The only plausible justification I can think of for the first point is that Eve is put on as understudy more or less as a formality; that is, the understanding would be that if Margo had to cancel, the performance would be canceled. And then, when Margo does cancel (a few days after Miss Caswell's ill-fated audition), perhaps Max Fabian felt pressured to have the performance go on by the presence of so many critics and journalists in the house that night, and obviously Eve herself could be very persuasive.
Eve would only have been in place as Margo's understudy for a short time anyway, since it's established that Aged in Wood is about to close so Margo can go into rehearsals for Footsteps on the Ceiling.
It's not precisely established when Eve's debut occurs, but it's two weeks after Bill returns from Hollywood, where he went to make a movie in early October, and it's apparently early winter (snow on the ground near the Richards' country house, but the next day, warm enough in Manhattan that Karen arrives at "21" for lunch in a suit, no coat and a light fur wrap... so, let's say that Eve goes in as understudy in early December, then goes on sometime around Christmas week?
Anyway, Footsteps on the Ceiling gets cast, rehearsed, taken out of town, opened in New York, acclaimed, Eve wins the Sarah Siddons award and announces she's leaving the show, all by June of the following year. If Footsteps was planned for a spring opening, then Aged in Wood must surely have been planned to close soon after the first of the year, i.e., only a few weeks after Eve came on as understudy.
As to the second point, it's suggested that Lloyd is very much under Karen's thumb when it comes to casting his plays, and Eve has blackmailed Karen into insisting on her for the part of Cora. Eve is, we are to believe, brilliantly talented and Lloyd has the hots for her, so there's that. But, yes, it seems bizarre that a Broadway premiere of a big commercial play would go on with someone with no experience at all.
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