COMEDIC MALE

To find a specific monologue press ctrl f and type in the title

Adams, Johanna - Lickspittles, Buttonholers and Damned Pernicious Go-Betweens//Albom, Mitch - Duck Hunter Shoots Angel//Alexander, Ronald - Time Out for Ginger//Allen, Woody - Play It Again, Sam//Anouilh, Jean - The Lark (Adapted by Lillian Hellman)//Ayckbourn, Alan - The Norman Conquests: Living Together//Ayckbourn, Alan - The Norman Conquests: Round and Round the Garden//Ayckbourn, Alan - The Norman Conquests: Table Manners//Ayckbourn, Alan - Relatively Speaking//Ball, Alan - Power Lunch//Ball, Alan - Your Mother's Butt//Barlow, Patrick - John Buchan's The 39 Steps//Baron, Jeff - Visiting Mr. Green//Beane, Douglas Carter - The Little Dog Laughed//Bishop, John - The Musical Comedy Murders of 1940//Churchill, Caryl - Cloud Nine//Cooney, Ray - Run For Your Wife//Dee, Peter - ... and stuff ...//Dee, Peter - Voices From the High School//Diamond, Lydia, R. - Smart People//Durang, Christopher - The Actor's Nightmare//Durang, Christopher - Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike//Durang, Christopher - Why Torture is Wrong, and the People Who Love Them//Fierstein, Harvey - Safe Sex//Guirgis, Stephen Adly - The Motherfucker With The Hat//Gurney, A.R. - The Cocktail Hour//Ives, David - The Philadelphia//Ives, David - The Universal Language//Jacobs-Jenkins, Branden - Gloria//Kotis, Greg  - Michael Von Siebenburg//Lonergan, Kenneth - Lobby Hero//McNally, Terrence - Dedication or The Stuff of Dreams//McNally, Terrence - It's Only A Play//Nowra, Louis - Summer of the Aliens//Pierce, Greg - Her Requiem//Pintauro, Joe - Reindeer Soup//Rudnick, Paul - I Hate Hamlet//Sherman, Jonathan Marc - Sophistry//Shue, Larry - The Nerd//Silver, Nicky - The Altruists//Sternheim, Carl - The Underpants (Adapted by Steve Martin)//Stoppard, Tom - Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead//Szymkowicz, Adam - Nerve//Wilson, Lanford - Burn This

Lickspittles, Buttonholers and Damned Pernicious Go-Betweens by Johanna Adams

STUB.

Oh, I say, I say, dear girl, do you have the time? No? Of all things on this planet, aren't churches sublime? This nice spot, how the light from the stained-glass ripples! But the reverend here, dear, well, you know he tipples. Churches are like that. Gorgeous, breathtaking exteriors, but inside, clergy and parishioners, oh, simply inferiors. No, it never fails. Yes, it's just the way of the world ever since God, glorious majesty, His creation unfurled. Not a simple apple can be found without a worm at its heart, nothing man bui9lds with his hands will not fall apart. Oh, it distresses me greatly, every night I weep and moan, but pray as we might, God's left this poor world on its own. We must learn to care for our brethren, our fellow man; On that topic, I'd like to give you some advice if I can. Do you mind? Would it bother you? Tell me if you're peeved. I won't say if it you think my intentions ill-conceived! Oh, you sheltered darling! Poor God-fearing Lutheran child, in this apostolicity is one who would see you defiled! "Apostolicity." Greek derivation. Of or pertaining to Apostles. Etymology? Are word origins of interest to you? Well, not important. Off the subject. I digress, I'm here to save you, Sestine, in your time of distress! No, don't look 'round you, as if you fear I am mad, if you value your virtue, of my counsels be glad. A dark, skulking despoiler mars the chapel's serenity, determined enemy of you precious virginity! He hides at the church door, plotting the longer you stay, to grab you and hold you and have his fiendish way! I see you grow pale and then bright red at the image. He's eager for his sport. He's at the line of scrimmage. There's not a moment to lose in evading his plan. Poor dear, flee the church, of know too much of man! I see you hesitate. I see you uncertain. You waver. Sestine, honest main, I can't believe this behavior. Get out now. While you can. You're young and strong, don't let him degrade you and then string you along.

Time Out for Ginger by Ronald Alexander

TOMMY.

To deprive any person, man or woman, of his constitutional rights is to infringe upon the fundamental law of the land and deny them their basic freedom as set down by our founding fathers, when they said, "We hold these truths to be self-evident; that all men are created equal..." In other words, it is the privilege and the responsibility of every American to think the way he likes, vote the way he likes, and worship as he pleases. And I would like to say, regardless of race, color, creed or sex, there are no second-class citizens of these United States, and we, as liberty-loving people, must seek out the evil, never retreat from the heat of battle, and destroy the forces of reaction that impede progress. That speech got me last year's debating medal.

Play It Again, Sam by Woody Allen

ALLAN.

