Fences

'Fences' by August Wilson

Summary: Rose finally tells Troy how she feels

ROSE: I been standing with you! I been right here with you, Troy. I got a life too. I gave eighteen years of my life to stand in the same spot with you. Don’t you think I ever wanted other things? Don’t you think I had dreams and hopes? What about my life? What about me? Don’t you think it ever crossed my mind to want to know other men? That I wanted to lay up somewhere and forget about my responsibilities? That I wanted someone to make me laugh so I could feel good? You not the only one who’s got wants and needs. But I held on to you, Troy. I took all my feelings, my wants and needs, my dreams…and I buried them inside you. I planted a seed and watched and prayed over it. I planted myself inside you and waited to bloom. And it didn’t take me no eighteen years to find out the soil was hard and rocky and it wasn’t never gonna bloom.

But I held on to you, Troy. I held you tighter. You was my husband. I owed you everything I had. Every part of me I could find to give you. And upstairs in that room…with the darkness falling in on me…I gave everything I had to try and erase the doubt that you wasn’t the finest man in the world. And wherever you was going…I wanted to be there with you. Cause you was my husband. Cause that’s the only way I was gonna survive as your wife. You always talking about what you give…and what you don’t have to give. But you take, too. You take…and don’t even know nobody’s giving!

Reasons to be Pretty

'Reasons to be Pretty' by Neil LaBute

Summary: Greg, Kent and Carly work in a warehouse; Steph is a hairdresser all in their 30’s they are trying to come to terms with life in their dead-end jobs. There are hook-ups and breakups and struggles to keep friendship alive, but this play is mostly about the power of language and listening.

CARLY: I’m very attractive. I am. I’ve always been that way but it’s no great big deal to me—if anything, it’s worked against me for most of my life. (Beat.) It’s about this (Points.) My face. I was born with it, people. That’s all. I have been given this thing to wear around, my features, and I’m stuck with it. And yes, over the years it’s gotten me things, I won’t lie about that, dates and into clubs that I really wanted to get into or smiles from my father . . . but as I got older it suddenly became a kind of, I dunno what, but almost like a problem. A real bother that I don’t have any control over. (Beat.) Listen, I’m not stupid, I know I should be thankful, that I should pray to heaven and be happy that I’m not scarred or missing an ear—I know girls who hate, I mean, despise their noses and mouths or the fact that their eyes are too far out on their faces . . . I don’t have any of those problems and I’m happy about that. I look in the mirror and I see some beautiful woman looking back at me; my worst day, a line or two, a little pale or whatnot, but a really good face in there. Smiling. I’m not saying that I don’t understand how I got lucky in many ways, I do get that, I do, I just want folks to comprehend that beauty comes with a price, just like ugly does. A different one, of course, and I’ll take what I’ve got, but I’ve cried myself to sleep at night because of who I am as well, and you should know that . . . (Beat.) I hope my baby’s OK,—did I mention that we found out it was a little girl? But I really hope she’s no more than pretty, that’s my wish. That she’s not some beauty queen that people can’t stop staring at because I’d hate that for her . . . to be this object, some thing that people can’t help gawking at. ‘Cause if she is— born like I was, is what I’m saying—if she ends up with a face that is some sorta magnet for men, the way I’ve been . . . I’d almost rather it was a situation where she was oblivious to it—not blind or anything, I wouldn’t wish that on her, but close. Some sort of oblivion that gets pasted over her eyes so she can go about life and not be aware that people are cruel in many ways. . . not just with their words but with the ways they look at you and desire you and, and, and . . . almost hate you because of it. (Smiles.) I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to get all heavy or anything, but I do think about it sometimes. My shift at work’s kinda long, you know? It is . . . so I’ve usually got some time on my hands to, you know. . . whatever. Think, I guess.

AN IDEAL HUSBAND

MABEL:

Well, Tommy has proposed to me again. Tommy really does nothing but propose to me. He proposed to me last night in the music room, when I was quite unprotected, as there was an elaborate trio going on. I didn’t dare to make the smallest repartee, I need hardly tell you. If I had, it would have stopped the music at once. Musical people are so absurdly unreasonable. They always want one to be perfectly dumb at the very moment when one is longing to be perfectly deaf. Then he proposed to me in broad daylight this morning, in front of that dreadful statue of Achilles. Really, the things that go on in front of that work of art are quite appalling. The police should interfere. At luncheon I saw by the glare in his eye that he was going to propose again, and I just managed to check him in tome by assuring him that I was a bimetallist. Fortunately, I don’t know what bimetallism means. And I don’t believe anybody else does either. But the observation crushed Tommy for ten minutes. He looked quite shocked. And then Tommy is so annoying in the way he proposes. If he proposed at the top of his voice, I should no mind so much. That might produce some effect on the public. But he does it in a horrid confidential way. When Tommy wants to be romantic he talks to one just like a doctor. I am very fond of Tommy, but his methods of proposing are quite out of date. I wish, Gertrude, you would speak to him, and tell him that once a week is quite often enough to propose to anyone, and that it should always be done in a manner that attracts some attention.

LOVE, LOSS AND WHAT I WORE

HEATHER: I look gorgeous in high heels. Everyone looks gorgeous in high heels. But my feet hurt. My little toe was always crushed. I had a bunion. I was in so much pain, I couldn’t think. I had to choose- heels or think. I chose think. So I bought some chic flat shoes. I made a lot of mistakes. I bought these turquoise blue Marc Jacobs flats that the salesman talked me into because he said they had “toe cleavage”. I’d never heard of toe cleavage. Anyway, I realized that chic flat shoes are almost as uncomfortable as heels, and don’t do that amazing thing for your legs. Fortunately, at just about that time, I met an unbelievably stylish woman who was wearing Birkenstocks. When I was in High School, I was a Doc Martens girl, and Birkenstocks symbolized everything I didn’t want to be. They were incredibly uncool and the girls who wore them had big dirty toes that stuck out the ends. You absolutely could not be friends with a person who wore Birkenstocks. But this stylish woman wore her Birks with baggy cords and a Comme de Garcons sleeveless shirt. It was a revelation. The next day I went out and got a pedicure and a pair- dark brown, standard style. I realized that Birkenstocks were actually the coolest, punk-est shoes a girl could wear. They were a statement: “Look, these are my feet, we all have them. Okay?” My husband had a slightly different opinion. He hated my Birkenstocks. He said they made me look like a troll from Middle Earth. And once, when the Yankees were in the playoffs, he made me take them off before coming into the same room as the TV so I wouldn’t hex the team. After we split up, you’d think I’d have stuck with my Birkenstocks, but no. I started wearing heels again. Oh the pain, I can’t think. But I look gorgeous. I had to choose- heels or think. I chose heels.

