Showstopper (4 page)

My eyes lit up. “We could?”
Black Beauty
was one of my favorite novels.

“We could if we had more than a week,” Austin clarified. “It would take some time to adapt a story into a play, plus it would also require writing an entire score of original songs.”

“Too bad about
Black Beauty
,” Susan observed. “I would have given anything to see Sophia Ciancio play the back half of a horse!”

I shot Susan a look and she left the room, grumbling.

“So if we can't adapt something in time, how is this public domain stuff helpful?” I asked.

“Check your phone,” said Austin.

On the screen he picked up his cell and hit a few buttons. In the next second, my phone dinged with a text: a link to a website called drama-o-rama.com.

“Drama-o-Rama?” I giggled. “I like it.”

Drama-o-Rama was amazing. It had at least fifty kid-friendly (and, even more important, kid-budget-friendly) options to choose from. Straight plays, musicals, holiday specials—even one-acts. And for a relatively low price, a theater company like ours could rent scripts and scores.

“Austin, this is amazing!” I cried. “And cheap. We can afford to license one of these with pretty much our dues money alone.”

“Now all we have to do is pick one,” said Austin.

As my eyes scanned the available titles, I really had to hand it to the Drama-o-Rama writing staff. They sure knew how to spin things, and with a sense of humor. For example,
Totally Rad Riding Hood
was really just
Little Red Riding Hood
set in the radically tubular decade of the 1980s. And
Journey to the Center of the Mall
was clearly the story Jules Verne
would
have written if he'd understood the concept of the food court.

Also in our price range:
Dr. Jekyll Plays Hyde-and-Seek; Jane Airhead; Fence Painting for Dummies
(based on Mark Twain's Tom Sawyer);
Robin Hoodie
(comes with the sweatshirt); and
Tarzan Goes Ape: A Real Swingin' Show
.

There was even a musical called
The Princess and the Peanut
, designed to help boost awareness about the seriousness of food allergies. It included the song “I Want to Come Out of My Shell” and the dance number “My Kingdom for an EpiPen.”

“Upbeat
and
educational,” I observed.

“There's one based on
Ivanhoe
,” said Austin hopefully.

“Ivan-
who
?” I asked.

“It's one of my favorite stories,” Austin explained. “A classic by Sir Walter Scott about twelfth-century English knights. Do you think Maxie could get her hands on some suits of armor?”

“I doubt it,” I said, quickly scanning the
Ivanhoe
blurb on the website. “And even if she could, it wouldn't work for us. It's a holiday show. See?
Ivan-ho-ho-ho: A Medieval Merry Christmas
. One of the songs is ‘Silent Knight.' ”

“Oh.” Austin frowned. “I didn't read the whole description.”

“No worries,” I assured him. “There are plenty more.”

I noticed a title based on another of my all-time favorite books,
The Secret Garden
, which the Drama-o-Rama dramatists
had cleverly dubbed
The Garden Nobody Knew About
.

“Kind of girly,” said Austin.

I knew what he meant. Frances Hodgson Burnett's novel is centered around a female character. I shrugged. “To be honest, I thought the same thing when you suggested
Ivanhoe
. I know there's plenty of romance in the story, but the main character is still a boy. Our goal is to find something that appeals to the broadest audience. It would be great if we found a play our cast members could be excited about, whatever their genders, with an equal number of girls' and boys' roles.”

Of course, the gender breakdown of a show wasn't necessarily a deal breaker. We could easily have girls play boys or boys play girls if we had to. We'd tried that at our first audition, and it had worked out surprisingly well.

“Hey, what about
The Odyssey
?” Austin suggested.

I laughed, looking at the list. “I think you mean
The Odd-yssey
. Two
D
s.”

“The original material is the epic Greek poem by Homer,” Austin explained. “It takes place in ancient times, and this solider—”

“Odysseus!”

“Right!”

“I know because we studied the poem a little in English
class,” I said. “It's perfect. The subject matter is more appealing because the Greek goddesses are a lot more powerful than Ivanhoe's damsels in distress. There are plenty of roles that could be played by either boys or girls . . . like, monsters and mythical figures and animals . . .”

“So maybe we can cast Sophia as a horse's backside after all!”

I laughed. “Personally, I'd rather see her as one of Homer's classic monsters. The Cyclops, maybe, although knowing Sophia, she'd pitch a fit about only getting to wear
half
a pair of false eyelashes.”

Austin was reading the information on
The Odd-yssey
. “This actually sounds perfect,” he said. “It's got everything: adventure, suspense, romance, comedy.” He looked at a sample of the sheet music. “The score is pretty simple. We won't have any trouble learning the songs.”

I cleared my throat. “Speaking of songs . . . do you think we'll have our theme song in time for the show?”

Austin gave me a knowing look and we both blushed. The Great Theme Song Battle, as I'd come to call it in my head, hadn't been one of our shining moments. We'd moved past it, and I was pretty sure one day we'd both look back on the argument and laugh. But right now the embarrassment was still a little fresh . . . for both of us.

“I'll work on it,” he said in a reasonable tone. “But I'm not making any promises.”

“And I'm not making any demands.”

So we officially agreed that Random Farms' second show was going to be
The Odd-yssey: An Epically Funny Musical
.

“The website says to allow three days for delivery,” I said. “I'd better contact Drama-o-Rama right now if we want the material delivered in time for auditions next week.”

“Sounds good,” said Austin.

I logged off Skype and went downstairs to borrow a credit card.

CHAPTER

3

The next two days were all about preparing for the big trip and for Nana and Papa's extended stay.

On Tuesday Susan and I ran errands for Mom while she hunkered down in her office to wrap up current business and notify clients of her unexpected travel plans.

