DD is lead role in play tonight and has just developed gastroenteritis.....

[DorianGrey]

DD is 15, has just had pretty violent diarrhoea and vomiting, aches etc. (started around 2am).
She is supposed to be playing the lead role in a production at our local theatre for the next 4 nights starting tonight (Wednesday). There is no understudy.

I'm certain it is gastroenteritis, not nerves as she's a seasoned performer.

She is desperate to go on with the show and doesn't want to let anyone down.

I think loperamide is the treatment for diarrhoea, what would be best for the vomiting?

No idea whether it's something she atr or a bug.
Would she still be infectious if it is a bug but we can get the symptoms under control?

Aargh, what would you Do?

Contact the theatre ASAP and see if you can cancel tonight's performance or push the dates back by a day or two. It's their error for not having an understudy.
She will still be contagious for a couple of days.

She'll be so washed out that doing the show tonight is most likely impossible. It is very very physically demanding being on stage under hot lights etc. This shouldn't be underestimated. Far better to sit out tonight and be better for the rest of the week.

Also if DD turns up today, chances are that others in the cast will develop it for subsequent nights of the show.

It beggars belief that they don't have an understudy for the lead! But in my experience there will be other members of the cast who know the lead role well enough to be able to fill in almost satisfactorily because you tend to absorb the lines and stage choreography of the lead roles when you're sitting around watching during rehearsals.

Something similar happened to me at precisely the same age. I, for one night had a lead role (but not the lead) on the last of a play and woke up that morning with no voice whatsoever due to a throat infection. Determined to do it I forced out a voice for the evening and damaged my vocal cords so badly I had a year of losing my voice 70% of the time and had to have speech therapy to rebuild everything and have never fully recovered.

It isn't worth the potential risks of your DD doing tonight's show. Far better for her to rest and make a decent job of Thurs, Fri, Sat shows.

Applying the 48 hour rule probably isn't necessary with a 15 yr old. In most adult settings a 24 hr rule is applied because adults are better at hygeine, hand washing etc.

You probably don't need anti sickness meds as if it's gastroenteritis and she's throwing up very frequently now chances are she'll stop of her own accord within the next eight hours anyway. Better to let her body rid itself of the virus than try to stop it.

for your DD. I know how devastating it feels and the feeling of letting others down is horrid but is not her fault! Whoever organised the play without an understudy for the lead is a muppet, to put it politely!

Amateur shows don't usually have understudies. There just isn't the time, nor often the people available, to rehearse understudies.

I've been involved in amateur dramatics for 11 years through the dc in various shows. I think in all that time we've never needed an understudy-come close on one occasion, but that's it.

The only time understudies were appointed, it was to appease a pushy mum who expected her dc to get the main part every time and clearly wasn't going to achieve it without clear unfairness to most of the cast those who were clearly better. It was name only and no rehearsals were ever done for the understudies. I suspect if pushy mum had poisoned sleeping beauty had been ill then she wouldn't have been capable of doing it anyway.