It’s brilliant. So very believable. Bravo.
The problem? The problem is the King is magically healed in Act Two by Helen. The problem is that for the rest of the play, His Majesty is positively brimming with miraculous health. The post-healing scene—where the King is so euphoric and giddy from his recovery that he is supposed to dance through the halls of the court with Helen—is particularly difficult for Briana.
Day three of tech week, I decide we really need to tackle the matter head-on.
“King of France,” I tell her, “you’ve just been cured, remember? It’s a miracle. You’re well now. Show us how well you are by rejoicing.” I smile encouragingly at Briana. Hunched and drowning in her kingly robes. One hand clutching her scepter like a cane. The other gripping Ellie’s shoulder like she’s a human crutch.
Briana looks at me like, How dare you. How dare you say the word well to me. But then her face falls pitifully. “I can’t,” she says.
“Try,” I say gently. And it’s like I struck her. Her face becomes even more warped with self-pity. She shakes her head.
“Imagine,” I say, walking up to the stage, toward her trembling body, “coming back to yourself at last. Who is this person,” I ask her softly, “who can suddenly walk? Who can suddenly bend? Who can stand on two feet without a cane or a crutch? Whose feet suddenly seem to float as if on air? Who isn’t afraid of staircases or chairs anymore?”
She looks at me standing before her, and I feel her cower slightly. The other students have moved off the stage. All except Ellie, who’s still standing there beside Briana, sagging beneath the weight of her grip. I take a step closer.
“Only a moment ago, you were so, so heavy. What a heavy, hopeless world you lived in for so long. Limbs heavy. Heart heavy. Head muddy with useless drugs. Useless doctors. Sadistic therapists. So many white rooms. So many doctor heads shaking at you. People keeping themselves at a distance. Thinking you’re lying. Thinking you’re contagious. Thinking you’re just unpleasant to be around now. Your tears bore people. All that sadness and fear’s getting old. You’re getting old. There’s your life. One long gray corridor, twisting ever downward. You would do anything, anything, to go back. Go back to who you were. And then? And then along comes this stranger with a miracle in their hands. They know your pain. They know its name.”
I smile. “And now, Your Majesty? Now you’re suddenly filled with this impossible lightness. You want to cry, but how can you cry when you literally can’t stop smiling? You’d like to, but you can’t. The smile is always there now, stretching your lips. Now you laugh for no reason at all.”
And I laugh to show her. I laugh and I laugh and I laugh.
“You’re free,” I say, still laughing. “And the freedom is exhilarating. The freedom makes you drunk. It’s like the streets are suddenly perfumed. It’s like you can look directly into the sun. You feel so light, like you can literally lift off the ground. You want to run, you want to dance.”
Briana looks at me like I’m on fire before her very eyes. My glowing, laughing, supple self. How is it possible? It can’t be possible. She shakes her head. “No.”
“Yes.”
“I can’t.”
“It’s in the script, I’m afraid, Your Majesty,” I tell her. “Following his miraculous cure, Lafeu remarks that the King is able to lead Helen in a coranto.”
“What’s a coranto again?” Ellie says.
“Ellie, we’ve gone over this. It’s a sort of dance. A running, jumping dance.”
“A jumping dance?” Trevor says from the corner of the stage. “But Grace said it was more like a glide.…”
See? How they do miss you, Grace. You are missed.
“Well, Grace isn’t here, is she? Different sources, different interpretations, am I right? I think Shakespeare would have wanted the King to do a jumping, running dance. Far more celebratory than a glide. You’ll have to jump a little to do it. See? Like I’m doing, look. It’s really fun.”
But Briana just stands there watching me jump up and down. All the students watch. I get lost in the dance, I have to admit. Because it’s such an exalting moment. Vindicating. Joyous. That taste of the air beneath your feet. That impossible lightness after such heaviness. It brings tears to your eyes, laughter to your mouth, to move like that. Mark was right, movement heals, movement is king. Which is why the King must dance.