NWC #12- "Play within
a play" DUE Nov 13th at 8am
I've had a lot of stages
build "inside" the stage of the play. I'm currently writing a two
person "pocket musical" version of Beowulf that has this element in
it as well.
Theater inside theater is
so meta!
Dude.
Yes.
*CHALLENGE-* Take either
your #10 or #11 posting and have that be the play that is happening inside the
play you write today.
Who is watching this?
Kings and Queens? Inmates? Teens on a first date?
How does this play make a
revelation happen for someone in today's play?
What action do they take?
Stab stab stab
Or, ya know... break all
the rulz.
THAT'S MY FETUS! (Tech
week!)
BETTY and BOB.
Their living room.
BOB
As you know, Betty, you and I have been married to
each other for seven years.
BETTY
Yes, Bob, my husband. I am aware of that.
STAGE MANAGER calls out over a loudspeaker.
STAGE MANAGER
Hold,
please.
BETTY (actor)
And
it was going so well.
BOB (actor)
Yes. We were really on a roll.
BETTY (actor)
Two
whole lines in. The momentum!
STAGE MANAGER
OK,
OK, you know the first cue takes forever.
Just let us get the settings right for the living room set and building
all the other cues on top of it after this will be that much easier.
BOB (actor)
Hey,
I'm getting paid. I don't care. I'll read a book.
BETTY (actor)
Wait? You're getting paid.
BOB (actor)
I
guess they're only paying the good actors this time.
BETTY (actor)
Ha
ha. We're all getting paid.
BOB (actor)
Yes,
but are you being paid as much as I am?
BETTY (actor)
Patriarchy
being what it is, probably not.
BOB (actor)
Want
to compare?
BETTY (actor)
No. I don't want to be depressed this early in
tech. It's already gonna be a long
night.
BOB (actor)
Truer
words were never spoken.
STAGE MANAGEMENT
We're
nearly set, guys. Thanks for your
patience.
BETTY (actor)
Besides,
if they were only paying the good actors, the only one getting paid would be
fetus boy.
FETUS (actor) leans in.
FETUS (actor)
Yeah,
well, Fetus Boy here covered in stage blood which is starting to congeal in
uncomfortable places.
BETTY (actor)
Well,
you're dead anyway, so it shouldn't bother you.
FETUS (actor)
Ha
ha. You're a laugh riot evil non-mommy.
STAGE MANAGER
OK,
we're ready to go. Pick up right where
you left off. Thanks.
BOB plays
this line up for his tech week audience of collaborators.
BOB
Seven long years.
STAGE MANAGER
You're
hilarious. Keep going.
BETTY
plays along.
BETTY
Wouldn't have seemed so long if they'd been good
years, would they, Bob?
STAGE MANAGER
You
want to go home before midnight, you'll keep it moving.
BOB
Yes, Betty, it's been tough.
BETTY
By tough, do you mean the abortion you've never
forgiven me for?
BOB
Now, Betty, what did I tell you about ending a
sentence in a preposition?
BETTY
I'm sorry, Grammar Nazi. I meant, of course, the abortion for which
you've never forgiven me.
BOB
It's not a choice, it's a child, Betty.
BETTY
Well, it wasn't your child, Bob, and if I'd let it
live, probably even someone as stupid and selfish as you would have figured out
the baby looks nothing like you.
BOB
Who would it look like, Betty? Perhaps Pablo, our groundskeeper?
STAGE MANAGER
Hold,
please.
BETTY (actor)
Really?
BOB (actor)
For
what?
STAGE MANAGER
Pablo
to the stage, please. Pablo to the
stage.
PABLO (actor) pokes his head in.
PABLO (actor)
Shirt
or no shirt?
STAGE MANAGER
What
do *you* think?
PABLO (actor)
No
shirt it is.
STAGE MANAGER
Thank
you. I'm sorry.
PABLO (actor)
Hey,
it's a paycheck.
PABLO has a spray bottle of water. He mists his bare torso.
