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Narrator prologue/set up

….

[King sitting on his throne. Hercules enters.

KING: The great Hercules has been sent to me? I was expecting someone bigger

HERCULES: Zeus wants me to take orders from you? You’re a pathetic excuse for a king.

KING: Pathetic excuse for a king? How dare you!? But be as you will… your first task is to…

kill the Nemean Lion!.

[awkward pause, looks at audience]

HERCULES: The what?

KING: the Nemean Lion. You’ve never heard of it? It’s a Lion that ravages the land. It has claws

sharper than any mortal’s weapon and shreds all men it encounters and leave the bones for

Hades. It should be no trouble at all for a warrior of your stature, I’m sure

HERCULES: Oh, but of course.

KING: Alright then it’s settled. Go and bring me back the Nemean lion. Make sure its dead.

Especially the dead part..

[Hercules begins to walk out, king shouts after him]

KING: Oh, by the way its hide is impervious!

Lights out, stage cleared, next scene set, Light on Narrator.

NARRATOR: So Hercules set out on his quest to slay the Nemean Lion. After trekking

throughout the land, We join back up with him at dreaded cave of the Nemean lion..

[Lights back on, Hercules walks to the middle of the stage and looks all around for the lion. ]
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HERCULES: Here kitty, kitty. [clucks tongue] here kitty kitty kitty…

Dramatic music plays, the lion enters.

The lion and Hercules circle each other. Hercules shoots arrows at it and they do nothing.

HERCULES: OH! Invulnerable as well as ugly!

They circle in the opposite direction. Hercules lets out a battle cry and changes with the club.

[bashes it] The lion gets back to the side of the stage and then knocks the club away and chases

Herc to the opposite side of the stage [don’t stop running]. Music gets louder and more dramatic.

Circle a few more times. *HERCULES: Boo!!!* the lion flinches and reels. Herc jumps on the

lion and chokes the lion out, then rips off the skin and raises it in victory.

Lights out.

Narrator: Hercules, victorious over the lion, returns to the king, who thought the lion would

surely be the death of our hero. As Hercules returns to the throne room with the pelt, the king

covers in fear of the great hero.

Lights back on. King sitting on throne playing with dolls on a table. Hercules enters from a side

door loudly. The king quickly tosses the dolls off the table and hides behind his throne.

KING: why aren’t you dead….what are you doing back! I mean here! Already! I told you to kill

the lion.

HERCULES: I did.

KING: where is the proof?

Hercules lifts the lion skin to show the king. Kings jaw drops for a minute.
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KING: Oh you did kill it didn’t you. [aside] He killed the lion, what’s more dangerous then the

lion… hm… oh perfect. the hydra. [to Hercules] alright next task. Go kill the hydra. And next

knock before you come in here. On second thought, don’t come at all. I’ll send someone to you.

Lights back to Narrator

NARRATOR: So Hercules set off to find the hydra and kill it in search of redemption. For this

task he brought his eager nephew Iolaus. After a long arduous journey, the two of them arrived at

the swamp of the hydra.

Dim lights. Enter Herc and Iolaus (with torch).

HERCULES: From here on in I must go alone. The Hydra is very poisonous and even its breath

can kill you.

IOLAUS: I’ll Stand and wait on your call.

HERCULES: Yes, Yes. Just don’t get yourself into trouble.

Hercules disappears back stage. Crashing noises and animal roaring sound effects.

Hercules dives out from behind the curtain wrestling with a snake head.

HERCULES: Iolaus help me! Every time I kill one head two more pop up in its place!

IOLAUS: I’m Coming uncle! [runs back stage goofily with torch in hand]

Dying animal roar, Hercules throws a head into the audience.

Lights out, and on Narrator

NARRATOR: so with his second task completed, Hercules returned to the king.

Lights on. King on throne eating. Hercules barges in through side door again. Kings splits out

food in shock. Hercules closes door, knocks loudly then opens it again.

KING: I told you not to come here again!

HERCULES: well I forgot that part. At least I knocked this time.

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KING: no you didn’t!

HERCULES: It was a step in the right direction.

