| Author | Post |
|---|
Steamboat Chambers
Member
|
Posted: Tue Mar 4th, 2008 03:23 am |
|
Something I've been working on lately. Let me know what you all think of it so far. Thanks. Have a couple ideas for the ending. The one I tend toward is that the two men tape Joyce up in duct tape, lay her on the couch, and the lights fade out as they are flipping a coin for, quite literally, "heads" or "tails."
Too Much
Characters:
Joyce (Jaws): gregarious woman in late 50s, wide and bulky, gussied up in chintzy attire and accessories, garish makeup (loud colors, eyebrows painted on)
Flossie: Joyce’s dying mother in her 80s, thinning silver hair, makeup to match Joyce, deep folds in her face
Pickle: man, late 40s, a ruffian and roughneck: pompous, disruptive, and hard-bitten
Jimmy: spiritless and torpid man in his 50s, an Elvis impersonator, barrel-chested with thick, dyed black pompadour and lamb chop sideburns
Scene: Mid-morning. A raffishly disordered and sloven living room sometime in the summer. An open window in the right wall of the interior leads outside. Fly paper hangs in opening of window. Carpentry tools and utility belt are spread out on the floor below the window. Downstage right a big screen television faces a couch, stage left angled toward the t.v, stuffing poking out of large tears in the cushions, clothing of all sorts thrown over its back. A dark wooden coffee table, the plain blonde wood exposed all over the surface from dings, nicks, and scratches, sits an arm’s length from the couch. Empty beer cans, a bottle of whiskey, full ash tray, Cds, half-eaten sandwich, pizza box, and playing cards consume the table and the area of the floor around it. The central element of the room’s claustrophobia is the collection of Elvis Presley memorabilia, merchandise, regalia, and collectibles that cover the walls, top of the television, and much of the floor. An inclined hospital bed on wheels with metal railings is upstage right between the couch and open window, but out of the way of the action. To the right of the bed stands a mobile steel IV stand, drip bags and their tubes hang from it, an 8" X 10" photo of Elvis is tapped to its apparatus.
At curtain: Joyce stands before TV engrossed (enraptured) by the white noise of its static. She wears a cheap flowing black dress, the top pushed down around her waist, and a bra, straps hanging at her sides. She is rubbing sunless tanner/bronzer cream under her arms. Pickle is outside window, offstage, trying to mount a satellite dish. Flossie, Joyce’s dying mother is beneath the blankets of the hospital bed, tucked in up to her neck, an IV tube connecting her right arm to the drip bag. Jimmy sleeps sprawled across the couch, barefoot and shirtless, in jeans with button undone and fly down.
Pickle (offstage): How 'bout now?
(Joyce stares at t.v. and applies bronzer.)
Pickle (offstage): Jaws!
Joyce: Yeah?
Pickle (offstage): How 'bout now?
Joyce: Nothing. There's nothing. Still the same.
Pickle (offstage): Anything? (long pause) Jaws!
Joyce: Yeah?
Pickle (offstage): You got a picture yet?
(Joyce strains her neck to see if she's applied enough cream to her armpits. Pickle sticks head through the window. He holds a satellite dish.)
Pickle: Jesus Christ Joyce, answer me here!
Joyce (stares at t.v.): Still got static. Watch the fly paper. Don't hit your head. It’s sticky stuff. I’ve seen it catch bugs bigger than your head. (points at t.v.) Look in the center. It's like one a those 3-D pictures. The fuzzy lookin' things from the mall that got pictures hiding behind 'm that jump out when you stare real hard. 'Member? They were the cats ass years back.
(Pickle stares at t.v. for a second.)
Pickle: It ain't like that at all.
Joyce: Ohh, jar loose Pickle!
Pickle: I'm tryin' to locate the signal. A bunch a' bars gonna come up on the screen when I got the dish pointin' in the right direction. Yell for Christ's sake when the bars are on the screen. Turn to channel 3...or 4. Is it on 3?
Joyce: My, I thought so.
(Pickle sits dish down outside and crawls in through window. He changes channels on t.v.)
Pickle: You had it on thirteen.
Joyce: Well that's got a three in it.
Pickle: My guess is those big, dumb statues you got in the front yard block the signal.
Joyce: Not my Greek boys?
Pickle: Yep, they're the problem. The Greeks. The Betas and Alphas and Epsiloons.
Joyce: My Greek boys got big peckers, that's why. Their huge cocks are what block the signal.
Pickle: Why'd you blow your money on such stupid junk?
Joyce: My handy men like you who can rig illegal cable save me lotsa money, so I got extra ta blow, plus them boys got hard bodies.
