- Professor Welch makes huge blaring sounds to silence the auditorium and the introductions begin.
- Looking into the crowd, Jim can see that the bottom seats are filled with pretty much every bigwig in the entire town.
- He thinks he may be feeling a little tipsy. Uh-huh.
- The balcony is full of students and regular townsfolk. There's definitely a pretty big class divide between the two areas.
- Finally, Jim gets up to the lectern and starts reading. There's an initial murmur in the crowd when people see his black eye.
- Jim keeps reading.
- The murmuring doesn't stop though. It gets louder.
- It takes Jim another minute to realize that he's reading his lecture in a mocking version of Professor Welch's voice.
- Jim looks out over the crowd to settle himself, and sees Bill Atkinson sitting out there.
- Bill has promised Jim to fake a fainting spell if Jim flashes him the secret signal.
- After an awkward pause, Jim starts reading again.
- But this time, he takes on the voice of the university Principal.
- People in the balcony think it's really funny, though the people in the lower area don't.
- Welch asks Jim what's wrong with him, but Jim carries on.
- Shortly put, Jim's just too drunk to make it through the lecture. Once he gets going, he can't control the tone of his voice.
- Instead of mocking Welch or the Principal, he spends the rest of his speech talking in a bitterly sarcastic tone, showing the crowd just how stupid he thinks all of this academic stuff is.
- In front of him, the entire lower section of the audience is frozen with shock and anger.
- Except for Mr. Gore-Urquhart, who's nearly laughing his head off.
- The crowd in the balcony is laughing, too. Everyone realizes that Jim's totally drunk.
- When he can bear no more, the Principal of the university stands up and tells Jim to stop.
- But Jim grabs the lectern and keeps going.
- Now he's shouting, telling the whole audience about how silly the whole study of medieval England is.
- Without realizing it, Jim gives Atkinson the secret signal. Atkinson screams in the middle of the audience and fakes a fainting spell.
- Meanwhile, Christine and Carol Goldsmith have shouted something at Bertrand and have gotten up to leave.
- It looks like Carol must've told Christine about what was going on between her and Bertrand.
- The whole scene is pretty much dissolving into chaos.
- And while all this is happening, Jim sinks to his knees and passes out onstage.