KING: [facepalm] you have to be kidding me… you can kill to huge monsters but you can’t

follow a simple direction…

HERCULES: What’s the next task?

KING: Bring me the Ceryneia Hind

HERCULES: Isn’t that Artemis’ Deer?

KING: wow, you’re a quick. If it was just a random deer, then it wouldn’t really be a challenge

now would it?

Exit herc, lights out and to Narrator

NARRATOR: So Hercules once again set out on his task.

Lights on, Deer enters skipping across stage. Hercules follows, skipping as well. Follows it

around the room.

NARRAOTR: After a year of tracking the deer, Hercules finally caught it as it crossed a river.

[Hercules dives and grabs the deer then puts it on his shoulders and carries it off stage, light

focus on narrator.] After a brief confrontation with Artemis and Apollo, Hercules returned to the

king for his next task.

King in throne room again. Enter Herc kicks through the door again, king cowers behind the

throne.

KING: How many times do I have to tell you to stop doing that!
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HERCULES: [lays the deer in front of the throne] lets skip the banter this time. Just tell me what

the next task is.

KING:[ponders a bit] another man eating monster. Erymanthian Boar.

HERCULES: Fun more animals…

Lights to narrator

NARRATIOR: So yet again Hercules sets out in search of another ferocious animal in another

part of Greece.

Lights on stage. Hercules enters. Boar sound effects play.

HERCULES: [to audience] Shhhhh….. I think I hear it. [creeps back stage]

Boar comes charging out from behind curtain with herc close behind. He chances it off the front

of the stage where it “falls” off a “cliff”

HERCULES: Not quite what I had in mind but it’ll work. A dead boar is still a dead boar.

NARRATOR: on his way back to the king, Hercules encountered another obstacle he was not

expecting. The centaurs whose territory he had been crossing through attacked him. [Two

centaurs come out and pelt him with rocks] Hercules fought back and used the poison arrows he

had gotten by killing the hydra and shot them. Many of the centaurs, including Hercules’ old

teacher Cherion were felled. Finally Hercules returned to the king.

Enter Hercules to the king’s throne room. The king isn’t there. Hercules loks around and walks

over to the throne. The king creeps out from backstage and as Hercules looks around the throne

he jumps up and tries to scare him.

KING: BWWAAAHH!!!

Hercules turns around without flinching

HERCULES: Nice try

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KING: That’s not fair….

HERCULES: Not fair? I’m the one doing a bunch of meaningless tasks for a king to scared to do

any of them himself.

KING: Scared? Well who about this for a “meaningless” task. Your next assignment is to clean

King Augeas’ stables.

HERCULES: How is that even remotely a heroic task?

KING: Its not. But King Augeas is you know… a friend of a friend… and there’s a lot of poop…

and just don’t like you

HERCULES: Well that’s not fair at all

KING: [mockingly] “Well that’s not fair at all” well guess what? Your going to do it anyway.

Hercules storms out. Lights go out and back to the narrator.

NARRATOR: To his great disgust, Hercules went to the stables as the king ordered and arrived

to perform his horrid task, of cleaning the mountain of manure. [lights of Hercules walks on

stage] as he looked around him at the every growing mounds of horse dung, he pondered how it

was possible to even clean it all up. Finally he realized that he could use water to clean it. He tore

down a near by damn [tears down the wall, confetti and balloons fall out] and diverted the water

to flow to the stables and they were cleaned. [directly to the audience] thankfully this is a myth

so there is no need to wonder about the fact that none of the horses were harmed and that the

stables were still standing after an entire river was sent rushing through. Anyway, after solving

this delema, Hercules returned to the king.

Lights out, back to the king’s throne room

HERCULES: I’m Finish!

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KING: I could have sworn that would have taken you at least a few months. How are you

finished already?

HERCULES: I’m not only a Great hero, I’m also a genius [taps his temple] bet you didn’t know

that huh.

KING: Well, we’ll see about that. Any way next task, get rid of some birds. The Stymphalian

Birds to be exact.

HERCULES: Lemme guess- they’re mana eating birds

KING: Close but not quite. They’re giant man eating birds. What fun would it be if there wasn’t

a good chance of you dying huh?

