MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM; A COMIC JEWISH SATIRE

An adaptation by John Hudson

to reveal the underlying religious Allegory
March 15th, 2007, WGW Registration No. 1165487

PERFORMED AT THE SMITHSONIAN, WASHINGTON DC, AS PART OF THE

WASHINGTON SHAKESPEARE FESTIVAL AND AT THE ABINGDON THEATER
IN NEW YORK CITY IN MARCH/APRIL 2007

THE DICE PLAYERS AT THE FOOT OF THE CROSS; From Left, Megan
McGrath, Kirsta Peterson (center) as Bottom/Pyramus, and Amanda Bruton

For further details on this production visit

http://www.nytheatre-wire.com/gs07031t.htm
http://www.njjewishnews.com/njjn.com/022808/ltKosherBard.html
http://www.scribd.com/doc/15262132/A-Midsummer-Nights-Dream-An-Experiment-in-
Allegorical-Staging
email; Darkladyplayers@aol.com

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1. DUMB SHOW
The theater is in darkness. Strange harsh noises. Soldiers enter and take up firing positions at
front stage. Titus enters, holds his arms up at back stage. Fairy soldiers stand either side of him
and salute and march in rhythm to the music, then march off. At the appearance of the melody
the Little Judean boy enters accompanied by bees who he blesses. Fairy/soldiers enter and pull
away the bees. Re-enter Titus who takes Little Judean boy, slices at him with a sword, and pulls
him off stage, shouting the words ‘Buzz Buzz’ (the expression used in Hamlet for ‘bizbuz’
meaning in Hebrew to plunder spoils).
http://vortex4u.com/speare/spotted_1.mp3

2. INTRODUCTION
Ba ss a no Pav a na M as qu e of O bero n ( qui etly )
Processional entrance of Theseus and Hippolyta to courtly music.

HIPPOLYTA: Tis strange my Theseus,

That these Lovers speak of.

THESEUS: 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.

Sign; REALITY BASED APPROACH (The ‘allegory of poets’. Reason can discern the objective
Reality beneath the surface fantasies (The signs appear written on a pair of giant cardboard rabbits that
take up position facing each other at front stage—modeled on those on the front page of the Sonnets. It is
also a theatrical tradition begun by Tree to bring rabbits on stage. The positioning of this allegory also
reflects a debate between the ‘reality based community’ and those in the Bush Administration, who want to
create their own reality by spinning stories (see Ron Suskind, New York Times, October 2004).

(Theseus now turns to address audience)

The Luna-tic,
the Lover
and the Poet
Are of Imagination all compact:
*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

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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!
Enter Second Rabbit sign; WE CREATE OUR OWN REALITY (the ‘allegory of the theologians’
whatever story we spin is Reality if told over enough times).

(naïvely, admiring Theseus’ brilliance which challengesher viewpoint and attempting to feed ‘her’ rabbit)
HIPPOLYTA : 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.

Curtains open to reveal moon. Theseus acknowledges the Moon (Luna) which is
followed by the Lunatic Lovers who exemplify those he had just been referring to
at the start of his speech.

THESEUS: Here come the Lovers, full of joy and mirth.

Theseus and Hippolyta exit.

3. ACT 1, SCENE 1; lines 128-155 LOVERS SCENE

The set is dominated by an enormous full moon. The stage is lit by a circle of red light to signify
the primal cauldron, the ‘hyle’ or in Latin ‘silva’ the ‘wood’. (These two elements of the yellow
circle and the red circle will be reversed in the final scene).

Two actors playing the 4 moonstruck, lunatic Lovers initially enter wearing jeans with
T shirts (?) to represent the Elements ( Black/Earth as Demetrius) and (Blue/ Water as Helena),
and then re-enter immediately wearing (White/Air as Lysander) and (Red/Fire as Hermia).
Each shirt has the name of one of the elements. At each of the three mentions of ‘cross’ an actor
runs on stage bearing a cross and takes up position at front stage.
The lovers are contained in a circle/cauldron of red light since they represent some of the four
elements Earth/Fire/Water/Air that make up creation). Demetrius rushes on stage magnetically
followed by Helena. Their characteristic movement is rushing.

DEMETRIUS: I love thee not, therefore pursue me not.

Where is Lysander and fair Hermia?
The one I'll slay, the other slayeth me.
Thou told'st me they were stolen unto this wood;
And here am I, and wode within this wood,
Because I cannot meet my Hermia.
Hence, get thee gone, and follow me no more.

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HELENA: You draw me, you hard-hearted adamant;
But yet you draw not iron, for my heart is true as steel:
leave you your power to draw,
And I shall have no power to follow you.

DEMETRIUS: Do I entice you? do I speak you fair?

Or, rather, do I not in plainest truth
Tell you, I do not, nor I cannot love you?
Tempt not too much the hatred of my spirit;
For I am sick when I do look on thee.

HELENA: And I am sick when I look not on you.

(Demetrius makes an aside to audience includes a quote from Sonnet 105. It begins with the idea
of insane love in which someone ‘dotes’, a term that will then be applied to Titania who will
“madly dote” on Bottom).

DEMETRIUS : The sweet lady dotes, devoutely dotes in idolatry

Let not my love be call'd idolatry,
Nor my belove`d as an idol show
I'll run from thee and hide me in the brakes, (Demetrius runs out)
And leave thee to the mercy of wild beasts (shouted from offstage)

HELENA: The wildest hath not such a heart as you. (shouts)

Run when you will, the story shall be changed:
Apollo flies, and Daphne holds the chase;
The dove pursues the griffin;
the mild hind makes Speed to catch the Tiger; (Helena runs out)
bootless Speed----when Cowardice pursues
and Valour flies. (shouted from offstage)

(Lysander enters talking to someone behind him)

LYSANDER: How now, my love! why is your cheek so pale?
How chance the roses there do fade so fast?

(Hermia enters in red T shirt and a complaining manner following him )

HERMIA: Belike for want of rain, which I could well
Beteem them from the tempest of my eyes.

LYSANDER: Ay me!
for aught that I could ever read,
Could ever hear--- by tale or history,
The course of true love never did run smooth;
But, either it was different in blood,--

HERMIA: O cross! too High to be enthrall'd to Low.

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 (Roman instruments of torture enter the world. Cross enters, both lovers respond with alarm as
if the crosses were pursuing them)

LYSANDER: Or else misgraff`ed in respect of years,--

HERMIA: O spite! too Old to be engaged to Young.

