Mrs. Potts Confronts the Enchantress Who Cursed Her and the Other Servants

MRS. POTTS knocks on the door to a magic palace. An ENCHANTRESS opens it.

ENCHANTRESS: Bonjour?

MRS. POTTS: Bonjour.

ENCHANTRESS: Bonjour!

MRS. POTTS: Bon — No, enough of that. My name is Mrs. Potts. You don’t know me, but you transformed me into an anthropomorphized object for some reason.

ENCHANTRESS: What?

MRS. POTTS: Remember the night you disguised yourself as a haggard old woman and showed up at a castle door to test the morality of the local monarch?

ENCHANTRESS: You’re going to have to be more specific.

MRS. POTTS: I remember it well. It’s the night I became a teapot.

ENCHANTRESS: Why did I do this, again?

MRS. POTTS: To teach my spoiled selfish employer a lesson. Because a great way to make a prince more selfless and considerate is to imprison and curse all of his servants alongside him, thus ensuring he can continue to live his life without having to lift a finger. That’ll learn him.

ENCHANTRESS: Okay, it’s coming back to me. I turned him into a lion/goat/bear hybrid?

MRS. POTTS: Yes. I just need to understand why. Why did you curse us? We were completely blameless, and if anything, oppressed in our own right by the feudalistic class system in place.

ENCHANTRESS: I wonder why I didn’t see the injustice there before.

MRS. POTTS: I don’t know, maybe because you’re a fairy princess who also lives in a castle. And kind of hard to believe there was no ill intent here. Mrs. Potts the teapot? Cogsworth the clock? Lumiere the candelabra?

ENCHANTRESS: I swear that wasn’t intentional. Probably some curse algorithm involving aptronyms. I’m ever so embarrassed.

MRS. POTTS: Whatever. So you think this asshole’s gonna change long-term because of a flower?

ENCHANTRESS: I was going more for trauma.

MRS. POTTS: If he’s been terrible to women his whole life — and his servants frankly — you think he’ll treat her differently?

ENCHANTRESS: Who?

MRS. POTTS: Belle.

ENCHANTRESS: Who’s Belle.

MRS. POTTS: The literate peasant he recently imprisoned in exchange for her father who he had previously imprisoned.

ENCHANTRESS: Ohhhhh, this was one of my love curses then?

MRS. POTTS: Your plan was essentially “place an unknowing teenage girl in the palm of an abuser who’s had no counseling, no anger management, no treatment for his own history of trauma as a man turned into a lion/goat/bear hybrid.” And she’s supposed to do what? Fix him? With her love?

ENCHANTRESS: Love is a powerful thing.

MRS. POTTS: So is Stockholm syndrome. Talk about squandered potential. She wanted adventure in the great wide somewhere, not to be imprisoned in a castle like a mile from her childhood home.

ENCHANTRESS: Look, I didn’t place any teen girls anywhere. I just set up an enchanted castle and a love-based curse. How was I to know that would attract a teen girl? And who’s to say I didn’t just want the prince to suffer with self loathing until he died? In all likelihood, that was my plan A.

MRS. POTTS: So what exactly happens to us, his staff, if he dies?

ENCHANTRESS: Hmmm.

MRS. POTTS: Didn’t even give it a thought. Tale as old as the monarchy.

ENCHANTRESS: Sorry, I’m not entirely sure what happens.

MRS. POTTS: I stand before you as this porcelain kitchenware to say I sure as hell would like to know. Do my children die? Are we being treated as the extension of our master here, robbed entirely of our identities? Or are we doomed to be household objects for the rest of our lives? What even is the lifespan of a teapot? Do my teacup children age into teapots? Are we essentially immortal until broken? Do you see the existential mess you’ve created?

ENCHANTRESS: Well, I suppose there’s a chance you’d all go back to normal if he died.

MRS. POTTS: I mean yeah, we’ve discussed killing him. After all dear, this is France, and a revolt here is never second best. But seems too risky. From a utilitarian standpoint, Belle taking one for the team is a better option. But I don’t want that either.

ENCHANTRESS: You could kill him after the curse lifts?

MRS. POTTS: Or you could lift the curse now. At least the part involving me and the other servants.

ENCHANTRESS: Of course, of course.

MRS. POTTS: Look. I know your intentions were good, but just think it through next time.

ENCHANTRESS: You’re right. No more curses.

MRS. POTTS: I didn’t say that. I could think of a million ways to curse the French monarchy if you had thought to ask me.

ENCHANTRESS: I’ll make it up to you then. Curse by curse, one by one, till you shout, “Enough I’m done!”

ENCHANTRESS opens the door wide. MRS. POTTS smiles and hops into the castle.

MRS. POTTS: Tie your charms around your neck Cherie, and I’ll provide the rest.