|
|
||||||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
|
|||||
 Auditions |
|||||
Tuesday, Sept 2, 2008 from 4-7pm in the MiraCosta Theatre OUR TOWN & HEARTLAND (world premier) Please prepare one 1-2 minute contemporary dramatic monologue.
Our Town by Thornton Wilder Directed by Tracy Williams
HEARTLAND by Anita Simons/Lauren Simon Directed by Eric Bishop SYNOPSIS: From 1943 to1946, the United States held captured Prisoners of War (POWs) in prison camps throughout the U.S. Although imprisoned, these German, Italian and Japanese soldiers were permitted to work in factories and on farms as part of the American effort to re-educate the prisoners in the American way of life. Not widely known or acknowledged is the fact that from 1941 to 1945, the U.S. government also imprisoned nearly 11,000 German-Americans and 3,500 Italian-Americans. Unlike interred Japanese-Americans, many of these so-called enemy alien immigrants to the United States faced interrogation and internment conditions that were far worse than those faced by foreign nationals. Some of these prisoners were held in captivity even after World War II had ended, and more than 1,000 German-Americans, including innocent American-born children, were expatriated to Germany against their will. HEARTLAND is set on a small, family-run dairy farm in Wisconsin where, in March 1945, a German-born widow and her children are struggling to make ends meet after the family patriarch has died. When they receive notice from the War Manpower Commission offering two Prisoners of War to work their farm, it seems like an answer to the family’s prayers, but the arrival of these two strangers causes changes no one had anticipated. Based on true stories of many such arrests of German-American families during World War II, HEARTLAND explores what can happen when fear and prejudice pit neighbor against neighbor in times of war. A politically relevant drama with one set and a cast of four women, two - five men and one boy, the play is approximately 90 minutes.
CHARACTER BREAKDOWN:
|
|||||