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THE ROLES OF VIOLET AND BARBARA HAVE ALREADY BEEN CAST.

BEVERLY WESTON- MALE LATE 60S/EARLY 70S

The patriarch of the Weston family, he appears in only one scene—the play’s prologue. His disappearance and suicide is what brings his dysfunctional family together. Beverly is a self-professed alcoholic who is grizzled and jaded at the start of the play. 

BILL FORDHAM – MALE LATE 40S/EARLY 50S

Husband to Barbara – the eldest Weston daughter. He’s a university professor currently embroiled in an affair with a younger student. Bill is intellectual and aloof. He loves Barbara but finds her difficult, and is overwhelmed by Barbara’s toxic and overbearing family. He often uses his bewilderment as an excuse for his lack of emotional support for both Barbara and their daughter Jean.

JEAN FORDHAM – ACTOR MUST BE ABLE TO PLAY A TEENAGER

Barbara and Bill’s fourteen-year-old daughter, Jean is sullen, quirky, and desperate for an escape from her difficult family. She retreats into movies and marijuana, longing to drown out her separated parents’ incessant fighting. It’s implied that Jean has recently gone through puberty, and that she looks older than her age. Jean is uneasily stumbling through her adolescence, desperate not to make a big deal out of the many slights, traumas, and difficulties her family puts onto her plate. During the play, Karen’s fiancé Steve attempts to assault her after the two share a joint. 

IVY WESTON – FEMALE 40S

The middle child of the Weston family, Ivy is quiet, sensitive, and emotionally aloof. She is the only one of her sisters who never moved away from their hometown.  As such, her life has been structured around her role as the primary caregiver for her parents, as well as her mother’s punching bag. The trauma of this confining and suffocating existence is evident in Ivy’s isolation, self-destructiveness, and vivid fantasy life. She is having an affair with Little Charles, often fantasizing about running away with him. She is devastated when she learns he is her half-brother.

KAREN WESTON – FEMALE EARLY 40S

The youngest of the Weston sisters. Karen is flighty and false. She seems to have a checkered past marked by many failed relationships and unspeakable mistakes. Karen is guarded about her personal history but eager to use the family reunion to prove to everyone that she is happy, fulfilled, and loved now that she is engaged to Steve.

MATTIE FAE AIKEN – FEMALE LATE 50S

Violet’s younger sister. Mattie Fae is boisterous and funny, but, like her sister, has a strong cruel streak. Mattie Fae’s meanness is mainly focused on her only son, Little Charles. Mattie Fae is relentless in her criticisms of Little Charles, and the source of her unending disappointment in him is eventually revealed to stem from her own guilt and self-loathing over the fact that Little Charles is actually Beverly’s illegitimate son.

LITTLE CHARLES AIKEN – MALE MID TO LATE 30S

Mattie Fae and Charlie Aiken’s adult son, he is thirty-seven years old but stunted in almost every way—he is unmarried, unemployed, and seemingly has trouble taking basic care of himself. But, he is also tender and creative. Hi has been having an affair with Ivy. It is eventually revealed—to nearly everyone but Little Charles himself—that Little Charles is actually Beverly’s illegitimate son.

JOHNNA MONEVATA – FEMALE MID TO LATE 20S

A Native American woman from the Cheyenne tribe who is hired to be Beverly and Violet Weston’s live-in housekeeper. Despite the difficult emotional demands of the job she has accepted, Johnna quickly becomes a mostly silent but steadfast participant in the lives—and the dramas—of the Weston clan, intervening when she is most needed to protect, defend, and support the very damaged people she has signed on to care for. Though Johnna is often a victim of Violet’s verbal abuse and harsh language, she is the only one left, in the end, to comfort Violet in her moment of deepest sorrow and defeat.

CHARLIE AIKEN – MALE LATE 50S/EARLY 60S

Mattie Fae’s husband, he is a sensitive and jocular man who seems uneasy about replacing his brother-in-law Beverly as the patriarch of the Weston clan. Charlie resents Mattie Fae’s cruel treatment of their son, Little Charles, and attempts to defend his stunted but tender son any chance he gets.

STEVE HEIDEBRECHT – MALE LATE 40S/EARLY 50S

Karen’s fiancé, he is a shady businessman who lives in Florida and is purposefully oblique about his profession. He is later revealed to be a pedophile when he attempts to sleep with the fourteen-year-old Jean.

SHERIFF DEON GILBEAU – MALE LATE 40S 

The Osage County Sheriff, he and Barbara attended high school together, and her return to Pawhuska seems to stir up longing for the past—and for one another—in both of them.