“Do you know what the date is today?”
“Nah.”
“Is it somebody’s birthday?”
It was the first cultural studies class after the holidays.
“No, it’s the fifteenth of October!”
“So?”
“I think what Velvet is trying to point out,” Mr MacDonald explained, “is that it’s only four weeks until the performance.”
“Four weeks! Are you sure?”
“Yes. The jubilee celebrations are taking place over the second week in November.”
There was a silence as the reality of this hit everyone. It had been fun so far, singing and acting in T6 and in the practice room behind the stage, but in a few short weeks they had to do it in front of an audience.
“When’s the actual performance?”
“It’s set for the Friday afternoon.”
“That’s not Friday the thirteenth, is it?”
Velvet looked at her school diary. “Yes.”
“Great.”
“Can’t we change it to another day?”
“What, reschedule the school’s jubilee?”
“Slinky would be rapt.”
“Thirteen is a lucky number in some cultures,” Mr MacDonald said. “Let’s work out a schedule.”
He started scribbling dates on the board. It was the first time Velvet had seen him use a whiteboard.
“You’ve got five Thursday afternoons before the performance. You can do a full run-through this week and next week. Then a dress rehearsal. After that there’ll be two sessions to refine it.”
“Refine it? We haven’t finished writing it yet! There’s still something missing in the second half.”
“It’s time you found out what it is then. Let’s get to work.”
The first run-through didn’t get off to a good start. Drago refused to sing. They’d been so concerned about the band, the hole in the second half, the costumes, Hailie’s singing and Mei’s elocution that it hadn’t occurred to them that they’d never actually heard Drago sing the soliloquy song that opened the show.
“I don’t want to sing.”
“You have to.”
“I can’t.”
“Now he tells us!”
“You can act, Drago. It’s the same thing.”
“No, it’s not.”
“You have the main part,” Velvet said. “If you’ve got stage fright here in T6 with nobody but us around, we’ve got serious problems.”
“Why didn’t you tell us before?”
“I didn’t know till now.”
“I’m gonna strangle you, Drago.”
It looked like another brawl was looming.
“Why don’t you all sing the soliloquy song together?” Mr MacDonald suggested. “Help him get into it.”
Taleb started playing the song. “Does everyone know the words?”
Velvet sang along with Taleb. They went through it again and the others slowly joined in. At the fourth attempt Drago finally sang, only so quietly that no one could hear him.
“I’ve never sung before,” he said defensively.
“You have too! What about the rude version of the school song?” Jesus said.
“Yeah,” Roula said. “I’ve stood behind you at assembly. You can sing loud enough then.”
“That’s different.”
“Why is it different?”
“You know. I’m not supposed to.”
“So you can do anything if it’s against the rules?”
Drago shrugged.
Taleb had an idea. “Treat the song the same. Richard likes to break the rules. I’ll spice it up a bit. It can be a defiant song rather than a sad song. You know, ‘I’m not a pretty boy, so who cares?’ I can make it like a rap song.”
Taleb sped up the tempo and changed the key. Drago got the idea and half-sang, half-shouted the words. It wasn’t quite what everybody had had in mind, but at least Drago was singing.
They stumbled through the rest of Act I. Taleb’s acting in the dream scene was appalling. They didn’t have anyone for the roles of the murderers and spent twenty minutes arguing about who could play them.
“We’ve already got to have a couple of kids as the princes,” Peter said. “I reckon that’s enough outsiders. What if they don’t turn up?”
“Okay. Peter,” Velvet said, “you’re not in that scene, you can be a murderer. You too, Jesus.”
That was one problem solved, but Velvet was already worrying about another.
“I don’t think anybody is going to understand what’s going on.”
“We don’t,” Drago said. “Why should the audience?”
“We haven’t explained properly that Richard is doing all this mean stuff because he wants to be king.”
“Nobody expects to understand Shakespeare,” Hailie said.
“I know!” said Peter. “We could have Drago eyeing off the crown while Edward’s sick and dying. You know, picking it up and polishing it, trying it on when no one’s looking.”
“That’s great.”
“Except that we haven’t got a King Edward.”
“We have to have one. It’s such a good idea.”
“King Edward died because he ate and drank too much,” Velvet informed them. “He doesn’t even have to speak.”
“All we need,” Roula said, “is someone to lie around looking fat and then lie around looking dead.”
There was a sudden silence as the same idea hit everyone at once. They all turned to Mr MacDonald who was in his customary place at the back of the room eating an iced doughnut.
“What?” he said, wiping hundreds and thousands off his chin.
Hailie put on her sweetest smile. “We want you to play King Edward.”
“Please.”
“You don’t have to say anything.”
“Go on, sir. You’d be great.”
“Say yes.”
Mr MacDonald didn’t have a hope in the face of all that enthusiasm. “All right, I suppose so.”
Everybody cheered.
They worked out a whole routine with the Duke of Clarence and Richard both admiring the crown. Taleb wasn’t a good actor, but, as Velvet had predicted, Drago was great as the villain. They decided to continue the theme into the next scene and have Richard carrying the crown when he meets the little princes.
“And the prince who is heir to the throne wants to try it on,” Peter suggested, “but Richard won’t let him.”
“That’s not in the play though.”
“Jesus, I think we’re way past worrying about that,” Velvet said.
“The prince could say it’s got to be made smaller to fit him.”
“Then in the coronation scene when Richard finally gets to put on the crown it’s a really big moment.”
“God, we’re brilliant.”
“Yeah, I hope Miss Ryan’s cardboard crown will make the distance.”
Act I needed so much work, they didn’t have time to get to Act II.
“Next week we’ll finish going through the second half.”