by Eric Lane
(Enter JULIO. Enough said. After a brief and futile attempt at a stare down, BRADLEY exits, defeated.)
JULIO: Dinah?
DINAH: My God! Who are you?
JULIO: (removing shades) Dinah, the name is Julio. And I'll be your socially acceptable, conventionally healthy, and refreshinglymasculine fantasy for the duration of your pharmaceutical experience.
DINAH: (Looks at the pill bottle in awe.) Sweet nectar!
JULIO: Shhhh. From now on, there won't be any talking.
(Blackout.)
*CASTING NOTE: In one production of this play, the need for a pharmacist and extras in the drugstore scene was avoided by having Dinah and Bradley pantomime the exchange downstage.
THE FIND
Susan Sandler
The Find premiered in New York City on June 5, 2002, at the HB Playwrights Foundation as part of the Theatre's Sixth Annual Short Play Series. Amy Saltz directed the following cast:
PERRY Bernie Passeltiner
AGNES Victoria Boothby
(A man, PERR, [late sixties to early seventies] wielding a well-worn metal detector moves down the beach, monitoring the piercing beeps on his earphones. He wears a foreign legion khaki hat and carries a backpack with a small folding shovel attached. His pants are rolled up to his knees.)
(A woman, AGNES, [late sixties to early seventies] sits in a lounge chair, wearing a careful linen beach dress. She is patrician, bronze, and has about her the look of a summer spent in luxury at the beach.)
(The man moves the metal detector in careful circles around her. The clunky machinery buzzes loudly.)
AGNES: Disgusting. (When she speaks we hear her crisply —British, upper-class, and brittle, thoroughly repulsed by the spectacle.) I thought this was a private beach. (He keeps buzzing.) Won't you take your—equipment somewhere else? You're disturbing me. (He doesn 't hear her.) Dear God, do you mind?! (He keeps buzzing. She gets up, jabs him on the shoulder, her pointed finger a dagger. Shouting in his face.) Won't you take this disgusting thing somewhere else. There's six bloody miles of beach here, do you have to do this directly in my line of vision? This is, after all, a private beach.
(He gestures to his headset. Turns down the volume, slips off the headset.)
PERRY: What's that?
AGNES: (at normal volume, crisply) This is a private beach. Won't you please take your … equipment somewhere else.
PERRY: Oh, no, no—No private beaches here. All the beaches belong to all the people. That's how we do things in this country.
AGNES: I am a houseguest of Martin and Regina Duncan. These are the Duncan steps, this is the Duncan boat and I am quite certain that this then is the Duncan beach.
(She points to the sign on the steps that lead up the cliff to the imposing house.)
PERRY: First ten feet. After that, it's public property. My property, everybody's property—maybe not yours— You a U.S. citizen?
AGNES: No.
PERRY: Didn't think so.
AGNES: You're just doing this to irritate me. You've got a whole stretch of unmined beach and you're insisting on doing this section, one agonizing inch at a time. Why, may I ask, have you picked this bit of sand?
PERRY: Instinct. You get a feeling in the gut. Like everything else. You know what you know. And I feel like something real good is here.
AGNES: Oh? And what does your … gut tell you it might be? PERRY: Could be gold jewelry, precious stones. A find.
AGNES: Ridiculous. People don't toss their jewelry around in the sand.
PERRY: You'd be surprised. All kinds of things happen. People are careless with their treasures at the beach. They're here under this sky, breathing this air, the sun makes them feel, I don't know, like they could live forever and things don't matter so much. Things are just things—they get lost, they slip away, and it doesn't matter so much.
AGNES: What nonsense. Please, couldn't you just move along. I'm appealing to your better character. I've had a very diffi-
cult morning and I would adore the chance to just be alone and have some quiet time. You do understand.
PERRY: They at it again, are they?
AGNES: I beg your pardon?
PERRY: The Duncans. They at each other's throat again?
AGNES: I don't know whatever you mean.
PERRY: I seen 'em down here last month, she coulda sliced him down the middle like a big old bass, that's how steamy she was… she's a killer, eh?
AGNES: I don't approve of public disagreements.
