The first human actors to get on a stage without the intention of cleaning it in decades walked nervously out from behind the curtain. The absence of the Robot Players was far from the grand surprise that Sean had hoped for when he first started. A combination of rumour mongering from the drunk Irishman/press mole, leaks from the cast and the suspicious comings and goings at the theatre had ensured that pretty much everyone on the ship had advance warning. The sight of flesh and blood on stage still drew gasps from the audience, however, as well as a rotten tomato or two. The applause they received, although welcome, was reflective of the audience’s anticipation of a rare freak show – enthusiastic to the point of irony.
Although during a solid week’s rehearsal the cast had only managed a little under one slightly abridged read-through of the play, things went surprisingly well from the start. Both Hamlet and Ophelia were remarked to be particularly well cast, and many of the support’s faltering lines and missed cues were viewed with sympathetic amusement. There was no riot, which had been Sean’s main concern; the only glitch was that Hugo was having to sneak on between acts in order to sweep up all the rotten fruit and vegetables that were piling up on the stage.
The closer the play drew towards its finale, the more nervous Sean became. Deep into Act IV almost no one had walked out and the actors could still just about be heard above the general chatter of the audience. For some reason, a great hush descended over them as (in what was rather a nice touch) the fair Ophelia was laid out on a dais, in a rather damp and clingy sheer white gown.
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Hamlet: Act IV, scene (vii), verses 163-186
King – Sean Oliveson
Queen – Shirley Miller
Laertes – Stanley Miller
Ophelia – Katie Slivers
Enter the Queen
KING:How, sweet Queen?
QUEEN:One woe doth tread upon another’s heel,
So fast they follow. Your sister’s drowned, Laertes.
LAERTES:Drowned! O, where?
QUEEN:There is a willow grows askant the brook,
That shows his hoar leaves in the glassy stream.
Therewith fantastic garlands did she make
Of crowflowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples,
That liberal shepherds give a grosser name,
But our cold maids do dead-men’s-fingers call them.
There on the pendent boughs her crownet weeds
Clambering to hang, an envious silver broke,
When down her weedy trophies and herself
Fell in the weeping brook. Her clothes spread wide,
And mermaid-like awhile they bore her up;
Which time she chanted snatches of old tunes,
As one incapable of her own distress,
Or like a creature native and induced
Unto that element. But long it could not be
Till that her garments, heavy with their drink,
Pulled the poor wretch from her melodious lay
To muddy death.
LAERTES:Alas, then she is drowned?
QUEEN:Drowned, drowned.
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The audience remained hushed as the curtain fell at the end of the scene, although a murmer grew as one by one the gentlemen realised that they were unlikely to see the fair Ophelia again, particularly not in any slinky see-through costumes. Playing the King, Sean was distracted by the ongoing sensation that his bottom was about to collapse, but he tried his best to ignore it. He knew that, above all else, it was imperative that they hold the audience’s attention to the very last scene. If anything went badly wrong then the mob were still out there in the cheap seats, waiting to get him.
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Hamlet: Act V, scene (i), verses 177-181First Clown – Sean Oliveson
Hamlet – Mick Poultice
Horatio – Hugo Spankworthy
HAMET:This?
FIRST CLOWN:E’en that.
HAMLET:Let me see.
Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him,
Hugo. A fellow of…..
HORATIO:Eh? Is it me? What do you mean?
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Until this point, Mick had been word perfect, so he could be forgiven this minor slip of the tongue. Hugo, however, had been hanging on by his fingernails at all times, helped along by a combination of luck and the desperation of his fellow cast members to avoid a farce. Hugo’s character had not said anything for some considerable period of time, and he had long been distracted, gazing out into the crowd and waving to people he knew. The sudden mention of his actual name caused him untold confusion, and left him fearful that he had missed a cue.
“Stop talking and let me carry on!” Mick whispered, urgently
“What?” said Hugo, loudly.
“That wasn’t the correct line!” said Sean, losing patience, in a stage whisper that carried to all parts.
The audience chuckled, and Mick began to lose his cool for the first time. He was taking this all very seriously now.
“What am I supposed to say then? Where are we?” asked Hugo again, not letting it go.
