The Show Must Go On

(Enter DRACO and HARRY, still in full fairy regalia, except now they have makeup. DRACO's theme of 'white 'til your retinas fry' is much more pronounced, and HARRY is wearing green eyeshadow. They make immediately for that threadbare sofa that always seems to appear onstage during any amateur theatrical effort. Muffled sobs that sound vaguely like a foghorn come from offstage)

HERMIONE: Ron, I am so disappointed in you. Taking the makeup case away from poor Vincent like that.

RON: Well, excuse me for not thinking that black noses, whiskers, and rainbow stars are what's called for in the makeup arena.

HERMIONE: Just listen. Hear that? Don't you feel sorry for yourself? Vincent's crying in a corner, poor thing.

RON: Go me!

HERMIONE: (grimly) You are not amusing me.

(HERMIONE turns her back on RON and marches off to deal with GINNY, who has somehow managed to 'lose' her hideous pink frilly outfit)

HERMIONE: You did this on purpose, didn't you? Just to make my life harder.

GINNY: No, I didn't. I would have if I'd thought of it, though.

HERMIONE: Then what happened to your costume? Did it just get up and walk away?

NEVILLE: (helpfully) It may have done. Dean was practicing Traqnsfiguration, and it may have-

HERMIONE: Mouth is open, Neville, should be shut.

HARRY: 'Tis strange my Theseus, that these lovers speak of.

SEAMUS: You're telling me!

DRACO: More strange than true: I never may believe
These antique fables, nor these fairy toys.
Lovers and madmen have such seething brains,
Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend
More than cool reason ever comprehends.
The lunatic, the lover and the poet
Are of imagination all compact:

CRABBE: Compact! (cries harder)

DRACO: One sees more devils than vast hell can hold,
That is, the madman: the lover, all as frantic,
Sees Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt:
The poet's eye, in fine frenzy rolling,
Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven;
And as imagination bodies forth
The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen
Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name.
Such tricks hath strong imagination,
That if it would but apprehend some joy,
It comprehends some bringer of that joy;
Or in the night, imagining some fear,
How easy is a bush supposed a bear!

NEVILLE: I never thought so... usually bushes end up being.... ooh, trolls or something.

(Enter SEAMUS, sneaking onstage to avoid HERMIONE. He only managed to get rid of part of his fairy costume; one wing is still hanging on, although it's lopsided and dangly.)

HARRY: But all the story of the night told over,
And all their minds transfigured so together,
More witnesseth than fancy's images
And grows to something of great constancy;
But, howsoever, strange and admirable.

RON: Emphasis on 'strange'. You two do know there's more than one cushion on the sofa, right?

DRACO: Here come the lovers, full of joy and mirth.

NEVILLE: Well, there they are, but they're a bit lakcing in 'joy and mirth'.

(Enter DEAN, RON, GINNY, and HERMIONE)

DRACO: Joy, gentle friends! joy and fresh days of love
Accompany your hearts!

DEAN: More than to us
Wait in your royal walks, your board, your bed!

RON: Oh no. No no no. I am not going to think about that. Not. Not thinking.

DRACO: Come now; what masques, what dances shall we have,
To wear away this long age of three hours
Between our after-supper and bed-time?
Where is our usual manager of mirth?
What revels are in hand? Is there no play,
To ease the anguish of a torturing hour?
Call Philostrate.

SEAMUS: Here, mighty Theseus.

RON: Oh sure, like he's gonna be any help. He's got the dirtiest mind here.

DRACO: Say, what abridgement have you for this evening?
What masque? what music? How shall we beguile
The lazy time, if not with some delight?

SEAMUS: Um... you don't need any entertainment. You are the entertainment.... (catches HERMIONE's glare and returns to script)
There is a brief how many sports are ripe:
Make choice of which your highness will see first.

(He hands DRACO the tacky pink scarf.)

DRACO: (pretending to read from the scarf)
'The battle with the Centaurs, to be sung
By an Athenian eunuch to the harp.'
We'll none of that: that have I told my love,
In glory of my kinsman Hercules.

SEAMUS: And eunuchs are so depressing.

