A Review Of The Fool's Errand

The Fool's Errand was performed on April 17th, 2015, the first show on the last night of the Accademia dell'Arte grad lab presentations. This meant that when the audience arrived, the performance space was already set up for my show. The audience entered a quiet, dimly lit performance space surrounded by black curtains and facing a field of stars and the, as of yet unexplained, Moon Beam Lantern; glowing softly and suspended above. The house music was relatively low, though audible, and was made up of songs about the Moon and Fools. The sense of the space was dreamy and contemplative, like sitting outside on a summer evening watching the stars wheel overhead. When the show begins, the lights go out, leaving the Moon Beam Lantern the only

Trapped by his own words that only a Fool could believe in accomplishing the impossible, the Senses-Taker offers to make the man a Fool. Without his Common Sense, she explains, he will be foolish enough to seek a path to the moon. The Assistant warns him, however, that there is no place in using his normal world for Fools. He skeptically agrees, and with a plunger, the Senses-Taker pulls all of his Common Sense out of his head, leaving him a witless Fool. The stars are lit for the first time within the story of the play, and we are drawn from the harshly lit real world into the more softly lit realm of Fairy Tales. The Assistant gives a few last pieces of advice and a bag of supplies for the journey and with that, the Fool is off to find his way to the Moon. He starts by going to the Fork in the Road, which turns out to be a large fork lying in the middle of the road. He adds it to his bag and continues, only to be pursued by the Thief. The Fool and his money are soon parted as the Thief tricks him through fractured logic and outright lies. The Fool realizes he is being deceived and moves on, where he encounters an Old Man along his

He sees her and does indeed become enthralled, asking why he would even want to go to the Moon. He reveals that the man he loved died after saying that he loved the Fool “to the Moon and back”. The Fool is desperate to find out if the Man on the Moon, is in fact, his lost love. The Star Queen convinces him to give up his quest, on the basis that after all he's gone through, he has grown too wise to hope for something so foolish. She points out that so many other Fools have tried, and failed to get to the Moon and when they miss the Moon they end up as stars in the sky. Unable to break through the enchantment of seeing her beauty, he surrenders, resigning himself to become just another star, rather than risk the uncertainty of the rest of the journey to the