SETC Audition first-timer

SETC Professional Auditions: March 2026

I’ve never done an audition conference before. I think I submitted one time in grad school to Straw Hats. This was 1) (duh) when Straw Hats still existed (circa 2008) and 2) before pre-screen videos were a thing. You just submitted (re: MAILED IN!) a headshot and resume and maybe a cover letter (I don’t remember but that sounds right).

I got rejected from Straw Hats. Which made sense. My resume was maybe two lines long and both were high school credits. Not a huge indicator that I was professionally cast-able.

So 2026, I was eager to experience this type of audition opportunity in 2026, as both an actor and an educator.

As an actor, I’m in “starting over” mode. I have been since I finished my doctorate and went to my first audition in four years last year. I have no agent and no contacts come to mind to get my foot in the door outside of my local professional theatre region. An audition conference seemed like a good way to be seen by a ton of companies at once. Turns out, yes, they are - but with drawbacks, which I’ll get into in a bit.

As an educator, even if I had had an audition conference experience back in the early 2000s when I was first entering the world of professional acting, it would have been too long ago to be relevant for my current students to benefit from. I want to know and understand the current industry practices and audition opportunities for actors so I can pass that information on to current and future students.

Tips for SETC Audition Conference

1) Be ready to submit in September

2) Read and follow prescreen requirements carefully

3) Budget for the submission fee ($40), actual conference fee ($350 – yeesh), airfare ($350), food, and hotel ($460)

4) Expect a sterile audition experience

5) Temper your callback expectations

6) Take advantage of the great workshops you’re already paying for (Again...$350 – yeesh!)

1) Be ready to submit in September

I knew of three conferences when I applied for acceptance last fall: A1s, SETC, and UPTAs. When it occurred to me to hop on to websites and apply, I made the deadlines for A1 and SETC but had already missed UPTA. So start looking online for submission requirements in August and have your materials ready in September, just to be safe.

2) Read and follow prescreen requirements carefully

SETC was the most stringent out of the two I submitted for. I was accepted, but warned that in the future, I need to record my whole 60 second audition package in one take, rather than editing together separate videos between my slate, monologue and song. I’d imagine it’s because they are so strict about your audition time at the actual audition and want to make sure you are prepared to get through your package on time, including the time it takes you to say your name and audition number.

For SETC, you can submit a variety of options: one 60 second monologue; one 60 second song; two monologues that add up to 60 seconds; two songs that add up to 60 seconds; or one song and one monologue that add up to 60 seconds.

For A1, you submit separately if you are a singer who also wants to be considered for the actor-only auditions, and you get 90 seconds for your package. I submitted a package of two song cuts adding up to 90 seconds and a second video of two monologues adding up to 90 seconds. I got accepted for the singer audition but not the acting audition (ouch). A1 also offers a bit of grace time at the live audition if your package goes over – SETC does not. (Now...I did not actually end up attending A1s, even though I flew out to New York with that intention. But that’s a harrowing tale about travel sometimes wreaking havoc during perimenopause for another time.)

(I didn't keep a copy of my submission to SETC but here is my submission to A1, which is similiar)

3) Budget for the submission fee ($40), actual conference fee ($350), airfare ($350), food, and hotel ($460)

Yep. That’s a lot of money. Even for a 40-something college lecturer with great budgeting habits. A1 was cheaper. Similar submission fee, but the conference fee was half the cost of SETC, the flight about the same price, and lodging free because I stayed at a friend’s apartment in the city, just a hour train ride from the audition conference. But since I didn’t actually get to attend the audition, I can’t weigh in on if the smaller price tag is a better deal than SETC. For sure, the other conference elements of SETC are enormous: play festivals, college auditions, workshops, job fairs, and networking opportunities in spades. But I don't know if I'd say it was worth it.

4) Expect a sterile audition experience

Auditioning is an absurdly-specific vacuum of an experience and slightly different every time. In a regular audition, you are seeing one company and you will most likely at least trade common pleasantries when you enter the room (at the very least: “Hi!” “Hello!”). You will most likely at least hear, “Thank you,” when you finish your audition. Take all of that away for your SETC audition. Put yourself in a giant hotel conference room with rows and rows of tables that company representatives are scattered amongst. You are a cog in a wheel. You have exactly 60 seconds to make your own and you will likely receive zero feedback from the room that affirms if you have accomplished this. You are one of 50 people they will see each hour, all of you in the room for the entire hour watching one another and waiting for their turn. You are one of 250 people they will see that day, and 700 they will see over the three days of auditions. Imagine you are behind one of those tables watching 700 auditions, one after the other. It would put the most experienced industry person in an auditor coma.

I naively expected my many years of audition experience to transfer seamlessly to this environment. They did not. My monologue was dramatic and my song was comedic, so I decided to end with my fun song. My monologue had built in pockets of me listening and reacting to my "other," which ended up just meaning I had pockets of time to be aware of how sterile the room was, which got into my head. When the pianist started my song (which I’ve sung in auditions multiple times), I couldn’t find my key. (What??!!) I have three degrees in music, almost 20 years of teaching voice, and another 15 years of successfully finding my key in auditions, and I couldn’t find my key. That’s how distracted I was by sterile the room. I found the key within a few measures, and I was still able to show I know how to act and sing, but there was no denying in the room that I was thrown. It surely cost me some callbacks. And on that note...

