Well, you can guess the rest. I had been looking forward to today’s rehearsal, with the same group – Mercutio, Benvolio, Romeo (on the day when he was filling in/trying out for the role), aka Chhatra, Prabha, Anup – as had done so well before, with the addition of Tybalt (no. 3), Pawan, another really nice guy. And I had messaged them all in the morning, all confirming that they would be there, Mercutio and Tybalt…
And then two of them failed to show, ironically, the two who were due to be killed. Which I suppose shows an impressive identification with their characters. It was not a complete waste of time; I was able to rehearse the scene between Romeo and Benvolio, I heard Himani (our rapper) go through her song… And then Pawan turned up, with half an hour left, so we could at least do a bit of work in the murder scene, with Aashish standing in for Mercutio.
But there was more disquieting news, with Prabha and Richa explaining (via Khushi as interpreter) that their teacher had organised a six-day excursion next week. I was more or less speechless; what could I say, But when I went down to Aparna’s office after the rehearsal, she was in conversation – though that is putting it mildly – with a man I had never met, who turned out to be the teacher in question. She was furious, mostly with him, but then asking Richa in particular to make a choice between the trip and the role. And then asking me whether I was prepared to release her. I pointed out that this should not be up to either of us, nor to the teacher for that matter (who had meanwhile upped the ante by claiming that 50 marks of coursework were at stake – a claim which turned out to be a lie.) This, I suggested, was a matter for management to sort out – Usha, or possibly Yogi.
When the teacher left, the matter seemed unresolved, but then Aparna rang Usha, and it transpired that the trip had not been approved, but that there would be a meeting about it tomorrow. So we shall see.
Chhatra, shamefaced, also turned up to apologise; it seemed he had a bad neck, or something of the kind, but he didn’t seem too bad to me. Pathetic.
Tomorrow is another day.