Goodbye Charles

Comedic female monologue from the play Goodbye Charles
By Gabriel Davis

(Monologist stands in front of her soon to be ex-husband)

I ate them. That’s right. I ate the divorce papers, Charles. I ate them with ketchup. And they were good...goooood. You probably want me to get serious about our divorce. The thing is you always called our marriage a joke. So let’s use logic here: If A we never had a serious marriage then B we can’t have a serious divorce. No. We can’t. The whole thing’s a farce, Charles – a farce that tastes good with ketchup.

I mean, wasn’t it last week, your dad asked you the reason you walked down that aisle with me, and you said “for the exercise.” Ha, ha. That’s funny. You’re a funny guy, Charles. I’m laughing, not a crying. Ha, ha. I’m laughing because you’re about to give up on a woman who is infinitely lovable.

For instance: Paul. He has loved me since the eighth grade. Sure, he’s a little creepy, but he reeeeally loves me. He’s made one hundred twenty seven passes at me, proposed forty seven times, and sent me over two hundred original love sonnets. He sees something in me, Charles. And he writes it down, in metered verse!

And that’s not something you just find everyday. Someone who really loves everything about who you are as a person. Paul may be insane, but I value his feelings for me.

I would never ask him to sign his name to a piece of paper promising to just turn off his feelings for me forever. But that’s what you’re asking me to do, for you. To sign away my right to...to that sweet voice Charles, those baby brown eyes, the way your hands feel through my hair before bed...

Those aren’t things I want to lose. In fact, I won’t lose them. I won’t lose you. I’ll woo you. I’ve written you a sonnet. “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day. Thou art more lovely and more temperate, rough winds do shake the darling buds of may and...”  I’m not crying. I’m laughing. It’s all a big joke. It’s very funny, Charles. I keep waiting for you to say “April Fools.” Then I’ll rush into your arms and... But you’re not going to, are you? No. Of course not. It’s not April.

I, I didn’t really write that sonnet, you know. Paul did. I think it’s good.

You see, the truth...the truth is, Charles, I ate the divorce papers, I ate them, because I can’t stomach the thought of losing you.

Brighton Beach Memoirs

'Brighton Beach Memoirs' by Neil Simon

Summary: Nora Morton is a beautiful and ambitious 16-year-old girl with dreams of Broadway. She's often resentful of her younger sister and angry at her father for dying

NORA: How would you feel if your entire life depended on what your Uncle Jack decided?…Oh, God, I wish Daddy were alive.

Oh, God, he was so handsome. Always dressed so dapper, his shoes always shined. I always thought he should have been a movie star…like Gary Cooper…only very short. Mostly I remember his pockets.

When I was six or seven he always brought me home a little surprise. Like a Hershey or a top. He’d tell me to go get it in his coat pocket. So I’d run to the closet and put my hand in and it felt as big as a tent. I wanted to crawl in there and go to sleep. And there were all these terrific things in there, like Juicy Fruit gum or Spearmint Life Savers and bits of cellophane and crumbled pieces of tobacco and movie stubs and nickels and pennies and rubber bands and paper clips and his grey suede gloves that he wore in the winter time.

Then I found his coat in Mom’s closet and I put my hand in the pocket. And everything was gone. It was emptied and dry-cleaned and it felt cold…And that’s when I knew he was really dead.

Oh God, I wish we had our own place to live. I hate being a boarder. Listen, let’s make a pact…The first one who makes enough money promises not to spend any on herself, but saves it all to get a house for you and me and Mom. That means every penny we get from now on, we save for the house…We can’t buy anything. No lipstick or magazines or nail polish or bubble gum. Nothing…Is it a pact?

Brighton Beach Memoirs

Brighton Beach Memoirs

Summary: Nora Morton is a beautiful and ambitious 16-year-old girl with dreams of Broadway. She's often resentful of her younger sister and angry at her father for dying

NORA: I can’t believe it. You mean it’s alright for you to leave us but it wasn’t alright for me to leave you?

It was my future. Why couldn’t I have something to say about it? I need to be independent.

So I have to give up the one chance I may never get again, is that it? I’m the one who has to pay for what you couldn’t do with your own life. I’m not judging you. I can’t even talk to you. I don’t exist to you. I have tried so hard to get close to you, but there was never any room. Whatever you had to give went to Daddy, and when he died, whatever was left you gave to Laurie…

….I have been jealous my whole life of Laurie because she was lucky enough to be born sick. I could never turn a light on in my room at night or read in bed because Laurie always needed her precious sleep. I could never have a friend over on the weekends because Laurie was always resting. I used to pray I’d get some terrible disease or get hit by a car so I’d have a leg all twisted and crippled and then once, maybe just once, I’d get to crawl into bed next to you on a cold rainy night and talk to you and hold you until I fell asleep in your arms…just once…

PROMEDY

PROMEDY, by Wade Bradford.  Beatrix, the 17-year old president of the student body. after her "ex-friend" deviously cancels the prom.

BEATRIX.   Young women need the Prom. It's a rite of passage as sacred as getting your driver's license or buying your first bra. There are only a few things in life that are guaranteed to be glorious and memorable and sparkling with gowns and cummerbunds. Prom is the quintessential teenage experience.

