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21
The Bacchae
“Jane” by Kiselev Andrey Valerevich, ID1100309834 licensed from Shutterstock.com.
“YOU’RE HERE!” I exclaimed when Peter and Jane showed up at the shop on Saturday afternoon. “It’s so wonderful to see you!”
We hugged all around. The girls kissed both Jane and Peter, but Toni needed to talk to Peter right away.
“Did you bring dogs?” she asked breathlessly.
“Oh, sweet little thing! The dogs had to stay with Brian at the castle. I’m sorry.”
“Okay. I show you horses.”
“Really? You have a horse?”
“At the ranch. Tomorrow is Sunday. We go ride horses,” Toni declared.
Well, it had become a regular Sunday afternoon activity for us. She was getting pretty good. For my part, I could stay in the saddle and usually the horse did what I wanted it to. As long as I wanted the same thing he did.
“When do you want to get started?” Patricia whispered to Jane.
“Oh, we have a couple of days to get settled. I’m just finishing the monthly. We don’t have to go straight to bed,” Jane said.
My girlfriends were as excited about getting Jane pregnant as she was.
“I might need to find some entertainment while I’m here,” Peter chuckled. “You will still take care of things, won’t you, Nate?”
“As well as I’m able, Peter. You both still have the option of backing out.”
“I don’t think so. We’ve been married seven weeks and people have already started dropping hints that we should get started,” he said. “And we’ve talked about it frequently. We do need to go over the legal papers. I know it is an important issue for you and we tried to be as open as we could. It will be a sensitive topic among the nob-watchers in Britain. We took off on our honeymoon five weeks ago. At least when we are in some other part of the world, we needn’t worry about the gossipmongers.”
“I can’t imagine how difficult it must be,” I said.
“We’re trying to make sure it’s not difficult on your family. We’ll be here in Stratford for the month, but we plan to head back home in August. That way we’ll be able to present it as a done deal while we were on our honeymoon. No one will think to track it to our American friends who come to London in September.”
“I hope it works the first time around,” I said. “It took Patricia and me a couple of months.”
“I hope you plan on more than one time. If we aren’t successful, there will be all winter to arrange things.”
We helped Peter and Jane get settled at the hotel and then went to dinner. We all agreed to hold off going to the theatre until the next week. Nonetheless, we had a good time and promised to see them Sunday afternoon to go to the ranch.
Monday morning, of course, was when we got to show off our friends. We all went to That Scottish Café, where so many theatre people came for Monday breakfast.
“Lady Jane and Lord Peter,” Kathleen exclaimed when she came into the café. “How wonderful that you’ve come to Stratford!”
Jane bypassed the offered handshake and hugged Kathleen and then Damien. Damien introduced Anita before being embraced by Peter.
“I was saddened that we couldn’t attend the wedding,” Kathleen said. “We’d already begun rehearsals here and there was no way to escape.”
“Oh, we had several people we wanted to see but weren’t able to. I took Peter to Australia for a month before we came here. Did I tell you we saw Dale in Melbourne, Nate? Of course, she sends you her love.”
“I saw her just in March,” I said. “I’m glad you spent time with her.”
“We went to Perth, as well,” she said. “I didn’t want my husband to get bored while I was with a girlfriend. Ari was very hospitable.”
“I’m glad you saw him, too!”
I had to process what Jane was saying. A little wink of her eye led me to believe she’d managed to get Ari and Peter together. She was certainly taking care of her husband.
“Hello, my lovelies,” Eugene said sweeping into the room. Emma, Tessa, and Greta jumped to greet him. His voice just filled the room and everyone turned to see him.
“Who is that gorgeous man?” Peter whispered.
“Mmm. That is Eugene Stevens. He plays Dionysus in The Bacchae and is completely different in The Taming of the Shrew as Christopher Sly. I actually had to look at the program to figure out it was him in Shrew,” I said.
“I do hope you will take time to introduce me properly. Those girls are distracting him.”
“I found Eugene at the opera in Milan and captured him immediately,” Damien said.
“I’m sorry, Damien. I didn’t realize you swung that way,” Peter quickly apologized.
