The Slice: Can’t sing or dance, but a natural at promotion

Well, I missed my opportunity to get in on the square dance shebang.

Rats.

But life is full of second chances.

The nice folks at the Lake City Playhouse have invited me to audition for a role in an upcoming production of “Oklahoma!”

It’s tempting.

Though I might still have the hair for it, they’ll probably want someone a bit younger to be their Curly. Plus, I imagine the casting director will be looking for an actor who can actually sing. That leaves me out.

Perhaps I could try for the part of Ali Hakim, the peddler. I can’t do a Middle Eastern accent. But I occasionally allude to the prospects for a “three-day bellyache,” and I believe that’s one of his lines in the show.

I’m not drawn to the role of Will Parker, Ado Annie’s alleged boyfriend. Always found him off-puttingly dense.

But maybe I could be the old guy who wonders why the farmer and the cow man can’t be friends.

I can’t honestly suggest I would be right for a spot as one of the high-kicking dream sequence dancers. They’re not putting this on as a comedy, after all.

Nah. The part calling to me is that of the lonely, disturbed farm hand, Jud Fry.

If they want sullen, I can do sullen.

Resentful? Check. Alienated? Check.

The only problem is that my favorite performance by Rod Steiger (who played Jud in the 1955 film version) is his portrayal of the under-pressure Mississippi police chief in 1967’s “In the Heat of the Night.”

I’m afraid that during a performance of “Oklahoma!” I might forget one of Jud’s lines and instead spout something in the voice of Steiger’s Chief Gillespie: “I got the motive which is money and the body which is dead.”

That wouldn’t do.

Oh, wait a second. Hold everything. I just looked at that email again. The Lake City Playhouse folks don’t want me to try out. They just want to me help publicize the upcoming auditions.

Oh.

The tryouts are July 15 and 16. Call (208) 667-1323 for information, or go to www.lakecityplayhouse.org.>

Good luck. Hold on to your hat when the wind comes sweepin’ down the plain.