How does he do it? What's the secret? It's the movies that's the secret. Maybe if I took two more aspirin I'd feel better. That's 2-4-6 aspirin. I'm turning into an aspirin junkie. Next thing you know I'll be boiling the cotton at the top of the bottle to get the extra. What's the matter with me - why can't I relax? I never should have signed those papers. Let her take me to court. Two years of marriage down the drain... like that... I couldn't believe it when she told me two weeks ago. She was like a stranger, not like my wife, like a total stranger. Oh, I won't take it personal. I'll just kill myself, that's all. If only I knew where my damn analyst was vacationing. Where do they go every August? They leave the city. Every summer New York is full of people who are crazy till Labor Day. And so what? What if I reach him? No matter what I say he tells me it's a sexual problem. Isn't that silly? How can there be a sexual problem? We weren't even having relations. Well, once in a while. But she used to watch television during it... and change channels with the remote control switch. What's the matter with me? Why can't I be cool? What's the secret?

Play It Again, Sam by Woody Allen

ALLAN.

He's right. A lot of girls get turned on by a masculine earthy quality. I shouldn't have put so much Bianca under my arms. I want to create a good subliminal impression without being too pushy. Hey, I better memorize some photography terms, if she's a photographer's assistant. "Not only is there a great qualitative difference between my Nikon and my other cameras," says ace photographer Greg Barnett, "but my Nikon is built sturdy enough to withstand the throwing around I give it when the outdoor shooting gets rough." I'm going to charm this girl. Wouldn't it be great if Sharon and I hit it off at first sight? Sure, why not? They say dames are simple. I never met one who didn't respond to a slap in the mouth or a slug from a forty-five. C'mere, Sharon.

The Lark by Jean Anouilh (Adapted by Lillian Hellman)

BEAUDRICOURT.

Well, you can look at it that way, of course. But you take me, for example. No, I'm not ugly, but sometimes I wonder if I'm intelligent. No, no, don't protest. I tell you there are times when I have problems that seem too much for me. They ask me to decide something, a tactical or administrative point. Then, all of the sudden, I don't know why, my head acts like it's gone someplace else, and I don't even understand the words people are saying. Isn't that strange? But I never show it. I roar out an order whatever happens. That's the main thing in the army. Make a decision, good or bad, just make it. Things will turn out almost the same, anyway. Still, I wish I could have done better. This is a small village to die away with your life. They think I'm a great man, but they never saw anybody else. Like every other man, I wanted to be brilliant and remarkable, but I end up hanging a few poor bastards who deserted from a broken army. I wanted to shake a nation - Ah, well. Why do I tell you all this? You can't help me, you're crazy.

Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard

PLAYER.

We're actors... We pledges our identities, secure in the conventions of our trade, that someone would be watching. And then, gradually, no one was. We were caught, high and dry. It was not until the murderer's long soliloquy that we were able to look around; frozen as we were in profile, our eyes searched you out, first confidently, then hesitantly, then desperately as each patch of turf, each log, every exposed corner in every direction proved uninhabited, and all the while the murderous King addressed the horizon with his dreary interminable guilt... Our heads began to move, wary as lizards, the corpse of unsullied Rosalinda peeped through his fingers, and the King faltered. Even then, habit and a stubborn trust that our audience spied upon us from behind the nearest bush, forced our bodies to blunder on long after they had emptied of meaning, until like runaway carts they dragged to a halt. No one came forward. No one shouted at us. The silence was unbreakable, it imposed itself upon us; it was obscene. We took off our crowns and swords and cloth of gold and moved silent on the road to Elsinore.

Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard

GUILDENSTERN.

The scientific approach to the examination of phenomena is a defence against the pure emotion of fear. Keep tight hold and continue while there's time. Now - counter to the previous syllogism: tricky one, follow me carefully, it may prove a comfort. If we postulate, and we just have, that within un-, sub-, or supernatural forces the probability is that the law of probability will not operate as a factor, then we must accept that the probability of the first part will not operate as a factor, in which case the law of probability will operate as a factor within un-, sub- or supernatural forces. And since it obviously hasn't been doing so, we can take it that we are not held within un-, sub- or supernatural forces after all; in all probability, that is. Which is a great relief to me personally. Which is all very well, except that - [We have been spinning coins together since I don't know when, and in all that time (if it is all that time) I don't suppose either of us was more than a couple of gold pieces up or down. I hope that doesn't sound surprising because its very unsurprisingness is something I am trying to keep hold of. The equanimity of your average tosser of coins depends upon a law, or rather a tendency, or let us say a probability, or t any rate a mathematically calculable chance, which ensures that he will not upset himself by losing too much nor upset his opponent by winning too often. This made for a kind of harmony and a kind of confidence. It related the fortuitous and the ordained into a reassuring union which we recognized as nature. The sun came up about as often as it went down, in the long run, and a coin showed heads about as often as it showed tails. Then] a messenger arrived. We had been sent for. Nothing else happened. Ninety-two coins spun consecutively have come down heads ninety-two consecutive times... and for the last three minutes on the wind of a windless day I have heard the sound of drums and flute...

The Underpants by Carl Sternheim (Adapted by Steve Martin)

VERSATI.

There are so many women, Louise. Pale blondes with subtle streaks of blue along their wrists. Dark-haired, with elegantly cut figures, tall, short, some wear jangling beads and stones, or translucent dresses that silhouette in the sun. Some are so fragile that you touch them like a leaf, some are strong and you draw them into you forcefully. But you, Louise, are beyond category, and when I am with you, I will be in unknown territory, taking in my hands something unfamiliar and new, unlike anyone ever. I am on fire, Louise, and there is no doubt I am finally and forever in love. "Take me." In those two words, our fate. How beautiful when you say them. If I could capture that feeling on paper, I would be one of the greats! Take... take... I must take up my pen! My inspiration is so direct, what I write could not come out false. Yes! I will take you and transform you into words. And when I am done we will be as tightly woven as this scarf. I the warp and you the weft... and then and only then will I demand full payment of your beauty.

