1 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? Youre 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. Youve never heard of it? Its a Lion that ravages the land. It has claws sharper than any mortals 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, Im sure HERCULES: Oh, but of course. KING: Alright then its 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. ]

2 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 [dont 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 arent 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.

3 KING: Oh you did kill it didnt you. [aside] He killed the lion, whats 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, dont come at all. Ill 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: Ill Stand and wait on your call. HERCULES: Yes, Yes. Just dont 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: Im 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.

4 KING: no you didnt! 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 cant follow a simple direction HERCULES: Whats the next task? KING: Bring me the Ceryneia Hind HERCULES: Isnt that Artemis Deer? KING: wow, youre a quick. If it was just a random deer, then it wouldnt 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!

5 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 itll 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 kings throne room. The king isnt 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

6 KING: Thats not fair. HERCULES: Not fair? Im 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 theres a lot of poop and just dont like you HERCULES: Well thats not fair at all KING: [mockingly] Well thats 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 kings throne room HERCULES: Im Finish!

7 KING: I could have sworn that would have taken you at least a few months. How are you finished already? HERCULES: Im not only a Great hero, Im also a genius [taps his temple] bet you didnt know that huh. KING: Well, well see about that. Any way next task, get rid of some birds. The Stymphalian Birds to be exact. HERCULES: Lemme guess- theyre mana eating birds KING: Close but not quite. Theyre giant man eating birds. What fun would it be if there wasnt a good chance of you dying huh? HERCULES: How is that fun? KING: It all depends on your view point. Its 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 dont 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!!!

8 Hercules starts shooting arrows at the birds and they all drop to the floor and twitch HERCULES: [wiping his brow] Glad thats 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 Ive completed all of them. KING: But you had help on two of them. That wasnt 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?

9 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: Im in search of the Golden Apple. Ive 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 Im 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. Ill 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 theres a catch I have no interest in carrying the weight of the world on my back any longer. Instead youre going to. NARRATOR: But our hero isnt so easily defeated. HERCULES: Fine Ill hold the weight of the world, but allow me one thing. Could I have a pad for my shoulders if Im 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.