Think of the unlucky grown-ups and the elderly who lament the day they decided not to go to the Prom. It is a key ingredient to a happy and meaningful life. Prom is short for Promenade, a slow, gentle walk through a shady glen, and this beloved ceremony symbolizes our journey from the shadows of adolescence to the bright sunshine of the adult world with all its freedoms.

And it may be the only chance I'll ever have to dance with a boy. Maybe I'll never have someone get down on a knee and offer me a diamond ring. Maybe I'll never walk down the aisle with a smug look of bridal triumph. But it is my right, and the right of every plain, frumpy, book-wormy, soon-to-be librarian to have one night of Cinderella magic. Even if we have to go with our cousin, or our gay best friend from tap class, we will have a Prom. And you will help me.

SAINT JOAN

SAINT JOAN, by George Bernard Shaw.  Joan, who confronts the men condemning her at a hearing.

JOAN.   Yes, they told me you were fools and that I was not to listen to your fine words nor trust to your charity. You promised me my life but you lied. You think that life is nothing but not being stone dead. It is not the bread and water I fear: bread has no sorrow for me, and water no affliction. But to shut me from the light of the sky, and the sight of the fields and flowers, to chain my feet so that I can never again ride with the soldiers nor climb the hills; to make me breathe foul damp darkness, and keep me from everything that brings me back to the love of God when your wickedness and foolishness tempt me to hate Him. All this is worse than the furnace in the Bible that was heated seven times.

I could do without my war horse, I could drag about in a skirt. I could let the banners and the trumpets and the knights and soldiers pass me and leave me behind as they leave the other women, if only I could still hear the wind in the trees, the larks in the sunshine, the young lambs crying through the healthy frost, and the blessed blessed church bells that send my angel voices floating to me on the wind.

But without these things I cannot live; and by your wanting to take them away from me, or from any human creature, I know that your counsel is of the devil, and that mine is of God.

PROOF

PROOF, BY David Auburn. Catherine,  a woman whose mathematician father lost touch with reality at the end of his life.

CATHERINE.  I lived with him. I spent my life with him. I fed him. Talked to him. Tried to listen when he talked. Talked to people who weren’t there . . . Watched him shuffling around like a ghost. A very smelly ghost. He was filthy. I had to make sure he bathed. My own father . . .

After my mother died it was just me here. I tried to keep him happy no matter what idiotic project he was doing. He used to read all day. He kept demanding more and more books. I took them out of the library by the carload. We had hundreds upstairs. Then I realized he wasn’t reading: he believed aliens were sending him messages through the Dewey decimal numbers on the library books. He was trying to work out the code . . .

Beautiful mathematics. The most elegant proofs, perfect proofs, proofs like music . . .Plus fashion tips, knock-knock jokes – I mean it was nuts, OK? Later the writing phase: scribbling nineteen, twenty hours a day . . . I ordered him a case of notebooks and he used every one.

I dropped out of school . . . I’m glad he’s dead.

REASONS TO BE PRETTY

REASONS TO BE PRETTY, by Neil Labute.  Steph, a woman upset by something she heard her boyfriend has said about her appearance.

STEPH.   He hurt me, he really did, you know? I mean, I can take a lot, pretty much, anyway, but I'm, like, my face? That's jerk. It just is ... (Beat.) Not that I think I'm some beauty — an old-fashioned glamour gal or anything, I don't — but I'm not bad, ya know, not bad at all ... and even if I was, ugly, I'm saying, even if I was not cute or close to that, unattractive by world standards, don't I wanna be with someone who finds me beautiful? I think so. It's not like a math equation or anything, it is fairly simple — you can't be with a guy who finds you unpleasant to look at. Not that, but even on the fence ... How can I? Knowing that he's sitting there at dinner across from me but he's always reaching for something, the salt or whatever, or looking around the room, and why? 'Cause he doesn't wanna make eye contact. That would suck, completely suck if you were that woman and that was gonna be me — I'm saying once I knew how he felt about me, that was what I had to look forward to. Listen, it's weird, I know that, because I don't count looks as my top thing in a guy, not at all — look at Greg. He's got a good face, really, not knockout but very OK, yet I never used to even think it to myself, I mean, envision him in that way. Sometimes, a friend or, like, some cousin of mine visited a few months back and she whispered to me at a family thing we were at, a barbecue, "God, he's cute. He's so cute!" And I looked over to where she was pointing, expecting to see a boy from the neighborhood — and she's pointing at Greg. Just right there, my boyfriend, who's over at the grill and laughing and making burgers for all of us ... and he was, too. With the sun going down — you know how it shoots a ray out sometimes around something, like a halo, almost — it was doing that and he was bathed in this light for a second, in this splash of gold and creamy light, and I thought, "Yeah, he is. He really is a handsome man," but, see, that still isn't any big deal to me. Even though he is ... in his own way ... it's not the thing about him that first made me like him. Uh-uh.

Not saying this is full of profound insight or anything but any woman I know, like, my age or younger, she's gonna be super upset if she heard what I did. That her boyfriend thinks her face is "OK." You can't swallow that down and find a way to come up smiling or anything, you know what I'm saying? There is just no good way to take that! (Beat.) Why do we feel that way, though, I wonder? Is it maybe TV or magazines or something, our moms telling us that we're pretty no matter what we look like ... I'm not sure. I just know that women throw everything they've got into their physical being, and a main part of that — the main part — is the face. (Beat.) I go nuts if I still break out on my chin or anything, carry tweezers in my purse, and I'm not even, like, all crazy about it like a lot of my friends are ... and every one of them, the ones that I've called, at least, they all said to dump him. They did. Because if he's willing to say that, even to a friend, then you can bet he's probably thinking even more than you know about. Can you imagine what he's actually feeling about my legs or arms, anything ... OK, yes, I'm thinking about all the rest of it, too, of course I am!  I can't even start to go there without wanting to throw up. I always felt like my face was one of my better parts and he's talking about me like I'm some old Buick out in the backyard that he keeps thinking about fixing but just can't get to it. (Laughs.) "Meant as a compliment," he says to me, like that should calm my nerves or something, so ... forget that. I mean, really. I'm realistic and I know me as a person — I don't have that much going for me, not really. Not all educated and smart or anything, and not gorgeous, not like some girls — but I like what I've got and I'm gonna protect that. I am. Yeah. (Beat.) I mean, wouldn't you?

