THE WITCH THAT WASN’T. Casting Call for New Writing Theatre Performance.

Once upon a time at the edge of a lake, at the edge of a wood...

Image: Daniel.Stark via flickr (Creative Commons)

 

Dear creatives!

Myself and the THE WITCH THAT WASN’T team are currently seeking 3-4 female and 1-2 male actors for an initial creative development of this contemporary, dark, musical folk tale. The development will take place over three days in January 2015, culminating in a rehearsed reading on the final day for an invited audience. This is a Playlab supported dramaturgical development.

Dates, details & roles below. To apply, please email alice@aliceflynn.org along with your acting CV, headshot and, if available, links to your showreel/website.

Many thanks,

Alice & the TWTW team.

 
Production title: THE WITCH THAT WASN’T
Production Type: Independent 
Production Phase: Initial creative development (dramaturgical)
Posted on: 02/12/14
Production location: Brisbane, QLD
Company website: aliceflynn.org
Director: Alice Flynn
Dramaturg: Louise Gough
Writer: Alice Flynn
Email: alice@aliceflynn.org
Compensation: No. Unpaid.
 

KEY DATES

Creative Development Phase one:

January 12, 14 & 16, 2015, daytimes. (TBC, approx. 9:00 – 5:00 PM each day).

 
Notes

Actors who can sing and/or play an instrument are especially encouraged to apply, as are those with a movement/dance/physical theatre practice.

Synopsis

THE WITCH THAT WASN’T is a dark folktale for the outsider in us all. It speaks to the heart and the heat of being human as it explores perceptions – and distortions – of love, lust and all that lies between. Under the stars  our storyteller guides us, invites us into the tale: a witch is in love with the moon. Villagers stalk her from the shadows, hiding from themselves; Seamus, the most dangerous, commits an act that sees the witch flee for her life. Haunted and hunted as she is, the audience journey with the witch as she discovers whether she – and love – can survive.

 
Character BIOS

WITCH. GENDER: FEMALE. AGE: 25-35

The Witch lives at the edge of the woods. She’s independent, strong and longs for the love of the moon and not much else. That is, until she meets with the dangers beyond her own home and she is forced to journey into the depths of her self, whilst facing the threats that grasp at her from darkness.

  
SEAMUS. GENDER: MALE. AGE: 25-40

Seamus, a woodcutter, is desperate to prove himself as a man worthy of approval and love. He’s haunted by the ghost of his mother (as is his unforgiving father, the Mayor) and his own shadows…which draw him further into the night, where he would take the Witch with him.

 
STORYTELLER. GENDER: MALE/FEMALE. AGE: 28 +

The Storyteller is otherworldly, beyond time and of the stars. He/she exists to hold space for and share the tales of all humanity with depth, light-heartedness and, of course, a little bit of wonder and magic.

 
VILLAGER 1. GENDER: FEMALE. AGE: 30-50

Villager 1 is married to Peter, who’s in bed with another. She’s angry at the world and bitter about love. She’s a curtain-twitcher who cares so much about what others see or say, she forgets to care for herself. The Witch threatens her sense of morality and is an easy target for her sharp, spiked words. But will sharp words be enough to satisfy her bitterness?

 
VILLAGER 2. GENDER: FEMALE. AGE: 20-30

Villager 2 is desperate to wed and craves love but doesn’t yet know what it is or how to share it. She’s obsessed with her best dress and finding opportunities to meet suitors. She’s blind to her real needs and desires, until a certain independent woman comes her way.



 

Twelve Days of Christmas: 1

A Very Merry Christmas to You!

Here we are at the last of our twelve days of Christmas. Thank you for your presence on this winter  adventure in words. I hope you, yes, you, have a restful, playful, heartening holiday.

Alice x

 

A Partridge in a Pear Tree

 

On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me

a memory.

Everyone’s lying on the sofas and the floor

stuffed fat with too much food

and he comes in

wearing a borrowed jumper

telling me how cold it is in the garden

and that

I should come and look

I’m playing scrabble with my siblings

but I’m losing so I say

okay

and we walk through the hallway

with its wood chip wallpaper and

peeling paint.

The kitchen’s still steamy and the big mirror’s

dripping wet.

So I draw us on it.

I make his ears look bigger and

my hair look curlier

and we both have dots for eyes.

We put on some wellies

not ours

that are by the back door and

I wrestle with the bolt at the bottom

and then we’re outside

on the patio.

It’s so cold

a cold that I sometimes miss.

It wakes us up.

The sky is

familiar grey

I like it

not too bright

not too blue

not all the time.