Pickle: They're stone.
Joyce: I know. I said they were hard. I can see 'um outta my window at night when I’m fallin' asleep in bed. They're my gatekeepers.
Pickle: I'm gonna castrate 'um with my hammer if the damn signal don't show up. Nip and tuck right on your front lawn. I'll throw their balls on the road.
(Joyce crosses to him and holds an arm up in the air.)
Joyce: Hey, hey tell me something. Do my armpits look good? I mean like brown.
Pickle: I ain't into arms or armpits. I like feet. Stick a foot out?
Joyce (sticks out foot): Bottle says the goo gives skin (reads bottle slowly, stumbles over words) "a sun-kissed glow without harmful ultraviolet exposure."
Pickle (stares at her feet): Wiggle your toes. You got about size...what size? A seven or eight. They aren't too big. But you got plenty uv ankle. I like that in a woman. You know those Greeks was raised by a she-wolf with tits enough to feed all the country. You got it where it counts, Jawsy--the tits and the ankles.
Joyce: I want the same color on all of me, not these white patches under my arms. The tanning beds can't get at the hard-to-reach spots. It's disgusting at a pool or something and one a' these little chickies raises her arms, and her pits are whiter than baby’s skin, blinding to the swimmers? Grosses me out. Serious Pickle. Is it standout? I hate seeing...quit looking at my feet!
Pickle: Put some socks on or something if you don't want me ta look at 'um. Feet like that are gonna get looked at by me. I know about feet. Sometimes I've gone into Payless--you know Payless? (Joyce ignores him.) Payless, the one they got out there in the mall, the shoe store. I like to cozy up on one of them benches and try on sneakers and boots beside young girls. Lotta times they got thick, dumb socks on. Takes all the fun right outta it for me. Then there are the moments that make it worth the time and effort. (pause) You know God made the feet uv Adam and Eve first...I like to think. Concentrated his best ideas into the feet and slapdashed some parts on top. You listening, Jawsy? I never saw you this concentrated before in my life. (grabs her shoulders and shakes her) Wake up! Jaws! Jaws! Wake up!
Joyce (holds up an arm): Honest Pickle, my armpits, can you see a line where my body tan ends and the armpit starts?
(Joyce doesn't pay attention to him, continues looking at armpit.)
Pickle: My lady at home needs a good shake a lot a' times. She don't do a damn thing. Unimaginative to the bone. She ain't no better than a doorstop. She sits around reading her checkout line smut magazines collecting all the scraps of garbage in her lint trap head. (shakes Joyce lightly) I gota shake her around to bring her back to reality, and then she bitches and moans I'm giving her "shaken wife syndrome" and that the head trauma makes her brain unthinkable, so much so that she ain't able to cook dinner or do wash. And I get hungry and need clean work clothes, so I shake her some more. The wheel keeps turnin.'
(Pickle shakes Joyce violently. A smile spreads across her face. She looks him in his face. He quits shaking and smiles back.)
Pickle: What?
Joyce: Don't play stupid.
Pickle: No, I don't know. What?
Joyce (shakes her body): Jar loose! Don't stop.
(Pickle shakes her again with renewed vigor. Joyce drops the bronzer.)
Pickle: Don't stop? Like this huh? Like a leaf in the wind?
Joyce: Squeeze my neck! Strangle my neck! Shake it! Two hands!
(Pickle grips her neck in a stranglehold and shakes. Joyce cries out, the gray sounds between pleasure and pain. Pickle covers her mouth and mumbles, "Don't speak, don't speak." Both breathe heavily. She collapses to the floor, lies on her back. Pickle straddles her, applying the grip to her neck. Finally he releases her. A long silent moment, both starring at the other, exhausted breathing, chests heaving. Pickle rises to his feet and stands over her in a position of taunting domination, like boxer over a felled opponent. An expression of accomplishment on his face. )
Joyce (taps her head and mutters): The less oxygen goes up there, (rubs her crotch) the better it feels down there.
Pickle: Yell back this time...alright?
(Pickle exits right through window. Long pause, audible clamor from offstage right, where Pickle is working. Joyce teeters to her feet, picks up bronzer, and recommences applying the cream, again straining to see armpits. She moves close to t.v. and examines armpit in the screen's reflection. She turns the t.v. off to get a better reflection.)
Pickle (offstage): How 'bout now?
Joyce: Nothing!
(long pause)
Pickle (offstage): Signal bars?
Joyce: Nothing!
(She turns t.v. on and takes a few steps back, still smearing on lotion. Pickle at window with dish in his hands panting.)
