Chapter Text
Prologue: “Direct my sail! On, lusty gentlemen.”
A stack of folders hit the table with a thwack. Everyone seated around it jumped to attention, their chairs creaking under the added pressure. All eyes turned to the newcomer.
“I’m sorry to call you in early like this, but we have a problem.” John Grey sat heavily in the chair at the head of the table and rubbed his eyes with one hand before dragging it down his scruffy face, his mouth drooping into a frown.
“What’s the problem, John?” Alicia Grant asked. She crossed her long legs and tapped a pencil against her knee, its pink and silver sparkles flashing in stark contrast to her black gym shorts and dark skin.
Mr. Grey tore his eyes away from the distracting shiny arc it made and answered, “Pemberly pulled out of the Shakespeare, and we have to present our finalized season to the Board on Monday.”
“Oh shit,” she said, the pencil stopping abruptly. “What happened?”
He sighed and rubbed his eyes again. “Their theatre director, Madame Peel, called me this morning. They’ve made an executive decision to perform their own all-female production, the Penelopiad, during the Shakespeare time-slot. I have no problem with it. I think that’s a wonderful idea. I just wish we had more time. We need to make a decision today so that I can prepare a finalized report for the Board over the weekend.”
“Are they pulling out of all the productions?” George Carter, the head of the music department, asked worriedly.
“No. No, thank God. The spring musical won’t be affected.”
Mr. Carter sighed in obvious relief. “Yes, thank God. I can’t imagine trying to figure that out. We’ve already filled out all the paperwork for the permissions and score rental.”
“Yes, that one will be fine. It’s just the Shakespeare. So,” he sat back and adjusted his cable knit cardigan, “What do we do?” He gazed around the table, eyes moving from teacher to teacher. Mrs. Grant, the head of the literature department as well as his favorite colleague and work wife, looked undaunted, the wheels already turning behind her sharp, brown eyes. Mr. Carter’s eyebrows were knitted in concern as he gazed out of the window, and Milan Hendrickx, his volunteer directing assistant, nearly vibrated with glee, leaning forward on the table as if ready to pounce. But it was Mr. Argus Avery, the principal, he watched. Mr. Avery had final say over every decision they made, and it was he who had to be convinced. Mr. Grey doubted any of the others would object to his proposal, but Mr. Avery might.
“Well,” Mr. Carter began hesitantly, obviously already realizing the problem, “It’s Romeo and Juliet. Would that be awkward without the girls? This is a tragedy year. Perhaps we could switch to something like Macbeth, something a little more violent and bloody, something with fewer female roles.”
As Mr. Avery nodded sagely, saying, “That’s a viable option,” Milan blurted out, “Romeo and Juliet doesn't exactly have a lot of female roles. We’re looking at one lead role, a smaller comic role, and two minor ones. That shouldn’t be a determining factor.”
“That’s an excellent point,” Mrs. Grant agreed, throwing Milan an approving smile. “There are more female roles in Macbeth, actually, though you could argue that the witches need not be female. May I also remind you that Shakespeare’s plays were originally performed by men. Women weren’t allowed on stage, so the original Juliet was a man.”
“Yes, but–” Mr. Avery interjected.
Mrs. Grant ignored him. “Annnd, if I may say, from a curriculum standpoint, I am loathe to change the play.”
Mr. Avery raised his eyebrows and turned to her. “Why’s that?”
“Think about it.” She waved the pencil around. “Our curriculum is fine-tuned. It’s part of our main advertising and promotion. Our Shakespeare productions are on a strict rotation–tragedy, comedy, history–and while tickets are available to members of the community and family, we require that all students attend the production the following Monday during school. Our overall goal here is, of course, education and learning.” She looked pointedly at Mr. Avery, who coughed, shifting uncomfortably in his dark business suit.
“The plays we choose to perform are specifically not the ones we teach in class,” she continued. “If we cut Romeo and Juliet this year, next year will be a comedy. If we change it to Macbeth, they’ll be double dipping on one play and completely missing out on another, as they read Macbeth in their final year. Our goal is to expose them to as many of the plays as we can without actually teaching them all because, I think we can all agree, that there are many worthwhile stories and authors out there. Including yearly Shakespeare is part of the Academy by-laws, I know, but this is one of the ways we’ve been able to include more modern, diverse literature.”