“No need to apologize. I mean I put him on contract. As soon as I saw him and heard his voice, I knew I wanted him for Dionysus. I had to guarantee salary until the end of the year so we can get established in London with the show,” Damien said.
“London? You’re coming to London?” Peter said.
“Yes. We’ll open The Bacchae with The P Pirates in October in the West End. New rock opera that we’ll premiere here in three weeks.”
“Wonderful!”
Peter was obviously struck by Eugene’s presence. I really had no idea what Eugene’s sexuality was. He certainly kept the Weird Sisters close to him, but he did have a bit of an effeminate side. I thought that was going to play extremely well in the opera.
After our breakfast, Ronda and I had to hurry over to the Patterson stage to photograph Inook and the Sun. It was a small cast and an unusual play that would be performed only for one weekend, like most shows in the experimental theatre. The play made use of both marionettes and live actors integrated together to tell the story of the young Eskimo boy Inook and his adventures in search of the sun.
It was pretty cool. The marionettes were operated by at least two people for each, who stood on a platform above the action. The live actors and the marionettes interacted with each other in a rather broad style, but watching the puppeteers was just as interesting as watching the action below.
We shot pictures all afternoon and then I headed for the studio to get film developed and proofs pulled. Ronda kept me company in the darkroom as well as having kept all the notes and managing the film during the shoot. We worked well together, and it didn’t take long for us to get naked once we were in the darkroom.
We were pretty lazy about actually processing film and printing proofs. We got it done, but we spent a lot more time just touching and talking. And eventually, I found myself slipping into her fiery center as she moaned into my mouth.
“Do you have any idea how hot it makes your wives to think of you putting a baby in that skinny countess?” Ronda said. She began moving on me as I played with and sucked on her nipples. “Even Patricia is thinking that Alex is old enough she could start another one.”
“Alex isn’t even six months old yet!” I practically shouted. “And I distinctly remember Patricia saying she was through now. She can’t seriously think having another baby is a good idea.”
“Of course she doesn’t think it’s a good idea. I don’t think it would be a good idea for you to plant one in me. But I’m here moving with your penis in my vagina thinking about how you could be putting one of your monster babies in my tum. Can you imagine me with someone the size of Alex trying to get out of your fuck glove? They’d have to cut me open, too. But I want to feel you putting live wigglers up in my vagina and feel them trying to find the egg that isn’t there for them.”
“Ronda, you’re painting pictures in my head. I want to keep my cock in you until I feel a baby starting to grow there.”
“Yes! You know what we’re thinking. And Anna… Anna is thinking maybe she could trick you into assuming you were doing Jane when you were really doing Anna. She’s wondering if there is some psychological way she could be in Jane’s head—in her body, too—as you plant a big baby up there and she carries it back to England. Anna is probably waiting outside the darkroom door so she can take my place and imagine you impregnating her.”
“I’m not going to last long enough for her to get in here,” I said.
“And I’m not going to unlock the door until I’ve got as much of your baby batter in me as I can milk out of you. Do it, Nate. Come in my vagina. Pump it up against my cervix and let me suck it up into my womb. Do you feel it?” She put my hands on her tummy as we continued to move together. “I can feel your cock straining to get to my eggs. Give them to me! Give me all of them!”
“Oh, God!”
There was no more holding back. Ronda, the smallest of my wives, was doing her best to drain me dry. I flooded her pussy and felt the backwash running out of her and down my balls. We kissed frantically as I tried to put more into her and she lifted her legs to my shoulders to open herself further. I had to focus on holding her so she didn’t fall off my lap onto the darkroom floor. We just kept kissing until my softening cock was finally pushed out of her by one of her pulses.
“I think we made a mess,” I breathed.
“Oh, yeah. And the longer you hold me in this position, the more that’s going to run out of me and onto your chair. Love me, Nate. It’s the only thing in the world I desire.”
Of course, this was exactly the time that business in the studio began picking up. I had two studio appointments that week for actresses who had days off. I sorted through the flats John had delivered this spring and found some great settings for portraits. One was an interior of a palace that looked like we were standing at the top of a staircase looking down among marble pillars.