PABLO (actor)
Pays
for my gym membership.
BETTY (actor)
I'd
like to shake the hand of your personal trainer.
BOB (actor)
Me,
too.
PABLO (actor)
Fake
sweaty enough?
STAGE MANAGER
Yes,
but keep the spray bottle nearby. We may
need to mist you up again while we reset the lights.
PABLO (actor)
Will
do.
STAGE MANAGER
OK,
can we start it back up on "Well, it wasn't your child, Bob..."? Thanks.
BETTY
Well, it wasn't your child, Bob, and if I'd let it
live, probably even someone as stupid and selfish as you would have figured out
the baby looks nothing like you.
BOB
Who would it look like, Betty? Perhaps Pablo, our groundskeeper?
Special light reveals PABLO, shirtless and
glistening.
BETTY (actor)
Oh
come on!
STAGE MANAGER
What?
BETTY (actor)
How
is anybody supposed to concentrate on what we're saying with him standing there glistening like that?
BOB (actor)
How
am *I* supposed to concentrate on what we're saying with him standing there
glistening like that?
PABLO (actor)
Thanks,
dude.
BOB (actor)
No,
thank *you*.
STAGE MANAGER
This
is what the producers want.
BETTY (actor)
I
am not touching that one.
BOB (actor)
I
would gladly touch -
STAGE MANAGER
Guys!
BETTY (actor)
OK,
OK.
STAGE MANAGER
Pick
up from the Pablo reveal.
BETTY
You should know, Bob. You slept with him, too.
BOB
Bisexuals are so confusing.
BETTY
You should know, Bob. Why didn't you screw your secretary like any
normal man? Heck, I'd fuck her. Oh wait, I did. I borrowed one of the dildos you and Pablo
were temporarily not shoving up your bungholes together and gave that minimum
wage slave the ride of her life.
BOB
Her short life.
BETTY
Not as short as my baby's.
BOB
Why did my secretary kill herself?
Special light reveals SECRETARY, hanging from a
self-made noose.
BETTY (actor)
Seriously? I'm now getting upstaged by an aborted fetus,
the hunky gardener, AND the suicidal secretary handing from the rafters?
The aborted FETUS pokes his head in.
FETUS (actor)
I
haven't started to upstage you yet.
Technically.
STAGE MANAGER
Please
don't encourage her. We'll never see
home again.
SECRETARY (actor)
Can
we speed things along, please? The
harness that's keeping me from actually hanging myself is giving me a wedgie.
BOB (actor)
Wait
a second. When you say "we'll"
never see home again, are you using the grand collective "we" or do
you mean - ?
BETTY (actor)
Oh
my god, you're banging fetus boy?!
PABLO (actor)
Man,
you two must have been really engrossed in your lines. You miss everything.
SECRETARY (actor)
Apparently
even dead people like me are quicker on the uptake.
BOB (actor)
You're
banging fetus boy?
STAGE MANAGER
Fetus
boy's banging me actually but yeah.
BETTY (actor)
He's
a child!
STAGE MANAGER
He's
not an actual fetus.
BETTY (actor)
I'm
aware of that, thank you. I mean he's -
FETUS (actor)
I'm
nineteen.
BETTY (actor)
Good
for you, sweetie.
FETUS (actor)
I'm
in a BFA actor training program.
BETTY (actor)
Still
means you're barely legal, and he can't even get you drunk first.
FETUS (actor)
He
doesn't need to get me drunk, trust me.
He can apply and remove my stage blood any day of the week.
PABLO (actor)
And
he does. Get a room, you two.
FETUS (actor)
Oh
we will. Trust me.
STAGE MANAGER
Just
as soon as we get through tech, people.
C'mon. Moist gardener, swingin'
secretary, but the fetus hasn't even crawled out on stage yet.
BETTY (actor)
I
feel like I should report you to someone.
FETUS (actor)
Please. I pounced on him first. He's hot.
BETTY (actor)
But.