HERMIONE: Get used to them, Finnegan. You'll be one shortly if you keep on like this.

DRACO: (pretends to read again)
'The riot of the tipsy Bacchanals,
Tearing the Thracian singer in their rage.'
That is an old device; and it was play'd
When I from Thebes came last a conqueror.

SEAMUS: You conquered Thebes? Harry... is there something you're not telling the rest of us?

(HARRY blushes bright red and tried to hide in the sofa)

DRACO: ('reading' again, not disturbed at all)
'The thrice three Muses mourning for the death
Of Learning, late deceased in beggary.'
That is some satire, keen and critical,
Not sorting with a nuptial ceremony.

GOYLE: (nodding) Organization's hard. You gotta put hting in the right order... like diction'ries. Those're tough to figure out.

DRACO: (and... again reading from the scarf)
'A tedious brief scene of young Pyramus
And his love Thisbe; very tragical mirth.'
Merry and tragical! tedious and brief!
That is, hot ice and wondrous strange snow.
How shall we find the concord of this discord?

SEAMUS: A play there is, my lord, some ten words long,
Which is as brief as I have known a play;
But by ten words, my lord, it is too long,
Which makes it tedious; for in all the play
There is not one word apt, one player fitted:
And tragical, my noble lord, it is;
For Pyramus therein doth kill himself.
Which, when I saw rehearsed, I must confess,
Made mine eyes water; but more merry tears
The passion of loud laughter never shed.

DRACO: What are they that do play it?

SEAMUS: Hard-handed men that work in Athens here,
Which never labour'd in their minds till now,
And now have toil'd their unbreathed memories
With this same play, against your nuptial.

DRACO: And we will hear it.

RON: Hear it, yes. See it, no. Well? We're waiting!

SEAMUS: No, my noble lord;
It is not for you: I have heard it over,
And it is nothing, nothing in the world;
Unless you can find sport in their intents,
Extremely stretch'd and conn'd, with cruel pain.

DRACO: I will hear that play;
For never anything can be amiss,
When simpleness and duty tender it.
Go, bring them in: and take your places, ladies.

(Exit SEAMUS, trying to pull off the last fairy wing)

HARRY: I love not to see wretchedness o'er charged
And duty in his service perishing.

DRACO: Why, gentle sweet, you shall see no such thing.

SEAMUS: Not like that, he won't. When do you two breathe?

HARRY: He says they can do nothing in this kind.

DRACO: The kinder we, to give them thanks for nothing.
Our sport shall be to take what they mistake:
And what poor duty cannot do, noble respect
Takes it in might, not merit.
Where I have come, great clerks have purposed
To greet me with premeditated welcomes;
Where I have seen them shiver and look pale,
Make periods in the midst of sentences,
Throttle their practised accent in their fears
And in conclusion dumbly have broke off,
Not paying me a welcome. Trust me, sweet,
Out of this silence yet I pick'd a welcome;
And in the modesty of fearful duty
I read as much as from the rattling tongue
Of saucy and audacious eloquence.
Love, therefore, and tongue-tied simplicity
In least speak most, to my capacity.

(Re-enter SEAMUS sans fairy wing)

SEAMUS: So please your grace, the Prologue is address'd.

DRACO: Let him approach.

SEAMUS: Well, it's me, isn't it, and I'm already here.

HERMIONE: (warningly) Seamus....

(Exit SEAMUS left stage, running at top speed. He re-enters stage right, wearing an extremely silly jester's cap)

SEAMUS: If we offend, it is with our good will.
That you should think, we come not to offend,
But with good will. To show our simple skill,
That is the true beginning of our end.
Consider then we come but in despite.
We do not come as minding to content you,
Our true intent is. All for your delight
We are not here. That you should here repent you,
The actors are at hand and by their show
You shall know all that you are like to know.

DRACO: This fellow doth not stand upon points.

SEAMUS: Ow! I hope not!

DEAN: He hath rid his prologue like a rough colt; he knows not the stop. A good moral, my lord: it is not enough to speak, but to speak true.

SEAMUS: Someone gag her, please. My blood sugar can't take any more.

