So this is me writing again. I almost feel awkward after so long. But hopefully I haven't completely regressed to illiteracy. All comments are welcome. After so long, I'll even accept "You spelled ______ wrong."
But try to be a little bit more helpful than that. 
Stanislavsky's Chainsaw
The room listened intently, as Toby October stood alone, talking to himself. He was poetic and deluded, and had not existed in his present form until that day.
“If we’re fatalists, doesn’t that mean that every decision is the right one? My creator gave me the answers to every question that would ever be asked of me, but conveniently didn’t tell me anything important. I know that in a few days, when someone asks me if I’ve seen a man in a blue suit walk past in the last few minutes, I’ll say that he had turned a corner and left nothing behind.”
Toby paused, dramatically, and then continued.
“When I forget which bus to take, I know that whichever one I take will get me to where I have to go. Now doesn’t that sound very comforting? Of course it doesn’t, because my creator hates me. I know this because he refuses to kill me. Instead I’m just supposed to stand here in front of you and tell you about how I’m doomed to stand here. He didn’t tell me where exactly I am – I don’t know the name of this city – and he certainly didn’t tell me why he created me as a fatalist. He told someone, but she talks to me far too often to ever tell me anything. So please, remember that the wretch in front of you knows everything about his future and nothing about his past, and don’t, for the sake of etiquette, tell me anything at all. I’m a fatalist in an absurdist play. How unfortunate.”
Sounds like rapid gunfire ensued, and Toby forfeited his existence again.
Act I
Chapter One
Four days after Toby made his soliloquy, I’m sitting in the ninth row of seats at the Fremantle town hall, watching Emily on stage, pretending to be a tree. Actors move about her, acting out a scene in which there is no tree, until eventually she can’t hold her arms above her head any longer. She walks off while the action continues.
She is to be the lead in the play. I am the other lead. No one needs us here today.
I’ve spoken eight words to her in my life, but I think our love will be infinite. “Hi. I’m Conor. I guess we’ll be lovers,” I had said only yesterday.
“I guess so,” she said, smiling. I hope she was as happy about it as I was.
She walked away after that, but I feel like I had said enough to ensure that we’d connect. It had all been planned out. We’ll kiss tomorrow at about midday, and for four weeks after that we’ll plan the rest of our lives together. We’ll live happily ever after in oblivion starting June 9th.
Today is May 5th, which means there are about five more weeks until I conquer life’s objectives.
I watch her as she walks over to talk with the director. He sits in the front row, staring at the stage as if in a trance. Gavin, his name is, and he is a most terrible director. He doesn’t know anything about the play. He just saw a performance of it once in London and figured that if people liked it so much there, they’d like him for putting it on over here.
Moving over to a table near her that is full of scripts, pretending to read one of them, I listen to their conversation.
“Gavin, I need to talk to you about this character I’m playing,” she says.
“What is it? I’m a little bit busy with a vision I’m having of the set,” he says, pompously.
“Well, I was just wondering if she’s, you know, real.” It sounds like she’s asking a child about astrophysics.
“This is Theatre of the Absurd. Of course she’s not real. No one talks like that, no one does the things she does. How could she be real?”
“No, I mean, does she...” She is interrupted by Gavin.
“Look, I just had a breakthrough with the set design. I just figured out how we can replicate exactly what they did in London. So could you please just leave me alone? Go talk to someone else about it.”
She walks away, insulted and afraid for the future of modern drama.
Feeling like I have some answers, yet actually having none, I go after her. At the door leading to the hallway at stage right, I catch up to her. “Emily, wait.”
She turns, quickly. “Oh, hi Conor.”
“I just overheard you talking with Gavin.” I wait for her to interject. She doesn’t. “Does he scare you as much as he does me?”
“Oh, no, he just makes me incredibly sad to end up here.”
“Hmmm, I think I understand. Anyway, I was actually thinking of asking him the same sort of thing that you asked him. But now that I can see that he won’t give me an answer that doesn’t involve the words ‘how they did it in London’ I was wondering if we could maybe go through this together.”
“Well, do you have any answers for my question?” she asks me.
She makes me wish I was a master of aphorisms, of compressed and humble wisdom.
Fearing the rambling that was about to ensue, I try to hit the small target of a small and profound answer. “She’s incredibly real,” I begin.
“How do you figure?” she asks.
I knew I’d have to elaborate, but the whole time I was pausing all I could think of was how good it would be if I could pull this off. “In the third scene, she talks about a dream she had. What use do empty shells have for dreams?” I say, surprised at myself. That was the page I was feigning to read while eavesdropping on Emily and Gavin, which is why I guess it came to mind.
