Just Deserts

Richard Joyce

Description

Can anything rescue Wildmoor from disaster? A deluded journalist with trouble distinguishing reality from fiction... A politician with a murky secret... A dubious educational establishment badly managed... Honey-traps and fake harassment charges... A 'play for our times', indeed. Enthusiastic young school actors observe their ambitious school production spiralling out of control, while all about them, their elders and betters pursue their own shameless interests, desires and worse. Is the tragic plot of the school play starting to overwhelm the school itself? Only Providence can help now

Informations

• Publié par: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Date de parution: 30 septembre 2019
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781528962841
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Just Deserts
Richard Joyce
Austin Macauley Publishers
2019-09-30
Just Deserts About the Author About the Book Dedication Copyright Information © Acknowledgements Dramatis Personae Adults School Pupils Act 1 Scene 1 Scene 2 Scene 3 Scene 4 Scene 5 Act 2 Scene 1 Scene 2 Scene 3 Scene 4 Scene 5 Scene 6 Act 3 Scene 1 Scene 2 Scene 3 Scene 4 Act 4 Scene 1 Scene 2 Scene 3 Scene 4 Scene 5 Scene 6 Act 5 Scene 1 Scene 2 Scene 3 Scene 4
About the Author
The author was educated at a school in southern England. Following graduation from Trinity College, Cambridge, he made a working visit to Dallas, Texas, where, as a teacher, he obtained much of the background for his first novel, A Premature Affair, a personalised study of the events and repercussions surrounding the Kennedy assassination. He has worked in London as a freelance journalist, teacher and writer, and travelled and taught widely in Germany, the United States and Canada; it was during these assignments that he obtained experience of schools’ theatre productions, particularly Shakespeare, and the difficulties and exhilaration inherent in them. He currently lives in Somerset, where he is working on the third part of his Kennedy trilogy.
About the Book
Can anything rescue Wildmoor from disaster? A deluded journalist with trouble distinguishing reality from fiction… A politician with a murky secret… A dubious educational establishment badly managed… Honey-traps and fake harassment charges… A ‘ play for our times ’, indeed.
Enthusiastic young school actors observe their ambitious school production spiralling out of control, while all about them, their elders and betters pursue their own shameless interests, desires and worse. Is the tragic plot of the school play starting to overwhelm the school itself?
Only Providence can help now…
Dedication
For Caryl
Copyright Information ©
Richard Joyce (2019)
The right of Richard Joyce to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with section 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.
Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.
ISBN 9781528919814 (Paperback)
ISBN 9781528962841 (ePub e-book)
www.austinmacauley.com
First Published (2019)
Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd
25 Canada Square
Canary Wharf
London
E14 5LQ
Acknowledgements
To my son, Jeremy, who gave me invaluable advice on plays and play script formatting
To Caryl, who read the first draft so encouragingly
To John.D, who gave me my first opportunity to produce a school play
Dramatis Personae

Adults
Major Ray Parker, headmaster
Sheila Parker, headmaster’s wife, mother to Ben Jonson
Willy Wagstaff, school drama director
Ben Jonson, son of Sheila Parker, stepson of Major Parker
Ben Jonson Snr, father of Ben
Sir John Kilman, a school governor
Colonel Maurice Minor, a school governor
Hugh Cockrell, staff member
Mike Hacker, local journalist
Fred Josephs, father of Delia (plays Polonius)
Titus Josephs, brother of Delia
Malfellow (a henchman)
Police chief
Bodyguards to Kilman

School Pupils
Cordelia Josephs (Stage Manager and Narrator)
Sam Steadfast (also plays Horatio)
Laura
Gemma (plays Gertrude)
Al Hammit (plays Hamlet and Marcellus)
Dennis Thugley (plays King Claudius and Barnardo)
Sally
Henry Wise (plays Francisco)
Eisha Minor, daughter of Colonel Minor (plays Ophelia)
Sonny Polski, young foreign boy
Time – the present
Place – a small private academy for the arts somewhere in the English-speaking world
Act 1

