Jolly
Audition Information for NWTC's 2010
FEATS Entry: Jolly by David Mamet
Synopsis
Jolly is the second play in Mamet's three-play trilogy The Old Neighborhood. All three plays feature Bobby Gould, a character who also appears at various ages in the Mamet plays American Buffalo, Bobby Gould in Hell, and Speed-the-Plow. In The Old Neighborhood, Bobby, his marriage ending, returns to the neighborhood in Chicago where he grew up. In Jolly, which has been called Mamet's most autobiographical play, Bobby visits his sister "Jolly" (Julia) and her husband Carl. Bobby and Jolly stay up late into the night remembering, discussing, and reliving old grievances from their childhood and adolescence. The siblings are able to laugh at some memories, while others surface with renewed and searing rage; still others summon both extremes at once.
Characters and Play
Bobby: In his forties
Jolly: A few years younger
Carl: Jolly's husband
Bobby and Jolly are native Chicagoans and speak with American accents. Carl can be of any background and can be anywhere from a little younger than Jolly to several years older.
The play's theatricality lies in the characters' relationship and history as revealed through dialogue. This dialogue, which is rapid and overlapping, intercut with pauses, and often profane, peels away the characters' outer protective shells, exposing the rawness of their thoughts, fears, jealousies, resentments, etc.
Additional Information
Auditions will be held upstairs at the Odeon café (10 rue Munchen Tesch, L-2173, Luxembourg) on Saturday, 23 January 2010, from 16.00-18.00 (following the NWTC auditions for Twelve Angry Men). No advanced preparation is required: auditions will consist of readings from the script.
Erik Abbott will direct the production.