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[0:00] Charlie Murphy: Hello, hello, and happy August. Welcome to the end of the summer break series of Mapping The College Audition. I'm still Charlie Murphy, director of MTCA. That's Musical Theatre College Auditions. Check us out at mtca.com. And this is it, our last of these pre-recorded intros and RE-AIRs, recorded blogs, all those things. I hope you enjoyed the bonus content, but I know you are all thirsting to get back to our brand new regularly scheduled programming, of which we have some very exciting stuff that is coming up next week. I hope you all had a blast at our Summer Faculty Masterclass week as you're listening to this, which it has not yet happened as I record this, but will have just wrapped as you are listening.

You'll have had a chance to meet last week's guest, Ali Lewis-Borsgi, short of some disaster befalling him or us that week, as well as some of the castmates of this upcoming MTCA Alumni guest, Emma Flynn, as part of our Broadway Q&A panel that we just did. I will say this was a really fun Wicked 2026 for MTCA, where we've had four different MTCA alum representing just the witches in Wicked, with Talia, who's a previous podcast guest, jumping on for a bit earlier in the year, Aluchi, who covers Elphaba, hopefully you met at that Broadway Q&A, Celia, who's both an MTCA alum and former MTCA coach, and then Emma, who you're about to hear. That's two Glindas, two Elphabas, all in 2026, as they would say in Oz.

How thrillifying. I do hope you enjoy this interview with Emma, who I think is really delightful. Before we toss it to the interview, I'm actually going to toss it to myself through a bit of a topper that I added after we recorded. So I added a few months after we recorded this little topper, which does spoil the fact that she's going to be in Wicked, which of course is spoiled for you all already, and talks about the terrible audition story that she's going to tell later in the episode, which is of course about that very Wicked audition that ends up booking her Broadway debut. I'm going to let my past self break it down for you a little bit, but first enjoy me, then enjoy Emma, and we'll be back next week with some new episodes.

[2:19] Charlie Murphy: Hello, it's Charlie from the future, which is now the past. I'm recording this little intro as an episode topper, even though maybe it should have been an insert into the episode, or maybe even an ending, because what I'm about to say is of course a giant spoiler. If you're listening to this episode, you may already know that Emma recently announced her Broadway debut coming up soon in Wicked as Glinda, and I'll bet if I didn't say anything in this topper, you would wonder when she tells an audition story that she's about to tell in this episode, if it is in fact that audition. So I wanted to confirm for you all that it is in fact that audition. I reached out to Emma after the episode, emailed her, and she said, yes, that is in fact the audition, with a lot of exclamation points and funny emojis.

That may spoil some of the fun of this reveal, so I'm sorry for spoiling it for you, but I think it will help you in hearing the interview itself. Emma's going to tell you a story about having the worst audition ever, how this was a really bad audition, no, no, a seriously, actually, not like joking, a really bad audition, and then we're going to talk about it in the truth of that context, which is what she was experiencing that day. And that's not to dismiss the experience of having really bad auditions, which of course does happen, and some people really do bomb in auditions, obviously that couldn't happen, but just to introduce the idea that even as professionals, and Emma is certainly a professional at this point, we're not always the best judges of our own experience.

Emma is judging that audition against her years of expectation, probably since she was 15, 16, 17 herself, of how she would do in a Glinda audition if it ever came, and how she might have that day felt like she came up short of that expectation. But obviously these auditors were able to see through that, see through what might not have been her absolute best that she possibly can do, but also see how perfect Emma is as Glinda, which of course she will be, and I can't wait to root her on. And I say all that for our young listeners, whether you're still in college, right out of college, with their early professional auditions when you have those, and even our high school auditionees too who are hearing this, who I think always spend way too much time trying to parse out the meaning of their post-audition experiences.

If you're listening to this right after I happen to be recording this, you may have just finished Unifieds, and a huge part of what you will say made an audition good or bad will be about some pretty irrelevant stuff that might be said to you behind the table, right? Which when you're talking about scheduled auditions with schools, meaning non-walk-in auditions, these are scheduled auditions that you've applied in advance, the difference between what is said or not said behind the table will normally have much more to do with how a school chooses to conduct auditions than how well or badly you actually did, right? And also, I think it's worth adding in what we can learn from Emma here, that adding in the weight of stakes and expectations, if this is a huge audition for you, if this is a dream school, that that might color your experience of how you did, which it likely does for Emma here.

So again, as you listen on to what I think is a really great interview and a beautifully vulnerable experience that Emma shares, I just want to give you that little flash-forward that a TV show sometimes does, so that you know the ending as you're experiencing the episode. Let that fact, let that truth wash over you, as you also hear the emotional truth and the reality of what she's saying, with you now knowing what you know. And maybe for yourself, just think about the ways that we do this to ourselves as artists all the time. I hope you enjoy.

[5:44] Charlie Murphy: Well, we are so excited to be joined by Emma Flynn Bespolka, formerly known as Emma Flynn when she was an MTCA student. And we are so excited to do another one of our MTCA alumni interviews. I'm excited to take you through the gauntlet. But first, I will just say, Emma has a BFA from the Hart School, and most recently played Cher in Clueless on the West End. So we're going to talk all about, this is our first American guest who has worked internationally in the way that you're going to do it, so we're going to talk about some international stuff. But before we all do all that, how are you doing, Emma? Welcome on the pod.

