Zap (6 page)

LUKE. Hello.
(He listens. To GRANDMAMMY.)
Nobody there.

GRANDMAMMY.
(Rolls her eyes, then addresses audience.)
Y’all go on to another play. I need to talk to this boy a minute.

(Zap sound. Blackout. Lights come up on the
RUSSIAN PLAY,
as before.
IRINA
is now asleep.)

KONSTANTIN. Of course, if you should see black spots on the leaves, that tells you something. Something important!
(He pounds his staff on the floor for emphasis, waking up IRINA.)
I cannot emphasize that enough.

NIKOLAI.
(Writing in notebook.)
Black . . .

KONSTANTIN.
(Repeating for NIKOLAI.)
Black . . .

(Zap sound. Blackout. Lights come up on the
ENGLISH MYSTERY,
as before.)

MRS. HARDWICKE. — how lovely it would be if the war were to end in the springtime, because I have this absolutely precious linen dress with a brocade bodice —

(Zap sound. Blackout. Lights come up on the
PERFORMANCE ART MONOLOGUE.
)

MARSHA. Wow. You natives are restless tonight.
(Sneezes. She takes the bandanna off her head, blows her nose into it, can’t decide what to do with it, and puts it back on her head.)
So anyway, my family lived in the suburbs, naturally. And my parents, naturally, picked the newest, stupidest suburb to live in. And, naturally, our street had a stupid name. So stupid, I’m too embarrassed to say it.
(Silently debates whether to tell.)
All right, all right. Gotta tell the freaking truth. Burbling Rivulet Court. These developers like suddenly turn into American Indians when they name their streets. Probably his son was named Pees on Toilet Seat. My father actually liked the name. Naturally. And my mother appreciated the shag carpeting in the bathrooms and the sparkly finish on the walls. I was twelve when we moved there from the city and I thought it sucked. The whole neighborhood looked fake, like it had been built by some model train nut. I kept expecting to see this giant hand reach down. Maybe, I thought, we were only an inch high and we were actually living in some weirdo’s basement. That would have at least been more exciting. There were all kinds of lawsuits against the developer for sewer problems, heating problems, mold problems, karma problems, so practically half the houses were empty. After living downtown, it was like being shipwrecked. The closest store was like two miles away at a mall. No wonder I got into make-believe. It was the only way to escape from Burbling freaking Rivulet Court. First, I started calling myself Alexandra instead of Marsha. Then I switched from Alexandra to Atlantis. My parents totally refused to go along and change my name on all the legal papers and stuff, so I finally had to go back to Marsha, kind of like —
(English accent.)
“Clifford,” with his arm in the sling, who was born a woman, then he went through all the treatments and operations and became a guy and married that dolt who plays Lady Denslow, but then, I don’t know, maybe it was the hair on his back or having to wear boring men’s clothes, but he told me, like in private, that he’s started cross-dressing and is kinda thinking about
going back
to being a woman — especially with the big lingerie sale at Macy’s —

(Zap sound. Blackout. Lights come up on the
ENGLISH MYSTERY.
CLIFFORD
and
EMMALINE
are alone in the room.)

EMMALINE. Oh, Clifford — I’m so frightened!

(She runs toward him, then seems to recall
MARSHA
’s revelation and pulls up short of the expected embrace. The following exchange is delivered with trepidation by the actors, the words reverberating with coincidental double meaning.)

CLIFFORD. Don’t be afraid, Emmaline. I’m here.

EMMALINE. But you haven’t — you haven’t seemed like yourself.

CLIFFORD. No one comes back from there unchanged.

EMMALINE. But I never expected — this.

CLIFFORD. I know it must be a shock to you.

EMMALINE. I feel I hardly know you.

(
LADY DENSLOW
saunters onstage, glaring at
CLIFFORD.
She speaks without a British accent.)

LADY DENSLOW. Yeah. Me, too.

EMMALINE. I’m sure everything must be quite disorienting for you.

CLIFFORD. You’ve no idea.
(Dropping character, fingering his uniform’s buttons.)
I’d just gotten used to having buttons on the right.