Lobby Hero by Kenneth Lonergan

WILLIAM.

My brother's fucked up. He's always been a fuck-up. Always been selfish. Always been wild and selfish: You know the type. Living like a free spirit or what have you, while everybody else is trying to work. You know the type? I mean - I don't know, man. Sometimes you just have to wash your hands of a person. Because you just get no recompense. You know what I mean there, Jeff? You must know what I mean. You've seen something of the world. I've never seen anything of the world. I've been working for security firms since I was sixteen years old. Do you know I'm the youngest captain in the history of this firm? But I'm square, man. You know? I'm square. I'm no fun. And I will bust your ass, all you guys, if you mess up on my shifts, because I don't let people mess up on my shifts. That's how I got to be the youngest captain in the history of this fucking no-account security firm. I can't believe some of the people they hire, man. Can you? I mean - did you happen to see that article in The New York Times about security companies in New York City? Guys with long prison beards, rapists, murderers, anybody at all who can sign his name they stick a gun on his waist and set him up to protect somebody. You want to explain that insanity to me? I personally got rid of three guys they had working for this company, man, because these guys were just out-and-out criminals. You can't just hire anybody who looks like he can man-handle a person, you know? Anyway, I'm just rambling. So how's it going with you anyway, Jeff? Everything all right?

Reindeer Soup by Joe Pintauro

CHARLIE.

No one here appreciates my cooking like you do Vince. This may sound silly but I tried cooking the rocking chair, before Pop ran over the raccoon. If an animal crosses the road, instead of hitting the brake, he floors the accelerator and whack! We got road pizza! It's special man. Two weeks ago we had a mink in this soup, now there's just a few bones left at the bottom. I tie him up when he dozes in the chair. We're down to his last five pills, but it's like TV watchin' him. When the pill wears off he thinks he's somebody else. Today he's Richard Nixon. Yesterday he was Murphy Brown.

Safe Sex by Harvey Fierstein

GHEE.

That your complaint, dearie? That you got stuck with a lukewarm lover? Well, fill your ears with this, buddy: I've got two faucets, hot and cold, and if you were getting lukewarm loving then maybe it's because that's what you dialed. Hey, don't try and shut me off. You ran this shower, now stand under it. So, you laid alone in bed, did ya? You were forced to walk the streets for affection, eh? Let me tell you something, Samantha, you could have had all the sex you wanted. You could've had intimacy pouring out your eyeballs. All you had to do was wash up. You had your chance to mouth your neo-Nietzsche nonsense, now it's my turn at bat. You'd come home to me night after night all hot and sweaty from a hard day's work. You'd drift through the door after stopping for a few brews with the boys, reeking of beer, clothes soaked through, hair as greasy as a used-up peanut butter jar, and you'd throw your arms out to me and say, "Baby, I need your lovin'," and expect me to swoon. I swooned alright! Now, I will admit to finding the air pretty sexy for the first year. It was like living in a John Garfield fantasy, my very own hot blue-collared lover leaving armpit stains on my settee; but after a year? But I figured it was a stage, a phase. After all, when we were first dating you'd show up perfectly coiffed and cologned, and it was a chore and challenge to melt you down. But here we were, fairly crossing the threshold, and I'd traded my Arthurian knight in for his white horse. I will grant you, there are those with penchants for farm follies. I do not, however, happen to march in their number. And I'd say, "Baby, wouldn't you like to clean up first?" And you'd say, "No." And I'd say, "Darling, how about we take a shower together?" And you'd say, "How 'bout we don't?" and laugh a laugh as soiled as your sweat socks. My sex and sensuality have been attacked. There's no time for illusions.

Burn This by Lanford Wilson

PALE.

There was this character runnin' off at the mouth; I told him I'm gonna push his face in, he don't shut up. Now, this should be a fairly obvious statement, right? But this dipshit starts trying to explain to me what he's been saying ad nauseam all night, like there was some subtle gradation of thought that was gonna make it all right that he was mouthing this horseshit. So when I'm forced to bust the son of a bitch, he's down on the floor, he's dripping blood from a split lip, he's testing a loose tooth, and that fucker is still talking. Now, some people might think that this was the problem of this guy, he's got this motor going, he's not privy to where the shutoff valve is. But I gotta come to the conclusion that I'm weird. 'Cause I try to communicate with these jerkoffs in what is essentially the mother tongue, but no one is picking me up; they're not reading me. There's some mystery here. Okay, sometimes they're just on a rap. I respect rap. You're not supposed to be listening. You can read the paper, watch TV, eat pistachios, I'm not talking that. I'm talking these jerkoffs think you're listening. You said the choreographer organizes what? Sculptured space? What is that? Well, see, fine, you got these little social phrases and politeness - all they show me is this - like - giganticness of unconcern with your "I'm sorrys." I'm sorry is this roll of toilet paper - they're growing whole forests, for people to wipe their asses on with their "I'm sorrys." Be a tree. For one day. And know that that tree over there is gonna be maybe music paper, the Boss is gonna make forty million writin' some poor-slob-can't-get-work song on. This tree is gonna be ten-dollar bills, get passed around, buy things, mean something, hear stories; we got sketch pads and fuckin' "I don't love you anymore" letters pinned to some creep's pillow - something of import. Headlines, box scores, some great book or movie script - Jack Nicholson's gonna mark you all up, say whatever he wishes to, anyway, out in some fuckin' desert, you're supposed to be his text, he's gonna lay out this line of coke on you - Tree over there is gonna be in some four-star restaurant, they're gonna call him parchment, bake pompano in him. And you're stuck in the ground, you can't go nowhere, all you know is some fuckin' junkie's gonna wipe his ass and flush you down the East River. Go floating out past the Statue of Liberty all limp and covered with shit, get tangled up in some Saudi Arabian oil tanker's fuckin' propellers - you got maybe three hundred years before you drift down to Brazil somewhere and get a chance to be maybe a coffee bush. "I'm sorrys" are fuck, man.