HERCULES: How is that fun?

KING: It all depends on your view point. It’s perfectly entertaining for me.

HERCULES: [grumbling]

Lights out and on to the Narrator.

NARRATOR: So as usual, Hercules followed the kings orders.

[Hercules enters and goes over to the birds]

NARRATOR: But these were no ordinary birds

HERCULES: MOVE! SHOO! Get out of here!

The birds don’t move

NARRATOR: Having a hard time with getting rid of the birds, Hercules obtained a noise maker

created by the immortal craftsman Hephaestus.

Hercules comes in banging pots and pans. The bird get up and start flapping around and attaking

him

HERCULES: Ahhh!!!! Get off of me!!!

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Hercules starts shooting arrows at the birds and they all drop to the floor and twitch

HERCULES: [wiping his brow] Glad that’s over

As he turns around, one bird gets up and attacks him. Hercules turns around in slow motion and

in one movement punched to bird in the face and it falls to the ground

HERCULES: [to the bird] And stay down!

Lights out and back to narrator.

NARRATOR: so Hercules defeated yet another deadly adversary. He returned to the king to

finish up his 10 tasks on his quest for immortality and redemption. He battle the Creatan bull,

killed the man eating mares of Diomedes, stole the belt of the fierce some Amazon and brought

back the cattle of the monster Geyrom. He returned to the king successful after each task. After

finishing his 10 super human labors, he returned to the king, but to his dismay the king refused to

recognize two of them.

Lights back to Hercules and the king mid argument.

HERCULES: What do you mean you wont recognize two of them? For the past 8 years I have

risked my life on every stupid task you have assigned me and I’ve completed all of them.

KING: But you had help on two of them. That wasn’t part of the bargain.

HERCULES: which two do you think I had help on?

Finish

……

NARRATOR: So the king had just commanded Hercules to bring him golden apples which
belonged to Zeus, king of the gods. Hera had given these apples to Zeus as a wedding gift, so
surely this task was impossible. Hera, who didn't want to see Hercules succeed, would never
permit him to steal one of her prize possessions, would she?
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These apples were kept in a garden at the northern edge of the world, and they were guarded not
only by a hundred-headed dragon, but also by the Hesperides, who were daughters of Atlas, the
titan who held the sky and the earth upon his shoulders. So Hercules being the brilliant hero he is
went to the titan Atlas himself for help with the matter.

[Enter Hercules to stage with atlas holding up the globe]

HERCULES: Hoy! Great titan atlas, I seek your council.

ATLAS: What is it you need boy? And make it fast.

HERCULES: I’m in search of the Golden Apple. I’ve heard that you might be able to help me as
you have some… connections

ATLAS: Ah… the golden apples of zeus. I might be able to help you with that… but of course
I’m busy holding up the world. If you would hold it up for me I could go get you the apples my
self.

HERCULES: Seems like a fair deal. I’ll hold the world up for a bit and you get the apples.

NARRATOR: So atlas gave the weight of the world to Hercules [gives him the globe] and went
to get the apples. Now atlas had no interest in taking the globe back from Hercules. He did
however return with the apple.

ATLAS: Hercules! I brought you the apples. But… there’s a catch… I have no interest in
carrying the weight of the world on my back any longer. Instead you’re going to.

NARRATOR: But our hero isn’t so easily defeated.

HERCULES: Fine I’ll hold the weight of the world, but allow me one thing. Could I have a pad
for my shoulders if I’m going to hold this thing for the rest of eternity.

ATLAS: seems reasonable

HERCULES: alright here hold this for a second…

NARRATOR: When he gave the world back to Atlas, Hercules grabbed the golden apple and ran
leaving Atlas back to the job of eternally carrying the world. He returned to the king, apple in
hand and received his 12th, final and most dangerous task. Hercules was instructed to bring the
Cerberus, the guardian of the underworld back to the king. Hercules journeyed to the
underworld, a journey which no mortal had ever made. Once in the underworld, he spoke with
the ruler of the underworld, Hades, who agreed that if Hercules was able to overpower the
Cerberus, he could take it back to the king.