Smith comes to town and meets his friend Johnson; they are discussing
plays, when they meet Bayes, a poular
playwright
on his way to a
rehearsal of his new play. He talks about where he gets his ideas
(stolen and rephrased), disses critics, and tries to decide what
prologue and epilogue to use. He disses the actors; and various kinds
of extravagance, illogic, and silliness by various contemporary
dramatists are satirized. Then Bayes has to show the actors how to
dance to his tune, and falls and breaks his nose, leaving to get it
staunched. The rehearsal continues in the third act; the author leaves,
claiming he is the strangest person in the world because he writes for
reputation, not money. The fourth act brings in love scenes, and the
fifth act, battles. The Country Man wants to strangle Bayes, the
playwright, but he and JOhnson sneak off to dinner while Bayes is gone.
He goes to find them, and the actors leave for lunch. Bayes comes back,
curses them all, and says he's taking his play to another company of
actors. The Stage-keeper says it will disappoint the afternoon
audience, but the playwright stalks off, all wounded amour-propre. The
players return from lunch and get ready for a different play that day.
This play is an hilarious comedy. The authors make much of the modern
theater's folly (the theater of their time). It is a send-up of a
number of plays and playwrights, from Shakespeare to Dryden, who have
everything in their plays except wit and good sense. The epilogue ends
with a plea for those qualities as the ancients used to display in
their plays -- asking for "a season of prose and sense."