Enter SHAKESPEARE, HENSLOW, and BABBITT, pursued by a bear.

HENSLOW:
Nay, William, nay! This scheme will not suffice.
Your weird sisters will be sufficient weird
Without they fly about our theatre
On ropes and pulleys, hazarding our men.
‘Tis perilous unto the players’ lives.

SHAKESPEARE:
But players, sir, are cheap, as thou dost say,
As plentiful as pigeons in Paris.

HENSLOW:
Yet here’s an actor worth ten times his weight,
Nay, twenty times! in gold most pure and bright.
How fares thy bear, good Babbitt? Doth he thrive?

BABBITT:
He sleeps, he dances, eats, then sleeps again.
Sooth, any player breathes in this domain
Would do much more, and righteous cheerfully,
For half the coin I spend upon this beast.

SHAKESPEARE:
Is he made tame? Doth his kind temper change?

BABBITT:
He is the tame as ever he was, sir.
Here, take this grape and hold thy hand out flat,
Just so, aye, there’s the way of feeding him.

SHAKESPEARE:
Ah! Ah! I am attacked! A bear! A bear!

HENSLOW:
Now there’s fine comedy! And comedy
Doth fill my coffers fuller than thy verse.
There’s more ducats made in bear-baiting shows,
From blood and roaring and the common sport,
Than from thy wordy, leaden tragedies.

SHAKESPEARE:
Wretch! Baiting such magnificence as this!
Henslow, what think’st thou of my Winter’s Tale?

HENSLOW:
The less I think on it, the better pleased.
‘Tis slow and tiresome through two acts entire,
Then sudden shifts, most jarringly, to jest.
The groundlings will not comprehend thy wit;
They’ll all demand their pennies back again.

SHAKESPEARE:
By Jesu most immaculate and pure,
I have conceived a notion most inspired!
What doth thy bear perform, good Babbitt? Speak!

BABBITT:
He eats, he dances, sleeps, as I just said,
Which thou didst choose to wantonly ignore.

SHAKESPEARE:
But prithee, tell me, doth the creature walk?

BABBITT:
When walking gets him to his food more swift,
Or to his dance, or to his bed more soon.

SHAKESPEARE:
Come, Henslow, come! Envision, if thou wilt,
Solution here to all our varied woes!
Act three: Antigonus, alone, laments,
Gives speech about the orphan and its gold,
Its papers and its providence, and then,
Without expectation or forewarning,
He exits, fleeing, chased, pursued by bear!

HENSLOW:
Doth bear catch him? Pray tell me that he doth.

SHAKESPEARE:
Alas, the bear doth not.

HENSLOW:
A sorry shame.
‘Twould be one fewer actor in the world,
One less to feed, to costume, and to pay.

SHAKESPEARE:
But serendipity none will expect,
A drama metamorphs to comedy!
The tragedy becomes a play of mirth!

HENSLOW:
This spectacle, a bear, loosed on the stage?
Released upon the boards that carry men?

SHAKESPEARE:
The boards will bear the bear; the audience then
Will bear it too! They’ll bear the mem’ry hence,
They’ll speak of nothing else for months entire.

HENSLOW:
Bear with me, Will, for if thy bear doth bear
Ill will, or lack a proper bearing, then
‘Twill be a bare, discourteous bear indeed.
Hence, loosed upon the grounds, would groundlings eat,
Their sickly stink more juicy than a grape,
More succulent than Babbitt’s dainty treats.

SHAKESPEARE:
Thou slanderest! Observe how peaceful he;
Bear thee no mind of Henslow’s words, sweet bear,
For he knows not your contemplative ways.

HENSLOW:
I would be perfectly content and pleased
If this bear ate the audience entire;
But, William, they do pay thy wage and mine.
And if the bear consumed our patrons whole,
Then lawyers, fouler beasts than any bear,
Would feast on us, devouring us in turn.

SHAKESPEARE:
Thou art a friend to money, not to art!
A servant unto Mammon, not the Muse!
This bear and I are fallen deep in love,
A pure affection, transcendent and true!
And thou wilt get him on a stage, or else
Thou losest me entirely, keep’st thy bear,
And I’ll to Burbage, who respects my plays!

HENSLOW:
Hold, hold! I do relent. Give me but space,
A moment to consider this alone.
[Aside]
Playwrights are fools, and this one doubly so.
I’ll not have bears devouring customers;
‘Tis poisonous to business, death to trade.
Instead, I’ll fetch a bear’s skin from our stock;
We have one in the tiring house, methinks,
And tell our William that this bear hath died,
Perished, expired, gone to that heav’nly cave
Where all angelic bears must hibernate,
And William Shakespeare now must save the show
By going on, in costume, as the bear.
‘Tis a device fantastic and absurd,
And it appeals unto the playwright’s pride,
His monstrous and inflated sense of self,
That he is bound to fall for’t utterly.
Forthwith, he’ll have his bear, I’ll have my joke,
And none within the house shall come to harm.
[To SHAKESPEARE]
Good Will! We’ll get thy bear into thy play
Though we must gorge him heavy on a grape
Or two beforehand, that he be sedate.

SHAKESPEARE:
Bravo, good Henslow! Friend and patron true!
Thou art a champion of Shakespeare’s arts!

HENSLOW:
Goodwill to thee, good Will! Bravo, heigh-ho!

Exeunt, pursued by a bear.