The first model I put against that scene started to get dizzy, but I got an interesting shot that looked like she was falling down the staircase. I carried her to a bedroom set to recover and managed to get her undressed as I comforted her. Keying off the experience with the staircase painting, I chose a couple of unusual angles, including duplicating the falling pose while she lay on the bed.
The next model only barely tolerated having her portrait taken before she started stripping off her clothes right in the middle of the set.
“I came here for nude pictures, not a high school yearbook. Tell me what looks good. I try to pose in a mirror, but it’s never right. You need to move me into position.”
That proved to be an interesting afternoon. She was interested in, shall we say, a wide range of positions rather than poses. Some of them came from an illustrated book of sex positions she had with her.
“In this position, could you actually enter me?” she asked. “I mean, you don’t actually have to do it, but could you get in the position with me so I know it actually works? Some of the positions in this book look uncomfortable for both parties.”
There was a lot of touching and a lot of pictures, some of which exposed more than I’d normally show in an art photo. Some of the positions were uncomfortable for one or both of us. Then again, at least one position was satisfying enough that we stayed in it until she’d cried out her orgasm and then made sure I got mine.
When she was ready to leave, I reminded her not to forget her book.
“Oh, you can have the book. I’ve already memorized all the positions.”
I thought maybe my wives would enjoy it.
Jane and Peter were not idly hanging around waiting for me to impregnate Jane. We’d all had a good time together at the ranch Sunday afternoon. Jane and Peter were both accomplished horse persons. I shivered a little when Jane took a lively horse over a series of jumps in the arena. Toni immediately wanted to “jump horsie.” The ranch manager had a smaller set of jumps set up just for this purpose and led Toni’s horse over the simple jumps at a walk while Patricia and I jogged alongside.
We all enjoyed the opening of Inook and the Sun Thursday night and went to the bar to celebrate with the cast afterward. Taming of the Shrew was dark that night and Eugene had gone to see the experimental show. I wasn’t sure if they’d set it up in advance or not, but Eugene sat next to Peter, both at the show and at the bar.
The next morning, however, Jane and Peter went to Niagara-on-the-Lake, to catch a couple of performances at the Shaw Festival. It was only a hundred miles or so from Stratford, but we’d never paid much attention to it. We were too busy in Stratford. Peter, however, was adamant that they had to attend the show in the new Shaw Festival Theatre. The Queen had been there for the grand opening just a week before and Her Majesty would surely ask Peter what he thought of the play and the new theatre the next time they talked.
They saw Shaw’s You Never Can Tell and Fanny’s First Play. They’d also spoken highly of William Golding’s The Iron Butterfly, which was playing in rep. I knew who Shaw was, but it took some coaching before I remembered William Golding as the author of Lord of the Flies, which we’d read in high school. It was the first year for the Shaw Festival to run all three shows in repertory, rather than one following another.
What was more important, though, was Lady Jane’s twenty-fourth birthday on Tuesday the tenth, and her announcement as we all had dinner together to celebrate, that she was ready to start ‘getting in a mommy way.’
Peter excused himself after dinner and said he was going to see Eugene in Shrew, and would probably be out ‘late, at least.’ Jane became an instant part of the family that night, bringing along a suitcase so she could live with us for a week or so.
“Jane, it’s a momentous decision,” I said as we retired to the guest room. “Are you sure you want to proceed?”
“I’m definitely ready to have a child, Nate. And other than my husband, I can think of no man I would rather launch that journey with.”
“You’re really in love with Peter, aren’t you.”
“Yes. I didn’t intend to be. He is younger—only twenty—and he’s gay. It didn’t sound like a match made in heaven. But we spent time together and discovered we had many common interests. He often works with me as my assistant when I’m on a photography assignment. He has a wonderful eye and is often in the darkroom with me after a stimulating photo session. We even sometimes strip and cuddle in the darkroom. Sometimes, I wish I could do for him sexually what Derek or even Eugene does. But I don’t want to change him. He is a wonderful partner.”
“And he’s consented to have you come to me to get pregnant.”
“I think he told you and your wives that explicitly. And here I am.”
“Do you care for me a little?” I asked. It felt funny to say that—like it should be something the woman was supposed to say. I needed to know, though, that there was more to what we were about to do than me sticking my dick in her hole.
