Ripley's 2013 Mermaid Auditions

[Mahi Mermaid]

So a few of you are aware I went out for the Ripley's audtion. I just wanted to share my experience with you ladies, incase any of you were thinking of joining the Ripley's team.

Day 1:
-Consisted of a 400 meter swim, free style, no fin. You were "scored" off of how fast you completed the swim
-25 meter underwater swim
-50 meter underwater swim with monofin

Day 2:
-play day mainly, learing the "seven skills"
-4 continuous backflips
-going straight down with one push of hands
-"chasing your tail"
-barrell roll
-and then two syncronized tricks with a partner, one front flip and one backflip

Day 3:
-8 minute continous swim with monofin, only coming up for air...basically looking like a dolphin :)
-test of the 7 skills
-mock 5-minute show

Day 4: Results....

So I didn't make it. There were about 20 girls there, most of them were already Ripley's mermaids (they had to retest to be a mermaid this year which I think is fair). The lady in charge wasn't the one watching or 'grading' the skills, two of the current mermaids did that part. (which I think is a little bias)

My thoughts:
I'm pretty bummed that I didn't get it. I had all 7 skills down pat. I know my swimming isn't strong but I got through the 8 minute dolphin swim with the monofin just fine. I think that a lot of us mermaids didn't grow up on swim teams or aren't currently swimming for some college or high school team. I feel that personality has a lot to do with being a mermaid and a person who is technically sound, might not be as fun to be around as a person who is like me.

Future:
I won't try out for Ripley's again, I think I'm meant to do more work like Hannah, Kariel, and even Melissa (even though she did work for Ripley's last year).

I'm interested to hear what you guys have to think...should there have been that 400 meter swim without a fin? should that score have weighed so heavily on who is chosen or not?

[Morticia Mermaid]

I swam 4 years competitively. Whenever we wanted to test or train our endurance, or sometimes speed, we'd swim a 400. They were probably having everyone do a 400 as an endurance and speed test. I've noticed that tank performers have to be pretty quick a lot of the time, and they probably want to be sure those they take on will be able to handle the "stress" of continuous swimming.

Just my 2 cents :)

[Coradion]

I was a comp swimmer for 13 years, if it's a graded swim competitive swimmers are gonna win out. It's a finesse and technique sport and recreational swimmers can rarely keep up with you even if you're out of shape. It might sound mean but it's hard to compete with, when I swam it was for 6 and a half hours a day, six days a week. That much training is just gonna be hard to go up against, also watching most mers swim in a monofin looks awkward. If you put a swimmer in a monofin it's nothing new, same motion as butterfly and we can breathe differently and make it generally look more fluid.

Do the Ripley's mermaids even do public interaction at all? I thought they were just in the tanks the whole time?

[MerEmma]

They come out at the end of the show I think to talk to the audience.

400 isn't too bad. I'm a competitive swimmer (in the summers anyway haha) and our warm up is a 400. It's tough for me since I'm so young, short, weak, et cetera but I can do one in about...ten minutes? lol. Probably a lil' less. It's good info though!

The 400 would provide a good weigh in sort of to show what you can do, but without a fin seems a bit...off since you WILL be swimming with a fin (unless you're not; Melissa's MVD tail doesn't have one, so).

[Kanti]

Meh seems a bit much for me.
I'm sure you have a point, Morticia, that the 400m is to help you get ready for constant swimming, but honestly I've seen clips on youtube and sometimes the mermaids are up for air for quite a while, so I'm sure you're allowed to take a break.
I mean, the sharks, stringrays, fish and whatever else in the tanks aren't performing for anyone either, they're just chill, I don't see why the mermaid wouldn't be allowed to slow down and just swim around gracefully. I'm sure the spectators couldn't care less if she didn't do 4 continuous flips either, they'd probably be much more impressed that there's a MERMAID AT THE DAMN AQUARIUM!!
Lol but I get what they're trying to do, just doesn't seem like my cup of tea.