PERRY: Well, whether you approve or not, them two's been having it up and down the beach all summer. I'm surprised they're not divorced already.
AGNES: (It slips out.) They will be. Very soon.
PERRY:See?
AGNES: My God, how frightful, I shouldn't be gossiping with you.
PERRY: Why not?
AGNES: I don't even know you.
PERRY: (extending his hand, warmly) Perry. Perry Geddis.
AGNES: (bristling, not taking his hand) Mr. Geddis, I am not in the habit of gossiping about my host and hostess. It's vulgar, it's rude and I am thoroughly ashamed of myself. Good day.
(She moves off toward the steps leading up the cliff to the house.)
PERRY: Wait, wait—don't let me chase you off. I can imagine how rough it must be for you up there. Please. I'll move along. (She hesitates.) I mean to say, I'm sorry I disturbed you. Please Miz—? (She turns.)
AGNES: Agnes Barton-Caufield.
PERRY: You related to Michael Caufield in Chattam? No, no of course not.—How could you be—I mean, well—We used to fish together—Good man, Caufield. Good friend. He came all the way to the island to see me after Madeline died. Tried to get me out on his boat. Good man.
AGNES: Yes, well—
PERRY: Please, take your seat, enjoy the sunset. (She moves slowly back and sits.) So where are you from?
AGNES: My family home is Shropshire, but I'm—I'm visiting friends here in the States.
PERRY: YOU mean the Duncans. AGNES: The Duncans and—and others. PERRY: Oh, I see. You're making the rounds.
AGNES: I hadn't thought about it in those terms—but yes, I suppose one might say I was “making the rounds.”
PERRY: We get a lot of that here. You got a home on this island, you got friends all over. Suddenly they're your best friends. Can't wait to see you, spend quality time—that means at least a week—enough to justify their airfare. Well, me and Maddie finally put a stop to it, whole summer there she was cooking, cleaning, changing sheets, like she was running a B&B and where were those dear friends in the middle of winter, I want to know. Yup, we put a stop to it. Even family can be freeloaders—Oh, sorry, I didn't mean to—I mean, I'm sure your—your situation is—. Well, I don't think the Duncans worry much about their houseguests, huh? They got a whole separate house for you, probably got your own separate maid. All you have to do is show up at dinner.
AGNES: Making the rounds, as you say, is a bit more complicated than it sounds. One does not just show up and act cheerful, one must play by one's hosts'rules, however ridiculous, how-
ever humiliating. One must learn to speak carefully with the staff, not too familiar, not too removed, a tone that says, please may I have some little comfort, without presuming to be in fact the lady of the house, one must understand that there is an art to being a good guest. And by that I mean, not just a good guest who doesn't ruffle feathers, or require too much attention, but a guest who gets invited BACK, that's the whole of it, you see, one wants to establish the pattern, the expectation—Oh, it's July, this must be Agnes. Can't wait to see dear, jolly Agnes. She listens to all our woes, laughs at our tired jokes, our excruciatingly boring family stories that God knows she's heard a thousand times, and will no doubt hear many more times—and while she certainly can carry off a bit of the old glamour and does have a whiff of royalty— her mother was Lady Frampton, her sister married a duke— she is a rather poor relation and we do get to feel sorry for dear Agnes—sorry and a little superi
or to the poor soul, and yes, we also get the added satisfaction, of feeling better about ourselves for having given the poor dear a bit of a break from the nasty summer heat of what is rumored to be her painfully modest London flat, barely a maid's room, that no one has ever seen, nor will they ever see.
(Silence.)
PERRY: Where do you go from here?
AGNES: Newport. The Gambols—then back to the Vineyard and then up to this utterly beautiful private island off the coast of Maine, and while I do detest these people, they have the most wonderful chef and a very sweet little guest cottage— it's a good distance from the main house. There is absolutely nothing to do there and the house has no library to speak of, and all they do is fish and drink and play cards, but I do have a good deal of time to myself.
PERRY: Well, I suppose that's something. (Pause.) There's always a price, eh?
AGNES: Always.
PERRY: Well, I'll be seeing you, Agnes. Enjoy the sunset.
