Character Breakdown: PRAYER FOR THE FRENCH REPUBLIC Cast Unpacks Their Roles

She is such a controlling, wonderfully accomplished person who is grappling with a lot of fear and anxiety and a growing world situation that is forcing her to make a decision that she doesn't want to make

So the fiercest part of her and the most delicate part of her coexist

and she has a different relationship with everybody in the play, her husband, her brother, her son, her father, her daughter

it's just, it gives you so many facets to dig into of your instrument

It's fantastic. And for you, sir. Well, I mean, what I love about Patrick is that it starts really with his heart

has completely broken. He's completely, everything that he thought was true is not true, and it's blown up

And he has to, he's the play for, he's trying to figure out how to put it all back together and figure it out

And that incredible relationship that we all have, if we're lucky enough to have siblings, is what is that

How do brothers and sisters need each other or not? And how do we get in each other's way

And ultimately, who do you have in the end of the day? Other than family whether you make it up or you lucky enough to have it I play Irma the mother the great great of the other family

the other descendants in the play. And she just is strong and asks questions that she feels need to be asked in the room

and wants answers. So she's strong. I play a dog. We're husband and wife

I'm the father. Well, it's slightly complicated, but I'm the father of almost

father or grandfather of somebody else in the play. But Adolf is quiet

but he has this very strong moral core. And also he has this

what I think of as a kind of strain of optimism, if I dare say

which is an, actually is a moral choice, I think, especially in the world that he lives in

that he resides in. And it's very powerful to me. And I love the character, and that's why I love doing it

I play Lucien Salomon, who is a father, first and foremost, a son, a business owner

and a survivor of some horrible things. And my love for my family is the thing that drives me forward

Yeah so that kind of my whole thing I played Young Pierre the younger version of the talented Richard Masser here And Young Pierre is like Ari said he just experienced some really terrible things

some things that a 15-year-old should never have to and probably never does experience in their lifetime

And you get to see sort of like how he processes his emotions alongside his family

And it's a really beautiful thing to experience and watch. And I'm the worn-out desiccated version of this one, who's had a very long life and who is the sion of the family and who everybody is kind of afraid of because they don't know what he's going to do, what he's going to say, how he's going to react to things, and ends up telling the story on which the entire play is based

And it's a lovely, lovely piece to be involved with on any level, but especially to be kind of the, it's not quite the button on the end, but almost the button on the end

And I'm very grateful to be here. I play Elity Benamow. I share a last name with her

So she feels like home to me. She's the daughter in the family

She has a very kind of interesting relationship with her mother They very combative for lack of a better word But there a lot of love there And I think the whole family really loves each other

You can't fight well if you don't love each other. Totally. Who do you play

I played Charles Benamu, who is an Algerian Jew who's in France

And he's El-Didi's father, Marcel's husband. Even-keeled. Yes, he's sort of... He's sort of the, yeah, he's kind of an anchor at points early in the play

and he's grappling with what to do in a time where his family feels like they're not safe

So I play Molly, who is the distant cousin of the Benamoo family

She's the one American in the play. She's studying abroad in France. And she, you know, spends some time in Paris and gets to know these distant relatives

and learns a lot in the process, grows a lot in the process. It's a fun role to play

Who do you play in what you love about him already in the rehearsal? I play Daniel Benamu

He's the youngest son of the Benamu Quartet. And I mean, like, what I love about rehearsing with Daniel specifically, I guess

is like the whole play is a constant re-evaluation of perspective. And so every time we rehearsed, it's sort of fun to just pick a new one

and see if it is more fun than the last one. Yeah