VEGETABLE LOVE

VEGETABLE LOVE, by Tammy Ryan.  April, a troubled woman who is mourning the death of her father.

You know what scares me?  Not human catastrophes like relationships and nuclear war – we can avoid those if we’re smart – we probably aren’t, but if we were – we have some measure of control over those decisions – some human’s finger is on the button, and it’s up to him or her – it’s up to us in a larger sense – to decide if we are that stupid or not.  And that’s pretty frightening too, actually, now that I’m talking about it – but not in the everyday sense.  I’m able to live on some level of denial about that.  But what punctures through the everyday veil of denial – what really really scares me in waking moments and in sleep – like now – is Mother Nature.  There’s no way to protect yourself from a really big earthquake – or an out of control tornado, or a hurricane – or a – a typhoon.  I mean, there’s no reckoning with that kind of power.  Struck by lightning?  It can happen at any time.  And if we venture out further – like imagine Outer Space:  billions of meteors cruising like ballistic missiles, missing us by inches?  How do we know?  You know what wiped out the dinosaurs?  A rock.  A big one.  It’s insane.  We can be wiped out by the mindless whim of Mommy Nature skipping stones across the galaxy.  She smiles at us from out of Hallmark Cards, but Mommy gives away how terrifying she can be with every move she makes.  I mean, do you realize what kind of force has been unleashed in you?  To set life in motion?  ZAP!  Like lightning striking.  Do you know there’s only fifteen minutes in a month when a woman can get pregnant?  It all comes down to a difference between one moment, really, and another, for every person that’s alive.  It’s a miracle.  That kind of power is impressive – and absolutely horrifying.

MARCUS IS WALKING

MARCUS IS WALKING, by Joan Ackerman.  Caitlin, a woman prone to panic attacks while driving.

CAITLYN.  Did you know that one out of eight women have panic attacks?  One out of eight.  That’s a lot of panic.  I know it’s all in my head but I can’t control it, it’s like the road freezes in a freeze frame, things stop moving as a video, and my mind jams into this . . . ozone . . . warp and it’s exhausting like I’m towing a car with my brain and I can’t breathe and I get disconnected from my body and I think I’ll pass out.  I never have passed out but I think I will.  If there’s a breakdown lane it doesn’t happen; if there isn’t one, it’s . . . god, it’s indescribably awful.  The weird thing, I’m more afraid of the fear than I am of actually getting into a car crash.

Maybe something in my brain knows something I don’t know; maybe it’s protecting me and being very sensible, very rational.  I mean, up until this century human beings didn’t go faster than, what, five miles an hour, unless they were flung up on an ox or a horse or something, pitched out a castle window.  For centuries, for millennia, humans have traveled very, very slowly.  When you think about it, going sixty miles an hour, going forty miles an hour is a profoundly unnatural thing to do.  Insanely dangerous.  Maybe some part of my brain realizes this and says what the heck are you doing out in the little tinny metal box that can crumple like gum foil in an instant, flying, hurtling through space alongside of hundreds of other people in little tinny metal boxes, many of whom are complete idiots, morons entrusted with these death machines.  It’s insane.  Really, people have panic attacks in very logical places – elevators, airplanes, cars – dangerous places.  Maybe it’s not panic, maybe it’s preservation of the species, common sense, it’s “Get your body out of here.  It’s a very, very stupid place for you to be.”

ICARUS

ICARUS, by Edwin Sanchez.  Altagracia, a woman whose face is noticeably deformed and whose spirit is noticeably amazing.

ALTAGRACIA.  When I was a mere slip of a girl I went to my high school prom.  This is not gonna bring up any evil high school memories, is it?  I had no intention of going, but my mother found out the theme was Mardi Gras and that everyone had to wear a mask.  She became like a woman possessed. It mattered so much to her that I let myself be talked into it.  Let her spend money we didn’t have on this beautiful red velvet dress, let her make this gorgeous mask of feathers and sequins.  I even let her pay my cousin to take me.  She took a Polaroid of us and she waved us off.  I thought my heart was gonna pop out of my chest.  There I was outside the gymnasium door, and on the other side, everyone who had ever made my life hell for the past twelve years.  The doors open, and all eyes turn to face the fairy princess.

Not a single person recognized me.  Not a soul.  I was the mystery girl.  If I could bottle any moment in my life, that would be it.  Then somebody figured out who I was.  And they all looked away, like they were embarrassed for me.  Like I had been caught trying to pull something off.  But I fixed them.  I took over the prom.  I got in the middle of the dance floor with my arms spread out, taking up as much space as I could and started spinning around.  And while I was out there no one else dared to dance.  They didn’t have the guts to look me in the eye. It became my prom, all mine.  (pause)  Sometimes, you just gotta make people feel uncomfortable.  Make the golden people look away.

HAZING THE MONKEY

HAZING THE MONKEY, by Marcus A. Hennessy.  Sally, a young unhappy wife in Iowa.

SALLY.  Two years ago, you begged me to marry you.  I’m the one who made the commitment to stick with you for the long haul.  Because I believed in you.  I had faith in your ability to provide as a man, even though at the time you were just some drunk singer in a dead-end band.  Look, we are in this thing together.  TOGETHER!  You know what I mean?  This is a partnership.  You know how much time and energy and love I’ve spent on this partnership?  A butt-load pardon my French.  I got you off the bottle.  I save you from the perils of liquor.  And I pulled you out of your hopeless dreams.  That took one helluva lot of work, pardon my French.  And I helped you to get a job.  A real job.  You don’t know what I went through with Fred and that pig of a sister-in-law to get you that first interview two years ago.  She hates you.  But I convinced her to give your application to the right people, and you got the job.  Because of me.  BECAUSE OF ME!