Pickle: I can't hold it up by myself. The signal's coming in higher than I thought. It's gonna have to go up higher than I thought. Too high for me to mount it up there with one set a’ hands. (points at Joyce) That lotion makes you look like a wetback.
Joyce: Good. (holds up arm) In my pits? (Turns her back to him.) Behind the knees?
Pickle: I did a job for a buncha illegals once, not long ago.
(Joyce crosses back to hospital bed and straightens bed covers. She whispers something in her mother's ear and laughs to herself. Pickle crawls in through the window.)
Pickle: Hey I'm not kidding you. I got a call, and I pull up to the address, and I'm not kidding you, there was fifteen Mexicans, looking just like you, packed in a ten-by-ten room, populated in there like sardines. Talk about shitting where you eat, they had about half a foot uv space per head.
(Pickle grabs whiskey carafe from top of t.v. Pulls out stopper. Joyce hurries upstage and reaches to take it from him.)
Joyce: Oh my, no! No no, no!
Pickle: Lemme have a swallow.
Joice: God no!
Pickle (carafe poised to his lips): God no? Why not?
Joice (grabs bottle from him): Why not? I'll tell you, why not. This innit whiskey. It's water.
(Pickle takes can of snuff from his back pocket, tries to take back carafe.)
Pickle: Well that's even better 'cus I just need a swallow ta wash my mouth out 'fore I throw in a lipper. (He packs the can of chew.)
Joice: It's pool water, dummy!
Pickle (reaches for carafe): I'll drink it. You think I care at all 'bout a little chlorine, gimme a swallow. I'm thirtsy anyways. Nothing wrong with pool water.
Joice (motions to hospital bed): That don't make it right to drink 'cus you still don't know about it. It's for Mom's drip bags. I pour half a cup in her drip bags with the other liquids the nurses gave me.
Pickle: Pool water in her drip bags? I piss in pools. (tucking a wad of chew in lower lip) Ha, ha, ha did they tell you when you were little not ta piss in pools, that your piss would turn the water red and the monsters would surface from the deep end and eat ya' thinking the red piss was blood?
Joice: You ain't got a clue how good this water fortifies Mom. It’s nectar. I stole it from Elvis' pool at Graceland last summer on a Greyhound pilgrimage I took down to Memphis to see the King. (She offers him a styrofoam cup from off the floor.) Want a spitter?
Pickle: I gut the juices.
(Joyce drops cup and smells rim of carafe.)
Joyce: Jar loose, Pickle, jar loose. Have it how you want it. You're gonna get stomach cancer. (sniffing) This is piss free. Elvis got manners. (She takes a sip.)
Pickle: Now what's fair about that, drinking the devil's water right in front of me after you gripe it's contaminated and not for drinking. You're gonna wind up with stomach cancer drinking toilet water like that.
(Pickle takes pack of cigarettes from back pocket and lights up.)
Joyce (holds carafe aloft, looks at water level): I'll sell you a cup.
Pickle: How much?
Joyce: Cheap. Two easy payments.
Pickle: How much?
Joyce (lifts carafe): The rest of the water, and I'll throw the carafe in free. It's Waldorf crystal. (pause) You may never get another offer like this. It's gonna pass shortly, limited time only.
Pickle: How much?
Joyce: For the installation. And I'll show you the scar I got jumping the pool fence to get the water.
Pickle: Nope. $75 flat for installing, cash or check. I'll give you ten to see the scar.
(Joyce stomps back to mother with carafe. She drips drops of the water into her palm and annoits her mother's forehead.)
Pickle: You're just gonna have to be pissed off. There ain't never gonna be another cable bill to pay. Once the dish is up--free for the rest of your days. (long pause) I was sayin' something about something before all this, but I lost my thought train. Before I got aware that they call you Jaws 'cus you talk so much, I thought it was 'cus you could unhinge your jaws like a boa constrictor.
(Pickle stares at floor, sees bronzer, picks it up, and sits it on t.v. top.)
Pickle: Oh right, the lotion, the Mexicans. I got a call to do a job for a family uv chupacabres (gestures) They were ten ina bed ina room smaller than from here to the couch. (he crosses to couch) I went against my instincts and all my father’s moral lessons that told me, "here are fifteen thieves who stole fifteen American jobs, hiding out." I did the job for 'um, put in a dish. (pause, ashes cigarette in ash tray on coffee table) The time came to settle up and Pappa Mexican hands me cash. Yo no se. Yo no se, I say. Give me a check. (mimes gesture) Write me a fucking check. (drags cigarette) I wanted a check to see if they truly was illegals or not. No one in the room could write me a check, then I knew I was dealing with illegals. I say to Pappa, "a case of Corona," and it's even-steven. Yo no se. Yo no se, he say. (pause) I had to do a thing I didn't want to have to do but, you know, I had to. He left me with no other option.