“You know I do, Nate. You’re a wonderful friend and lover. And I love you for being able to do what my husband cannot. This is not something to do once and walk away from. We want you and your family—all six of you—to be a part of our lives. There may come a time when we’ll want another child. And… uh… periodically, you know, I would like to connect with you. Just for fun.”
By this time, Jane and I had each other undressed, but were still standing in the middle of the guest room, kissing, and fondling each other. I had no difficulty holding and making love to my British friend. Yes, and being her lover.
The girls had all kissed us both passionately before we retired and had promised to make sure Jane was not only impregnated, but was fully satisfied. Jane kissed Ronda twice as passionately after that declaration.
We eventually drifted to the bed and stretched out together as we continued to kiss and pet. I moved down her body, worshiping her breasts and then on down her stomach and between her legs. As I sort of expected, Jane was mentally turned on, just by the knowledge that she could get pregnant tonight. But physically, she was not quite as ready.
I gently parted her lips and bathed the vestibule with my tongue as she moaned her pleasure. I took my time and didn’t move directly to her clit, first making sure her pump was primed and even straying over her anus a few times. I didn’t think Jane was one who would particularly enjoy anal sex. She’d been willing to try with Peter, but it just didn’t work for either of them. At the same time, the nerves in that area were undeniably connected to the other erogenous zones and she was soon lubricating prolifically. Then I moved to focus on her clit as I introduced first one finger and then two into her pussy.
Jane was lost in the sensations and writhing on the bed when she came. I slid up her body and into her in one motion as we kissed.
“You’re in me,” she breathed. “Nate, I love you. I do. Please, fill me with your sperm and let us make a baby.”
“I can hardly decline an invitation like that,” I said. “But I want you to come again. I want you to come, knowing that I’m going to make you pregnant. Patricia read in one of her pregnancy books that conception when both parents are in orgasm is the most positive kind. You’ll have to ask her what book. For now, I’m going to roll over so you are on top and I can reach all your pleasure points. Don’t worry, my love. I will be with you when you come.”
With Jane riding me and my hands busy at her nipples and clit, it did not take long for her to reach that climax. I joined directly with her and then rolled us back over on her back as I continued to pump into her and stay hard until she was caught up and ready to go again.
We didn’t fuck all night. We did get some sleep. But it was clear to all of us that this was not going to be a one and done operation. Jane would be living with us for at least a few days.
On Sunday, we celebrated Toni’s fifth birthday by returning to the ranch to ride. Jane and Peter surprised her with full riding gear, including jodhpurs, jacket, boots, and a helmet—for which I was doubly thankful. Jane and Peter were dressed in their riding clothes as well, making the rest of us look like the old west. Peter promised Toni that when she moved to England, he would make sure she had real lessons in proper dressage. Peter was definitely one of Toni’s favorite people.
Grandpa Tor and Grandma Elise came up for the weekend and were soon as caught up in the mystique of Stratford as the rest of us. And they were instantly a part of Jane and Peter’s circle of friends, plotting when they would come to London to visit us.
And all through that time, Jane stayed resident in our guest room, or in our family bed. Ronda made good on her promise that Jane would be thoroughly sated.
Of course, I also made time for Jane in my studio. I selected a backdrop by one of John’s students and reminded myself to thank him again for the great backdrops. I’d not seen a lot of him this summer, but this week we’d be photographing The Bacchae, and I was sure I’d be seeing him there. The backdrop was a blue-gray textured flat and I had Jane stand in front of it. It took a while to get the lighting right so she was well-lit, but the flat faded to blackness next to her, engulfing her shadow in limitless darkness. Yes!
Jane was truly an exquisite model and it was not at all difficult to get her naked in front of my camera. Her daily look typically had her long blonde curls tied up in a knot behind her head or braided. I understood Peter loved to braid her hair. I could see why.
Ronda slipped into the darkroom with us and made sure Jane was getting all the attention she deserved. By the time I had the film developed and proofs printed, I was merely the source to fill the vessel—a task I did happily while Ronda licked our noble lover to another orgasm.