There’s a lot of crap you don’t know, Roger, pardon my French.  So here we are, hun, living in a mobile home in a mobile home park in the middle of Iowa, and I hate it!  I absolutely hate it!  I said I liked it because you liked it.  Maybe I fudged with the truth, forgive me dear Lord.  Think about it, Roger.  A mobile home in a mobile home park in Iowa!  You know what we are?  Do you? 

WE ARE A BULLSEYE FOR TORNADOES!  That’s what we are! Tornadoes will go out of their way to hit us here.  We’re easy pickin’s.  You never see a high-class neighborhood ravaged by a twister.  Those houses are built solid.  No, no, it’s always a swath of destruction through some mobile home park where everything’s built cheap and flimsy.  I can’t tell you how many stormy nights I just prayed and prayed that the twisters would stay clear of this place long enough for us to get out and into a solid home.  And my friends, people I know from the church, they see me working at the store and they smile at me and I can just see those thought balloons over their heads like in the comic books . . . “Oh look, there’s pretty Sally Youngblood.  She’s such a nice girl and she has such a nice husband but they live in a mobile home.  They’ll be gone soon.  Such a pity.”

THE DARK PARENT

THE DARK PARENT, by Victor Bravo.  Carol, a woman whose daughter has disappeared.

CAROL.  It’s been six weeks since I last talked to my daughter.  She’s still the foremost part of my life, and for that, she’ll forever hold power over me.  I teach children piano and drama every day and often see her face in one of their faces, or hear her voice in one of their voices.  Maybe I’m naïve, but I refuse to accept the end of her.  I refuse to accept the arbitrariness of a violent world.  So strongly do I feel her alive, that the telephone, an otherwise inanimate object that I’ve always hated, has become the center of my world at home.  No matter what I’m doing, it always seems to draw my attention.  I wait for it to ring.  Periods between rings are transitional, unreal times.  And when the person on the other end is not her I chat amiably, set the receiver down, and wait for it to ring again. In very weak moments I pray to the phone.  The phone has become my god.  (pause)  My husband stayed in New Orleans another week after I returned to Texas.  He called Detective Sorenson everyday to see if anyone had made an attempt to claim the car.  No one had.  He made the rounds of clubs and restaurants, believing intensely with each new morning that this was going to be the day he found her.  That was his way of exhausting all possibilities.  He doesn’t understand the possibilities are endless.  He wants to believe she’s alive, but darkness has always won with him.  So, he’s returning to the French Quarter next weekend to ask people his heartfelt questions and show them her picture.  (pause)  I can’t do that.  Now, I do what he used to.  I stare out the window into the driveway at three in the morning, waiting for her to pull up.  I stare dreamily, until her car, blurry, creeps alongside the front garden, and her face, tired but glorious, catches the porch light as she climbs out and walks toward the house.  And I don’t think it’s silly at all.

FUDDY MEERS

FUDDY MEERS, by David-Lindsay-Abaire.  Claire, a woman strugging with memory loss.

CLAIRE.  You remember that dog?  Skinny old thing Mr. Cuthart kept tied up in the front lawn all day? Daddy always said he was going to report him.  Remember she just sat in the sun, biting at her scabs?  Cuthart didn’t even give her any water.  So I’d sneak down the road with my squirt gun, and spritz water into her mouth and she’d bark.  And one day, when Cuthart was downtown, I untied her and let her run around a little.  But she darted straight into the road, just as Daddy’s pickup was coming around the curve, and he didn’t see her, so he plowed into her. Daddy and I came through the back door, and Nancy was hanging out of his arms like a set of broken bagpipes.  And he spread her out on the kitchen floor and she was breathing real hard.  And the pain was humming off of her like I could hear it.  And she just let the pain take her over.  And that’s all she was.  This pained thing.  And Daddy was bent over her, talking to her real quiet.  And all of a sudden Nancy stood up, like it was a new day, and she started running around the kitchen like she wasn’t half-dead, barking and clicking her nails against the floor tiles.  And we were all shocked because Nancy was like a puppy all of a sudden, not that bony heap on the floor.  She was this fireball for about three minutes, until she got tired again, and curled up beside the sink and went to sleep and died like it meant nothing.  You remember how all that happened to her?  It’s funny how almost everything else is gone to me, and that sad old dog just came into my head.

PAST TENSE FEMININE GENDER

PAST TENSE FEMININE GENDER, by Le Wilhelm.  Alma, a young woman welcoming a new century on New Year’s Eve, 1900.

ALMA.  It’s a beautiful night.  Not a cloud in the sky.  Looking out the window you see a million stars.  I don’t know if I have ever seen a finer night than this.  There’s snow on the ground and the light from the moon and stars reflects off the white land.  I’m all dressed up because it’s New Year’s Eve.  This dress was made a company in Philadelphia.  It’s my first dress that I’ve ever had that wasn’t made by my momma.  I like it a lot, but I like a dress that’s made by my momma too, ‘cause I get to watch it being born.  And I get to try it on and even make suggestions sometimes when she’s in a good mood.

In just a few seconds it will be a brand new century!!  You can probably hear them downstairs.  That’s where the party is going on.  I snuck up here to the attic room so I could be by myself.  I love it up here.  I always go here when I want to be alone.  I also like to look out the window at the hills and the river.  Tonight I’m up here waiting for the twentieth century to arrive.

Because it’s a new century, everyone has been acting strange, real excited and planning big parties.  Well, that’s what most people are doing.  Some folks in town have said that this is the end of time.  My parents don’t believe that’s going to happen and neither do I, so they’re having a party.  I feel kind of sorry for all those people who believe the world’s going to end ‘cause when it don’t, I guss they’re going to be terribly disappointed and feel downright foolish.  I know I would!  If I had gone around telling everyone the end is near, and then the end doesn’t end.  I’d feel like an idiot.

