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Writer's pictureHina Siddiqui

Vanya: Scenes 4 & 5

Updated: Aug 27, 2020

Continued from here








SCENE 4


Speaking Parts:

Baba Yaga, Vanya

Other Characters:

Leshiye: 15-20


Scene opens to a green place, with large trees. A few Leshy stand with snowflakes hung from sticks.


Dance of the Leshiye: 2-3 mins

  • Leshiye do a Russian folk style celebration dance

  • Large Snowflakes can be used as props

  • It can actually function as a circle dance as in the video

  • By the end of the piece Baba Yaga enters

  • She does some funny dance moves and everyone claps and laughs

  • Then she suddenly pauses


Baba Yaga

Hmmm... (she sticks her tongue out like she is tasting something). Something new in my forest? ... Come out boy!


Vanya enters. He carries the sceptre, the sword is belted on him and he carried a sack over his shoulder.


Baba Yaga

Vanya from the village Chudovo...


Vanya

How did you know my name?


Baba Yaga

I am Baba Yaga... I know everything. You have passed water and fire and come to Earth... chasing Morozko... You are very brave... or very foolish...


The Leshiye laugh


Vanya

I was hoping...


Baba Yaga

That Baba Yaga would help you? Baba Yaga doesn’t help anyone without getting something in return. Where is my gift?


Vanya

I have it right here... (he puts down the sack)


The leshiye rush to grab it. It open in, put their hands in and pull out a fists full of mud. They immediately fling it away.


Baba Yaga

Mud? That is your gift for Baba Yaga?


Vanya

Not mud, compost. It will enrich your soil and help your garden grow strong and healthy.


Baba Yaga

Hmmm... Seems like you aren’t as foolish as you seem! Morozko’s last snowstorm destroyed my herbs and vegetables. With your compost, things might just recover!


Vanya

I am glad to be of service.


Baba Yaga

What a polite little human! But this soft mud is not enough! You must make me a promise as well. If you succeed...


Vanya

I will succeed...


Baba Yaga

Fine, when you succeed, tell your villagers to stop being greedy... They may use my

forests, but not destroy them!


Vanya

I promise to do that.


Baba Yaga

Good! Now come, Baba Yaga will help you. I will take you to Sky. But crossing Sky won’t be easy...


Vanya

If you take me there, then I will find a way to cross.


Baba Yaga

Then get into the mortar and let us fly!


Fade to green


Narrator

And so Vanya got into the strange vehicle Baba Yaga flew. And the old crone moved her pestle at lightning speed and they floated up and up and up! Beyond the mountaintops, beyond the clouds to Sky. Sky, which was the home of the Swan Princess and her court of Birds.








SCENE 5


Speaking Parts:

Swan Princess, Vanya, Morozko

Other Characters:

Birds: 8-10


Scene opens to a cloudy misty space with lots of different coloured streamers hanging down. The Birds enter and do the dance.


Dance of the Birds: 2-3 mins

  • Birds come

  • They can dance with streamers or ribbons or just their wings

  • The children playing the Swan Princess and older birds come in the centre and starts to dance with the little ones

  • At the end of the song, some smoke is released from all sides of the stage

  • Everyone collapses coughing


Fade to black


Narrator

The Sky, just like the other elements, was paying the price of human activities. Humans have been burning forests to make space for farms and more villages. The smoke this causes spreads through Sky and affects all beings. The Swan Princess and her Court of Birds can’t dance anymore. They can’t even breathe. But brave Vanya arrives just in time. He uses the magic sceptre gifted to him by the King of the Vodyanoy. This melts the smoke and makes it dissipate. But this is just a temporary solution. The pollution of the air can only stop when all humans learn to act more responsibly.


Stage lights up slowly. Only the Swan Princess and Vanya remain onstage. The Swan Princess is still looking sickly.


Swan

Thank you for saving us today...


Vanya

I did what I could.


Swan

But it won’t be enough... The smoke will return. Go through your journey brave Vanya, for there may be no Sky left very soon. Because humans will continue to be wasteful.