The next day, Anna and I were onsite at the experimental theatre—what was now called the Patterson Theatre—to get pre-production photos of The Bacchae. Kathleen was there to guide us because Damien was too immersed in the production to deal with photographs. Jane and Peter were attending as well and Peter seemed to have a running commentary on everything for Jane’s entertainment. Kathleen gave Anna and me our briefing.
“The Bacchae was written sometime around 400BC by Euripides,” Kathleen started. “It may have been his most famous and most popular play. But you have to forget about Euripides in order to enjoy Damien’s production. He tossed the script entirely and wrote a new play based on the same structure.”
“I can imagine it would have been harder for The P Pirates to work with the version I read at the library. You know the library here in Stratford has an incredible collection of theatre history and plays.”
“Yes. We love it. Damien spent all last fall in there working on his adaptation,” Kathleen continued. “In this version, the three male leads of Euripides are almost incidental. Tiresias and Cadmus are old men, perhaps repenting of having denied the godhood of Dionysius, who was Cadmus’s grandson from his daughter, Semele, and her liaison with Zeus. The real villain is Pentheus of Thebes, Cadmus’s other grandson who has been told since he was an infant by his mother and two aunts that Dionysus was no god, but that their sister, Semele, was just a loose woman who made up the story about Zeus to avoid facing her shame.”
“So, I assume the major conflict is between Dionysus and Pentheus, right?” Anna said.
“No. I mean, yes, but Dionysus is even more pissed off at his three aunts. They allowed their jealousy of their sister to become an outright denial of the gods.”
“What happened to Semele, his mother?” I asked. The band was warming up and it was getting loud in the theatre.
“She got caught in the cross-fire between Zeus and Hera. Died of a lightning bolt in giving birth. Zeus snatched the infant Dionysus and hid him in his thigh until he was full grown. Now Dionysus has come to get revenge on his cousin and three aunts, in the most gruesome way possible. Pentheus’s mother, Agave, and aunts tear him to shreds as they are overwhelmed by their ecstasy in worshiping Dionysus. His mother bears his head on a pike to Cadmus, bragging about the lion she has killed.”
“Oh, yuck! Okay. Are we re-using Macbeth’s head from season before last?”
“I think props came up with an all-new head. Of course, our three Weird Sisters play the three aunts of Dionysus and are joined by others as the chorus singing his praises.”
“What happened to them lying about Dionysus? Why are they singing his praises if they’ve been denying his godhood all this time?”
“Scene one. Dionysus enters and seduces the three into a trance so they all go off to worship him. It’s the first solo song after the choral invocation, so to speak.”
John did not disappoint with the scenery. There was a backdrop that was painted like a Greek theatre ruin. In front of it were platforms that looked like they had been randomly thrown together and then all painted like the rocks of the ruins. I remembered Olivia’s comment a couple of years ago that John loved acting surfaces that weren’t horizontal. He was always using raked platforms that intersected at unusual angles. An arch on one side of the stage functioned as the gates of the city. Upstage, a set of pillars indicated the front of the palace. On the other side of the stage, the rocks went upward until they disappeared behind the curtains.
The P Pirates were fantastic. The opening number established the musicians as part of the chorus with the Weird Sisters, giving a general overview of what the play was about without being specific to the play. What I mean is that the song could be released as a single without being connected to The Bacchae. It had a lot to do with jealousy and denial. They were good musicians, and they looked good, too. Even though they were playing guitars and drums, and wailing into a microphone, they were costumed as part of the show and had a portion of the stage devoted to their instruments.
When Eugene entered the stage as Dionysus, he was the very picture of Bacchus. He was soft and boyish, a kind of toga pulled over one shoulder, leaving his other shoulder and man-boob exposed. I could see Peter patting his heart.
“Dear hearts,
My loves and my desires,
Come with me and frolic in the fields.
Drink and feed the fires,
Come see what our passion yields.”
Dionysus passes wine around, calling each of the weird sisters by name as they drink and fall into a trance, lulled and seduced by his mellifluous baritone.
The staging and the action were so complex that we often stopped the action and changed camera angles and positions, shifted focus from the principals to the chorus to the band, and changed lighting just to get more dramatic effects.
