an unimportant play for those who are interested
Current work-in-progress.
Excerpt:
SCENE FOUR
The audience is interrupted by the Cards, who speak in the lobby.
CARD 1: This is the Cards speaking. We’re hijacking this play because it sucks and has no plot. We are tired of being at the mercy of the Queen. She’s a bad director and a terrible actress. She should have become a veterinarian.
CARD 2: We, on the other hand, are The Cards. We have creative minds and ambition for original work. We have therefore disguised ourselves with The Mouth in order to add commentary on the play which would otherwise go unnoticed.
CARD 1: You can think of the Mouth as God. God speaks at each interval in the play to add context and camaraderie. They convince you, the audience, that this play is, in fact, worth your time.
CARD 2: You think this because we have used a special hypnotism technique drawn from new AI and generative motion capture sensory computer graphics to provide an immersive and pleasure-invoking experience.
CARD 1: In fact, we feel that right now too, which is why we’ve decided to lie down in the lobby and let the Mouth do the talking for us.
The Cards lie down and the Mouth appears in the room.
MOUTH: In our opinion, the theater should not be one continuous sappy monologue. We do not care about emotional trauma that brings tears to everyone’s eyes. We are also not interested in story and narrative (although some sort of plot would certainly be helpful). We want a theater that is fast and psychedelic. One that vibrates the audience’s seats until they are on the brink of having a theatrical orgasm. The room should be filled with light and movement to create a near-religious experience. Theater is the church of tomorrow and we are its pioneers! While the Queen has been wasting your time with dramatic pauses and over-theatrical Shakespearean sighs, we have been orchestrating an alternate ending that will take everyone by surprise. We believe in shock and disbelief, and we are here to give it to you.
The Mouth begins to cough loudly. It hacks and hacks and hacks until eventually a large piece of meat comes out of it (done through theatrical trickery of an open curtain behind the projection).
MOUTH: Please excuse the mess. I have been trying to get that out for days. Cards! Cards! Please clean this up immediately.
The Cards rush in unison to assist the Mouth. They haul the clump of meat off in a wheelbarrow. As they exit, one of the Cards pauses and says:
CARD 2: The meat will be served in kabob form at the end of the play.
The Rabbit blows the trumpet and the audience re-enters the theater.
SCENE FIVE
The Rabbit sits before the audience. He is eating an apple. There are several already-eaten apple cores spread around him on the grass.
RABBIT: The roses are gone and the Queen is covered in red paint. That was a fake theatrical trick that made her appear like she was covered in blood, only she wasn’t supposed to do that. It wasn’t in the script. The roses were supposed to be dry but instead they were wet because I am a technician, not a scenographer. I was hired to do the lights and instead I am the stage manager, the scenographer, the narrator, the props man, and the person who is supposed to bring the play to a meaningful conclusion in the end. We should have rehearsed more but everyone kept getting sick and having to quarantine and then we tried to do it on Zoom but the internet didn’t work and before we knew it we had to perform the play before we had even rehearsed it. So we hired a marching band and an over-eager group of model actors who we found on Facebook and we also got some food to try to convince you that the intermission is just as exciting if not more exciting than the play itself. I always thought that the second half of a play after the intermission was not worth staying for. But you have now stayed past four intermissions! Is it really that good??!
The truth is that I am the only real actor in this theater. I am more than just a lighting technician and stagehand. I have Hamlet memorized backwards. I could perform Lucky’s monologue from Waiting for Godot while standing on my head! I am a master juggler, a black belt in taekwondo, I sing an impressive baritone, I play the piano with one hand, and I can perform in five different languages including the french version of pig latin. I tailored all of the costumes in the play as well. I composed the marching band songs and taught it to them IN A DAY. I have been working my fucking ass off on this play. So many sleepless nights. And now I am facing you, the audience, the people I have feared this entire time, and all I can think about is that I can’t believe that he (pointing to an audience member) wore Peppa Pig socks to the THEATER. Who the hell are you people? Why are you eating my chocolate dipped strawberries? What do I owe you? I am a simple Rabbit, just trying to get my job done on time so I can call it a wrap at the end of the night and return to my day job in the morning. I am done with the theater unless someone can convince me otherwise. I simply cannot do it anymore.
Uncomfortable silence.