Bright Star Auditions

Tuesday | April 7 | 4:30–9:00 pm
Wednesday | April 8 | 4:30–9:00 pm
BDACT Fine Arts Center

Reserve your spot and prepare your audition today to be a part of our area high school production of Bright Star.

Any current high school student is invited to audition for this summer’s production of Bright Star. Students will check in at the BDACT lobby with our Stage Manager prior to their signed-up audition time. When prompted, students will individually audition with 1-2 minutes of a prepared song and their prepared read. They will then wait back in the lobby until their whole group is prepared to return and work through a bit of taught choreography.

Choose your time on the SignUpGenius link and complete the online audition form ahead of time. Audition form, time sign-up, and prepared read are all found online. Students are also asked to bring in a conflict calendar (also linked in audition form and sign-up genius) to help with rehearsal scheduling.

Participants can expect to return for our all-cast read-through on Tuesday, April 14. The first two weeks of rehearsal times have been marked on the conflict calendar, as well as tech rehearsals, dress rehearsals, and performances. Students are asked to do their best to make those times a priority even before auditions. Rehearsals will typically be in the 4-6 pm window once school is out for the summer.

Character Descriptions:

ALICE MURPHY –(Mezzo-Soprano)- Plays both 16-17 and 36-37. Alice at age 36-37 is an editor of a southern literary magazine; intelligent, attractive, professional – but with an air of melancholy. Young Alice at age 16-17 is rebellious, high-spirited, adventurous – looking to break out of small-town life and experience the world. She must be a very strong singer and comfortable in folk and bluegrass styles.

BILLY CANE –(Tenor)- A young soldier returning home from WWII; an aspiring young writer; fresh, open, optimistic, charming, and a little naïve.

DADDY CANE –(Tenor)- Billy’s father. A widower. Spry, good looking. Kind hearted, if a bit lonely.

MARGO CRAWFORD –(Soprano)- A small-town bookstore owner; a childhood friend of Billy’s who now harbors romantic feelings towards him; a natural beauty with a keen intellect.

MAX –(non-singer)- A customer at Margo’s bookstore, at first, he has a crush on Margo, but later becomes Edna’s beau.

FLORENCE –(Mezzo-Soprano)- An employee at Margo’s bookstore and a childhood friend of both Billy and Margo.

EDNA –(Mezzo-Soprano)- An employee at Margo’s bookstore.

DARYL AMES –(Bari-Tenor)- An assistant at a literary magazine. Funny, with a dry and officious sense of humor. Insecure, and perhaps a bit socially awkward, but endearing and innately likeable.

LUCY GRANT –(Soprano)- A junior editor at a literary magazine. An ambitious, professional young “modern” career woman of the 1940’s. Strong, forthright and provocative with a sharp sense of humor.

MAMA MURPHY –(Mezzo-Soprano)- Alice’s mother. A caretaker to her family and her rural community. A warm, loving, sensible woman. Hardworking, with great inner strength and compassion.

DADDY MURPHY –(Baritone)- Alice’s father; an authoritative and a stern disciplinarian; devoutly religious, hard-working, a poor but proud farmer.

MAYOR JOSIAH DOBBS –(Baritone)- The Mayor of Zebulon; a political and financial powerbroker – distinguished, an imposing and controlling presence; has a genuine interest in protecting his son’s future and his family name, but in doing so, is ultimately pushed to a point of extreme and irrevocable cruelty.

JIMMY RAY DOBBS –(Tenor)- plays both age 18-20 and 38-40. Jimmy Ray in his early 20s in flashbacks is Mayor Dobbs’ son and young Alice’s beau; handsome, boyishly charming, well-built and intelligent; from a family of wealth and power and is being groomed by his father for a similar future in the family business; an independent thinker who is not afraid to stand up to his father for what he believes in; he has a sense of personal responsibility and morality as well as a deep reserve of passion and emotion. The same actor will also play an adult Jimmy Ray at age 38-40.

STANFORD –(Bari-Tenor)- Loyal assistant to Mayor Josiah Dobbs

DR. NORQUIST –(non-singer) The local family doctor in Zebulon