I. Three situations with a woman, man,
fruit/childhood game.
1. Grandfather and grandson are walking in
a large city in Europe during the second World War. The grandfather talks to his grandson about
the child's jewish name. The grandfather
tells him to be proud of his name but offers a less recognizable version of it
to offer to strangers. The grandfather
then explains to his grandson that if
the boy should ever need help that he should go to the school that his mother teaches
at and look for her or ask for help from the other teachers at the school. The grandfather tosses an apple casually in
his hand as they discuss how many of their neighbors were taken away in trucks
to the central train station that day.
They see military officers up ahead and the grandfather sends the child
off with the apple to a nearby fountain to wash it just as the armed soldiers
approach asking the elderly man for his documents. When the boy turns around he sees his
grandfather being escorted away and follows at a distance. The boy enters a building and sees his
grandfather's back to the glass door that the boy is peering through, he
recognizes the man's grey coat and hunched over posture, he watches as the
soldiers question him.
2. A husband enters the door to the house
after work, his wife greets him with an expression from an Italian children's
game ('one, two, three, stella'. Similar
to blindman's bluff: one person must turn their back to the other player/s as
they attempt to tag him. The first
player can turn around at any moment calling out 1,2,3, stella! If they catch
another player moving, that player is 'out') Each time the husband comes in he
has a criticism to move or a subject to argue over. The wife is constantly interrupted in stream
of speech or thought. Each time she is
interrupted the lights dim and the scene begins anew with her going to the door
cheerfully calling out 1,2,3 stella! At
the first criticism she smile disbelievingly, at the second she draws him into a reasonable
conversation about how he is deflecting the topic, as the scene continues she
grows more uncomfortable, first looking out the window, then leaving the room
each time he refuses to listen to her or creates a verbal attack. At last she comes from one side of the stage
with her suitcase in hand saying, 'I am leaving, good bye,' but the husband is
so absorbed in his ranting that he does not hear her and continues complaining
from the other room, returns to the entryway where his wife has just walked out
closing the door quietly behind her and continues to gripe that she never
speaks up, he cannot even hear her answer. Lights go down.
3. In a coffee shop a young man walks in
and orders a latte. He goes to a table
and studies his law books for the bar exam.
The girlfriend he has just broken up with a few days ago slides into the
seat in front of him. He turns to the
audience and describes his girlfriend and her influential family in a
monologue, while the light goes down somewhat on the scene of his girlfriend at
the table going about her 'busy' activities;
phoning on her cell phone for appointments, the coffee shop attendant
bringing her order over and a friend of hers who puts her hand over the girl's
eyes to make her 'guess who.' When the
young man returns to the conversation with her, she announces that she 'has
forgiven him and already forgotten.'The young man has a second monologue toward
the audience explaining about their breakup.
When he comes back to the conversation that she is dominating, she tells
him that they have dinner plans with friends and traps him into getting back
together.
II First page of the scene (using format)
COFFEE SHOP - AFTERNOON
Evan walks into the coffee shop near his
apartment with law books in his backpack, he is stretching his stiff neck. He calls out an order to the staff for a
latte and sits at a table to study. He
is intent on his books, his coffee is set on the counter, nearby him , he gets
up for it and, as he sits down with it, stretches his legs and resumes his studying. A beautiful girl, with a thin, athletic physique, wearing tennis whites, expensive name brand leather
bag over her shoulder enters. Her long blond
hair swishes with her movements and she smiles brightly, slides into the seat
in front of him jingling her diamond bracelet and putting the keys to her BMW
on the table.
SAMANTHA
(radiant
and smiling)
I've
forgiven you.
EVAN
(he breathes in deep and calm, he is unperturbed, he had been waiting for this)
Hi,
Sam.
EVAN
(lights
go dim on Samantha sitting in the booth, she goes on about her busy
activities; setting up appointments in her daytimer while talking on her cell
phone, ordering a latte with authority a from the staff and having it brought
over to her, chatting with a friend who asks about her diamond bracelet, a gift
from Evan. The friend smiles
approvingly. Sam looks satisfied, like
she has planned everything in her life and has no doubts whatsoever. Evan turns
to the audience, leaning his arms on the back of his chair and speaks with candor.)
Sam is simply perfection and she is on
her way to success at our East Coast law
school. Her parents are accomplished
attorneys with a boutique law firm catering to big business here on the Coast. Her mother is specialized in intellectual
property rights, her father, a master of corporate law. It is expected that I work for the firm when
I've passed the admission to the bar. Our
families are on entirely different astral plains socially and financially. Impeccable test scores got me accepted to
college and my parents somehow manage the tuition. I like law and studying has always come easy
to me. I am, or was lucky to have
Samantha and the future that was laid out in front of me. The position that is being
offered to me is great but it is something I could find on my own, without
Sam's family making it available to me.
SAMANTHA
(still
smiling radiantly, speaking cheerfully and confidently, her demeanor older than
her years)
I
said I've forgiven you. I've forgotten
all about it.
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