We only got through one act of the three-act musical. Damien wanted a good portfolio of color slides to show to his London producer, so in addition to black and whites on the Hasselblad, I was shooting 35mm slides with the Nikon, and was switching between color and black and white in the Linhof. I got the slides straight over to Pro Photo Source where Dave had his motorcycle courier standing by to take the film for overnight processing in London (Ontario). Then Anna and I went to the darkroom with Jane on our heels.
“I have shivers from watching this performance!” Jane said.
She had barely closed the door behind us when she started pulling her clothing off. Anna joined her as I set up the first two rolls from the Hasselblad in tanks and handed them to the girls. Then I worked on processing the black and white 4x5s. By the time I was pulling the first proofs, the girls had me naked, too.
“Did you see Peter?” Jane asked. “He absolutely salivates over Eugene. And damn it! I understand. That guy has the most seductive voice I’ve ever heard. If he’d have sung to me, I’d have stripped. Peter would have been on his hands and knees.”
“That’s graphic,” Anna laughed.
“I do tend to get that way. You know Audrey and I have been with Peter and Derek on occasion and we’ve seen exactly what goes down—so to speak. I’m amazed they don’t mind us gawking at them, but when it comes to sex, they are both kind of show-offs.”
“Oh, my. It turns you on, doesn’t it?” Anna said. She had a hand between Jane’s legs.
“Yes! I don’t really want either of them to put their huge members in my ass, but it is quite a turn-on to watch them do each other. No offense, Nate, but I’m quite thankful you are not hung like either my husband or his boyfriend. And that you don’t try to put it in my arse.”
“I remember the first one I saw,” Anna said. “We had a guy in our class in high school who was unashamedly homosexual. He wanted Nate to take his photo and I posed him. My God! I thought that if Nate was hung like that, I’d stay a virgin forever.”
“Exactly,” Jane laughed. “But it is so exciting to see him aroused.”
I confess, that just listening to Jane and Anna describing men was a little arousing for me, too. It wasn’t the description of the men that did it, but the enthusiasm with which they discussed the topic. I had no idea normal women found gay men so stimulating and arousing. I did all the processing and printing while Anna and Jane played with each other. When the last picture was plated, I was pulled into action. We shoved the chair out of the way and I lay down on the floor. Jane mounted my cock and Anna mounted my face. I loved this position of being able to service two of my lovers at once, while they also pleased each other.
The next day we worked Act II. In this act, Dionysus thwarts his cousin Pentheus’s attempts to capture and imprison him. Then Dionysus sets about seducing Pentheus. Seeing him work his magic on his cousin as he had on his aunts was breathtaking. He visually turned Pentheus into a woman, dressing him in women’s clothes and applying makeup as he continued to get him drunk. And Pentheus adopted the role of drag queen, convinced that being disguised as a woman, he will be able to spy on the rites of the Bacchae and their orgies, thus proving the cult of Dionysus to be a fraud that preys on innocent women.
I was in the darkroom with Patricia and Jane that afternoon. The driving beat of The P Pirates whipping the women’s chorus into a frenzy continued to drive us into Jane as Patricia and I focused on her. Jane was beginning to walk a little funny after all the times she’d been fucked in the past week.
In Act III the next day, Damien pulled out all the stops. The women’s clothing had been getting looser all through the play—including the band’s clothing. In Act III, it began falling away entirely. By the time Greta entered as Agave, bearing Pentheus’s (her son’s) head, the Weird Sisters were all naked and covered in blood and gore. The band and the other chorus women were at least topless as other portions of their dresses seemed near falling off.
“I can’t join you in the darkroom today,” Jane said, as we were putting cameras away and heading to the photo lab. “Peter has arranged a little treat with Dionysus and the Weird Sisters.”
“Well, if you are going to get pregnant this week, I’m sure the job is done,” Ronda said. “But don’t think that because of that, you can’t come and play some more. Oh! Adrienne will be here tomorrow. I’m sure she’d love to meet you.”
“Oh, my! I am looking forward to meeting her, too. Well, we’ll be here through next week before we’re heading home. I’ll talk to you later.”
Adrienne drove in from Toronto Saturday afternoon after flying from LA. I offered to pick her up, but she wanted to have a car available, in case she needed to kidnap me. I could think of less pleasant things.