We look at the veggie patch and

we don’t find much that

doesn’t look like sticks and twigs.

We go to the pond.

Together

we lift up the wire protector

which keeps the hedgehogs from drowning.

We poke at the ice

but don’t break it

just to see if anything’s moving underneath.

He starts making up a song

and

I join in

we put the cover back on the pond

so the little ones don’t fall in.

The song sometimes rhymes and

sometimes it doesn’t

and it makes us laugh.

He points to a robin in the holly tree

he points as he sings:

‘And a

partridge in a pear tree.’

 

 

 

Twelve Days of Christmas: 2

Two Turtle Doves

Have you ever seen a spotted turtle-dove? It has a black collar with white spots on it. It looks like it’s from a lady’s dress or a pair of butterfly wings. It’s the prettiest of all the doves.

I once saw a turtle-dove standing over another dead turtle-dove because it didn’t want to leave it.

I know about birds because my Grandad gave me his bird book. He gave it to me so I can keep looking up birds even when I’m not at his house because he won’t be in.

Grandad dresses smartly and only wears shirts with collars and long sleeves and they have to have a pocket. He says a shirt without a pocket on the front is no use. He puts a pen in the pocket and his glasses. His other pockets, in his trousers, have got hankies in them. One for his nose and one for a spare in case a lady faints or cries and she needs to use it. Sometimes Grandad wears a suit, like on Christmas and at weddings or special birthdays and funerals.

Turtle-doves make a cooing sound and other doves can hear it from really far away. I know this because I heard one by the river and then I walked to the library with Grandad, which is ages away, and we saw another turtle-dove cooing in someone’s garden. We watched it and listened really carefully and could hear the other dove, the one at the river, calling all the way back.

Grandad told mum the food is crummy at the hospital so Mum brought him some biscuits. But she can’t do it every day because she’s too busy and Christmas is coming and she hasn’t wrapped our presents or done the food shop yet. I asked her what food is she going to get at the shops and is she going to get any cakes. She said Christmassy food like mince pies with a cherry on top and a pudding for the adults – and I won’t like it so I can have swiss rolls instead – and some chocolates and some nuts and probably something nice to drink. And a big fat chicken. But I don’t have to eat that because I’m vegetarian. I will probably get Linda McCartney sausages because that’s what I get every year.

Grandad likes birds but he also eats them. I don’t think he’s eaten a turtle-dove.

I can’t remember Granny’s cooking but she always had lovely cakes from the shops like battenberg and butterfly cakes. She kept them in a yellow tin and now the tin is on top of Grandad’s bookcase and no one’s allowed to touch it except Grandad.

Granny would hum a bit when she poured the tea and Grandad would say ‘Oh my favourite tune!’ and Granny would laugh and kiss him on the head. And when she finished pouring the tea she always, always sat next to Grandad on the couch and I always sat next to them. Even when it was Christmas and everybody was over and there was no room for everyone on the couch, I always sat next to them. 

Twelve Days of Christmas: 3

Three French Hens

A woman in her late seventies, with highly coiffured white hair, sits upright in a winged armchair next to a small, three-legged table on which a telephone stands. She wears a navy blue cardigan over a baby blue blouse, a string of pearls and a dark blue pencil skirt with opaque navy tights and patent low-heeled shoes.  The woman, Penelope, holds the phone to her ear whilst scanning the piece of paper in her hand.

We hear ‘Greensleeves’ for a minute or two as it plays through the telephone. It stops abruptly.

PENELOPE:      Ah! Hello, Customer Service? Excellent. My name is Penelope Henley. Kate? Thank you, Kate. I’m hoping you can help clear up what I can only describe as a very unfortunate misunderstanding. Quite an incredulous situation, Kate.

Thank you. I’m sure you will.

Now, my daughter insisted I employ a personal shopper this year – as if I’m too old to go to the shops by myself – anyway, I did what she asked and now I’m paying for it – password?

Oh.

Is there a password?

My daughter set up the account.

No, in my name. Penelope – wait a minute.

I would have told her.

Camilla Parker Bowles?

No?

Charles and Diana? No? Hm.

1953, the Queen’s coronation, that must be it. Is it?

Royalist? No, I’m not an anything-ist.

Seventy-three Baxter Avenue.

Is this really necessary?

1939. Ellen, Penelope Ellen Henley.

Thank goodness!

Yes, let’s get back to it, I agree. 

Laurence. He was the young man who arranged everything, he did the shopping, he took down the order. I don’t know where he was from – he was very polite, ever so friendly but, well, he had a slight accent. France? Germany perhaps?

