Erin Insists Her Show Must Go On!

Since Dr Namen seemed to be the source of this ill-timed excitement, Erin scrolled up to his most recent message to see what it was about. She had to read his text a few times before she could believe the news:

"Good morning, boys and girls! Sorry if I'm disturbing your Sunday morning, but I think you'll forgive me when you see why. A friend of mine manages a theater which is going to be dark between productions the same week you'll be on Thanksgiving break. Having been mounted only a handful of times since the fall of Rome, and NEVER in New York, the Theatre world there is very interested in seeing the play we just put on performed there. There's a lot of details to be worked out, but I wanted to get in touch with you all to see if enough of you are interested and available. I need to let my friend know by noon tomorrow, so please get back to me before then. An opportunity for a collegiate production like ours to play on Broadway doesn't come up every day, so I hope you make the most of it!

The responses from her fellow cast and crew mates bounced around all morning, with the general consensus being enthusiastic:

"Hell, yeah!

A week in New York? I'm in!

Why WOULDN'T I?

On Broadway at 19? Yes, please!"

A handful of people were more interested in sticking to their already plans, but not enough in prominent roles to be a problem. With the students on board, Dr Namen worked on the logistics; he worked out a deal with his friend and a hotel near the theater to cover student lodging backed on ticket sales. If the play attracted large enough ticket sales, the students would divide the amount above their bill at the hotel. The college covered the cost of charter bus travel. All the students needed to pay for was their meals and whatever shopping or sightseeing they did. It took until Thursday for Dr Namen to work it all out, so the cast was limited to one rehearsal before their 7:00 AM Saturday departure. It hadn't been all that long since the end of their production, so by the time they'd finished one rehearsal they felt like that was preparation enough.

Arriving as late as they did Saturday, the excited group simply settled in at their hotel. They ventured out just long enough to get some food and walk around Times Square. On Sunday they were a bit disappointed to not be able to at least have a look at the place they would be performing in a few days, waking up to see a text from Dr Namen telling them that if the management opened the theater, union rules would require them to bring in a full maintenance crew to work, all paid double for an 8 hour shift just for coming in on a Sunday. The students made the most of the situation, doing every touristy thing they could think of as long as they had a day in Manhattan with no other obligations.

When the students arrived at their theater Monday morning, they were met by Raymond, a very apologetic building manager who told them a transformer supplying power to the theater had died early that morning, meaning nothing but emergency lighting was working. He assured them that his electricians were already working on removing the dead unit and a replacement was going to be installed by sometime that evening. "Better it died today than when you're in the middle of your play, right?" Trying to make up for the disruption, he offered to treat the group to dinner that night. As full of attractions as New York is, the students found plenty of ways to make use of another free day, with many taking advantage of discounted admission at some museum or another.

Most of the group took Raymond up on his offer of dinner, which turned out to be at a modest Italian restaurant owned by Raymond's cousin. After a couple of days sightseeing, shopping, and paying for their own meals, a free dinner of almost any quality would have been fine with most of the group. Dinner was nothing fancy, but the food was actually pretty good. The students good mood got even better when Raymond asked if they would like to make a quick visit to the theater after dessert. "The electricians are still doing some testing, but I can give you a quick tour if you'd like."

The tour left them in awe and a little nervous; their soon-to-be stage was huge compared to the Theatre department auditorium, which was more of an oversized classroom with stadium seating than an actual purpose-built theater. The lighting equipment, several areas on the stage which appeared to be trap doors or elevators, and various curtains were far more involved than what they were used to. The sheer size of the seating area dwarfed their usual venue at their college; "almost 2,000 seats here," Dr Namen informed them, "compared to 350 at our campus!"

A few members of the cast tried out some of their lines with castmates stationed at various points in the seats, getting a feel for how much they would have to project their voices. Erin chose to try out a line or two from the role of Julia, Hannah's part, thinking her status as the understudy for that part justified her practicing with them. She drew a sharp look from Hannah, who seemed to be offended by having to hear her part, even a tiny bit of it, delivered by a rival.