Nerve by Adam Szymkowicz

ELLIOT.

I just don't want to come off as fragile or something. Just because I don't like roller coasters. I mean to say, I function in this world. No, I guess, not all the time, like there was a while when I just wanted to crawl under my bed and spend the day there but I was really unhappy and I just got out of a bad relationship and had a terrible job and I just hated my life. And yes I guess I still do have panic attacks sometimes and suddenly am afraid my hand is going to fall off or that I'm going to stop breathing and I freak out but then I realize I'm still breathing and I'm probably not going to suddenly die and I'm OK. I suppose I thought for a long time I would be dead by now like in some horrible plane crash or car crash or like a stray bullet and I would be dead by like twenty but here I am and I'm not dead. So when I'm saying is that I'm, you know, pretty healthy now, not depressed or anything and I'm not like a daredevil. No, I don't have tattoos or piercings and I'm not going to drive a steel rod through my head, but I'm not going to curl up on your couch and cry or anything.

Cloud Nine by Caryl Churchill

MARTIN.

So, I lost my erection last night not because I'm not prepared to talk, it's just that taking in technical information is a different art of the brain and also I don't like to feel that you do it better to yourself. I have read the Hite report. I do know that women have to learn to get their pleasure despite our clumsy attempts at expressing undying devotion and ecstasy, and that what we spent our adolescence thinking was an animal urge we had to suppress is in fact a fine art we have to acquire. I'm not like whatever percentage of American men have become impotent as a direct result of women's liberation, which I am totally in favor of, more I sometimes think than you are yourself. Nor am I one of your villains who sticks it in, bangs away, and falls asleep. My one aim is to give you pleasure. My one aim is to give you rolling orgasms like I do other women. So why the hell don't you have them? My analysis for what it's worth is that despite all my efforts you still feel dominated by me. I in fact think it's very sad that you don't feel able to take that job. It makes me feel very guilty. I don't want you to do it because I encourage you to do it. But don't you think you'd feel better if you did take the job? You're the one who's experimenting with bisexuality, and I don't stop you, I think women have something to give each other. You seem to need the mutual support. You find me too overwhelming. So follow it through, go away, leave me and Tommy alone for a bit, we can manage perfectly well without you. I'm not putting any pressure on you but I don't think you're being a whole person. God knows I do everything I can to make you stand on your own two feet. Just be yourself. You don't seem to realize how insulting it is to me that you can't get yourself together.

Summer of the Aliens by Louis Nowra

ERIC.

Shhhh... Listen. Your mother's footsteps. Pretty heavy for a small woman. You can hear your grannie snoring. Women hate being underground. It scares them. That's why men love being underground. Be away from women. You should have seen the tunnels we dug in the Snowy Mountains. Right through granite like a knife through butter. Day after day we blew up the rock with dynamite, inching our way down for the good of Australia. It got hotter as we got deeper. We dug past fossils from dinosaur days. It was hard to breathe it was so deep. A lot of strange things happen in tunnels. Can't go into details right now. When you're older. We could dig a tunnel - just the two of us - under the house and come out under Irvin's floorboards. Boy, would they be surprised. That girl you like, Dulcie or whatever, you could come up through her bedroom floor. Her eyes would be as big as saucers. A lot of space... We could dig a tunnel through the floorboards into Castro's bedroom, probably while he's knocking off some Russian sheila. I can always tell your mother's footsteps. Doesn't realise what we've got in store for her. Women always expect the worst from a man. Bit of bounce in her footsteps. Probably thinking of me. Hey, it's lucky we're white, isn't it? How do blacks see one another in the dark? Like those West Indian cricketers eh? I saw them in the tied Test. I was up in Brisbane for a while. Had to see a man about a tunnel. The West Indians were like gods. A lot of work ahead of us. Our little Snowy Scheme right under your mother's feet. Twinkle, twinkle little star, sixteen days and there you are. Always remember that rhyme, Lewis. It's how long it took Bert Hinkler to fly to Australia from London. My father taught it to me. That bloody budgie. Something should be done about it. You know what happened in the second world war? Those fellers wanted to escape from the Nazis, so they built a wooden horse, an exercise horse, to dig a tunnel. The problem was: how to get rid of the soil so that the krauts didn't know what was happening. So they put the soil up their trousers and secretly sprinkled it on the parade ground. That's us, Lewis. We're the POWS and your mum's the kraut. In sixteen days we're going to give her the bestest birthday present.

Summer of the Aliens by Louis Nowra

BRIAN.

