[size=(and BOB & JULIE and ED & JULIE and ED & SUE): ]
A Ten Minute Play
By Bill McCann, Jr.
Characters
Bob: father of Ed, age 50
Ed: age 15
Julie: age 45, Ed’s step-mother
Setting: a suburban living room (couch, recliner, TV and coffee table being the only furnishings.
Time: Yesterday
Copyright 2006 Bill McCann, Jr.
BOB & ED and BOB & JULIE and ED & JULIE and ED & SUE: A 10 Minute Play
When the curtain rises BOB is sitting in a recliner. His chair is reclined, the newspaper covering his face and upper body.
ED enters, purposefully making enough noise to disturb his father. Throwing himself on the couch he picks the remote control up and turns on the television.
V-JAY
(from the television)
Next up on Party Planet is the latest from Pink Passion Ladies: “Barbie’s Passion Position.” But first these words from our sponsor—
BOB
(sitting up suddenly)
Would you turn that crap off?
Ed turns the TV off.
Thank you.
I’m trying to get a little nap in before your Mom comes home.
ED
Why not go to bed?
BOB
Its made up.
ED
Well, unmake it!
BOB
Ed, have you interrupted me for a reason? Or are you just being a jerk?
ED
Sorry.
Can I talk to you for a minute?
BOB
I suppose. I’m awake now.
ED
Um…
Will Mom be back soon?
BOB
Probably, the next few minutes—she’s just gone to the grocery to get things for dinner. Go ahead though.
ED
Yeah. Sure.
Do you think I could go live with my real Mom?
BOB
Your real Mom? Who took care of you—
ED
Alright. My biological mom.
Can I go live with her?
BOB
How come?
ED
You know how come. I hate…
I dislike how Julie treats me.
BOB
And all of that would change at your mother’s?
I was married to Sue for twelve years, she too is a stickler for keeping a clean room and doing chores and all the things that Julie insists you do. So, how would being there be any different?
ED
I …don’t … know…. It just would.
BOB
Well, I need a reason.
ED
I’m fifteen. I ought to be able to make my own decisions about where I live?
BOB
Try again.
ED
You’ve had me since you all divorced. It’s her turn.
BOB
Don’t think so. One more chance.
Ed and Bob, father and son look at each other.
How about the real reason?
ED
I don’t like Julie. I love you. I like being with you, I just can’t stand her!
BOB
(not making it easy)
Her?
ED
Julie.
Silence. No reaction from Bob.
Alright… Mom.
I don’t like Mom.
BOB
Why not? She is the one who has been here, since you were four years old. Even while your biological Mom was serving time in jail, Julie was here taking care of you: Making your meals. Buying your clothes. Holding you when you woke up with bad dreams. Putting on band aids when you fell and got hurt. What’s not to like?
ED
So she did all that. Wasn’t she supposed to?
BOB
Yes.. But she didn’t have to. You weren’t her biological child, she had no personal obligation to help raise you.
ED
She married you. Didn’t that obligate her to raising me?
BOB
No.
ED
No?
BOB
No. All our marriage obligated her to was to having to have you in the house. Before we ever got married she made me promise that I’d be responsible for taking care of you. But, of course, the truth is that she did as much as I have.
ED
How can you say that? She has refused to take me to school. She refuses to be involved with PTA, or orchestra or football or any of the other things I’m involved in.
BOB
That’s not true. You know better than that. But even if it were, what does that have to do with your wanting to move in with Sue full time?
ED
I just think that since I have been with you since I was two that fairness says I should stay with my biological Mom until I’m 18.
BOB
Right now you stay every Thursday and Friday night and every other weekend with Sue. That’s seven days out of every fourteen. If you went to stay with her, then you would spend Thursday and Friday nights and every other weekend with me—seven days out of every fourteen. So what’s the difference?
ED
Actually, its now six out of 14 days I spend with her. So, I’d get to spend more time with her.
BOB
Ed, what is this really all about?
ED
That’s really all this is about: more time with my real Mom!
BOB
Well, if that’s all its about, we’re just talking about a difference of 13 days a year. You can spend two extra weeks a year with Sue each summer and it won’t be necessary to go to court to get custody changed. How about that?
ED
Well, I don’t know…
BOB
You don’t know what? Whether or not you really want to spend more time with your biological mother?
ED
No. Its…
BOB
What’s really the issue here, Ed?
ED
(blurting)
If I stayed with my real Mom full-time, you wouldn’t get child support anymore, would you?
BOB
No. I wouldn’t get child support any more. That’s true.
But why would that matter to you?
ED
Mom says that if she didn’t have to pay you child support that she could afford to live in a nicer place.
BOB
Forgetting the issue of child support—which is none of your business—why do you want to live at Sue’s?
ED
But that’s the reason. Mom is unemployed now. She can’t afford child support. If she didn’t have to pay child support then I wouldn’t have to live in her dump half the time and your mansion the other half. She could afford something closer in quality to where you live.
BOB
You’re not responsible for taking care of your mother. She has made her own bed—let her lie in it.
ED
But I have to lie in too, Dad. And I don’t like it!
BOB
Well, don’t stay there as much. You only have to spend one afternoon a week and every other weekend with your biological mother. The court hasn’t required that you spend so much time there, you have.
ED
I know. But I love my Mom—both my moms, actually—and I want to spend time with her. But I’m so tired of being embarrassed about where she lives and what she does for a living. I don’t really understand what you do. But you’re making a good living and I admire that. I know you love me. And I like that too. But, well…
BOB
Sue has done some things I know that she probably regrets. But I don’t think she has any regrets about you. On that I’m sure we both agree.
ED
You’re changing the topic, Dad.
BOB
Yeah. I suppose so.
ED
So can I go stay with Mom, full-time?
BOB
Tell you what, Ed. You can try staying there for a month. Beyond that I won’t make any promises.
ED
Will she have to pay child support during that month?
BOB
Of course. Your braces will still have to be paid for. So will rental of your cello and I’ll still have to buy your meals at school and give you an allowance. But we’ll see what happens after the month is up.
ED
Does that mean you’ll stop charging Mom child support?
BOB
We’ve been through this all before…
ED
(sarcastic, mimicing Bob)
The court sets child support, I don’t.
BOB
Yeah. Do you want me to reconsider agreeing to let you stay at Sue’s?
ED
No. It just seems so unfair to Mom though…
BOB
Well, it’s not. I think you’ll understand better when….
A door slams. We hear the rustling of paper and the crash of cans thudding heavily on o counter.
JULIE
(off stage)
I’m home with groceries for dinner. Could my favorite boys to please set the table and help put away the groceries while I get dinner started?
BOB
Be right there.
ED
(to Bob)
Can we discuss this more later?
BOB
Sure. Right now though I need for you to set the table.
Good slice of life. It's short, but has all the elements of good story telling.
I agree with Leon about a few of the sentences. I think the information in those sentences add to the story, but might be more realistic if revealed in shorter sentences or some other way.
Of course that comes from a writer who never stops editing. And as someone famous once said "A great play is a story onstage with something wrong with it." Or maybe it was something wrong on on stage. Or something onstage wrong. A story gone wrong onstage. Or... Well you get the idea.
I would have said, also, the dialogue runs a bit stiff. There isn't the feeling that they know each other well. The continued reference to biological mother didn't ring true. I'd expect more half sentences and interruptions.
Still...like the place you came from with this play.
