Much Ado about Macbeth

by Randy McCharles

  The news elicited a chorus of ohs and ows. Lenny’s face split into a wide grin.

  “Yes, Lenny. This means that you’ll have to be Macbeth. William, you’ll be Macduff. Everyone, open your scripts, and we’ll see how far we get before the bell.”

  Paul only half listened as the understudies read lines. How had things gone from top of the world last night to his play’s villain being sent to the hospital this morning? Perhaps the play really was cursed.

  No, he couldn’t think that way. Accidents happen. Seventeen-year-old boys were constantly hurting themselves. They still carried a sense of youthful indestructibility, taking risks and operating with general inattentiveness until life stepped up and hit them in the face a few times. How else could you explain falling down a flight of stairs that was crowded with students? No curse. Life had simply hit Kim Greyson in the face. Perhaps he’d tread more carefully going forward.

  When class ended, a student Paul didn’t know entered the auditorium and handed him a note. He didn’t have to read it. With a sigh, he headed toward the principal’s office.

  Principal Winston was old school. He handed out detentions like they were candy and made the students do work as penance. Most of the students in his waiting area were in detention, waiting for Winston to give them an assignment. Completing the assignment usually meant that detention was over. Neither was Winston above pulling teachers out of class, even though the school board gave him grief over it. Paul was certain that the old fart would have teachers serving detention if he could get away with it.

  There were three students still in detention when Paul arrived outside the principal’s office: Winston’s private workforce.

  Once Mrs. Kennedy nodded Paul inside, the school principal greeted him with a pronouncement: “Your play is cancelled.”

  That took Paul by surprise. The production was in its first week. It usually took at least ten days before Winston reached the point where he threatened to cancel. Paul offered his traditional response. “Because?”

  Winston grunted. “I would think that was obvious. One of your students is in the hospital. His parents have already called and given me an earful. The play is too dangerous, so I’m shutting it down.”

  Paul was stunned. That was absurd, even for Winston. “Kim didn’t hurt himself in my class. He fell down the south stairwell. Using that logic, you will have to shut down the school, not the play.”

  It was Winston’s turn to look stunned. Eventually he frowned and loosened his tie, which to Paul’s eye already looked plenty loose. “He was on his way to your class.”

  “It could have been any student falling down those stairs.” Paul shook his head. “This is just a lame excuse, and I can’t think of anyone who won’t see it as such. Go ahead and cancel the play. Then you can get thirty more phone calls from angry parents.”

  Winston let that run through his mind for a moment. “Get out of here.”

  Paul kept the smile from his face as he left the office and closed the door.

  “The drama teacher wins another round?” asked Mrs. Kennedy.

  Paul nodded. “That man gets more mental every year.”

  Mrs. Kennedy chuckled. “Then he’ll make superintendent in no time.”

  Scene 17: Contradict Thyself, and Say It Is Not So

  Employing a plastic spoon, Agatha churned the remains of an extra-large Mint-Oreo Blizzard. “I still can’t get used to this concept of weekends off,” the tall witch said.

  The three hags had changed seats, with Agatha now sitting by the window with her back against the wall. Gertrude shared the same bench, while Netty occupied most of the opposite bench all on her own. It had taken them a week to reach this arrangement. Witches were like cats that way.

  “Waste of a perfectly good building,” Gertrude said. “Standing empty for two full days out of every seven.”

  Netty bobbed her round head. “When I went to school, the building never stood empty. Classroom by day. Tavern by evening. Sleep house by night. Used as a church on Sundays.”

  The other two hags stared at her. “You went to school?”

  The onion-shaped hag cackled. “No, I just slept there!”

  “What about Saturdays?” asked Agatha. “You said the building never stood empty.”

  “Got hosed down on Saturdays.”

  “All day?”

  Netty flashed a gap-toothed smile. “Needed lots of hosing.”

  “Especially since you slept there,” Gertrude said, nodding her crooked head.

  The three hags all cackled.

