It was time for Walt's solo. This is a sweet, sentimental song that tells the story of a man whose son is away at sea. Walt's speech beforehand is warm and thoughtful and relate's to the queen's own son who is also serving in the royal navy and who is also at sea. It's a beautiful song and a nice opportunity for Mr. Bumblepitch to interact with the queen. And then there are a few lines afterward.
When the song ended I was backstage listening for the queen's line. Nothing. NOTHING!!! I stepped out onstage and said the lines so poor Walt wouldn't be left hanging.
And then the queen said, "Well friends, it is time for us to depart your company."
No, no, NO!!! She skipped two songs!!!!! She said her last speech and then they all stood up and WALKED OUT!!!! I said, "Um, everyone please rise..." and the audience stood as queen and company left the room. I whispered to Walt and Bethie that we would do the songs she skipped and finish the show. When everyone sat down I said to Drew (my darling brother who was running the music cues. More about him later), "Please Mr. Lang, we will do Rutherford Rhodes." just to make sure he didn't skip ahead to the end. We did the last two songs plus another song at the end where we all gush about the friggin' queen. We improvised the Felicity/Maisie-gets-exposed-but-it-all-ends-well part and finished the show.
Afterward, Drew came backstage and handed me the queen's script. She had left the script behind even though we had another queen show on Sunday! My head went KABOOM. Again, we were all agape. And it wasn't just us actors. Everyone at the church who was involved with the show were also astonished and more than a little miffed.
I decided to take the script back to the Mission Inn and leave it at the desk. I sat down and wrote her a note (Drew is telling me to stay calm) and stapled it to the front of the script. I basically told her that she had skipped two songs and that it was important for her to take some time and PRACTICE her lines so we could have a great show on Sunday. Then I took it to the Mission Inn.
Janet was in the lobby. I tore the note off and approached her and handed her the script. I was calm and friendly (really, I was!). I let her know how important it was that she practice her lines and that she had skipped those songs. She was apologetic, and it really wouldn't have been appropriate for me to rip off her wig right there in the hotel lobby so I left it at that.
Sunday! That morning I redid the queen's script. I removed the pre-show page and any other stage directions and put the song titles in bold print and colored them red. That way she should be able to find her place both by looking at her own bold, blue lines and the red, bold, song titles. I put the pages into plastic sheet protectors and put everything into a three ring binder. I don't see how I could have made it any more idiot proof. I headed off to the church.
We did a Jeffrey show, which went very well. Drew and I decided to take a stroll and check out the rest of the Dickens Faire. Right outside the church was our familiar lady-in-waiting. She said, "The queen didn't get her script after the show." I told her that we found her script and it has already been placed in Janet's hands. I also told her that I had redone the script and that it would be placed on the table in front of her. Once again the L-I-W said, "I will convey that message to Her Majesty." I said, "Her name is Janet, you know. She's not really the queen." Really, I'd had it up to here with all this queen bullshit. The L-I-W said, "I know. I like to stay in character." But you could see she thought it was a little silly. Before we left, Drew dashed back in and took the script off the table and hid it. He thought that just maybe the L-I-W would try to nab it. I think he was probably right.
The entourage showed up a little early and the queen and I went through the script again. She appreciated the simplified and straight-forward script. Also, we had replaced the problem chairs with plain, wooden ones from the sanctuary. I also told her that whatever Dick says in his announcement, they need to arrange themselves so the queen ends up in the middle. And I told her that when the room is full of people, they soak up a lot of sound so she needs to speak loudly in order to be heard.
She said, "Sitting at the end of the table I was too far away from the microphone."
There was no microphone.
So, the show began, they all went in in the correct order and the queen said the correct opening line. So guess who flubbed a line? ME!
And the queen shot me a look that was laden with daggers and ice picks. Seriously, bitch? Well, now you know how we felt.
The rest of the show went as it should. We had one more Jeffrey show after that. More in Part 4.
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