Northern Borders—Synopsis and Character Breakdowns

Production partners: Kingdom County Productions and Marlboro College

Auditions:

  • New York City -- Sunday and Monday, November 20 and 21 (9am to 5pm)
  • Brattleboro, VT – Wednesday, November 30 (3:30pm to 6pm)
  • Burlington, VT – Saturday, December 3 (10am to 3pm)
  • St. Johnsbury, VT – Sunday, December 4 (1 to 4pm).

* The film is fully financed for a start date of Monday, March 26 in and around Brattleboro Vermont. It will be shot on a SAG Ultra Low Budget Agreement.

* Actors should submit photo and resume to director Jay Craven (), who will conduct the auditions. Actors selected to audition will be contacted abut the time and place of their audition.

Synopsis:Northern Borders tells the story of young Austen Kittredge (could be played by a boy or the right girl) who is sent by his father to live on his grandparents’ Vermont farm where he experiences wild adventures and uncovers long-festering family secrets. It’s 1956 and the farm becomes a magical place for Austen, full of eccentric people -- like his rascal cousin and stubborn but loving grandparents, whose thorny marriage is known as the Forty Years War. A humorous and sometimes startling coming-of-age story, Northern Borders evokes the Northeast Kingdom’s wildness, its sublime beauty, and its aura of enchantment. The film will mark the Kingdom’s wobbly first steps toward rural electrification—and take viewers toa rough-hewn county fair, a fractious one-room schoolhouse, and an annual Kittredge family reunion whose oddand improvised rendition of The Tempest collapses when FBI agents show up to accuse young Austen’s rowdy Aunt Liz of having robbed the local bank with her boyfriend, Foster James, a direct descendant of notorious outlaws, Frank and Jesse James. The story was previously in development by producer Jake Eberts for Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward. Writing for the New York Times Book Review, Fannie Flagg called Mosher’s novel, “A touching and unforgettable portrait of a people and time.”

LEAD ROLES

Austen (8 to 12 year-old boy or the right girl) is serious, sensitive, smart and a bit dreamy, with attentive eyes, a dry wit, and an appreciation of irony. Austen’s too responsible for his (or her) age but he’s curious and learns to fend for himself, developing a survivor’s keen instinct and varied tactics. He learns how to look beneath the surface, to size up and make the best of unfamiliar situations, and to find redemptive power in the shared secret. As he makes his way through a variety of charged situations and tangled family emotions, Austen sees imperfections in the adults around him and takes a more assertive approach in his navigation of this extended family’s buried mysteries and unpredictable relationships. He forms deep mutual bonds with his grandparents, whose companionship and irrepressible spirit mark each of their lives.

Austen Kittredge, Sr.(55-75 year old male)is young Austen’s grandfather. He’s rugged and unyielding, from a lifetime of unacknowledged emotional setbacks buried under decades of hard work as a former logger, sawyer, and roughneck on oil rigs out west. Discovered on a doorstep when he was only a few days old, Kittredge was then raised by his adopted mother (and here closeted lesbian lover) until he dropped out of school at the age of 12 and fled home to crew the big timber runs and log drives along New England’s northern frontier. Kittredge has a rough voice and a sharp but critical look in his eyes--the kind that misses nothing. Kittredge works hard, stands his ground, and can’t abide schoolteachers or the local sheriff. He frequently retreats to his cabin on the ridge overlooking his farm, reveling in the solitude but maybe also haunted—by what others may feel about him, his obscured past, and the prickly and unyielding relationship he endures with his wife, Abiah. His relationship with young Austen doesn’t change him, but the boy (or girl) ties in to Kittredge’s daily work routine and becomes a foil to the old man’s resolve to escape all matters of family – and fate.

Abiah Kittredge (55-75 year old female) is young Austen’s grandmother. She’s an eagle-eyed observer, a hard worker, and a survivor. As a child, alongside her sister, she crossed the Atlantic in the underbelly of a freight steamer; then the two girls crisscrossed Cape Breton and Nova Scotia as itinerant laborers willing to perform any tough task in exchange for a meal and place to sleep. Abiah’s hard-knocks upbringing surely prepared her for decades of child-rearing, her tending to cows, chickens, and the cultivation of a prized apple orchard. It also helped her bear the emotional weight of a chilly marriage. Her survival surely comes at a price, but Abiah is a sturdy and self-sufficient woman – and a creature of intuition and imagination with a startling ability to look beyond what’s visible, whether it be into young Austen’s presumed future or the jam-packed narratives and prophesies of ancient times that she invokes in her farmhouse den that she aptly calls “Egypt.” In this small den, with its profusion of every known Egyptian replica artifact under the sun, Abiah finds solace, summons wisdom, and imparts sometimes good advice to young Austen or her own son and daughters. It doesn’t matter that her husband of forty years keeps his distance and views her eccentricity with a jaundiced eye—Abiah has made her place in the world and has worked it to her satisfaction and vast knowledge.

SUPPORTING ROLES

Rob Kittredge (32-37 year old male) is at loose ends, a private school assistant headmaster and English teacher who loves his child (Austen) but was never prepared to take on the role of single parent. He sends Austen to live with his parents, fully knowing that their charged and contentious relationship may prove difficult for his son (or daughter). But he’s at the end of his rope and is about to lose his job. He doesn’t know what else to do. Besides, maybe Austen will break through the rigid shell of disapproval and low-regard that old Kittredge has built up toward his own son, ever since Rob decided to leave the farm and become a schoolteacher. Or maybe Austen’s presence in his parent’s life will shake loose a family dynamic that Rob finds nearly impossible to endure. In either case, Austen will surely experience something worthwhile, right? Kids are resilient—and, besides, he really doesn’t have time to raise a kid on the verge of becoming a teen-ager. At least, not now.

