Magnus and Holly are sent on a dangerous mission to collect dragon tears – at the only place where dragons are guaranteed to cry.
With Julian Sark as Magnus and Olivia Jon as Holly, and special guest Kristi Boulton
Music by Hedley Knights of Battle Bird Productions
Script and sound design by Eli McIlveen
Directed by Sean Howard and Eli McIlveen
Content warning: violence, speciesism, bodily harm, avant-garde music and sad dragons.
ELI
Hi everyone. Hope you’re well. It’s Eli here with surprise bonus mini-episode from Alba Salix Season 2! I’ve got more to say about the making of this one, but I’ll wait until afterward. It’s called “It’ll All End In Tears”.
Music sting.
INT. OPERA HOUSE
An orchestra tunes up, while the audience talks in sibilant whispers.
FIRST OPERA-GOER
(male, a huge, snooty voice)
“A tour de force”, I’m told.
SECOND OPERA-GOER
(female, equally huge and snooty)
Well, we shall see. I hope we can at least put that wretched ballet last season behind us.
FIRST OPERA-GOER
Ugh! The music was bad enough, but the costumes!
SECOND OPERA-GOER
Say no more.
FIRST OPERA-GOER
Ugh. Have they replaced these seats? My tail is getting crushed.
Magnus and Holly work their way down the aisle, bumping into patrons as they approach.
MAGNUS
Excuse me.
HOLLY
Pardon me. Sorry.
MAGNUS
Coming through.
SECOND OPERA-GOER
(with distaste)
The human section is up there.
HOLLY
I’m a fairy, I’ll have you know.
SECOND OPERA-GOER
(scoffs)
Humanoid, then. Who can tell all you little things apart?
Holly flutters her wings angrily.
HOLLY
Look! Wings!
MAGNUS
Okay, maybe don’t antagonize everyone in our row, Holly.
They move on.
FIRST OPERA-GOER
They’re just letting anyone in now.
SECOND OPERA-GOER
Sad, isn’t it?
HOLLY
This looks like a good spot.
MAGNUS
All this fuss just to get a few dragon tears. I bet I could make a dragon cry without having to sit through an opera.
HOLLY
Who’s being antagonizing now?
MAGNUS
I’m not!
HOLLY
You always have to resort to violence.
MAGNUS
Who said anything about violence? Look, we just tell a couple dragons a sad story, collect their tears, and buzz off.
HOLLY
Dragons almost never cry.
MAGNUS
Well, this better be one sad freakin’ opera, then.
Holly opens her program.
HOLLY
Oh, dragon opera is where they let it all those feelings out! It’s always so big and tragic and passionate and emotional. And this show is supposed to be amazing.
(reads)
“Enziga Krammarbatch: an audacious new work of theatrical magic.” And we can say we saw it on opening night!
MAGNUS
You can say that. I’m gonna be over here sleeping.
HOLLY
Magnus, don’t you dare! You need to be ready with your pan.
MAGNUS
Alba got me up at four this morning and I’ve been riding on carts and wagons all day to get here. My bruises have bruises. All so I can come here to watch dragons stomp around and sing.
HOLLY
But how amazing is that? Dragons! Stomping around! Singing! It’s high culture!
The audience breaks into applause, then falls silent as the conductor taps a baton.
Then the music starts: gentle woodwinds and strings that quickly turn ominous as the soprano begins to belt out her first notes.
SINGER
Ins Foia dei us griben Gretza / Hem zen Ziga af Fronenfifa…
MAGNUS
Oh man, four hours of this?
HOLLY
Okay, this is a little different than I was expecting.
SINGER
Dal faunen eis Golfa dei / Com pritza, Fiantschi / Al Dimal dudal Tei
The music rises to fever pitch, with pummeling, atonal strings and brass. The audience begins to mutter and even boo.
SINGER
La Chita dala Picalinga / Da fonen is –
The singer hits a particularly startling note — then screams suddenly as she’s hit with flying produce, and falls over.
The audience is in an uproar, tearing up the seats and throwing them.
MAGNUS
All right! This is more like it.
HOLLY
Magnus, run!
