God's Promises by John Bale - Act 7

Discussing the play with John the Baptist

In late 2013 I started to record God's Promises but quickly got very behind.  Since those first tentative steps I have upgraded my equipment and, to some degree, feel I want to start all over again.  However, we did record the introduction, the final scene and the closing speech and these are now available to listen - in a rough edit.  There were several textual issues which I don't think we have succeeded in clearing.  Firstly, the text is very dense.  It features a lot of argument, the kind you might expect from a theologian, especially one such as Bale who had the Protestant axe to grind.

The Prologue: Baleus Prolocutor
So, the opening and closing speeches are to be spoken by Bale or someone as him.  (We decided to ignore this in the recording, so that there was at least one female part in the production.  It also meant we could use the same actor to read stage directions without them being confused as another character.)  They are outside the text, the author directly addressing his audience, or perhaps more appropriately, his flock.  Making this Tudor text clear was a challenge and one which, in the short time span available, I don't know has succeeded.  But you may judge for yourself.  Hopefully anyone thinking of reading the play can use the recording to help guide them into the text.

listen to ‘God's Promises - by John Bale. Baleus Procolutor’ on Audioboo

Act Seven:  John the Baptist
We spent a little longer recording the completed scene seven.  The play is a running argument, starting with Adam and ending with John, encountering various Biblical figures along the way.  All argue with God to forgive mankind, and only with John does God relent - though, of course, he has already relented, having already sent Jesus into the world.

Cecil Qadir as John the Baptist

John begins by pleading with God that the worst excesses of man are past - this is a long list of people and names from the Bible, showing up the virtue of many good men.  When God reveals his plan, and that John will be Jesus' messenger to the world, John says he won't be of any use, he is as a child.  God then gifts him a golden tongue (this is a literal stage direction) and he then ends the play with a speech about his mission, ending in a song of praise.  We couldn't think of a way of turning the golden tongue into an audio event and used a narrator, and as we have no budget for music at this time, this is also indicated by the narrator.
Again, as we rehearsed this scene we had a long discussion about clarity.  The final recording is clearer than the opening and closing speeches, as it is a dialogue.  If you read the precis first, I suspect what is being said is clear.  However, out of context, without reading the above, I suspect most people will struggle.
This isn't, I hope, just because of our performances.  I suspect that the text, its very denseness, will always make this play a difficult proposition.  It is, oddly, harder to follow than an earlier play - it is caught between the more rigid rhyming verse of the medieval street theatre and the later public theatre voice.  That doesn't make the play uninteresting, just difficult, and I hope listening will reward your effort.

listen to ‘God's Promises by John Bale - Act 7’ on Audioboo

The Epilogue: Baleus Prolocutor
I find, listening back, that the closing speech is much clearer - but that could just be me.  It's possibly tempered by the fact that I've gone through the play before listening to it and am more attuned - which would also be the case for the audience.  It's a reminder of the message of the play and the importance of the Protestant interpretation of Christianity.

The light of our faith makes this thing evident,
And not the practice of other experiment.

The other being the Catholic interpretation.  This is a polemical work, designed to reference the Catholic drama of the middle ages but retooled for Protestant ears.  This kind of religious propaganda is short lived, lasting from the reformation to the reign of Elizabeth, with both sides of the divide flinging drama of this sort at each other.  It was divisive, dangerous and could not last.  Perhaps the reason why these plays have fallen out of favour is this lack of context.  The play doesn't need to involve inner conflict, because the conflict was off stage, the danger is in the existence of the play, not necessarily in the dramaturgy.  The challenge for a modern producer is to find a way of making these stakes evident.

listen to ‘God's Promises - by John Bale. Baleus Procolutor (Epilogue) ’ on Audioboo

The Reynes Extracts - An Epilogue

Here is the second of the Reynes extracts – I have previously blogged about the other A Speech of Delight.  This second fragment is an epilogue – perhaps to the same play, but it could easily be for any play of the period – a generic plea to the audience to forgive the players if they weren’t any good and not report them if they’d fluffed their lines – and some productions had strict rules over the players of plays, with fines exacted for being incompetent.  This short epilogue also mentions a church ale, which follows on from the production, suggesting both play and the ale were fundraisers for the local church.  One of the things we see with small scale medieval playing was it was often done to raise money for specific causes – the church roof for example.  Times don’t change.  I'm planning to use this speech in a production next year, popping it onto a play that doesn't have a proper ending.  That way this little speech will get to live in the real world once again - possibly the first time in a production for many hundreds of years.

listen to ‘An Epilogue - A Medieval Fragment’ on Audioboo

An Epilogue

Now worshipful sovereigns that sittyn here in sith

Lords and ladies and Franklins in fay

With all manner of obeisance we recommend us right

Pleasantly to your persons that present be in play.

And for your suffering silence that ye have kept this day

In playing of our play without any resistance

Dearly we thank you with might as we may

And for your laudable listening in good audience

That we have had this day.

And if we have passed any point in our playing

Or moved any matters in our saying

That should be to your persons displeasing

We beseech you report it not away.

For truly our intent was well to do

And if any fault be there found in it is our negligency

And short time advisement cause it also

For little time of learning we have had sickerly

And every man is not expert in eloquency

To utteryn his matter gaily unto your audience.

Wherefore we beseech you of your great gentry

The best to report of us in our absence

In every ilke a place.

Sovereigns all insame [in company]

Ye that are come to see our game

We pray you all in Gods name

To drink ere ye pass.

For an ale is here ordained by a comely assent

For all manner of people that appearyn here this day

Unto holy church to the increasement

All that exceedeth the costs of our play.

The Ashmole Fragment

The Ashmole Fragment is a tiny little scrap left over from a play now lost.  It really is blink and you’ll miss it.  It features one character - Secundus Miles (second soldier) – who speaks his loyalty to his Emperor – to defend him from any gedling (rascal) and then to a high priest – offering his dagger to Mahound (or in modern terms Mohammed – a name generally used as an oath in medieval drama, ironically, by anyone who was a bit pagan).  It isn’t clear what the surrounding play was – something with a tyrant and priests, and whilst Herod springs to mind, there are plenty of other biblical stories that could use the same motif.

listen to ‘The Ashmole Fragment’ on Audioboo

SECUNDUS MILES:

Sure Emperor, dread ye no thing!

If there be any fresh gedling [rascal]

That would you grieve with any thing,

In word or in deed,

By the beard I shall him shake

That his skull shall all to crake [crack]

And his soul from him take

And roast him over a glede. [fire]

To the high priest

O Mahound, thou great God and true,

Lowuely [handsome] and also meek of hue,

Offer to thee I will new

A dagger that is good and fine.

And all else is lost.