  Agatha gazed out the window toward the high school across the street. “With no one there all weekend, we’ll have to hold off on the curses until Monday.”

  “Oh, my!” Gertrude said. “Does that mean that we get the weekend off?”

  “I’ve never had a weekend off,” Netty admitted. “Wouldn’t know what to do with one.”

  “You could take up cribbage,” Gertrude suggested.

  “Cribbage?” Netty scowled at the deformed hag. “Is that a vegetable?”

  “It’s a card game,” said Agatha. “With pegs.”

  Netty looked thoughtful. “You poke the cards with pegs?”

  Agatha stared at her. Then she said, “Yes.”

  “Our Agatha is in a cribbage league,” Gertrude said. “Plays most Saturday afternoons. What’s that league called?”

  “The BCC,” grumbled Agatha.

  Netty smacked her thick lips together, working her tongue around a loose tooth. “The British Broadcasting Corporation?”

  Agatha sighed. “The British Cribbage Congress.”

  “Well,” said Netty. “You certainly don’t seem happy about it.”

  Gertrude chortled. “Agatha must be down in the standings.”

  Agatha threw down her spoon. “I am not down in the standings! I’m in second place.”

  “Then why so glum?” Netty asked, pushing several fries into her mouth. “Second place isn’t bad. Though I’m a bit surprised. A small curse here and a slight nudge there, and you could be in first place. Why aren’t you in first place?”

  “Because,” Agatha said, grating her crooked teeth, “Hecate is in first place.”

  “You called?” Hecate asked from where she suddenly sat next to Netty on the bench across the booth from Gertrude and Agatha. The senior witch had her midnight hair up, and her dragon skin cloak was studded with diamonds.

  “All dressed up and nowhere to go?” asked Gertrude.

  Hecate smiled. “I’m off to the opera. Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. One of my favourites.”

  “I always find Wagner a bit tedious,” Agatha said, “especially Die Meistersinger. Four and a half hours. What was the man thinking?”

  “This one will be three hours,” Hecate said. “I’m going to burn down the opera house at the opening of the third act.”

  “Oh, my!” said Gertrude. “That sounds like fun.”

  “More fun than cribbage,” Netty agreed. “Sounds daft, poking pegs through cards.”

  “Yes, well . . .” Hecate gave Netty a peculiar look. “Everyone needs a little down time. Cribbage is a good way to let off a little steam.”

  Gertrude snorted. “Let off a little steam? National competitive cribbage?”

  Hecate shrugged. “Never do anything small. And speaking of small, I see your Thane of Glamis coming.” As quickly as she had appeared, Hecate was gone.

  “I hate that witch,” Agatha said.

  Lenny Cadwell threw himself down into the space Hecate had vacated. “Kim broke his leg.”

  “Kim?” echoed Netty. “Who’s that?”

  Lenny twisted sideways and looked down into the bulbous witch’s rubbery face. “My classmate who was going to be Macbeth. Now I’ve got the role.”

  “Oh, what a coincidence,” said Gertrude. “Isn’t that the role you wanted?”

  “You broke his leg!” said Lenny. He glared at all three of the witches.

  “Did nothing of the kind,”
refuted Agatha.

  “That’s right,” said Gertrude. “We haven’t moved from this spot all day.”

  “All week,” corrected Netty.

  “All week,” Gertrude admitted. “Well, we have switched seats.”

  “We were right here sipping cherry colas when the poor lad had his spill,” said Agatha.

  “At the end of first period,” Netty added.

  “Poor lad.” Gertrude wagged her crooked head. “I understand that a broken fibula can be quite painful. A bruised patella can hurt even more.”

  Agatha let out a loud cackle then covered her mouth with her hand. “Sorry. I don’t know where that came from.”

  “You’re not going to do anything else, are you?” Lenny asked. “I mean, I have the role now. You’ve kept your promise. No one else needs to get hurt.”

  “No one else needs to get hurt.” Agatha rolled the words off her tongue. “I rather like that line. Do you mind if a borrow it? It could come in handy.”

