Gray
Scene II
(It’s morning. Mute is up, tossing his rock from hand to hand, thinking. Sage is asleep. Blaine wasn’t able to sleep last night, and he’s very tired and groggy. Prate is asleep, in the same position he was last scene, the half-made twine still in his hands.)
MUTE: You up, Sage? (beat) Sage, you ‘wake? (long pause) Blaine? Blaine, are you up? (beat) Blaine?
BLAINE: (sigh) What do you want?
MUTE: You got the window, right?
BLAINE: Yup.
MUTE: What can you see?
BLAINE: What does it matter?
MUTE: Are there trees?
BLAINE: There’s nothing to see.
MUTE: (dreaded pause) Did…did they block it?
BLAINE: No.
MUTE: Then…how can there be nothin’ to see?
BLAINE: There isn’t anything.
MUTE: But if they didn’t block it, you can still see through it, right? I mean, clearly?
BLAINE: Obviously.
MUTE: You’re confusin’ me…
BLAINE: Look, there’s nothing but sky, okay?
MUTE: Really?!
BLAINE: Yup.
MUTE: What’s it look like?
BLAINE: (beat) What?
MUTE: What does the sky look like?
BLAINE: What do you think a sky looks like? It looks like sky.
MUTE: What color s’it?
BLAINE: Green.
MUTE: Really?
BLAINE: No! Of course it’s blue!
MUTE: (hurt) It’s not always blue…
BLAINE: Blue sky, sky blue. What other color could it be?
(Sage starts to wake up as their conversation gets louder.)
MUTE: (desperately) Black, white, gray, purple, pink, yellow, gold, red…
BLAINE: What are you talking about?
MUTE: …an’ a dozen diff’rent shades o’ blue with a hundred diff’rent types o’ clouds in a thousand diff’rent shapes and sizes! It’s not always blue, I remember! I swear, I remember that, at least!
BLAINE: It’s blue. No clouds. Happy?
MUTE: (beat) What shade of blue?
BLAINE: Oh, for the love of…!
MUTE: Please! Is it a deep blue? A bright blue? A pale blue?
BLAINE: It’s a dark navy blue.
MUTE: Quit mockin’ me!
BLAINE: Oh, I’m dead serious. It’s a dark navy, sort of a brownish color.
SAGE: (now fully awake) Stop it. Not another word.
BLAINE: Huh. Look who’s up.
SAGE: You’re worse than any prison guard. Is that what you are? Some agent of the king to torment His Majesty’s prisoners?
BLAINE: What idiot would choose to be down here with people like Mute?
SAGE: Tell me the truth. What does the sky look like?
BLAINE: Who are you to—?
SAGE: What…does…the sky…look…like?
BLAINE: (beat, sigh) It’s a bright blue today.
MUTE: Is it real clear?
BLAINE: Sure. Yeah.
(Mute leans back, trying to visualize the sky, and becomes completely oblivious to anything else around him.)
MUTE: Clear, bright blue sky…
SAGE: (to Blaine) Honestly, Mute hasn’t seen the sky for two years. He hasn’t seen anything for two years.
BLAINE: Take off the damn blindfold. Maybe then he’ll be able to see.
SAGE: You know why he has that on.
BLAINE: (beat) Why? What did he do?
SAGE: It’s not my story. He’ll tell it when he wants to.
(Their conversation is interrupted by Mute’s sudden cry. Sage runs to the other side of his cell. Prate jerks awake, then fervently starts to weave the twine. Mute stumbles towards Sage, pushing his hand through the bars.)
MUTE: Sage? You there?
SAGE: (takes his fingers) I’m here, I’m here. What’s wrong?
MUTE: I can’t see no more! I can’t see!
SAGE: Of course you can’t see.
MUTE: S’not what I mean, s’not what I mean! It ain’t in my mind no more! It ain't there, I can’t see it! I can’t see nothin’! There’s, there’s no…
SAGE: Shhh…calm down…
MUTE: There’s no colors…they’re fadin’, they’re…they’re almost…
SAGE: Shhh…
(There’s a long silence while Sage tries to comfort him through the bars. Blaine stands awkwardly for a second, then goes back to his escape mindset; testing the bars, wiggling the lock, etc. Prate puts his head in his hands.)
MUTE: S’there light comin’ from the window?
SAGE: Yes, there’s light.
MUTE: What’s it look like?
SAGE: It’s white gold, and it never changes. It’s very bright, today.
MUTE: White gold…very bright…(sighs, imagines it) they’re almost gone…
(Anymore clues as to what their ages are? I'm trying to see if their dialogue works for thier ages...and, btw, they're all different ages. If this question bothers you, you don't have to answer. Haha. Thanks for reading!)
I liked it, but I agree that you should wait longer before making the colors fade. It would make it seem more realistic and it would be more emotional when it happened. Another thing I noticed was that the conversation about the blindfold seemed a bit awkward. I agree it should be in there, but maybe word it differently? I'm not quite sure what to do about that. I hope this helps.
I spoke the last time on interaction for the sake of interaction, regarding interaction. Ha, that is to say, the lack of substance. Right now, all the dialogue and every spoken word lies on the surface - nothing lies beneath, there's no subtext and between Sage and Mute that's unacceptable, as they know each other well. You give the barest hint of it here by mentioning that Mute has a story and that Sage can't tell it.
There's simply not enough here though.
Trivial things can come to mean the world to people in prison, yes, so the colours are an important aspect of Mute's world but you should have waited, should have built it up until the point where we all but forgotten its significance so routine had it become and then taken it away. As it stands, Mute comes off as completely insecure and hysterical, Blaine seems to have randomly decided to behave himself by talking and the scene doesn't mean as much as it should.
It's morning. Where are the guards? Where's the breakfast? Where are the anecdotes and stories that keep them from going insane? That remind them of life? Where are the curses on those that they no doubt blame for their current predicament? And if they have taken responsibility for it, where are the self-recriminations? Where is the gossip of the outside that filters in, even to them.
In short, where is the substance? Having a discussion is simply not enough. I don't expect you to throw all of the above into once scene but you simply have to keep them in mind, and you have to keep us, the audience entertained. Right now, you're not doing it. It's not funny enough to be amusing and its not dramatic or tense enough to make me care. Choose an emotion. Nail it.
I'm in love with Mute I think. XD I feel so sad; I just wanna give him a huge hug.
Again, this was an amazing idea, and you do an incredible job of inferring what people inside a prison might feel. Blaine's sort of confused feel in response to Mute's question about the sky was great.
MUTE: Please! Is it a deep blue? A bright blue? A pale blue?
BLAINE: It’s a dark navy blue.
MUTE: Quit mockin’ me!
BLAINE: Oh, I’m dead serious. It’s a dark navy, sort of a brownish color.
SAGE: (now fully awake) Stop it. Not another word.
BLAINE: Huh. Look who’s up.
Looks like you got everything I asked for. ^_^ A little more about Mute's eyes and more about what Prate is doing. Still, there wasn't any grammar errors that I found. That's good.
Now, about the ages... I would guess that Prate is the oldest. He just seems that way because of his lack of doing much other than sleep, eat, bathroom, and spin twine. Blaine I'd guess is second oldest, and then Sage and Mute is about the same. I think that Sage might be a year or so younger... or maybe older. He give me the most confusion, I think.
BLAINE: Oh, for the love of…!
SAGE: What…does…the sky…look…like?
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