[6:05] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Gosh, I'm good. Thank you so much for having me. I'm really excited to talk. I had a plan for what we're going to talk about, but then you came on this call and said that you just had a terrible audition. So we're definitely going to talk about that, too. I'm really going to make you relive it. I was like, I want the deep emotional breakdown on the pod. That will be our first of those, too. So it's exciting to be doing it first.

[6:36] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Oh, yeah. I'm down to emotionally break down. That's my forte.

[6:41] Charlie Murphy: A great skill as an actor to have. But before we do all that, take me through, I want to take our listeners especially through a little bit of your own audition gauntlet in terms of your college audition experiences. You're now joining the ranks of so exciting how many MTCA alum we've had on the pod. We've had Helen Chen and Talia Soskauer and Ali-Louise Borgi and all these amazing. We just had Molly Griggs. We just played two weeks before you, I think, if this timing is right. But it's always fun for us to go through the process and hear about some of the different processes, especially I feel like some of our more veteran guests, our older guests, it was such a different process for them 30 years ago.

And for you, you're going to feel that way from 10 years ago, but it's still not too long. But before I take you through the 10 years ago time, give me a little bit of like a catch up on you in terms of where you've come from in the world. Catch me up to you at around 16, 17 years old as you started thinking about the college process. What do I need to know about you up till that point?

[7:30] Emma Flynn Bespolka: So I was, yeah, I was about actually I just turned 18 when I did my in-person audition. So I was 17 when I was doing my self tapes and like thinking about auditioning. And I lived in Bedford, New Hampshire with my family and I was one of nine children.

[7:47] Charlie Murphy: Oh my God. I didn't remember that. Nine children.

[7:49] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Yes. One of nine children. I was the third. So I was, I was in the older side of the kids. And so I had still lots of children at home. There was still like, I think there was still seven of us at home at the time. And so lots going on. My parents were very busy obviously, but they still made time for my auditions, which is crazy. And I think I was kind of at first thinking about doing nursing school as well. So I was applying to nursing schools at the same time. And spoiler alert, I got into all my nursing programs and I only got into one musical theater program. So that puts in perspective too. And yeah, I was deeply insecure. I was like a 17 year old. Um, I didn't, I wasn't actually, this is what's funny.

Like I think some people go into this fully confident that they are going to make it. I think I went into this loving the art, but had zero confidence that I was actually good at it. I was just kind of like, let me go to school and like see. Um, but that informed, I think a lot of the outcome of my college audition program, because I think that, that I was like that deep insecurity is something that, uh, because I didn't have that like belief in myself yet as a human being, like all of the different things that you have to do when you are auditioning, which is a lot of like putting yourself out there. Obviously, a lot of our listeners are going to relate to that. That's why I want you to tell this terrible audition story, which I'm sorry to make you relive, but I do think a lot of our listeners are going to relate to that idea of going.

It is a real battle with their insecurity. You know, we've, we've added much more in terms from MPCA perspective, we've added more like wellness coaching and more, more psychological prep, even independent of the wellness coaching, just in the, the coaching itself, we realized it's a bigger and bigger part of what the battle that young people are going through is like, is their self belief and is the confidence to walk in the room and all those kinds of things is a, it's a huge part of it. But wait, we're getting ahead. I want to do a little bit. I have to pause and talk a little bit about your parents. So how did your parents, I'm sure we have some parent listeners going doing this process with seven other kids at home.

Oh my God. Or seven kids at home. So how did they navigate this? Were you mostly doing it on your own and them giving you a little help? Were someone helping you navigate and be stage managing this process? I mean, I don't think my mother was really helpful. Like, I don't think I had the same experience as other people. Like, I think when I look back on it, that's why my parents put me in MPCA because they didn't have the bandwidth to be like at everything all the time. Always. They're not showing up to every parent meeting and every, there's no way they tried their best. And like my mom especially was like really present with me through the whole process. Like she was, every time someone is going through like the college process, like she's very present.

Cause she knows that it's going to take up a lot of, and my mom always says like, teenagers need you more than like younger children. Like a lot of times because they're going through like so many more things and they're just taking on so many responsibilities. So I have a four year old. You can't tell me that she's going to need me more when she's 17. The amount that she needs us now is overwhelming. Yes, I know. Right. But it'll be in a different way. And like, I think cause yeah, it's like children need you in different ways at all points in their life. But I really like appreciate it now looking back, like my mom had so much going on and she still came with me to like Chicago Unifieds. But that's why I think my mom has always been like a really big, she's always been just like a very intellectual person.

And she, she was a doctor before she stayed home. And so she cares a lot about education and she wanted to figure out for each child, you know, like what the best educational route was. And I think like, that's why she wanted MTCA or some sort of college prep program because she knew how difficult the audition process was just from hearing about it. And she was also just very good at like, like being on Facebook and like, like witnessing the other moms and like kind of figuring out how people are doing it. Because at the time, my, both my parents are in medicine and both my brothers went into like scientific degrees and I didn't have any friends who had done it. I didn't have any community members who had really done it.