She looks at me, intrigued for a second. Without any reference to what I had just said, she smiles and says, “Are you doing anything this afternoon? I think we discuss becoming our own directors over some coffee.”
Exeunt omnes all the air in my lungs, she directs.
“But I don’t think that’s how they did it in London,” I say, smiling and feeling very witty.
“They didn’t have to work it out for themselves either.”
The city of Fremantle blew about us like a casual and colourful cyclone. The eye of the storm was Emily and I, and a café on High Street where we drank coffee and spoke of abandoning ourselves for higher beings.
“You know what I think? I think everyone got it wrong,” Emily says. She sounds like she knows a dirty little secret about the entire population of the earth.
“You say it like everybody’s never gotten it wrong before,” I say.
“I don’t think it’s Theatre of the Absurd at all.”
“Oh, so when your character and mine go looking for angels in the spray-paint aisle of the shopping centre, we’re imitating some vital part of real life that I’ve been missing out on.” She laughs, which is something I love because I am not normally a funny person. “Face it, these characters are either absurdists or this is a realist play about two nutcases.”
“Well you’re not so far from it. But suppose they aren’t nutcases, but absurdists in a realist play.”
“Isn’t that what nutcases are in real life anyway?”
“Exactly! Now you see what I’m saying.”
“Not entirely, but I’ll give it a go. You’re saying that rather than being Theatre of the Absurd, this is plain old representational theatre about two people who should be in the Theatre of the Absurd. Did I get that right?”
“Spot on.”
“How do you figure?” I ask, perplexed. The idea seems plausible enough when I think about it, but something about the act of thinking about it seems perplexing.
“Well, the only clue to go by is Eli,” she says.
“The wretched little boy who plays the accordion on the street?”
“Yep,” she says, with the pride of adding the last piece to a jigsaw puzzle.
“What does he say to your character? What is the only line he has in the whole production?”
“Ummm... something like “You don’t belong here. Not until you learn how to fit in.””
She bursts into victorious laughter. “Don’t you see? He’s the only character in the whole damn thing that’s where he’s supposed to be.”
“And where is that, exactly?”
“The real world!”
I ponder this theory for a second or two, until I come across a hole in her logic. “But how do you know that he’s not the one who’s in the wrong place?”
“Because playwrights are too unimaginative to make everything up. They have to borrow from what they know.”
“Huh?”
“Have you ever looked up the guy who wrote this play? His mother had severe dementia and most of his life he’s been afraid that he’ll go through the same thing.”
“Okay, for a second I thought I grasped all of this, back when we were talking about Eli, but what the hell is this tangent you’ve shipwrecked us on?” I say.
“He’d have to know what it’s like being an emissary of the real world trying to get through to someone detached from it.”
“Something tells me you’re about to bring up nutcases again.”
“Actually, I’m going to use the term ‘mentally unbalanced’ this time.”
“Wonderful,” I say, feigning excitement.
“His mother, the person he sees himself becoming, these are the prototypes of our characters. They’re detached from the world around them, but they’re still trapped by it. There are no sane people living in the mentally defective world.”
“So, the whole play is a commentary on what it must be like being detached from reality but still having to live with it?”
“Oh my, no.”
“But isn’t that...” She interrupts.
“No, the play is about dealing with the way you were created, and accepting that you’ll never find out why.”
I sip my coffee, frustrated. “So why the hell have we just been through all this speculation?”
“Because we’re directors, not playwrights. But there has to be some overlap. Now that we know what the playwright was getting at, we should use that to create more realistic characters.”
“But we’re not realis- oh, wait. We are realistic, aren’t we? We’re just mental.”
“You’ve got it! Well done.”
“So what should we do now?” I ask. I’ve given up any hope of interjecting with my own ideas or thoughts. I’ll follow whatever she does.
“We have to get into character,” she says with a smile. To me, it looks like she is going to enjoy that process a great deal.
“I’m getting an overwhelming feeling that you know exactly how you want to do that.”
“Definitely. Should I assume you know of Stanislavsky’s methods? It would be a shame if you were to say you weren’t.”
“Please, I’m an actor. I may not know much about much else, but I know my theory for this stuff.”
“Good, we must start right away.”
“How? How do we get into the heads of our characters?”
“We have to stop making sense in this world.”
And before I can say anything else, she stands up on her chair, spreads her arms out wide and shouts at the top of her lungs: “Does anyone know which way is up?”