She placed the pencil on the table in what Mr. Grey could only interpret as a mic drop. This was why he was lucky to have a literature teacher as his Technical Director. No one knew the curriculum better than her.
“Hmmm,” Mr. Avery responded thoughtfully. “If Macbeth doesn’t make sense, could we do Hamlet or Julius Caesar?”
“Sir,” Milan cut in again, “If I may…” Mr. Avery nodded, so he continued, “If your concern is about the romance, specifically presenting a romance between two boys.” He looked around the room and shrugged, “Sorry. But that’s what this is about, isn’t it? I might as well bring it up now. We need to talk about it.”
Mr. Avery coughed again, looking even more uncomfortable, but said, “Go on.”
“Well, think about it. Hamlet has romance. Ophelia and Hamlet are kind of a thing. Hamlet’s mom was cheating on his dad. Othello might as well be entirely about sex. Antony and Cleopatra is based on a legendary romance. King Lear has no romance, but there are three daughters, three major female roles. Do you see my point?” He paused so that they could work it out on their own. “Romeo and Juliet is a known romantic tragedy, yes, but seriously, who cares? You’re not going to be able to avoid women and/or sex. It’s Shakespeare! Hell, even Macbeth has a few scenes were he and Lady Macbeth refer to being ‘married.’” He snorted on the last one and put it in air quotes, making his meaning obvious.
“They also read Julius Caesar in second year,” Mrs. Grant snuck in while Mr. Avery blustered.
“Okay. Okay,” he finally squeaked. “We get your point. So, John,” he turned to face Mr. Grey, “You’ve been rather quiet about all of this. What do you think?”
“I’m with Mrs. Grant and Milan if I’m understanding their arguments correctly. You want to keep Romeo and Juliet?” He met their eyes individually, and they both nodded. “Okay. Good. George?”
He turned to Mr. Carter, who frowned and waved his hands in an uncaring gesture. “The plays are your domain. I just step in with the musicals. If you’re happy, I’m happy. I have no problems with Romeo and Juliet.”
“Excellent. Now,” he turned back to Mr. Avery, “I’d also like to present a new perspective as well, separate from the curriculum and play content. Sir, think about the PR. Everyone knows we plan to do Romeo and Juliet this year. Like Alicia said, our curriculum is fine-tuned. We have everything planned out in four year increments. So, imagine a parent or the press or even one of our boys realizes that we changed the play because of this.”
Personally, he didn’t give a shit about the board, the PR, or the parents. He cared about the boys, but he knew this line of reasoning would work best with Mr. Avery. “What image do we want to have? What message are we sending? Do we want to be known as a progressive educational institution that approaches sensitive topics with an open mind, or do we want to be written off as bigots who aren’t even educated enough to remember that Romeo and Juliet was originally performed by two men. There was even a movie about it.”
Mr. Avery’s eyebrows relaxed, and his face cleared. “Hmmm. That is an excellent point, John. We need to think about our image. We’ve worked very hard to modernize our curriculum, and diversity has been our top priority for the last five years. Our investors and parents expect both dignity and academic excellence from us. This would look hypocritical wouldn’t it?”
Yes, it fucking would, but he said, “It wouldn’t look good, that’s true.”
“This is all true,” Mrs. Grant added, tapping her pencil on the table in some agitation, “But is that really our main focus here?”
There it was! He cheered inwardly but outwardly beamed at her with a wink.
She threw Mr. Grey an ‘I know what you just did’ look and barreled into her point. “Yes, the school’s reputation is important, but what about the boys? Who cares what message we’re sending to the investors? What about the message we’re sending the boys? As you said, John, they know it’s supposed to be Romeo and Juliet. I mean–” and she laughed a little to herself, “I would bet money that Sander already has Romeo memorized.”
Mr. Grey chuckled in complete agreement and said, “I wouldn't take that bet.”
“See,” she said, looking at Mr. Avery, “The boys already know. If we change the play because we’re afraid of having two boys in the main roles, then what are we teaching the students?”
“She’s right,” Milan added. “Are we teaching them to accept homophobia or embrace the universality of love and the human experience?”
“Exactly!” Mrs. Grant said, throwing her hands up in the air.
