MSND [slowplay]

[auroryborealis.livejournal.com]

The sets are up, the house lights are dimmed, and the play is ready to begin.



[Actual production will be SP'd here. There will be an audience post tomorrow night, so the audience can react to what's going on onstage then. Have fun, go nuts, guys. Chat room is: MSND, but I have school and won't be on until tonight or so. Outline. Please use the scripts you were emailed. Important: DO NOT SKIP AHEAD IN THE PRODUCTION. THERE ARE EVENTS PLANNED OKAY I LIED. Please just post Acts I-III for right now, as there is something planned to happen at the end of Act III. Please just check in on this post to check for a cue.]

Comments

ACT III

[auroryborealis.livejournal.com]

..

ACT III, Scene I

[auroryborealis.livejournal.com]

.

Re: ACT III, Scene I

[soldtoarmenians]

Bottom, fool in all things, strutted into the clearing, seeing nothing before him but the chance to strut his stage. Niall, less blind, bespied his Lady Queen asleep, just as good Master Will had writ, and bit his smile, before he spoke Nick Bottom's part.

"There are things in this comedy of Pyramus and Thisby that will never please. First, Pyramus must draw a sword--" He mimed a weapon that he did not have. "-- to kill himself; which the ladies cannot abide." Weak of heart as they are, after all, like my fainting, fearful Queen, hey boy? Niall thought at the child trapped within his own body, and heard the echo of grudging laughter back at him.

"How answer you that?"

Snout's eager voice piped up, in an accent not all of these parts, some unknown fairy's eyes bright with the chance to dance her way through this play in someone else's feet, no matter how few the lines. "By'r lakin, a parlous fear."

Re: ACT III, Scene I

[game-of-you.livejournal.com]

Starveling responded in kind, eyes roaming the audience, hungry to see things unknown in Faerie.

He did not truly convey the nervous spirit inherent in the line, I believe we must leave the killing out, when all is done.

Re: ACT III, Scene I

[soldtoarmenians]

"Not a whit," said Niall, grinning in spite of himself at Bottom's base form of cunning. "I have a device to make all well. Write me a prologue; and let the prologue seem to say, we will do no harm with our swords, and that Pyramus is not killed indeed; and, for the more better assurance, tell them that I, Pyramus, am not Pyramus, but Bottom the weaver." And thus his own name out upon the stage, if he cannot take to him every part. "This will put them out of fear."

"Will not the ladies be afeard of the lion?" There was laughter in Snout's tone as well, though the girl delivered the line straight enough as it were written.

Re: ACT III, Scene I

[game-of-you.livejournal.com]

I fear it, I promise you, Starveling averred.

Or tried to aver. Again, he looked infinitely more eager and curious to explore than anxious.

Re: ACT III, Scene I

[soldtoarmenians]

Xander's body mocked a shudder. "Masters, you ought to consider with yourselves: to bring in--God shield us!--a lion among ladies, is a most dreadful thing; for there is not a more fearful wild-fowl than your lion living; and we ought to look to 't."

Clearly Shakespeare never met the Fandom Island ducks came floating faintly up into Niall's consciousness, and he grinned, then covered his mouth with his hand and shushed the boy.

"Therefore another prologue must tell he is not a lion," Snout said, playing along.

Bottom shook his head, the metal in his ear catching the stagelights and bouncing light across the floor. "Nay, you must name his name, and half his face must be seen through the lion's neck: and he himself must speak through, saying thus, or to the same defect," Here Niall frowned, for these words did not come trippingly off the tongue.

Below his blanket of green silence, Xander stirred and poked at him. Lemme. Awkward and dorky, I can do. And they are my lines. I should get to say some of 'em.

Play no games with it, boy, Niall warned him, but cautiously let the mortal rise to the surface for a moment.

"--'Ladies,'--or 'Fair-ladies--I would wish You,'--or 'I would request you,'--or 'I would entreat you,--not to fear, not to tremble: my life for yours." The stammer was natural; the foolish babble poured out easily from Xander's mouth. "If you think I come hither as a lion, it were pity of my life: no I am no such thing; I am a man as other men are."

There Niall cut the boy off, after the line that would have been a lie had he spoken it himself, and picked up the smoother portion of the tale. "And there indeed let him name his name, and tell them plainly he is Snug the joiner."

My thanks, youngling. Well-spoken. Or badly, as the case may be.

Re: ACT III, Scene I

[swerval_zero]

Puck leaned toward them and mused, "What hempen home-spuns have we swaggering here, so near the cradle of the fairy queen? What, a play toward! I'll be an auditor; an actor too, perhaps, if I see cause." How dare they come so near his queen? Even if she had angered Oberon, was she not still Titania? They must be punished.