LYSANDER: Or else it stood upon the choice of friends,--

HERMIA: If then true lovers have been ever cross'd, (cross enters)

It stands as an edict in destiny:

Then let us teach our trial patience,
Because it is a customary cross, (cross enters)
As due to love as thoughts and dreams and sighs,
Wishes and tears, poor Fancy's followers.

(on the word Fancy they look at the crosses and exit)

4. ACT 1, SCENE 2; lines 1-21, 38-53

THE MECHANICALS PUT ON ALLEGORICAL IDENTITIES
Enter Mechancals and Quince, in his cornerstone costume holding the other costumes and an
enormous Scroll, (the Script Scroll is held up or hung onstage. It identifies their roles which the
Mechanicals are excited to learn
SCRIPT SCROLL
Pyramus = Bottom = JESUS
& Thisbe = Flute = THE CHURCH
An Allegory of Christ's Death
For love of his Church
&
Peter Quince = Petros Quoin
= Rocky Cornerstone = SAINT PETER

QUINCE: Is all our company here?

Here is the Scroll of every man's name, which is
thought fit, through all Athens……. (Bottom interrupts)

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

QUINCE: Marry, our play is, The Most Lamentable Comedy, and
Most Cruel Death of Pyramus and Thisby.

BOTTOM: A very good piece of work, I assure you, and a

merry. Now, good Peter Quince, call forth your
actors by the Scroll. Masters, spread yourselves.

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

BOTTOM: Ready. Name what part I am for, and proceed.

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

BOTTOM: What is Pyramus? a lover, or a tyrant?

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

(Mechanical gives him white Jesus costume which he begins to put on with halo)
BOTTOM: That will ask some tears in the true performing of it….

QUINCE: Francis Flute, the bellows-mender.

FLUTE: Here, Peter Quince.

QUINCE: Flute, you must take Thisby on you.

(Mechanical gives him black clergy costume he begins to put on)
FLUTE: What is Thisby? a wandering knight?

QUINCE: It is the lady that Pyramus must love.

FLUTE: Nay, faith, let me not play a woman, I have a beard coming.

QUINCE: That's all one: you shall play it in a Mask, and

you may speak as small as you will…. (Quince gives Flute the mask that looks like a church)

Bottom interrupts Quince, rudely pushing Flute aside

BOTTOM: An I may hide my face, let me play Thisby too,
I'll speak in a monstrous little voice. 'Thisne,Thisne;'
'Ah, Pyramus, lover dear! thy Thisby dear,and lady dear!'

QUINCE: No, no; you must play Pyramus and Flute Thisby.

BOTTOM: Well, proceed. (, Bottom leads them off stage taking the Script/scroll)

5. ACT 2, SCENE 1, LINES 19-145

OBERON CONFRONTS TITANIA
This is not a physical fight scene, although the events recounted in Titania’s speech are a
representation of the Jewish War which destroyed Judea. Perhaps the lighting during the speech
could indicate the war—possibly using the same (?flashing?) lighting used in the introductory
Dumb Show, to indicate the relationship.

While Puck is singing, there is the offstage sound of marching feet, Fairies march on stage in
Roman military uniform and take up position. They have with them, as if a captive, the Little
Indian (Iudean) Boy. Titania enters once the Fairies are in position, and goes up to the Little

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Indian Boy. Oberon is followed by the bees making their characteristic movements who reach out
to the Boy ineffectively. (Titania is pronounced with a long ‘i’ and the last syllable is long as in
TIGHTanya). Oberon may be wearing golden/Indian like clothing. He should walk in a slow and
stately fashion, in contrast to Titania’s military briskness. After Puck has said the introductory
verse, Titania takes the Little Indian/Judean Boy sets him up in a crucifixion pose and puts a
crown of thorns on his head in dumbshow

Tune is on pg 335 of The Shakespeare Songbook. Puck enters from audience and sings first verse
of The Mad Merry Pranks of Robin Goodfellow
http://vortex4u.com/speare/madmerry_1.mp3
(and on www.darkladyplayers.com under Dream/Music)
PUCK sings: From Oberon in fairy land
The king of ghosts and goblins there
Mad Robin I at his command
Am set to view the night sports here
What revel rout is here about
In any corner where I go
I will it see and merry be
And make good sport ,ho, ho ho.

Enter Fairies(Soldiers) who take up formation. They give a military salute as Titania enters and
remain standing to attention as Titania performs the dumb show—crowning the boy with
flowers-.
PUCK: King Oberon keeps his revels here tonight
Take heed the Queen comes not within his sight
For Oberon is passing fell and wrath
Because that she as her attendant hath
A lovely boy, stolen from an Iudean King.
Never had she so sweet a changling
And Jealous Oberon would have the child
but she perforce witholds the love`d boy
And crowns him with flowers and makes him all her joy
(moves to side of stage and observes as this happens)

Angry that Titania has destroyed his kingdom of Judea, captured the young Prince, and destroyed
the Temple, Oberon addresses Titus Caesar/Titania, the Roman conqueror, with barely
suppressed rage. Titania’s response is not a comment about Oberon’s sexual jealousy, but mocks
him by referring to his monotheistic insistence on being the sole Lord, which is almost part of
his title---and which Titus stole away by making himself the god of the Jews. Oberon enters from
the audience.

OBERON: Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania.

(Titania addresses the audience, as if she has just noticed him, prolonging the syllables of his
name and alluding to the quotation from Exodus 20;5 about the Lord being a jealous god which
will appear soon on the Torah scroll when it comes on stage. She moves as if to leave)
TITANIA: What!!! Jealous Oberon (begins to exit)

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OBERON: Tarry, rash wanton: am not I thy LORD?

TITANIA: Then I must be thy lady: (Titania deliberately mistakes Oberon’s claim to be God)
but why art thou here,
Come from the farthest Steppe of Iudea?
(referring presumably to the original staging that Oebron is descending from some steps---in this
case coming through the theater. all this time the Little Iudean boy, his arms supported by the
fairies/soldiers is held in position)

OBERON: How canst thou thus, for shame… (Oberon steps onto the stage)

TITANIA: These are the forgeries of jealousy:

Therefore the winds, piping to us in vain,
As in revenge, have sucked up from the sea
Contagious fogs; which falling in the land
Have every pelting river made so proud
That they have overborne their continents:
The fold stands empty in the drowne`d field,
And crows are fatted with the Moorian flock;
The Nine Men's Moorish is filled up with mud,
{Puck opens newspaper. now fearfully reads
News of the Jews
Titus destroys Judea
Moors Killed
Land Destroyed

No night is now with hymn or carol blest:

Therefore the moon, the governess of floods, (walks by the moon)
Pale in her anger, washes all the air,
That rheumatic diseases do abound:
And thorough this distemperature we see
The seasons alter: hoary-headed frosts
Far in the fresh lap of the crimson rose,
And on old Hiems' thin and icy crown
An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
And this same progeny of evils comes
From our debate, from our dissension;
We are their parents and original.

