Sure-Footed Ponies: Finding our Tau

ENTRY 6: Finding Our Tau
February 9, 2011—Maseru, Lesotho
Casting decisions have cost Andrew Mudge some sleepless nights, but he may have found the Tau he's been looking for.


We've seen incredible talent out of Johannesburg. All of last week, cramped but cozy in a sunlit audition room at Bonnie Lee Bouman's casting agency, we the TFK team auditioned upwards of 40 young men and women for the lead roles of Atang and Dineo. It's inspiring to see these two characters come to life in the hands of such passionate and capable actors.



I've also had a couple of almost sleepless nights trying to make the decisions about whom to cast for the leads. In the early morning hours, when even our neighborhood's pack of canines have sacked out somewhere, I open my laptop and pull up Quicktimes of improvised scenes of the three female finalists auditioning for the role of Dineo. I play one video for a few seconds, pause it, quickly jump to the second video, then the final one, back to the first one, and so on. A running commentary is going off in my mind: "She nailed that bit of dialogue... her sadness seems more genuine... she gets the nuances here... she's got incredible hair!" They say go with your gut, but what do you do when your gut has left a note on the front door, written neatly in calligraphy, that reads, "Every choice is the right choice"? I need an actor right now, not my inner Mr. Miyagi.



I can't complain. And besides, I think I've found my Tau. He's 12 years old, has bags under his eyes, and has this perpetual look of contemplation on his face that suggests at any moment he might just launch into the next great American political speech. He's made repeated claims to me that he is an above average swimmer, despite the fact that I've never mentioned any kind of Tom Hanks-trying-to-save-a-sinking-volleyball scene in our movie. The name of this boy is Ntsane, and I didn't find him spinning his own wool high in some remote cave where no white man has ever traveled. The discovery was quite uneventful: just another kid jumping into the improv circle at one of Maseru's public schools. But I remember thinking to myself when I walked out the classroom, "Damn, I just met a real actor." And that was it. It's going to take a lot of effort to bring him along, but little Ntsane has more raw talent than any other kid I've seen in Lesotho or South Africa.



Now, I say I "think" I've found him because we still haven't met with his parents to get their full permission and cooperation on this endeavor. That happens at 7 pm tomorrow, when TR, Cecil and I take Ntsane's entire family out to Mimmos, Lesotho's only pizzeria. Over a bacon and banana pizza (a favorite in these parts), Cecil will summon his finest Sesotho to delicately explain that we'll be pulling their son out of school for more than a month so he can gallivant around southern Africa with what is ostensibly a traveling circus. Ntsane will need to grow his hair out, hang out with film grips, and sleep in crowded quarters. Not to mention long days and horseback riding lessons twice a week for the next month. Oh yes, I'm thinking this will be a pizza party to be remembered.

Want more Sure-Footed Ponies? Get caught up:

Sure-Footed Ponies: An Introduction
Sure-Footed Ponies: The Beginning
Sure-Footed Ponies: Return to Lesotho
Sure-Footed Ponies: Tortoise's Pace
Sure-Footed Ponies: Rain, Rain, Rising Rivers
Sure-Footed Ponies: Where There is no Sunscreen

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