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Canary word: Present
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125,018 Literary Works • 672,856 Reviews
Ok, wow i didn't have to read that much, i suppose i shouldn't join a writers society if i don't want to read that much. On a first note i think that at times the difference between Stanislavski and method acting is lost by these characters, though that is not incredibly important.
This will be quick and probably not that useful, i am sorry but i can only give general comments on the piece and the overall feelings. I personally felt that it was like a drug, one that confused and baffled but seemed so obvious when you were reading, but starts to seem strange as you have a come down. Yet i have to confess a love for it, i am in fact incredibly envious. You have crafted with skill an at times absurdist and at other times, dare i use the word sweet, romance. The two parts seem to work so well and yet also seem so different.
I loved the director when he said he was seeing the stage, having worked with directors i know that type of person.
Yet that is the only specific i can give you now, if you would like more specifics PM me and i will read it again knowing what to expect and try to be more useful. All i will say is that one of the great success was that it was strange but, another risky word, accessible and yet at times is did seem confused, just look again at what makes no-sense instead of little.
A little note, i like flabby sentences, this may not be a popular view but it is my own. Maybe my proof of madness
So, nearly one year after chapter one was completed, here is chapter three. I will be accepting my crown as Least Productive Young Writer in the days to come.
Enjoy.
________________________
“Have you ever felt insane?”
I don’t know how to answer her question.
“Sometimes, I guess,” is the only reply the speech centre of my brain will send to my lips.
“When?” she asks me. We sit on the grass near the Fremantle library, working on our characters. Today is the first session in the process of using Stanislavski’s teachings to make ourselves nothing like our selves.
“Do you want me to say I hear voices in my head, or that I was abducted by aliens and no one believes me when I tell them? Because I actually think I’m quite sane.”
“Okay, let me rephrase. Have you ever felt something that other people don’t feel? Do you have strange opinions of things, or do you hate something that everyone else seems to love?”
“Well, I do have a theory that God is a scientist. And that he planted everything there is to discover, just so he could be proud of us for being curious.” Immediately I feel insane. She’s good at this. “Oh, and I also believe that I am a better actor than Keanu Reeves and that electro music sucks, if that counts.”
“Wonderful. It seems you’re not as sane as you think. I mean, that whole ‘God is a scientist’ thing sounds rational, but electro music is awesome.” She sits and thinks for a second, and soon tells me why this is perfect for our purpose. “While you may not live your life by this philosophy you’ve come up with, you do not subscribe to popular belief. The only reason you haven’t been classified as insane is because you haven’t explained your theory on television. Now, how does it feel to occupy your own little corner of philosophy that no one else will ever find you in?”
“Well, I feel ridiculous. If it were based on anything more than my own idle speculation, I’d feel like humanity got everything wrong. But since I’m the only one to come to this conclusion, I feel like I should leave theology to people who have that have obviously done a bit more research and soul-searching.”
“Good. Very good. What I think you have to do now is tell the world how you feel,” she says. Everything she says during these conversations about acting is dead serious. Yesterday after rehearsals we talked about, I don’t know, whatever came to mind. She told me about her brother who lives in Egypt, and I told her what I though of a movie I saw last weekend. The whole thing was lighthearted and has led me to feel like I could call her my friend. But now when she asks me to tell the world that God is a scientist who set a bunch of problems for us to figure out at the beginning of time, I know that she won’t accept me not doing it.
“How? Where? Should I try to get on television? Because that may prove difficult,” I tell her.
“No, nothing like that. Just stand on that bench over there and tell everyone who will listen the gospel according to Conor.”
“Okay,” I say. “But first, have you ever felt insane?”
“Once, for a few months. But the meds really helped,” she says, jokingly. I’m glad she can still joke when we do this.
Now, as an actor I am used to making a spectacle of myself. But normally the people who witness it have paid money or at least decided they want to see it. The people that are about to hear ‘the gospel according to Conor’ are pedestrians, shoppers, people enjoying themselves by themselves. They will hear me, and they will, most likely, tell me where to go.
I stand up, and with a smile at Emily and a last thought about what exactly I am about to do, I walk over to the bench and jump on top of it.
“In the beginning,” I begin, loudly, “God created the heavens and the earth. After such a task, there proved to be very little else to do. Unsure of his next move and having lots of spare time on his hands before the rapture, he decided to give mankind some commandments and some challenges. The commandments were easy – he simply scribbled some basic outlines for morality, possibly on a bar napkin or an old piece of cardboard.”
Already the crowd was divided. Half walked faster as they passed me, while others slowed down to hear exactly what nonsense I was proclaiming.