OBERON: Do you amend it then; it lies in you:

Why should Titania cross her Oberon?
I do but beg a little changeling boy,
To be my henchman.

TITANIA: Set your heart at rest:

The fairy land buys not the child of me.
His mother was a Vot’ress of my Order:

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.But she, being mortal, of that boy did die;
And for her sake do I rear up her boy, (raises boy’s arms in crucifixion)
And for her sake I will not part with him.

Woman dressed in blue like the Virgin Mary comes on stage in prayerful pose and collapses
dumbly at foot of where the Iudean boy is standing. Totania makes as if to kick her, then follows
everyone else off stage saying the last line

Not for thy fairy kingdom

Titania exits, leaving Oberon onstage.

6. ACT 2, SCENE 1; lines 148-176, 188-193, 229-237, 239,241-2, 246-58

THE MAD WOOD & PUCK GETS THE ’FLOWER’
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTtDvyApMFk&feature=related
Enter bees, who surround Oberon and assist with the prop whiteboard.

OBERON: My gentle Puck, come hither. Thou rememberest

Since once I sat upon a promontory,
And heard a mermaid on a dolphin's back

PUCK: I remember.

Oberon begins in an instructional pedagogic style as if lecturing and referring to a large chart
and ticks off each item as if Puck were a student—he sits there attentively while the bees hold up
the chart).

ALLEGORY 101
Flower = A Book
Flower Gathering = Anthology
Purple = Imperial Color
Idleness = Idolness
Dote = love a fantasy

OBERON: That very time I saw, but thou couldst not,

Flying between the cold moon and the earth,
Cupid all armed: a certain aim he took
At a fair vestal throne`d by the west,
And loosed his love-shaft smartly from his bow,
Yet marked I where the bolt of Cupid fell:
It fell upon a little western ‘flower’,
Before milk-white, now Purple with love's wound,
And maidens call it love-in-idol-ness.
Fetch me that ‘flower’ the herb I shew'd thee once:
The juice of it on sleeping eye-lids laid
Will make or man or woman madly dote
Upon the next live creature that it sees.

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Fetch me this ‘herb’; and be thou here again
Ere the Leviathan can swim a league.

PUCK: I'll put a girdle round about the earth

In forty minutes
(puts on aeroplane ‘wings’ from EL-AL and exits into audience where he discovers the ‘flower’)

OBERON: Having once this juice,

I'll watch Titania when she is asleep,
And drop the liquor of it in her eyes.
The next thing then she waking looks upon,
Be it on lion, bear, or wolf, or bull,
On meddling monkey, or on busy ape,
She shall pursue it with the soul of love..

Re-enter PUCK he is holding something wrapped in a piece of purple Wrapping Paper, which
says LOVE IN IDOL-NESS. He holds it up like a gospel, vertically in both hands, displays it
and chants the line “Ay there.” in plainsong, as he unwraps it— revealing it as a purple book
titled BOOK OF HATEFUL FANTASIES.

OBERON: Hast thou the ‘flower’ there? Welcome, wanderer.

Bees enter and buzz around Puck and the ‘flower’. Puck carries it above his head, with highly
ritualized formal gestures, and chants)

PUCK: Ay, there it is

OBERON: I pray thee----------- (chanted)

Give it me.
I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,
There sleeps Titania sometime of the night,
And with the juice of this I'll streak her eyes,
And make her Full of Hateful Fantasies. (rejoicingly and triumphantly)

7. ACT II, Scene 2, 1-33 THE FOREST ANIMALS FIGHT SCENE

Massive scene change. Titania enters with the Fairies and Philomel, ravaged.
Fairies/Soldiers are carrying flags which they hang up on the bower so the words are
readable. One is a regular flag that says TITUS DEI. The other is in the form of a very
large amputated pink tongue which says JUDEA CAPTA (referring to Philomel). The
bower includes a string from which hang purple/black streamers and from which the two
flags, and amputated limbs will be later hung. Titus Arch enters. Puck sits to the side front
stage as a commentator. Oberon and the bees, and Titania and the Fairies, walk across the
stage for a moment missing each other, as if not seeing the other army. Then Titania sets up
her camp around her while the bees get ready to attack.

Enter Titania carrying the Little Iudean Boy over his shoulder

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TITANIA: Come, now a roundel and a fairy song;
Then, for the third part of a minute, hence;
Some to kill cankers in the musk-rose buds,
Some war with bat-mice for their leathern wings,
To make my small elves coats, and some keep back
The clamorous owl that nightly hoots and wonders
At our quaint spirits. Sing me now asleep;
Then to your offices and let me rest.

Fairies/Soldiers make up camp. The fairies defend the camp by addressing the first part of the
verse to the Bees, and the second part of each verse to taunting Philomel.
http://www.vortex4u.com/speare/spotted_5.mp3
FAIRIES sing:
You spotted snakes with double tongue, (Fairies defend the camp)
Thorny hedgehogs, BE NOT SEEN;
Newts and blind-worms, do no wrong,
COME NOT NEAR our fairy queen.

Philomel, with melody (Fairies abuse Philomel)

Sing in our sweet lullaby;
Lulla, lulla, lullaby, lulla, lulla, lullaby:
NEVER HARM ,Nor spell nor charm,
Come our lovely lady nigh;
So, good night, with lullaby.
Lulla, lulla, lullaby

Weaving spiders, COME NOT HERE; (Titus takes Philomel to bed)

HENCE, you long-legg'd spinners, HENCE! (Fairies defend the camp)
Beetles black, approach not near;
Worm nor snail, do no offence.

Philomel, with melody, (Fairies taunt Philomel)

Sing in our sweet lullaby;
Lulla, lulla, lullaby, lulla, lulla, lullaby:

The words of Cobweb and Oberon are spoken respectively over the final rattles and haunting
echoes of the soundtrack
COBWEB: Hence, away! now all is well:
One aloof stand sentinel.

Cobweb stands alone while Exeunt other Fairies and bees. Sentinel turns his back, TITANIA
sleeps.

Puck makes an ironical aside to the audience adapted from Amelia Lanyer’s poem on Cooke-ham)

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PUCK: With Christ and the Apostles here to talk
In these sweet woods, how lovely is a walk.
Me thinks each thing doth unto sorrow frame
The trees, the flowers, and the birds the same
That ravished Philomel, that wanted was to sing
Now cannot sing, nor chirp , nor use her wing
But with her tender feet on some sparse spray
Just warbles sorrow and her own dismay.
Fair Philomela sings her doeful ditty
But cries in vain, she can procure no pity.

