OFFICE HOUR - NYC EPA
New York Shakespeare Festival
AUDITION DATE
Jun 27, 2017
9:30 am - 5:30 pm (EDT)
Lunch 1 to 2
CONTRACT
Off Broadway Off Broadway CC; $690/week
SEEKING
Equity actors for 4 roles. See breakdown
PREPARATION
Please prepare one SHORT (no more than two minutes in length) monologue. Bring picture and resume.
LOCATION
Actors' Equity New York Audition Center
165 W 46th St
16th Fl
New York, NY 10036
PERSONNEL
By Julia Cho
Directed Neel Keller
Casting: Jordan Thaler/Heidi Griffiths
EPA Attended by: Jordan Thaler, Heidi Griffiths, and/or Kate Murray
OTHER DATES
First Rehearsal: 9/12/17
First Performance: 10/17/17
Closing: 12/03/17
Possible Extension: 12/17/17
OTHER
EPA Procedures are in effect for this audition.
An Equity monitor will be provided.
Equity’s contracts prohibit discrimination. Equity is committed to diversity and encourages all its employers to engage in a policy of equal employment opportunity designed to promote a positive model of inclusion. As such, Equity encourages performers of all ethnicities, gender identities, and ages, as well as performers with disabilities, to attend every audition.
Always bring your Equity Membership card to auditions.
BREAKDOWN
On a college campus a student and a teacher face off during her office hour. He has been behaving bizarrely in class and she is determined to discover the root of his anger and apparent unhappiness. He sits silently at the back of the classroom, exuding malevolence and intimidating both his fellow students and instructors. The writing assignments he turns in are violent, ugly and artless. His behavior is freaking everyone out. Is he disturbed or maybe dangerous? Or is he a frightened and lost young man asking for help?
SEEKING:
GINA:
Korean-American. 30 - 40. A creative writing professor who, like many of her colleagues, is teaching as a means to create space for her own creativity. But even as she teaches others she struggles with enormous ambivalence towards her writing which is born of an excruciatingly slow and painful process. She recognizes much of herself in Dennis and she tries to persuade him to open up despite his hostility and resistance. Unlike her colleagues she refuses to give up on him although their encounters are unsettling and possibly even dangerous. She is empathic, open and emotionally available but in the end, through Dennis’ silence which she talks to fill, she learns more about herself than she ever learns about him.
DENNIS:
Korean-American. 20’s. A college freshman. A vulnerable, awkward young man who has discovered the enormous and unsettling power of silence. He is perhaps unaware of how imposing and, ultimately threatening his behavior is to those he encounters. An outsider and oddball, painfully ignored by his contemporaries. He is plagued by the teenage trifecta of bad skin, shyness and insecurity. He hides behind a baseball cap and sun glasses and channels his anger into writing violent, deeply disturbing diatribes. When he finally does speak to Gina he is surprisingly empathic. This is a role for an actor who has great physical command and who can reveal character through physicality as much as through language.
DAVID:
Caucasian. 30’s. He teaches writing for stage and screen. He’s a bit of a hipster. The kind of professor that the kids love and want to hang out with. He’s just biding his time in academia until his own screenwriting career takes off. He prides himself on the relaxed vibe in his classroom and is angry that this kid messes with it. He’s not so interested in why Dennis behaves the way he does and flunks him because of the poor quality of his writing. He’s not without compassion he just believes in facing the issue head on. What he sees is a kid that’s trouble not a troubled kid.
GENEVIEVE:
Her race should be different and distinct from the three roles listed above. Early 30’s. Teaches poetry. She is the first to encounter Dennis in her Intro to Poetry class. She finds his behavior immediately troubling. Although she is scared for herself and for her students she is compassionate and immediately strategizes about ways of getting past the terrifying wall he has erected around himself. The effort is exhausting and she’s ultimately unable to get through to him. She is left feeling angry, frustrated and completely uncertain how to proceed but much relieved that she can now hand the problem on to Gina.
Equity’s contracts prohibit discrimination. Equity is committed to diversity and encourages all its employers to engage in a policy of equal employment opportunity designed to promote a positive model of inclusion. As such, Equity encourages performers of all ethnicities, gender identities, and ages, as well as performers with disabilities, to audition.
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