“But the challenges he decided to set for us required a bit more forethought. So he went to his desk, put his creation hat on and set about putting riddles into our existence. He gave us energy sources that were effective but bad for our environment. He hid power in some very hard to reach places. He gave us diseases and hid their cures somewhere on our planet. Sometimes the he broke down the solutions so that we needed to not only find things, but figure out how they fit together. But this existential Easter egg-hunt isn’t just to combat his boredom. No, the proof of God’s love for us is in these conundrums.”
By now a few people have actually gathered around me and are muttering to each other. I can’t hear what they’re saying, but I assume they’re using the word ‘crazy’.
“Yes, good listeners, God loves you because he wants to be proud of you. He’s a parent that sent us to a fancy boarding school. He isn’t satisfied by our mediocrity, so he gave us the chance to prove how smart and curious we are. And people think that science and the Bible are at odds. They’re not: science is the boarding school he sent us to, the Bible is the letter he wrote to us while we’re away from home doing great things with our minds. So, my friends, go now and live your lives like children who want nothing more than to get good grades to impress the people back home. And when you get back home, to him, he’ll embrace you because you studied and did your best, and didn’t spend all your time reading the letters he sent you. Thank you, and good luck to you all,” I finish.
I jump down from the bench and the small crowd disperses quickly. One of the listeners, a man with a long beard and a trucker hat says to me as he leaves that I ‘opened his eyes’. I thank him and return to where Emily had remained throughout my tirade.
“That was beautiful,” she says. I fall limp on the grass next to her, exhausted. “I especially like the part about God having a ‘creation hat’.”
“Yes, I thought you might like that.” The whole thing has left me feeling very faint. I put a lot into that speech and it’s nice to lie on the grass for a second and try to recapture all the energy and sanity I can find.
“Well?” Emily says to me after a minute or so.
“Well what?” I sit up and look at her.
“How did that make you feel?”
“Ummm... well it’s all kind of a blur. I just got up there and spoke.”
“How did the words come to you? I mean, it’s obvious that you’ve had those thoughts before, but how did each sentence come to mind?”
“I guess I just wanted to be as descriptive and entirely bizarre as I could. But at the same time it’s like I wanted the people to believe what I was telling them. I was lofty and preachy, but at the same time always feeling like I was in a losing battle for these people’s minds.”
“Excellent. This is exactly how it was supposed to go. Stanislavski said you should find analogous feelings between yourself and your character, and your character, I think, feels much the same as you did up there. This is a massive breakthrough for us. Now that you know these feelings and you’ve recognized them within yourself your performance will be so much better.” She’s really excited about all this and I must admit that I am too.
“So what about you? Your character doesn’t preach as much as mine, so it won’t do for you to yell at people from a park bench.”
“I’m not entirely sure what to make of her yet. I’m going to have to get to know her a little better. But I have noticed that while your character like to seek answers, mine is content to stand around and ask questions.”
I give her a big smile, and I think she understands why. “So if my exercise was to stand up and tell people what I think, yours is to ask people what they think.”
“I suppose that makes sense,” she says. “But what should I ask?”
“I think you should start simple. Ask someone where they’re going. Maybe ask them why later on.”
“Okay, watch this,” she says as she stands up. For a second she looks around to find someone to talk to. When a victorious look flashes across her face, I know she’s found someone. She strides off in the direction of a teenage girl dressed all in black, except for long red socks that connect her black skirt to her black shoes. It’s too far away for me to hear, so I go in closer to listen.
“Excuse me,” Emily says to the girl. She keeps walking. “Excuse me, sorry,” she says again, walking alongside her now. Emily taps her on the shoulder and the she removes an earphone from behind her long hair. The distorted sounds of loud thrash metal come flowing out as Emily begins.
“Excuse me, but may I ask you where you’re going?” she asks, timidly.
“What does it matter to you?” the girl replies, with a healthy mixture of hostility and confusion.
“Oh, it doesn’t. I’m just curious.”
“Get the fuck away from me, weirdo,” the girl says, now with hostility taking over the entirety of her tone.
“I’m afraid that if you don’t tell me, I’ll have to follow you. Just tell me and I’ll leave you alone,” Emily says with surprising sincerity.
“Ugh, fine. I’m going to the train station. Happy? Now please, fuck off.”
“Thank you. Sorry to bother you,” she says, with a slight bowing motion. She walks over to the low wall I had positioned myself on, shaking her head all the way. The girl in black watches Emily walk away for a few seconds, puts her earphone back in and continues in her own direction, toward the train station.
“This is hard,” she tells me.
“I can see that,” I say, laughing.
“It’s not like your exercise where I can just talk. I actually need reciprocation. Without that I can’t do anything.”