On Wednesday we got things ready for our grandparents' visit. Susan stayed home to tidy up the guest bedroom and bath, while I headed off to the market for groceries. My best friend, Becky, had a rare day off from her crazy sports schedule, so when she called that morning and asked if I could hang out, I invited her to come along.

Mom had given me a very specific grocery list and enough cash to stock the pantry until the next millennium. Becky pushed the cart while I scanned the shelves in search of the items on Mom's list.

“How's tennis going?” I asked, placing a box of oatmeal in the cart.

“Great,” said Becky. “I'm ranked number one in my age division. I've got a tournament on Sunday afternoon. If I win, I go to the league championships.”

“That's awesome,” I said.

“Thanks.” Becky was quiet for a moment. “So . . . how's Austin's original musical coming along?”

I shrugged, reaching for a jar of instant freeze-dried decaffeinated coffee. “I'm not sure. He hasn't mentioned it. I'm guessing he's still working on it, though.”

As we wandered the aisles, we caught up on each other's lives: Becky told me about her new state-of-the-art tennis sneakers and her older brother's torn ACL, and I told her all about
The Odd-yssey
.

“I know Sophia is going to want to be Penelope,” I predicted. “It's the female lead. I just can't picture her pulling it off. After all, Penelope is famous throughout history for being loyal and unselfish. And Sophia . . . isn't!”

Becky laughed.

I added low-sodium tomato juice, sugar-free butterscotch hard candies, diet ginger ale, and all the ingredients for Nana's famous chicken potpie to the grocery cart.

Then I filled Becky in on our plan to move the rehearsals
to our house.

“Your parents are okay with that?” asked Becky.

“Well, they're not
not
okay with it,” I said vaguely. “And it will only be for two weeks. Mr. Healy is pretty sure we'll be back in the clubhouse before tech week.”

“When are auditions?”

“Saturday, bright and early,” I said. “Swing by if you want.”

Becky shook her head. “Can't. Tennis practice. But the match on Sunday is at the public courts in town. Maybe you and Austin can come watch.”

I smiled. “Consider it done,” I said.

We finished the shopping by picking out some frozen waffles, the makings for a Caesar salad, and baking ingredients, including chocolate chips and brown sugar (homemade cookies were a major perk of having doting grandparents visit). After we checked out, Becky gave me a huge hug and headed off to the pool for her diving lesson.

I collected my reusable shopping bags and hurried home.

It wasn't until I was dropping them on the kitchen counter and telling Susan, “I shopped.
You
put the groceries away,” that I realized what Becky had said:

Maybe you and Austin can come watch.

Weird.

She'd invited me
and
Austin. What did that mean? That
she thought he and I were automatically doing that kind of thing together now, just because we were jointly running a theater program? Or did it mean she wanted Austin Weatherly to see how amazing she and her new cool sneakers were at tennis? It was hard to say for sure.

But I decided not to read too much into it.

I had a couple of grandparents and an epic play to prepare for, and both were going to require every bit of my attention.

Drama-o-Rama promised “speedy and reliable shipping,” and they didn't disappoint. On Thursday morning, the materials for
The Odd-yssey
arrived! A deliveryman in brown shorts hauled a hefty cardboard box up the front steps, and I actually got to sign for it. That felt pretty important. I'd never signed for anything before.

Susan helped me carry the box down to the basement, where we tore into it as if it were a treasure chest. The contents were as follows:

SCRIPTS (TWENTY TOTAL)

DIRECTOR'S GUIDE

PIANO VOCAL SCORE

SET/COSTUME/MAKEUP GUIDES

COSTUME/MAKEUP TUTORIAL CD

SOUND TRACK/SOUND EFFECTS CD

PERFORMANCE CD

It was basically a kit—Drama-o-Rama had provided the script and the music, as well as suggestions for things we'd need to gather on our own.

On the very bottom of the box was a large manila envelope containing a legal-looking document—the performance license.

“Wow,” said Susan. “That's so official. We're big-time, now!”

I examined the CD cases and sighed. “Too bad we won't be able to use the sound track. I bet it sounds like a whole orchestra. Austin would love that.”

“Maybe one of these days we'll be able to invest in a sound system for the clubhouse theater,” said Susan.

“That would be awesome,” I said. “But for now let's focus on getting this play in motion.”

I picked up the script, flipping directly to the cast list, which I read from aloud: “Odysseus, Penelope, Telemachus, Poseidon . . .”

“Poseidon? Isn't he related to Ariel's dad in
The Little Mermaid?
”

“Yes,” I said with a chuckle. “But way before that he was a pretty major figure in Greek mythology.” I kept reading. “The Sirens, Athena, the Cyclops.”

“The Cycle Ops? Who's he? The Greek god of training wheels?”

“Cyclops. Monster with one eye.”

“Oh. Well, good luck to Maxie costuming
that!
”

I put down the script and glanced around the basement, realizing Maxie wasn't the only one who had her work cut out for her. This place was a disaster! My original plan for the theater (before we struck our deal with Dr. Ciancio to use the neighborhood clubhouse) was to clean up the cellar and use it as our meeting headquarters and rehearsal space. Looking around now, it was clear I'd underestimated just how much cleaning up it needed.

The whole place was dusty, musty, and cluttered. This was because none of us Wallachs ever came down here much, except to do laundry. The upside to this was that the ever-present springtime scent of fabric softener and dryer sheets helped mask the smell of mothballs and mildew.

“If we're going to hold rehearsals down here,” I said, “we're going to have to spruce it up a bit. It totally needs to be organized, swept, and dusted.”