HARRY: Indeed he hath played on his prologue like a child on a recorder; a sound, but not in government.

DRACO: His speech, was like a tangled chain; nothing impaired, but all disordered. Who is next?

(Enter GOYLE and COLIN, PANSY, NEVILLE, and CRABBE. GOYLE is shoving PANSY along, as she has been gagged and tied to a chair to prevent escape. CRABBE looks awful; his face is all puffy, red, and tearstained, but he's onstage without being bribed by crayons. COLIN reveals where GINNY's horrid pink getup went; he's wearing it. He's also wearing a Shirley Temple wig and an absurd amount of makeup.)

HERMIONE: (pointing at the horror that is COLIN) Ron, you didn't do... that, did you?

RON: No! I'm not colorblind!

HERMIONE: Then who-

CRABBE: (proudly) Found where the makeup was hidden. En't he pretty?

SEAMUS: Gentles, perchance you wonder at this show;
But wonder on, till truth make all things plain.
This man is Pyramus, if you would know;
This beauteous lady Thisbe is certain.
This man, with lime and rough-cast, doth present
Wall, that vile Wall which did these lovers sunder;
And through Wall's chink, poor souls, they are content
To whisper. At the which let no man wonder.
This man, with lanthorn, dog, and bush of thorn,
Presenteth Moonshine; for, if you will know,
By moonshine did these lovers think no scorn
To meet at Ninus' tomb, there, there to woo.
This grisly beast, which Lion hight by name,
The trusty Thisbe coming first by night,
Did scare away, or rather did affright;
And, as she fled, her mantle she did fall,
Which Lion vile with bloody mouth did stain.
Anon comes Pyramus, sweet youth and tall,
And finds his trusty Thisbe's mantle slain:
Whereat, with blade, with bloody blameful blade,
He bravely broach'd his boiling bloody breast;
And Thisbe, tarrying in mulberry shade,
His dagger drew, and died. For all the rest,
Let Lion, Moonshine, Wall, and lovers twain
At large discourse, while here they do remain.

RON: Why bother doing the play if you're just going to tell us everything that happens?

(Exit SEAMUS, COLIN, CRABBE, and NEVILLE)

DRACO: I wonder if the lion be to speak.

RON: No wonder, my lord: one lion may, when many asses do.

GOYLE: Hey!

PANSY: NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!!

DRACO: Would you desire lime and hair to speak better?

RON: It is the wittiest partition that ever I heard discourse, my lord.

GINNY: Or she would have been if she wasn't gagged and tied to a chair.

DEAN: (piously) It's the thought that counts.

(Enter GOYLE)

DRACO: Pyramus draws near the wall: silence!

GOYLE: O grim-look'd night! O night with hue so black!
O night, which ever art when day is not!
O night, O night! alack, alack, alack,
I fear my Thizb's promise is forgot!
And thou, O wall, O sweet, O lovely wall,
That stand'st between her father's ground and mine!
Thou wall, O wall, O sweet and lovely wall,
Show me thy chink, to blink through with mine eyne!

(PANSY rocks from side to side, not quite managing to fall over. COLIN watches her avidly from offstage)

COLIN: Was I that funny?

SEAMUS: You were funnier.

COLIN: Wow... are you gonna let her go after we're done with rehearsal?

SEAMUS: Yeah, why?

COLIN: Because... umm, well.... (he goes on tiptoe and whispers something in SEAMUS's ear)

SEAMUS: (grins evilly) Welcome to the land of the corrupted, my friend.

GOYLE: Thanks, courteous wall: Jove shield thee well for this!
But what see I? No Thisbe do I see.
O wicked wall, through whom I see no bliss!
Cursed be thy stones for thus deceiving me!

DRACO: The wall, methinks, being sensible, should curse again.

GOYLE: No, in truth, sir, he should not. 'Deceiving me' is Thisbe's cue: she is to enter now, and I am to spy her through the wall. You shall see, it will fall pat as I told you. Yonder she comes.