“Not really. I mean, you just need a response, don’t you? That girl called you a weirdo, didn’t she? I though that was what we were aiming for.”
“I guess so. But still, I need something more than “fuck off”. I’ll try one more time.”
She looks around and sees a couple exiting the library. She approaches them and asks them where they’re going.
The encounter goes pretty much the same as the first one did, except they use the word ‘freak’.
She returns and says to me that no matter what word people use to describe her, it’s just going to keep ending up the same way. I have to agree with her.
But then I have an idea. “Are you hungry?” I ask her.
She looks at her watch, and realizing that it is probably about time we had lunch, she tells me she is a little hungry.
“Great, follow me.”
There’s a little café nearby that has very nice sandwiches. It’s called the Red Hat, and it’s perfect for us because of the waitresses.
We walk in and sit at a table toward the back. The place is decorated with dark wooden furniture and lots of red and purple everywhere. The walls are red – blood red – and this gives the place a very overbearing feel. It’s very disparate to the understated exterior – the old facade that many buildings in the town have.
There’s a picture of a city street that covers a large area on the back wall. I really like it, though it’s hard to explain why. I almost feel like it was painted by a mediocre photographer, trying his hand at painting and finding that he is pretty good at it.
“Right,” I begin, “what will you be ordering? They make excellent chicken schnitzel sandwiches here.”
“Is this part of our work, or is this just lunch? Either way, I think I’ll have one of those sandwiches, but I just want to know what’s going on.”
“Okay, think about this. We need someone who is going to talk to you no matter what you say, right? And who would have more reason to talk to you than someone who is getting paid to do it? As soon as a waitress gets over here, just ask her something really strange. But make sure you order; I’m starving.”
“Oh, I get it now. This is brilliant,” she says.
We wait a few minutes, not really saying anything to each other. I think she’s trying to figure out what to say when the waitress gets here, so I don’t interrupt.
Eventually, a girl in a red polo shirt with the café’s logo on it walks over to us. “Hi, I’m Amanda,” she says. “What can I get you two today?”
“Hi. Ummm... well my friend here tells me you have great chicken schnitzel sandwiches.”
“Best in town,” Amanda says.
“Excellent. We’ll have two of those, no tomato on mine.”
“No problem. Can I get you anything to drink?”
“That depends. Do you have any polka music?”
“Excuse me?” Amanda says, like she misheard what Emily said.
“Polka music. You know, accordions, flugelhorns, double basses, simple little dances that are so much fun.”
I try hard not to laugh.
“I’m sorry, but we don’t have a stereo in here,” Amanda says, obviously having concluded that we wanted to listen to some. I sort of feel sorry for her, because of the complete bewilderment she’s about to go through.
“No, I mean I’m thirsty for some polka music. That is what I would like to drink. And Conor, would you like some too?” she asks me.
“Absolutely. Nothing like a cool glass of polka,” I say. This is fun.
The waitress has no idea what to say. Fearing that the conversation would end with her simply walking away, I jump in.
“Emily, they obviously don’t have any. You know we’ve only ever found one place that will serve it to us.” I turn to Amanda. “I apologize, this must be very odd for you. We’ll just take two lemonades.”
“Okay, two lemonades. I can do that.”
“Sorry about that,” Emily says. “We’re not from around here.”
She walks off, much faster than she walked toward us to get our order.
“That was fun,” Emily says. “But it still didn’t last very long.”
“It’s because it was too blunt. You asked for something that they couldn’t give you, and there was nowhere to go beyond that. Try asking something more open-ended when she comes back.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know. Something like what day of the week she feels most like going swimming. Or what she would name her son if he were born with hair on his palms. These are obviously very bad examples, but you need to ask her something that makes no sense, but still has an answer.”
“And what is the answer to that last question?”
“Ben,” I say.
“Why?” she asks.
“Why not?”
She pauses. “You’re a strange guy,” she says.
“You just asked a waitress for a glass of polka.”
“Touché. Anyway, I think I’ve got an idea. Just follow my lead when she comes back.”
A few minutes later, Amanda returns with two chicken schnitzel sandwiches, each with a side of salad. “No tomato for you,” she says, giving Emily her meal. “And here’s yours,” she says as she puts mine down in front of me.
“Thanks,” I say.
“No problem.”
“Excuse me, but just one more thing.” Emily says to Amanda.
The waitress looks at her, afraid of what she might come out with, given the previous conversation.
“My friend and I are having a very heated debate, and we were wondering if you could give us an opinion on something.”
“Uhhh, okay. But I have to get back to work, so could you make it quick?”