So it was really like, I was coming in with zero knowledge and my parents were coming in with zero knowledge. So for us, that's kind of why they took advantage of a college prep program, because even though, you know, it's kind of an investment, it, it was like, if you are a person who like doesn't have any experience or people around you, like a village around you, like that is the village you have to kind of invest in one. Totally. How much, I already heard some mentions of Chicago Unified. How much do you remember the details of the process? Do you remember like which auditions you did on campus? Do you remember about how many schools you did? You know, talk to me about what, what do you remember? You did mention self-tapes, which I guess you would have been at the beginning of what we called pre-screens or we still call it pre-screens. It was the first year.

[12:42] Charlie Murphy: Going through the pre-screen process and then through an audition process, what sticks out? What sticks in your mind?

[12:45] Emma Flynn Bespolka: I remember almost everything. I didn't do that many in-person auditions because I was so limited by my resources with my family and stuff. I did mostly unified. I did audition for two programs on the campus, Hart and Pace because I was going so close to Hart. Then around the time my audition was for Pace, I think I was going there anyways. I was going to unified already or something else. I think I was coming in and out of New York so much that it didn't feel like that much of a thing. I think I might have come by myself. I think my mom came to every single audition. I know she went to Hart, but I think there were things that I got on the train and I went by myself, which is so crazy to think about now because I was so little.

I was 17, 18 years old. I was so green. I still feel green. When I was auditioning via self-tape, I remember I used a bed sheet and I taped it to the wall. My dad went and got lights from Lowe's and we put the camera up on a stool with a bunch of things piled on top of it so that the camera would be facing me. I recorded those self-tapes a million times. I still do this. All that sounds the same as now, except maybe the lights from Lowe's now people are going to have a ring light or whatever. Sure, that sounds pretty similar. I haven't learned a thing. No, I'm just kidding. Honestly, the process is still grueling. I think what I learned now looking back is that was a really good sort of window into the professional world of acting, which is mostly unemployment and auditioning.

That's the work of it, but I digress. I remember so much about auditioning. Oh, I auditioned at Juilliard as well. I went in person on campus. Oh, wait. No, not on campus. That was at UChicago University. Do you remember the number? I mean, especially because people heard, oh my gosh, one school. You got into it. Luckily, it was a great school, but I think the fear was, oh God, one school means you're only one away from zero. Do you remember how many you ended up actually applying to?

[15:07] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Yeah, so like over 20.

[15:08] Charlie Murphy: Over 20?

[15:10] Emma Flynn Bespolka: I think it was like 22 or 25. If it was an affordable program, I was applying to it. The only programs I didn't apply to were NYU and Boston Conservatory because of the prices. Other than that, I was applying to quite literally everything that I could. Maybe not Elon because I remember we couldn't afford to fly there. It was too far away.

[15:36] Charlie Murphy: So if you believe it, Emma, as of this year, Elon is coming to Chicago Unified.

[15:39] Emma Flynn Bespolka: I'm not surprised because it really does a disservice to the school to not make—

[15:46] Charlie Murphy: You're going to miss out on talent just on people who can't afford it.

[15:49] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Yeah, because not only rich people are talented. There's people from all walks of life. But also, oh, I auditioned on campus at Carnegie Mellon, of course. That was my dream school.

[16:00] Charlie Murphy: No, of course, necessarily. That's great that you did. I do think that's a generational thing. Two things you've said here so specific to your generation is one, taking the train into New York, which used to happen. All of our students from Jersey, from two hours away, people take the train and take the train back all by themselves to coach, to do whatever, to go see shows, to go audition. And now I think that is so uncommon, so rare that somebody is doing it all by themselves in that same way. Not that you would never go to an audition by yourself, I guess, if you live close. But I think more parents and students don't feel—Post-COVID, I'm not feeling as much comfort in kids going on their own.

But then the other thing that feels so generational is the idea of you did 20 schools and got into one. I think you're the generation when it really got competitive. The pre-schools were hitting. The competitiveness was really upping. But that has freaked all these people out. It's why they're doing 40 schools. And we go, you don't need to do 40 schools. We have to find a little bit of balance to it or whatever. But I think they get nervous hearing stories like that. And especially knowing someone as talented as you could have been 20 in one. And that would not be the only case where that happened. So I do think you've contributed to the inflation of people's school list with this pod. I do think you don't have to apply to that many schools.

I think I look back and there was a lot of schools that I applied to because I felt like I had to. But the truth is the school that you're going to get into is the school that you... Well, we can get into that. But I think where it ended up was the school that I felt the least amount of resistance at. And I felt really calm in that audition. And I think I didn't feel calm in any of the other circumstances. And I think that is something that as an adult, I still work on. And I think if you put so much pressure on like, I have to apply to 40 different schools, it's like, it puts such a weight on you. But then also if you only apply to two, of course, there's pros and cons. But it's like...

[18:01] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Like so many things, it's balance, right? We talk about the balance.

[18:05] Charlie Murphy: Yes, the number between two and 40 probably going to balance somewhere in between there. But also, we always talk about the competitive balance to having enough schools that aren't the most competitive schools on your list that gives yourself a little bit of a breath and a little more security so that you know you'll have multiple options. And that also are not... If they're all the most competitive schools, then you can't guarantee that's going to happen. And I do think more people would do 20, but 16 of them or 17 of them would be most competitive schools. And you go, that really makes the balance tougher. That's where we often talk about six or seven in that competitive tier. I think also, I look back and... I mean, the Hart School is great and it gave me what I needed, but I wish that I think I had prioritized different things than I did when I was 18.