“Your pet is so spoiled,” she said when she arrived at the studio. “When I checked in at the hotel, I discovered that my room had been taken for another week yet. Then I discovered the residents were an English Lord and Lady. I guess I know when I’m outranked.”
“Of course! We should have known Jane and Peter would take the best room in the hotel. Shall we search for a better kennel for our pet?” I asked.
“Oh, my master. But to be in your arms is all the treat this poor pet needs. I would happily lie at the foot of the Lord and Lady’s bed if you wished me to,” she said, kissing my face over and over.
When we got up to the apartment, Toni was all over Aunt Addie. My wives were quick to get kisses in and Adrienne reached out to hold Alex.
“She’s grown so much!” Adrienne said. “I will happily stay with the little ones when you wish to go to the theatre. Or out with the Lord and Lady.”
“I assure you, you’ll get your opportunity,” Patricia said.
“Aunt Addie, I learn to twist. I teach you the dance.”
I looked at my little girl in surprise.
“Where did you learn to twist?” I asked. Toni immediately went into the movements and did a very respectable twist.
“Uncle Peter teached me. You’ll like Uncle Peter, Aunt Addie. And Aunt Jane. Aunt Jane teached me riding and jumping. She teach you, too!”
“Hmm,” Anna said. “I think Jane and Peter have made quite an impression. Pumpkin, we need to take Aunt Addie to dinner. Shall we go to the pub?”
“Yum!” Toni declared. She was already down the stairs before we were out of the apartment.
After dinner and after dancing with Toni and getting her to teach us all to twist, I took Adrienne to her hotel room and spent the night there, with the promise we would be back for horses Sunday afternoon. Having my mistress back in my arms was like wrapping a warm blanket around myself in the middle of winter. It was ‘right.’
We made love and talked well into the night. Then we made love again. We went out to the ranch for riding on Sunday and that was where Adrienne met Jane and Peter. I thought there might be some fireworks between Jane and Adrienne, but we’d told them about each other, so before there were any explosions, they agreed to get along.
That was almost undone when Adrienne walked in with the family to That Scottish Café. Jane and Peter were already seated, but nearly all the customers in the café rushed to greet Adrienne. Kathleen and Anita nearly fought to be seated next to her. That was a kind of magic that British Nobility simply didn’t rate.
“Nate’s done a marvelous new portfolio for me,” Anita said. “I’m told, though, that you will be the one to review my resume and interview me. The more I’ve thought about it the past month, the more I’m certain Hollywood should be the next stop on my career path. When can we meet?”
Adrienne was a little overwhelmed with the woman’s exuberance. I stepped in.
“Anita, Adrienne only just arrived in town. Let’s give her a few days to get settled in. When is your next day off?” I asked.
“Oh! Yes, of course. I’m so sorry, Adrienne. You can tell I’m excited about the prospect. I’m dark on Thursday and Sunday this week. And, of course, on Monday. I think Damien manipulated the schedule a little so Eugene would only miss two shows of Shrew. He opens in The Bacchae on Thursday night. Of course, we’ll all want to be there,” Anita said. She finally took a breath.
“If my master has no other plans for me that day, let’s meet on Thursday afternoon at the studio. Master? Will I be available then?”
“Yes, my Fifi. We’ll set it up so you have a comfortable space to talk and go over Anita’s resume and photos.”
“Should we all be calling you master?” Anita asked.
“I’m her master, not yours,” I said.
“Thank heaven he’s not my master,” Jane said. She started giggling. “It’s all I can do to remember to obey my husband.”
“Oh, my love. We struck that from the vows. As long as you wait on me hand and foot, you don’t need to think about obeying,” Peter smirked.
“Oh yes. What can I bring my Lord? Will you have sweets for breakfast?” Jane teased.
“Only my own sweet wife.”
I was impressed with how well Jane and Peter maintained the relationship as husband and wife. I suppose, though, they might not have the future difficulties that some married people have when one or the other loses interest in sex. They could chat as if they had it all, but neither one was really interested in sex with the other. They wouldn’t have that hurdle in the future.
“Anita, come in,” I said when she arrived at the studio Thursday afternoon. “Adrienne asked me to sit in on the interview, if you don’t mind.”