5) Temper your callback expectations

I had heard from a few students who had done one of the three big audition conferences before, and the general consensus was that each students maybe received one in-person callback, but most were just asked to drop off their headshot and resume with the company later. At SETC, three callbacks were possible: 1) leave your headshot/resume at their booth in the job fair; 2) attend the mass dance call that evening; 3) schedule a time to meet with the company one on one later that day to either chat or actually read/sing sides. My understanding is that the third option is the least common. The companies just don’t have time or capacity to facilitate an actual callback (re: 700 auditions in three days). You are told to start watching your online messages for callback invites as soon as your group of 50 leave the audition room, and to continue watching the rest of the day. There is a strict rule that companies can only call you back the day of your actual audition, so once your audition day ends, that’s it for you. I was one of two auditioners past college age in my group, and I am a fairly seasoned performer and auditioner, so even with the bumps in my audition package, I expected it to be a long day with lots of callbacks, including attending the dance call.

Uh...It was not.

I got two requests to leave my headshot and resume and no requests to attend the dance call. I came to find out later than one of the companies only called me back because I had color guard listed as a special skill and they needed someone for a Six Flags show they produced. When I looked up the other company (which is several states away from my listed home residence), I saw that they don’t provide housing for their actors, so I’m not even sure why they wasted time and money to be at the conference/call back folks from out of town. I took myself out to lunch to nurse my hurt pride and regroup.

I walked past the older gentleman who was the other older-than-college-age auditioner in my group later that day. He was probably in his 60s and had a decent "older gentleman" audition package. He got laughs on his monologue and had just enough warble in his song to be charming and not questionable (and managed to sing the whole thing in key which is more than I can say for myself). I stopped and asked him how his auditions had gone. I was surprised to find out it was essentially the same as me! He got one headshot request and one actual face to face callback. That was it.

That’s when it occurred to me that what I’d seen as an asset for myself – not being one of the hundreds of college age actors – was actually overrated. If I had to guess, most of the companies are mostly looking for youthful actors (that are cheaper on the pocketbook), and already have their own home stables of older actors.

6) Take advantage of the great workshops you’re already paying for

I went to a fantastic film/TV workshop with the Michael Howard studio in New York, which inspired me to enroll in a one week intensive with a film acting studio near my home. And I went to a workshop on producing new works, which was timely because I’d just directed a table read of a musical by brother had co-written, and was in the process of becoming a producer on it. I also went to some dud workshops that were more interesting on paper than in reality, but those two were truly valuable, and while not necessarily worth the cost of admission, softened the blow of how much money I’d sunk into the conference.

My Experience

On the first morning of the conference, all auditionees are asked to attend a half hour info meeting in the same room that they will be auditioning in. It’s a large room with rows and rows of tables for the professional companies to sit at. In Chattanooga, there were two entrances. One was guarded, bouncer-style, to prevent auditionees from entering before they were invited to do so. Companies could and were already entering to get settled for their (very long) day.

8:15AM

Waiting for the pre-audition info session to start, I opted to go linger by the far door, which was unmanned, which I took advantage of. I slipped in and took a seat at the table nearest the door. I’m sure I would have been asked to leave, except for the fact that I’m forty and looked more like a company rep than a college student.

8:30AM

Just after 8:30, auditionees were invited in and shepherded to the front of the room to stand gathered like sardines around the stage, in front of the tables. A small group of student volunteers introduced themselves as stage managers and dance captains for the auditions and then gave us the rundown:

- You get 60 seconds. If you go over, you will hear “thank you” from the time monitor. You must stop immediately. If you are singing at the time, the accompanist will stop playing.

- Start and end your audition with your name and number. When you say your name and number at the end, that doesn’t count as part of your time. (Gotta say, I was a little surprised to not witness any bold souls try and milk that into a loophole but I’d put money on it happening at some point during the conference. Your telling me no one has taken advatange of not being timed at the end when they re-slate by belting their final slate? Saying it while they do the splits or a jump or a flip? In a cool accent?)

- Be at the holding room one hour before your audition slot. You will sit in numerical order in the holding room and follow those lines into the audition room, where you will sit in numerical order again.

- You will be given a marathon race-type number that you will pin where it can easily be seen during your audition, and again in the dance call, if you are asked to attend

- There are two on-deck chairs, one in front of the other, next to the pianist. If you are next, you move to the front chair; if you are second to next, move to the back chair. Hold your sheet music open to your cut so that whenever the pianist has a spare moment, they can glance at your music.

- Do not speak to the pianist unless spoken to, so that they can keep their attention where it needs to be at any given moment.

- If you are doing your monologue first, write the last line of it at the top of your cut so that the pianist knows when to start playing.

- Walk up the stairs to the portable stage when it’s your turn to audition. Walk down the ramp next to the stairs when you finish your audition. That way, there are no traffic jams with auditioners coming and going.