“Sure, this will just take a second. Anyway, my friend here seems to think that most people, upon finding themselves in a situation involving the police and a man wielding a very realistic-looking plastic sword would inevitably develop a fear of plastic in the years following the incident. I disagree, I think the person would find comfort in plastic products, since they remind them of the time they would have been in danger, if it had not been for the nonfatal nature of such a material. What do you think?”
“Ummm... are you guys insane?”
“Oh, no. We’re psychology students. We probably should have mentioned that earlier. This is for an assignment our professor set us.”
“Oh, I get it now. I thought you were just really strange, but I guess not.
Emily smiles at her. “So do you have an opinion? It’s okay if not, we just wanted some outside input.”
“Ummm... well I suppose if it were me I’d just be afraid of the guy with the plastic sword, not the actual thing. So I’d say my feelings about plastic wouldn’t really change.”
“Ah, I see. Interesting. Thanks for that. And thanks again for the sandwiches, they look lovely,” Emily says with a large smile.
“Not worries at all. Just give me a wave if you need anything else. Food, that is. I’m not sure I can keep up with any more of this psychology stuff.” She walks away.
“Bravo,” I say. “That was very good. Although I’m not sure I agree with the lie about being students.”
“But we are students. And this whole thing goes hand in hand with psychology. Thus, psychology students.”
“No, I get that, but I mean trying to justify yourself to her. The second she starts thinking we’re rational we’ve lost what we’re trying to do.”
“But no one in the play think our characters are irrational. They all think alike. Except for Eli, everyone is on the same level. If I had just kept spouting nonsense, she’d have the same opinion of us as the audience, but since we’re interacting with her, she needed to trust that we’re sane people discussing something very outlandish, and nothing more."
“But you said the other day that we aren’t mentally balanced.”
“We aren’t, but we’re supposed to interact with others like us, while still talking in non sequiturs and riddles. And since it’s no help for us to go into the world of a waitress named Amanda, and it’s impossible to get her to where we are, I had to make some compromises. This was your idea, I’m just doing the best I can.”
“So when I ranted on top of that park bench, that was just as productive as this.”
“No, that was important because it needed no interaction. That was just you, and it didn’t matter what people thought because it only mattered where your head was at.”
“So what are you saying?” I ask.
“I’m saying that our characters’ affliction isn’t just insanity. It’s a folie à deux.”
“A what?”
“It’s a French term that translates to a ‘madness shared by two’. They’re in it together, neither would be the same without the other. Toby’s delusion’s become Delilah’s delusions, and vice versa.”
I take another bite of my sandwich, which is very good, and ponder this for a moment. It makes perfect sense when she says it, but I must research this when I get home.
“Should we both get up on a park bench?” I ask her after a short silence.
She laughs. “No, we need to interact with each other more. We need to just talk, about everything and nothing, basically like we tried to do with Amanda.”
“Alright, let’s do it.”
“We will, but not now. Once we’re finished lunch I’ve got a thing I have to go to.”
“Okay, how about tomorrow after rehearsals?”
“Perfect.”
I very much like the idea of interacting with her more, and I will admit that my mind went into the gutter momentarily after she said it. Sure, we’re characters while we do this, but we’re people too. While Toby’s lips are pressed to Delilah’s, my body is in very close proximity to hers. And as actors, I don’t think we’re that good that it doesn’t mean anything to Conor and Emily. I know I’m not.
“You know, these really are excellent sandwiches,” she says.
“I’m glad you think so.”
I've been struggling with chapter two for, well, since I posted chapter one. I was trying to think of a way to expand it and make it contribute more to the novel. But I'm starting to think that it's as long as it needs to be and does everything that the second chapter of this particular story should. But I may be wrong. What does everyone else think?
This is my attempt at being cryptic. Probably too cryptic.
Enjoy.
Chapter 2
“Ladies and gentlemen, let me first say that I welcome you all and congratulate you on being a part of the Empty Seat Theatre Company’s production of Nowhere Near Here.” Gavin stands in the centre of a circle made by actors and technical crew members, addressing us like Caesar. There are only about fifteen of us – nine of us actors. Two of us know not to take anything that is said seriously.
“Now, there is, traditionally, a note from the author that comes with the play, to be read to the actors before rehearsals start. I see no point in it, but some of you have requested that it be read aloud to everybody, so here it is.”
He pulls a folded piece of paper from his pocket, clears his throat and begins. His voice rings with the dull echo of the cavernous hall, and yet has none of the presence such a place gives to others.