Changed his mind. Came out of the clink a different person. If he goes in again, this time it'll be for years. A cop comes around a lot trying to get him back into the stolen car racket. Nothing more bent than a crooked cop. Dad wants nothing to do with him. He thinks it's a trap that the cop and Mr. Irvin have set up for him to get him back into jail. He likes to go down to the rifle range a lot. He gained a funny sense of humor since he was last in the clink. Pointed his gun at me and said 'Start running, son'. I was about to piss off, he looked real mean, when he suddenly smiles and gives me a slug gun. That's what we should do. Go shooting. Plenty of cats around here, especially in Gallipoli street. Bang, right between the eyes. You got any money? There's this fella I know who'll sell me a few blue magazines. Hair and everything. Norks this big at a minimum. How can you control yourself, Lewis? You practise your bowling, I'm pulverising the python. Lately I've been thinking a lot about Dulcie while I'm doing it. Put a good word in for me with her, will you?

Summer of the Aliens by Louis Nowra

RICHARD.

Because your dad isn't here, Lewis, my sister wanted me to give you some advice. Lewis, in a place, a god forsaken suburb like this, it's easy to be average. I have a great fear that you'll be average. Don't be. Be different. Head and shoulders above the crowd. By the way, do you masterbate? Well, start practising. Sex is like athletics, you have to keep your hand in before you start screwing girls. Now, another thing. Be firm with women. Be the boss, they like it. Without firmness they're like a compass needle spinning around wildly, endlessly searching for north. We are the magnetic pole for women. And another thing: oriental women are the best. Western women will only let you down.

Sophistry by Jonathan Marc Sherman

IGOR.

I wouldn't even know how to start, Robin, I swear. First of all, trying to find somebody safe on this campus, I mean, somebody who's relatively disease free, who hasn't slept with one of my friends, who isn't heavily involved with somebody, who isn't painful to look at or talk to, who actually likes guys - this is a next-to-impossible task. If I do find somebody like this, the odds that she will have any interest in me are not terrific. And, you know, I mean, I don't even know if I would allow myself to go after a person I respected, since I know the kind of guy I am. I know the thoughts I think. I know I would not want me to date my daughter, if I had a daughter. I know that I cease to become interested in nine out of ten women almost immediately after I've slept with them, and I've only slept with three women. I know I prematurely ejaculate on occasion. I know I sometimes prefer blow jobs to actual intercourse, yet I can't come up with a halfway logical reason for a woman to want to give one. I know I find sleazy women pretty attractive, and look at most women as objects. I know that white men have a hell of a historical legacy, what with enslaving blacks and treating women like cattle, so I feel ashamed to be a member of what is supposed to be the privileged class. And I know that sensitive guys sound good in theory, but in practice, most of the women I observe are attracted to men who treat them like shit. I know these things. So, you see, it would be very difficult for me to try to pick you up while retaining even minor amounts of dignity and truth and still enjoy myself a little. But I was standing over there, across the room, and I saw Willy try to pick you up, and I know he's pretty smashed tonight, and I just wanted to see if you were okay. Are you okay?

Her Requiem by Greg Price

DEAN.

When I was Caitlin's age and I had mono, all I did all day besides jerk off was read philosophy for six weeks straight, ten hours a day: Hegel, Kant, Locke, Marx, Confucius, Schpenhauer, Niezsche, Satre, Aristotle, and I made an astounding discovery, Al: the only way to live on this planet is to let something grab you by the nutsack - or its female equivalent - and pull you under. After four hundred hours of reading philosophy, when my mother asked me if I felt like having green bean casserole, she was suddenly advocating for Cartesian dualism; watching my father shave was a masterclass in Zen. I let my world change drastically even though that was scary because I didn't know if it'd ever go back to normal. I felt crazy! - like I was actually getting somewhere. Then I went back to school. What is school? Eight periods a day, forty-five minutes each. What's forty-five minutes? Just enough time to feel like you're sinking into something incredible before getting ripped out and plunked down into something else. We read Romeo and Juliet in high school - Romeo and Juliet! As soon as we got the thing cast and made it to the words "fair Verona" - shhwp! - off to algebra. I didn't hate algebra because it was boring, I hated it because it ripped me away from Shakespeare - because goddamn "moderation" keeps us all... somewhere over here. It's all designed to keep up in this mind-numbing state of... anti-passion. They're borifying our world, Al! When we have dinner with Raych and Jon we're not allowed to stay on the same subject for more than two-point-five minutes because that'd be obsessive but honestly, I don't wanna be alive without being obsessive about something. That's why what Caitlin's doing it so goddamn genius! Fuck moderation! Moderation is the archenemy of everything that's actually worth it. I'll say it again: Fuck moderation!

Dedication or The Stuff of Dreams by Terrence McNally

LOU.

I hate Shakespeare. I don't know anyone who's honest who doesn't. In the first place, there's too many words. He said so himself: "Words, words, words." And what are they talking about? "Speak English," I want to yell at the actors. No, instead you get yada yada yada in iambic pentameter for six and a half hours. And the plots! People getting murdered because they lost a handkerchief. Women playing men and no one notices. "What's with the high voice, buddy? And what are those, pray tell, oh shepherd youth? Look like hooters to me." The plays are so confusing people don't even know what period to set them in. The Scottish Play on the North Pole in 3005 - I'm sorry, I'm very confused. I don't deny Shakespeare wrote a lot of great lines. "To be or not to be." "Et tu, Brute?" "Let's kill all the lawyers." It's just the goddamn plays you have to sit through to get to them! King Lear or Dumbo, there's no contest.

