Actor
(Any gender, 18 to 99 years old)

EARWORM - Horror Short (Student)

Met Film School Master’s Thesis

Earworm is a sound-based horror which sees our doomed protagonist desperately fend off an unseen entity by drowning out its call with the help of only a hand-cranked trench gramophone.

Accommodation is NOT provided. So please make sure you are local to, or are able to get to the London Location.

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Character - John/Joan

Joan/John has heard something they shouldn’t have, and now it’s taken root in their head. It is a sound which seems to get closer the longer they can hear it, heralding the onset of a terrible fate. Their only respite comes when they can drown out the noise with some louder sound, which halts the entity’s otherwise inexorable advance. But now they have been backed into a corner, with no means to delay the inevitable except an ancient hand-cranked gramophone. With each break in the music, the entity draws nearer, and leaves Joan/John with less time to wind it back up again, a vicious circle which must eventually fail. Realising this, our protagonist is forced in their desperation to take more drastic measures – the complete destruction of their hearing using a nearby screwdriver. A false hope, it turns out. Now Joan/John is left as an empty vessel, the sound emanating from their gaping mouth, ready to pass to the next unfortunate soul.

Joan/John’s experience has left them terrified, exhausted, and anxious. The role has no dialogue, success will rely on the physicality and intensity of the actor’s performance.

The self-tape can be:

1) Performing a version of the scene, wherein some item is used as a stand-in for the gramophone (perhaps a box), switching between periods of relative safety and desperate winding. When the box is being wound, you can hear the terrible sound bearing down upon you. Finally, accepting that the box will fail you, you may mime the process of deliberately rupturing your eardrums, and relish your victory over the horror when this is done.

2) A scene from a film where the protagonist is being “tormented” by a horror.

Before recording the scene, please state your name to the camera, followed by how you discovered the Casting Call.