Chapter 006
<Episode 6>
“Again.”
“…Still early….”
“Again.”
“…Still….”
“Again.”
“…….”
“Again.”
“…You didn’t say anything?”
Leo glared at Louisa with an absurd expression.
Louisa pointed to Leo’s toes as if there was nothing surprising.
“He should be Romeo from the moment he appears. This is the moment Romeo first appears. A man like a flower in Verona, a city devastated by a war between two families. A man who fell in love with his enemy. Romeo Montague.”
A man who loves his enemy’s daughter.
Leo wrinkled his face at those words.
Leo Peer.
That was his name.
Not Montague, but Peer, the next heir to the imperial family.
After leaving the imperial castle, he had seen various plays. So he knew very well.
No one acts like that.
Acting was not about being ‘Romeo’, but about actors who were extremely handsome, extremely funny, extremely short, or extremely tall acting to the best of their abilities.
With bizarre pronunciation or unique hand and foot gestures.
But Louisa kept telling him to become Romeo Montague.
“You are Romeo Montague on stage, slave.”
However, even though Louisa bought him for a whopping 50 million derks, she did not ask his name for 10 days.
He didn’t even call him in the first place, and when he did, he called him ‘slave’, and whenever he touched him, he flinched and stepped back.
‘Contact is not good.’
While saying unknown things like that.
And now he was making strange demands to become a male actor.
What an actor.
‘To make you do some perverted things again.’
After being sold here and there for 9 years, Leo Peer realized something at some point.
I’m growing up quite beautifully.
Starting around the age of 14, the number of noble ladies squinting at his face increased. At first, the house only made him do chores, but they kept trying to bring him in.
Every time that happened, he ran away.
It wasn’t because I didn’t like perverts.
It was not a situation where he would refuse to save his life even if it meant selling his body.
What really mattered was the situation of getting close to someone.
A nobleman who saw his face up close would recognize him or, in the worst case, spread a rumor that would reach the ears of the current emperor and his associates.
To stop it, he ran away, then got lost in the forest and was sold into slavery.
‘50 million derks.’
I looked into the eyes of the woman who paid a lot of money for him.
The red eyes were shining and the mouth was smiling brightly.
‘Madwoman.’
Leo’s impressions from Louisa were simple.
However, while hiding his identity and going through difficult times in order to survive, he realized one clear truth.
It is easier for purely crazy people to use it.
So he decided to become Louisa’s actor.
If he had run away anyway, he could have starved to death on the streets or been captured by slave traders in a faraway place.
Luisa Mecenat.
He knew her name.
I saw it a few times when I was young, at places like the imperial festival.
The only granddaughter of the Duke of Mecenat, who was loyal to the imperial family, she was quite obedient when she was young, but as she grew up, she became askew and became infamous within the empire.
You’re a fucking princess.
So, the reason why I bought him is probably obvious.
‘Take off your clothes.’
He had been prepared since the first day she told him to take off his clothes.
I was careful not to let any body, let alone a woman’s body, touch me, but it would happen someday.
But when he opened his eyes, the woman was not in front of him.
‘Are you sure you washed it thoroughly? The hygiene standards here are unbelievable. Be considerate of the other actor.’
I just said this the next day.
After that, Louisa never invited him to bed or made him do anything strange.
No, on the contrary, he just advised me to tell him in advance if I don’t want to stand on stage.
‘It would be difficult if you complained because I forced you to do something. Just in case, don’t call me master.’
After hearing that, he always called her master.
I liked how every time I heard the word “master,” that inexplicable expression would break and my eyebrows would arch in disgust.
I liked the way his face crumpled as if he had chewed dust, and the way he blushed and got angry at his grumbling.
If you react like this and eventually explode and hit him with your hand or make him do something strange, he might like it too.
Okay. Because that’s a damn princess.
If she reveals her true colors, he will somehow seduce her and grow up safely.
To buy a little more time, a little more time.
Time to wait for the emperor to finally forget himself and completely let down his guard.
Time to put the sword in the back of the unwary emperor.
But to do that, it was important to first reveal the woman’s desire.
Leo snatched the script from the hands of the woman who was looking at him as if she were an object or a chess piece.
“Anyway, the first part isn’t fun, so let’s start with the important part. Here. This part.”
The place Leo pointed to was the part in the play where Romeo and Juliet kiss for the first time.
Louisa laughed bitterly at those words.
Louisa, who briefly looked up into Leo’s golden eyes, strode up to the stage.
What kind of noblewoman would walk like that and have her hair tied up with flimsy quills?