You look back and you're like, oh, I actually wish I had... And I'm glad I went because I met my husband and lots of good things happened from it. But I think what you prioritize as a child versus what you actually need in your adulthood is so different. Talk to me about that. What would you prioritize? What did you prioritize then and what would you prioritize differently now if you looked at it?

[19:04] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Well, I prioritized going to a school that was a conservatory program where I was going to get really intense training. And I think what I discovered was that the training that I got, it's good to go to a conservatory. It really, really is. But I also think it's really good to have a real life. And I think when you're an adult and you are in this theater community, and if you put yourself in the bubble and you only think about theater all day long, and you only think about this one thing all day, again, you put so much pressure on yourself. You put so much pressure on this thing and achieving this thing and striving for this success in this industry. And it's all you're surrounded by. And I think for me as a person, I think everybody is different.

But I think I would have really benefited from actually a little bit more life, like a little bit more campus, a little bit more school spirit, a little bit more separation of career and real life. Because I think that I did feel the heat all four years that I was there. And I felt like life or death, I have to be successful in this program or else I'm going to die. That's how it feels. And I think now as an adult, I have such different priorities for myself. I'm like, okay, when it starts to get hot like that, that's when I actually need to say, okay, I need a break from this environment. And I need to fill my life up with other things that make me feel grounded again.

[20:46] Charlie Murphy: It's so well said. And I think it's really hard to know at 16, 17, or is it just at 18? It's hard to know what you're going to want. I mean, there are people who feel that way and go, oh, gosh, the conservatory was too intensive. Even if I knew from my summer program and I tried testing it out and I tried whatever, but they go was too, or the opposite. People go, no, I wish I felt more rigor. It's hard to know what you're going to want when you're 17 until you're in it. And you can't look back on and truly no regrets. But I think it is, as a 17-year-old, it's impossible to know exactly. And to me, I look back and I'm like, there's no perfect choice. There's no right decision. It's just you make the decision right. It's like wherever you go, you just make it right.

[21:27] Emma Flynn Bespolka: You make the decision right. I love that. I've never heard that. That's like love the one you're with basically.

[21:30] Charlie Murphy: Yeah. It's like the same thing for marriage. It's like there's no perfect whatever. It's like you make a decision and yeah. You're part of making it right. You're part of making that marriage work. You're part of making the school work for yourself. It's like you can't make a perfect decision or right decision. It's like you make that decision right. And so putting all that pressure, like I have to find the perfect school or else my life isn't going to go. No, it's fine. Wherever you go, you are going to make it right. And it doesn't have to be actually perfect in every single way. It just has to be as good of a choice as you can make in that moment at 17. I love I love that answer. OK, well, then that leads me right to tell me a little bit about Hart in terms of, you know, in general, we're now over 200 episodes in.

So most of the schools from artists episodes we've heard a decent amount about. So I've been skipping this for some schools. But I think you are our first actual artist guest who went to Hart. We had Hart on to talk about the program itself. We had representatives from the faculty. But I'd love to hear, like, what was the experience? How did you make it right for yourself? What was right and wrong? And what was the experience curriculum for you?

[22:34] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Yeah, no, I mean, the curricular experience was like really intense. It was a conservatory. But then also my class was a bigger class than they were used to. I think they had a high acceptance rate year, a higher yield than they expected. Yeah, I think like a higher, yes, commitment rate or something. And so we had like 50 kids in my class, which was quite large for their program at the time. And I would say now a lot of the faculty that was there since I was in school has retired, actually. So it's a different I don't know what the environment is exactly like today. But I can give you an idea of like, you know, if you were a beginner ballet, you were starting your day at 8:30. You know, you were going mostly to dance and acting and voice classes at the there was a separate campus for the dance and theater kind of world off campus called HPAC.

So we would go out there. And then most students after their freshman year lived off campus. So it was a very separated world. Like we weren't at the University of Hartford necessarily very much. We were very much at HPAC, which was kind of a singular building off campus. And it sort of set it up. So it felt like kind of that summer intensive program, like you're going to this one building, you're really staying there. You don't I don't know how it is now. But at the time, you don't perform in any of the main stage productions until your junior year. So your first two years are really like about the classwork and like the curriculum. And so it was a lot of like, you know, 10 a.m. ballet and then 11:50 voice and then, you know, one o'clock jazz.

And then, you know, you're going through and then you have rehearsals that you're working on a show as, you know, a freshman intern. So you're like doing or whatever they call it, like a crew, your crew. So I was like ASM for a show. And then you're in rehearsals until like 9 or 10 p.m. And so it's a quite intense grilling. And you if you do have any classes on campus, which you do sometimes like you have like music theory classes on campus because there's another music school on campus. So it's like a lot of traveling in and out of campus. And I would say I had to learn how to be adaptable. I did not go in. I came from like kind of a rural suburban life before college. And then I went to Hartford, which is like quite different of an experience.

It was much more like, you know, not just diverse and people, but also like in backgrounds. And I was like the most diverse place I'd ever been to. And then also along with that, like it was my first time kind of like living in an urban environment. And that was something I had to learn. And even though I was driving like it was my first time like living in an apartment. And, you know, it was a lot of learning.

[25:53] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Being yourself is “popular.”

[26:23] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Being yourself is “popular.”

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[36:19] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Being yourself is “popular.”

[36:47] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Being yourself is “popular.”

[37:17] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Being yourself is “popular.”

[37:44] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Being yourself is “popular.”

