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West Side Story was written for a large, young cast. There are lead roles, but the creators weren't looking for stars to fill them.

"Everybody has to seem to be a teenager, and be able to sing a very difficult score, act a very difficult book and dance very difficult dances," recalled Leonard Bernstein at a Dramatists Guild symposium a few years before his death.

Carol Lawrence was 23 when she was called in to audition — over and over again — for the lead role of Maria. The repeated callbacks earned the displeasure of Actors Equity, the performers' union.

"I did 13 auditions, and that got me into all kinds of trouble with Equity," Lawrence recalls. "They did write a law that was, for a while, known as the Carol Lawrence Law, and it says you cannot audition a person more than three times without paying them."

For her final audition, Lawrence was paired with a young chorus boy named Larry Kert, who was up for the part of Tony. The two rehearsed and memorized the balcony scene, but director Jerome Robbins wanted to make the moment spontaneous. He asked Kert to leave the theater.
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