  Lenny stared at her. Then he rose from his seat and wandered out of the Dairy Queen.

  Once the door closed, Gertrude said, “Not as dumb as he looks, that one.”

  Agatha stared at her, straight faced, and said, “No one else needs to get hurt.”

  All three witches burst out laughing.

  Scene 18: Now Is the Time of Help

  Friday evening and Susie was off somewhere with her friends. Sylvia joined Paul in the dining room for supper, but the energy of the previous two family meals was absent. Missing was Susie’s excitement about her newly discovered interest in theatre, and Paul was in a foul mood about Kim Greyson’s injury.

  He knew that the injury had nothing to do with his choice of play. If he had been forced to do Death of a Salesman again or, God forbid, Grease, Kim would still have fallen down the stairs and Lenny would now be Willy Loman or Danny Zuko. And Lenny should have the lead anyway. He was a better actor than Kim. Paul was just loath to feed the boy’s prima donna attitude. Lenny needed a setback if he was ever to learn anything, but it looked like that setback would have to be something other than not playing the role of Macbeth. The idea that The Bard’s Play was actually cursed was ridiculous.

  “I was wondering if I could help with the play,” Sylvia said from out of nowhere, shipwrecking his thoughts.

  Paul’s fork froze midway to his mouth. “Help?”

  “With the play,” Sylvia repeated.

  “Er.”

  “It would be fun.” Sylvia smiled.

  “I, uh, don’t know what Susie would think. I mean. It’s bad enough that she has to be in her dad’s class. But with her mother too . . .”

  “It was Susie’s idea,” his wife said. “Look, the housing market is in a shambles. I haven’t had calls from anyone looking to buy or sell in days. I need something to keep myself busy.”

  Paul coughed. “I don’t think the school is actually keen on teachers bringing their spouses to work. Winston would lay an egg.”

  Sylvia laughed but whether it was at the image of the Ashcroft Senior High School principal laying an egg or his spouse-to-work comment, Paul didn’t know.

  “Don’t be silly,” Sylvia said. “I wouldn’t help as your spouse but as Susie’s mother. You’ve had students’ parents help with plays before.”

  Paul bought himself some time by wiping his mouth with a napkin, but he was still at a loss for what to say. “Sometimes that’s unavoidable,” he began and realized immediately that he had taken the wrong tack. “I mean, most of that help was less than . . . helpful.” Even worse.

  Sylvia glowered at him. “You’re not suggesting that I’d just get in the way?”

  “No, no, no,” Paul said, though that’s exactly what he meant. “It’s just awkward for the students when one of them has a parent running shotgun in the classroom.” He could see from his wife’s expression that he had failed to help matters.

  “Susie already has a parent in the classroom,” Sylvia said. “I don’t know how you can get more shotgun than by being the teacher.”

  Paul had no choice but to give in. If he kept on the way he was going, he’d be eating his shoes for dessert. “You’re right, dear. Of course. And since Susie’s agreeable, I don’t see a problem. What did you have in mind?”

  Sylvia smiled her “score one for me” smile. “Why, set designer, of course. Architecture is my forte.”

  Set designer? Paul wasn’t sure how ten years of putting for sale signs on people’s lawns earned you a forte in architecture, but he decided that allowing his wife to take a stab at set design wouldn’t be disastrous.

  Before he could say anything, Sylvia reached over to the counter and retrieved a DVD still in its shrink-wrapped plastic case. She turned its face toward him. It was the 1971 Roman Polanski film adaptation of Macbeth.

  “We can watch the movie tonight, and I’ll make set notes.”

  Paul nodded his head. It might be worthwhile watching the film again. “But tomorrow night we’ll watch the 1948 Orson Welles version. I think you’ll find its set easier to emulate. It also lacks Lady Macbeth’s nude sleepwalking scene that Polanski included.”

  “Nude!” said Sylvia. “Not our Susie!”

  “You can’t go wrong with Orson Welles,” Paul said.