[38:05] Emma Flynn Bespolka: How do you get your feet back on the ground? Do you call on mom? Are you calling your husband? You have to grieve it for a moment. You have to allow yourself to feel embarrassment and sad and shame, all the things like, you know, it's just information. And I think also the thing you have to tell yourself is like, I can't change it. I can't. I did it. And you know what? I'm embarrassed. Sure. I feel embarrassed. I feel like I feel ashamed, but you also just have to say, I can't change it now. And so like in the grand scheme of things, it really is just one audition. And who judging you is going to think, oh my God, I guess she's a terrible actor instead of being like, well, she had a bad audition.

Even if it was as bad as you think it was, which maybe it wasn't quite as bad. Maybe it felt worse inside than it may not have been as remarkable to them as it felt to you. Who knows? I don't know. But even if it was, they've seen a lot of bad auditions. Yeah. And I think also you just have to be like, you know, nobody's thinking about you. Nobody's thinking about you that deeply. Everybody's moving on with their lives. If anything, they were like, oh, that was kind of embarrassing. And then they move on. You know, even a worst case scenario, they're sitting there like, oh my gosh, she's terrible. Or even if like that's a real face plant, I'm like, how many times have they seen a face plant?

We've all seen people face plant. That's it. And it will be my last one. I'll tell you that. Like everybody, I think it's just information and you do have to be forgiving to yourself. Like I'm saying that for myself too. Like I want to beat myself up so badly and be like, you dummy, like you messed up everything, you know. But I think this has happened to me before and I think also the older you get, the more you see your track record and you're like, okay, I have like totally bombed before. Right. It's just one small part of my story. And then it all came out on the other side and, you know, and that's okay. Like I think I'm not a great auditioner and I think a lot of people feel that way in the industry.

So you just have to be like, I need to rewire some things in my brain. I shouldn't say I'm not a great auditioner. I should rewire that. I am a good auditioner because you are what you say about yourself. But you're saying you're a person capable of having bad auditions, which everybody is capable of that. Of course. By the way, everybody is. And I think it's also like a learning lesson. Like everything's just information. For the rest of the day though, I will like probably call my mom, probably cry, probably I have a meeting at four. I'm going to focus on that. And then guess what? Like, I'm going to go do something fun with my husband or like cook dinner and like move on because guess what? I can't change it.

[41:05] Charlie Murphy: I mean, that is, I think our first, I mean, I think we may have heard some funny audition stories, but that's sort of the, we've heard so many audition stories of the job that booked my Broadway gig or whatever, but assuming, and maybe we're wrong, maybe you'll end up booking. Maybe this is the first booking of you get a call back a year later and you do end up booking this bar. Who knows? But otherwise this would be the first story we've had on the bottom, just about audition. But boy, is that relatable. And boy, is it like, we talk about it with, you know, the getting to January and February for these students who are doing this process of like how important getting yourself to a psychologically prepared place is.

Like you said, two feet on the ground. I think that is such a, you're never going to have exactly two feet on the ground in high school going through this process, but like walking in as a psychologically, you know, we talk about psychologically competitive, meaning like, are you in that place where you feel your strongest, you're bringing your whole self into the room and it's hard to do, but it's so, it's almost more important by that point than your material or some of these things where it's like, can you walk in and be your best person versus not? If you're shaking like a leaf, it's hard to get to meet who you actually are.

[42:06] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Yeah. And I think like whatever that is for you, it may not be the same as like the person next to you. I think it's just, you know, I think preparation is key. But even if you prepare, you know, completely, I mean you still, sometimes you can't also control the, yeah, sometimes things just happen and also you just have to trust. Like I, and I say this for myself too, like you just have to trust that, like that experience or that place. Like you weren't meant to go there and like that's a hard thing to swallow sometimes, but like you were meant to go somewhere else. Like it's not a bad thing. It's just a redirection and I think like people always say like, oh, rejection is redirection, but it really is. I don't know. Like maybe if you've gone to that school, like you would have had a terrible time or you would have, you know, and you just, it's again, like you just make it, you make the decision right. And you make it right.

[43:00] Charlie Murphy: I love that. All right. Let's jump back a little bit. So you're graduating from Hart. Can you tell me a little bit about your showcase experience? And most importantly, I want to hear how do you end up in London? So give me that journey of how do you, are you finding an agent immediately? I know we're about to hit the pandemic basically right after you graduate. So in terms of all that timing, but I guess how was the graduation, your entry into the business and then how on earth do we get over to London?

[43:19] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Yeah. So gosh, um, when I graduated it was right before the pandemic and then I got my first like equity principal job. I was going to go do like this great regional theater and then the whole world shut down and it got canceled and I didn't get my equity card and all these things. And um, for showcase, jumping back, I broke my foot my senior year.

[43:43] Charlie Murphy: Oh my God. Leo would love that. He loves telling his broke his foot story.

[43:45] Emma Flynn Bespolka: I love it. You broke your foot doing what?

[43:48] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Um, dancing. I was, I was recording an audition for Norwegian Cruise Lines for Jersey Boys and I was dancing, which I never dance. I don't know why I was going for this, but I was doing a dance to Jersey Boys and I went to do, I don't remember what I was doing, a chasse, like I was just doing super simple and I, I just twisted my foot and I broke it. And then my friend like wheeled me into her car and like took me to the hospital and now she's a great Broadway dancer. She's got like good juju, but I, um, I ended up doing my showcase with a broken foot and I was in a boot and my song, we only could sing one song and it was like 30 seconds because we had such a big class that we couldn't, you know, we couldn't have that many people.

