Cuckfield Dramatic Society
Please circulate!
Auditions (For October 2019) This Week!
This will be part of a double bill of two one-act plays, and are holding open auditions on Tue 11th and Wed 12th of June
at the White Harte in Cuckfield (see here for details).
The Bear
A comedy by Anton Chekhov – see details
- This will be accompanied in October by another one-act play which will be announced shortly.
Audition Dates:
- Tuesday 11th June – 8pm
- Wednesday 12th June – 8pm
(These dates are now ONLY for The Bear.
Auditions for the other play will be announced again in due course.)
- Scripts will be provided but can be emailed on request.
- The Bear co-directors: Hazelle Woodhurst & Simon Perkins
- Contact us if you can’t make either date!
- Non-CDS members are welcome to audition!
- Please feel free to circulate this further!
Audition Venue
-
Ye White Harte Inne, (in the meeting room at the rear), South Street, Cuckfield, RH17 5LB
Performance Dates
- First show at the Queen's Hall in Cuckfield will be on Tuesday 29th or Wednesday 30th October (TBC)
- The last show will be on Friday 1st November 2019
- As usual this is half term week, but there will be no Saturday Show because of clashes with Fireworks and Halloween Parties, and the Veteran Car Run that weekend!
The Bear
Characters
- Popova – Romantic, sentimental, a young widow, in mourning for her late husband.
- 20’s to late 30’s/ early 40’s
- Smirnov – Brutish, (Bear-like) landowner, who has come to collect on a debt.
- Late 30’s – late 40’s/early 50’s
- Luka – Manservant to Popova. Gentle but with excellent comic timing.
- Late 50’s –60’s/early 70’s
The Bear: An Overview
The Bear (or sometimes The Boor) is one of Anton
Chekhov’s lesser-known plays, but it is is an excellent representative
of a “Farce in One-Act”.
Fast-paced and with biting dialogue, its
comedy involves exaggerated emotions that quickly turn into their
opposites. Popova fancies herself inconsolably bereaved, while Smirnov
considers himself a man’s man. But could it be that they start to
develop feelings for each other?
A Synopsis of “The Bear”
The action begins at Yelena Ivanovna Popova’s house, as she is seen looking at a photograph of her late husband. Her manservant, Luka, tries to comfort her and encourage her to finally leave the house, a year after her husband’s death. Popova stubbornly refuses, citing the pretext that she must remain forever faithful to her husband—as he had never been to her.
A bell rings and Gregory Stepanovich Smirnov enters the scene, claiming that he has come on urgent business and asks Popova to return the money owed to him by her late husband. As she does not have money at the house and is not in the “mood” to deal with financial matters, she tells him to return the day after tomorrow.
Angered by her casual response, Smirnov refuses to leave until she repays the debt. They engage in a series of passionate arguments: Smirnov accuses women of dishonesty and of making false claims to equality, while Popova makes the argument personal, by calling Smirnov a “bear” for his boorish manners. Smirnov exclaims that if Popova, as a feminist, really wants equality, he will give it to her—in the form of a duel! He soon realises though much to his frustration, that he is beginning to have feelings for this fiery creature…
Written, published, and performed in 1888, Chekhov’s play reflects on and pokes fun at liberal discourses in mid- to late-nineteenth-century Russia. With its fast-paced, biting dialogue, comedy and exaggerated emotions that quickly turn into their opposites, this three-character drama is both gripping and funny!