Did they make you provide your own tail?

[Mahi Mermaid]

I'm just saying all they put in the job posting requirements was 'comfort in the water' and if they wanted to have competitive swimmers than they should have said it was a requirement or it was preferred. In the interview, I even stated that I was only a recreational swimmer, and was no wear near a competitive swimmer and she said that wasn't what she was looking for, so I was ok- that all she wanted to see was that I felt comfortible in the water....both of which were not the case, at all. I wouldn't have tried out if I knew I was going up against swimmers that have ranked top 25 in the state...

[Kanti]

xD yea I hear you Krystal.
I'm nowhere near a professional swimmer but I swim a lot more gracefully than my friend who was a swimmer for 4+ years. I know how to keep my head straight with my body and how to move everything properly, I also know how to make the monofin look natural rather than making it look like a swim fin.
You should write them an email and tell them what you thought of it. Not really to complain, but to say you found it misleading, because it sort of was.. If they didn't want a professional swimmer they shouldn't have made the requirements related to that so much.

[Merman_Ryan]

Dead Ripley's Hire me. :P

[MermaidAiera]

I would love to try out for this! I feel like I would do awesome :3
And a 400 is pretty standard. I'm surprised they did't make it a 500. As a competitive swimmer of 13 years, my team warms up with a continuous 1600 (roughly a mile) of swimming, kicking, I.M.s, pulling and drills by 200.
And the fact that other mermaids judge is, well...BS! There should be an unbiased judge at all times >:T

[Mermaid Kalliope]

Wha? When and where were these?! O.o

I can understand the need for endurance, but I also agree that they should have put something that showed they're looking for "Strong Swimmers" rather than just "comfortable in the water"... Meh... In a few years, I'd love to try out! Just for the shiggles. :-P

[halesloveswhales]

Woah, why am I just seeing this now?! I need to get crackin' on training!

[Fathom delMar]

Woah, why am I just seeing this now?! I need to get crackin' on training!Exactly! I live about 2.5 hours from the Ripley's in Myrtle Beach, SC. If I'm here in the next few years, it would be cool to try out. But My goal is to get to Hawaii by the end of next year, so we'll see. I just found out the other day that Ripley's even had mermaids! We have a local aquarium (about 35 minutes away with good traffic) that I think I would have a better shot at. I just need to get on training... And getting/making a tail >.<

[Echidna]

watching most mers swim in a monofin looks awkward. If you put a swimmer in a monofin it's nothing new, same motion as butterfly and we can breathe differently and make it generally look more fluid.

Eh...not really?
To appear like a real aquatic being, you should be able to swim gracefully, elegant, like dancing underwater.
I see competitive swimmers training every day.
I see lifeguard and baywatch swimmers train, with and without fins, doing their timed laps.
Know what?
NONE of them looks in the least mermaid-like. Or slightly elegant.
No matter what style they swim- they crawl and splash and almost empty half the pool when they swim about.
That is not what a mermaid should look like.

Even those athletes that manage to swim with a monofin (trust me, not many), don't look any better than if they were crawling.
You just can't equate butterfly and mermaiding.
It might have similar movements, but the style is totally different.
It's like saying a jazz pianist should totally be able to play a classic Chopin concerto, because "it's all the same piano keys".

I find the audition method described here fairly strange.
If the mermaids will be perma-swimming in a tank doing tricks, this is what I would have auditioned.
Put them in a tank (WITH a tail!), let them swim for a few hours.
Quite easy to see then who has the grace, the endurance, the technique.

Swimming 400m without fins the fastest is about the worst method to find elegant tank performers lol.
(Oh, and by the way.
Being a fast distance swimmer doesn't say squat about how long you can actually stay underwater and look good.
Most competitive swimmers aren't that well at freediving; they are too used to come up every few secs to swim their timed laps fast.)

