Detroit Public Theatre | Detroit, MI
REVISED
Updated Breakdown.
Tuesday, June 3, 2025
10:00 AM - 7:00 PM (E)
Break 3:00 PM - 4:00 PM
To set up appointment, please email:
auditions@detroitpublictheatre.org.
SPT
$525 weekly minimum (SPT 4) - 2024-25 rates
Equity actors for roles in Detroit Public Theatre's 2025-26 Season (See breakdown).
Please prepare a monologue of your choice OR if interested in in DPT's Holiday Cabaret: Please prepare a song of your choice, and indicate your interest in DPT's Holiday Cabaret when completing your audition sign-up. Please bring your headshot, and resume, stapled together.
Detroit Public Theatre
3960 3rd Ave
Detroit, MI 48201
Lot and street parking available
Expected to attend:
Courtney Burkett: Producing Artistic Director
Sarah Clare Corporandy: Producing Artistic Director
Sarah Winkler: Producing Artistic Director
See breakdown for production specific dates.
www.detroitpublictheatre.org
An Equity Monitor will not be provided. The producer will run all aspects of this audition.
Equity’s contracts prohibit discrimination. Equity is committed to diversity and encourages all its employers to engage in a policy of equal employment opportunity designed to promote a positive model of inclusion. As such, Equity encourages performers of all ethnicities, gender identities, and ages, as well as performers with disabilities, to attend every audition.
Always bring your Equity Membership card to auditions.
Notice: Audition Call Type: EPA
Detroit Public Theatre 2025-26 Season
First Rehearsal: Monday 09/01/2025
Opening: Saturday 10/04/2025
Closing: Sunday 11/02/2025
NOTE: All actors play both contemporary archivists at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum as well as characters who were directly involved in/impacted by the totalitarian regime of Germany in World War II. All of the archivists are detectives, unearthing small details in historical photographs that lead to a thrilling unraveling of history.
[REBECCA ERBELDING, LILI JACOB, AND OTHERS] (she/her, 20s-30s, open to all ethnicities). The head intake archivist at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. Rebecca takes us on the journey of this play. She leads with an intense curiosity that's compelling yet relentless. The wheels are always turning. As LILI: Decades after the miracle of finding photos of herself and her family in a discarded Nazi album, Lili makes the difficult decision to donate the album.
[JUDY COHEN AND OTHERS] (she/her, 50s-70s, open to all ethnicities). The Director of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum's photographic collection. Studies the pictures like a puzzle and gets excited when the dots connect. Judy has been around long enough to know that blinders are the only way to get by in a job like this. She focuses on the details, and that helps her make it through.
[MELITA MASCHMANN AND OTHERS] (she/her, 40s-70s, open to all ethnicities). As MELITA: Meticulous in her speech, she is still coming to terms with her role as Press and Propaganda Officer of the League of German Girls. As a young girl, she was wooed by Hitler’s promises of a better life.
[TILMAN TAUBE AND OTHERS] (he/him, 30s-40s, open to all ethnicities). Discovers that he is a direct descendant of a war criminal in light of this photo album of Auschwitz that has been discovered. Over the course of the play, he comes to terms with his family's role in the Holocaust and tries to help others do the same.
[KARL HÖCKER AND OTHERS] (he/him, 40s-50s, white). At the start of the war, a lowly bank teller. Due to an injury, he becomes the right hand man to the head of Auschwitz. He's at the center of power, and he considers this power a fortune.
[PETER WIRTHS AND OTHERS] (he/him, 40s-60s, open to all ethnicities). Peter Wirths is coming to terms with his family history - a combination of empathy and remorse for his father, a Nazi doctor who tried to “do good.”
[RAINER HÖSS AND OTHERS] (he/him, 20s-30s, white). As a teen, Rainer Höss comes undone when he learns about his grandfather’s role as the creator of Auschwitz. By the time we meet him, he is a dangerous thug. He has been broken down by his family's secrets, struggling to make sense of it all.
[CHARLOTTE SCHUNZEL AND OTHERS] (she/her, 20s-40s). Methodical but not unfeeling, Charlotte acted as a receptionist and coordinated arrivals on the camp. In one interrogation scene, she denies knowing anything, as the receptionists were kept out of the loop of what was going on. But how could she not know?
[UNDERSTUDY 1] (20s-40s, open to all ethnicities). Covering Melita, Charlotte, and Rebecca.
[UNDERSTUDY 2] (20s-40s, open to all ethnicities). Covering Höcker, Wirths, Rainer Höss, and Tilman Taube.
First Rehearsal: Monday 11/17/2025
Opening: Saturday 12/06/2025
Closing: Sunday 12/21/2025
Singers (1 or 2): 18-80; any ethnicity. Actors will be asked to bring themselves and their experiences to the production. They will play a version of themselves in a lighthearted and irreverent celebration of the season.
First Rehearsal: Monday January 5, 2026
Opening: Thursday February 7, 2026
Closing: Sunday March 8, 2026
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr - Ethnicity: Black, Gender: Male, Age: 39. Nobel Peace Prize-winning Civil Rights Movement leader. Awe-inspiring, charming, and powerful with a profound intelligence and hidden vulnerability. He can sometimes present as older than his true age. While being a brilliant orator, impassioned preacher, and a fearless leader, he is more than the hero in our history books. Brewing underneath is a human carrying all the vulnerability, fear, and weariness of an unquenchable lust for life.
Camae - Ethnicity: Black, Gender: Female, Age: 20s-30s. A young maid at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. She is charming, confident and Dr. King's equal. And although deeply human and vulnerable, there is much more to her than is first revealed. She owns the power of her convictions and sensuality, with an “otherworldly” strength. Carries a secret.
First Rehearsal: Monday April 6, 2026
Opening Night: Saturday May 9, 2026
Closing: Sunday June 7, 2026
SHAWN – Ethnicity: Black, Gender: Male, Ages: 21, 27, 31 and 33. Confident but reserved. A hardcore basketball fan and a writer. Quietly ambitious, smart, thoughtful, thinks before he talks, he has strong opinions.
MATT – Ethnicity: White, Gender: Male, Ages: 21, 27, 31 and 33. Messy, talkative (talks before he thinks), doesn't hold back. A hardcore basketball fan and bartender. His messiness spills over into his entire life.
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