Comedy Tonight (From "a Funny Thing Happened On the Way to the Forum")

Playgoers, I bid you welcome. The theater is a temple, and we are here to worship the gods of comedy, and of tragedy. Tonight I am pleased to announce--a comedy! We shall employ every device we know in our desire to divert you. Something familiar, Something peculiar, Something for everyone: A comedy tonight! Something appealing, Something appalling, Something for everyone: A comedy tonight! Nothing with kings, nothing with crowns; Bring on the lovers, liars, and clowns! Old situations, New complications, Nothing portentous or polite; Tragedy tomorrow, Comedy tonight! Something exotic, Something erotic, Something for everyone: A comedy tonight! Something expensive, Something offensive, Something for everyone: A comedy tonight! Tragedy tomorrow, comedy tonight! Something convulsive, Something repulsive, Something for everyone: A comedy tonight! Something aesthetic, Something frenetic, Something for everyone: A comedy tonight! Nothing with gods, nothing with fate; Weighty affairs will just have to wait! Nothing that's formal, Nothing that's normal, No recitations to recite; Open up the curtain: Comedy tonight! It all takes place on a street in Rome, around and about these three houses. First, the house of Erronius, a beffudled old man. Abroad now in search of his children, stolen in infancy by pirates. Something for everyone: A comedy tonight! Something erratic, Something dramatic, Something for everyone: A comedy tonight! Frenzy and frolic, Strictly symbolic, Something for everyone: A comedy tonight! Second, the house of Lycus, a buyer and seller of the flesh of beautiful women. That's for those of you who have absolutely no interest in pirates. Finally, the house of Senex, who lives here with his wife and son. Also in the house lives Psedudolus, slave to the son. Pseudulous is a role of tremendous nuance and variety, and played by an actor of such--let me put it to you this way. I play the part! Comedy tonight! And now, the entire company! Something familiar, Something peculiar, Something for everybody: Comedy tonight! Something that's gaudy, Something that's bawdy-- Something for everybawdy! Comedy tonight! Nothing that's grim. Nothing that's Greek. She plays Medea later this week. Stunning surprises! Cunning disguises! Hundreds of actors out of sight! Pantaloons and tunics! Courtesans and eunuchs! Funerals and chases! Baritones and basses! Panderers! Philanderers! Cupidity! Timidity! Mistakes! Fakes! Rhymes! Crimes! Tumblers! Grumblers! Bumblers! Fumblers! No royal curse, no Trojan horse, And a happy ending, of course! Goodness and badness, Panic is madness, This time it all turns out all right! Tragedy tomorrow, Comedy tonight!