“Dear actors, director, set designers, costume designers, dramaturges and whoever else may be involved: You are inevitably going to find out that you are putting on a play that doesn’t make sense. I can not justify such ludicrous things, except by saying that I am a product of a world that doesn’t make sense. You’ll have to visit me here to find out why anyone does anything. So do whatever you like with my play. Just say the lines properly and turn off the lights when you’re done.”
I look over at Emily, who is sitting on a table next to me, to see how she reacts. I think I know what she’s thinking. She’s just been validated as a skilled interpreter of drama. He’s the product of a world that doesn’t make sense - his mother, dementia - it all fits. She lets out a small laugh. No one else does. Gavin looks frustrated.
“That is exactly why I didn’t want to read it. Typical playwright bastards - never telling us anything of any value. Of course the play doesn’t make any sense. But that’s why the critics love it, because it’s so different from all the plays that do.”
Samuel, one of the set designers, raises his hand and says, “Don’t critics love it because it’s a complex statement about humanity and the things we do to make sense of everything?”
“If that were true then why did the author himself say that it didn’t make sense? Anyway, there isn’t time to sit around and philosophize over the words of a deadbeat writer from the slums of Belfast. We’re on too tight a schedule. Now, can we forget about that and get down to business already? There are a few things we have to get out of the way before we start running lines.”
Emily frowns. I frown too.
“Okay people. This is, unfortunately, Theatre of the Absurd. Who has experience in this genre?”
Six of the actors raise their hands, me included.
“Okay, great. Conor,” he says, pointing at me. “What experience do you have?”
“Well... I’ve done a few Beckett plays, and read nearly all of them. I played Estragon in Waiting For Godot and Willie in Happy Days.”
“Great,” he says. “That Beckett guy was like... the man when it came to this stuff, right?”
“Ummm... I guess you could say it like that,” I say, astounded. I’m not sure that, in dramatic circles, Samuel Beckett is referred to as ‘the man’ very often.
He points at someone else, and asks them what they’ve done. I don’t know who they are and I don’t listen. I think I heard “studied drama at university”. It certainly would explain why the director was so pleased with the response.
He then points at Emily. “Ms. Wintergreen, why was it a good decision to pick you for the lead?” he asks her.
“Oh, it wasn’t,” she says. Gavin doesn’t know what to do.
“Well surely you’ve done something to give you some experience,” he says, trying to get her to retract her last statement.
“Nope,” she admits, smiling. “This is my first time doing anything besides musical theatre. And I’m afraid “that Beckett guy” didn’t write anything that you can hum along to after the show.”
“But you auditioned so well,” he says, exasperated.
“Oh, well it wasn’t so hard. It’s a pretty straightforward part to play.”
“But what about the nonsensical dialogue? The erratic stage direction? This is Theatre of the Absurd, not regular theatre. And it most certainly isn’t a straightforward part.”
“Of course it is,” she says, reveling in subversion against the man in charge. “I just pretend it’s all very commonplace.”
“But you play a character that knows she doesn’t make any sense. She’s cryptic and ridiculous and lives in a world that she admits, does not make any sense.”
“Okay, whatever. But is it alright if I pretend to take every word seriously? I mean, if I pretend she’s making perfect sense?”
“Do whatever you like, just don’t screw up the lines,” Gavin says. If everything is fine aesthetically, he will be pleased. If the reviews come back positive, he’ll think he’s a dramatic genius.
“Anyway,” he says, beginning another tirade. “Opening night is June 9th. Does anyone have a problem with rehearsals every Monday, Wednesday and Friday until then?”
No one admits to having any such problems. This is probably a good thing, seeing as Gavin will need as much time with us as possible to make sure we listen to every word he says.
“Good,” he says. “Do you all have your scripts with you?”
[Curtain]
Toby October springs forth from the abyss and greets Delilah where she stands, as far from the abyss as possible. “You’re here already?” he says. “But the sun has not fallen yet.”
“Yes, but the sun falls for me long before it does for you,” she replies.
They come together at the centre of their world and kiss briefly. They kiss again, this time for longer, until Toby forces her off of him. “We can’t do this!”
“Why not?” she asks.
“Because we have important things that need to be done. Codes deciphered, names found, realities disproved,” he tells her. He loves her like a typewriters loves words, but she’ll never know that.
“Where should we start today?”
“In the same place as yesterday.”
“But we already looked there,” she says, totally disparaging what he says.
“Oh, right. Then where haven’t we looked?”
“Close your eyes,” she orders him.
He closes his eyes.
“Do you see anything?”
“Only the backs of my eyelids,” he says.
“Is that what we’re looking for?”
“No. We’re looking for something that fits over our eyes much more comfortably.”
