(Pause.)
Change.
(Insistent.)
Change!
(Quickly.)
Everything is changing around us so fast that we have no reference points any more. That’s what I’m talking about.
(Unsure.)
Well, perhaps I should elaborate. I’m not talking about suitcase bombs or artificial intelligence or smokeless ashtrays. That’s scientific advancement. I’m not talking about animals becoming extinct, soil erosion or tsunamis. That’s just Mother Nature. And I’m not talking about the coins in your purse or pocket because that’s just . . .
(Quickly.)
. . . well, change, but it’s not the kind of change I’m talking about, although it has something to do with it but . . .
(Pause.)
It’s the constant change of traditions. The destruction of established norms, the shattering of the few expectations we still have left to hold onto.
(Frustrated.)
I suppose you want an example.
(HE paces, thinking. Stops.)
All right. Here it is. You can’t get a good candy bar in this country for under a dollar any more. It’s this willful, negligent and unnecessary increase in the price of services and products that were at a standard price so long, they became part of the foundation of the American way of life!
(Catches his breath. Smugly.)
You’re starting to follow me, aren’t you? This didn’t all start with the death of cheap candy. No way! Where did it start? Nobody knows. Because I’m the only one who’s noticed it so far and I’m only 17 years old. This has probably been going on since man first traded polished stones for pieces of cooked dinosaur meat. But I can tell you when I first discovered this phenomenon.
(Happily reminiscent.)
As a boy, my family and I used to go to a place called the Four G’s Restaurant for dinner. They had the best steaks in town. You got a thick, juicy cut of steak, a big baked potato with gobs of butter and sour cream and nice dinner salad with lots of different vegetables in it for $5.99. We went there once a week. The quality was uniform. The price was right. It became, like, a tradition.
(Ominously.)
And then, one terrible night, we arrived at Four G’s only to read a sign in the window with three of the most terrifying words I’ve ever read together.
(Mimes reading, slowly.)
“Under . . . New . . . Management.”
(HE walks toward an imaginary restaurant, staring at it, stunned.)
What was wrong with the old management? They did good business. The place had plenty of customers. We were regulars. The owner knew us by name. He was a great guy, Mister, uh, Mister. . . . I can’t remember his name right now, but anyway!
(HE mimes walking inside the restaurant and sits.)
We walked inside cautiously. Same plastic, red and white gingham tablecloths. Same paintings of old sailing ships on the walls. Our waitress was even the same. She handed us menus. Without even looking, we order the usual. The waitress wrote down our order and left.
(HE mimes opening the menu.)
Ten dollars and ninety-nine cents? We made tense small talk, waiting for our food, fearing our food. And then it came.
(Horrified.)
Tough, dark wedges of meat, brimming with fat. A potato barely the size of a golf ball. And a dinner salad that consisted of lots of lettuce topped with one single cherry tomato.
(Sadly philosophical.)
My childhood died right there, that night. If the comfort of my family’s weekly dinner at Four G’s could be taken away that quickly, that pointlessly, then what tradition was safe? Soon after that, I found out everything was up for grabs. The Big Hunk candy bar I bought shrank into a little chunk. There were suddenly fewer baseball cards in a pack and they cost more and to try and make up for it, they gave you a thin, dried-up wafer of gum, that crumbled like old parchment when you chewed it.
(Angrily.)
I mean, my God, I was just a little kid and my world was systematically degraded and devalued.
(Remembering.)
I’m sure it was tough on my parents, too. But they were adults, used to the world of mortgages, down payments and short-term loans. All I knew was five dollars a week allowance, cash and carry.
(Deep parental voice.)
“Make it last!”
(Normal voice.)
My folks told me each week. But how was I supposed to stretch my shopping dollar when prices were multiplying like a hyperactive amoeba? I’ll tell you, I was getting an education in economics that would put the Harvard Business School to shame.
(Excitedly.)
But I came up with a solution. Get more money! I went to management . . .
(Sotto voce.)
. . . my parents.
(Normal voice.)
And told them that labor . . .
(Sotto voce.)
. . . that’s me . . .
(Normal voice.)
. . . was in need of a cost-of living increase. Management took a hard line, claiming I hadn’t fulfilled one clause in our oral agreement, specifically, washing the dishes every Tuesday. I suggested amending the current contract, bringing labor’s salary up to the industry standard, which, according to my friend Jackie Heggemann was at least seven dollars a week. Management said, “No.” I said, “What’s your counteroffer?” They said,
(Parental voice.)