And I remember like I was doing on the other side of the tracks, which is from little me and I, um, you probably know it from all the auditions, but I, I got to the part where it's like, and I'm off and running over the rail. And I had my boot on and I was like running in my boot and they were just like, they ate it up and I was like, great. And I ended up, it ended up being such a blessing in disguise because people like recognize me as the girl with the broken foot.

[44:57] Charlie Murphy: Stand out with that boot.

[44:58] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Yeah. And so I ended up going in and meeting with a couple of agents. I signed with an agency who, um, then I worked with for like six years. I'm still with them now. And, um, I was like really struggling. I went and did a Norwegian cruise job. I was doing, after the broken foot, my God. So I ended up doing kinky boots with Norwegian. And again, like I was so nervous in the audition, I know I didn't even get Lauren. I was like her understudy. So I was understudying Lauren on the cruise. And then, um, about four months into it, we all got laid off. They decided that they wanted to close the show, which like never happens like on cruises, like you never close. Like usually it's just like, you know, you can get stuck on this cruise.

You can't, you can't even sell tickets to the one show that's happening. I know. So they decided they wanted to shut down the show and now Norwegians like shutting down a lot of their musicals. I don't know if they, like the pandemic affected a bunch of, you know, the, we don't, but anyways, I did that cruise ship. I came back. Um, it was still like post COVID times. Things were pretty dead, but I was trying to get seen and I just could not get past self tape. I was a very nervous auditioner. I was not doing well in the room, all this stuff. I decided I'm going to take some time off. I got married. I took about six months off and I was working for a woman who was going through a medical emergency.

I was her nanny. And so I ended up just like kind of just focusing on her family and her and her baby. And I took some time off and I was just nannying for them. And then about October. So it's been about six months since I got off the ship, I, um, and got married and everything. I was like, Oh, I really miss like singing for people. So I went and actually had took a lesson with, um, Dan Michique, who's the Wicked Cat, um, music director. And he was the one who was like, have you ever been in for Glenda? And I was like, no, I've never been in for anything. And he, um, was so kind. He like somehow got me an audition, like the next week to come in for Glenda. I totally bombed. I was like the most nervous auditioner ever.

Just like today I walked in and I was shaking in my boots and I just completely bombed and ran out of the door. I ran out of the, um, audition building crying. Like I was just horrified and Dan and I met again and he was like, just go to auditions. You just need to go because you're just so green. You just need to go get into rooms and like, um, basically just become a better auditioner. Never going to book Glenda if you're green. That's one thing.

[47:34] Charlie Murphy: Yeah.

[47:35] Emma Flynn Bespolka: So I was like, okay, I'm going to listen to this music director. He's clearly very successful. I go to like every, um, I'm like, I'm going to go to every open call. So I, I, I told my boss, I was like, I'm going to take a Thursday off work. Um, I went to Pearl Studios, sign up on the list at like 4am and then at like, no, they don't do that anymore. Apparently they have no more unofficial lists. I don't know. Um, online lists is what I hear. Yeah. And so at 4pm the monitor comes out and she's like, actually, so sorry, we're not going to have time to see anyone today. And I was like, dang it. I waited all day. But then my friend, sorry, this is a long story. I'm getting there. Great story. We love it.

Yeah. So my friend calls me and he's like, Hey, I'm across the street. I'm at an open call for Tommy on Broadway and like nobody showed up. Like there's nobody here. So if you want to come over, you can get seen right away. And I was like, great. So I go in, I sang like 30 seconds of a rock of ages and, um, and then I left and I didn't think anything of it. But then, um, casting reached out to my agent and they were like, Hey, we just met this girl, Emma, and we'd love to bring her in for this new show that they're doing in London called clueless. And I was like, Oh my God, I'd love clueless. Like that sounds perfect. And I was like, um, so I go to the audition, I go to several callbacks. It's the only thing I'm in for.

It's my first basically audition after bombing my wicked audition and I got the job. And then after that, I did it out of town in Bromley and in the UK, it's kind of like doing it at paper mill. And then I came back to the States. I did, um, legally blonde and then I did beautiful. So I did those like kind of back to back and I went and did clueless again in the West End and then I'm basically just kind of getting back now. Um, but yeah, that's how you're nominated for all kinds of awards. Did you win them?

[49:19] Charlie Murphy: I don't know.

[49:20] Emma Flynn Bespolka: I thought those are awards that are happening. I was nominated. I lost to Rachel Zegler, of course, she's an honor to lose to her. I know. And, and, you know, it was public voting and I was like the second I, I was like, okay, she's 2.5 million followers. I was like, I'm going to go ahead and say like, even if she gets 1% of her followers to vote, like it will still be all of us. So, um, that was exciting. I, you know, just went to the awards a couple of weekends ago and, um, you know, she's so cool and she deserves it. Um, but yeah, I don't know. I have another awards that are coming up in March, but we'll see.

[49:56] Charlie Murphy: And that means you're flying back and forth to these awards.

[49:58] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Yeah.

[50:00] Charlie Murphy: So when you say you're kind of living a little bit in New York, a little bit in London, what does that look like? I mean, first, are there, is there future for clueless that's happening in London or is that now over?

