Roman army, that is. They needed some more legionnaires for Bethlehem and I was all too happy to volunteer: everyone knows the Romans are the real stars of the show. :D In fact, over the course of the show we picked up more and more "recruits", to the point that we ran out of uniforms on the last day. At which point Tim, who was the smallest and least impressive of out number at a mere 5'8", was "fired" to let the taller troops have their time in the spotlight. ^^;

Romans are largely present to provide crowd control -- making sure that Mary, Joseph, and the donkey (and later, the wise men and their procession) have a clear path through the audience so that no one gets kicked. Of course, we're also a great photo op. Larry, at over 7 feet, got the most requests when he was present, but the rest of us had our chances as well. (The proper answer to "Can we take your picture?" is "Depends. Have you paid your taxes?") We also got to harass a lot of people at random, which they enjoyed way more than they should have.

We didn't get our usual camel this year. Instead, we got stuck with Roxie, who's younger, smaller, and (at least for the first three nights, before she warmed up to the crowds) more ornery. Riding her was out of the question from the start, and we quickly learned that we couldn't put her at the front of the procession either: the crowds were parting fast enough for the sentient members of the procession, who could walk a straight line, but not a camel who liked to turn sideways to see what was going on behind her. So we stuck her in the rear of the pack, where she had more room to manuever (and where there was less to see behind her anyway).

Script tweaks since last year:
- Last year, when I was playing a shepherd, the guards halted us when we tried to enter the city and we had to plead our way past and promise not to make trouble. This year, when I could have been giving it out instead of taking it, that scene was cut. Figures.
- Those who remember last year's commentary may be amused to know that during the exchange between Reuben and his wife, after "if I were with child, would you be putting ME in a stable?" Reuben now pauses for a moment to think about it. Sadly, it rarely got a reaction from the crowd, maybe because most of them couldn't see his face.
- The big change: while Mary and Joseph are looking for a place to stay, the wise men and their entourage are breaking camp on the other side of the church, in preparation to enter the city. The entourage even does a bit of a dance number. This unfortunately means that when they DO approach the city, they've got a large crowd of people who were watching that part of the show following them. Which means more work for us guards.

Had a brief scare on the last day when our commanding officer didn't show until the last minute. He's got a speech to deliver from a balcony to all the "provincials" in the audience, so we couldn't just start without him. There was a bit of a debate among the troops about who would deliver the speech if he didn't make it at all, and at one point we briefly debated the idea of having all 14 of us crowd the balcony and deliver it in unison. (No, not seriously.)

David White was the most obnoxious of the troops and gleefully so. He was telling anyone who asked that Roxie was actually two guys in a camel suit (some people actually bought it!), and when he wasn't doing anything important, he drew his (plastic) sword and used it to pick his nails or teeth. I think he was also the one to suggest that for the last performance, we go out with a bang by storming the stable and killing them all. I preferred the idea of marching in to, instead of one of the usual marching chants, "Men in Tights".

Anyway, record attendance. Last year we were a couple hundred people under our goal of 10,000 people over the five nights. This year: 14 thousand and change.