By 10 AM Tuesday the crew was beginning to set up the backdrops and furniture they had managed to rescue from a dumpster behind the campus theater. Looking around backstage and in various storerooms most of the day, they managed to find some other items to help fill out the large stage.

The cast practiced their roles in the unfamiliar setup, gradually getting a feel for how they needed to adjust their volume of their voices, and also how their movements around the stage needed to be adjusted to the larger space. After a late lunch, they were ready for a full run through, in makeup and costumes.

One hitch was discovered when the costumes were unpacked; the gold braid collars tying the front and back panels of the tunics were missing, apparently taken by another group in the department for another upcoming production. Dr Namen was furious, but calmed down when he realized what a disaster it would have been to find out about the problem just before the curtain went up on opening night. He wasn't exactly happy with the solution suggested by a crew member, gold colored felt strips pinned together, but agreed that they didn't look too bad from the audience's vantage point.

There were a handful of technical adjustments to be made in response to problems discovered during the run through, mostly in the placement of props and small containers of fake blood used where violence was to be portrayed. Testing the staged bloodletting helped the crew revise their gore, but since they had no extra tunics, the crew was forced to launder a few of the bloodied outfits. Since Erin's role as Flavia, the doomed slave, was one of three calling for dramatic bleeding, once the cast was finished rehearsing and changed back into street clothes she handed it over to be laundered once the crew was satisfied with their work.

The time spent working out the kinks left no time for Erin and Sean to rehearse their parts, but since Hannah seemed to be in perfect health, Erin figured there wouldn't be any need for her to fill in anyway. As the cast split up to go find their dinner of choice, Erin looked at the theater's marquee, now lit up and featuring the name of her play! She immediately stopped moping about not playing the lead and felt grateful for the whole experience. She took a couple of photos and went in search of some cheap pizza.

Most of the cast slept late on Wednesday, all arriving at the theater between 1 and 3 PM. Dr Namen spent the afternoon giving the cast minor suggestions, but mostly went around to chat with each member of the cast to help them settle their nerves. The only cast member showing no sign of nervousness was Hannah, who went off by herself and made phone call after phone call. As much as Hannah's attitude of superiority could grate on her fellow student's nerves, they had to admit she was miles ahead of them when it came to being able to relax during these anxious hours.

At 6 PM Dr Namen told the cast to head to their dressing rooms and do their makeup and get into costume. Most of the cast felt at least a little bit jittery, but settled down as they helped each other work on their makeup. Erin studied her tunic before putting it on, thinking that the fabric looked a bit thinner than when she had handed it over to be washed. Now, preparing to appear onstage in front of, according to Dr Namen, around 1,140 people, she worried that her tunic might show more than she was comfortable with! Gone was the casual way she'd accepted how visible her body was when she tested the original ultra-lightweight tunic!

Only by comparing her tunic to those of a few castmates was Erin able to relax about how much she might be on display in an hour or so. Putting it on revealed another problem; the two fabric panels appeared to have shrunk. The gap of one inch between the front and back panels was now three inches wide; the ties were barely long enough to bridge the gap. Checking her appearance from several angles in a mirror, she sighed, thinking, "okay, not ideal, but it's probably too late to do anything about it for tonight's show. I'll just have to be careful about how I move, and accept that I might be showing a little bit of sideboob!"

With less than 20 minutes to go before show time, a stricken looking Dr Namen found Erin and asked, "Do you feel confident that you could play the part of Julia instead of Flavia? I mean tonight! I know it's a lot to ask on such short notice, but Hannah called me just a couple of minutes ago, saying she couldn't make it!"

"I don't understand," Erin asked, understandably nervous, "She was here less than an hour ago and looked fine, what happened?"

"It's not an illness," Dr Namen said angrily, "her agent set her up for a meeting and audition for a part, both to be done immediately. It's apparently a choice role in a movie starring Margot Robbie. She said she didn't know any of this was happening until a half hour ago, and that she couldn't get the time changed. I can understand her not being able to say no to such an opportunity, but the timing is atrocious! I know you didn't get much time rehearsing her part, but...

