Here in the Greater Cambridge-Somerville area of Massachusetts, we have birthed a new wedding tradition-- the so-called "Wedding Mummers Play". Loosly based on the traditional Mummers Plays performed by Morris Dancers at Yuletide, the stock characters always include a Fool (usually, but not always the narrator), and a Quackish Doctor -- both characters stolen from traditional mummers plays, and of course, the bride and groom, usually played by friends who can best fake a physicial resemblence. The plot is fairly sketchy, but usually involves the usual Mummer's play death and resurrection; often it is the Bride or Groom (or both) who die, but not always. Since the tradition started among folk dancers (though since has greatly spread), many of the plays, particularly the early ones, involve references to folk dance. In-Jokes about the lives and hobbies of the Bride and Groom, or about the nature of their relationship are highly encouraged; the play is usually set while they are courting or planning their wedding. It often ends with either a blessing for the married couple, an apology for the play, a folk dance, or a combination of the above.
The play is usually written by committee in the months before the wedding, by friends in group brainstorming sessions, ocassionally suplemented by email. It is performed at the wedding reception, not the ceremony, and is meant to be a surprise (though lately, some people seem to have come to expect them..). The play is almost never memorized (hard to do, when it keeps changing up until the day of the wedding, and minor characters are recruited half an hour before hand from among wedding guests), so it is read from copies of the script. Props have ranged from minimal to truly extensive, and are snuck into the reception, and kept out of sight until the performance. When the performace occurs, the bride and groom are escorted to chairs of honor at the front of the performance, to watch the proceedings.
I've started trying to collect some of these plays; but I do not have a complete collection. In fact, I pretty only much have copies of the ones that took place at weddings I attended. If you have one that is not here,and would like it included in this archive, please send it along to cowen@eecs.tufts.edu and I will add it. If you have any scanned-in photos from performances, I'd be willing to put up copies here too. Here in nearly chronological order (and they got more elaborate and longer, as time went on), are the plays for:
And if you want some of the motif stats, here they are. All the plays have a fool and at least one doctor. All make references to the occupations of both the bride and groom.
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