Leo was confused every time he saw Louisa like that.
I wonder if that’s the villain I know.
“Good. Let’s do it.”
Louisa’s red eyes narrowed. Leo hesitated and extended his hand to Louisa.
I tried to touch her cheek or waist, but at that moment she widened the distance and moved away.
Then, I passed behind the stage and went up to the dressing room on the second floor.
Leo frowned as he looked at Louisa, who stuck her head out from the railed façade.
“What are you doing….”
“Romeo.”
Louisa did not look down.
She just looked up.
At the same time, the roughly fixed hair loosened and her black hair fell down.
Leo silently watched that scene without realizing it.
Strangely enough, it catches attention for a moment.
It was a moment I had never felt before during a play performed at a local inn.
Unlike when drunk actors act funny with loud voices, even when they whisper softly, the entire voice can be heard.
“Why is your name Romeo?”
A little nervous and sensitive girl.
Leo looked at Louisa and saw such a girl at the same time.
Who is the target of such a girl’s resentment?
“Deny your Father and forsake your name.”
At the same time, who is the person you love so much?
Leo became curious.
And Louisa…. No, the moment Juliet looked down at him with drowsy eyes, he froze.
“And take me instead of that name.”
Leo bit his lip. His fingertips became hot.
In the original script, Juliet clearly does not look down on Romeo like this.
Juliet was a naive 14-year-old girl who was deeply in love and just talking to herself.
However, the current Juliet is a woman who knew that Romeo would come to the balcony looking for her.
‘You are Romeo Montague on stage, slave.’
Leo instantly realized what those words meant.
Louisa was now Juliet.
However, Juliet was not the conventional woman in love in the script Louisa showed her.
A woman who pretends to wait for love, but actually wins it.
Juliet, this is Louisa’s Juliet.
For a woman like this, the story of escaping the man chosen by her family and marrying the man she loves cannot be read as just the love of an immature young girl.
An unconventional and rebellious woman.
At that moment, Leo unconsciously nodded.
We can see why Romeo loved Juliet.
Because this isn’t just love, it’s rebellion.
A rebellion against stupid old men who repeat foolish wars.
“I will.”
Leo answered.
At the same time, Louisa smiled brightly.
“It was okay for the first time.”
“……!”
As if a light was turned on in a dark room, Leo felt his immersion momentarily broken.
And the moment Leo returned to cold reality, he panicked.
Is this called acting?
I’ve never heard of anyone acting like this?
* * *
‘Yes, this is the method.’
Method.
In Korea, this is a word that started to become popular on comedy shows, and is actually an acting theory created by a director and actor named Stanislavsky.
The goal is to have the actors move as naturally as possible so that the audience thinks what is happening on stage is actually happening.
So how did the actor act before that?
Like speaking eloquently. Like singing. Like dancing.
The plays of Shakespeare’s time were the same. There are certain gestures that must be made when playing Macbeth, and there are certain gestures that must be made when playing Juliet.
Like dancing, people preferred the actor who could do it best.
Of course, this does not mean that the acting of that era was bad and that only the current acting is good.
Because there are plays that require expressive acting.
But the play I want now requires a method.
People see Juliet and confuse it with Louisa, and people see Romeo and confuse it with Leo Peer.
As you empathize with the two main characters, a man and a woman who rebel against the older generation, you will find yourself thinking about the people behind them.
‘Isn’t Louisa just a young victim of the complicated political situation of the principality?’
Of course not.
Louisa’s psychotic personality was not created by the older generation, but by herself.
But the important thing is that theater has this power.
The power to activate infinite understanding within the framework of fantasy.
One might feel a little sorry for a 22-year-old child who had an arranged marriage at the age of 9, lost her parents at an early age, and grew up under a strict grandfather.
The power to think like that.
If that can be triggered at all, people will be able to sympathize with me instead of criticizing me when they leave the theater, as Arno wanted.
And one more thing.
You.
“Is it still early in the morning?”
Leo Peer is playing Romeo right in front of me.
The author will naturally be imprinted in people’s eyes.
As the emperor of a new empire who will show a new politics.
“Why don’t you tell me to do it again?”
Leo looked at me with puzzled eyes when he didn’t say “again” after two lines.
I said with a grin.
“My speech, vocalization, and pronunciation were all fine, so why me?”
“…….”
“Once you immerse yourself in it, you immediately get better. Look at this. This is my strength.”
This is my directing.
Do you think I was successful in Daehakro for no reason?
I smiled arrogantly and crossed my legs.
“Now, again.”
EstelleStars
Is it just me or did the translation suddenly get worse?