Enter OBERON and empties the ‘ flower’ on TITANIA's eyelids in a shower of purple confetti
saying in a vengeful manner

OBERON: What thou seest when thou dost wake,

Do it for thy true-love take,
Love and languish for his sake:
Be it lynx, or cat, or bear,
‘Pard, or boar with bristled hair,
In thy eye that shall appear
When thou wakest, it is thy Dear:
Wake when some vile thing is near.

Exit Puck and Oberon, comforting and stealing away the Little Iudean Boy and
leaving Titania and guard asleep
8. ACT 3, I, 1-95
THE REHEARSAL & THE TRANSFIGURATION OF BOTTOM
(During this scene Titania is asleep in her bower). At the start Quince is in costume, Bottom
and Flute/Thisbe are putting theirs on. Snout is not in costume but will get draped in a
rehearsal version of his Wall sheet. Starveling is holding his (standalone) crescent moon.
There is a Calendar on the side of the stage that reads 1596.

Mechanicals enter, Quince holding the Prologues. Flute, Snout and Starveling sit to watch.
BOTTOM: Peter Quince,--

QUINCE: What sayest thou, bully Bottom?

BOTTOM: There are things in this Comedy of Pyramus and

Thisby that will never please. First, Pyramus must
draw a sword to kill himself; which the ladies
cannot abide. How answer you that?

(at this point Flute, Starveling and Snout act terrified hugging each other)

SNOUT: By our Lady, a parlous fear.

STARVELING: I believe we must leave the killing out.

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BOTTOM: Not a whit: I have a device to make all well.
Write me a prologue; and let the Prologue seem to
say, we will do no harm with our swords, and that
Pyramus is not killed indeed; and, for the more
better assurance, tell them that I, Pyramus, am not
Pyramus, but Bottom the weaver: this will put them
out of fear.

QUINCE: Well, we will have such a Prologue (Mechanicals audience applauds)

he holds up what will later be used as a sandwich board

PROLOGUE:
Look for the allegory
He shows it to Flute, Snout and Starveling, who sit there relieved and applaud, until they think
of a new potential problem)

SNOUT: Will not the ladies be afeard of the Lion?

STARVELING: I fear it, I promise you. (they are all fearful again)

BOTTOM: Therefore another Prologue must tell he is not a Lion,

and tell them plainly he is Snug the Joiner.

Quince holds up another Prologue which the stage audience of Mechanicals again applaud
PROLOGUE:
Decipher the fantasies

QUINCE: Then, there is another thing:

we must have a Wall in the great chamber;
for Pyramus and Thisby says the story,
did talk through the chink of a wall.

SNOUT: You can never bring in a Wall. What say you, Bottom? (he gets up)

BOTTOM: Some man or other must present Wall:,

and through that cranny shall Pyramus
and Thisby ‘whisper’.
(Quince and Bottom drape Snout in the rehearsal version of the blue sheet representing Wall and he
practices holding it up)

QUINCE: Speak, Pyramus, Thisby, stand forth (they move either side of Snout/Wall)

BOTTOM: Thisby, the flowers of odious savours sweet,--

QUINCE: Odours, odours.

BOTTOM: --odours savours sweet:

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So hath thy breath, my dearest Thisby dear.
But hark, a voice! stay thou but here awhile,
And by and by I will to thee appear.
Bottom goes over to wall calendar, changes the date, and exits

January 14th
FESTUM ASINORUM
Feast of Christ as an Ass

Flute resumes the rehearsal and addressing the absent Bottom. In this speech Bottom’s cue is
‘never tire’ after which he is supposed to enter and say something, to which Flute will then reply
“I’’ll meet thee Pyramus).

FLUTE: Most radiant Pyramus, most lily-white of hue,

Of colour like the red rose on triumphant brier,
Most brisky Juvenal and eke most lovely Jew,
As true as Truest Horse that yet would never tire,
I'll meet thee, Pyramus, at Ninny's tomb. (shaded lines chanted in plainsong)

QUINCE: 'Ninus' tomb,' man: why, you must not speak that
yet; that you answer to Pyramus:
you speak all your
part at once, cues and all
(he shouts to Pyramus offstage)
Pyramus , ENTER, ENTER
your cue is past; it is, 'never tire.

FLUTE: As true as Truest Horse, that yet would never tire…… (chanted in plainsong)

On the word ‘would’ Bottom gallops in, as a pantomime horse, wearing the ass-head)
FLUTE: O monstrous! Masters we are haunted (Exit Starvling and Flute)

BOTTOM : Why do they run away? this is a knavery of them to make me afeard.

SNOUT: O Bottom, thou art changed! what do I see on thee?

BOTTOM: What do you see? you see an asshead of your own, do you?

Here at the Translation, they stand with Snout at stage right, with Bottom center, Quince/St
Peter blessing the Ass with the sign of the cross in a reverential fashion

QUINCE: Bless thee, Bottom! Benedicimus te!

bless thee! thou art TRANSLATED !

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(Quince puts a banner or sash around Bottom like a prize horse it reads

‘TRANSLATED’ = ENTERED THE

KINGDOM OF JESUS (1 Col. 13)
&
‘BECOME AN ALLEGORICAL
FIGURE OF FALSE SEEMING (Puttenham)

All exit,except the Bottom pantomime donkey which remains on stage

9. ACT 3, scene 1, lines 99-190

THE SLAUGHTER OF THE BEES
Bottom’s appearance with the ass head is the first confirmation of his identity. His being
‘Translated’ is the equivalent of the ‘Transfiguration’ of Jesus (Gospel of Matthew 17;2).

BOTTOM : I see their knavery: this is to make an ass of me;

to fright me, if they could.
But I will not stir from this place,
do what they can: I will walk up and down here,
and I will sing, that they shall hear
I am not afraid.
Sings, to original tune
BOTTOM ; The ousel cock so black of hue,
With orange-tawny bill,
The throstle with his note so true,
The--- wren with little quill

The Finch, the Sparrow and the Lark

the plainsong Cuckoo gray;
Whose notes full many a man doth mark,
and---- dares not answer na-a-a-y (he neighs like a donkey)

TITANIA: What angel wakes me from my flowery bed?

I pray thee, gentle mortal, sing again:
Mine ear is much enamour'd of thy note;
So is mine eye enthralle`d to thy shape;
And thy fair virtue's force perforce doth move me
On the first view to say, to swear, I love thee.

