Cory Monteith Fesses Up About His Unglamorous Life Before 'Glee' — He Worked At Wal-Mart!
As the musical quarterback of William McKinley High, Cory Monteith sings and dances up a storm on Glee — but his life before the show wasn’t nearly as exciting!
Before landing his major role as Finn Hudson, 28-year-old Cory Monteith says he had to do a string of odd jobs in order to make enough money to support himself — one of which was a people-greeter at Wal-Mart.
“You stand at the front, and you say, ‘Hi, welcome to Wal-Mart,’” Cory explained Sept. 20 on Live with Regis and Kelly. Although Cory was pretty much willing to do whatever it took to make money, people-greeting wasn’t his first job choice at Wal-Mart. He said what he really wanted to do was work in the shop and fix cars, but the only position available was to be a people-greeter. Cory worked there for a few months in hopes of eventually moving up, but never made it to the shop before the job ended.
And while most of the actors on Glee were building up their theatrical backgrounds before the show began, Cory was surprisingly not very involved in music, besides playing the drums in his high school band. It caused a bit of a problem when it came time to send in his audition tape for Glee – he was asked to send in a tape of himself singing, something he was not trained in.
So instead, he decided to show off his more creative side, to show them he was a “musical person”: he played the drums using pencils and a set of wine glasses and Tupperware in his kitchen.
The tape got their attention, but, Cory said, “They were interested, but they weren’t that interested – because they wouldn’t fly me down.” Cory drove himself down there, and it definitely turned out to be totally worth the trip!
