions they may never be able to show off their true acting skills. This participant is introduced as Masaki Minamoto, an actor and member of the Kano Office. Another member of the Kano Office pops up from behind him and cheerily tells Kei not to pay Masaki any mind, this is Akane Yushima. She notes that Kei is quite the beauty and is impressed that she'd made it this far in only her second audition.

The participants are all split up into groups of four to give their auditions together, with Kei being put in a group with Akane, Masaki, and Takemitsu. Most participants who are waiting pull out a black book and begin to read it. Kei asks Masaki if that is the book currently in vogue but he chastises her for not knowing that it is the novel the movie will be adapting. Takemitsu says he hasn't read it either and that they should be competing based on their acting skills and personalities. Masaki vehemently disagrees and says that adapting to the role is hard work and not reading the original work is careless negligence and offers to lend his copy of Death Island to Kei to read. However, Takemitsu interjects and pushes the book back to Masaki, saying it will influence Kei's acting. The two of them begin arguing with Kei sitting perplexed in the middle until Akane pulls Masaki back and says that if they were needed for the work then they would pass and that's all there was to be an actor. Kei then says with a resolve that as long as she knows herself she can play any role and that's the only way she knew how to act. She declines the Death Island novel and returns it to a slightly crestfallen Masaki, though Takemitsu looks at her with interest at what she had said.

The group is called in for their audition and on their way over Akane gives Kei an overview of Death Island's plot as a gift for being in the same group. She tells her that it is a story about twenty-four students who are stranded on an island and fight each other to be the last one standing. Kei says she has never been stranded on a deserted island before and is excited to get a chance to act it out.

Chapter Notes

• Stars hold public auditions for the other half of the Death Island cast.
• We are introduced to Takemitsu Karasuyama, Masaki Minamoto, and Akane Yushima.

Characters in This Chapter

Trivia

References