by Jessica Swale. Directed by Alice Han Thomas.
Performance dates and venue :
Evenings at 7.30pm : Wednesday 6 – Saturday 9 January and Tuesday 12 – Saturday 16 January
Matinées at 3pm on Saturdays 9 and 16 January
To be performed at the Tower Theatre, Stoke Newington
Audition dates and times :
Auditions will take place on Sunday 11 October between 2pm and 6pm, and Tuesday 13 October from 6pm onwards at the Tower Theatre, Stoke Newington.
Audition slots are 90 minutes long, and will be held as group auditions. We ask that you please read the play before auditioning, as this will help you (and us) during the audition.
Auditions are for Tower Theatre Company Members only.
Please note that you cannot audition for any show if you have not passed a company audition. If you would like to join the Company, please contact our membership/auditions secretary Stephen Brasher here for more information.
For your audition we will ask you to prepare a short scene from the script that we will send to you once you have completed the online sign up form. These need not be learnt by heart, we just want to get a sense of your take on the character(s). As some of the roles will be doubled, depending on which role you audition for, you will also need to read for other roles. This is reflected in the online sign up form, and the casting information below.
Recalls will take place from 6pm onwards on the Friday 16 October, by invitation only (exact timings TBC).
To sign up for an audition, please complete our online sign up form. If you have any questions about the process, please feel free to email the director at [email protected].
About the Show
Cambridge, 1896. At Girton College, the first university institution in Britain to admit female students, four brilliant young women study ferociously. Between the trials and tribulations of education, love and adolescence, we follow these young women as they fight to be recognised as equals. As they match their male peers, grade for grade, they are denied their rightful degrees, and instead labelled “blue stockings”. A derogatory term for female intellectuals. Will these women succeed in winning the vote, and receiving their degrees?
Casting Information
We encourage all auditionees to audition for the role that they feel best suits their skills.
We have no preconceived ideas as to the ethnicity of any role. We will be working with accents during rehearsals. During auditions, for most roles we are looking for RP accents, aside from Maeve and Billy Sullivan, who will need working class, Irish accents.
Some of the roles will be doubled, and will be used for ensembles as well. Please check below the roles which will be doubled, and thus may also be part of the ensemble, to decide whether that is something you are prepared to do.
Tess Moffat – Playing age: 18-23 Gender: Female A curious girl. She goes on a journey of discovery, battling with the sacrifice it took at the time for a woman to be in higher education, whilst still being buffeted by the rough winds of young love.
Celia Willbond – Playing age: 18-23 Gender: Female A fragile hard worker. She likes to play by the rules, though she is fiercely loyal to her friends.
Carolyn Addison – Playing age: 18-23 Gender: Female An early bohemian, easy going young woman. She is extremely well travelled and carries this accrued wisdom with her.
Maeve Sullivan (doubled) – Playing age: 18-23 Gender: Female A mystery. A bright young woman from a disadvantaged background. She takes the fall for the cause. Irish accent needed. / Lady in Cafe – Gender: Female A lady in cafe. Opposes the girls.
Ralph Mayhew (doubled) – Playing age: 18-23 Gender: Male A student at Trinity. The love interest of Tess. Though he seems to be romantic and everything she would want at first, he ultimately betrays her, scared of facing the politics of the situation should he stay with her. / Professor Anderson – Gender: Male A lecturer at Trinity.
Lloyd (doubled) – Playing age: 18-23 Gender: Male A student at Trinity. He is the primary antagonist among the four girls. He represents the fierce, deeply ingrained institutional opposition to women receiving degrees at Cambridge University. / Professor Radleigh – Gender: Male A board member at Trinity and an important man. He is unsympathetic to the cause of degrees for women.
Holmes (doubled) – Playing age: 18-23 Gender: Male Lloyd’s right-hand-man, though he questions whether his friend goes too far at times. He ultimately rejects Lloyd, rising to a higher moral standpoint. / Billy Sullivan – Gender: Male Maeve’s brother who comes to fetch her home. Irish accent needed.
Edwards (doubled) – Playing age: 18-23 Gender: Male Edwards is clumsy, impressionable, and often the victim of Lloyd and Holmes’s pranks. He has a terrible time attempting to chat up women, sings drunken songs, and is secretly terrified of the strict chaperone, Miss Bott. / Professor Collins – Gender: Male A lecturer at Trinity. He shows he has a softer side, when he struggles to conceal a smile when Tess is given a second chance.
Will Bennett (doubled) – Playing age: 18-23 Gender: Male An old family friend of Tess. He has promised her father that he will look after her, which he always looks to do, even if he does not fully understand her. He falls in love with her. / Waiter – Gender: Male Waiter in cafe.
Elizabeth Welsh – Playing age: Late 40s/Early 50s Gender: Female Mistress of Girton College. A fiercely protective leader who masks her deep devotion to her female students behind a stern, authoritative exterior.
Dr Maudsley (doubled) – Playing age: 40+ Gender: Male A renowned psychiatrist, he does not believe that women should be educated, and as such represents the rigid, institutionalised sexism of the medical and academic establishments. / Mr Peck – Gender: Male The gardener and maintenance man at Girton. / Husband – Gender: Male Lady in cafe’s husband.
Mr Banks – Playing age: 30+ Gender: Male A brilliant lecturer, he teaches at Trinity and Girton. Unlike his deeply conservative peers, he is a passionate, forward-thinking ally for the women at Girton.
Miss Blake (doubled) – Playing age: 30s Gender: Female A fantastic lecturer at Girton. She is progressive in her thinking and politics. She sympathises with the work of the suffragettes. / Minnie – Gender: Female The housemaid at Girton. She is friendly and helps the girls out, even if it means bending the rules. / Librarian – Strict librarian who takes their job very seriously.
Miss Bott (doubled) – Playing age: 40+ Gender: Female The women of Girton’s chaperone. She gives an exterior of strictness, though there is evidence that she is more aware of the mischief than she lets on. / Mrs Lindley – Gender: Female A shopkeeper in the haberdashery.
Rehearsals
Rehearsals will take place at the Tower Theatre on Tuesday and Friday evenings from 7pm and on Sundays between 10am-2pm beginning on Sunday 25 October with a full-company read through (from 10am).
You will be required for the Get-In Day on Sunday 3 January, Technical Rehearsals on Monday 4 January, and Dress Rehearsals on the Tuesday 5 January leading up to the performance dates.
A full rehearsal schedule with confirmed rehearsal times will be created once the casting process is complete. Please make sure you declare at your audition any dates that you are unavailable during the rehearsal period, as rehearsal availability may be considered as part of the casting process.
 Alice Han-Thomas is a writer and director with an MA in Screenwriting from UAL. She was previously an assistant director on After Life, and her short film Milkarma premiered at the BFI IMAX with a special mention from the Writers’ Guild. She has also facilitated workshops at the National Youth Theatre and works in the Cine Lumière at the Institut Français. |
Costume Design : Zoë George
Lighting Design : Samuel Littley
Sound Design: Matthew Ibbotson