Cleopatra Kittredge: She’s 20 to 25 years old, sharp-tongued, an aspiring actress with a fondness for Humphrey Bogart. Cleopatra is the youngest of three Kittredge off-spring that include her older brother (and young Austen’s father) Rob, in his 30’s, and her sister Liz. Cleopatra’s birth was such an ordeal that it caused her mother Abiah to get a court order preventing her husband from every touching her again. Cleopatra has been the most drawn-in by her parent’s conflict-ridden relationship. But she handles it with a keen sense of irony—and the irrepressible spirit to persist and even thrive navigating relations in Kittredge clan and the equally rough-and-tumble theater world. As Austen’s young aunt, Cleopatra, offers the boy sometimes fanciful and not terribly reliable advice – and an insight into the family history.

Liz Kittredge:She’s in her 20’s, strong-featured, with lots of hair, long legs like a cowboy, an outdoors complexion, and the same pale blue, assessing eyes as her father, Austen Kittredge. She dresses like a gunslinger, in jeans and cowboy boots, a fringed leather jacket over a sky-blue western-style shirt and an off-tan-colored cowboy hat. Liz is reputed to have robbed the local town bank with her second husband, Foster James the great-grandson of Jesse James. Her return to Kingdom County, the first since the bank robbery, provokes suspicions all around that she may be back to recover the stolen $42,000. She’s smooth and in control, determined to fulfill her mission and never disclosing whether she robbed the bank or where the money might be.

Theresa DuBois:(8 to 14 year-old girl). Faced with a chaotic classroom where rebellious kids face off against a controlling teacher at their one-room school, Theresa seems a little spacey and even awkward but she’s actually an adept strategist who quickly sketches the stakes and situation for newcomer Austen. Theresa’s a bit shy, but with a smart sense of humor. She quickly becomes Austen’s most effective ally. She’s also the one character with whom Austen can be a kid.

Snake Man:(15 to 50). A street-wise card sharp whose body is embellished with a vivid multi-colored tattoo of a hissing snake. Snake Man draws in unsuspecting locals, setting them up for defeat as he plays his card tricks, and often fleeces them for a few extra bucks in the process. He’s tough, a fast talker, and shrewd. He thinks fast on his feet and plays to win.

Hermie Hill (12 to 15 year old boy or the right girl). Local tough kid armed with a peashooter and a will to cause trouble and take on any perceived foe, regardless of age or gender. Doesn’t like school and likes to tangle with teachers or any authority figure.

FBI Agent Jordan Sanders: (30's to 50's). Sanders shows up to investigate Liz Kittredge and her alleged robbery of the local bank. He's not easily fooled--but can't seem to get anywhere in his investigation of the formidable Liz.

Pastor J.W. Kittredge: (40's to 60's). Fire breathing Vermont preacher whose Christmas sermon takes up the unlikely subject of "spare the rod, spoil the child."

Whiskeyjack Kittredge: (40's to 60's). Whiskey-swilling Falstaff-style rough neck and jokester who scandalizes women, children, preachers - anyone willing (or unlucky enough)to provide an audience to his outrageous behavior.

Mason White: (30's to 60's). Local fumbling sheriff and undertaker - not terribly bright or formidable -- with a penchant for making the wrong move or comment at exactly the worst time.

Director Jay Craven is an award-winning producer, independent film writer/director, and community arts activist. His five feature films include Disappearances (w/ Kris Kristofferson, Genevieve Bujold, Gary Farmer, Charlie McDermott, William Sanderson, Lothaire Bluteau), A Stranger in the Kingdom (w/Ernie Hudson, David Lansbury, Martin Sheen, Larry Pine, Tom Aldredge, Henry Gibson, Jean Louisa Kelly), The Year That Trembled (w/Fred Willard, Jonathan Brandis, Marin Hinkle, Martin Mull) and Where the Rivers Flow North (w/Rip Torn, Tantoo Cardinal, Michael J. Fox, Bill Raymond, Treat Williams). Craven has also made six documentaries and the Windy Acres public television comedy series, winner of two New England Emmys. His films have played more than 50 international film festivals including Sundance, South By Southwest,and AFI: Fest—have sold more than 300,000 DVD’s, played TV outlets including Showtime, Starz, PBS, Sundance Channel, and Disney Channel—and they’ve been licensed in 43 countries. Special screenings include The Smithsonian, Lincoln Center, Anthology Film Archives, the American Film Institute, Art Institute of Chicago, Harvard Film Archives, George Eastman House, Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts, Jerusalem Cinematheque, Cinémathèque Française, The Constitutional Court of Johannesburg, and La Cinemateca Nacional de Venezuela.Beijing Normal University, and the UNESCO headquarters in Paris. His most recent film, Disappearances, was selected by the American Film Institute, President’s Committee for the Arts and Humanities and National Endowment for the Arts as one of 7 American films to travel internationally in the AFI’s first-ever international cultural exchange program, AFI: Project 20/20. Craven also directs the film studies program at Marlboro College.