- There is a chair on stage if you want to use it, but it’s your responsibility to put it back before you leave stage. (And make sure you place the chair where you want it before you slate so that the time it takes you to set up the chair doesn’t count against you!)

- They encourage you to do exactly what you submitted for your prescreen package, which I did.

- There are two sessions per day for learning the dance, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Morning auditioners should attend the afternoon session, and afternoon auditioners should attend the morning session. You can only attend one session. This likely means that the morning sessions are more full than the afternoon, because afternoon auditioners have to take a guess and assume that they will be asked to attend the dance call, whereas morning auditioners know for certain if they have been asked to attend.

- If you are called for the dance, there will be a choreo review one hour before the dance call that evening.

- You will only receive callback messages the day of your audition, and you are only eligible to schedule your callbacks for the same day as your audition.

- Each callback will be a separate online message (received through the Acceptd platform, as well as via email). Refresh pages often to make sure you don’t miss messages.

9AM

Thank God, I was assigned a time in the very first audition slot of the conference! Number Ten in the 9:30AM Thursday audition hour - I was thankful to get it over and done. The 9:30AM audition group was walked directly over to the holding room from the info session. We were asked to refrain from sitting in the chairs until they called our name, in order of our audition numbers, so that they could seat us in that order. Once we were all seated and pinned into our number bibs, we were free to chat with the reserve pianist sitting at the front of the room. This would not be the pianist actually playing our audition, so the only benefit was to double check your audition cut. I didn’t take advantage of this, but, looking back, I wish I would have. We were also free to head next door to the warmup room, which was open all day to auditioners and was the only place folks were allowed to warmup and run through their song (unless they had scheduled a coaching session). This was to prevent folks from singing in all sorts of invasive nooks and crannies around the convention center. I went over and found an empty sliver of wall to face and did my best to tune out 50+ other singers while I ran through my cut.

9:15AM

We were told to be back at 9:15AM and not a minutes later. 9:30AM group had a slight disadvantage in this regard, with less time to run to the restroom, get water, check with the holding room pianist, or run something in the warmup room. I didn’t mind at all - I was glad to get it all over with.

9:25AM

We were walked over, like numerically-ordered ducks in a row to the audition room and sat in another row of chairs, off to the side of the stage and auditor tables. As number 10, I got up when number 7 was on the stage auditioning and sat in the secondary seat to the side of the accompanist. If he had time (ie: the person on stage was doing their monologue), he’d quickly look over the sheet music, first of the person in the primary seat, then the person in the secondary seat.

Roughly 9:40AM

I auditioned (see "Expect a sterile audition experience" section above for that experience).

Roughly 9:41AM

I sat back down and watched 40 more auditions.

Roughly 10:25AM

We were free to leave the room and disperse. I went straight back to my hotel room next door and got on my laptop to prepare for the absolute inundation of callback messages I was SURE I was going to have to wade through. ;)

By 12PM

I realized I wasn’t likely to be called for the dance call or one on one callbacks at this point. I took myself to lunch, still refreshing my messages just in case, and then headed back to the convention center to drop off my headshot with the whopping two companies who had sent messages asking me for them.

What would I do differently?

- Take advantage of the free audition coachings. They have them throughout the conference, beginning the night before the first day. I figured, this is far from my first rodeo, I know what I’m doing, and I figured wrong! This was a unique machine inside the already-peculiar machine that auditioning is. I wasn’t prepared for that. You should sign up for these coachings in advance of the conference, as soon as SETC emails the link. These spots will fill up.

- I would start with my song, not my monologue. I’m a good actor but I’m still a singer first. I should have led with that strength. My reasoning was that my monologue was serious and my song was fun ("Never Fall in Love With an Elf") and I wanted to end on a fun note; but looking back, I wish I had started on a fun note. I think it would have given me better momentum and hooked the room from the jump. Also, I severely cut down my monologue to make sure I didn’t get cut off during my song. Had I led with the song, I would have gone with my monologue and let the time monitor cut me off, which would have fit the storytelling anyway and probably allowed me to add a couple of lines.

- I would re-cut my sheet music so that the accompanist leads me in by a measure instead of only getting my starting note and leading us in. In a room that sterile and assembly-line like, I would have been better off allowing a few of my 60 seconds to go toward getting the key firmly in my ear before I had to sing.

- I would have chosen a different monologue with more words and less listening and reacting. In that setting, with only 60 seconds to establish what you can offer, a picture is not worth a thousand words!

- I would have dug a little deeper into my hotel search to make sure that my cool-looking hotel was actually cool and not a re-named Days Inn, lipstick-on-a-pig situation. But whatever, they left me a Moon Pie and RC Cola (Chattanooga is the birthplace of both), so I forgive them for pulling that fast one on me.

My next steps plans.

-  SETC does also have a fall audition conference for professional actors, which I also applied to and was accepted for, but I ended up having a conflict because of a show I was cast in. I’d like to attend this one in the future and see how the experience compares (it’s on a smaller scale, but that also means less companies show up, I think).

-  Resubmit for A1s (held in northern CT in January)

-  Submit for UPTAs

-  Start a budget now, because even if I’m at a university teaching next year, my travel fund will likely only cover one of those conferences!