FALLACI - Berkeley Repertory Theatre Auditions

Berkeley Repertory Theatre (Berkeley, CA)  LORT B; theatre paying $900/week

Director: Oskar Eustis

Playwright: Lawrence Wright

Casting (Berkeley Rep): Amy Potozkin

NYC Casting: Stephanie Klapper Casting

1st Rehearsal: February 5th, 2013.  Runs: March 8th, 2013 - April 21st, 2013 (with a possible extension to May 5th, 2013)

With Fallaci, Pulitzer Prize-winner Lawrence Wright turns the spotlight on a fellow reporter and her fascinating contradictions. In this world premiere, a young woman interviews the fiery author at the end of her life, when she became a darling of the right. What begins as a discussion of journalism ends with two women exchanging life-changing lessons about destiny and empathy.  Both roles call for actors of tremendous skill.

SEEKING: 

ORIANA FALLACI

(50s+) A famous Italian journalist. Larger than life, brilliant, sexy, fiery. Fallaci’s childhood courage resisting the Nazis fueled her work as a war correspondent with an anti-authoritarian zeal that perfectly matched the fervor of the 60s and 70s.  She gained fame by grilling Kissinger, Castro, Khomeini, Qadaffi and other public figures who squirmed under her ferocious questioning.   She became a journalist at the age of 16 to help pay her way through medical school, but ill health forced her to give up her studies, and the day job developed into a dazzling career.  Aside from the star-style interviews which made her name, she was an accomplished war reporter – in Vietnam, Latin America, the Middle East and the Indian subcontinent.  In 1968 she was shot and seriously wounded in the student riots before the Mexico City Olympics. She distilled her experiences into several bestselling books. Seeking a STAR name or a well respected theatrical actress.

MIRYAM KARIMI 

(late 20s-30s) Iranian-American. Thin, attractive, sensuous, intense, courageous, outspoken.  Speaks with a slight Persian accent. There is a blithe, almost comic quality about her at the start of the play. Later in the play she reveals a dark and painful past. A graduate of Columbia University School of Journalism she writes obituaries for the New York Times.  By the end of the play 5 years later she is a celebrated author with a bestseller. Miryam idolizes Fallaci – knows everything about her. She quotes Fallaci “The point of journalism is to leave nothing unanswered’ and during the play she and Fallaci play a cat and mouse game of probing soul searching questions that will uncork both women’s deepest secrets, truths, sufferings, longings.