Two Rooms
By: Lee Blessing
Directed by Adam Adolfo
Audition Dates
Sunday, July 1st – 7:00
Monday, July 2nd – 7:00
You do NOT need to attend both audition days.
About the Play
The two rooms of the title are a windowless cubicle in Beirut where an American hostage is
being held by Arab terrorists and a room in his home in the United States, which his wife has
stripped of furniture so that, at least symbolically, she can share his ordeal. In fact the same room serves for both and is also the locale for imaginary conversations between the hostage and his wife, plus the setting for the real talks she has with a reporter and a State Department official. The wife is goaded by unforeseen developments to speak out against government policy and, in doing, triggers the tragic series of event that brings the play to its startling conclusion. In the end there are no winners, only losers, and the sense of futility and despair that comes when peopleof good will realize that logic, compassion and fairness have become meaningless when dealing with those who would commit such barbarous acts so willingly.
There are casting opportunities for 2 men and 2 women.
Questions or Comments? Contact the director at adam.adolfo@gmail.com
Audition Process
I will assign each actor a monologue from the show to deliver. It does not need to be memorized.
I am always looking for stage presence, delivery, and an ability to change internal motivations
without being contrived or overly aggressive. Following monologues, some actors will be asked
to do cold readings from the script.
Rehearsals and Conflicts
Rehearsals are typically Sunday afternoons and Monday through Thursday late afternoons and/or evenings, depending on schedules. Usually not every actor needs to be at every rehearsal. I’ll know more about scheduling once the show has been cast. Actors will be required to attend ALL rehearsals the last two weeks of the production.
Please provide a schedule of conflicts at auditions. I will attempt to work around conflicts if I
am notified well in advance. Absences, tardiness, lack of preparation for rehearsal, and lack of
advance notice of conflicts can result in an actor being fired from the production.
The Characters
Michael: Educator (History), Hostage, longing
Walker: Reporter, passionate, sympathetic, wants a story
Lainie: Educator (Natural Sciences) Married to Michael, devoted
Ellen: A representative of the State Department, sometimes cold, but needs to be sympathetic
These characters are malleable. Trust your instincts. Read the script.
Audition Scenes
The two big pieces of this audition are scenes and monologues. Be familiar with these scenes and
be prepared with a monologue.
1.) WALKER, LAINIE, and, ELLEN: Page 13-15
2.) LAINIE and WALKER: Page 17-19
3.) ELLEN and LAINIE: Page 20-22
4.) ELLEN and LAINIE Page 31-32
Monologues
MICHAEL – Page 15
I ask all the time, ?Why did we stay here? Why did we stay here? Why?? (A beat.) I look back
now and can’t believe we stayed. Can’t believe we actually sat there at the University
and said, ?One last term. Then we’ll leave.? One last term. I wonder if we would’ve left
even then. I wonder if somehow, some part of us even liked the danger. Or was in awe
of what we were witnessing. I mean, why does anyone stay? This city’s in the hands
of boys. Teenagers roam the streets carrying AK-47’s and somebody stays? I don’t
know if there’s ever been a city that has for this long been such a horror. That’s taken
itself apart brick by brick, life by life. And so many of us stayed. We walked down the
street, through the rubble, past the checkpoints, past the bombings—we had days full of
ordinary moments. Amid—what?—devils from Hell. Boys who might shoot you the next
moment. Cars that might drive up, park and explode. (With a growing tension that finally
breaks through.) And none of us seemed ready to say, ?Leave it. Let us out of here! Please,
God anything but this! Stop it!” (A beat. He recovers himself.) And none of us was ever quite
ready to leave.
LAINIE – Page 16
(She is showing slides)
This is a hotel in Beirut near where we lived. It was destroyed in some shelling a couple of
months before… before he was taken. (A new slide) A car bombing. Michael used to take
pictures as he walked along. He wasn’t looking for these kinds of things. You just couldn’t avoid them. People at the University told him it was dangerous. It made people notice him. Even more, I mean. And he did stop a few weeks before… (Another slide) This guy commanded a whole block. He liked Michael. He wanted to pose. (Another slide) Michael said he could’ve taken this picture a hundred times. I’m not sure what it was about her. He didn’t know her. He saw something different as he passed. Maybe the sun’s shining on her in a different way. Maybe it’s something about the way she’s standing, or—whatever it is, all the values just seem to… hold you.
ELLEN - Page 29
These men, all kidnap victims, are of course undergoing dehumanizing conditions in their false imprisonment. No one denies this. They are being held by men who would as soon kill them as anything else. Yet, since 1984 out of the total of more than sixty foreigners taken, only a few have died. Over thirty have been released. We in State have to believe that the kidnappers are no more interested in dead hostages than we are. That ultimately the situation will be resolved— after a presidential election here, or a shift in the military or political situation there or whatever. A break will come. But if I’m wrong, if these men in fact all suffer torture and die as a direct result of this country’s policy in the Middle East, I must be ready to accept that too. American citizens have to realize that when we take a risk, the U.S. government can’t always save us. That the time comes when we—on an individual basis—will simply have to pay.
MICHAEL – Page 39
Sometimes I wake up with the most intense desire to know what day it is. Sunday? Thursday?
I feel like I’m going to die the next minute if I don’t find out. Other times I’ll wake up and
suddenly realize that months have gone by—must have gone by—since I last had a conscious
thought about time. It makes me feel like the astronaut who travels forty years at the spee of
light and then returns, no older. ?What’s happened to everyone?? he must think. ?Time must
be for them, not me.? I never thought of time as a coat you could take off and put on
again. Too cold to live without it—so we all keep it on. We hug it to ourselves, because
if we can’t… (A beat.) Time is change. That’s all it is. When there’s no change. When there’s no change…Yesterday one of my guards told me I’d been here three years. (A beat.) I didn’t know what he meant.
