Xena Reviews: Season 4, Episode 17

The Play’s the Thing – Director: Christopher Graves/Writers: Ashley Gable, Thomas A. Swynden

This one starts with Xena and Gabi doing yoga (yes, Xena’s doing it too) in a meadow, but Gabi can’t enjoy the serenity because she lost her latest scroll. Apparently, it’s a more intimate examination of their relationship (maybe it contains details of their sex life), so Xena tells her to go back to the last town they were in (Piraeus) and look for the scroll. Xena has to go help a prince in another town, so Gabi heads back to Piraeus, a city that’s completely theatre-mad. She comes across an older dude who tries to add her to his entourage of hot women, but she shoots him down. Gabi runs into Joxer (who’s quite taken with her new look) and meets Zira and her assistant Milo when they return her lost scroll (which they found in the bathroom). Zira tells Gabi she’s a producer and wants to get Gabi’s play into a theatre. Gabi hesitates, but some flattery from Zira convinces her the world needs to hear her message of peace and love. (Apparently, the play is about Xena stopping a warlord named Humungous with words instead of weapons.) Gabi goes to send Xena a message and we see that Zira is a scam artist, hoping to cash in on Gabi’s play by sucking in warlords to invest, leaving Gabi to face the consequences when the play fails.

Zira finds Gabi a shithole theatre (the Apollo, of course) and Gabi agrees to let Joxer help her get it into shape. Gabi holds open auditions and has trouble finding a Gabrielle, but casts a woman named Paulina as Xena. Paulina (who’s played by Lucy’s real-life stand-in Polly Baigent) is a terrible actress, but can do her own flips, which Gabi likes. Minya shows up to play Xena and is pissed off that the part is filled, but Gabi convinces her to play a villain. Gabi also casts a centaur (Dustinus Hoofmanus), which is quite a coup since centaurs never do plays. Gabi’s worried about her writing (comparing herself to her hero, Sophocles), until Joxer tells her that he met a warlord (Therax) who’s excited about her play. Gabi figures the play can be a moral lesson to warlords about peace and love, even it doesn’t appeal to the masses. We see what Zira’s scam is … she’s promised 75% of the play’s profits to Therax and the same to another warlord, Kaelus. (Yes, like in The Producers.) Zira figures she can take off with a good chunk of the money and when the play tanks, Therax and Kaelus will go after Gabi for their money.

Zira convinces Gabi to make Joxer the producer and Gabi reluctantly agrees. She ends up casting herself as Gabrielle, but the initial rehearsal doesn’t go well. The rest of the cast aren’t thrilled with the peace and love stuff, urging Gabi to add a little sex and violence, which pisses her off. After Gabi calms down, she apologizes and rehearsal starts again. But Joxer has made some changes (sexed up Paulina’s costume and changed the negotiation scene so the king ends up with Humungous’s head on a pike). Gabi freaks and takes off, deciding to ask Sophocles for advice. But his latest play is full of sex and violence too and Gabi realizes he’s the creepy dude who hit on her earlier. She figures if nobody sees her play, nobody can get absorb the message, so she goes back to the theatre and tells everyone to go all out on the exploitation.

The updated version of the play is more commercial and when Gabi asks Zira for more money, she gets worried. Milo mentions another warlord (Cleon) who Zira knows hates Xena. She convinces Cleon to fund the play, saying he’ll be able to learn the secret to defeating Xena. Therax and Kaelus both sneak in to check on their investments and are thrilled with the play. That worries Zira, since she won’t make any money if the play’s a success, so she sabotages things by telling Gabi she’s inspiring the warlords to commit more crimes. Gabi realizes she sold out and tells everyone they’re going back to the peace-and-love version of the play.

The play opens and the warlords aren’t impressed with Gabi’s message of peace. Cleon sneaks backstage and pounds Joxer, interrupting the play. Just as he’s about to waste Gabi, the real Xena shows up and kicks his ass, as well as Therax, Kaelus, and all their men (with a little help from Minya and Paulina). The crowd grabs Zira and Milo (when Gabi tells them it’s interactive theatre) and Xena lets Gabi know that Zira is the Queen of Cons. Xena forces Zira and the warlords to donate the remaining money to an orphanage, and Zira says she’s going to use her scamming talents more productively … she’s becoming an agent. (Her first client is Dustinus Hoofmanus, but he really wants to direct.) Gabi feels stupid for getting scammed, but Xena tells her to hold on to her message of peace, since peace is what most people really want. Minya thanks Gabi for helping her realize what she really is deep down inside … a thespian. Minya and Paulina run off hand-in-hand, making Gabi and Xena wonder if Minya really meant thespian, or something else.

