Lights On

Sophomore year of high school I had freshly joined the school's theater program, I was new to acting in front of an actual audience, but not acting in itself. We were on our last day of Hell Week, meaning we were running rehearsals from right after school till 9 pm. Running rehearsals in full costumes, testing our queues, using our props, and checking our marks, was a lot.

Our director had chosen Real Women Have Curves, a group of 5 Latinas working in a factory to make dresses by a deadline. All the characters but 1 are older women, our cast was 4 women and 1 guy. The oldest character, Carmen was played by our youngest cast member Robert. Working with him, in the cast, having the interactions and lines between the characters was interesting and a test to keep in character. This will remain my baseline for any acting I do on the difficulty of staying in character.

On our opening night, we set up our matinee that we would put on for the students at our school, getting the sewing machines set up on the tables and the 'to-be-sewn' dresses. I was nervous to be standing in the wing of the stage with the lights dimmed. Each of the cast members, but Megan who was playing Ana, had their hair greyed and stretch marks painted on them for a later scene.

Our matinee ran pretty smoothly, we were a little slow, ironing out the last kinks and making sure we were pronouncing the Spanish words correctly. Now, when it came time to run our evening show, everything felt so much more pressure-filled. The audience was more diverse, there were parents in the audience, other students, their friends, I was feeling antsy.

My fellow cast members and I got together before our curtain call and we calmed each other, making sure that we were ready for the stage. Our stage makeup was set, our costumes were on, the props were in their places, and the lighting was coming up. We were ready to be on stage for 2 hours- give or take a few minutes- with an intermission.

The curtain came up on our opening night, the stage lights blinding as ever and hot as hell. The audience sat there through the line deliveries, humor, and drama of it all. I could feel myself getting nervous, hoping and wishing that my lines were delivered believably, and with emotion. Thankfully, we made it through Act I of the play, with minimal slip-ups and mispronunciations of the Spanish lines.

Near the end of Act I, I stepped forward on the skirt of the stage and recited my character's monologue in Spanish. At the end of my monologue, the curtain dropped and we began our intermission. I stood back and walked off to the side of the stage to a door that led to the wing.

For reasons, I can't remember I didn't take full advantage of the 15-25 minute intermission to go to the bathroom. I did however grab a snack, fix up my costume and makeup. We got our props and set pieces set up for Act II. We had clunky-looking coffee mugs that we used on stage to drink water, which we all refilled. We were ready when the curtain went up for the second half of the play. We were ready, but I had the sudden urge to pee with no exit queue.

The lights were on, the audience was back in their seats and we were set. However, my bladder was pretty adamant on reminding me that I had to go. Luckily, the entire time I was stuck with my butt, seated, all I had to was focus on acting and the scenes.

We were most of the way through the play, I can't actually remember the order and how close it was to the end. But at one point in the play, all the characters get together and talk about their bodies as well as their stretch marks. One by one we would stand up near the front of the stage and we would tell 'Ana' not to worry about her body, that she was beautiful, and then we would slowly but surely strip down to our camisoles and silk slips under our clothes and compare our stretch marks. We'd all say our character had the worst stretch marks, and complain about how old we were.

I had just gotten done with my characters lines, and undressing to my camisole and slip, when Robert- 'Dona Carmen' began talking about her stretch marks and her weight as well as her age. We had rehearsed this scene so many times, but this time, being in full costume and having Robert fully commit to the scene. He practically ripped his dress open, a few of the buttons flew onto the stage floor and his voice sounded almost guttural as he delivered the line "You wanna see stretch marks? I'll show you stretch marks!"

I don't know if it was because I had to pee, his delivery of the line, or something else but I couldn't hold back my laughter. I doubled over, grabbed hold of the table next to me, and just let loose with laughter. My hand clutched my stomach, my co-stars laughed, and then I felt it- my stomach and my bladder clenched. My eyes widened and there on the floor were 3 small droplets, I looked around still chuckling as were my costars and no one noticed. I took my nylon-covered foot and stepped on the 3 drops, hopped the audience couldn't see anything and I carried on till the end of the show.

I have told only one person of this accident and died of embarrassment and stupidity while doing so. Why didn't I use the bathroom during intermission?