  While his wife pontificated on the audacity of modern directors adding nude scenes to PG-13 classics, Paul recalled the other problem with the Roman Polanski version. After his pregnant wife and several friends were murdered by Charles Manson’s followers, the director had dropped his current project and proceeded to develop the film version of Macbeth that Sylvia had just purchased. Some people theorized that Polanski had already decided to start the Macbeth project, and that it was the play’s curse that had given rise to the murders in his home.

  The curse again. Paul had the horrible feeling that he wasn’t going to be able to escape it.

  –Act II–

  Scene 1: And Thus I Clothe My Naked Villainy

  “Attention, everyone.” Paul found that he had to use his megaphone to bring his class to order. Mondays were like that sometimes.

  “I hope you all had an enjoyable weekend and that you spent part of it learning your lines.”

  Grumbling eddied among the students.

  “I’d like to introduce Susie’s mother, Mrs. Samson. She has graciously volunteered to help us with sets and costumes.”

  “Hello, everyone,” Sylvia said. “I’m thrilled to be here.”

  The grumbling evolved into a halfhearted chorus of “hi” and “welcome.”

  Paul continued. “While I walk small groups through some of their lines, Mrs. Samson is going to come around and speak with the rest of you, taking your measurements, and discussing costume ideas. As you know from previous years, our wardrobe department consists of two racks filled with cast-off clothing. Our prop closet isn’t much better. We’ll be relying on class members to contribute toward props and costumes. Nothing fancy, but the more authentic the production looks, the better your individual performance will be received.”

  A huge outpouring of breath greeted that.

  Paul was neither surprised nor discouraged by the lack of enthusiasm. As with every school production, those students with true interest would eventually put some effort into their costumes and find things at home to enhance the stage. None of them ever did at the beginning.

  Lenny put his hand in the air.

  “Yes, Lenny?”

  “I already have a costume.” He held up a gym bag.

  Now Paul was surprised.

  “Can I go to the changing room and put it on?” Lenny asked.

  “Please do,” said Sylvia, excitement in her eyes.

  “Of course,” Paul said.

  A few minutes later, the young man paraded across the stage dressed in black boots, black pants, black shirt, and a black cape. A large silver brooch tied the cape just above his heart. In his hand he carried a silver sword. And on his head he wore a thin, silver crown.

  The cl
ass went, “Ooh!”

  “Very good,” Paul said. In fifteen years of teaching, he had never seen a boy come in with a better costume. The girls usually did quite well, but the boys rarely made more than a token effort.

  “It’s very . . . black,” Sylvia said.

  “I’m the villain.” Lenny looked at her with an expression that clearly stated that his attire should be self-explanatory.

  “I see,” said Sylvia, just as clearly not seeing.

  Paul tried to salvage things. “Now let’s see the rest of you start working on your costumes. And think about things you may have around the house that may work as props.”

  Sylvia added, “On Friday, wear some clothing you don’t mind getting paint on. We’ll be painting scenery flats.”

  Paul opened his mouth but didn’t say anything. You don’t get the entire class painting flats. Just four of five are needed. Well, he doubted more than five students would come prepared.

  Instead he said, “Let’s get started, shall we? You’ve all read through your lines. Now it’s time to think about what props you may want to use to embellish your words. The stage is a visual art. What you do with your facial expressions, your movements, and your props often says more than your dialogue. I expect you all to come up with ideas. Don’t go too hog wild. We’re not going to use machine guns instead of swords. Speaking of swords, that’s one of the few items that we have plenty of in our supply cupboard.”

  Paul reached into a large, cardboard box he had retrieved from the cupboard before class and brandished a gunmetal grey sword.

  “I already have a sword,” Lenny said. He brandished the silver sword he had brought with this costume. Like the ones in the box, it was painted plastic.

  “You can use that one, Lenny,” Paul said. “The Thanes and the English soldiers will also need swords. Mrs. Samson has thirty large shopping bags, the durable paper kind with twine handles. Everyone take one and write your name on it. These are where you will store your costumes and any personal props for your character. Keep them backstage by the supply cupboard.”