Duck Hunter Shoots Angel by Mitch Albom

SANDY.

It's not that I didn't have higher aspirations, I mean, honestly. Does anyone grow UP wanting to write for the Weekly World and Globe? Think about that name: The World and Globe? Shouldn't one word be enough for that? And here's the kicker. The Weekly World and Globe? It comes out twice a week! They were gonna call it the BI-Weekly World and Globe, but the owners thought that sounded gay. Or Bi. Not that our readers would know the difference. We sell four hundred thousand copies each week - twice a week - and I fill the pages. I write about aliens taking over the White House and three-headed babies who speak three languages. I give them half-boy-half-wolf creatures that hide inside shopping carts at the Piggly Wiggly, I give them... "Man, eaten by alligator, comes back in alligator's body, takes revenge on swamp." You wouldn't believe how well that story sold. You can go now. No, really. Go. BEGONE, BEAST! BACK TO THE SWAMP THAT SPAWNED YOU! No, really, Phil. We're done. Take off the costume and leave it in the studio. You asked me to do what I do. This is what I do: I write crap, for the Weekly World and Globe, which comes out twice a week. I don't do it for art. I don't do it for satisfaction. I do it for this. My paycheck. Which comes out once a week.

Gloria by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins

SHAWN.

There this girl who works here - Vanessa? She one of them girls that has Witherspoon face. You know how some white girls just randomly be looking like Reese Witherspoon? Vanessa be getting so mad when I say that though. She be like, "Shawn that is racist! All white girls do not look alike!" And I'm like, "Bitch, it's not racist if I say you look famous." It's not like I mistook her for Reese Witherspoon. It's not like when people coming in here mistaking me for student they had the year they did Teach for America! Vanessa just be so sensitive. I didn't tap her on the shoulder and be like, "Reese Witherspoon, is that you?" I just said she look like Reese Witherspoon, because she for a Witherspoon face. I mean, it would be different if somebody mistook me for somebody famous once in a while. That would be nice. But that, like, never happens.

Gloria by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins

LORIN.

That is still a fact-checker! In fact, it's worse because you're the fucking mother of all fact-checkers. You have to stay here the whole fucking night fact-checking the fact-checkers and after like six hours of fact-checking fact-checkers fact-checking all these sloppy fucking facts the writers could actually give a shit about, you just want to claw your eyes off and bleed out through your skull holes! You're just like, "What does it even matter if this is true or not? It's all a fucking story in a fucking magazine! No one reads magazines for the truth! People just want something to read on the elliptical at the gym or to line their fucking canary cages with -" I don't fucking know! And all that work just winds up in the trash by Friday. And then there's fresh load of this bullshit waiting for you in your mailbox on Monday! And what is a "profile writer" actually doing besides throwing one human being after another to the wolves of history, rendering entire lives flat and uncomplicated and eight thousand words long? Like this fucking Sarah Tweed girl. Why the fuck are we only interested in her now, now that she's dead? Why does dying suddenly make someone interesting? What the fuck is she going to do with a profile now? Sell her CDs? She's fucking dead. What is this going to do except make money for people other than her? It's so fucking fucked up. And I really envy her, you know. I wish I was dead, full of opiates in the back of a station wagon right now. I fucking wish. Anything but this bullshit! I bet she was fucking smiling when she swallowed that bottle of painkillers and climbed into that sleeping bag. I bet she was just like, "Finally, I'm getting the fuck out of this miserable existence, off of this miserable planet of people who seem like they're interested in you, but really only want you dead, who only want you when you're dead!" What is this terrible place? Why are we like this? Is another human life anything to us but an excuse to think about ourselves? Sorry, her music - I think her music is just really powerful.

Gloria by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins

MILES.

I just realized that I've spent my entire life being in school. I think I need to experience the real world. I'm actually thinking about maybe going abroad and just like teaching English. Just somewhere really far away and random. Like Germany or Japan or something, but I'm really interested in Africa, though. Did you know that, within our lifetime, they're expecting like two-thirds of the population of the whole continent to just be... gone? Just totally wiped out. I suddenly feel this deep anxiety about the future, about how everything on the Earth right now at this exact moment could be totally different tomorrow.

Gloria by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins

DEAN.

You've only been here a year, Anica, but yes: "back then" internships were real because you actually had to do this thing called "apply for it" and there were no "labor laws" "protecting" you so no one had to give you a "stipend" and the work you did was real because you were basically auditioning for a job. That's how I started. That's how Sasha started before me and Crystal before you. Now all these baby Ivy League fuckers come waltzing in here with their fancy writing professor's recommendations - just looking to pad their stupid resumes - and then we're stuck running some sort of summer camp - literally making up busy work for them to do on top of our actual work because they're too entitled to do anything else and they know they'll just get handed better jobs than ours right after college anyway or start their own internet media platform digital stupid space app dummy stupid thing and make a billion dollars selling it to Facebook This kid should be getting people Vitaminwaters just for the life experience.

The Motherfucker With The Hat by Stephen Adly Guirgis

JACKIE.