Scene 1
Theatre Auditorium. Front of curtains.
WILLY sits unnoticed in front row of auditorium. BARNARDO standing down R on apron. Enter FRANCISCO, on apron down L. We hear a wind sound effect.
Barnardo: Who’s there?
Francisco: Nay, answer me. Stand and unfold yourself.
Barnardo: Long live the King!
Francisco: Barnardo?
Barnardo: He.
Francisco: You come most carefully upon your hour .
Willy: Speak up, chaps. You’ve got to out-perform the wind. Okay? Your line, Barnardo.
Barnardo: ’Tis now struck twelve. Get thee to bed, Francisco.
Francisco For this relief much thanks. ’Tis bitter cold, and I am sick at heart.
Barnardo: Have you had quiet guard?
Francisco: Not a mouse stirring.
Barnardo: Well, good night. If you do meet Horatio and Marcellus, the rivals of my watch, bid them make haste.
Enter HORATIO and MARCELLUS, down L.
Francisco: I think I hear them. Stand, ho! Who is there?
Horatio: Friends to this ground.
Marcellus: And liegemen to the Dane.
He walks over to them.
Francisco: Give you good night.
Marcellus O, farewell honest soldier. Who hath relieved you?
Francisco: Barnardo hath my place. Give you good night.
Exits L.
Marcellus: Holla, Barnardo! Say –
Barnardo: What? Is Horatio there?
Horatio: A piece of him.
Barnardo: Welcome, Horatio. Welcome, good Marcellus.
Marcellus: What, has this thing appeared again tonight?
Barnardo: I have seen nothing.
Marcellus: Horatio says, ’tis but our fantasy, and will not –
Willy: Cut! The rest of that speech is cut.
Marcellus: Sorry, Mr Wagstaff. How much –
Willy: You go on, Horatio. Line 34.
Horatio: Well, sit we down, and let us hear Barnardo speak of this.
Barnardo: Last night of all, when yond same star –
Willy: Okay, stop it there. Ghost appears at this point; the rest is cut.
Barnardo: What are you going to do for a ghost, sir?
Willy: Worry about it when the time comes. Anyway, well done everyone. That’s at least given me a bit of encouragement. Who knows, we might actually get this play off the ground after all.
Barnardo: We worked and worked at it, Mr Wagstaff.
Willy: Yes, I know. Right, that’s it for now. There’s a lecture in the school hall in half an hour. Thanks everyone; Marcellus, make sure you’ve got all the cuts.
Marcellus: Will do, Mr Wagstaff.
All exit. Lights fade.

Scene 2
A lecture hall in the school.
The curtain rises to reveal a large room decorated with banners bearing political logos and slogans . Around the room stand a few bodyguards and members of the party KILMAN is running for. Pupils and staff members wander in. BEN JONSON and WILLY WAGSTAFF stand down C, talking earnestly.
Ben: Who’s addressing us tonight, Willy? I haven’t had a moment to look. Seems like a three-line party whip.
Willy: Yes, some politician; the name eludes me though. No doubt the King and Queen have spent the evening ‘corporate entertaining’. Ah, here they come now. Right on cue.
PARKER, SHEILA and KILMAN enter up L.
Ben: Good god! It’s Jack Kilman. I swear it is. With my mother.
Willy: Sir Jack actually, I believe.
Ben: Then he’s gone up in the world, I can tell you. But they say a leopard doesn’t change its spots.
Willy: The grapevine has it he’s an old flame of your mother’s.
Ben: Does it indeed? Listen, Kilman doesn’t deal in old flames. Not even my mother’s. No, there’s got to be another reason.
Willy: Where do you know him from?
Ben: I have a history with the man. So has my mother. We were in Kosovo together. My father was stationed there. Hush, they’re coming over. Let’s see if he’s still the lascivious, lecherous, lying bastard I once knew.
Willy: Strong words, Ben. Are those his only faults?
Ben: That I know of. But I doubt it.
PARKER walks across to the rostrum with KILMAN.
Parker: Quiet, everybody. We’re fortunate enough this evening to have with us a genuine celebrity, a man with fingers in many pies: business, politics, I might even say Education –
Ben: ( aside, to WILLY ) Politics and Education never went well together.
Parker: Sir John Kilman is running for member of parliament in the forth-coming elections, and he’s been kind enough to take time out to talk to us this evening. I won’t say any more but leave you in his capable hands.
Kilman: Boys and girls, it’s for me the honour, and the pleasure, to talk to you this evening. Now, I have a confession to make: I’m a man with a mission, a political man with a political mission, and as such, what I have to say to you boils down to just one vital message: if you’re not for something then you’re against it; there’s no halfway house in politics; that’s just as sure as the cliffs guarding our precious land are white. And we in the ESP aim to keep those cliffs white – I see a question there – Yes, son?
Al Hammit: What does ESP stand for, sir?
Kilman: Well, a good question. I can see our PR people haven’t worked hard enough in these parts. ESP: Ethnic Socialist Party, a party for the individual and a party for the whole … to preserve those values our forefathers handed down … and not just values, no, to preserve the stock that has fashioned our proud nation … another question from our last questioner there – yes, young man.
Al Hammit: E xcuse me, sir. I’m Al, Al Hammit. My question is: your party doesn’t sound all that different from the one we’ve been studying in History, the German National Socialist Party. They were labelled racist; might not your party also be accused of racism –
Kilman: I’ll tell you what, Al – Al, is it? Yes, well, I can answer your question in one sentence: if it’s racist to be proud of the country you live in, to want to keep it a land fit for heroes, then I’m proud to be called racist. Another question I see – young lady over there –
Laura: Isn’t that three sentences, sir?
Kilman: Three, one, it amounts to the same thing. But let me move on. Are some of you here studying French? – Good. Well, here’s another question: Do any of you know what the French word for ‘foreigners’ is? – ‘Etran