BOTTOM: Methinks, mistress, you should have little reason

for that: and yet, to say the truth, reason and
love keep little company together now-a-days; the
more the pity that some honest neighbours will not
make them friends. Nay, I can gleek----- upon occasion.
goes to the calendar and changes the date (light shines on the face of the ‘translated’ Bottom as
he gleeks)

15
 August 6th
FEAST OF THE TRANSFIGURATION
Gleeks = Jesus shone like the Sun

TITANIA: Thou art as wise as thou art beautiful.

BOTTOM: N-e-i-g-h, not so, neither: but if I had wit enough to get out
of this wood, I have enough to serve mine own turn.

TITANIA: Out of this wood do not desire to go:

Thou shalt remain here, whether thou wilt or no.
I'll give thee fairies to attend on thee,
And they shall fetch thee Jew-els from the deep,
And sing while thou on presse`d flowers dost sleep;
And I will purge thy mortal grossness so
That thou shalt like an airy spirit go.
Peaseblossom! Cobweb! Moth! and Mustardseed!

Dressed as Roman centurions carrying spears enter the Fairies who give Roman military salutes first to
Titania and then to Bottom in a co-ordinated military manner.
COBWEB: Ready.

PEASEBLOSSOM: And I.

MUSTARDSEED: And I.

ALL FAIRIES: Where shall we go?

TITANIA: Be kind and courteous to this… ‘Gentleman’; (escorts Bottom to bower)

Hop in his walks and gambol in his eyes;
Feed him with apricocks and dewberries,
With purple grapes, green figs, and mulberries;

PEASEBLOSSOM: Hail, mortal! (military salute gets repeated)

ALL TOGETHER : Hail!

(Enter bees around he edge of the Torah. Titania now gives her orders to the troops in a
deliberate, commanding military fashion, after which the Fairies attack the bees and slaughter
them). She points to the bees.

TITANIA: The honey-bags---- Steal ---from the humble Bees,

And for night-tapers---Crop their waxen Thighs
And Light them--- at the fiery glow-worm's eyes,
To have my love to bed and to arise;
And Pluck the wings---- from painted ButterFlies

16
To fan the moonbeams from his sleeping eyes:
Nod to him, elves, and do him courtesies.

In the Bower Bottom discovers opens a Newspaper which contains the headline that he displays,
nodding approvingly
News of the Jews
Titus Caesar cuts off
Maccabee’s Limbs

Battle noises as Fairy centurions yell, attack the bees and bloodily cut off their legs. A drum beat
may mark each time one of the combatants scores a hit. The amputated (human) limbs of the
bees are carried aloft--as in the representation of the menorah on the side of the arch of Titus—
and are hung up in the Bower from a string. The bower is lit with a firery red light. One bee,
which had been hiding, is left alive on stage. The bodies of the other bees are left on stage dead.

10. ACT 4, SCENE 1; lines 1-43

BOTTOM KILLS A BEE & DONKEY SEX SCENE
The bower is hung with amputated limbs . Bottom is lying down. At front stage the actor
playing the six legged Bee who had escaped being killed in the last slaughter, is watching the
proceedings, in great distress.

TITANIA: Come, sit thee down upon this flowery bed,

While I thy amiable cheeks do coy,
And stick musk-roses in thy sleek smooth head,
And kiss thy fair large ears, my gentle joy.

Titania places large crown of thorns on Bottom’s head

BOTTOM :Where's Peaseblossom?

PEASEBLOSSOM: Ready.

BOTTOM: Scratch my head Peaseblossom.

Bottom now gives his instructions pointing to the remaining bee who is now discovered

BOTTOM: Mounsieur Cobweb, good mounsieur,

get you your weapons in your hand,
and Kill me a red-hipped humble-bee
on the top of a thistle; and, good
mounsieur, bring me the honey-bag.
Do not fret yourself too much in the action, mounsieur;
and,good mounsieur, have a care the honey-bag break not;
I would be loath to have you overflown
with a honey-bag, signior.
(Cobweb salutes and goes to cut off the bee’s legs and arms

(Mustardseed goes over to the bee and forces it to sing. It reads out of a very large music score
marked ‘Monsieur’s Almaine Psalm 137. (See Shakespeare’s Songbook pg 268). While Cobweb
approaches and menaces it with a sword. At the end of the song its legs will be cut off.

17
http://www.vortex4u.com/speare/almaine_1.mp3
(and on www.darkladyplayers.com under Dream/Music)

BEE sings ; Our wealth and riches which we enjoyed long

They do appoint their prey and spoil
By cruelty and wrong

To set our houses afire on our heads

And cursedly to cut our throats
As we lie in our beds
Our children’s brains to dash against the ground
And from the earth our memory
For ever to confound

Our children’s brains to dash against the ground

And from the earth our memory
For ever to confound
Bottom speaks over the concluding sounds of the song and the screams of the bee.
BOTTOM: Give me your hand, Mounsieur Mustardseed. ( Fairy gives him an arm))
Pray you, leave your courtesy, good mounsieur.

MUSTARDSEED: What's your Will?

BOTTOM: Nothing, good mounsieur, but to help

Calvary Cobweb to scratch.
I must to the Barber's, monsieur; for
methinks I am marvellous hairy about the face; and I
am such a tender ass, if my hair do but tickle me,
I must scratch.

Cobweb brings back the remaining bee’s limbs offers them to Bottom and hangs them up in the
bower. The dead bee remains on stage with the others.
TITANIA: Or say, sweet love, what thou desirest?

BOTTOM:, I pray you, let none of your people stir me:

I have an exposition of sleep come upon me.

TITANIA: Sleep thou, and I will wind thee in my arms.

Fairies, begone, and be all ways away.

Titania entwists Bottom Exeunt fairies. Bees remain on stage dead.

So doth the woodbine the sweet honeysuckle
Gently entwist; the female ivy so
Enrings the barky fingers of the elm.
Oh, Oh oh oh…….

18
O, how I love thee!
Oh how I dote on thee!
Titania makes screaming orgasm noises . They sleep, with Titania entwisted with Bottom

10.5 PUCK AND OBERON SCENE

Meanwhile Oberon and Puck enter and hug, Oberon will give Puck the scissors
OBERON: Welcome, good Puck.
See'st thou this sweet sight?
Take off this head! (Puck looks puzzled, then Oberon points at Bottom)
Take this transforme`d scalp
From off the head of this Athenian swain

Oberon stands to one side and watches. Puck uses large pair of meta-theatrical shears to snip off
his head and cuts off Bottom 1 and then says his lines.