AGNES: Thank you, Mr. Geddis.—Perry.
(He smiles, puts his headset on, and starts down the beach, buzzing in a careful grid. AGNES picks up her book, starts to read, puts it down, and stares out at the horizon. PERRY turns, starts back.)
PERRY: Wouldn't you just like to give her a feel? (He takes the headset off, extends it to her.) AGNES: I think not.
PERRY: Oh, come on, give her a try. When was the last time you had a chance to be a certified treasure hunter?
AGNES: I'm rather pleased to say—never.
PERRY: No one's looking. You know you want to— (He moves closer.) Just give her a little feel. Give her a little listen. (He takes off the headset.) It's not just the treasures you know, it's the stories that taste so good. After I get a good find, I like to think up the stories myself—sometimes it's like these two young lovers have this argument, and she's so hurt she wants to hurt him back. So she throws the ring, the thing that tied them together, right into the ocean and it's swallowed up. It's gone—then later, maybe years later, the shoreline reshapes itself, ocean piles the sand high here—destroys the dunes there, and that ring suddenly lands ten inches down, directly below your feet.
(He slips the headset around her neck —holds the detector out for her to take.)
AGNES: It's—it's awfully sweet of you. But I don't see myself engaged in this occupation. It's simply not what I do. Ever. (She starts to hand the headset back —then suddenly hears —) What's that sound?
PERRY: That's her heart beating. Hmm, she's purring. She's ready for something big.
AGNES: Oh?
(He slips the headset on, smiles blissfully.)
PERRY: Oh, yeah. Something big. Very near.
AGNES: Well, let me hear.
(She takes the headset, puts it on.)
AGNES: Oh, yes—I certainly hear that—oh—it's very interesting, isn't it. It gets louder over here, doesn't it. Uh huh. Yes. Just over here and then—
(She moves the wand over the sand cautiously, carefully, scanning the beach square foot by square foot with the look of a pro. PERRY smiles, watching her.)
PERRY: My Madeline, she never went hunting with me, but when I'm home with the prize, she's all for it. She'd have the table cleared off, “Watcha got today, honey?”
(AGNES takes her headset off, suddenly aware that he 's talking, not hearing.) AGNES: What are you saying there?
PERRY: I said, we'll have another hour of good light after the sunset.
AGNES: Just an hour, that's all? PERRY: Yup, looks like.
(She puts the headset back on. AGNES is fiercely into the search now, moving across the sand in careful circles. She turns to PERRY, her eyes blazing, the headset still in place, she can hear only the Tick-Tick, we hear it faintly now, too.)
PERRY: (to himself, as she moves the wand) —Oh, it's big time. The first find, you're hooked, Agnes. You're hooked.
AGNES: (excitedly, not hearing him) Well, come along then.
(AGNES circles the beach. We hear the ticking with her now as it draws her closer and closer to the target.)
(PERRY watches her, beaming as the ticking grows louder and louder and louder…. Blackout.)
THE GRAND DESIGN
Susan Miller
The Grand Design was done as a reading at New York's Town Hall on September 11, 2002, for Brave New World, a benefit commemorating 9/11. Starring Marsha Mason and Scott Cohen, directed by Cynthia Croot.
CHARACTERS
JOSH: Mid/late thirties. Smart. Underlying (and not so underlying) angst. Governed by his questions—the joy and difficulty of what he searches for and what he finds—and an abiding sense of humor.
FRANCES: Josh's mother. Late fifties/early sixties. Whatever her son has—trace it back! She is also, like him, in the process of discovery.
Their rhythms are bantering, intimate, passionate.
TWO-THREE PEOPLE: Any gender. Diverse. They sit somewhere on the periphery of the stage almost as if watching the action until they become part of it.
TIME: The present.
PRODUCTION NOTE: There are three slides shown at the beginning of the play and one slide near the end. The illustrations from which to make the slides appear at the end of the script.
With a minor adjustment of words in the opening, the play can be done without the use of slides.
(Lights up. JOSH leans against a desk. He is charismatic and relishes talking about what he knows and what he struggles to know. A slide goes up, depicting what he's about to tell us.)
