Gillian B : 14 - A Good Old Fashioned English Hanging (f)

[TamatoaShiny123]

(Reposted from the Canucks site. Enjoy!)

I went to an all-girls grammar school, which made the choice of material for school plays a bit tricky - it's hard to do most Shakespeare with an all-female cast! In my later years at school, we opened auditions to boys from the "other" grammar school in town. One such production was Richard III.

We switched gender on several of the main characters to boost the female/male ratio and we set the play in the then present day (1971 when we were doing it). We turned most characters' titles (they're nearly all lords of one kind or another) into surnames, so my part, Lord Hastings, became Dr Hastings. In the play, Hastings is effectively the Prime Minister at the time of Richard's coup d'etat, so making it a female part was quite radical at the time.

Hastings eventually falls foul of Richard's plans and is summarily executed. In our analysis of the play, we regarded this as the turning point in the action when the gloves come off and Richard reveals himself for the monster he really is. (I think I would disagree with that now, but no matter.) Accordingly, we decided to play this up for all it was worth. Shakespeare has Hastings beheaded off stage, we went for a hanging in full public view.

As we regarded Hastings' execution as pivotal, we put the intermission in our production immediately afterwards and this enabled us to do a more extravagant piece of stage business than would otherwise be practical. Hastings is accused of witchcraft by Richard at a cabinet meeting, arrested on the spot and dragged off. We staged this in a pool of light centrally on an otherwise dark stage. Richard and Hastings sat at opposite ends of a long table, with the other councillors ranged along the upstage side. Costume was modern - the other councillors (all men) were wearing dark suits or uniforms and to contrast, I was wearing a bright red sweater and a grey tweed skirt.

The arrest was carried out by two uniformed guards who dragged me off my chair, bound my wrists behind my back and then cut my exit speech off by cleave gagging me with a white cloth. The stage was immediately plunged into darkness. After about 10 seconds, the gallery we had along the back and left of the stage was lit from above and behind. I and my guards appeared at the centre of the back part of the gallery and immediately hurried to the front of the side part. By now my ankles were also tied and I was blindfolded. The guards carried me in a sitting position, one each side of me, with a third guard following. When they reached the end of the gallery, the third guard unhooked a noose from the side of the proscenium arch, put it over my head and tightened it round my neck. The two guards carrying me then just tossed me off the end of the gallery towards the audience. The rope was secured to the lighting gantry in the auditorium over about the fourth row of seating so I ended up swinging over the audience.

As soon as I had been thrown off the gallery, the house lights went up for the interval and the audience trooped out for their coffee with me still dangling in the auditorium. The shock value was tremendous. I was actually above one of the gangways between blocks of seats, so it was fairly easy to lower me to the floor and for a bearer party to carry me off in a coffin (all done as if part of the play, because a few of the audience always stayed in during the intermission).

Now for the technical bits. A harness for hanging is a fairly standard piece of theatrical kit and we hired one. It basically consists of a heavy-duty corset made of nylon webbing tightened with velcro straps. It grips your body tightly from chest to hips and the friction here is what supports your weight. It also has straps between the legs and over the shoulders. A small steel ring behind the base of your neck is what actually holds you up. The rope for hanging had a karabiner (big metal clip as used by climbers) fastened to the end with a spliced loop (we didn't trust a becket hitch to hold). The noose is just cosmetic and slides freely on the main rope. When the noose was put round my neck, the main rope was also fastened to the harness using the karabiner and the ring on the back of the harness. This was also the reason I was wearing a sweater - it was opaque to hide the harness and had a high but stretchy collar to hide the karabiner.

So far, so good. We were originally going to do it without me being bound, partly for speed but also so my character could walk to her death with dignity. The problem was that the jerk of the rope snatching tight bounced my arms like a broken doll - the tied wrists were to combat that effect. Tied ankles were really for modesty - I would be above the audience, and I didn't really want them to see my knickers! The jerk from the rope just about knocked the fillings out of my teeth, so the gag was partly to provide some cushioning. The blindfold was just so that I didn't have to worry about any facial expressions.