PUCK: Now, when thou wakest, with thine own fool's eyes peep.
(Puck exits or sits at front stage by the audience)

Bottom 1 in his Ass head is severed and left lying on the ground . Bottom 2 wakes and looks
around. Bottom turns the donkey sheet inside out to reveal it contains the Letter to the
Corinthians. This is hung up or displayed. Bottom deliberately refers to it, perhaps as if using it
as a lecture aid, gesturing to it as he mentions each of the key words. The body parts could be
visually illustrated
Paul's Letter to the Corinthians
Things which Eye hath not seen,
Neither Ear hath heard,
Neither came into man's Heart…
.. the Spirit searches all things, to the Bottom of God’s secrets

(Bottom addresses the audience)

BOTTOM 2; God’s my life, I have a most rare vision.
I have had a dream past the wit of man to say what dream it was.
Man is but an ass if he go about to expound this dream,
(reads the following lines from a bit of paper as if giving a lecture while pointing to the
different lines of St Pauls’ letter)

“The eye of man hath not heard,

the ear of man hath not seen,
man’s hand is not able to taste,
his tongue to conceive , nor
his heart to report what my dream was”.
I will get Peter Quince to write a Ballad of this dream;
it shall be called ‘Bottoms Dream’ because it hath no bottom. (exits)

(Oberon looks at Titania and addresses audience)

OBERON: Her dotage now I do begin to pity..
For now I have the boy, I will undo
This hateful imperfection of her eyes,

19
May all to Athens back again repair
And think no more of this night's accidents
But as the fierce vexation of a dream.
But first I will release the fairy queen
.
Oberon goes up to Titania. Beside her is a sash which Oberon holds up, and then lays over her.
It has the following message from the Jewish prayer the Amidah
“God resurrects the Dead”
(Oberon picks up a jar of Wormwood. he shows the label to the audience, and it is poured into
her mouth, like the way wormwood was administered to Jesus on the cross. Oil of wormwood is a
poison that causes convulsions, abnormal respiration, foaming at the mouth and death.
The jar should be marked
POISON;
WORMWOOD
= DIAN’S BUD.

Oberon holds Titania in a posture like the ‘Pieta’ and then kills her by pouring the
Wormwood into her mouth. Titania dies dramatically and at length
OBERON: Be as thou wast wont to be;
See as thou wast wont to see:
Wormwood o'er Cupid's flower
Hath such force and bless`ed power

(Titania waits a moment , has melodramatic convulsions then dies.

After a moment of stillness, Oberon takes hold of Titania as if in a ‘Pieta’ posture and chants
mysteriously in a liturgical act of resurrection)
OBERON: Now, my Titania;
Wake you---- my sweet Queen

Wearing the sash, Titania comes back to life as his sweet queen. (Whereas historically Titus Caesar
tried to get the Jews to abandon Yahweh and worship him instead, her the situation is reversed and
Titus/Titania now obeys Oberon/Yahweh being resurrected as a new baby soul who is scared and infantile)

TITANIA: My Oberon! what visions have I seen!

Methought I was enamoured of an Ass.

OBERON: There lies your love. (points at Bottom 1 in ass head lying on the ground)

TITANIA: How came these things to pass?

O, how mine eyes do loathe his visage now!

OBERON: Silence awhile.

Titania, music call; and strike more dead than common sleep
Of all these-----End the sense.

TITANIA: Music, ho music, such as charmeth sleep

20
M as qu e o f O be ro n n o. 5 T ru mpet e ns e mbl e so n at a by
Hei n ri ch Lu be ck 1 mi n 07 se c. cut out aft er as t he y e xit

OBERON: Sound, music

(he talks over it)
Come, my queen, take hands with me,
And rock the ground whereon these sleepers be. (take hands)
Now thou and I are new in amity,
And will to-morrow midnight solemnly dance
in Duke Theseus' house triumphantly.

TITANIA: Come, my LORD, and in our flight

Tell me how it came this night
That I sleeping here was found
With these mortals on the ground.

The make a heavenly Exit (with lighting effects). Arch and Torah scroll are now taken away.
Bottom 1 /ass head and Dead bees are removed by Puck.

11. ACT V. lines 32-81

CHOICE OF ENTERTAINMENT
Two chairs are on stage,, Theseus and Hippolyta enter and sit. Philostrate his master of
mirth, whose name means ‘I love battles’ wears outrageous glitzy 1970’s clothing. As each
possible entertainment is described, the actors come out and mime the actions as if in a
television game-show. The Moon has disappeared from the back-cloth. Enter Theseus and
Hippolyta.

THESEUS: 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.

Enter Philostrate immediately, resembling an over eager game show host

PHILOSTRATE: Here, mighty Theseus.

THESEUS: Say, what Abridgement have you for this evening?

What Masque? what Music? How shall we beguile (Theseus sits)
The lazy time, if not with some Delight?

PHILOSTRATE: There is a Brief (he hands it over)

how many sports are ripe:
Make choice of which your Highness will see first.
Number One, The Drunken Centaurs Battle Over Wine

21
THESEUS (Reads): Number One. The battle with the Centaurs, to be sung
By an Athenian eunuch to the harp.'
curtain opens; Centaurs run on stage and fight Hercules. In the dumbshow
they are drinking and seizing bottles of wine from each other.
We'll none of that. That have I told my love,
In glory of my kinsman Hercules. (curtain closes)

PHILOSTRATE; Number Two; Riot By The Drunken Followers

Of Bacchus The Wine God
THESEUS (Reads): Number Two. The riot of the tipsy Bacchanals,
Tearing the Thracian singer in their rage.'
curtain opens; Wild drunks, their clothes disheveled, drink from bottles, scream,
and tear a large doll apart in dumbshow
That is an old device; and it was play'd
When I from Thebes came last a conqueror. (curtain closes)

PHILOSTRATE; Number Three, The Man Who Died From Drink

THESEUS: Number three. The thrice three Muses mourning for the death
Of Learning, late deceased in beggary.'
curtain opens Robert Green comes on stage and dies of drink, accompanied by funereal black
sheeted Muses bearing his tombstone marked
RIP
Robert Greene,
Drunkard
That is some satire, keen and critical,
Not sorting with a nuptial ceremony. (curtain closes)

PHILOSTRATE; Number Four. Story Told To Prevent Worship Of A False God

(This time the curtain opens and the action starts before Theseus has read the program Brief. It
is staged by one actor using PUPPETS,----could be handpuppets--while other actors carrying
signs/chanting as if protesters protesting against the puppet show. Their different placards say;
THIS IS THE STORY OVID’s MINYADS TOLD.
DON’T WORSHIP FALSE GODS.
DON’T WORSHIP THE GOD OF THE VINE
DON’T WORSHIP DIONYSIUS
THESEUS: Number Four. A tedious brief scene of young Pyramus
And his love Thisbe; very tragical mirth.'
(hand-puppets begin to act out the scene)

Merry and tragical! tedious and brief!

