Theatre Casting Call for "The Shawshank Redemption"

Described in the book as "thirty years old, a short neat little man with clever hands and gold-rimmed spectacles, his fingernails were always clipped and they were always clean." However, we don't have to prescribe to this exact description. Tim Robbins, who played him in the movie, was nothing like that, and also Kyle Secor, who played him in the Edinburgh production, was a lanky six-foot-five; but I think it is important to keep this description in mind.

(Ellis Boyd Redding): Has been played in the movie and in the stage play by an African-American actor, and this seems to be the preferred option, though original written as Irish. He uses his charms and sales technique that he learned on the outside to become the "guy who could get things." Over the years Red had learned almost every trick in the book to survive the Shank, which is why Andy is drawn to him.

(Gregory) : Described in the book as "a lean man with a tight wiry gut and the coldest eyes you ever saw. He always had a painful pursed little grin on his face as if he had to have a shit but couldn't quite manage it, a cruel wretched cold-hearted weasel of a man." Gregory Stammas was expelled from college when he was 19 for trying to bribe one of his tutors into giving him a good grade. Stammas is a coward, a bully, and a cheating hypocrite, and will stop at nothing to get what he wants.

(Bryan): The head prison guard at the Shank. Described in the book as "a tall muscular shambling man with thinning brown hair, he sunburned easily and talked loud all the time and if you didn't move fast enough for him he'd cut you with his nightstick." There is not much subtlety to Hadley. He is in the pay of Stammas and is paid to watch his back at all times. Hadley isn't really aware of it but he is just as institutionalized as the cons on his landings.

Described in the book as "a big hulking sister with a brooding expression." I wanted Bogs to be more than a thug, which he is in the book. So I gave him an interest in chess and more of a vocabulary than most cons in the Shank. Bogs is a psychopath but he's not stupid and not without charm and humor. He is feared throughout the prison.

(Brooks Hatlen): Described in the book as a "tough old con." Brooksie has been incarcerated in the Shank since the 1920s-he’d had a college degree in animal husbandry and worked as a researcher for a pharmaceutical company. Poker was Brooksie's downfall, he lost everything: his house, car, and finally his job. When his wife tried to leave him and take their 11-year-old daughter with her, he shot them both dead in a drunken rage.

(Mert): Part of the furniture at the Shawshank. He's a "yes-sir, no-sir, three-bags-full sir" Jobsworth. He follows in the scary shadow of his head guard Bryan Hadley, who treats him like a slave. Entwistle does have a heart though, and when he can, goes easy on the cons. They know this, which makes him an easy touch-sometimes he tries to emulate Hadley and play the tough guy but he doesn't convince anyone.

(Roger Coogan): Serving two life sentences for beating his stepson to death with a claw hammer when he threatened to tell his mother about Rooster's sexual advances. He hails from white "trailer trash" in Montgomery, Alabama. Rooster has been a drug addict all his life, and his denial of his attraction to men manifests in sexual violence.

(Paul Rodriguez): Rico is originally from Portuguese stock and grew up in Detroit. His father was a Pastor and his mother a former prostitute who was "saved" by his father's church. Rico is bipolar. He married young and had seven kids. He could never hold down a job and was eventually jailed for three years for robbing a gas station.

At 24 years old, Tommy is the youngest con in the Shank and the best looking, which causes him problems with the "Sisters." He was brought up in an orphanage and then fostered from family to family; he never knew his parents. He was addicted to stealing expensive cars and became quite good at it. He fell in love with Shirley, and she married him after he promised her he would never steal another car.

(Jordan Dawkins): Was born in Omaha, Nebraska, and is serving life for the murder of his two former associates. Bill Neely and Harold Pinker. Neely and Pinker ran a gambling den in Kansas City. Dawkins, who was part of their criminal gang at the time, tried to steal $100,000 of their money. They suspected he was up to something and lay in wait for him in the cellar where they kept the safe. Dawkins shot both of them in a gun battle. He went on the run but was captured several weeks later.

Really a minor character. Can be of any age, creed, or color, and can come from any corner of the USA. Can double as the prison COOK.

To play various inmates.