The English
“You overreacted. That was your mistake.”
“I need one of you to sign.”
“Freddy, you should have heard him up there, shouting at the stage manager. The other actors
walked off when he started. All English, you see. Left him out there.”
“I’m standing right here in front of you.”
“Yes, we see you.”
“You’re referring to me in the third person.”
“Gee Gods, darling, you’re right. It IS him.”
“What you didn’t realize is that the theater is all shittery, isn’t it Freddy? You just weren’t
prepared.”
“Oh, and how. Each of us has to endure some degree of shittery. If you’re unlucky, sometimes
quite a bit.”
“Freddy calls it shittery, I call it bitchery. They’re both forms of treachery!”
“Darling, it can be referred to as EITHER bitchery OR treachery OR shittery."
“I need a signature, then I can leave your package.”
“It’s jealousy from the time you go on until the time you go off.”
“You were shitterized on stage. What you don’t realize is that this happens ALL THE TIME. It
was the English cast.”
“Please sign. I’m sorry you had to be there.”
“Betsy Von Furstenberg put a strong laxative in oh-what-was-his-name’s glass, put it right in his
glass. He went on stage and it all came out. Right on stage. She hated him because he was getting too much attention, you see. Barred from Equity for six months. Oh and I had it from women. CONSTANTLY. But there was nothing that could have prepared me for the ENGLISH! They are NOTORIOUS.”
“Darling, I’m afraid that’s true. They start their training right after birth.”
“Freddy’s English, you see. He warned me right from the start. I was playing Terrance Rattigan.
Freddy said, “Don’t get close to the English. You can’t do it. You don’t know what you’re up
against.” I would put down my head when I walked past them. What you went through was
NOTHING.”
“If I tell you I couldn’t take it, will you sign? It WAS the English, those fucking assholes!”
“Oh we KNOW it was the English. We were there, IN the audience.”
AF Knott is a retired physician writing full time. He maintains several blogs. One presents his flash fiction and its associated digital collages: Tall Tales and Non-Poems of the Perverse with Bargain Basement Collages by A.F. Knott.
He has also published a novel, The Trainee by Hekate Publishers available through Amazon.
