Phidas Morality Plays
by Eron12 with Hero Forge"Morality plays are no longer just for the Children and the Lanterns. Phidas' codes of conduct can help better his or her situation, be they peasant or prince. This is an easier sell to princes than it is to peasants, so we have to wrap Phidas' wisdom inside entertainment in order to make it more palatable to the masses." -Danuta, matriarch of the Fumayan Masks
by me with Midjourney"Phidas' plays are not the most exciting plays I've seen, and I'm not a fan of the not-so-subtle message: 'just work hard, keep your mouth shut, obey your lord, and everything will be fine!' But beggars can't be choosers. We don't get a lot of acting troupes passing through our village, so we got to take what we can get. The Masks don't charge admission, and they usually provide free snacks. Not too shabby." -Havro, the peasant farmer
History
Most of Scarterra's priesthoods sponsor morality plays, and the Masks are no exception though they are late to the party, the Masks have only begun putting serious effort into sponsoring plays relatively recently.
Some believe that Scarterra or at least West Colassia is currently experiencing a renaissance of theater, and the Masks are jumping on the bandwagon in response to the growing popularity of other priesthoods' morality plays and their growing cultural importance of secular plays.
Execution
Phidas is not generally known for being a warm and cuddly god and the Masks are not generally known for being warm and cuddly priests and priestesses. But Phidas Morality Plays are usually intended to be "feel good stories".
Most plays follow the format of a classical Greek comedy, not a modern Western comedy. It's a comedy in the sense that the hero (or less commonly the heroine), starts out in a bad position and ends up in a very good position.
Through perseverance, hard work, honoring his word and commitments, following the rules, and obeying his social better, the hero will earn Phidas' blessings and end the play materially much richer than he started the play. He will usually also marry a beautiful woman seemingly outside his league. If a protagonist is a woman, she will usually end up marrying a nobleman and drastically rise up in social status.
There may or may not be a villain serving as a dramatic foil to the hero. The playwright often goes over the top trying to make the audience love to hate the villain. The villain usually acts as petty to the hero or heroine early and often before the terms. The villain will be lazy and selfish and try to cheat the system, but this cheating will always backfire. The villain doesn't normally die, the villain usually ends up poor and humiliated.
by me with Midjourney
Components and tools
Worst of all, they don't do enough rehearsals, so the acting is wooden and the actors flub their lines a lot."-Zajac of the Fumayan Lanterns, stage actor and frequent critic of the Masksby Eron12 with Heroforge"The Masks will never pass up an opportunity to shake people down for coins, but they don't charge admission to their plays. If they tried to charge admission, no one would come. Phidas morality plays are a joke, except no one is laughing. Ignoring the obvious problems of including the words 'Phidas' and 'morality' in the same sentence, the plays are just bad. The Masks are copper pinching misers, so they cut corners on the music, they cut corners on the costumes, and they cut corners on the scenery, so everything is tacky and cheap. It's ironic that a group called 'the Masks' can't make good costumes.
Participants
The plays are all written by Masks. That's usually the weak spot of a Phidas Morality Play. These plays come across as very formulaic, even compared to the rest of the Nonagon's fairly predictable morality plays. They are improving, though, the Phidas plays I was a part of were a definite step up from the Phidas plays I saw as a kid."-Aheneus Estalar of the Dawnby Eron12 with Hero ForgeAs part of an outreach exchange between the Masks and the Keepers, I've provided some musical accompaniment to a few Phidas morality plays. If they can't find a handsome Keeper to help them, the Masks will hire one or two professional actors or musicians from the secular world to play the lead role(s), and use their own clergy to play the supporting roles and to build the sets and costumes. They do okay, even though theatrical productions is normally their forte.
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