Previous
Act 4, Scene 4
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in If We Were Villains, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Fate vs. Free Will
Identity and Disguise
Love and Sexuality
Theatre and Corruption
Summary
Analysis
Oliver is late to combat call with James and Camilo. James asks him where he’s been, but before Oliver can answer, Camilo starts the rehearsal. James and Oliver begin to run through the confrontation between Edmund and Edgar. Following the script, Oliver calls him a traitor, and James’s expression darkens. Camilo calls out to them to take it easy as they begin the physical fight choreography. The plan is for them to parry as they force each other down a “bridge” that reaches into the audience. Once they get to the end of the bridge, Edgar will wound Edmund, and Edmund will fall. But when Oliver prepares to give James the killing stroke, James cracks him across the face with the pommel of his sword instead. As Oliver’s nose gushes blood, Camilo orders a teary-eyed James to leave.
James seems particularly offended to be called a traitor; already, he appears to be taking the scene too seriously, given that Camilo even tells them to take it easy. As James and Oliver begin to act out their fight choreography, the scene recalls the rehearsals of Julius Caesar in which Richard became more violent than the scene required. Seemingly for no reason, James lashes out at Oliver, just as Richard would have—and in an echo of their first combat class of the year, Oliver takes the hit. James has changed since the beginning of the year. His strike at Oliver seems like it was in response to his motion to kill him, as if it’s a desperate act of self-defense—or is it a moment of violence against defenseless Oliver, like it was for Richard?
Themes
