Little Women 3/5

Harriet is handing out the scripts to the cast assembled in the Oleson parlor. Mary will be playing Marmie, Laura will play Beth and Ginny will be playing Jo. Nellie will play Meg as planned, along with the assurance from Mrs. Oleson that all the parts are tailored to the actors. Mary and Laura share a glance at that announcement. As the cast gets ready to leave Nellie reminds them that the man from the wig shop will be at tomorrow’s rehearsal. Laura asks why bother with a wig, to which Mrs. Oleson replies that “all fine actresses nowadays wear wigs.” Isn’t the point of those wigs so that the actresses have hair like Nellie’s? Or maybe I’m thinking of make-up so that the actresses can have permanent bitchface. Ginny’s excited about seeing the wig. Is she stalking Nellie?

As the girls walk home, Laura continues her whining from earlier. Mary offers the consolation that there aren’t too many lines to memorize. Laura agrees, since all of her lines are “oh yes” and “oh my”. Sounds riveting, Harriet. “I think I’ll add one more line,” Laura says. Mary asks what it is. “Shut up, Nellie.” No, I swear, that really happened! Mary laughs.

Back at the homestead Caroline is scrubbing the floor of the house. She asks the girls about the play and Mary explains the lack of enthusiasm. Although the lack of lines is annoying for a budding actor, the source material could be a lot worse. At least they aren’t doing The Upside of Down or Voices from the High School. Ma tries to console her daughters, but both seem pretty apathetic about the whole project so they should be fine in the long run.

Meanwhile, Willie and the Ants are practice the fence whitewashing scene from Tom Sawyer. Nels walks past the kids on the way back from the bank and tells them they are doing a nice job. Mr. Oleson, who is reading a ledger as he’s walking, moves towards the house and passes through a gap in the fence. He goes about five feet before realizing he did not walk through a gate. “Willie!” I guess the fence he is rehearsing with used to stand where the gap now exists. Willie asks what his Pa wants, but Nels thinks better of it and says never mind. Nels then walks around the fence to pass through the gate, instead of through the gap, and into the house.

Over at the Clark house, Mr. Mayfield stops by to pay a visit. Widow Clark steps onto the porch and tells Mr. Mayfield “if those flowers are for Ginny, she’s already left for school.” You know, lady, there are other ways to dissuade a gentleman caller than implying he may have an inappropriate relationship with your 9-year-old daughter. Mr. Mayfield perseveres and tries to give the flowers to Mrs. Clark. She refuses the flowers somewhat rudely, but that doesn’t stop Mayfield from pouring his heart out. He opens by calling her a “handsome woman.” Hehe. I know, “handsome” was gender neutral back then, but she does look somewhat mannish. Mayfield stumbles on his words a bit but finally spits out an invitation to join him at the play performance. Clark considers it for half a second before refusing, saying that she won’t be going because there’s too much to do at home. Mayfield says that Ginny will be heartbroken, but Clark says she will have to learn to live with disappointment. Booo! You suck, Ginny’s mom.

The conversation takes a turn when Mayfield tells Clark that her husband, who died two years ago, wouldn’t appreciate this. She says if she had the choice she would want to be dead with him. That’s lovely. Mayfield can’t believe she would think that, especially since he wouldn’t have followed his wife to the grave when she died five years ago. You know what doesn’t come off as flirty? Playing Quién es el Esposo más Muerto. Clark doesn’t want to play and sends Mayfield on his way.

The next day we see Nellie at her wig fitting. It looks like they are going for the 1974 Cher look. Laura and Mary are visibly bored and Harriet seems a bit apprehensive about the whole process. Nellie looks in a mirror and decides that she wants it to be curly like her normal hair. Harriet instantly agrees but the wig man cautions that it is a lot of hair to curl and that there will be an extra charge. This slows Harriet a bit as the wig man does some arithmetic and arrives at a total of $27. Yikes. Mrs. Oleson raises a fuss, Nellie gets all Veruca Salt about the wig, and the wig man says the hair alone cost $18. Mary and Laura are horrified by the economics of the situation before them. Harriet eventually agrees and the wig man assures them that the wig will be ready by morning. Ginny follows the wig man to the door and she watches his exit through the parlor window. Harriet starts the rehearsal and begins blocking the scene...badly.