We originally lit the hanging with a single spotlight from the side, but as I was being hanged from the lighting gantry, the spot would bounce wildly as my (not inconsiderable) weight hit the rope. We switched to back-lighting after that.

The jolt knocked the wind out of me every time, but otherwise didn't hurt. Once "hanged", I tensed my whole body once then relaxed. This was partly for effect, but also re-distributed the tight spots the harness developed when it took my weight.

Came the night of the technical rehearsal, we had all the details ironed out. Richard III gave his cue line and we went through the whole hanging business like clockwork. I hung there waiting to be lowered. Nothing happened. I assumed that a lighting hitch was being sorted out and carried on pretending to be dead. After an age, I was aware that I couldn't hear any noises, so I asked what was going on (as well as I could through my gag). No reply, so I waited a bit longer. Still no noises, so this time I yelled through my gag. I was getting rather peeved by this stage, so I started to see if I could get my wrist binding off. It wasn't too tight, so I was able to get my fingers to the knot after a bit of wriggling. Another two minutes had the rope off my wrists and I was able to remove my blindfold. As I looked down, I saw a circle of faces all looking up at me and grinning. "Bastards!" was one of my more printable comments once I had the gag off.

After they lowered me, it turned out that there had not only been a conspiracy, there had also been a sweepstake on how many minutes it would take for me to realise what had happened.

The dress rehearsal and the performances all went according to plan, with satisfying shocked gasps from the audience and the occasional scream as I was "hanged". From my perspective, it was a little arduous doing it every day, as a few tender spots developed. However, even though everything was under control and I knew it was under control, it remained absolutely terrifying being tossed off a gallery, bound gagged and blindfolded.

So there you are - how to hang a lady prime minister every night and twice on Saturdays, with relatively little wear and tear to the lady herself.

The end

[Alisonlovesropes]

I love the idea of being bound hand and foot, gagged and blindfolded in public and no one thinks it is weird. Now if only I could be barefooted too.

[Fordman]

I always enjoyed stories by this author, thanks for recovering this.

[TamatoaShiny123]

I always enjoyed stories by this author, thanks for recovering this.

No problem

[Alisonlovesropes]

I always enjoyed stories by this author, thanks for recovering this.

No problem

Any more by Gillian coming?

[TamatoaShiny123]

I always enjoyed stories by this author, thanks for recovering this.

No problem

Any more by Gillian coming?

Idk. I’ll go through the old site and see what else there is

[Canuck100]

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Gillian B's stories

• 01 - Jill's Revenge (fF/mm)
• 02 - Murder at the Vicarage (ff/f, f/F, f/ff)
• 03 - Gillian's Birthday Present (*/mf)
• 04 - Peter and Paul (mm/F, F/mm)
• 05 - Tying Myself up in Knots (f/self)
• 06 - The Magic Show (f/f)
• 07 - Tying Myself up in Knots (Again) (f/self)
• 08 - Trouble with Tim (f/m, f/self, m/f)
• 09 - The Great Biscuit Robbery (mf/F, F/mf)
• 10 - The Lamp Post (m+f+/f+)
• 11 - Teacher Torture (or: Ol’ Soggy) (ff/FF)
• 12 - Anna's Story (ff/f, F/ff)
• 13 - A Game of Soldiers (mm/f, Ff/mm)
• 14 - A Good Old Fashioned English Hanging (f)
• 15 - Kidnapping Cathy (f/m, m/ff, ff/m, f/f)
• 16 - A Surprise Party (fff/f)
• 17 - Challenging Mum (F/mf, mf/F)
• 18 - Getting Tied Up in my Studies (f/f, ff/F)
• 19 - Money for Old Rope (M/F)

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Index of all stories in the "Archive for Everyone" section