You probably think it’s odd that I don’t want to be downstairs at the party with my friends and family where all the fun’s going on.  I just want to be by myself.  So I can remember it.  I want to be able to remember when the twentieth century dawned.  I know it’s just a date on the calendar . . . but still it’s a new century . . . my century – it’s when I’m going to love most of my life . . . and no one knows what’s going to happen . . . all kinds of changes . . .  all sorts of wonderful things that I’m going to be a part of.  I’m curious and I’m scared . . . and I’m excited . . .

RAGE AMONGST YOURSELVES

RAGE AMONGST YOURSELVES, by Amy Beth Arkawy.  Tess, struggling in a group therapy meeting to find a place where she belongs.

TESS.  Being adopted . . . is about feeling like you . . . I mean feeling like I don’t belong anywhere.  (Pause, embarrassed)  I sound like I’m on Sally Jesse Raphael  or something.  Let’s just forget it.  It’s not important anyway.  It’s ancient history.  It’s got nothing to do with anything, anyway.  It was bad enough not to look like them.  But I didn’t even think like them or . . .  (laughs) smell like them.  It’s crazy, but for the longest time, I actually tried to smell like my mother.  I’d sneak into her closet and wrap myself up in her old fisherman’s sweater just so her smell would rub off on me.  But it never worked.  (laughs)  It was this blend of Chanel Number Five, cigarettes, and wintergreen lifesavers.  It was sickening, really. (pause)  See, how nuts is that?  I wanted to walk through the world engulfed in a nauseating aroma just because it reminded me of my mother.

The thing is, I don’t think they ever really wanted me, which sounds stupid because when most people adopt a child it’s because they really do want one but can’t have their own.  I think my parents adopted me because it was the right thing to do.  Like they were proving to the world, to God, maybe, that they were good people.  But they never seemed to want me around.  I think they went on a cruise ship up the Nile three days after they brought me home.  (pause, a laugh)  It must have been three weeks.  Three days wouldn’t look good.  It’s like they traveled all the time.  When I was fourteen they sent me to Emma Willard – it’s a boarding school. And then they stayed home.  Now they keep asking why I don’t visit more often.  How messed up is that?

THE BELLES OF THE MILL

THE BELLES OF THE MILL, by Rubin Ladutke.  Bridget Gallagher, an Irish mill worker, addressing Congress in 1912.

BRIDGET.  Representative Berger and members of the Committee.  I am Bridget Eileen Gallagher, from Ireland.  I am eighteen years old.  When I was fifteen, my mother took me to Cork and put me on a boat to America.  She told me there was nothing for me in Ireland.  And she was right.  I was so excited to be going to America.  Terrified too, o’ course.  When I first got off the boat, I felt like I was in a different world from everyone and every place I’d ever known and loved.  I’ve never felt so alone in my life.  And I was right to be scared.  I don’t mind hard work, but there’s a difference between hard work and slavery.  You all may think, you may have been told, that this strike is just a group of troublemakers who want to destroy the city.  But it’s not true.  The strikers I’ve met have as much of a stake in Lawrence as the mill officials and politicians do.  More, even.  We’re the ones that live there, and ship there, and worship there.  Meanwhile, not a single one of the mill officials, from second hand on up, live in Lawrence if they can afford not to.  (pause)  Do you know what it’s like inside of a mill?  Have you ever had to set foot in one of those hellholes?  Day after day, I can hardly get the sound out of my ears.  Thread flying through the air.  Thread working it’s way into my lungs.  I once saw an older woman – she must have had years of experience – get her dress caught in the machinery.  I rushed to turn it off, but it was too late.  She died right there, on the floor.  They came and carried her out, and the boss told us just to keep working like nothing had happened.  And we did.  We were afraid of losing our jobs if we stopped for five minutes.  It could just as easily have been me.  You get tired, and the machines go faster and faster, and there’s no chance of a break. If we want fresh water, we have to pay ten cents a week for it. And then ‘tisn’t even cold or fresh.  Ever since I came to Lawrence I work six days a week in the mill.  Death is all around me, death and pain and suffering.  It has been since I first came to Lawrence, and I see no end to it.  (pause) I love this country for what I’ve always known it could be.  But working in the mills kills your hopes and dreams, and even your spirit.  Do you love this country as much as I do?  Aye, of course you do.  You must.  Nobody could live here and not realize what an amazing, wonderful place it is.  You must see that strike had to happen, and that something has got to change.  We’ve done what we can.  Now it’s up to you.

ARE YOU ALL RIGHT IN THERE?

ARE YOU ALL RIGHT IN THERE? By David-Matthew Barnes.  Gina,  a high school student musing at a party about her life in small-town America.

GINA.  I’m sorry.  I’m just kind of emotional right now.  I think it’s graduation.  I’m graduating in a month and I can’t wait to get out of here. (pause) My home town. My friends.  My family.  (pause)  I hate these people.  And I feel so . . . guilty for it.  I must me the most horrible person in the entire world.  I hate this party.  I hate my best friend.  I hate my boyfriend. (pause)  But I really hate Brittany Tyler.  She’s evil and and she has a bad haircut.  (pause)  I am so horrible.  Something is seriously wrong with me.  I have lived here for all of my life.  I should be proud of where I come from.  I should look back with fond memories and kind thoughts – but I just can’t wait to leave.  (pause)  I don’t know why.  It’s like this . . . feeling.  I wake up in the morning and just chokes me.  It’s the same house and the same people and the same school – I just can’t take it anymore.  I am only seventeen. I should be happy.  I should be sweet.  I should do a lot of charity work in the community. (Panics)  What if I’m nuts? What if I need serious help – like therapy or something medieval like that?  My aunt went to therapy for six months and she totally gained thirty pounds.  She blew up like a house. (pause) This party is pathetic.  I could be at home right now, curled up in bed and reading Wuthering Heights.  Instead – I was standing in the living room and this foreign-exchange student kept staring with this weird look on his face.  He comes up to me and says, “Oh, you are such a beautiful American girl!”  So I looked at him – and I told him that he smelled.  So he started yelling at me in his native language and he freaked me out.  I thought he was psychotic.  Then he walked away as if it were supposed to shatter my heart into a million tiny pieces. (pause) Pul-leaze, Don Juan – either go home or grow.  So he slithered his way around the room until he found Leslie.  She thinks she’s cool because she went to Paris last summer and made out with some French guy at the Eiffel Tower.  I’ll tell you how I really feel about Leslie.  She has the personality of a cheese grater.  She’s been a cheerleader since she was in diapers and she thinks we should worship her because she knows how to jump in the air and do a cartwheel.  Trust me – I have been to a football gam and I have seen the girl dance.  It’s not pretty.  She should consider buying herself a little bit of rhythm before she goes to college.

