The Attic Ensemble, Theater for a New Jersey City, will hold auditions for the third production of its fortieth season, a non-union production of the August Wilson's drama The Piano Lesson, directed by Judith Moss. Auditions are Wednesday and Thursday, December 15 and 16 from 7:30-9:30 p.m.at the Attic Ensemble, 83 Wayne Street, Jersey City. Callbacks, if necessary, are TBA.
CASTING THE FOLLOWING ROLES:
Doaker Charles -( late 40's) Berniece and Boy Willie's uncle and the owner of the household in which the play takes place. Doaker is tall and thin and forty-seven years old. He spent his life working for the railroad. He functions as the play's testifier, recounting the piano's history. Like Wining Boy, the other member of the family's oldest living generation, Doaker offers a connection to the family's past through his stories.
Boy Willie (30) Berniece's brash, impulsive, and fast-talking brother. The thirty-year-old Boy Willie introduces the central conflict of the play. Coming from Mississippi, he plans to sell the family piano and buy the land his ancestors once worked as slaves. By selling the piano, he avenges his father, Boy Charles, who spent his life property-less.
Lymon - (29) Boy Willie's longtime friend. The twenty-nine-year-old Lymon is more taciturn than his partner, speaking with a disarming "straightforwardness." Fleeing the law, he plans to stay in the north and begin life anew. An outsider to the family, he functions particularly in the beginning of the play as a sort of listener, eliciting stories from the family's past. Obsessed with women, he will also appear prominently in his seduction of Berniece, where he helps bring her out of her mourning for her dead husband.
Maretha - Berniece's eleven-year-old daughter.
Avery Brown - (late 30's-40's) A preacher who is trying to build his congregation. Avery moves north once Berniece's husband dies in an attempt to court Berniece. Thirty-eight years old, he is honest and ambitious, having "taken to the city like a fish to water," and found opportunities unavailable to him in the rural South. Fervently religious, he brings Christian authority to bear in the exorcism of Sutter's ghost.
Wining Boy -(40's) A wandering, washed-up recording star who drifts in and out of his brother Doaker's household whenever he finds himself broke. ABILITY TO PLAY PIANO A DEFINITE PLUS
Grace - (20's) A young, urban woman whom Boy Willie and Lymon each try to pick up.
Familiarity with the script is strongly encouraged; sides will be provided for cold readings, monologues are not required. There are no appointments necessary; auditioners will be seen on a first come/first served basis. There is no pay/no fee.
The Story: Bearing the ornately carved faces of her enslaved ancestors, Berniece Charles's antique piano is her family's most treasured heirloom. Though it sits collecting dust, the option to sell it for land sparks a fierce debate with her exuberant brother Boy Willie, a Mississippi sharecropper.
Performances are February 18-27, 2011. Rehearsals will be held in the evening and weekend rehearsals as needed.
The Attic Ensemble is located just two blocks from the Grove Street PATH Station, in the Historic Barrow Mansion, 83 Wayne Street, Jersey City. There is free parking after 7 p.m. in the parking lot 1 ½ blocks away on Christopher Columbus Drive. For directions and information:
www.atticensemble.org; phone (201) 413-9200, e-mail: i
nfo@atticensemble.org.
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