Characters:
Marco Antonius (aka Marc Anthony) - Italian impresario
Morty Blumenstein, aka Ferdinand de Bullock, diplomat
Grace Belleville de Quincy-Beaufort, matron
Constance Belleville de Quincy-Beaufort, her daughter
Svetlana Plekova, wife of Andrei Abromovitsky, Russian oligarch
The location: The Commodore Hotel, in the English seaside village of BlanketBarn
Story:
Marco Antonius, the famous Italian impresario, has arrived in the small English seaside village of BlanketBarn to find the cast for his upcoming show “Girls, Girls, Girls, a comedy in three acts!”
He will stay at the Commodore Hotel, the most ritzy of the local pensions, with its tea served precisely at 4pm and its tiny little restaurant with its understaffed kitchen off the back.
Marc Antony, as he is commonly called in England, produces extravangzas of the first order and it’s the dream of many an aspiring young actress to get into one of his shows. Hence, the dancing girls (well, really young women) who have packed onto trains to get to BlanketBarn early are now lined up outside the hotel to see if they might find a room there. Or do they need to traipse around town looking for other lodging?
In the lobby, they fail to see a short fat man in a seersucker jacket, sweating profusely while trying to stuff the last bites of a sandwich into his mouth as he leans uncomfortably against the concierge’s oak desk. He is Morty Blumenstein, of New Jersey in the United States, trying to check into the hotel under the name of Ferdinand de Bullock, Spanish diplomat. Morty is here because Grace Belleville de Quincy-Beaufort is here, with her 16-year old daughter Constance.
Why are Grace and Constance here, you ask? The annual meeting of the British Temperance Union, Grace Belleville de Quincy-Beaufort president.
Every year, the Union (as it’s known) hosts a gala ball with Grace presiding. It is Morty’s firm belief that she will be wearing the famous Madagascar diamond. “Worth a trip from Jersey to try to get my hands on that rock,” is what he said to his mother as he departed for the docks in lower Manhattan to get on the boat that would take him here.
Grace’s daughter Constance is here because as a 16-year old, she had no choice. Grace’s husband, William Belleville de Quincy-Beaufort, retired ambassador to Kumpour, cares not a wit for the Temperance Union, indeed enjoys his tipple a little, and wouldn’t be caught dead in the Commodore Hotel this weekend. He’d rather take care of his tomatoes, sunflowers and zucchini than be dragged down to BlanketBarn for that dreadful affair.
So, Grace decided it would be best to bring Constance along. Little does she know that Constance … virginal, pure, unblemished Constance … wants nothing more than to be in one of Marc Antony’s shows. This she has kept from her dear mother because of the shock it would cause. This precious, some would say mischievous, innocent angel would never want to be in a show like that!
Meanwhile, Svetlana Plekova is also standing in the lobby. Dark black hair tied back in a bun, she is trying to check into