Ted White: The Next Maytag Man?

So it was an overcast spring day in Chicago, Illinois. My friend Dave (he and his siblings have their own blog linked on the right) and I made plans to go to the open casting to become the next Maytag Man. We both are pretty cold hearted sarcastic bastards so we didn't expect much, although the prospect of being in commercials and getting paid 350,000 a year really appealed to us. We were ready to sell our standards for a hefty chunk of change.

The day of the audition, my roommate at the time asked if he could come along. We said sure.
The auditions were at Navy Pier, where there's no free parking and public transportation access is too much of a hassle. I decided to drive and we would all split the parking. When we arrived we filled out a form and they called us into a room in groups of five. Dave's side of the story is detailed on his blog, along with another one of my pictures.

THIS picture is from my room. Now when they called us in, they went down the line and asked us WHY we wanted to be the next Maytag Man. I would be the last person they asked in my group so I got to hear everyone's answer before they got to me.

This is what they said:

Person 1 (A middle aged portly balding man): I am really good at repairing things, I have about 10 years of experience in the field, and I can act sad really well! (People thought this was funnier than Jerry Lewis)

Person 2 (A non descript person, also middle aged): I have about 15 years of repair experience.

By this point I started to wonder WHY these people felt it necessary to have repair experience if the Maytag man doesn't actually repair anything. That's the whole point.

Person 3 (This older small man) launched into this speech about how he's been a repairman for 25 years and how much he enjoys it because when he fixes something and it works...it's like magic. And then he did this little flair like he was actually a magician. Also he was actually WEARING a repairman outfit. He brought his tools along too, just in case he there was a leaky pipe or clogged toilet. After his speech, one of the women asking the questions said, "You win." I didn't know if she was referencing the Maytag contest or if she was just commenting on how nice it is to repair something and have it work. I figured the latter, but by this point I was starting to roll my eyes at the self importance of the entire situation.

Person 4 also had 20 years of repair experience. What a surprise! I was beginning to wonder if I should just lie and say that I had 45 years of repair experience since my dad was a repair man for 45 years. (Not true, my dad is a financial planner.)

So finally, they get to me. And they ask the question: Why do you want to be the next Maytag Man?

And I don't know what got into me, but I asked: "You mean like, a repair man for Maytag...or the guy in the commercials?"

Pause.

Judge: Um. The man in the commercials.

Me: Oh, so I wouldn't ACTUALLY have to repair ANY Maytag Product? Because wasn't the whole point that the Maytag product never breaks and therefore the repair man is really bored?

Judge:....No, you wouldn't have to repair anything.

Me: Ok. We're square then.

And that was basically it. They asked me some half assed question about my interests and I said I enjoy knitting and yoga.

So we went out to wait in the lobby for the results of who passed the first round of auditioning. After about 20 minutes I found out that all the repairmen in my room passed the first round, and I did not.

So much for honesty.