“we’re not making a counteroffer.”
(HE backs up, as if being threatened.)
Management still didn’t give an inch, although they did raise their voices. I was getting desperate. I tried $5.25 a week. Nothing. Five ten? Forget it. How about just deleting the clause concerning dishwashing?
(HE pathetically shakes his head no.)
Management had me begging and pleading and they loved every minute of it. My back was to the living-room wall. I summoned my courage and informed them that if they remained unwilling to renegotiate the contract, labor would have no other alternative than to go on strike.
(HE smugly stands his ground.)
That got them. They carefully sized me up, trying to determine if I’d go through with the strike threat.
(Intensely.)
The male half of management leaned forward, blew a puff of pipe smoke at me, and reminded me that if I struck, I could kiss goodbye my extensive benefits package, which included food, clothing and shelter. The female half of management . . .
(Shouting.)
SCREAMED THAT THOSE EMPLOYEE BENEFITS INCLUDED CLEANING, COOKING, SEWING, HEALTH CARE, TRANSPORTATION, EDUCATION AND MISCELLANEOUS EXPENSE ITEMS, LIKE MY TEN-SPEED BIKE AND BASEBALL GLOVE!
(Reasonably.)
I thought to myself, they’ve got a point. But my pride was at stake here, too. In an eleventh-hour bargaining compromise, I suggested $5.05 for allowance and a written guarantee on labor’s part to do dishes every Tuesday.
(Confidently.)
I knew that this offer would bridge our differences. And you know what happened?
(Stunned.)
Management got up, left the bargaining table and told me to go to my room! I couldn’t believe it. How much more reasonable do you want a kid to be?
(Lights fade.)
UNEQUALIBRIUM
BY ALEXANDER LYRAS AND ROBERT MCCASKILL
A young man, ISAAC, has a complicated good-night phone call with his girlfriend, Kassandra. HE wears sweatpants rolled up to his knees, a synthetic orange tank top, socks, and wool slippers, holds a phone with a long cord stretched across the apartment to his ear.
SCENE
ISAAC’s apartment. Scattered about the stage, ski pants, sweatshirt, a thick flannel shirt, duck boots, running shoes, ski goggles, a wool hat, a long winter coat, a warm-up pullover with gloves in the front pouch, a CD Walkman, keys, and a small cardboard box overstuffed with office supplies.
TIME
Friday night and Saturday, December 14 and 15, 2001
DISENTANGLED
ISAAC
: Good-bye! It’s late. I’m tired! You’re great! Good-bye. I’m not mad! No, I’m not coming over tonight, Kassandra.—I’m NOT coming over. Kassandra? Kassandra? Kassandra? Why are you torturing me? I’m NOT mad! Can you hold one sec?
(ISAAC puts the phone on hold. HE walks to a box and pulls out a nine iron. HE smashes a small cardboard box to death with it. Feels better. Returns to phone and picks it up.)
I’m back. Fine, I’m mad! I’m FURIOUS AT YOU!—Because it was our friend’s recital, our FRIEND! And you’re talking and you’re whispering, and you’re Fftffk! during the performance, like you’re in a bar! And I tell you to shhh and you SHHH me back LOUDER! That face you make! The whole thing was interrupted! And you’re with ME, Kass, PEOPLE KNOW YOU.
Everyone’s a potential client at this point, a very needed client, you know that. The LAST thing I need at this point is to lose a design because my girlfriend’s being a cunt.—Hello?
(HE hangs up.)
I gotta watch my fucking language now?
(HE redials.)
Trouble in paradise. Hi. . . . It slipped! I’m sorry. I promise I will never use that word again. I promise!—Okay . . . I’ll come over.
(ISAAC puts both duck boots on.)
Yes, now I’m putting my Timberlands on. You know, can I just say that you are my greatest joy and the only source of misery in my life.
Well, why are you being like this now? I need you to be supportive right now and you’re on a rampage!
(HE puts the flannel shirt on, accidentally buttoning it over the phone cord.)
I AM trying to! What do you think I’m doing every day? The market’s not what it used to be, darling, and right now web masters are a notch below typewriter repairmen!
