“Rehearsing a play is making the word flesh. Publishing a play is reversing the process.” - Peter Shaffer
          FHS Theatre is in rehearsal for Peter Shaffer’s Royal Hunt of the Sun.  Director, Kathy Powdrell worked with Shaffer’s publisher, Samuel French Inc. NYC-London to acquire special permission to not only allow a high school group to  produce his play but to perform scenes from Royal Hunt of the Sun for the spring contest:  University Interscholastic League One Act Play. 
          Shaffer took his plays off the “UIL scenes from” list 25 years ago for professional reasons.  America’s leading publisher of plays and musicals, Samuel French attends the University Interscholastic League State Academics - One Act Play Contest each year in Austin, Texas.
          Samuel French’s Vice President Kenneth Dingledine has admired the work of Friendswood at the State Meet over the years and  offered to help Powdrell with publishing issues if the need arose.  In August, while selecting a season for 2011 – 2012 Powdrell solicited Dingledine’s help to acquire the production rights for Fall and Spring  performances of Royal Hunt.  Powdrell received permission in early September.
          The Spanish expedition under Pizzaro to the land of the Incas told in dazzling spectacle and moral chiaroscuro. After general absolution for any crimes they may commit against the pagan Incas, the conquerors set forth upon the sea. The Inca god is a sun god, ruler of the riches and people of Peru and thought to be immortal. But the Spaniards have come in conquest rather than in reverence.
          There is misunderstanding, confusion, and slaughter: the Spaniards kill 3000 unarmed Incas and take the sun god captive. The ransom is 9000 pounds of gold. The avaricious Spaniards mutiny, try the sun god in kangaroo court and garrote him. He does not revive the Incas behold their dead god.
          "High intelligence and bold, imaginative reach ... soaring passages that recall the stage to its lofty enterprise, and a theme of enduring significance." N.Y. Times. "Greatest play of our generation." Daily Mail.
          The play begins in Spain, where Pizarro recruits 167 men for an expedition to Peru. He is accompanied by his second-in-command Hernando de Soto, and Vicente de Valverde, a Catholic priest determined to spread the shining light of Christianity. It is narrated or commented upon by Martin,  who is obsessed with chivalry, glory and honour, but becomes increasingly disillusioned throughout, as Pizarro's crisis of faith also unravels.
          Pizarro reveals to Martin that he used to dream of the Sun God as a child. When the room is finally filled, Pizarro asks Atahualpa to swear to leave his men unharmed, but the king refuses. The Spaniards urge Pizarro to have Atahualpa executed, and the beginnings of a mutiny against Pizarro stir. Atahualpa tells Pizarro to allow his men to kill him, because, as the son of the Sun, he will revive the morning after anybody kills him.
          Pizarro agrees to do this, and is inducted into the Incan religion by Atahualpa personally. Atahualpa is decreed to burn at the stake, and Pizarro has this changed to strangling (since Atahualpa's body is required intact for the rebirth to work) if Atahualpa agrees to be baptized. He does so, and is strangled. Pizarro waits until dawn with the body, but it does not re-awake, leading him to hold the body and weep while Old Martin narrates the end of the story.