“Nothing!” Sean snapped. “It’s not your line”
“Why is he speaking to me then?” Hugo persisted
“Just shut up you bloody idiot!” Mick shouted, aggressively.
The good-natured laughter in the audience was starting to turn into something darker. An exploratory boo rang out, and a rotten pumpkin whistled past Sean’s ear. Mick was struck full in the face by an anaemic aubergine. He was furious. Everything, in his mind, had now been ruined. He lobbed the skull into the crowd, hitting a little guy with a bandage on his nose full in the face, and buggered off in a prima donna strop. Claire, who could see the danger, immediately hit the controls to bring the curtain down so that they could re-organise. Unfortunately it fell in such a way as to leave Hugo standing on his own on the wrong side of it, looking utterly mystified. Before anyone else could react, and before the rotten fruit could hone in on its target, Claire reached through the curtain, grabbed him by the shoulders, and yanked him to safety.
“Where’s Mick?” Sean demanded, panicking. He knew full well what these mobs could be like. The rest of the cast looked at him, blankly. No one had a clue.
Mick ducked into one of the changing rooms, locking the door behind him. Katie sat staring at him, still wearing the sheer slinky silk gown. As he gently slid his hand up her wholesome milky thigh, she looked urgently at him.
“You’re back early.” She said.
“Technical hitch, all the more time for us…” he said, grinning. ‘I love it when a plan comes together’
he thought, tenderly sticking his tongue down her throat.
Sean had to think quickly. He could hear a chorus of booing and derision coming from the other side of the curtain, and sensed it was about to turn nasty.
“Ok David, now you’re the King.”
“What?”
“They’ll know who he is!” Shirley objected, alarmed.
“They already know who he is!” said Sean. “Just.. wear a different beard, or something.”
“But…” David began.
“We don’t have time for this!” urged Sean “I’ll have to be Hamlet.”
“What a bloody surprise.” David muttered
“Be careful, Seany.” said Claire, clutching his arm. There was a catch in her voice that moved Sean
very much. He looked at her worried countenance and smiled in what he hoped was a reassuring way.
It was going to be all right. But it wasn’t.
“I’ll be fine.” he said confidently. But he wasn’t.
Sean had made the executive decision to skip straight to the final scene. He thought that if he moved straight to the part where all the characters were killed the audience might be less tempted to try it for themselves. As the curtain was raised again, he looked out into the crowd, who were by now openly hostile towards them.
“Bring back the robots!” some of the more polite people were saying, and “Rubbish! Useless!”
The less polite people seemed to have obtained pointy sticks from no-where. Sean made out a large tattooed man standing at the back, looking excited.
Unfortunately for Sean, in his hasty transformation from the King to Hamlet, he had been obliged to remove his beard. As soon as the cast stepped through the curtains and took up their positions a voice rang out from the crowd.
“That’s not Hamlet!” the voice said.
“It’s the guy who broke the robots! Get him!” said another.
“Oh dear” said Sean.
“Let’s get out of here!”
Quick as a flash what was a disgruntled group of theatre-goers transformed itself into a bloodthirsty baying mob. Sean just had that effect on people. The mob charged the stage. Fortinbras’ army, protectors of the Norwegian king and friends of Denmark, marched onto the set way ahead of their cue and with some sense of delight. They gathered in a fearsome phalanx, brandishing pointy swords towards the onrushing crowd. As Danny’s classmates viciously poked the aggressors, the main cast fell back. Literally in fact, as Hugo slipped over on the rotten vegetation that still littered the stage and stumbled into the back of the set, bringing the whole shebang down on top of them. As the crowd advanced the wooden stage groaned with the weight, and the press of the battle dislodged the lighting rig, which tumbled to hang dangerously low over the stage in a shower of sparks, before failing altogether. In the darkness Sean scrambled free, clutching his ass with one hand and dragging Claire along by the other. He hadn’t let go of her for a second. As screams and yells rang out across the theatre, he considered the merits of the chainsaw dream, as compared to the current scenario. At least the chainsaws would have been quick. Stumbling out of the side door, an angry looking duty nurse and two substantial orderlies from the hospital jumped him from behind, putting a chloroform soaked rag to his mouth before pulling a hessian sack over his head and dragging him away. As Sean lost consciousness yet again he though to himself that it had been quite a performance.