JOSH: The first page of the Dutil-Dumas message, sent from a transmitter in the Ukraine. To signal other civilizations. The message was encoded using a system called Lincos that starts with simple mathematical ideas and builds to complex information about who we are.
(Beat.)
In case there's anyone out there.
(Another slide.)
April 5, 1973. Pioneer 11 is launched into deep space, carrying a message in the form of a six-by-nine inch gold plaque showing human figures, Earth's location in the universe, and a diagram of the hydrogen atom.
(Beat.)
In that same year, on the day before Pioneer 11 makes its voyage, the ribbon is cut on the tallest building in the world. One hundred ten stories high on sixteen acres in lower Manhattan. “A living representation,” according to the architect, “of man's belief in the cooperation of men … and through this cooperation his ability to find greatness.”
(Another slide.)
November 16th, 1974. The Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico sent this message toward a cluster of stars 25,000 light-years away A string of 1,679 bits, or ones and zeros, it can be assembled into a pictogram showing the figure of a man, a telescope, the numbers, DNA, and the solar system.
(End slides.)
1977. My personal favorite: gold plated L.P.s—remember phonograph records—in aluminum cases launched on board Voyager I and II. With, of course, instructions on how to play the records.
(He breaks into a dance to a lush arrangement of Sinatra. After a few bars, the music stops.)
Items missing from Voyager, Dutil-Dumas, Arecibo, and all previous messages that have traveled through space and time: The sign over Auschwitz. ARBEIT MACHT FREI. Work makes one free. A slave ship carrying the first of fifty million people Africa will lose to slavery or death en route. The hole in our ozone layer. A small woman refusing to sit at the back of the bus. Yen. Francs. Dollars. Money.
(A blank slide goes up.) (His struggle.)
2003. What? What's the message this time?
(A woman, his mother, speaks to the audience from another part of the stage.)
FRANCES: My son is kind of a poet scientist. He has a grant to come up with a message to alien civilizations. To let them know who we are. The human race. He's hit a wall. And I've left town. On foot.
JOSH: My mother is walking. She is walking with no clear purpose all across the United States. It's her response to the sit-uation. To turning a certain age. To my breakup. It's her memorial to the nature of our times.
(Beat.)
She calls me from the road.
FRANCES: (a succession of calls) I'm on the Eleanor Roosevelt Trail.
I'm standing outside a church on top of a hill in Ohio where the underground railroad connected.
I don't know where I am. But, I see cows.
I'm covering ground. I'm walking past the things I know.
(Beat.)
I met this person who picks the places to stop. To stop along the way. You know when you get directions—on your computer. What's that called—map something? Well, they actually send people out to find interesting things to do along the routes. I just never thought of that. There are all kinds of jobs I never thought about.
JOSH: Look, I'm sorry. I'm sorry things didn't work out and I didn't give you grandchildren and—
FRANCES: (to audience) He thinks I'm out here because he failed in his marriage. I'm out here because I failed. To know what to do next. I was sad. And I started walking. I was walking in circles all around the house. Finally, I just took it outside. I'm not the only one out here. There are mothers walking all over the place.
(Beat.)
I'm worried he won't find love.
(Thephone rings in his house. Although they begin talking to each other, as if on the phone, this is dropped shortly and they just address each other directly.)
FRANCES: Hi, Sweetie!
JOSH: Mom? Where are you?
FRANCES: If I wanted to be located, I would stay home.
JOSH: Are you just walking aimlessly or do you have some kind of plan?
FRANCES: I do have a plan. To walk aimlessly. All right, the story so far. I just had the most delicious, sinful piece of pie. They use shortening and whole eggs. I don't care. Because while I eat my pie or have my coffee, I'm not drowning in the facts.
(Beat.)
How are you coming with your memo to alien civilizations?
JOSH: See, when you say it like that—
FRANCES: Like what?
JOSH: Like how you said it. FRANCES: Like how I said memo or how's it coming?
JOSH: Anyhow, it's more like an equation. You know? Which lays out the thing to be discovered or proven. It's not necessarily what we are—it's what we could be.