(Enter COLIN. The flowery apron is now layered on top of GINNY's lurid pink outfit. He is carrying a pink scriptbook opened to nearly the end)

COLIN: Hope I'm in the right place.... O wall, full often hast thou heard my moans,
For parting my fair Pyramus and me!
My cherry lips have often kiss'd thy stones,
Thy stones with lime and hair knit up in thee.

(Total stillness from the rest of the cast for a moment, then Mad Costumer and Interim Tyrannical Director Her Title Gets Longer Every Scene HERMIONE bursts out in maniacal laughter)

HERMIONE: Yes! Yes! They said it couldn't be done, but there it is! Colin is in the right place!!

RON: Um... Hermione? From now on, coffee at breakfast should be considered a bad thing.

HERMIONE: (still maniacal) Why?

RON: Oh, no reason, really....

DRACO: Wimp.

RON: Shut up, fairy boy.

GOYLE: I see a voice: now will I to the chink,
To spy an I can hear my Thisbe's face. Thisbe!

COLIN: My love thou art, my love I think.

GOYLE: Think what thou wilt, I am thy lover's grace;
And, like Limander, am I trusty still.

COLIN: And I like Helen, till the Fates me kill.

GOYLE: Not Shafalus to Procrus was so true.

COLIN: As Shafalus to Procrus, I to you.

SEAMUS: Must... retain... meal... must... not... projectile... vomit....

GOYLE: O kiss me through the hole of this vile wall!

COLIN: I kiss the wall's hole, not your lips at all.

GOYLE: Wilt thou at Ninny's tomb meet me straightway?

COLIN: 'Tide life, 'tide death, I come without delay.

PANSY: (rocks harder, but still doesn't manage to fall over. It's unclear what she thinks falling over will achieve) NNNNNNNNNNNN!!.

(Exit COLIN and GOYLE, who shoves PANSY's chair along in front of him)

COLIN: (to PANSY) Ha! Bet you're sorry now, huh? Bet you're getting all cramped and your tongue's all dry and poofy-feeling, huh?

(PANSY glares at him, but, being gagged, says nothing but NNNNNNNNNNNNNNN)

DRACO: Now is the mural down between the two neighbours.

RON: No remedy, my lord, when walls are so wilful to hear without warning.

HARRY: This is the silliest stuff that ever I heard.

DRACO: The best in this kind are but shadows; and the worst are no worse, if imagination amend them.

HARRY: It must be your imagination then, and not theirs.

DRACO: If we imagine no worse of them than they of themselves, they may pass for excellent men. Here come two noble beasts in, a man and a lion.

(Enter CRABBE and NEVILLE. NEVILLE is carrying a lit candle, which has not yet dripped wax onto his hand)

CRABBE: (pouty) Don't wanna be a lion. Wanna be a bunny.

(CRABBE starts hopping around the stage, using some green butcher paper as makeshift bunny ears)

DRACO: A very gentle beast, of a good conscience.

RON: The very best at a beast, my lord, that e'er I saw.

DEAN: This lion is a very fox for his valour.

DRACO: True; and a goose for his discretion.

RON: Not so, my lord; for his valour cannot carry his discretion; and the fox carries the goose.

DRACO: His discretion, I am sure, cannot carry his valour; for the goose carries not the fox. It is well: leave it to his discretion, and let us listen to the moon.

NEVILLE: This lanthorn doth the horned moon present;--

RON: He should have worn the horns on his head.

GINNY: (to HERMIONE) HWy don't we have any lines this scene?

HERMIONE: Because Shakespeare didn't write any.

GINNY: When has that stopped us?

DRACO: He is no crescent, and his horns are invisible within the circumference.

NEVILLE: This lanthorn doth the horned moon present;
Myself the man i' the moon do seem to be.

DRACO: This is the greatest error of all the rest: the man should be put into the lanthorn. How is it else the man i' the moon?

RON: He dares not come there for the candle; for, you see, it is already in snuff.

HARRY: I am aweary of this moon: would he would change!

SEAMUS: Onstage? Oooh... picture... but I don't think Professor McGonagall would allow it.

DRACO: It appears, by his small light of discretion, that he is in the wane; but yet, in courtesy, in all reason, we must stay the time.