“Then I must say that there is one less place for us to look. Would you like to check my eyelids? Or would that be a waste of time?”
“It most certainly would. Enough of this pointlessness! We need to search somewhere higher up. Let’s go,” he says as he falls to his knees. She looks at him like a child.
“What are you doing?” she asks.
“I don’t know,” he says, standing up again.
“Perhaps if you told me what we were looking for I could open my eyes to look.”
“We’re looking for words. Big words.”
“You mean like triskaidekaphobia?”
“No, and I’m thankful for that. We’d be searching for years to find that. I mean words that are really big, with letters the size of people,” he explained.
“I saw some like that a while ago. They were quite impressive.”
“What did they say?” He seems anxious now, like the words are his fate.
Delilah pauses, almost like she doesn’t remember what she’s supposed to say, or how to say it.
“They said ‘DON’T DIE JUST YET’ or something like that,” she tells him, trying her best to feign wisdom.
“Although I don’t know why he’d need to tell us that.”
“Who is he?”
“The author.”
“Which author?”
“There’s only one. You know that.”
“Of course. Sorry,” he says, bowing his head. “Did he say anything else?”
“No, the message ended as soon as I could figure out what it said for myself.”
“Oh.”
They stand still and silent for a few seconds. They kiss again and Toby goes to walk away. Before he reaches the
abyss that he had sprung from so recently, he turns back to Delilah and says, “I’m glad we found what we were looking for.”
“Me too,” she says.
Toby finds the abyss, and seconds later the abyss finds Delilah, standing in the centre of her world.
Hurrah! You wrote! ^_^
I've got to say--it really is a treat to read your things, every time. Not going to lie. You have a unique perspective, and all of the delicious things on philosophy are, well, delicious. *ceases to be coherent*
I could dither for days, but it seems you want us to be a little bit helpful.
A CURE FOR SENTENCE OBESITY:
I'm a firm believer in that sentences should be firm. Toned. There shouldn't be an ounce of fat on your sentences, because you will have burned it all away with your red pen. Sentences without excess baggage are clear and make a big impact upon the reader without weighing them down.
*needs to stop making weight loss puns*
Anyway. A few things to remember when looking at sentences:
1. "The road to Hell is paved with adverbs." Stephen King and I don't agree on several topics, but this is one that we do. Adverbs weaken, as they're usually used to make some sort of statement about the limitations upon something. "A was B" is direct and gets the point across without the possibility of rebuttal.
2. Avoid redundancy. Don't use five words for two, and don't repeat those same five words over and over again. Clarification on a large scale is different from single-sentence things--keep that in mind. One specific action does not usually need to be clarified.
How shall we doll up your opening line?
The room listened as Toby October stood at the front and talked to himself.
That's how I would do it, personally. There's terrible irony in this sentence, which is something that needs to be brought out. Keeping the sentence clean and to the point will help with this--besides, his name is amazing, and that should definitely be a focus. ^_~
DUDE, YOU BLEW MY MIND:
The problem with having philosophical discourse within a short story is that people are going to complain about it.
No joke. People don't like to think, and they must, it usually has something to do with snack selection. This is why, when you're throwing around Big Words, it's best to explain them.
Michael Crichton is a big fan of doing this in a very blatant manner. You don't have to explain every concept within your story in scientific detail, but they do need some explanation. The best way is to figure out how to slip in factual information within narrative without making it seem too out of place.
Granted, this is taken directly from first draft NaNoage, so the transition is not as smooth as it could be. But note that my explanation is just small enough to not be obstruction, and it sets up key words "prisoner" and "CIA" so that readers without any background on the Iraq war/Abu Gharib prison scandals, the Patriot Act, etc., will have a basic understanding of the fact that Daniel is not one for subtlety. And readers who are well-versed get it. Everyone wins. It's like watching Disney movies at age five and then in high school--the movie was enjoyable when you were a kid, but there's some complex humor that you glossed over before that you can get now.
Things to better clarify:
- Stanislavsky and method acting. This is going to be crucial in a mini-infodump, because it's your title.
- Absurdist/fatalist/realist and all of your lovely 'ist' words.
Your story has some absolutely beautiful allegory and symbolism, but it's the rare reader (i.e., someone with easy access to Google) who will be able to catch it all.
Something of an explanation, like, "Her presence was crucial, but at the same time superfluous" brings the true ridiculousness of the situation into light. It would also bring a nice opportunity for transition into the "love affair", which has the possibility to be played up into absurdity if you work with it.
___
Thanks for the read. ^_^ As usual, feel free to PM if you've got any questions.