GROSS INDECENCY: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde
By Moises Kaufman
DIRECTED BY ERIC MAGNUS
Open Audition
DECEMBER 2ND, 2007 from 7pm – 10pm at
OLATHE COMMUNITY THEATRE ~ 500 E. Loula, Olathe,
KS
Rehearsals begin December 10th
Opening night ~ January 18th, 2008
THE FOLLOWING ROLES ARE YET TO BE CAST

• MARQUESS OF QUEENSBURY / GILL /
LOCKWOOD / Narrator 8 ~ Male, 45’s – 65’s. The
Marquess was the father of Lord Alfred Douglas,
and the man that accused Wilde of being a “posing
sodomite”. This incident sparked the entire
trial process. Gill and Lockwood are the
prosecuting attorneys opposing Wilde in trials 2
& 3.
• NARRATOR 1 / ALFRED WOOD / GEORGE BERNARD
SHAW / Others Male, 20’s – 30’s
• NARRATOR 2 / FRED ATKINS / SIDNEY
WRIGHT / Others Male, 20’s – 30’s
THE STORY: In early 1895, the Marquess of
Queensberry, the father of Wilde's young lover,
Lord Alfred Douglas, left a card at Wilde's club
bearing the phrase "posing somdomite." Wilde sued
the Marquess for criminal libel. The defense
denounced Wilde's art and literature as immoral.
In the end Queensberry was acquitted, and
evidence that had been gathered against Wilde
compelled the Crown to prosecute him for "gross
indecency with male persons." With Wilde's
arrest, his hit plays running in London's West
End were forced to close, and Wilde was reduced
to penury. A second trial ended in a hung jury
with Wilde's impassioned defense of "the love
that dare not speak its name," prompting a third
trial. In the third and decisive trial, Wilde was
convicted and sentenced to two years imprisonment
at hard labor. He was separated forever from his
wife and children, and wrote very little for the
rest of his life. In addition to Wilde, Douglas
and Queensberry, characters ranging from Queen
Victoria to London's rent boys, to a present-day
academic are assembled to explore how history is
made and how it can be so timely revisited in the
theatre.