FETUS (actor)
You
didn't love me, Mommy. You vacuumed me
out and tossed me in the garbage. Let
someone else love me.
STAGE MANAGER
Can
we *please* pick up from "Why did my secretary kill herself?"
SECRETARY (actor)
Please?
BOB
Why did my secretary kill herself?
BETTY
Aside from the fact she was working for you, you
mean?
BOB
Yes, aside from that.
BETTY
She's a woman in America, Bob. Do the math.
BOB
Misogyny killed my secretary?
BETTY
No. Her
Protestantism did. Protestants are
pussies. They can't cope with the
supernatural.
BOB
I love that TV show.
BETTY
Of course you do.
It features four attractive men who are all in love with each other and
REALLY tortured about it. But I meant
the actual supernatural, Bob.
BOB
Oh, you mean like the fact that the spirit of your
aborted fetus still haunts our house?
BETTY
Yes, Bob.
Exactly.
Betty's
aborted FETUS starts dragging itself across the stage with the bloody stumps
that would have become its arms and legs.
BOB
There is it now.
Hi, baby!
FETUS
Fuck off, Bob.
You're not my daddy.
BOB
I still love you.
All life is precious.
FETUS
Stuff it, you useless old fuck. Go sodomize the gardener.
BOB
He's a groundskeeper.
FETUS
You still pay him more for servicing your shriveled
dick that you do for trimming the hedges, so I don't think he much cares what
you call him. And I don't feel like
reinforcing your sense of superiority by adopting your pretentious vocabulary,
so, you know, eat me.
BOB
I wish I'd gotten a chance to know you.
FETUS
You'll have plenty of time. I'll be haunting your ass the rest of your
life.
BOB
I meant, really know you. As a baby.
FETUS
Life begins at conception. I am a baby.
Was a baby. Will forever be a
murdered baby dragging my bloody carcass around your house and ruining your
hardwood floors.
BOB
It's what we deserve.
BETTY
You see, we can have a conversation with the spirit
of an aborted fetus and not lose our minds.
We're Catholics. We still believe
in exorcism. We expect the devil, the
actual devil, not a fictional construct, to come to our front door and
knock. We see our entire lives as a
struggle against a real enemy, actual evil in the flesh. And of course we believe in saints and
angels. It's a pity the vast majority of
decent churchgoing folk don't believe in things like ending poverty or hunger
or healing the sick or visiting those in prison. Things that, you know, might actuall;y
help. Keep us from being bored. Fucking the help.
FETUS
Aborting fetuses.
BETTY
Exactly.
What if we actually did good instead of insisting we ARE good without
any proof to back it up.
FETUS
I enjoyed driving your secretary insane, Bob. Now she's in hell, with all the other
suicides. And me, and all the aborted
fetuses. And one day you, too, will join
us, burning in the eternal flames.
BETTY
Your theology is troubling, dead baby.
FETUS
You should be troubled, you adulterous murdering
bitch.
BETTY
Finally someone sees me for who I truly am.
FETUS
I have a name.
BETTY
What is it?
FETUS
Fuck you!
You'll never know.
BOB
That seems like an awfully long name.
FETUS
Now I know why you fucked the gardener and the
secretary.
BOB
Groundskeeper and executive assistant.
FETUS
Fuck your vocabulary of privilege, non-daddy.
BETTY
Why will I never know your name, dead baby?
FETUS
Because God gave me my name. And God will never speak to you again.
BETTY
But we'll be together again in hell.
FETUS
And I will make your life here on earth a living
hell until then.
BETTY
I'm already married to Bob. There's not much more you can do to me.
BOB
tries to clean the floor.
BOB
Where does all this blood come from? How do you keep bleeding?
FETUS
It's my blood, mixed with the blood of Christ, and
all the Christian martyrs and saints, condemning you with the bright red stain
of retribution and God's unforgiving justice.
STAGE MANAGER
America,
ladies and gentlemen.
OK,
let's go back and run it from the top...
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