LEFT and STAGE RIGHT CHORUS create identical tableaux of a citizen washing his hands in a statue fountain. (See Performance Notes.)
Which, like a fountain with a hundred spouts,
Did run pure blood: and many lusty Romans
Came smiling, and did bathe their hands in it.
DECIUS BRUTUS
Your statue spouting blood in many pipes,
Signifies that from you great Rome shall suck
Reviving blood. The senate have concluded
To give this day a crown to mighty Caesar.
If Caesar hide himself, shall they not whisper
‘Lo, Caesar is afraid’?
CAESAR
How foolish do your fears seem now, Calpurnia!
I am ashamed I did yield to them.
I will go.
CHORUS break formation and join DECIUS BRUTUS, following CAESAR out. Exit ALL stage left.
Rome. Before the Capitol.
Enter NARRATOR from stage rear, coming downstage center.
NARRATOR
The conspirators surround Caesar. His wife was right: he should have stayed home.
Exit NARRATOR stage left.
Enter a crowd of CITIZENS, among them SOOTHSAYER, who is helped onto the stage by CINNA THE POET from stage left. CINNA THE POET carries a notebook and begins writing poems once SOOTHSAYER is in place.
SOUND OPERATOR plays Sound Cue #3 (“Drums”).
Enter CAESAR, BRUTUS, CASSIUS, CASCA, DECIUS BRUTUS, METELLUS CIMBER, and TREBONIUS from stage right.
CAESAR (to SOOTHSAYER)
The ides of March are come.
SOOTHSAYER
Ay, Caesar; but not gone.
CAESAR waves his arms to disperse CITIZENS. Exit ALL stage left, except for CINNA THE POET, who helps SOOTHSAYER to stage left.
Exit CINNA THE POET and SOOTHSAYER stage left.
CAESAR
Are we all ready? What is now amiss
That Caesar and his senate must redress?
METELLUS CIMBER
Most high, most mighty, and most puissant Caesar,
Metellus Cimber throws before thy seat
An humble heart, for the appealing of my
banished brother.
(kneels)
CAESAR
I must prevent thee, Cimber.
These couchings and these lowly courtesies
Might fire the blood of ordinary men,
But I am constant as the northern star,
Of whose true-fix’d and resting quality
There is no fellow in the firmament.
That I was constant Cimber should be banish’d,
And constant do remain to keep him so.
DECIUS BRUTUS (kneels)
Great Caesar,—
CAESAR
Doth not Brutus bootless kneel?
CASCA
Speak, hands for me!
SOUND OPERATOR plays Sound Cue #4 (“Drums and recorder”).
CASCA stabs CAESAR in slow motion. The other CONSPIRATORS, also in slow motion, follow his action and stab at CAESAR, slowly killing him. BRUTUS, the last to attack, first recoils backward in horror, clutching his dagger, before coming up to stab CAESAR. Both CAESAR and BRUTUS freeze for an instant, looking into each other’s eyes, with real time resuming as BRUTUS delivers the fatal thrust.
The music stops, and there is a moment of silence as CAESAR looks into BRUTUS’S eyes once more.
CAESAR (maintaining eye contact)
Et tu, Brute!
CAESAR looks out to audience.
Then fall, Caesar.
CAESAR dies.
SOUND OPERATOR plays Sound Cue #5 (“Final drumbeat”).
CINNA
Liberty! Freedom! Tyranny is dead!
CONSPIRATORS (repeating)
Tyranny is dead!
BRUTUS
Stoop, Romans, stoop,
And let us bathe our hands in Caesar’s blood
Up to the elbows, and besmear our swords:
Then walk we forth, even to the marketplace,
And, waving our red weapons o’er our heads,
Let’s all cry ‘Peace, freedom, and liberty!’
CONSPIRATORS (repeating)
Peace! Freedom!
(lifting arms and swords upward) Liberty! But here comes Antony.
Enter ANTONY from stage left.
Welcome, Mark Antony.
ANTONY (kneeling by CAESAR’S body)
O mighty Caesar! Dost thou lie so low?
(stands) Fare thee well. I know not, gentlemen, Who else must be let blood: If I myself, there is no hour so fit As Caesar’s death hour.
ANTONY opens his arms as if inviting CONSPIRATORS to stab him.
BRUTUS (putting his hand tentatively on ANTONY’S shoulder)
O Antony, beg not your death of us.
Though now we must appear bloody and cruel,
Our hearts you see not; they are pitiful;
And pity to the general wrong of Rome—
ANTONY
I doubt not of your wisdom.
Let each man render me his bloody hand:
How like a deer, strucken by many princes,
Dost thou here lie!
(to BRUTUS)
I am suitor that I may
Produce his body to the marketplace;
And in the pulpit, as becomes a friend,
Speak in the order of his funeral.