[halesloveswhales]

Eh, I've gotta disagree with you. Unfortunately, many people who "have the heart of a mermaid" and "feel it in their bones" are not as graceful in the water as they believe/hope they are. Trained swimmers are pretty conscious of their bodies when they are swimming, and they know how to move. Like in a dance class, they are constantly being told how to change their movements for a better result.
Swimming a fast 400 will prove that you have endurance and breath control to take on such a physically straining job. That part of the audition is not to show the judges how mermaidy you look, but rather (probably) to weed out the weaker swimmers who wouldn't be able to last in the aquarium, swimming for several hours.
I think that the audition seems pretty solid. The aquarium doesn't want all the liability issues of putting someone in the tank who isn't an extremely good swimmer.

[AniaR]

I dont think you missed out on much, when I interviewed mermaids who worked there for my book, they worked several times in a day (one even had to move to be closer) and made less than 200$ a week. And those were big name mers.

Personally, it would suck for me to be judged on my swimming without a tail, because I just don't do much. But in a tail I fly!

[Echidna]

Eh, I've gotta disagree with you. Unfortunately, many people who "have the heart of a mermaid" and "feel it in their bones" are not as graceful in the water as they believe/hope they are.

That wasn't the point :)
I was saying that being a fast distance swimmer doesn't make you an elegant mermaid, no matter how trained and "aware" of your body you are.

I can give you an example from my dance career:
Ballet is probably the style that is most taxing and difficult, and the least likely to be done by anyone but professionals.
Now, when I'm casting for a jazzdance company, do I audition with ballet pieces, because ballet is a good foundation for jazz, and because a ballet dancer will be more pro, durable, and trained than a jazz dancer can possibly be?

No, I won't.
Because being a ballet dancer does NOT imply you will look good doing jazzdance.
You need to move differently, although the basic moves are very similar (or even the same).
Still, many ballet dancers look laughable when they try to do a groovy jazz piece.

The other points (about weeding out weak swimmers etc) I have adressed further down in my post, but I guess it was a bit too TL;DR :)

[AniaR]

so I make more at a birthday party gig than some big name mers have made working at Ripleys as mermaids for a week. Not saying money is everything, but the cost of a tail, travel time, and it's not like you could have a job in between shows unless you worked elsewhere at the aquarium, just not worth it. Also, when I interviewed Eric for Tail Flip he also confirmed they pay so little it wasn't worth the amount of money he'd already spent on tails.

[Coradion]

Eh...not really?
To appear like a real aquatic being, you should be able to swim gracefully, elegant, like dancing underwater.
I see competitive swimmers training every day.
I see lifeguard and baywatch swimmers train, with and without fins, doing their timed laps.
Know what?
NONE of them looks in the least mermaid-like. Or slightly elegant.
No matter what style they swim- they crawl and splash and almost empty half the pool when they swim about.
That is not what a mermaid should look like.

Even those athletes that manage to swim with a monofin (trust me, not many), don't look any better than if they were crawling.
You just can't equate butterfly and mermaiding.
It might have similar movements, but the style is totally different.
It's like saying a jazz pianist should totally be able to play a classic Chopin concerto, because "it's all the same piano keys".

I find the audition method described here fairly strange.
If the mermaids will be perma-swimming in a tank doing tricks, this is what I would have auditioned.
Put them in a tank (WITH a tail!), let them swim for a few hours.
Quite easy to see then who has the grace, the endurance, the technique.

Swimming 400m without fins the fastest is about the worst method to find elegant tank performers lol.
(Oh, and by the way.
Being a fast distance swimmer doesn't say squat about how long you can actually stay underwater and look good.
Most competitive swimmers aren't that well at freediving; they are too used to come up every few secs to swim their timed laps fast.)


What you see above water and the motion of a swimmer from below the water are pretty different. I can pretty much guarantee you that if you put a true competitive swimmer in a monofin and tell them to swim like a mermaid, they will not only be able to do it quickly, but also elegantly. Of course a swimmer is going to splash in a pool, that's the point. It's SWIM team, not mermaid team. Most swimmers if they are used to handling pressure will still be on the whole a better free diver as well. You think that because we're used to swimming we NEED to breathe every few seconds? Please. Swimmer's breathe to a tempo that maximizes speed, for some of us that's every third stroke, some it's every stroke it all depends, but not breathing is faster than breathing. Every swim team learns breath control, underwater 25's and 50's are pretty standard in swim sets.

