27
“Somethingsomething monologue and a soliloquy?” Liam asks. We’re in the Theatre Office, me working on my stage manager binder, him browsing Dr. Lochley’s shelves.
“You can do either.”
He shakes his head. “What’s the difference?” He signs it too.
“Oh. A monologue is delivered to another character. A soliloquy is delivered to the audience or yourself. Like an internal monologue. So inHamlet, ‘To be or not to be,’ that’s a soliloquy, but inJulius Caesarthe whole ‘Friends, Romans, countrymen’ thing is a monologue.”
“Huh,” Paige says from her spot on the floor. She’s helping me sort the inventories I made of our sets and props and costumes. With the budget so tight, we need to reuse or repurpose anything we can. “I never knew that.”
Liam nods and turns back to the shelves, pulls out a slim blue volume withBest Monologues for Boys, 2001–2010on the spine. I can’t believe they gendered a monologue book.
Liam thumbs through it while Paige types away on her laptop, updating the scenery spreadsheet, and I mark up the script forTwelfth Night.
Dr. Lochley’s thinking about doing the show in the Little Theatre, either in the round or in a thrust configuration, where we block off the south side of the house and use it as a backdrop.
Liam flaps his hand to get my attention.
“Hm?”
“What about sonnets?”
“Well, they’re not really monologues or soliloquies, they’re more like poems. Like the one you did forJCSauditions.”
“You remember that?”
“Of course.” I remember everything about it. Well, I don’t remember the words, but I remember the way it felt like he was talking just to me. I remember the way my arms broke out into goose bumps.
Liam’s cheeks color as he pulls out a slim yellow volume of sonnets.
“Hey, didn’t this get damaged somethingsomething?” Paige points to one of the flats on our list: part of the garden of Gethsemane that got snagged on the dimmer rack because the actors carrying it were goofing off.
“Oh, good call.”
Paige is really sharp, with a great mind for details, which lets me focus on the big-picture stuff. We’re kind of a perfect partnership.
As we work, Dr. L rounds the corner, tote bag slung over her shoulder and Cam trailing in her wake, talking too low for me to make anything out.
But Cam’s mouth shuts once he sees we’re in the office.
“Sorry, we’re in your way,” Liam says, more to Dr. L I think, because Liam’s eyes narrow at Cam.
“No worries.” Dr. L drops her tote bag on her desk with a thud I can feel through the floor. “Looking at sonnets?”
Liam nods.
“Ambitious. What about you, Paige?”
“Somethingsomething monologues.”
I whip around to face her, my mouth hanging open. Did she say she was looking at monologues?
Is she auditioning?
I thought she was going to be my ASM. In fact, I was kind of counting on it.
“I’ve got somethingsomething, give me one second.” Dr. L sits, gestures to Cam to take the seat opposite her desk as a pile of scripts slides off her desk.
