Tuesday, July 19, 2016

Calling All Actors: Auditions Next Week at Heartland Theatre and Community Players

Heartland Theatre Company and Community Players Theatre have both announced that they'll hold auditions next week for upcoming shows. The dates overlap a bit -- Heartland's auditions will be held on the 24th and 25th, while Players will be doing their auditions on the 25th and 26th -- but not to worry. The shows they're casting could not be more different, so it seems unlikely anybody who is interested in one will also be trying out for the other.


First up, Heartland and director Don Shandow will be looking for three women for Sunil Kuruvilla's Fighting Words, a 2003 drama set in the small town of Merthyr Tydfil, Wales. Auditions are set for Sunday, July 24, from 4 to 8 pm, and Monday, July 25, from to 10 pm.

Fighting Words has a cast of three, with action involving two sisters -- Peg and Nia -- and their landlady, Mrs.  Davies. Heartland will be looking for actresses in the 20 to 30 range for Peg, approximately 25 to 35 for Nia, and 50 to 60 for Mrs. Davies, and everyone will need to be able to handle a Welsh accent. (Here's a short Youtube video of two actual sisters from Merthyr if you want to hear what they sound like and see a bit of the town in its current state.) As for the play... Here's what it's all about:
In September, 1980, three women in the tiny Welsh village of Merthyr Tydfil wait, worry and watch, pinning their hopes and dreams on a bantamweight boxer named Johnny Owen, who has traveled all the way from Wales to Los Angeles to fight for a world championship. Every man in town who could scrape up the money is in California with their favorite son, but sisters Peg and Nia and their landlady Mrs. Davies are left behind. To pass the time before the bout is on television, they bake, they talk – and they fight – about their futures and fears and how they live their lives in this sorrowful mining town.
Performances of Fighting Words are scheduled for September 8 to 24, 2016 at Heartland Theatre.


Over at Community Players, the comedy Boeing Boeing is in need of two men and three women. Director G. William Zorn and producer Chris Terven will hold auditions on Monday, July 25 and Tuesday, July 26, starting at 7 pm each night. Boeing Boeing is a silly, sexy farce -- very "Coffee, tea or me" if you remember that phrase -- about a playboy in Paris and the three flight attendants from different countries he's juggling. It was originally written in French in 1960 by playwright Marc Camoletti, but it was in English that it found its biggest audiences, with a smash London production that ran for seven years, a movie starring Tony Curtis and Jerry Lewis, and a revival in the new millennium that featured an all-star cast on Broadway. That cast included Bradley Whitford as a swinging bachelor living in a fab pad in Paris, with Mark Rylance as his clueless friend from the States, Christine Baranski as his housekeeper and Gina Gershon, Kathryn Hahn and Mary McCormack as the beautiful Italian, American and German women who are running in and out of the apartment. Rylance won another Tony for his Boeing Boeing performance. You can see descriptions of all the roles on the Players website, along with suggested ages for the various characters.

Community Players' production of Boeing Boeing will run from September 2 to 11, 2016.

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