DEAN: Proceed, Moon.

NEVILLE: All that I have to say, is, to tell you that the lanthorn is the moon; I, the man in the moon; this thorn-bush, my thorn-bush; and this dog, my dog.

RON: Why, all these should be in the lanthorn; for all these are in the moon. But, silence! here comes Thisbe.

(Enter COLIN)

COLIN: This is old Ninny's tomb. Where is my love?

CRABBE (yelling) Gimme the crayon!! Greg said you had a crayon!

(COLIN runs off)

RON: Well roared, Lion.

DRACO: Well run, Thisbe.

HARRY: Well shone, Moon. Truly, the moon shines with a good grace.

(CRABBE shakes COLIN's flowery apron, dislodges a pink crayon, and exits with it happily)

DRACO: Well moused, Lion.

DEAN: And so the lion vanished.

RON: And then came Pyramus.

HERMIONE: See how much faster things move when we stick to the script?

RON: We know, Hermione, there's no need to pound it into our heads like railway spikes.

(Enter GOYLE)

GOYLE: Sweet Moon, I thank thee for thy sunny beams;
I thank thee, Moon, for shining now so bright;
For, by thy gracious, golden, glittering gleams,
I trust to take of truest Thisbe sight.
But stay, O spite!
But mark, poor knight,
What dreadful dole is here!
Eyes, do you see?
How can it be?
O dainty duck! O dear!
Thy mantle good,
What, stain'd with blood!
Approach, ye Furies fell!
O Fates, come, come,
Cut thread and thrum;
Quail, crush, conclude, and quell!

HERMIONE: Oh, good job, Greg! You're really getting the hang of acting!

DRACO: This passion, and the death of a dear friend, would go near to make a man look sad.

HARRY: Beshrew my heart, but I pity the man.

GOYLE: O wherefore, Nature, didst thou lions frame?
Since lion vile hath here deflower'd my dear:
Which is--no, no--which was the fairest dame
That lived, that loved, that liked, that look'd with cheer.
Come, tears, confound;
Out, sword, and wound
The pap of Pyramus;
Ay, that left pap,
Where heart doth hop:
(Stabs himself with SEAMUS's bent paperclip)
Thus die I, thus, thus, thus.
Now am I dead,
Now am I fled;
My soul is in the sky:
Tongue, lose thy light;
Moon take thy flight:
(Exit NEVILLE, dropping the candle sinceit has just dripped hot wax on his hand)
Now die, die, die, die, die.

(GOYLE flops to the ground and stops moving.)

RON: No die, but an ace, for him; for he is but one.

DEAN: Less than an ace, man; for he is dead; he is nothing.

DRACO: With the help of a surgeon he might yet recover, and prove an ass.

HARRY: How chance Moonshine is gone before Thisbe comes back and finds her lover?

DRACO: She will find him by starlight. Here she comes; and her passion ends the play.

(Re-enter COLIN)

HARRY: Methinks she should not use a long one for such a Pyramus: I hope she will be brief.

RON: A mote will turn the balance, which Pyramus, which
Thisbe, is the better; he for a man, God warrant us;
she for a woman, God bless us.

DEAN: She hath spied him already with those sweet eyes.

NEVILLE: (singing) Dean and Colin, sittin' in a tree....

SEAMUS: Knock it off, Nev!!

RON: And thus she means, videlicet:--

COLIN: Asleep, my love?
What, dead, my dove?
O Pyramus, arise!
Speak, speak. Quite dumb?
Dead, dead? A tomb
Must cover thy sweet eyes.
These My lips,
This cherry nose,
These yellow cowslip cheeks,
Are gone, are gone:
(looks up at the rest of the cast, tearful and solemn)
Lovers, make moan:
His eyes were green as leeks.
O Sisters Three,
Come, come to me,
With hands as pale as milk;
Lay them in gore,
Since you have shore
With shears his thread of silk.
Tongue, not a word:
Come, trusty sword;
(stabs himself with the bent paperclip)
And, farewell, friends;
Thus Thisbe ends:
Adieu, adieu, adieu.
(Dies much more convincingly than GOYLE)

(A brief moment of silence from the others both onstage and off)

HERMIONE: Colin. Do that every time. That was perfect.