“Remember, I expected you to do the interview in the first place,” Anita said. “I’m happy to have you there.”
“Hello, Anita,” Adrienne said when we got to the little interview suite we’d set up on the stage. “Welcome to Photosensitive Productions satellite office at Attic Allure. Have a seat.”
“Thank you, Adrienne. It all looks so official,” Anita said.
“If we were filming your interview and screen test, you’d find a suite set up very much like this one with at least one movie camera to record it. Nate will take some pictures while we are talking together.”
“Sure.”
“You have a very impressive resume. Two years here at Stratford? And a stint with the Royal Shakespeare Company. Why do you want to leave?” Adrienne asked.
“When you count public school and university, I’ve been acting on stage for about fifteen years. For most shows, we work and rehearse for as much as two months before a show opens and then perform it as many as thirty or more times in three months or so. If one is cast in a successful West End or Broadway show, she might perform six times a week for years. It’s the same thing every show. The same lines. The same blocking. The same pause for applause or laughter. It’s wearing. I’d like to try my hand at working hard to get a performance filmed and then moving on to another project.”
“You don’t think you’ll miss the audience? You know, they might laugh at the same point every time a film is shown, but you won’t be there to experience that. During filming everyone is quiet until the director yells, ‘Cut!’ You never even experience the whole film in one sitting until it is released.”
“I’ve thought about that a lot. During the summer here in Stratford, I will perform in front of about 30,000 people. About half of those will be repeat audience members who either see me in more than one show or see the same show more than once. Even in Stratford, I’m not so well known that I’m recognized on the street. I’d like the fame that comes from being seen by 30 million people. I’d like to be recognized on the street.”
“And you are fine with them seeing you in the nude?”
“That gets right down to it, doesn’t it?”
“Photosensitive Productions is definitely producing films that are for adults. Seduction scenes and love scenes are a common part of that. However, Double Exposure had a grand total of only three minutes of nudity in it. I would expect that to continue to be a hallmark of their movies,” Adrienne said.
“I’m good with that. I’m not interested in doing pornography, but a well-done artistic seduction or love scene would be completely okay. You haven’t seen the production of The Bacchae that opens tonight, but the women performing live on stage are all nude for most of the third act, or thirty minutes.”
“I’m looking forward to seeing it. The difference is thirty minutes of exposure times 30,000 pairs of eyes, which would be 900,000 minutes of exposure, compared to three minutes in front of 30 million people or 90,000,000 minutes of exposure.”
“That makes it sound more exciting,” Anita laughed.
“I’m going to ask Nate to take some pictures of us as we act a short scene. The focus will be on you. It will be a film strip of sorts as a substitute screen test. We’ll send that with the tape recording of our interview and time together, along with your portfolio and resume, to the producers. If they are pleased, as I think they will be, they’ll want you to come to LA for a while after you’ve finished the season here in Stratford.”
“Oh, thank you, Adrienne!”
“Here’s the script for you to look at. The more of it you can have memorized, before we start shooting, the better.”
Anita raised an eyebrow when she looked at the shooting script Adrienne handed her. It wasn’t long, but it included camera directions, like a shooting script for a movie would. Adrienne had rehearsed me on what I was to do and when I was to take each photo. It included the angle and the position of the camera. I would shoot a thirty-six-exposure roll of slide film in the Nikon.
As Anita studied the script, I started turning on the lights, simulating the movie studio as well as I could. A movie set is often lit far more brightly than a stage play. Film needs more light than people do. By the time I was ready, Adrienne and Anita had rehearsed a couple of times to get the lines and were ready to shoot.
Anita did well, even when I moved in close to shoot right into her face. I’d never really watched Adrienne seduce a woman. When we’d played with Fran, Fran was already seduced before we started. My girlfriends always took the dominant role when we were together. This was a carefully scripted dialog that overwhelmed Anita and exposed her. When Adrienne finally called, ‘Cut!’ Anita grabbed her and kissed her passionately.
“I’m sure you’ll have some great opportunities in Hollywood,” Adrienne said. “I’ll look forward to seeing you there in October.”
Please feel free to send comments to the author at devon@devonlayne.com.
