Lydia: Here, my dear Lucy, hide these books. Quick, quick.—Fling Peregrine Pickle under the toilet.—throw Roderick Random into the closet—put The Innocent Adultery into The Whole Duty of Man—thrust Lord Aimworth under the sofa—cram Ovid behind the bolster—there—put The Man of Feeling into your pocket—so, so—now lay Mrs. Chapone in sight, and leave Fordyce’s Sermons open on the table.
Lydia: How’d I do? I finally memorized the lines.
Gavin: Yeah, not too bad.
Lydia: But not too great? Look, this shit is 300 years old. I’m trying.
Gavin: I know.
Lydia: It just feels perfunctory. What in the actual hell is really the conflict?
Gavin: Yeah, so imagine you needed to clear your browsing history because all you ever do is read soft porn, and your teacher wants to check what you’ve been up to?
Lydia: Ohhhhhhhhh.
Gavin: Does that make sense?
Lydia: It does. Do you read 18th Century soft porn?
Gavin: Well, as a director for the Royal Shakespeare Company….
Lydia: It must be really thrilling.
Gavin: And yet, a few scenes later, Sir Anthony says “all this is the natural consequence of teaching girls to read.”
Lydia: Kind of sexist.
Gavin: Aren’t you happy you know how to read? Even if you don’t read anything? Or a steady diet of soft porn?
Lydia: Better a perfidious panther than a pusillanimous pig!
Gavin: Which means what?
Lydia: I don’t know what I’m saying…
Gavin: Then make the audience feel it!