(Zap sound. Blackout. Lights come up on the
PERFORMANCE ART MONOLOGUE.
)

MARSHA. I wanted to act. Not that anyone in my town knew anything about any form of culture whatsoever, except what they’d picked up on
Jeopardy!
I mean, let’s face the truth. Living in the suburbs is about shopping. Pure and simple. Every person, get it, is like King Tut. And every person’s house is like King Tut’s freaking tomb. The more crammed with crap, the better.
(Imitating wife, then husband.)
“Look at this darling set of ceramic finger bowls I picked up on sale.” “That’s wonderful dear, even though we’ve never unwrapped the ones we have.” “Well, of course, I expect to do quite a bit more entertaining in the afterlife.” Instead of the Egyptian Book of the Dead, people have the Williams-Sonoma catalog. And since you can’t buy art and literature at the mall, it must not be worth anything, right? There’s some chemical they put in the water in the suburbs that keeps people from seeing how totally clueless they are. Except for me. I drank bottled water. So I got into drama, except in middle school the only play we put on was
Annie,
which the whole eighth grade class did. I tried out for the lead. Mrs. Hoffmeister gave it to Sylvia Scapellini and put me on stage crew because she hated my guts because I did some research and found out she
hadn’t
been married to Harrison Ford after all —

(Zap sound. Blackout. Lights come up on
RICHARD III,
act 3, scene 1.
PRINCE EDWARD,
wearing a crown, enters to sound of trumpet flourish.
GLOUCESTER
and
BUCKINGHAM
enter from the other direction.)

BUCKINGHAM. Welcome, sweet prince, to London, to your chamber.

GLOUCESTER. Welcome, dear cousin, my thoughts’ sovereign;

The weary way hath made you melancholy.

PRINCE. No, uncle, but our crosses on the way

Have made it tedious, wearisome —
(Zap sound. Blackout, but only for an instant as the furious GLOUCESTER stamps his foot, causing the lights to come back up.)
— and heavy:

I want more uncles here to welcome me.

GLOUCESTER. Sweet prince, the untainted virtue of your years —
(The zap sound is repeated. No blackout. GLOUCESTER again raises his hand in a “Stop” gesture toward the wings while facing the PRINCE and continuing his lines.)

Hath not yet div’d into the world’s deceit —

(
GLOUCESTER
emphasizes those last three words, turning his gaze on the audience. The zap sound is heard three times in a row. Blackout. After a longer than normal period of darkness and sounds of a scuffle, lights come up on the
RUSSIAN PLAY. IRINA
and
PAVEL
are standing alone. We hear a mournful tune played on a balalaika.)

IRINA.
(Cocking ear to the music.)
What is that dreadful, depressing music?

PAVEL. Your husband asked a few peasants to play him some of their traditional tunes.

IRINA. But that’s been going on for hours now! The lazy rascals are supposed to be working in the fields!

PAVEL. Your husband is blissfully blind to human evil, from the laziness of the peasants to the thieving of the servants to my own much more grievous sins. Though what we all find even more remarkable about him is that he actually appears to like the provinces. Never in life or in literature have I encountered such a man. The dearth of stimulation, the contempt for the arts, the coarse food —

IRINA. I believe I would kill to get my hands on a croissant right now.

PAVEL. It quite baffles me. Frankly, Irina, I wonder how a woman of your refinement will bear it.

IRINA. I swear, I would murder a harmless old woman for one of those Parisian raspberry tarts —

PAVEL. It will be very difficult.

IRINA. — with that delicate, buttery crust —

PAVEL. Very difficult, indeed. Unless, of course, you find comfort . . . elsewhere.

(
PAVEL
has been slowly approaching
IRINA.
He now takes her in his arms. They embrace passionately. After several seconds, the audience sees one of his hands moving in the air, trying to decide which buttock to sample.
IRINA
senses this and grabs his hand just in time. She pulls quickly away and must force her next line out of her mouth.)

IRINA. Oh, Pavel, the touch of your fingers so —
(With the greatest reluctance.)
— thrills me. Without you —

(Zap sound. Blackout. Lights come up on the
COMEDY.
IRV
is parading around the room, holding a strip of photos and triumphantly reporting to
SAMMY.
)

IRV. You wouldn’t have believed it.

SAMMY. Yeah?

IRV. I’m telling you, she was eating out of my hand!

SAMMY. I just hope you washed your hand first, better than your dishes.

IRV. So we have this long, quiet dinner together. Max had just left town for an autographing. She has a glass of wine, then another, then a third, and pretty soon she’s telling me what a jerk he is. Other women on the side, screams orders at her, blows up if she spends a dime on herself.