This is a really funny episode (which is why it’s #38 on my all-time list), with tons of jokes about the theatre, plus plenty of meta-references about the show itself. Some fans think Gabi fell for Zira’s bullshit a little too easily, but I think Zira just knew which buttons to push (probably from reading Gabi’s scroll). Gabi has always valued peace above fighting and that’s even more true after returning from India and committing herself to follow the Way of Love. When Gabi thought she could share that message and actually make a difference, it clashed with her desire to be a great bard, so it makes sense that she got lost in the mix and Zira capitalized on it. Gabi started out with good intentions, compromised her vision to get an audience, but went back to her original vision. It’s kind of a mirror of her ongoing struggle between peace and violence; she wants peace, but some part of her knows violence is sometimes necessary. There’s probably some meta-commentary here about Gabi’s journey of peace being boring (a complaint some fans had at the time) and it’s interesting that Xena pounding the warlords (for real) during the play gets a standing ovation.

But this is a comedy episode and there are so many funny moments it’s hard to mention them all. A few highlights: the casting call, with a line of Xena and Gabis stretching down the block; Criticus from Varietus attends the play (the critic from Variety) and mentions Buffus the Bacchae Slayer opening across the street (which was a callback to a mention of Xena on an episode of Buffy); the revised title of Gabi’s play is “Faster Chakram Kill, Kill, Kill”, a riff on the Russ Meyer movie Faster Pussycat Kill, Kill; the final cast of the play includes actors playing Ares, Callisto, Caesar, someone who might be Cyrene, and a minotaur; the cat screaming sound effect repeated throughout the episode; and the final joke with Joxer hanging upside-down and threatening to tell his brother unless they let him down (with his line coming just as Sam Raimi’s credit appears, so it’s probably another meta-reference).

Noticeable Things:

• This episode takes place in Piraeus, which is the Port of Athens but here is some kind of theatre town. Gabi calls it the Great Appian Way (which refers to Broadway being called the Great White Way), but the Appian Way was an actual road in Italy, so the geography’s a bit off.
• Some of the theatre marquees in Piraeus read: Sophocles—The Women of Trachis; A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Acropolis; and O Zeus A Divine Comedy—Laugh or Be Smitten.
• Sophocles’ play seems to be a cross between a Busby Berkeley musical and a Richard Donner movie, with two guys fighting above a chorus of scantily-clad dancing girls.
• Dustinus Hoofmanus, the centaur who refuses to play quadrupeds, is obviously meant to be Dustin Hoffman (who’s notoriously difficult to work with).
• While trying to impress Gabi, Joxer mentions he likes he likes Euripicles and Sophomore (Euripides and Sophocles) and suggests they attend the latest Sophocles play and share a bag of oats (which I guess was the Ancient Greek equivalent of popcorn).
• Gabi’s play has at least 8 acts (and Act 7 has at least 84 scenes).
• There’s an FX guy offstage who almost kills himself trying to provide sound effects for Xena’s fight with the warlords.

Favourite Quotes:

• “Not in your lifetime, thank you.” Gabi shooting down Sophocles when he hits on her, not realizing who he is.
• “Like what, Springtime for Warlords?” Gabi reminding us that this is a Producers homage.
• “It’ll kill ’em all!” Gabi’s response when asked what the critics will think of her revamped play.
• “Wow, I’m really wet.” Paulina as Xena in the ubiquitous hot tub scene. When the scene opens, it almost looks like she and Gabi are making out, but if you look closer, they’re just whispering to each other.
• “Now that was a little uncalled for.” Xena’s response when Cleon mistakes her for Paulina and says she’s not even a good actress. Possibly some more meta-commentary, as some people think Lucy’s not a very good actress. (Obviously people who haven’t seen the show … Lucy and Renee are both great actresses.)