Laurence. Except he said it sort of: Loronse. Loh-ronse.

Is this helping?

Turkey, schnapps, champagne, the usual. Yes, all of the food was exactly as I asked. And nearly all the gifts – to his credit, Kate, for a man he had exceptional taste. He chose a very chic dress for my daughter, modern but modest you might say. I simply adore the earrings he chose for my daughter-in-law, not that she deserves them but that’s another story.

Yes, Kate, that’s exactly right, extended family, never easy is it? One does what one can.

Now, Kate. It seems Laurence, Loronse, has misinterpreted a rather important part of the order.

Yes.

No, he read the order back to me, twice in fact. But everything I heard, was what I thought I had asked for. Not so, Kate, not so. 

I have three sons, you see.

Edgar, John and Alan. They’re all musical.

No, my daughter – Elizabeth – no, not a musical bone in her body.

But she’s very good at bowls.

My sons are all musical and all members of a local brass band. It’s quite a prestigious group. All male too: twelve drummers, eleven bagpipe players, pipers – I never know…neither of those are brass are they? Well anyway, I know they have seven trumpet players because they were in the paper, Kate. The trumpeters – and the drummers – they were all part of a wedding proposal. One of those flash mob things. So public. 

Everything’s bigger these days. Can’t anyone propose quietly over a glass of bubbly? 

 

Are you married, Kate?

Well, be careful how he asks you.

Even one trumpet and you know he’s hiding something.

I blame Hollywood. And supermarkets. Bigger, better, buy-one-get-one-free.

Sorry, Kate. Sorry.

 

Oh.

No, we can’t make you late for your lunch break. I’ll get straight to the point – although you did ask me about the boys Kate, you did ask!

The boys, the men I should say. My sons: Edgar, John, Alan. I wanted to get them something extra special this Christmas. There’s so much to celebrate. Baby George, advances in technology, a hot summer – there’s much to celebrate –

Oh but I’d rather talk with you, not your colleague. I feel I can trust you to follow this matter up, Kate. I’ll get straight to the point, Kate. 

This morning, the delivery man, well, he forced me to sign, he made me sign for them, he said he couldn’t take them back.

Well, you may ask, Kate, you may ask.

I specifically ordered three French horns, one for each of my sons and that’s what – I’m sure of it – that’s exactly what Laurence, Loronse, said when he read the order back.

Only now I’ve got a large cage in the hallway, and they’re very pretty Kate, quite striking to look at, but I never once asked for a large cage containing three French hens.

What would I do with three French hens, Kate?

 

What would I like? Oh, a refund or exchange…gift vouchers?

 

I’d like three French horns, Kate.

That is what I would like. 

I’m sorry.

 

The manager? Yes, thank you Kate.

I knew I could count on you.

Twelve Days of Christmas: 4

Four Calling Birds

Black fingers found an opening in the clouds and reached in ripping out insides, throwing rain to the thirsty earth of the hinterland below. On they flew, four corvid brothers, beaks tearing at the storm-heavy skies. They had heard, in caws and croaks, the bush fires were coming. Mouths of smoke and teeth of sparks, fireballs launching from tree to tree, swallowing them whole, belching out charred remains: the bones of the bush.

Haunted by their own form, by the memory of flesh and the lives they lost, the four brothers cried out urging others to join them. The height of summer, the heat of winter. Four calling birds, a curse of forever-flight turned to a gift.

Twelve Days of Christmas: 5

Five Gold Rings

Five gold rings. One for each winter he’d come to me across the sea on his sailing ship. Finding me at first frost; gone before the darkest day.  Leaving me wet, anchored to the shore, waves pushing me away. Five gold rings. Each holding the hope he will take me as his winter bride once more.

 

 

Twelve Days of Christmas: 6

Six Geese A-Laying

 

Christmas List.

He kissed/she kissed

a frog

with a golden ball

rolling in from the wrong fairy tale

it was an egg

rolling on to the wrong Christmas song

melting into five golden rings or

flaking gilt leaves

autumn into winter

 

Just an egg again

that falls inevitably

 – gravity –

out of one of

six geese

a-laying.

Egg cracks open.

A laying on of hands

faith healer

sweating blood

hoping to bring the silence of snow

this Christmas.

 

She kissed/he kissed

a frog

and waited.

It grew golden hair

plaited into thick rope

as rough as straw

as strong as steel cable

it held their weight

as they scaled down

the tower

waving goodbye to their

green true love

who never did become

anything other

than a smiling

boss-eyed

frog

unaware of their wanting

more.

But they knew a man

with a bag of magic beans…