Auditions for Fall Production
The Edward King House Senior Center announced the audition dates for its upcoming Fall production of Glen Berger’s Underneath the Lintel under the direction of Abby Adams. A one man or woman show the revolves a sole character—the Librarian— who embarks on a quest to find out who anonymously returned a library book that is 113 years overdue. A clue scribbled in the margin of the book and an unclaimed dry-cleaning ticket then take him or her on a mysterious adventure that spans the globe and the ages. The show is scheduled to run from November 17th to the 20th in the Other Space at the Edward King House.
SETTING & CHARACTER
Setting: Here
Time: Now
Set: THE LIBRARIAN has rented the space for the night, and didn’t have much to spend on it. Perhaps the auditorium we’re in has been “dark” for some time, or perhaps the theater is “between shows”. Props and other detritus from other shows can litter the back of the stage, or be seen in an exposed back room. An air of dilapidation would be fine. Perhaps THE LIBRARIAN is giving this lecture in a seedier part of town, on a rainy night, to four or five down-and-outs more interested in getting dry from the rain than listening to a lecture by a Dutchman. Over the course of the evening however, the “lecture” should imperceptibly turn into “theater”. The detritus, unnoticed and seemingly unimportant at first, can unexpectedly take on significance, alluding to scenes and history mentioned in the play. The lighting can become warmer, more “theatrical”, etc, and what seemed like a random strewing of objects, or a random water stain on the wall, for instance, can turn out to be not so random after all.
Character: Dutch because: The Dutch have a wonderfully bureaucratic streak in them (or so I’m told). They also tend to have a facility for other European languages, and I’ve known more than one person from the Netherlands who had remarkable English, with a nearly imperceptible accent. Point is, the accent should be very light, and the actor should pay more attention to developing the “idiolect”, meaning “an individual’s unique way of speaking”. Like the set, the character should imperceptibly transform over the evening. One last note: THE LIBRARIAN’s narrative is written, generally, in the past tense. However, the less the narrative is actually presented in the past tense, the better. Immediacy, I think, is key to giving this play some theatrical life. As THE LIBRARIAN narrates how he found a claim ticket in the Baedeker’s, for instance, he can “find” the claim ticket all over again. Without sacrificing pacing, of course, the goal is to make THE LIBRARIAN’s saga, in the end, nothing like a lecture, but rather, something that is happening now.