Vanya

Then I will teach them to be better.


Swan

You are just one boy. What can you do?


Vanya

That’s what everyone keeps telling me. That’s what they tell all children. Sometimes I feel they only say that because they are afraid of what children will achieve if they actually do what they want to.


Swan

So what are you going to do?


Vanya

Travelling through the elements has shown me that we humans are causing suffering to all. The water is full of our run-off, the fire is filled with our garbage, the earth is losing its fertility because of things we do. And the sky is dying in the smoke we make. So if we cause the problems, we need to fix them. That’s what I will teach people. To think. Without the elements we can’t survive. So when we destroy the elements, we destroy ourselves.


Enter Morozko


Morozko

Now if only the rest of humanity can learn as quickly as a 10-year-old boy.


Swan bows to Morozko and exits.


Vanya

Morozko! The Ice Demon!


Morozko

You know, I do hate that nickname. Why can’t I just be Morozko, the Cool Guy?


Vanya

You stole all the children from my village. That’s not something a cool guy would do!


Morozko

I only took the children so that they could see for themselves. See the harm their

parents are causing. Cutting forests, throwing rubbish away without segregating, over-using the soil... I mean, do they think they can return this planet when it stops working and get a free replacement?


Vanya

But why punish the children for what their parents have done?


Morozko

Punish? The children are not being punished! They are right there (points off) in the Giant’s garden, plucking apples and making snowmen.


Vanya

You mean, they are here? You mean this is Buyan? Your magical island?


Morozko

Indeed. Welcome to my home!


Vanya

But where is the snow and the everlasting ice?


Morozko

Ice gets boring after a while.


Vanya

But how did I get here?


Morozko

By crossing the 5 elements


Vanya

But I crossed only 4 – water where I met the Vodyanoy, fire where the dragons live, Earth with Baba Yaga and the Leshiye and Sky with the Swan Princess and her Court of Birds. I didn’t cross the fifth element – Heart!


Morozko

Heart isn’t found out here, heart is in there (points to Vanya’s chest). And you have crossed it twice – Once when you decided to search for the children. And once just now, when you decided to teach humans how to save the planet. You have a lot of heart kid!


Vanya

So, you’ll let me take the children and go back?


Morozko

Yes. I have better things to do than take care of a whole brood of snotty little babies.


Vanya

You won’t fight me?


Morozko

I am a pacifist.


Vanya

But you’re the ice-demon!


Morozko

Now you’re just being hurtful.


Vanya

So how do I go back?


Morozko

That sword of yours? It used to be mine. Just wave it about 3 times and you and the children will return home.


Vanya holds the sword above his head and starts waving it. The lights fade to black.


Narrator

And thus did Vanya cross the five elements and defeat the ice-demon Morozko.


From the dark


Morozko

He didn’t defeat me, I gave the children back. Can you guys please stop giving me such a bad rep?


Narrator

My apologies. And thus did Vanya cross the five elements and make friends with Vodyanoy, dragons, leshiye, Baba Yaga, the Swan Princess and the Court of Birds. And finally, he made friends with Morozko, the Lord of Winter him/herself.


From the dark


Morozko

Thank you. That feels much better.


Narrator

And with three waves of his magic sword, Vanya brought the children back to Chudovo. The villagers who had given up hope, jumped and whooped to see their children back. They hugged them and kissed them. And brave Vanya, they raised him on their shoulders and carried him across the village. Then they heard the tale of his adventure and promised to do their best to stop the destruction of the elements. And then they celebrated the happiest, most rollicking Maslenitsa ever!


Finale Dance: 3-4 mins

Other characters: Parents, Children. Eventually, the whole cast can join in and turn this in to a curtain call.

  • Parents are sitting sad and dejected

  • Children run in

  • Everyone jumps up and hugs their child

  • Everyone raises Vanya up

  • Everyone dances!


Fin






Download full script here


Artwork in the post:

Baba Yaga by Koka. Source: Wikimedia Commons

New Fairy Tale by Nikolay Bogdanov-Bel'sky. Source: Wikimedia Commons


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