SAMMY. Not like our philanthropist here. How’d you pay for the meal?

IRV. Got a credit card offer in the mail that morning.

SAMMY. So then what?

IRV. So then, we go out strolling. It had cooled off. It was gorgeous out. I take her for ice cream and tell her all about Marie.

SAMMY. Marie who?

IRV. Marie, my wife who died donating a kidney for a distant relative.

SAMMY.
(Affected.)
No kidding.

IRV. Of course I’m kidding! I made her up. She’s Mel’s wife. To stimulate sympathy.

SAMMY. Man, you fiction writers are brutal.

IRV. So we’re walking around, and we pass one of those booths that takes your picture. She’s still kind of tipsy and giggly. We go in. We have a ball. And every time the flash goes off, instead of “cheese,” I’m thinking, “Hi, Max.”

(
IRV
gives the strip of photos to
SAMMY.
)

SAMMY. Wow. She’s kissing your cheek in the last one.

IRV. The camera never lies.

SAMMY. So then?

IRV. So then, I walk her over to her place on the East Side.

SAMMY. One of the more inexpensive modes of travel. And then?

IRV. And then, we kiss on the doorstep.

SAMMY. You packed your 3-in-One oil?
(IRV snatches photo strip from SAMMY.)
And then?

IRV. And then I walked home.

SAMMY. You walked home? For a writer, you’re not much on love scenes.

IRV. Hey — I don’t have to be. Mission accomplished. When Max sees these, he’ll write the scene for me. He gets back the day after tomorrow. I’m gonna knock on his door and give ’em to him. And, man, when I do, all the money he’s making off my life suddenly ain’t gonna —

(A clap of thunder.
IRV
and
SAMMY
look confused.)

SAMMY.
(Obviously improvising.)
Guess a little storm . . . must have blown in.
(Another clap of thunder. IRV taps his foot on the floor experimentally. Another thunderclap. IRV pounds harder.)
I just hope your neighbor, the one with the
polka records,
remembered to close his windows.
(IRV and SAMMY wait expectantly for polka music. Long pause. Trumpet flourish from the last RICHARD III segment. IRV and SAMMY look at each other.)
You expecting somebody . . . important?

(Zap sound. Blackout. Lights come up on the
AVANT-GARDE PLAY.
The
MAN
has his ear to one of the walls. The
WOMAN
is knitting.)

MAN. I’m sure of it. A man. And a woman. The man is giving a tip to the bellboy.

WOMAN. What do they look like?

MAN.
(Concentrates awhile.)
I can’t tell.

WOMAN. I wonder if there’s a corpse in their room, too.

MAN. They haven’t mentioned one.

WOMAN. Do you suppose they’ll charge us for our corpse, even though we didn’t order it?

MAN. It’s best not to get into arguments with the staff. That was mentioned several times in the hotel information.
(A pause.)
She’s commenting on the lovely view. They look out on the lake.

WOMAN.
(Speaking with emotion for the first time.)
But there is no lake here. Not in any direction.

MAN. The man is eating the mints off the pillow.

WOMAN. We never had any mints on ours.

MAN. He says they’re quite good.

WOMAN. But it’s not bedtime yet! Pound on the wall! Make him stop!

MAN. Apparently, they’ve brought their Chihuahua.

WOMAN. But you read that pets weren’t allowed! The hotel brochure specifically mentioned that!

MAN. The dog’s name is Gringo.

WOMAN. That’s not fair! We were going to name our Chihuahua Gringo, if we ever got one. They get to have everything!

(A woman’s scream is heard through the wall.)

MAN. Wait.
(Pause.)
They have a corpse.

WOMAN.
(Composed again.)
Well. That’s a relief.

(Zap sound. Blackout. Lights come up on the
SOUTHERN PLAY.
A dummy of a female corpse, wearing a white dress like
GRANDMAMMY
’s and clearly distinguishable from the male corpse in black, lies face-down on the floor in front of the chair
GRANDMAMMY
last occupied.
REGINALD
and
CAROLINE
are gathered around, while
LUKE
bounces around the room. He uses a southern accent.)

LUKE. — all scrambled up about her great-great-grandfather’s family comin’ over in 1780 and how they left England so they’d be free to cook their meat according to how the Bible teaches, which is barbecue, and how iced tea’s mentioned in Scripture, too, only by a different name, and when I come back from getting her more tea in the kitchen, there she was, dead on the floor.