I'm not lying. And I'm not nice. You know you're fuckin' hot. But Raplh's my sponsor. And my friend. And men, even though we're fucked up, we got a code. It's a fucked-up code, but still, it's a code. And I respect the code. 'Cuz I respect Ralph. But even if I didn't respect Ralph, I'd still respect the code, unless, like, I fell in love with you instantly - but even if I did fall in love with you instantly, I'd still call Ralph and tell him that I had to break the code before I even tried to touch you, 'cuz, that's the only exception to the code, and maybe the code in stupid, but to me, it ain't fuckin' stupid. That's why I shot the motherfucker with the hat's hat. Even though we wasn't exactly friends, we was neighbors and we knew each other, so, in my mind, his ass broke the code. Ya know?

The Motherfucker With The Hat by Stephen Adly Guirgis

COUSIN JULIO.

Yeah. You are. And that's okay. The reason I said I'm doing this more for your mother's memory than for you is because, maybe I never said this before, but, I don't like you very much. And the reason I don't like you very much is because you think you're a nice guy, but really Jackie, you're not that nice. You've basically made fun of me my whole life, you talk a lot of shit, you fuck people over - not all the time but sometimes - and really, the space between who you think you are and who you actually are is a pretty embarrassingly wide gap. I hope this AA thing works out for you. Because the cousin I loved and hung out with and played Booties Up with when I was 8 - he bears no resemblance to the little cabroncito I'm looking at right now. When I first came to the States from PR, you had my back, and, really, you were a hero to me. And now, dios perdona, the hero is a zero, mijo! My Marisol was right about you: It's always all about Jackie. We've been married three years now, and whenever you come by our home, you don't even bring so much as a bag of pistachios. And yet, you see nothing wrong with jeopardizing my relationship and my apartment and our safety by bringing criminal things like this caca into our home. You're not a good friend, and you're not a good relative. My Marisol called it: You're a user. But thass okay. And that's all I got to say on that, so you can get out of my apartment now, and go to all those very more important things than spending time with your cousin Julio, okay?

The Motherfucker With The Hat by Stephen Adly Guirgis

RAPLH D.

Exactly. Well, guess what? I'm an asshole, bro! And so are you. Who else but a couple of real fuckin' assholes would end up messing their lives up so bad that they had to go to meetings all the time, and pray, and be honest, and do all that bullshit because if they didn't, they'd be fuckin' dead in a year? So yeah, we're fuckin' assholes, but it's okay. Hence - yoga. And her - I may be an asshole, but I'm fuckin' limber, bro! And healthy. And I like it. I'll tell ya something: I've always wanted to learn how to surf - guess what? Three days a week I'm on the A train to Rockaway at 5:30 in the morning, and I'm surfing. Not "thinking about surfing." Surfing, bro. Me! And I love it. I'm also learning how to speak French. I'm taking a fucking archery class, I floss now, I even showed up for jury duty for the first time in my life last month and I didn't mind it at all - I read a great detective novel and ate licorice till they dismissed me - it was fuckin' enjoyable! I know you're upset right now. I don't blame you. It's fucking upsetting. I know it is. But this situation with our girl, it's a blessing in disguise. And you know I'm right. And the fact that she would cheat on you is proof. And believe me, anybody that would cheat on you once, will do it again. It's what they call The Cycle of Self-Sabotage. And that's what addicts do. They self-sabotage. You know that. And I don't want to see that happen to you. You're my sponsee. I care about you. But it's up to you. Look, bro: My life isn't about bullshit and heartache no more, and yours doesn't have to be either. And you're doing so good. But in order to change, you got to change, man. I did. You can too. Stay with me and Victoria, get on my nutritional beverage plan, go to meetings, come to Rockaway with me, and you'll see that damn difference.

The Motherfucker With The Hat by Stephen Adly Guirgis

JACKIE.

Yo, the best part: career advancement! This guy, Veronica - the boss an' shit - he talked to me just like one human being to another, Veronica. He tol' me; "We only got two rules here: Be polite to the tenants, and be polite to each other." ...And I thought about it, and I was like, "Those are good rules, sir," and then he was like, "Good enough. Start Monday." ...And after I left, I was like, "That motherfucker was right." 'Cuz, really, life is too short, ya know? Why shouldn't we all be nice, or at least, like try... Ya know? An' yo - career advancement! If I hook this up right, these people got like five buildings. I could go from porter to maybe even a super 'cuz I already got the repair shit down, and then you get free rent and cable and even free Internet for like emails an' shit, and union benefits - and they got a strong-ass union - and, anyway, I started thinkin', Veronica, ya know, and I started makin' plans, happy plans, like, "next step" plans, Veronica, you know, like how you've been saying?

Run For Your Wife by Ray Cooney

JOHN.

Firstly, I would like to dispel the rumour that the young lady who just rushed out in a flood of tears is a nun. This is a concoction entirely of my own making. Nor is she married to Mr. Gardner - who does not have a disturbed schoolboy son called Stanley. And for those who have been led to believe otherwise, Mr. Gardner practices neither as a farmer not as a homosexual. Nor any any combination of the two. Secondly, I wish it to go on record that the charming but hysterical lady through there is neither my daily help nor is she a transvestite - Finally, I would like to say that all the aforementioned "Little White Lies" were contrived by me for the simple purpose of covering up my guilty secret - I am married to that lady in there and live here. At the same time I am married to the other lady and live somewhere else. Correct, Stanley?

Run For Your Wife by Ray Cooney

JOHN.