RUINED

RUINED, by Lynn Nottage. Mama, about how she has made her way in the Congo.

MAMA.  My Papa work too much, always want more, no rest.  He drove his farm hard, too the forest grows a man will never starve.  You’re in the Congo.  Things slip from our fingers like butter.  When I was eleven, this white man turned up with a piece of paper.  It say he has rights to my family land.  (with acid.)  Just like that.  Taken!  And you want to hear a joke?  Poor old Papa bought magic from a friend, he thought a hand full of powder would give him back his land.  Everyone talk  diamonds, but I . . .  I want a powerful slip of paper that says I can cut down forests and dig holes and build to the moon if I choose.  I don’t want someone to turn up at my door, and take my life from me.  Not ever again.  But how does a woman get a piece of land, without having to pick up a gun?

This pebble.  It doesn’t look like anything.  Stupid man, give it to me to hold for a one night of company and four beers not even cold enough to quench his thirst.  He said he’d be back for it and he’d pay me.  It’s a rough diamond.  It probably took him a half year of sifting through mud to dig up, and he promised his simple wife a Chinese motor scooter and fabric from Senegal.  And here it is, in my hand, some unfortunate woman’s dream.  What will I do with it?  I don’t know, but as long as they are foolish enough to give it to me, I’ll keep accepting it.  My mother taught me that you can follow behind everyone and walk in the dust, or you can walk ahead through the unbroken thorny brush.  You may get blood on your ankles, but you arrive first and not covered in the residue of others.  This land is fertile and blessed in many regards, and the men are not the only ones entitled to its bounty.

You men kill me.  You come in here, drink your beer, take your pleasure, and then wanna judge the way I run my “business.”  The front door swings both ways.  I didn’t force anyone’s hand.  I didn’t come to this place as Mama Nadi, I found her the same way miners find their wealth in the muck.  I stumbled off of that road without two twigs to start a fire.  I turned a basket of sweets and soggy biscuits into a business.  I don’t give a damn what any of you think.  This is my place, Mama Nadi’s.

LOVE, LOSS AND WHAT I WORE

LOVE, LOSS AND WHAT I WORE by Nora and Delia Ephron.  “The Prom Dress.”  Stephanie, reflecting on two different prom experiences.

STEPHANIE.  My junior prom dress was powder blue and white.  It was ribbed, with tiny ribs and a white waistband, and a white band around the bottom kind of like Cinderella, with a big powder blue bow.  The problem was my date.  He rang the bell, and I opened the door, and there he was, in a powder blue tuxedo with a white frilly shirt and a powder blue bow tie.  We matched.  It was totally mortifying.  I didn’t rally like him, but I was sort of the last to be asked to the prom – not the very last but one of the last, so I didn’t really have a choice in the date or what he wore, and I had a really horrible time at the prom, and afterwards we went into a field and tipped cows.  (Beat)  My senior prom was completely different.  My prom dress was black and short, it was in that sort of Madonna 1980s style, her “Like a Virgin” phase, tight on top and then it went out in a black net pouf and black lace gloves.  My date was also short, but dark and handsome, and we ended up drinking champagne and making out in his car, and it was great.  But here’s the thing – I’ve never really known for sure which of those two people I am – the girl who almost doesn’t get asked to prom at all or the girl who gets to go with a really cute guy.  Every time I thought I knew which one I was, I turned out to be the other.  Which is one reason why I think I got married, to, like, end the confusion.

EYE OF THE BEHOLDER

EYE OF THE BEHOLDER, by Heidi Decker.  Fiona, a wealthy, elegant girl who relies on her beauty to open all of life’s doors.

FIONA.  I didn’t make the world.  Mama always told me, God made the world and it is how it is.  People like me are born this way.  These looks are God-given . . . and if God decided to make me better than some people, it is not my fault.  She warned me all the time when I was a child, and she was right.  The world has always been filled with people who are jealous of people who were born better.  Like . . . like royalty and peasants!  Look all through history!  It’s all the same.  It’s decided when you’re born, and that’s it.  (pause) I have worked very hard to maintain this.  People have no idea what it’s like to be me.  And those people who get all that surgery to try to look like people like me . . . well,  that is just the saddest thing.  It’s like people who buy themselves a royal title.  Oh, it seems impressive at first, until you get in a room with someone who’s the real thing.

My Mama was very brave.  She took a huge risk when she had me. (pause, sincere)  Well, what if I had turned out that I wasn’t like her?  Can you imagine?  My mama is what is known as a classic beauty.  She and my Daddy were so brave . . . who know how I could have turned out.  I mean, the doctors can only do so many tests . . . beyond that, you have to just have faith that God will keep you.  Mama says she cried and worried and prayed for months.  She even had a couple of prayer vigils with the women in her bridge club . . . and . . . here I am.  Mama’s reward!  I inherited just about everything from her.  Well, except one thing.  (pause)  I’m not so brave.

LOVE, LOSS AND WHAT I WORE

LOVE, LOSS AND WHAT I WORE by Nora and Delia Ephron. “The Bathrobe,” Rosie, on how her mother’s early death affected her fashion sense.

