Kirk Douglas Theatre 2011-12 Season – Audition Information Los Angeles
Equity Contract
Center Theatre Group | Los Angeles, CA
Seeking
Actors–open to ALL AGES, ETHNICITIES, and PERFORMERS WITH DISABILITIES.
A RAISIN IN THE SUN
CASTING: all roles cast, except for 2 Male Roles – MOVING MEN : African-American men 35-50s
‘THE CONVERT’
CASTING:
[ESTER] Female, Late teens (legal 18), precocious, strong-willed young African woman with a determined spirit. She is almost forced into an arranged marriage but manages to escape it with the chutzpah she naturally possesses and the help of relatives. She strongly is aligned to her family and culture but also becomes powerfully aligned to her newfound Catholic faith; she discovers her oratory gifts, transforming from a free-spirited village girl to a Colonially influenced impassioned evangelist. But her love and loyalty to her family and blood ties though in conflict with her new faith, culture and language never die. Speaks some Shona, actor must be willing to learn and speak scripted Shona (Zimbabwean native language). PARTIAL NUDITY (topless) at beginning and end of play “traditionally dressed in a nhembe (a goat skin skirt) and very modest beads only partially concealing her breasts.”
[MAI KUDA] Female, 40s -50s very traditional African woman, Chilford’s maid, she is deeply connected to her culture and family but will stand up for justice and when her brother attempts to marry her niece to a man she knows her deceased brother would not approve of she steps in to help her niece escape. Very smart and resourceful she knows how to get what she needs out of Chilford and convince him that she is sincere about her conversion to the Catholic faith, but when the Uprising comes it becomes glaringly obvious where her loyalties truly lie. Speaks some Shona, actor must be willing to learn and speak scripted Shona (Zimbabwean native language).
[CHILFORD] Male, 30s, African Man, A stalwart for the Catholic Church and all things brought and taught by the Western Colonial. He is a catechist for the Catholic Church, the only native to hold this position in the region. He is a pious man of great deliberation and precision, as though his calling comes with so much responsibility that it dictates his every movement. His English is that of one who has strained to sound as European as possible, though he can never fully escape his African intonations, his attempt to color his speech with as may British sayings and expressions as possible leads to several malapropisms of which he is wholly unaware. He is on a determined mission to bring Christianity, the English language and all the ways of the Colonial occupier to his people and his unrelenting passion to do so gains him enemies amongst the Africans and the label ‘bafu’ (traitor). He saves JEKESAI from a forced marriage and takes her on as his protégé, and sides with the Western colonial during the Uprising. He refuses to speak his native (Matebele) tongue except when under deep duress and its utterances are beyond his control.
[CHANCELLOR MUZONDA] Male 30s, African, a member of the Catholic Church and Interpreter for white mine owners, he grew up with Chilford and Prudence at the Catholic Mission in Bulawayo. A bit of a scoundrel, he is an African opportunist, the beginnings of the black upwardly mobile, his interest in his Christian God is a nominal one, whatever is needed to garner the white man’s trust, study his mechanisms of power and control and exult his learnings upon his own people, to his own capitalistic ends. He, like Chilford speaks strained and malapropism-ridden English; though his is perhaps a touch less strained. He is a charmer and a womanizer and accustomed to figuring out effective ways to obtain exactly what he wants.
[UNCLE] Male, Late 40s. very traditional African man; he attempts to marry his young niece to a much older man for the bride price he will receive in return. He is the new patriarch of the family after his older brother’s death and when he is denied his claim to his niece by colonial authority he swears revenge and when the uprising begins he is ready to exact it. Speaks some Shona, actor must be willing to learn and speak scripted Shona (Zimbabwean native language).
[KUDA] Male, 20s – 30s, African Man, Ester’s cousin and Mai Kuda’s son. A mine worker, and very close to his cousin, he helps her escape from a forced marriage along with his mother. He has a heart of gold and is ferociously dedicated to his family and people but broken by the imposition of colonial rule and forced menial labor. He is resentful about the imposition of Christianity and western morals. He becomes a fighter in the Uprising and caught in a moment of blind rage he creates a dilemma that he regrets but whose effects he cannot reverse. Speaks some Shona, actor must be willing to learn and speak scripted Shona.
Audition is for 2011-2012 Productions at CTG’s Kirk Douglas Theatre in CULVER CITY, CA.
Center Theater Group will be holding auditions on:
Monday, August 1st
10am-6pm
Lunch 1-2pm
Sign-in begins at 9am
Auditions will be held at the:
Music Center Annex
601 West Temple Street
Los Angeles, CA 90012
Corner of Temple & Grand