"None, actually, not here in New York," Erin interrupted, "and none back at the college since before the performances began. And never with Bret. But I'll do it; I mean, it doesn't seem like we have any other choice, does it?"

"You're already dressed for the second scene, where Flavia brings you the news of the threat to your son, I'll get you the cloak Julia wears in the first scene when she ventures out of the palace. You need to get together with Sam, the effects guy to make sure you know how to actuate the bleeding when the time comes. Make sure you get him to tell you where the props are hidden and how they work!"

"I'll go see Sam right away," Erin said, "but if I'm going to play Julia, who's going to be Flavia?"

"I hadn't thought that far, do you think Cara could do it?"

"Flavia has just three lines," Erin replied, "I'm sure Cara can handle it, but you should go see her NOW to ask her and coach her on the lines; until now she hasn't had any reason to know those few!"

Dr Namen nodded, but before going to track down Cara he paused to remind Erin, "I hope that this sudden switch is the last bit of chaos we need to deal with tonight, but on opening night you have to be prepared for almost anything and remember what I've been telling you all semester...,"

"I remember," she interrupted, " ALWAYS carry on and do whatever you can to keep going!"

"Good," he replied, "and even though you've had the part for about 3 minutes, you're the lead now, so your castmates will look to you as, well, a leader!"

Erin raced around backstage looking for Sam, finally finding him at the controls for the lighting. "I need a 9 minute tutorial about everything Julia needs to do with fake blood and props," she said, trying to stay calm.

"But you're Flavia," Sam protested, "You get stabbed to death in the second act; Ursinus will appear to stab you in the heart with a collapsible dagger, which is loaded with our stage blood. You don't need to do anything but look and sound like you're being stabbed to death!"

"There's no time to explain," Erin grumbled, "I'm filling in for Hannah, and now we've only got 8 minutes left for you to explain how your stuff works and where it's stashed!"

Eleven minutes later, after a short address by Dr Namen about the historical significance of the play, the curtain rose on the first scene, set in an alley near the palace of the Emperor.

Erin tried to get over her nervousness, reminding herself that however suddenly she'd been switched to the lead role, she was exactly where she wanted to be! She delivered her first line, and felt her anxiety fade away; she WAS Julia now.

Various cast members milled about, with Julia looking for Flavia, having heard the servant might know details of her husband's murder. The two women meet and after much discussion Flavia tells Julia what she knows, naming Julia's new husband as one of the murderers of her first husband, and hints that another murder of someone else in her family may be about to happen.

Worried that her son may be in danger, Julia convinces Flavia to find out all she can and bring any news to her at the palace.

Alone on the stage at the end of the first act, Julia delivered a monologue, criticizing herself for marrying her first husband's killer in an attempt to keep her son safe, pleading with the gods to not allow him to be taken from her.

During the short break between scenes, Erin studied the stage direction notes to be sure she remembered Julia's movements. "You're doing well," Dr Namen told her as she headed to her mark, "keep it up and remember to carry on if there are any other glitches."

"What glitches," Erin thought, wondering if she was so focused on her own performance that she was oblivious to anything else happening on the stage!

As the second act began, Julia was at stage left; she greeted Flavia and asked what she had learned. Julia's worst nightmare was happening; her son Lucius was her husband's next target. With the unwilling Flavia in tow, Julia burst in on Ursinus in his bedchamber, finding him surrounded by concubines. Julia accused Ursinus of murder; he ordered the concubines and his bodyguards to leave. He listened patiently to all of her accusations, and casually admitted to them all.

Ursinus crossed the stage, stopping in front of Flavia, then casually killed her, stabbing her in her heart, soaking her tunic with stage blood. The unlucky servant collapsed, and dropped to the floor.

Before Julia could scream, he covered her mouth and warned her that he will blame her for Flavia's murder if she cries out.

"Her death will serve as a warning to any who spread rumors about me," Ursinus warned her, "You may be the granddaughter of one Emperor and widow of another, but you have no real power. Worst of all, you have cost me my companions for the evening! You will have to take their place!" He grabbed her arm and dragged her towards his bed, located at the center of the apron, close to the edge of the stage.

