Matt's note: This one is sourced from Puck's closing speech in A Midsummer Night's Dream
SPECIAL EFFECTS (any gender, late teens on up)
Aaaand, ladies and gentlemen thank you so much for coming out tonight. My name is Chris Maddison, I'm the company stage manager and-- fwew! What a wild ride that was, huh?
I wanted you all to know that even though your playbill says there will be a talk-back after the show, it turns out that - ha!- it turns out that... it takes a lot more time than we thought for the actors to get all cleaned up. But before everyone goes, I just want to, to, to- Well: This is a pretty unique little show isn't it? And I can see that some of you are still a little shook up from the you know, the- oh let's just get it out there: The crazy supernatural bloodbath after the chanting sequence. Ha!
And this may seem silly but I do want to remind everybody that we're a new theatre company and we've got some new special effects up our sleeve but I promise you there are going to be pleeenty of companies that catch onto our technique and you'll be seeing plenty of stuff just as, as, as, as convincing-looking as what happened tonight. Just as convincing and just as FAKE.
But hey: Live theatre, right? Pretty cool to have an art form that cannnnn... still give you some surprises?
Copyright 2016 by Matt Haynes.
If you would like to use this piece, please credit: "Courtesy of Matt Haynes and The Pulp Stage"