[50:09] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Um, clueless is pretty much over I would say, but they're going to tour and I don't think I'll be on the tour. Stay tuned. But I project I will probably not be touring. Stay tuned to this space.

[50:19] Charlie Murphy: Yep. Um, but what about, so are you, but are you also auditioning for things in London? Other things in London?

[50:24] Emma Flynn Bespolka: I'd like to. Yes.

[50:26] Charlie Murphy: Me too. So how does that, I would love to, cause we've had some international guests who were like international, but working in the U.S. and we've had a couple guests, we had an alumni of ours who, um, I went to school in, in London, I think, and then it worked there a little bit. But as somebody who went to school in the U.S., you're American citizen, how does that work then with like trying to work overseas, audition overseas? I have heard it's difficult.

[50:46] Emma Flynn Bespolka: The producers covered basically while I was doing Clueless and so now what it looks like is I have to apply for what's called a global talent visa, which is essentially like a five-year visa for a promising young talent. So I'm gonna go ahead and apply for that; it's kind of in application now, but I basically can't take any work until I have the right to work in the UK. I could still go audition now that my visa is kind of in the works, but yeah, I am sort of waiting to see if I get approved. Maybe this is a situation where those awards would help you, even the nominations, because like, yeah, you see that I'm promising. There are different parts of the visa that you need, so there's like performance reviews and any awards, and you also have to have letters of endorsement.

I had to have letters of endorsements from like the producers, from the creatives. It's a long, kind of expensive, arduous process, but then the fruit of it is that you can work in the UK for five years. For me, kind of being back and forth, the vibe in New York is just very, right now, things are really, really difficult. In the UK, even though things are also difficult, it's just slightly less; there's slightly more going on.

[52:08] Charlie Murphy: So are you having two different agents, or are you working with an agent in New York? But are you working with or meeting with UK agents?

[52:24] Emma Flynn Bespolka: I haven't. That's a secret, but I haven't signed with anyone, but it's definitely on my radar. I think my agent is American, and it's like kind of limitations. I don't know that he could wrap me in the UK. I don't know what the laws are. I'm pretty sure you can't. I think you have to have like an agent that is actually like officially in the UK, licensed there and everything. But that being said, if you book a job and you're American and like you're an American agent, you can negotiate. Like, you negotiated everything for Clueless. But then that being said, they auditioned in the US, right? So that's them; they're auditioning you as an American versus whatever if you're auditioning in the UK.

[53:15] Charlie Murphy: Exactly. So I have to ask this question as the husband of a very successful Broadway person. How does your husband feel about all this? Like, you get to pick whether we're in London or the US. Is he moving with you? How does that go?

[53:28] Emma Flynn Bespolka: I wouldn't do it unless he could come with me. I think that was like a contingency. And also, if he wasn't happy, then I would never force him to do this. There are things that I don't do because I just wouldn't work with our marriage. That's just different for everyone. Personally, I don't want to tour because I just don't want to be away from my husband for that long. I think everyone is different, but for me, going to the UK was different than touring because it was like we were uprooting and we were staying there. So he went back to school online, and he was sort of just game. God bless; I mean, he's like the best business partner. He just kind of picked up and came with me, and that was super amazing of him.

He's been super supportive of the whole thing, and he's like kind of my biggest... yeah, he's my number one. He was there; it was up and down, and he was there through it all. But again, if he wasn't happy, then I couldn't do it because that's not worth it to me.

[54:32] Charlie Murphy: I know I'm asking this question in the midst of it happening, so it's hard to tell your life as it's happening now. But you mentioned the idea of getting two feet on the ground. How do you get two feet on the ground in either place if you have a little bit of a sense of I'm kind of between? Are you really gonna be like, I really have a home base in New York and really a home base in London? Are you focused mostly in New York and you're gonna see what happens with this visa? How do you figure out how to manage your life if you're thinking about it could be this, it could be that?

[55:05] Emma Flynn Bespolka: That's something I like I was still thinking about because, of course, the dream is to work in both places. But I think also for me right now, I really need a break, and I really haven't taken one. So I have a sublet here in New York until March, and I'm giving myself that time. You know, of course, I had auditions a little bit when I came back, but I think my goal right now is to just kind of set up my life in New York and be here for a little bit while my visa is being processed. I do think that is actually really important to give yourself time and to get both of my feet back on the ground and also just put my head back on straight because doing eight shows a week is one thing. Carrying a show is another thing.

Carrying a show in a different country without your family, without your friends, without your support system is like a totally other thing, and like it wrecked me. Not because it was bad, but because it was so much, so much. I don't think I gave it enough credit, and I think now that I'm coming off of it, I haven't quite taken the time that, you know, is necessary. At a certain point, you need to just start being like, you know what, I'm gonna start saying no to everything and just take this time.

[56:24] Charlie Murphy: You're a human being too who has limits.

[56:26] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Yeah, the tendency is to be like, oh, I have to keep going. I have to keep getting the next thing. But like, you really don't actually, and you won't if you keep trying to do that. You do need to be a whole person before you can take on the next thing. But like, you won't be able to enjoy it or process it fully if you are half a person. I think, yeah, in order to be able to book the next thing too, you have to get yourself to that point of, could you have booked this audition today? Maybe, but not today. Maybe it needed a month from now. You could have booked this audition or whatever. I really think it's not about talent; it's really about being okay in yourself and being confident because honestly, there are plenty—can I say this?—there are plenty of untalented people who just have the confidence of God.