Don't you dare!

Peace, little human. It's no more than the script calls for.

Re: ACT III, Scene I

[cyclopeanmerc.livejournal.com]

"Must I speak now?" Jack said.


"Ay, marry, mutht you; for you mutht underthtand he goeth but to thee a noithe that he heard, and ith to come again," Pip responded.

The amount of spit flying off the stage into the audience at this point is staggering. By all known laws of physics, there should not be that much spit in a human mouth.

Jack struck an attitude of girliness (Not too hard in Pip's view. It was a suprise that some of the more "flippant" folk didn't pick him! All they saw was a pretty face!) and spoke his line.

"Most radiant Pyramus, most lily-white of hue,
Of colour like the red rose on triumphant brier,
Most brisky juvenal and eke most lovely Jew, As true as truest horse that yet would never tire,
I'll meet thee, Pyramus, at Ninny's tomb. "

"'Ninuth' tomb,' man: why, you mutht not thpeak that yet; that you anthwer to Pyramuth: you thpeak all your part at onthe, cueth and all Pyramuth enter: your cue is patht; it ith, 'never tire.'"

As the line continued, Pip's voice grew louder, his motions more frantic as he settled into a full on furious rant. In the name of the Shaper, what was wrong with fairies these days? And humans! They used to be smarter!

Near the end of the line, Pip's accent has become so strong that the last parts were completely incomprehensible. This only added to the saliva spewing forth from his mouth, now covering the stage with a disgusting layer of spit.

Re: ACT III, Scene I

[soldtoarmenians]

Sometime before the spittle got waist-deep, Niall had allowed the Puck to lead him away, as written. Oberon's favorite he might be, but Niall had no quarrel with him this night, and more to the point, no desire to end now in words or blows the path that was to lead to the arms of his queen, ere the night was over.

Now, he let Robin push him back into the mock-clearing, a configuration of leather straps around his head like unto a horse's halter - or more accurately, that of an ass, with long gray feather-ears sticking up from it on either side.

"O Bottom, thou art changed!" Snout said on cue, wiping spit from her costume with a roll of her eyes. "What do I see on thee?"

Bottom, all unknowing, did not reach to touch his ass' ears, though Niall's fingers twitched. "What do you see? you see an asshead of your own, do you?"

Re: ACT III, Scene I

[cyclopeanmerc.livejournal.com]

A look of what might have been fear but was more likely disgust crossed Pip's face.

Still, lines were lines, and directions were directions. With a yelp, Pip ran off stage, the other mechanicals following in mock panic.

Re: ACT III, Scene I

[mparkerceo.livejournal.com]

Waiting until the company had exited, Titania stretched luxuriously on her couch, then murmured, "What angel wakes me from my flowery bed?"

She turned to look at Niall, and stifled a smile at the contraption on his head, then let her expression go gleaming and speculative with glee. She swung one long leg over the edge of the couch, and straightened, one arm draped along the back of the black settee.

Re: ACT III, Scene I

[soldtoarmenians]

There was no music set for this; the one in Xander's head seemed to be shared with a martial tune that involved feathers in a cap and something called 'macaroni' that incited the urge to snicker in his host body even though Niall knew not the gist of the joke.

He sang it to another tune, low, old, and plaintive. Those who had ears to hear beyond the daily sounds of man might stare a little harder at the stage, he supposed, but from the surprise in Xander's mind, Niall suspected they'd be staring just as hard at him singing anything in tune at all. The voice was nasal, hardly strong, but it would do for the purpose.

The finch, the sparrow and the lark,
The plain-song cuckoo gray,
Whose note full many a man doth mark,
And dares not answer nay;--
for, indeed, who would set
his wit to so foolish a bird?
who would give a bird the lie, though he cry
'cuckoo' never so?

He moved toward his queen, and by the end of the song, he knelt at the foot of her lounge.

ACT III, Scene II

[auroryborealis.livejournal.com]

...

Re: ACT III, Scene II

[leeadama.livejournal.com]

Oberon paced onto the stage, speaking his thoughts, "I wonder if Titania be awaked; then, what it was that next came in her eye, which she must dote on in extremity."

For the sake of the human audience, he allowed a vague sense of regret into his voice whereas he felt none for the shaming of his wife.

As Puck entered, he smiled and gazed with pleasure at the lass.

"Here comes my messenger," he said to the audience, breaking the fourth wall with an amused smile.

"How now, mad spirit!," he addressed her regally, his voice ringing clear. "What night-rule now about this haunted grove?"

Re: ACT III, Scene II

[game-of-you.livejournal.com]

Puck chortled, taking genuine delight in what he was about to recount.