You know how swimmers usually make prettier mermaids in the water? It's because of butterfly. Watching most mers kick with a monofin is so painful at times because they kick with their knees. A swimmer won't do that, we can move our whole bodies through the water in fluid, rapid motion based on our butterfly strokes. Butterfly is swam the way it is because it is the most efficient way to move through the water with that technique. Moving efficiently and fluidly is how a marine organism works.

[Coradion]

If swimmers are winning out for Ripley's hires it's probably because they're making the best mermaids for what Ripley's needs. I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings, I think if you want a job like that at a place like Ripley's you should go for it, keep trying, and power through until you get what you want. I think Krystal is awesome for having tried out, and what she found out from having the experience is only going to help better prepare people for when they attempt it. I think trying to say swimmer's are not actually graceful or would not actually make good mermaids is silly. If they're getting hired look instead at what they do have from their training and strive to achieve their skills.

[Echidna]

Well, it depends on what they are looking for in their performers.

I read this thread with great interest, because I plan to put together a group for waterballet/synchron swimming (with tails),
and I wouldn't have thought to make a distance race, or who can do the most backflips the fastest, more important than the things we'll be doing in the end, aka waterballet
(just as I wouldn't let people do a running competition when I'm actually casting for a dance show.
You could make all the same points, btw, and claim a runner will always be a better dancer in the end than someone who has only trained dancing).

I've never seen the Ripley show, so I can't say whether their idea of a graceful mermaid matches mine ;D
In the end, it's their show, and they can do their auditions all the way they want.

[Galeocerdo]

Sorry that I'm just getting to this post, but I thought I'd reply anyway:

I saw that a lot of people were mentioning the 400yd swim that was a part of the audition process. As a veteran aquarium diver, I know that a lot of companies require that anyone who goes into their tanks to pass a swim test (a certain distance in a set amount of time). This isn't necessarily to see "who's the best, fastest, most technically sound, etc" but to see how people react in the case of exhaustion. Not saying that that was the sole basis behind the swim, but it may have played a big part. Endurance may have played a smaller part in the swim, depending on the rigor/goal of the show.

It may have been helpful for the company to have two of the veteran mermaids judging the new mermaids who were auditioning for the shows. If those mermaids were chosen for the team again, then they probably have a decent idea of what the company is looking for and where the company wants to take the show in the future. Comfort may have also played a factor in their decisions and "judging." I've seen some of their shows on YouTube, and it seems that they do shows in pairs. Personally, if I was performing, I would want to swim with someone who I felt could execute the moves properly and I could depend on to do their fair share of breath holds (from what I saw they do freediving shows). So in the end, that could cause someone to choose one person over another.

With the whole butterfly vs. mermaid swim thing, I have swam competitively for 11 years at the national level, and I can confidently say that the dolphin kick used during swimming starts and off of freestyle, butterfly, and (with the exception of being upside down) backstroke turns, is almost literally the same exact move used to swim mermaid-style. Just accelerated since swimming is all about speed in that situation. During my training, we often worked on dolphin kicks and worked on mentally breaking our bodies into multiple pieces and moving each piece on its own. That way we could achieve that perfect body roll that is also used when swimming like a mermaid. We often analyzed our movements via video to note what we could work on, so many of us have that critical nature and can visualize what we are supposed to do so our body movements can match. We also utilized monofins for our training, so that may be why some swimmers-turned-mermaid may seem less "awkward" when swimming as opposed to someone who has not had training with a monofin and is just getting into mermaiding.

I hope that my post did not offend anyone as these were just some things that I thought about while reading the posts attached to this thread. Xoxo