The Show Must Go On

(Enter SEAMUS, NEVILLE, GOYLE (looking a little bewildered), COLIN (still gagged), and CRABBE. After a moment or two, the other backstage cast members shove PANSY onstage too)

PANSY: (shrieking) I am not a bit player!

DRACO: You are now. Live with it.

PANSY: Bite me.

COLIN: (catches sight of SNAPE and begins dancing around trying to get noticed) MRRF! Hp! Hp!

(He falls over and rolls around, trying to get up without his hands.)

SNAPE: (too calmly) Lockhart, why is Creevey gagged and tied up?

LOCKHART: What, you don't think it's an improvement?

SNAPE: ...I didn't say that.

COLIN: MN!! MN!! HP! Ucn gtp!

SEAMUS: Is all our company here?

GOYLE: (speaking very slowly and carefully) You were best to call them... generally... man by man, according to the scrip.

SEAMUS: Here is the scroll of every man's name, which is thought fit, through all Athens, to play in our interlude before the duke and the duchess, on his wedding-day at night.

DEAN: Which would, being night, sort of make it not day.

GOYLE: First, good Peter... Quince, say what the play treats on, then read the names of the actors, and so grow to a point.

HARRY: He's definitely getting better.

RON: Bet someone's been coaching him.

DRACO: If you think it's me, Weasley, you will learn what pain is.

SEAMUS: Marry, our play is, The most lamentable comedy, and most cruel death of Pyramus and Thisbe.

GOYLE: A very good piece of work, I... ass-ure? you, and a merry. Now, good Peter Quince, call forth your actors by the scroll. Masters, spread yourselves.

DEAN: Talk about couch-casting!

DRACO: Jealous, Thomas?

SEAMUS: Answer as I call you. Nick Bottom, the weaver.

GOYLE: Ready. Name what part I am for, and... pro-seed.

SEAMUS: You, Nick Bottom, are set down for Pyramus.

GOYLE: What is... Pyramus? a lover, or a... ty-rant?

SEAMUS: A lover, that kills himself most gallant for love.

GOYLE: That will ask some tears in the true... per-form-ing of it: if I do it, let the... aud-i-ence look to their eyes; I will move storms, I will con-dole in some... measure. To the rest: yet my chief humour is for a... ty-rant: I could play Erk-uls rarely, or a part to tear a cat in, to make all split.
The... ragg-ing rocks
And... shiv-er-ing shocks
Shall break... the locks
Of... priz-zon gates;
And... Phibbus' car
Shall shine from far
And make and mar
The... foolish Fates.
This was... lofty! Now name the rest of the players. This is... Erk-uls' vein, a ty-rant's vein; a lover is more... con-dol-ing.

SEAMUS: Francis Flute, the bellows-mender.

(COLIN moans incoherently through the gag and rolls around some more)

SEAMUS: Flute, you must take Thisbe on you.

COLIN: (pauses) ??? mflt?

SEAMUS: It is the lady that Pyramus must love.

(COLIN wails and bursts into tears)

RON: What's his problem?

HARRY: Two female parts in one play, I think. 'Course, it could be the gag, too.

SEAMUS: That's all one: you shall play it in a mask, and you may speak as small as you will.

GOYLE: And I may hide my face, let me play... This-bee too, I'll speak in a... mons-ter-us little voice... 'Thisn... Thisn;'... 'Ah, Pyramus, lover dear! thy This-bee dear, and lady dear!'

SEAMUS: No, no; you must play Pyramus: and, Flute, you Thisbe.

GINNY: Does he want to play everybody? Man, give someone a good part and it goes right to their head, doesn't it?

SEAMUS: [under his breath] I am onstage. I'm not saying anything. I am onstage. I'm not saying anything.

GOYLE: Well... pro-seed.

DEAN: Even with a script, a guy with a future as a village idiot.

SEAMUS: Robin Starveling, the tailor

PANSY: Hmph!

SEAMUS: Robin Starveling, you must play Thisbe's mother. Tom Snout, the tinker.