Julia pulled out a small dagger and waved it wildly at her husband and would-be-rapist. Ursinus was no champion wrestler, but as an ex-soldier he was easily able to disarm her, a small scratch on his left arm the only damage he had suffered. Smiling as he backed toward his bed, he pulled her along with him by her neck. "Have the gods no mercy to leave me to the whims of this monster?" she cried out. Julia struggled to break free, while Orsinus tried to keep a hold on her neck and shoulder.

Erin had never rehearsed this action with Bret, so neither of them were quite sure what the other one was going to do next, only that in the end he should end up leaning back on the bed behind him. When she took a step onto a slightly depressed stage elevator she hadn't noticed, she lost her balance and stumbled, taking an unplanned step forward. Since Julia had been trying to hold Ursinus back, her stiff arm against his upper chest shoved him backward as she stumbled forward. She stepped backward, trying to regain her balance. Each seeing their fellow actor seemingly about to fall down, both Bret and Erin reached out to help each other stay upright, grasping for something to stop them from falling.

Neither Bret nor Erin was able to get a grip on anything sturdy enough to break the other's fall, but in the end each managed to steady themselves after a few wobbly seconds. Just when they each felt stable, each realized that there was something unfamiliar in their hand.

The unexpected things they were holding were long, thin strips of gold felt, carefully tied, but torn. The pieces of felt, former collar drawstrings, had been abruptly torn away from their place holding together the front and back cloth panels of their tunics. With the collars gone, there was nothing to keep what was left of the tunics from falling to the stage floor! Only a few seconds ago, they had been only a handful of minutes away from making it to the end of the play with no major gaffes; now both of the play's main characters were standing a few feet from the edge of the stage, stark naked other than some vaguely Roman sandals!

Brett looked like he was about to bolt off the stage, while Julia had only a brief moment of panic before she remembered Dr Namen's training. In spite of an off-the-chart level of embarassment, she looked Bret squarely in the eye and gave him a slight nod, practically willing him to deliver his next line!

"I may be a monster," Orsinus laughed, "but I will spare your son if you please me." Bret still looked a little shaky, but seemed calmer as Erin delivered her next line.

"Why would you let him live?" Julia asked; Erin tried to forget how many eyeballs were currently glued to her unexpected nudity!

Enjoying the villainous character he was playing, Bret was beginning to look almost comfortable!

"I would savor each day you freely let me take my pleasure with you, in whatever fashion I choose! On each such day I shall hold back the order to end his life. The day you refuse me is the day his fate will be sealed! Come, kneel before me!"

Erin paused a minute before approaching Bret, Julia's hesitation giving her a brief moment to think about what to do next. As it had been rehearsed, Ursinus held the edge of his tunic farthest from the audience up to make a sort of curtain, behind which Julia's head could be seen bobbing in an unseen but unmistakable depiction of a blowjob. With no tunic to shield the act, having Julia's head bobbing up and down on...nothing...would seem ridiculous. She couldn't think that this situation was what Dr Namen had in mind when he urged her to carry on no matter what!

But...

Erin knew that the Julia's story, her desperation and tragedy, the entire play, really, had been building up to this moment. She also saw a way to get to the conclusion of the play more or less following the script.

Julia shuffled over to Ursinus and knelt before him. She looked up at him and said simply, "As you command!" Leaning toward him, she reached out and wrapped her left hand around the base of his cock!

Bret realized they were heading for uncharted territory, but wasn't about to tell Erin to stop!

Erin heard several shocked gasps coming from the audience, as well as the sound of a handful of people leaving, but having come this far she was committed to seeing Julia through to the conclusion of her story.

After several strokes of Ursinus's cock, Julia leaned forward, her lips inches away from its tip. She paused, but only for a couple of seconds. She opened her mouth and took the head in, then dove down, taking the entire shaft in. She held it there, then began slowly pulling back, never completely releasing it, and plunging back down.