MAGNUS
Are you kidding? This right here is worth the trip.
The shouts turn to roars. Fire starts to crackle.
MAGNUS
Yeah! Burn it all down! Woo!
HOLLY
I’m getting out of here.
MAGNUS
Haha! You scared of a little dragon riot?
HOLLY
Yes, actually!
MAGNUS
Some people don’t know how to have a good time. Whoaaa! Hey! Put me down!
One of the dragons picks Magnus up and flings him across the theatre.
MAGNUS
High culture can kiss my aaaass!
INT. HOUSE OF HEALING
Magnus and Holly stagger in, shell-shocked.
ALBA
Holly! Magnus!
MAGNUS
Dragon opera? Can go suck it.
HOLLY
I still can’t feel my wings.
ALBA
What happened?
HOLLY
It was a brand new opera. Very controversial.
MAGNUS
It sounded like a herd of elephants decided to start an orchestra-slash-wrestling league.
ALBA
That’s how it usually sounds.
HOLLY
No, no, I’ve heard dragon opera. This was… different. It was audacious and iconoclastic.
MAGNUS
You know, when those guys decide to have a riot, they don’t mess around.
HOLLY
Some people throw tomatoes. Dragons throw forty-pound pumpkins.
MAGNUS
And sides of beef.
HOLLY
And fairies.
MAGNUS
And humans.
ALBA
So, in other words, you didn’t get any tears at all.
MAGNUS
Nope, none. Except… for this huge damn bottle.
He sets the bottle on the counter.
ALBA
What? That’s… that’s nearly a pint.
HOLLY
You’re welcome!
ALBA
What’s really in this bottle?
HOLLY
Tears! Genuine dragon tears! See, after they burned down the amphitheatre…
ALBA
After they what?
MAGNUS
Yeah, I mean, you’d think dragons of all people would know how to make things fireproof.
HOLLY
We found the soprano and the theatre owner in the bar across the street, getting drunk and crying their eyes out. They were so heartbroken.
ALBA
Really!
MAGNUS
I want it on record that I had nothing to do with any of the property damage that occurred.
ALBA
All right. Good work.
HOLLY
Yay! Go team!
Holly and Magnus high-five.
HOLLY
Ow.
MAGNUS
Ow. I’m gonna go lie down now.
CREDITS
ELI
So that is “It’ll All End In Tears”, featuring Julian Sark and Olivia Jon, with special guest Kristi Boulton and music by Hedley Knights of Battle Bird Productions.
This whole scene started as a B‑plot I wrote for Season 1, but it got bumped from I can’t even remember what episode, and ever since then it’s been wandering from script to script, looking for a home. And so when we were recording Season 2, we decided it’d be a fun mini-adventure on its own.
But after we recorded it — you know, here’s this scene featuring an avant-garde dragon opera that’s like a cross between Wagner and The Rite of Spring — I’m just staring at the files going, oh man, what have I done?
We released all the other bonuses from Season 2 a while back, but this one kind of languished because I knew it was going to take some extra effort.
And I brought in Kristi Boulton (whom you may have heard on Civilized and The End of Time and Other Bothers) to do the singing. She’s an improviser and her troupe The Understudies do musical improv all the time. So I handed her a sheet of nonsense lyrics and she just belted this out in about three minutes, maybe about four takes in total. Made up the melody on the spot, and she was pitch perfect. And we recorded the voices of the two grumpy, speciesist dragons in the audience in that same session.
But then of course the piece sat and gathered dust for a while longer because one, we were so busy with other shows, and two, I was just dreading tackling it.
And then Sean happened to mention the whole dilemma to Hedley Knights of We Fix Space Junk fame. And his ears perked up, and he was like “ooh, can I have a go?” So I sent him the rough vocal track, and within hours he sent back — pretty much what you just heard, with a few minor adjustments.
So hats off to the amazing Kristi and Hedley for finally bringing this story to life and bringing it to you. Hope you enjoyed!
We are now actually at work on more Alba! There’s a new set of mini-episodes being written as I speak, and we’re going to have more about that very soon.
Until then, thanks for listening and thanks so much for your support. Bye for now.
The opera plays again without the dialogue.