DUMMERSTON — Vermont Theatre Company announces auditions for the Neil Simon play California Suite at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Aug. 20, and Friday, Aug. 21, at the Evening Star Grange in Dummerston Center, and at 10 a.m. on Saturday, August 22, in the basement of the Dummerston Congregational Church (across the road from the Grange).
Robert DuCharme is the director of the show. He will be using four different casts, one for each of the four separate stories that take place in the same hotel room.
“By casting the play with four casts,” he said, “it is possible to cut down on rehearsal time and pressure for the people in the play. It would be fair to say that they would only have to learn lines for a one-act play.”
There are parts for five females and five males. Actors do not need to prepare anything for the audition.
In “Visitors from New York,” the first of the stories, Hannah Warren is a Manhattan workaholic who flies to Los Angeles to retrieve her teenaged daughter Jenny, after she leaves home to live with her successful screenwriter father, Bill. The bickering divorced couple is forced to decide what living arrangements are best for the girl.
In “Visitors from London,” Diana Barrie is a British actress and a first-time nominee for the Academy Award for Best Actress, an honor that could jump-start her faltering career, although she knows she doesn't have a chance of winning. She is in deep denial about the true nature of her marriage of convenience to Sidney Cochran, a once-closeted antique dealer who has become increasingly indiscreet about his sexual preference. As she prepares for her moment in the spotlight, her mood fluctuates from hope to panic to despair.
In “Visitors from Philadelphia,” conservative middle-aged businessman Marvin Michaels awakens to discover a prostitute named Bunny-an unexpected gift from his brother Harry-unconscious in his bed. With his wife Millie on her way up to the suite, he must find a way to conceal all traces of his uncharacteristic indiscretion.
In “Visitors from Chicago,” Dr. Chauncey Gump and his wife Lola, and Dr. Willis Panama and his wife Bettina, are taking a much-needed vacation together. Things begin to unravel quickly when everything seems to go wrong and the two men decide to settle their differences by engaging in a very competitive mixed doubles tennis match.
People who are interested in props, sound, stage-managing, and stage crew are also asked to attend.