Joyce: Took the cash from him.
Pickle: No. Did the short and easy naturalization to his wife and daughter in front of 'um, the whole clan. Squeling like pigs in a fire. It wasn't pretty. Hell, Mexican girls never are. Momma and daughter both had hammer toes, so I wasn't into it from the start. (pause) I swear I didn't wanna have to do it, ya' know, but outta respect for the country and the law of the land...(trails off) The Mexicans had a better signal than what you got. Now they got themselves a hundred and fifty channels to watch whenever they want. What's your boy's name on the couch?
Joice: Jimmy.
Pickle (looks over Jimmy): Jimmy thinks he's Elvis don't he.
Joice: He won the impersonation contest at Bobby's Tavern Wednesday night. I brought him home from there.
Pickle: And you let him drag his tail all across your floor and spread his trash all over hell's creation? I'll be doggone, he's deadwood. (crosses to window) Wake him up! I need his hands.
Joice: Jimmy promised me he'd sing Mom three Elvis tunes soon as she flatlines. He'll do it too. The King got manners. I'm lettin' him keep on 'til she goes, so she gets to hear Elvis when she crosses over. (rubs mother's head) Right mom? The hospice nurses came by Wednesday. They told me two days max. Two days are gone. Could be anytime now.
Pickle: Jimmy's gonna give me a hand with the sonuvabitch disc.
Joice: Jimmy's tired. The King kept me up all night. Do you think it smells like sex in here?
Pickle: You make him come hold the dish so I can mount it!
Joice: I can't make Jimmy do anything he doesn't want to. You try tellin’ the King which way the parade's goin’ and see what happens.
Pickle: I'll cold cock him!
Joice: Touch him and I won't pay you a penny for the installation.
Pickle: I'll get something outta ya.
Joice: Will not!
Pickle: Then I'll get something in you, the same way I did with the Mexican girls.
(Pickle crawls through window, back outside.)
Pickle (turning around, through window): I'm gonna ruin his face when I come back in if you don't make him help. His cheeks will be swollen black and blue where I knocked the teeth outta his jawbone. Only blind guys will believe he's Evlis after I cold cock him. And he’ll sing like (someone with a high falsetto) ‘cus I’m gonna castrate him with my hammer after I do the Greek boys outside first.
(Joyce takes bronzer from t.v., crosses to couch with carafe and cream, and prods at Jimmy.)
Joyce: Honey baby, get up for me. Jar loose. Rise and shine, honey baby.
(Jimmy sits up on couch, rubs eyes, looks around disoriented.)
Jimmy: Who's here?
Joyce: Cable man, putting in the dish.
Jimmy: You didn't tell me you were getting a dish.
Joyce: It don't cost a thing, 'cept couple dollars for his time. He's rigging it illegal.
Picke (offstage): Signal Jaws?
Joyce (turns over her shoulder): No! (to Jimmy, hands him bronzer) Rub it into my arms...pits. My armpits.
(Jimmy stands and rubs the cream on her arms.)
Jimmy: You change her drip bag?
Joyce: No, Pickle came over too early.
Pickle (offstage): Anything?
(Joyce and Jimmy ignore his call.)
Jimmy (coughs): Am I gonna sing today?
Pickle (offstage): Have ya' got any signal bars? Answer me!
(Joyce takes a few steps toward t.v.)
Joyce (calling): Yes, Yes!
Pickle: More than two?
Joyce: Screen's showin' four of 'um!
Pickle (offstage): I'm screwing the sonuvabithc to house then, okay Jaws?
(The noise from offstage becomes more clamorous. Sound of Pickle hammering.)
Jimmy: Today I'm gonna sing to her?
Joyce: How do I know when she'll die? Yeah, today. It should be today. It shoulda been yesterday.
Jimmy: I'm hungry for payment.
Joyce: You'll get your payment. (turns to him, pinches his cheeks) Jimmy I wish you'd go under the knife. You could look handsome like '68 Comeback Elvis, better than '68 Comeback Elvis, if you'd go and have these pouches of skin taken care of. Sing the three songs, and I'll pay for the surgery.
Jimmy (throws bronzer across the room): We made ourselves an agreement! A good ol' covenant. And I'm gonna have you the way we agreed on Wednesday night. You gotta choose quick what's more valuable to ya': Sending your momma off right or livin' with the fact your gonna have to face when she dies and I don't sing her into the clouds. And payment will be upfront. Too many times I've been snaked by bar owners who promise money after I perform and don't even give me the door. Don't think I'm gonna square up with you in any way but "doin' the F-word." I ain't takin' cash, and I ain't goin' in for surgeries.