My mistress with a monster is in love.
Near to her close and consecrated bower,
While she was in her dull and sleeping hour,
A crew of patches, rude mechanicals,
That work for bread upon Athenian stalls,
Were met together to rehearse a play
Intended for great Theseus' nuptial-day.
The shallowest thick-skin of that barren sort,
Who Pyramus presented, in their sport
Forsook his scene and enter'd in a brake
When I did him at this advantage take,
An ass's nole I fixed on his head:
Anon his Thisbe must be answered,
And forth my mimic comes. When they him spy,
As wild geese that the creeping fowler eye,
Or russet-pated choughs, many in sort,
Rising and cawing at the gun's report,
Sever themselves and madly sweep the sky,
So, at his sight, away his fellows fly;
And, at our stamp, here o'er and o'er one falls;
He murder cries and help from Athens calls.
Their sense thus weak, lost with their fears
thus strong,
Made senseless things begin to do them wrong;
For briers and thorns at their apparel snatch;
Some sleeves, some hats, from yielders all
things catch.
I led them on in this distracted fear,
And left sweet Pyramus translated there:
When in that moment, so it came to pass,
Titania waked and straightway loved an ass.

Re: ACT III, Scene II

[leeadama.livejournal.com]

Ever the sadist, Oberon roars in laughter at this glorious tale but stops once he hears the approaching humans. "Stand close," he commands. "This is the same Athenian," he says, glaring at the omg-very-cute Demetrius.

Re: ACT III, Scene II

[swerval_zero]

Puck said, distracted by keeping Zero from kicking Oberon, "This is the woman, but not this the man."

Re: ACT III, Scene II

[fh_jackass]

"O, why rebuke you him that loves you so?" asked "Demetrius", circling around Hermia and keeping a healthy distance. His eyes flickered over to Oberon and Puck, then back at Hermia. "Lay breath so bitter on your bitter foe."

Re: ACT III, Scene II

[nadiathesaint]

Nadia was swaying back and forth, playing with her skirt, and sucking her fingers. She was watching the stage lights as though hypnotized. She wanted to complain about how boooooooooooo-oooooooooooooored she was again, but Miss Majesty wouldn't like that.

So she said her line. It was devoid of anything resembling characterization or, at times, intelligibility, but she said it.

"Now I but child; but I should use vee worse,
For thou, I fear, hap given me cause to curse,
If thou hast slain Loserander in his sleep,
Bein' o'er shoeses in blood, plunge in the deep,
And kill me too.
The sun was not so true unto the day
As he to me: would he haff stolen away
From sleeping Herminia? I'll believe as soon
This whole earth may be bored and fat the moon
May through the centre creep and so displease
Her brother's noontide with Antilopes.
It cannot be but thou hasted murder'd him;
So should a murderer look, so dead, so grim."

Booooooooooooooooooo-riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiing,

Re: ACT III, Scene II

[fh_jackass]

"Demetrius" watched her, hypnotized by the swaying for a moment. Then his head jerked up, as if awakening. He looked around frantically, then curled up in a small ball on stage to mimic sleep. He kept his eyes half-open and looking all around.

Re: ACT III, Scene II

[nadiathesaint]

Nadia didn't have anything else to do in this scene, so she skipped off stage.

Maybe someone would play with her while she waited for her next entrance.

Re: ACT III, Scene II

[swerval_zero]

"Was she supposed to do that? I don't know, be quiet." Puck bounded up to Oberon and announced, "Captain of our fairy band, Helena is here at hand; and the youth, mistook by me, pleading for a lover's fee. Shall we their fond pageant see? Lord, what fools these mortals be!" So he'd screwed up. It was still funny after all this time. And mortals? Still foolish.

"OI!" the girl shrieked. "I AM NOT!"

If he hadn't been onstage, he would have covered his face. It had seemed like such a lovely lark...

Re: ACT III, Scene II

[auroryborealis.livejournal.com]

"Stand aside: the noise they make; will cause Demetrius to awake," He said with a smile playing about his mortal steed's lips.

Re: ACT III, Scene II

[lovechildblair.livejournal.com]

Blair and Callisto entered, Blair walking behind to get the better view. After they reached the stage, he moved to face her.

"Why should you think that I should woo in scorn?
Scorn and derision never come in tears;
Look, when I vow, I weep-" Blair stopped and glared at Callisto.

"Hell, that ain't right. I don't cry!" He looked out at the audience and repeated angrily. "No crying!"

"Look, when I vow, some people might weep, but not me, and vows so born,
In their nativity all truth appears.
How can these things in me seem scorn to you,
bearing the badge of faith, to prove them true?"