THE PROFESSION
by Marcia Eppich-Harris
Valerie’s world is turned upside down when she learns she is being unjustly fired by St. Sebastian University. As she attempts to save her career from freefall, she discovers the corruption running rampant among her conservative, religious male colleagues. Meanwhile, Valerie’s star student, Marina, is lured into sex work to pay her tuition. As the costs become too high to bear, Valerie and Marina find the seedy underbellies of their career paths exposed, but which profession is more corrupt isn’t entirely clear. As religion, sex, and politics collide, both women must answer the question: how much should be sacrificed for a job?
- Cast Size: 3M 4W
- Running Time: 90+ minutes
- Royalty Rate: $75 per performance
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About the Playwright
Marcia Eppich-Harris is the artistic director and founder of Southbank Theatre Company in Indianapolis. She holds a PhD in Shakespeare and Dramatic Literature and taught at the college level for over fifteen years. She is a playwright and a founding member of the Indiana Playwrights Circle (IPC). Marcia’s writing includes plays, fiction, poetry, scholarship, and reviews. Her creative writing is influenced by the literature and history of the ancient Greeks and Romans, the British Medieval and Renaissance periods, as well as current events. Her writing focuses thematically on politics, philosophy, the arts, gender, family, and culture.
“Higher ed has become some kind of capitalist hellscape,” Valerie says in this excellent play about the compromises liberal arts professors are called upon to make when which programs survive is determined by cost-benefit analysis. Corrupting academic politics, petty vindictiveness, ethical lapses, blackmail–all kinds of intellectual prostitution are on display, as is the traditional type available at the nearby strip club. Eppich-Harris’s well-drawn characters find themselves in soul-sucking workplace situations that may seem all too familiar to people in nearly any profession. Will any of them emerge with their humanity intact? Highly recommended. ”
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