DRACO: Moonshine and Lion are left to bury the dead.

RON: Ay, and Wall too.

GOYLE: (standing up)No assure you; the wall is down that parted their fathers. Will it please you to see the epilogue, or to hear a Bergomask dance between two of our company?

DRACO: No epilogue, I pray you; for your play needs no
excuse. Never excuse; for when the players are all
dead, there needs none to be blamed. Marry, if he
that writ it had played Pyramus and hanged himself
in Thisbe's garter, it would have been a fine
tragedy: and so it is, truly; and very notably
discharged. But come, your Bergomask: let your
epilogue alone.

(GOYLE sort of spins around for a few moments; his version of dancing. He makes himself dizzy and has to sit down again.)

DRACO: The iron tongue of midnight hath told twelve:
Lovers, to bed; 'tis almost fairy time.
I fear we shall out-sleep the coming morn
As much as we this night have overwatch'd.
This palpable-gross play hath well beguiled
The heavy gait of night. Sweet friends, to bed.
A fortnight hold we this solemnity,
In nightly revels and new jollity.

HARRY: Now the hungry lion roars,
And the wolf behowls the moon;
Whilst the heavy ploughman snores,
All with weary task fordone.
Now the wasted brands do glow,
Whilst the screech-owl, screeching loud,
Puts the wretch that lies in woe
In remembrance of a shroud.
Now it is the time of night
That the graves all gaping wide,
Every one lets forth his sprite,
In the church-way paths to glide:
And we fairies, that do run
By the triple Hecate's team,
From the presence of the sun,
Following darkness like a dream,
Now are frolic: not a mouse
Shall disturb this hallow'd house:
I am sent with broom before,
To sweep the dust behind the door.

COLIN: What dust? What door?

HERMIONE: (sighs) Rather a spectacular return to form after the 'perfect' moment.

DRACO: Through the house give glimmering light,
By the dead and drowsy fire:
Every elf and fairy sprite
Hop as light as bird from brier;
And this ditty, after me,
Sing, and dance it trippingly.

PANSY: NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!!

DRACO: Now, until the break of day,
Through this house each fairy stray.
To the best bride-bed will we,
Which by us shall blessed be;
And the issue there create
Ever shall be fortunate.
So shall all the couples three
Ever true in loving be;
And the blots of Nature's hand
Shall not in their issue stand;
Never mole, hare lip, nor scar,
Nor mark prodigious, such as are
Despised in nativity,
Shall upon their children be.
With this field-dew consecrate,
Every fairy take his gait;
And each several chamber bless,
Through this palace, with sweet peace;
And the owner of it blest
Ever shall in safety rest.
Trip away; make no stay;
Meet me all by break of day.

(Exit DRACO, dragging PANSY behind him)

HARRY: If we shadows have offended,
Think but this, and all is mended,
That you have but slumber'd here
While these visions did appear.
And this weak and idle theme,
No more yielding but a dream,
Gentles, do not reprehend:
if you pardon, we will mend:
And, as I am an honest Puck,
If we have unearned luck
Now to 'scape the serpent's tongue,
We will make amends ere long;
Else the Puck a liar call;
So, good night unto you all.
Give me your hands, if we be friends,
And Robin shall restore amends.

HERMIONE: Aaaand... that's it. All of you, horrible job. Harry and Draco, you two would have been good, except now I have to go throw up after watching you two cuddle for an entire scene. Ron... I'll deal with you later. Seamus, do the world a favor and swear now never to procreate-

(The rest of the cast, bored of listening to HERMIONE's rantings, leave to pursue Other Things. Not necessarily Better Things, but Other Things nonetheless, leaving HERMIONE ranting to a gagged and bound PANSY)

HERMIONE: And another thing. Why is it that no matter how much glitter I put aside, it always disappeared? Were you people eating it between scenes? Were you really that desperate or a snack?

PANSY: (starts to cry) NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!!