Joyce: Get one uv the drip bags.
(Jimmy finds an unused drip bag beneath the coffee table. He holds it open while Joyce pours.)
Pickle (offstage): Wake up the deadwood Jaws!
(Pickle climbs into scene through window.)
Pickle: He's back from the dead! Lucky, I found the signal where I hadn't looked, and it was in my reach to mount the dish. I was gonna do everything short of killing you to get your ass up. So you're gonna sing for momma. What tunes?
(Joyce sits carafe on coffee table and takes filled drip bag from Jimmy.)
Jimmy: What songs you want Joyce?
(She crosses to IV stand and begins to swap the bags.)
Pickle: You mean the King don't get ta' pick the songs he sings.
Jimmy: I can do 'um all, any on request.
Pickle: Joyce we can settle up. Job's done. (flips through channels on t.v.) You got 'um all now sweety. $75 and we are even-Steven and I'll head out and leave the two of you to your jailhouse lovin.'
Jimmy: She hasn't given it to me yet.
(Joyce lays drip bag down on bed, rushes to couch, and starts digging in a cushion hole, ripping out stuffing.)
Jimmy: You're not thinking about payin' him before me.
Joyce: I'm not thinking at all. Let me find the money, and I’ll level off with ya’ both, and ya’ both will leave, and I’ll see momma off.
Pickle: I shook her too hard. She's unthinkable. Didn't the cries wake you up?
(Jimmy digs in his pants' pockets. Pulls out a balled up napkin with scribblings on it. Crosses to Pickle.)
Jimmy (to Pickle): What's this napkin say on it?
Pickle (squints to read): All the greasin' the King can handle for three songs. Signed, two signatures, Joyce Havermeyer, Jimmy Pearson.
Jimmy: A binding contract is what it is. I saved the napkin Joyce from the bar.
Joyce: You're causing me to lose my faith in the king.
|
Basso
Member
| Joined: | Fri Feb 29th, 2008 |
| Location: | Canada |
| Posts: | 111 |
| Status: |
Offline
|
| Mana: |    |
|
Posted: Tue Mar 4th, 2008 11:07 am |
|
Hey, steamboat. You asked if there is anything "here"...what do you think? If you read it, and it feels real and enjoyable, then probably some of us will too.
Now to the play. I liked the rhythm of the dialogue, but I didn't think it moved along enough. These are some seriously weird people you have conjured up, and I think they could be fun, but they didn't seem real to me. They say clever things, but their is a incongruity of action. One moment he is putting up a satellite dish, then he is talking about his foot fetish, and the next he is choking Joyce...then he goes right back to installing the dish again. Meanwhile, Joyce rubs the goop on her, gets choked, rubs her crotch, and then talks about Elvis's pool water. I'm guessing this is a black comedy, but there has to be a build to something...no?
Your writing talent is obvious, and you had some great lines in here, I just didn't think you captured "your voice," with this one. Keep working on it. :)
Basso
Last edited on Tue Mar 4th, 2008 11:09 am by Basso
|
scenedreamer
Member
| Joined: | Thu Aug 3rd, 2006 |
| Location: | |
| Posts: | 164 |
| Status: |
Offline
|
| Mana: | |
|
Posted: Sat Mar 8th, 2008 04:03 am |
|
I liked the hokey characters and the sharp dialogue, but the action seems unrelated. It should lead somewhere. Use your talent with language to tell us a story that will prove your theme. Think dramatic arc (i.e. Theme, mdq, goals, ascending action, obstacles, crisis climax and resolution.
Put those terrific characters to work!
Good work. Keep going.
sd
Last edited on Sat Mar 8th, 2008 04:04 am by scenedreamer
|
Martin H
Member
|
Posted: Sat Mar 8th, 2008 07:58 am |
|
Very powerful dialogue, though here and there could use trimming.
"They're stone." "I know. I said they were hard." Much more powerful if you cut "I said they were hard.", "stone" already emphasizes the point enough. All along there are edits like that which could add snap.
There's definitely something here, but as the others have suggested, you still seem to be exploring to find out what. Probably need to make a few decisions about how to anchor the action without taking too much away from the really interesting bad craziness of these people.
|
Steamboat Chambers
Member
|
Posted: Sat Mar 8th, 2008 01:13 pm |
|
Thanks all, everything you folks say is highly informational! So appreciated! Have a lovely weekend.
Last edited on Sat Mar 8th, 2008 01:13 pm by Steamboat Chambers
|
Current time is 07:02 am | |
|
|
|