ROSIE.  The truth is, I have no fashion sense – never did.   For many years I blamed this on my mom’s death.  Then again, I blame pretty much everything on that, my weight, my addiction to television, my inability to spell.  In my fantasy world, had my mother lived, I would be extremely well-dressed. I would know what went with what, and everything I tried on would fit.  Mom and I would shop together at the places that moms and daughters go – a department store, an outlet mall, the flea market.  I would wear a lot of tasteful make-up too.  We would lunch someplace while shopping.  It would be at a café where we would have salad and like it.  We’d laugh about how great our lives turned out and make plans for the things we were still going to do.  But that’s all a dream, because my mother did not live.  She died when she was 39 years old.  (Beat)  The fact is that no item of clothing has ever moved me in any way – except one.  After my mom died, my father took his five motherless children to Belfast, Northern Ireland.  I guess he thought we could best recover from the trauma of her death by living in a war zone.  The IRA was nowhere near as scary as what had just happened to our lives.  When we returned, we found her side of the closet empty.  All her clothes were gone.  (Beat)  A few years later my dad got remarried to a lovely woman.  She was a schoolteacher named Mary May.  After the wedding she moved in.  That first morning she was there, I was eating breakfast with a few of my siblings when my new stepmom walked down the stairs and into the kitchen.  She was wearing a long burgundy velour three-quarter sleeve zip bathrobe with a thick vertical white stripe down the center, surrounding the zipper.  No one said a word.  We all looked at each other then back at Mary as she happily made her way to the stove to put on the kettle.  My mother had had the same exact bathrobe – in blue.  Electric blue.  What are the chances of that really?  The unspoken rule in my house was that my mom’s name was never mentioned after her death.  But that morning, I knew that rule was about to be broken.  My siblings left the kitchen.  I was alone with Mary.  “Mary,” I said.  “My Mom had the same bathrobe in blue.”  “Oh,” she said.  And that robe disappeared. Gone.  Sent away to the same place my mother’s clothes went, I assume.  (Beat)   To this day that bathrobe is the only piece of clothing I can actually see in my mind.  I have no visuals of prom dresses or favorite sweater or shoes I couldn’t live without.  Clothes are just something I use for cover, leaving room for one electric blue memory.

AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY

AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY, by Tracy Letts.  Karen, 40, talking to her sister on the day of a family funeral about having found a good husband.

KAREN.  The present.  Today, here and now.  I think I spent so much of my early life thinking about what’s to come, y’know, who would I marry, would he be a lawyer or a football player, would he be dark-haired and good-looking and broad-shouldered.  I spent a lot of time pretending I had a husband and I’d ask him about his day at work and what was happening at the office, and did he like the dinner that I made for him and where were we going to vacation that winter and he’d surprise me with tickets to Belize . . .   Then real life takes over because it always does – and things work out differently than you’d planned.  I created a better husband than any man I’d ever met.  And you punish yourself, tell yourself it’s your fault you can’t find a good one.  I don’t know how well you remember Andrew . . .   Here’s a guy I loved so intensely, and all the things he did wrong were just opportunities to make things right.  So if he cheated on me I’d think to myself, “No, you love him, you love him forever, and here’s an opportunity for you to make an adjustment in the way you view the world.”  And I can’t say when the precise moment was that I looked in the mirror and said, “OK, moron,” and walked out, but it kicked off this whole period of reflection.  How had I screwed it up, where’d I go wrong, and before you know it you can’t move forward, you’re just suspended there, you can’t move forward because you can’t stop thinking backward, I mean, you know . . . years!  Years of punishment, self-loathing.

And finally, one day I just said, “No, it’s me, it’s just me, here and now, with my music on the stereo and my glass of wine and my cat, and I don’t need anything else, I can live my life with myself.”  And that’s when I met Steve. That’s how it happens, of course, you only really find it when you’re not looking for it, suddenly you turn around and there it is.  Here he is, you know, a good man and he’s good to me and he’s good for me.  The best thing about him is that now what I think about is now.  My focus, my life, my world is now.  I don’t care about the past anymore, the mistakes I made, the way I thought, I won’t go back there.  And you know what the kicker is?  We’re going to Belize on our honeymoon.

LOVE, LOSS AND WHAT I WORE

LOVE, LOSS AND WHAT I WORE by Nora and Delia Ephron. “The Shirt,” Pam, on losing her favorite shirt.

PAM.  Last summer I lost my favorite shirt.  Or to be more accurate, my favorite shirt vanished into thin air.  When I got home from being away for the summer and I unpacked my bags, the shirt simply never materialized.  I have replayed the sequence of events in my mind several times, and I have theories about what happened to it, but the fact remains that the shirt just ceased to be.  The really sad part was that this came at the end of a summer when that shirt gradually revealed itself to be the perfect shirt.  It was flattering (I always felt pretty in it), I liked the color and the cut, it went with all my favorite pants, it was casual and dressed down but not crappy and falling apart, it was comfortable.  It was one of those shirts you have to make yourself NOT wear, because it seems every day’s outfit would be improved by it.  And as silly as it may sound, I am generally happier when I have clothes like this in my life, when there’s something I know I can put on and feel good in.  Something to fall back on.  When I realized the shirt was gone, I couldn’t think of anything else I owned that served remotely the same function, and I felt cheated out of something truly rare and precious.

I realize that I sound like I am talking about death, or about lost love – and maybe I am.  It’s probably worth noting that my relationship with my boyfriend was ending just at the same time I lost the shirt.  But I could have sworn to you at the time that I was not transferring my feelings about the loss of my boyfriend onto the shirt, but was actually mourning the loss of the shirt itself.  The main lesson to be learned from this experience came from the purchase of eight different shirts, which each had some likeness to the lost shirt, whether it be in color, cut, material, casualness.  But none of them in any way replaced it, and I eventually had to resolve to be thankful for the time I had with the shirt and move on.  At least I know what I’m looking for.