I can’t answer that.—No, because, there is no answer, okay? There is no SYSTEM for figuring this out. You can live your life like you think there is—like the corporate winners who downsized me—but it’s a lie. Because the truth is: NOBODY KNOWS ANYTHING.
I’m putting my jacket on!
(ISAAC puts on the winter jacket. Notices the phone cord in his shirt. Pulls it out.)
These people? These corporate people are all scared to DEATH to take a gamble!
(ISAAC begins to search for something. Pulls stuff from pockets. Shakes out the clothes and shoes on the floor.)
Their entire philosophy of life is predicated upon the idea of RISK AVERSION.
God, if I hear that term again I’m gonna put my fist through a shower curtain. These people can’t take a piss without figuring out if it’s risk averse or not. And all the MBAs and LMMs and whatever other initials I don’t have that they get a salary in perpetuity for are nothing more than a form of insurance, it’s all insurance!
(ISAAC searches elsewhere on the set.)
—I’m trying to find my keys, Kass. When I do, I’ll walk out the door! You’re like them, you realize that? Demand! That’s what they do. They demand that big money-making idea! But make a mistake and you’re fired. These people will never understand that mistakes are the only time anything interesting ever happens.
You know what these people gave me after six years and four months of work for them, Kass? Know what they gave me? A cardboard box with my belongings in it.
(ISAAC searches underneath the beaten cardboard box.)
—I’m not indicting anyone! I’m saying I have to reinvent everything from scratch now, on my own, with no help and therefore I have a different form of stress, WHICH YOU ARE NOW EXACERBATING!
(HE finds the keys!)
No, I’m NOT coming over! ’Cause I’m not waiting forty minutes for the F train, that’s why!
(HE takes off duck boots and winter jacket.)
—I can’t afford a taxi to BROOKLYN, Kassandra. You want to hear me say it? I CAN’T AFFORD THAT.
(Rips off flannel shirt.)
This isn’t about what I want, I asked what YOU want! That’s how we started this however many years ago—Fine, you wanna know what I want? I want to stop you mid-mood swing, ‘cause I have problems too. I want my severance check without having to sue somebody. I want the other five hundred thousand losers who got laid off to stay out of MY Starbucks ’cause I can’t get a seat. I never wanna have to eat at Gray’s Papaya again.—I want a break! I want a break FROM ABOVE ’cause I deserve it! And if I don’t get it right this second—NOPE, DIDN’T GET IT!—Then RIGHT NOW what I want to do is to go for a long run and get all this hostility out.
(Pulls jogging sweatshirt on backwards and inside out.)
—I know it’s snowing out, I like to run in the snow.
(Fixes sweatshirt.)
—Where do you get that from what I said?—So I’m subconsciously running away from you? I run when I’m stressed, that means we’re breaking up?!
(Puts on running shoes and all-weather pants. The phone cord, between his legs, gets wrapped into his pants without him realizing it.)
Okay, I’m gonna say something now, I don’t want you to get mad. No more Ricki Lake. No more. Because you get this swivel-chair psychology and honestly—(Laugh.) I have no place to put it.
(HE paces with phone cord caught inside his pants.)
—Okay, Kassi, don’t start that! Kassandra, Kassandra, Kassandra. . . . Stop crying.
Kass? Kassi? Please don’t cry.—Shmushy? Who’s a mushy? Who am I gonna smush with?
If I come over, you’ll stop crying? Yes, I’ll come over.
(Pulls off sweatshirt and running shoes, puts on duck boots.)
—I AM serious about us! Do you really think we would have combined CDs if I wasn’t serious?
Go, if you have a suggestion, we’re communicating here.
(Puts on flannel.)
—What about my ego?—Well, whose ego should I worry about, darling, my fellow man? I refuse to help my fellow man, my fellow man just LAID ME—I’m sorry, did I interrupt you? Egomaniacal? It’s egoMANIACAL now?
(Takes off flannel. Puts on one running shoe.)
—Uhuh, well . . . the only part of you that’s grown in the past four years is your ability to fight. I’m convinced you need to feel pain! I’m convinced you like it. HEY, MAYBE I COULD START SMACKING YOU AROUND LIKE YOUR FATHER DID, HOW’S THAT SOUND?!
—Hello?
(HE hangs up.)
Oh, that was a genius move. Smacking you around like your father did?
Why don’t you just offer to dig her mother up from the grave while you’re at it?
(HE redials.)
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