That is, hot ice and wondrous strange snow.
How shall we find the concord of this discord?

PHILOSTRATE: 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

22
There is not one word apt, one player fitted:
And tragical, my noble lord, it is;
For Pyramus therein doth kill himself. ( puppet Pyramus dies)
Which, when I saw rehearsed, I must confess, (sign holders stand at back)
Made mine eyes water; but more merry tears
The passion of loud laughter never shed.

THESEUS: What are they that do play it?

PHILOSTRATE: 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.

THESEUS: And we will hear it. (Mechanicals rejoice they have been chosen)

PHILOSTRATE: 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, (he mockingly holds out his arms )
To do you service.

THESEUS: I will hear that play;

For never anything can be amiss,
When simpleness and duty tender it (Philostrate bows)

(Wall remains on stage, and unwraps his blue wall sheet . Philostrate shoos out the protestors
and the handpuppet actor, but remains on stage himself.)

12. ACT V. PYRAMUS AND THISBE SEX SCENE lines 154-207

Theseus and Hippolyta sit in chairs with Philostrate standing near them, as an on-stage
audience for the show. The Wall may look like a large blue sheet with small gold stars on
it, like a night sky, to show it is the wall or mora (delay) that is separating earth from
heaven, Jesus from coming to unite with his church, the bride of Christ. The graffiti on the
Wall says APOCALYPSE NOW. NO MORE DELAY.

WALL: In this same Interlude it doth befall

That I, one Snout by name, present a Wall;
And such a wall, as I would have you think,
That had in it a crannied hole or ‘chink’, (said naughtily as if it were embarrassing)
Through which the lovers, Pyramus and Thisby,
Did ‘whisper’ often very secretly.
And this the cranny is, Right and Sinister, (gestures)
Through which the fearful lovers are to ‘whisper’.

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

23
PHILOSTRATE: It is the wittiest partition that ever I heard
discourse, my lord.

Enter Pyramus

THESEUS: Pyramus draws near the wall: silence!

PYRAMUS:
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 Thisby'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!

With embarrassment Wall displays a hole like the one in their sheets that Puritans used to have
sex through. The chink should be high up from the ground so that Thisbe cannot get her hips
high enough, sideways, to align with it.

Thanks, courteous wall: Jove shield thee well for this!

But what see I? No Thisby do I see.
O wicked wall, through whom I see no Bliss!
Cursed be thy stones for thus deceiving me!

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

BOTTOM 2: (Aside) No, in truth, sir, he should not. 'Deceiving me'

is Thisby'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 Thisbe, who begins with a sex joke as if they are trying to have sex through the chink in the
wall. According to Rubenstein’s Dictionary of Shakespeare’s sexual slang ‘lips’ are labia,
‘stones’ are testicles, and wall is slang for buttocks. The word chink is slang for a sexual
orifice. She makes pelvic thrusts against the wall (as the allegorical Bride of Christ seeking
sexual union with her long delayed bridegroom).

THISBE: 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.

PYRAMUS: I see a voice: now will I to the chink,

To spy an I can hear my Thisby's face. Thisby!

24
THISBE: My love thou art, my love I think.

(the lovers then compare themselves to historic lovers who were responsible for each other’s deaths. Wall
moves around the stage preventing Pyramus and Thisbe from meeting each other

PYRAMUS: Think what thou wilt, I am thy lover's grace;

And, like Limander, am I trusty still.

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

PYRAMUS: Not Shafalus to Procrus was so true.

THISBE: As Shafalus to Procrus, I to you.

PYRAMUS: O kiss me through the hole of this vile wall! (try to kiss through Wall’s legs)

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

PYRAMUS: Wilt thou at NINNY'S TOMB meet me straightway?

THISBE: 'Tide life, 'tide death, I come without delay, (last 4 words are chanted)

Exeunt Pyramus and Thisbe ecstatically running about since it is the Last Day and they can be
united, Theseus and Hippolyta laugh.. Wall speaks to the audience.

WALL: No more mora, no more Mural.

Thus have I, Wall, my part discharg`ed so;
And, being done, thus Wall away doth go. Exit, Wall is pulled down noisily

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

PHILOSTRATE: No remedy, my lord, when walls are so wilful to hear

without warning.

HIPPOLYTA: This is the silliest stuff that ever I heard. ( Philostrate exits)

13. ACT V. lines 258-303

THE PASSION STORY AND DEATH OF BOTTOM/ PYRAMUS

Puck opens the curtain to reveal NINNY’S TOMB at the place where Pyramus and Thisbe
will rendezvous. Theseus and Hippolyta remain seated in the chairs to one side.

Officers 1 enters wearing small red cloaks like the soldiers who would have sat at the foot of
the cross in the Gospel. They will partly undress Pyramus, and initially stand either side but

25
end up (as if) seated at the foot of the cruciform Pyramus, front stage playing with
metatheatrically large dice.

A freestanding cardboard crescent Moonshine (not an actor) is at front stage giving off weak
rays, perhaps with several electric torches attached to it. Peter Quince (wearing his Prologue
signs) comes dumbly on-stage since he is the director and would watch as his creation, the
church built upon him the ‘rock’, falls to pieces. As before his signs read
PROLOGUE:
Look for the allegory

PROLOGUE:
Decipher the fantasies
Puck will enter invisibly and sit at a corner of front stage from where he will make asides to
the audience.

PHILOSTRATE : And then came Pyramus.

(Enter Pyramus in a Loincloth. He is guarded by officer 1, and followed surreptitiously by Puck.

Pyramus speaks on entering and addresses the Cardboard crescent moon and the weak light it
is giving
PYRAMUS :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 Thisby 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!

(1)Officer 2 enters with medieval banner/sash, Together they place it above

Pyramus’ head with the words THE PASSION
.
(2) Quince, goes among the audience, wearing his sandwich
boards shouting out FREE TICKET FOR THE PASSION OF CHRIST.
FREE TICKET FOR THE CRUCIFIXION, and distributing small
‘tickets’, then goes onstage and stands near Pyramus as a spectator

THESEUS: This Passion, and the death of a dear friend,

would go near to make a man look sad.

