The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood
20th–24th May
Directed by Lucy Pitman-Wallace

Homer’s 3,000-year-old story of Odysseus and his eventful voyage home from the Trojan Wars is world famous, but what is known of his queen, Penelope, beyond the fact that she waited for him for 20 years and fooled a palace full of greedy, brutish suitors into waiting too?

In The Penelopiad Margaret Atwood has conjured the ghosts of Penelope and her maids from the fields of Hades to tell their story in dramatic prose, song and dance.

Audition Dates
Monday 27th January at 7.30pm (venue tbc)
Thursday 30th January at 7.30pm (venue tbc)
Sunday 2nd February at 2.30pm in the Curtis Room at the Corn Exchange

There are thirteen female roles – twelve maidservants of age range 20-70 and Penelope who is around 40, but most roles are flexible on age.

Similar to a Greek Chorus the maids sing and dance to illustrate sections of the story, playing several roles to cover all the characters except Penelope.

Penelope – age 40s
Prince Telemachus/Maid – age 20s
Melantho of the Pretty Cheeks/Maid 1 – age 30s
Antonius/Maid/Suitor 1 – Violent suitor/Maid 50s
Maid 2 – age 40s
Penelope’s Naiad Mother/Maid – age 40s
Eurycleia (Odysseus’s old nurse)/Maid – age 70s
Oracle/Maid 3 – age 50s-60s
King Icarius of Sparta/Maid/Suitor 2 – age 40s-60s
Odysseus/Maid – age 50s
King Laertes of Ithaca/Suitor 3/Maid – age 50s-60s
Helen of Troy/Maid – 30-40s
Queen Anticleia of Ithaca/Maid 4 – age 50s

Scripts are available from the CX foyer
Enquiries to lucypw@mac.com