Darkness. Faint ringing of bells, of the tri-corn variety. A candle is lit, then a second, and finally the third, completing the candelbra. As each candle is lit, the house lights are raised, illuminating a figure dressed in motley. His back to the audience, the man sits on a wooden chair in front of a wooden desk, writing with an turkey quill and scroll. His movements cause bells on his costume to sound, until at last he removes his tri-corn and tosses it on the desk and in one motion he is up. Facing the audience, the lights dance behind him, with one alternating lens on his front. He is intermittently obscurred by shadow, thourghout the piece. His voice, is raspy, as if he's just been bellowing or yelling for extended periods.
He coughs.
BEAT
Well now...
My father, he says to me...he says, this has got to be a score and two ago...he says, "Thom...you cannah let tham make a fool autta you! You onny git one life from tha laird. Don' wass it trying ta please noone!"
He was drunk, my ol' father when he gave me those words of advice. O'course he was drunk the most of a time, was me pap.
But, I took heed of his advice. I never let anyone make a fool out of me. Oh sure, I led them to believe that they were having their laugh at my expense, but it were me who was having the real laughs. I'd be telling a jovial tale, or singing an ode to some ridiculous event, all the while veiling the true meaning of my story. That's allegory. stories within stories...but you know this, one feels.
BEAT
It was about ten year ago, when I came to jest for the court of Tristan. Now, King Tristan was a tyrant, a right foul menace. He never gave an ounce of anything to his people. His was "the rule of mine".
His Kingdom, through and through. BEAT
...and I ain't talking material possessions...to him, to HIM everything was a material possession. Even his women. This King Tristan would take a woman a night, despite keeping a wife in the dreadful Queen Annabella. She were a fright, to behold no jov. They's marriage was a play to unite the two empires, and they both knew it. Her
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