(NEVILLE starts and looks around desperately, beginning to shake)

SEAMUS: You, Pyramus' father: myself, Thisbe's father: Snug, the joiner; you, the lion's part: and, I hope, here is a play fitted.

CRABBE: Lion? Big kitty... with a big neck... see?

SEAMUS: You may do it extempore, for it is nothing but roaring.

GOYLE: Let me play the lion too: I will roar, that I will do any man's heart good to hear me; I will roar, that I will make the duke say 'Let him roar again, let him roar again.

LOCKHART: I suppose as long as the words all have a maximum of two syllables, he's fine.

SEAMUS: An you should do it too terribly, you would fright the duchess and the ladies, that they would shriek; and that were enough to hang us all.

(There are a few moments of silence while everyone misses a line. COLIN moans and rocks back and forth, having twisted into a more-or-less seated position, Pansy begins to clean her nails, and CRABBE starts drawing daisies on COLIN's script)

GOYLE: I grant you, friends, if that you should... fright the ladies out of their wits... they would have no more... diss-crett-ion but to hang us: but I will... ag-ra-vayte my voice so that I will roar you as gently as any sucking dove; I will roar you an... 'tweer any... night-in-gale.

SEAMUS: You can play no part but Pyramus; for Pyramus is a sweet-faced man; a proper man, as one shall see in a summer's day; a most lovely gentleman-like man: therefore you must needs play Pyramus. [in an undertone] Glory hog.

RON: Goyle? 'Sweet-faced'? (bursts out laughing)

HERMIONE: Be quiet, Ron. This is your first warning.

GOYLE: Well, I will... und-er-take it. What beard were I best to play it in?

SEAMUS: Why, what you will.

HERMIONE:[offstage] I've heard horsehair works well, Greg.

CRABBE: Horsies! I can draw horsies! (begins drawing a fat horse on NEVILLE's script, dropping COLIN's floral-decorated script on the ground)

GOYLE: I will... dis-charge it in either your... straw-colour? beard, your... or-ange-tawny beard, your... purple-in-grain beard, or your... French-crown-colour beard, your perfect yellow.

SEAMUS: Some of your French crowns have no hair at all, and then you will play bare-faced.

HARRY: Like there's really any choice there, since we don't have costumes.

HERMIONE: (waspish) I'm working on it, Harry.

SEAMUS: But, masters, here are your parts: and I am to entreat you, request you and desire you, to con them by to-morrow night; and meet me in the palace wood, a mile without the town, by moonlight; there will we rehearse, for if we meet in the city, we shall be dogged with company, and our devices known. In the meantime I will draw a bill of properties, such as our play wants. I pray you, fail me not.

SNAPE: If this were a class, you would have failed already, Finnegan.

GOYLE: We will meet; and there we may rehearse most... obscenely? and cou- coura--

HERMIONE: (stage whispering) Courageously!

RON: Hermione... you're helping him?

HERMIONE: Of course not. I just didn't want to sit here for half an hour while he tried to pronounce one word.

GOYLE: (relieved) Courageously. Take pains; be perfect: ad-i-yew.

SEAMUS: (interested) Obscenely? Now we're getting somewhere.

LOCKHART: Mr. Finnegan, do please keep to the... you know what? I give up.

SEAMUS: (almost hopeful) Really?

LOCKHART: No. What do you want me to do, tell the truth? Mr. Finnegan, remember what happened the last time you neglected to keep your remarks offstage.

SNAPE: (muttering) I hate coming in in the middle.

LOCKHART: (brightly) But that's the best place, Severus. Beginnings can be so dull.

SNAPE: ...I refuse to speak to you.

HERMIONE: (to others backstage) I think that's one for Lockhart's side.

DEAN: Someone's side, anyway.

SEAMUS: At the duke's oak we meet.

GOYLE: Enough; hold or cut... bow-strings? [looks puzzled] 'Mione, wha'd I just say?

HERMIONE: (sighing) I'll tell you later, all right?

RON: Ha! I knew someone was coaching him! I knew it!

SEAMUS: Am I missing something?

DEAN: If you are, it's a first.

DRACO: Second. He's been missing his mind for some time.