I think it really is like if you're not a confident person, it's okay; I'm not either. But I think it is about not just making yourself confident, but like making yourself be like, I'm okay. I actually just don't need to think about myself. I don't have to over-criticize myself; I can just be okay. Part of that is just getting your feet on the ground and setting up a foundation for your life.

[57:33] Charlie Murphy: So well said. And yeah, whatever those people are drinking, the people that have the confidence of God, we got to find out the elixir. If you have like natural confidence, like what are you doing? What are you doing? Tell me everything. I love it. Okay, let's move toward wrapping up here. So I'd love to talk about, you know, you mentioned to the—we talked about your parents in the craziness of them raising nine kids. You know, either from the parent perspective or from the young artist's perspective, do you have any advice in terms of, like, for—I'd love to hear both from parents how they can best support their children. It's a double, I guess, double advice. And then for our 17-year-old listeners, you know, is there any big advice that you just have for them in terms of this college process, but also just in terms of their life and career?

[58:21] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Oh, that's such a good question. I would say for parents, I would say, oh my gosh, I think everybody just like take a deep breath. The most important thing is like your child's mental well-being, like genuinely. And I think, like, and yours. There’s so much pressure to be like successful in this process and like get into the best schools or even just like get into a lot of schools, have lots of options. It's okay if that's not your child because in the long run, that's not what's going to make them successful. What's going to make them successful, again, it's really like not actually that much about talent. Talent's a prerequisite. The most important thing is that they're a whole person and like whatever they need to feel psychologically supported is like the thing.

Sometimes that means like living life. Like, okay, let's take a break from everything and like let's just go, I don't know, go get our nails done or I don't know. I think also like preparation, but not to the point of psychosis. Allow yourself to get really prepared and then do it in three takes. Then maybe take a day, and then if you want to record something again, like do it again in three takes. But don't be—you will find that you're gonna waste so much time spiraling, and then you're gonna end up taking the first option that you had anyways. So just allow yourself to, yeah, I would take a deep breath.

[59:52] Charlie Murphy: Yeah, I love that. As we talk about that so much with this process of like preparation is important, of course, but what are you preparing toward? We're not preparing toward perfection; we're not preparing toward this is the perfect take, right? We want to prepare for the ability to be joyful and flexible and let the thing go and serve it up. You know, to the point of if you have to do it 15 times, you're probably not actually leaning toward the right goal either. You're not getting anything that's necessarily just tightening it.

[60:38] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Yeah, like the most important thing you can do is relax. Get into meditation, get into yoga, get into prayer, whatever you have to do to just like relax. I also think like during this process, if you don't have a higher power—like this sounds so like woo-woo—but like get a higher power. If you believe in God, go to church. If you are, you know, go to synagogue, go pray, go do whatever you need to do to spiritually root yourself because the more you can let it go and let God or let the universe and just trust that higher power that actually they're working for your good, the better. That might be woo-woo, and I don't know if they can teach that in MTCA if that's like legal, but I do think we're not gonna force you to have a higher power.

But I like the advice of borrowing what I feel. I mean, I'm someone who's not religious myself, but boy, I use a lot of that sort of spiritual advice of going, how do you like going like God? I mean, if you can borrow one for this process, please, that's a great idea. It's great. I think you have to sometimes be like, all right, I can't do this on my own. I need to just like leave this with God and kind of like trust that he's got me or, you know, the universe has got me and they're working for my good. Sometimes you need that higher power, and like definitely during—because so much of it is out of your control. Everything is out of your control. The things that you can control are like you and like your well-being.

[62:01] Charlie Murphy: I love it, Emma. That's a great place to wrap it. Thank you for the time today. If people want to check out more, we know what we can follow you on Instagram. Should we be looking for Clueless maybe coming to the States eventually after touring? Do you have any idea of such things?

[62:10] Emma Flynn Bespolka: I don't know. I mean, stay tuned maybe.

[62:15] Charlie Murphy: Stay tuned to see a year from now whether Emma books the big role in the big Broadway show that you would expect her to be booking. We'll find out.

[62:23] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Definitely not this year, but maybe next.

[62:29] Charlie Murphy: Maybe next year. I really thank you.

[62:33] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Yes, yes, yes! What a delight she is, right? Just the best. I feel like she both sounded useful and like also very much of her generation, but then also really mature. How honest and vulnerable she was. She really came at it from a perspective that I thought was really mature, which I guess in some ways is true of a lot of people of her specific generation. So I really enjoyed that conversation. All right, I'm gonna try to be really quick with some hitters here. I often say that, but I'm gonna try to actually do this. I jotted down a bunch of bullet points, but I'm not gonna deep dive into any of them. These are all gonna be just quick underlines, quick hitters. Some of these may be like future longer takeaways and blogs and all those kind of things as we often do, but let's dive into some really quick hitter takeaways.

I just want to quickly underline in boldface that idea of like being yourself versus the idea of playing against type. You know, we basically said it in the episode, but just worth underlining that you don't have to play against who you are to be who you are.

[1:03:58] Emma Flynn Bespolka: Being yourself is “popular.”

[1:04:28] Charlie Murphy: Being yourself is “popular.”

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