Interested actors can audition this weekend for Summerville’s Flowertown Players’ 47th season featuring a lineup of shows ranging from dramatic plays to campy musicals. Those auditioning should prepare a one-minute monologue as well as 16 to 32 bars of music with a backing track to be considered for musicals.
Jason Olson became the artistic director this month after working with the theater company on and off for 11 years. He said he’s excited to kick off the new season with auditions, which will take place at 6 p.m. May 21-22 at the James F. Dean Community Theater in Summerville. To reserve an audition slot in-person or via video, sign up here.
Olson said he’s looking forward to seeing new and old faces during auditions and hopes to strengthen Flowertown Players’ connection to its Summerville and surrounding community in his new role as artistic director.
“We’re coming out strong with a powerful season. We’re really trying to make those community connections again that we’ve kind of let slip over the last few years for one reason or another.”
Upcoming performances
This month, Flowertown Players closes out season 46 with Curtains, a musical whodunnit which will run May 19-June 4. Later this summer, season 47 kicks off with Ruthless! The MusicaI, which will run August 11-27.
“Ruthless is a campy, melodramatic story about a little girl who wants to be a star and the lengths she goes to to make that happen,” Olson said. “There’s a murder of the star of the show, and the understudy takes over the role. And at the end it all comes together in hilarious Broadway fashion.”
Social Security, a contemporary comedy about a married couple of art dealers and their complicated familial relationships, takes the stage October 13-29.
Just before the holiday season December 1-17, the Flowertown Players will show Miracle on 34th Street, a play adapted from the 1947 film. Olson said the show will be fun to cast because the characters range in widely in age.
“That’s going to be a great one for the family, both to see and to act in,” he said. “We’ve got some acting families here in Charleston, and this is a good one where the parents and the kids can do a show together.”
The first show of the new year will be Flowertown Players’ production of The Glass Menagerie, the only Tennesse WIlliams play the theater has not yet produced. It takes the stage January 19-February 4. Olson said he’s excited to be showing this “Southern classic,” the work which catapulted Williams to fame.
The season closes with a performance of 9 to 5 playing May 3-19. The musical by Patricia Resnick features music and lyrics by Dolly Parton, including her hit song of the same name. “It’s all about feminism in the workplace,” Olson said, “and the production team putting it together will be mostly female. It’s going to be a great way to end our season.”
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