“Essentially, Argus,” Mr. Grey used Mr. Avery’s first name for emphasis, to make sure he had his attention, though almost no one on staff ever called him that. “As the core theatre staff, we believe that performing this play is the best choice for the school and the students.”
Mr. Avery steepled his fingers. “I understand what you’re saying, and I tend to believe I agree from the staff perspective. But what will the boys think about this? Are any of them going to want to wear a dress? Don’t we need buy-in from them?”
Milan covered a laugh with a cough, and Mr. Grey answered immediately, “I guarantee the boys won’t have any problems with it. Sander, Senne, Elias, Younes. I anticipate they’ll all try out regardless, and we’re probably looking at our Romeo and Juliet right there, unless, of course, we have a few surprise entries.”
“They aren’t going to care, sir. It’s a performance, an act,” Milan added after sobering up. “Your personal sexual orientation or opinions don’t matter in acting.”
“And who said they need to wear dresses anyway?” Mrs. Grant cut in, her voice brisk. “We can stage the play however we want–setting, costumes. I say we leave that up to the boys.”
“Oh, I like that idea,” Mr. Grey agreed, tapping his finger on his lower lip.
“I like it for two reasons,” Mrs. Grant added, thinking out loud. “One, it’s always best to give students choices, to allow them agency when we can. Something like this is easily within their rights to be able to decide. Elizabethan costumes, cowboys, space aliens, modern clothes, a male Juliet. And second, it’s also an excellent creativity and problem solving exercise. They’ll have to really think things through and plan how things will be done. I love it!” She recrossed her legs and thrust her pencil into the top of her long ponytail for emphasis.
“I can only imagine what nonsense Sander and his goofballs will decide if you let them,” Mr. Carter interjected. “Remember the lyrics they wrote to that song last year?”
Mr. Grey shuddered. He did remember it. They’d taken a melody from last year’s Seussical and added their own raunchy, raucous lyrics that they then sang as often as possible. It still haunted his dreams. Mrs. Grant’s space aliens probably weren’t too far off, honestly.
“Okay, so Mr. Avery, what have we officially decided? What should I write up for the board?” Mr. Grey asked, folding his hands over his stack of folders.
Mr. Avery sat back, thoughtful. Finally, the chair squeaked, and he said, “We perform Romeo and Juliet as planned. You will present our reasoning, based on educational decisions that we believe best benefit the students. Our production budget will remain unchanged, and I am in full support of giving the students agency on deciding how to produce the play, though I have final approval.”
Mr. Grey took notes as he spoke and nodded when he finished. “Thank you, Mr. Avery. I do think this is best, and I am very excited about the coming season.” He turned to face the rest of his staff. “Are we all in agreement? Does anyone have any further thoughts?”
No one spoke up.
“Alright, then, thank you all for coming in on your last day of summer vacation. I appreciate your time and your input. Have a good weekend, and I’ll see you on Monday!”
Mr. Carter groaned, and Mrs. Grant kicked his chair, saying, “You can fit in a few more golf games this weekend. Get over it!”
He waved a hand at her as he stood up, rolling his eyes. “Hush! You know I’ve been in band camp for the last two weeks. My summer ended ages ago. I’m already tired.” He yawned dramatically.
“Well, that’s what you get for being a music teacher. I get late nights grading papers,” Mrs. Grant answered, unwinding her legs and standing up as well.
“And I,” Mr. Grey sidled in, “Have to strategically influence the principal to do what we want.” He gave Milan a ‘See what I did there’ look over his shoulder, and Milan chuckled.
“Yes,” Mrs. Grant eyed him, her lips twitching. “That was…quite nice, you letting me do all the hard work!” Her voice rose on the last few words, and she gave his shoulder a smack.
“I don’t know what you mean,” he grinned, anything but innocent, and walked out, waving his folders over his shoulder in goodbye, Milan close on his heels.
Mr. Grey slowed down, so he could catch up. Then, placing a hand on Milan’s shoulder, he whispered, “Lesson one: always hire staff who are smarter than you.”
“Got it,” Milan nodded with a smile.
“Alright, on to lesson two: how to write a report.”
“Oh joy,” Milan answered sarcastically, and Mr. Grey patted his shoulder again before leading them to his office.