26
HIPPOLYTA: Beshrew my heart, but I pity the man,
my own son was hung upon the tree soldiers arrange him in a cross here

(3) During Pyramus’ next speech an Officer goes up to Pyramus and writes a
message on his arms THEY PIERCED HIS SIDE, JOHN 19;34

PYRAMUS: 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; soldier pierces his left side with a sword
Ay, that left pap,
Where heart doth hop:

Thus die I, thus, thus, thus

Now am I dead,
Now am I fled;
My soul is in the sky: (they freeze while Puck is spotlit)

(Puck, while sitting at front, makes an aside,)

PUCK: Next in the Gospel of Matthew ‘Darkness Came Over The Whole Land”

PYRAMUS : Tongue, lose thy light;

Moon take thy flight:

(4) Cardboard Moon is carried out. .Lights dim for a moment

Now die, die, die, die, die. Dies, but remains hanging, does not collapse

(5) officers sit down. Meanwhile Puck is spotlit and speaks his aside
PUCK; Next in the Gospel of John—they began playing dice
(6) the officers play dice energetically)
OFFICER 2: No die, but an ace, for him…..
for he is but one
OFFICER 1: Less than an ace, man;
for he is dead; he is nothing

(7) spotlight Theseus as he opens and silently reads a

newspaper that says
News of the Jews
Titus Crucifies man
Who recovers under Surgeon

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

27
HIPPOLYTA: How chance Moonshine is gone before Thisbe comes
back and finds her lover?

PHILOSTRATE: She will find him by starlight.

The stage is dark and, quiet for a moment.

14. ACT V. lines 303-334 DEATH OF THISBE,

It is the middle of the night and dark. NINNY’s TOMB remains on centre stage as
a painted sheet/cardboard. The officers stand now guard but away from the
hanging body.

THESEUS: Here comes Thisbe!

and her Passion ends the play. enter Thisbe crawling like a silkworm

HIPPOLYTA: Methinks she should not use a long Passion like

Pyramus: I hope she will be brief.

THESEUS: She hath spied him already

And thus she moans and groans…

Thisbe crawls on stage towards where Pyramus is hanging,then she gets partially up
THISBE: Asleep, my love?
What, dead, my dove?
O Pyramus, arise! (the opening 3 lines are chanted, Thisbe rises)
Speak, speak. Quite dumb?
Dead, dead? A Tomb ( gestures toward the Tomb and takes off her mask)
Must cover thy sweet eyes.
These My lips,
This cherry nose,
These yellow cowslip cheeks,
Are gone, are gone:
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;
Come, blade, my breast imbrue:
She metatheatrically stabs herself (in a 1607 performance it was done with a scabbard). Peter
Quince weeping throws himself under her feet,--- since he is the rock upon which the church had
been built.

28
And, farewell, friends;
Thus Thisby ends:
Adieu, adieu, adieu. The last line is sung off key

Quince, Bottom 2/Pyramus, and Thisbe (the whole of Christianity in fact) remain on stage in a
pile

15. ACT V. lines 335-3 BOTTOM/ PYRAMUS’s RESURRECTION SCENE

Center stage remains the painted sheet/cardboard of Ninny’s Tomb,

THESEUS: Moonshine is left to bury the dead.

Bottom2 rises from the pile now resurrected in a white sheet and/or spotlight shining on him,
making ecstatic gestures (everyone applauds), and the other mechnicals get up applauding

BOTTOM 2: Will it please you to see the Epilogue,?

THESEUS: NO EPILOGUE, (everyone joins in protesting “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;

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.

To M usic fr o m Ma s que o f O bero n no 6 Pava na, by A ug usti ne

Ba ss a no, Mechanicals make solemn processional exit in front of the tomb. Before he leaves
Theseus goes up to the Calendar and turns it over , looks knowingly at the audience and then
exits.)
Jewish New Year's Day
HAPPY HOLIDAYS
HAPPY HOLIDAYS

16. ACT V. lines 3 -422 APOCALYPSE: DAYLIGHT DAWNS :

RESURRECTION DEW-BLESSING SCENE

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Puck enters with broom, and tidies up the two chairs that have been left on stage. He will use
his broom to sweep away the remains of an old world. On the backcloth a massive sun is just
beginning to rise in the east.

PUCK :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:

(at ‘gaping wide’ all the cast come on stage like Halloween figures, all the cast (except for
Titania) emerge from the tomb as the ghosts, the resurrected dead and join in the DANCE.
Cou nt ry D an ce B rawl e ci rcl e dan ce

Puck watches and waits 20 seconds then speaks over the music—in rhythm to it-- so that he
finishes speaking while the dancers are still dancing , and stands watching them
PUCK; 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 (sweeps)

As the dancers conclude the Circle dance they will each be standing in different places on stage,
with their hands raised and trickliong their hands through the air like an amoeba or seaweed.
They will see Oberon entering from the audience. They acknowledge and cheer his entrance. He
stands initially at front stage then ends up in front of the rising sun. His words recall the extract
of the Cookham poem previously quoted.

Enter Oberon from the audience. All on stage Bow to Oberon

OBERON: Through the house give gathering 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.

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Mu si c fro m M as qu e of O be ron n o. 1 6 t he Fai ri es d an ce by
Ro bert J on so n 1 m in 4 7 s e c. Fi n al DA NCE begi n s

Oberon watches the dance, and then begins talking so that his speech finishes ideally at the same
time as the dance.
OBERON : I with the Morning’s love have oft made sport
Even till the eastern Gate, all firery red
Opening on Neptune with fair blesse`d beams
Turns into yellow gold his salt green streams

Sun begins to rise as dawn breaks, and this sign appears written near the sun on banners
Ps.24. Yahweh the King of glory
enters the eastern gate of the Temple

OBERON Now, until the break of day,

Through this house each fairy stray.
To the best bride-bed will we,
Which by us shall blesse`d be; (begins to distribute dew to audience)
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
despise`d in nativity,
Shall upon their children be.

Near the sun –the following banners appear

The Holy One will raise the Dead to Life…
and send Dew upon them (The Zohar).

The dancers continue to dance around the circle of golden light and Oberon now blesses the
dancers, anointing them with sacred dew to make them and the world holy .Oberon walks among
the dancers in an act of consecration, blessing them.
OBERON: 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.

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If the dance finishes before Oberon’s speech is concluded then the dancers just assemble around
Oberon and go out as his entourage. As Oberon concludes his speech, all dance out, with
Oberon. All exit except for Puck.

PUCK: If we Shadows have offended,

Think but this, and all is mended,
That you have but slumber'd here (birdsong begins)
While these visions did appear.
And this weak and Idle theme,
No more yielding but a dream
Gentiles, do not reprehend: if you pardon, we will mend. (exits)

The sun rises more fully, dawn breaks and the stage is flooded with reddish sunlight, and with
Birdsong, for the CURTAIN CALL

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