Well, it wasn't serious, pumpkin. I just nipped into their casualty department. Banged my head under the taxi bonnet, checking the plugs. I'm always doing it. I was in and out of the place in five minutes. It was nothing. But, of course, they took down all my particulars. That explains it, doesn't it? Yes, the hospital has both my address from the other day and the address of the other Mr. Smith - from this morning. Naturally, the other Mr. Smith asks the police to take him to an address in Wimbledon - where he lives - but when the hospital is asked for the other Mr. Smith's address they look up the wrong page in their casualty book and see John Smith, Taxi Driver, Nature of Injury - abrasion of the cranium - and give you my address in Streatham - not realizing that on the very next page is the address of the other John Smith, Taxi Driver, Nature of Injury - abrasion to the cranium - who's just gone home to Wimbledon. You can close the file!

Smart People by Lydia R. Diamond

BRIAN.

You've had a squirrel or something trapped in a wall, or vent or something, yeah? You know, at first it's this sort of non-localized smell, just unpleasant around the edges... it's nagging... and maybe you just need to take out the garbage or put a lemon in the disposal... so you do, and then you run to whatever meeting or class you're late to. A little later you notice again. It's faint and maybe you're imagining it. You spray a little Febreze and go about your business. Then one day you get home and it's just... foul... putrid... and you know that something has died in the fucking wall. My point. I'm not being altruistic. It smells, and I live here.

It's Only A Play by Terrence McNally

FRANK.

I'm fine. I feel good. Really really good. Thank you New York Post. I finally got what I wanted. I hate it. Who does he think he is anyway? My father? "Good boy! Bad boy! Go play some rugby with your mates, 'stead of playing with bleeding puppets." "But I love me puppets, Daddy." "I'll show you what I think of your little toy theatre. That's what I think of it! Think you're better than your old man, don't you?" "I don't, Daddy!" "Going off to Oxford to read literature when your dad can't even read his own name." "He can't read his own name." "I know! The biggest mistake of my entire life was taking you to that bloody Christmas panto." "I want to be Peter Pan, Daddy. I want to fly." "I'll teach you to fly, you little lump of nothing." Okay. That was great.

It's Only A Play by Terrence McNally

IRA.

You can stop right now, Mr. Wicker. I'm a critic of the old school. I don't know what I'm going to write about a play until I sit down to write it. I can't be had for one of Mrs. Budder's pastry puffs, as tasty as they may be. I'm still processing what I saw this evening and I have to keep an open mind. They put me behind Chris Christie. I could hardly see. I admit I have an agenda. There's too many revivals and not enough Brecht. Celebrity wattage does not impress. A play should have a beginning, a middle, and an end. Plots are important, too, along with interesting characters. Attractive actors with trained voices are always welcome. In the right context, full-frontal nudity has its place. I'd love to see Cate Blanchett starkers. That's about it. Thanks to the anti-Christ, Bill Gates, I'll soon be a critic without a place to publish. Serious theatre criticism has become an endangered species. People read up to find out what they thought of a play. Now they have opinions of their own and put them on the internet. What we are witnessing is the collapse of Western civilization.

Why Torture Is Wrong, and the People Who Love Them by Christopher Durang

REVEREND MIKE.

I'm glad you're not a heroin addict, that's good news. I used to sell heroin, but I think that was a bad thing I did, drugs aren't good for you. Selling them doesn't fit the Beatitudes, and I am a minister. It doesn't say "Blessed are the dope pushers," does it? I think making porno is a better thing to do for people than selling heroin, because God created sex and it's holy and good and hot and fun, and people can't seem to stop watching it, so somebody's gotta film it. My next project is called The Big Bang, and it's going to have twenty-seven orgasms. And you know, it helps people out - they get some money for doing something fun, and though of course a lot of the performers are on drugs, I don't sell them the drugs, so it's not really my fault. But as it says in the Beatitudes, "different strokes for different folks."

I Hate Hamlet by Paul Rudnick

GARY.

Even if it's a dud, one year and out - it's enough, to breathe, to lay back. A house. Houses. Cars. No - for your folks. For all they've done. Or, if you hate 'em, rub 'em out - the money's there. And if the show hits, okay, you're tied up for a few years, but - triple it. Quadruple. Keep going. Picture it. One day, you wake up, and whatever happens - you're rich. Something goes wrong, something breaks, it's not so bad, it's never gonna be so bad. Why? You're rich!! It's like they say, the rich are different from you and me - they're RICH!!! On the other hand, and I'm just blowin' smoke here, pretend like you're outta your mind, pretend you say no. Pretend... you stick around here. The theater. El footlights. And in a few years... Here you are. No offense, but - another out-of-work actor. Not so young, not so network. Maybe you wait tables. Sorry - maitre'd. Pretty soon you move, 'cause you can't afford this place. But hey, once in a while - you get work. Off-off-nowhere. It's Chekov. It's a basement. It's July. And there's folding chairs. I'm not trying to scare you, I'm just doing my job, as a bud.

I Hate Hamlet by Paul Rudnick

GARY.

I mean, maybe it's foolproof - maybe, with Shakespeare, there's no difference between bad and good. And everybody's afraid to say it. I mean, at the movies, on the tube - either you're funny, or you're cancelled. You're good-looking, or you're best-supporting. I mean, you can tell. But Shakespeare - it's just real hard to tell who's good, without nudity. Can I be frank? I don't get it. The theater. It doesn't make sense. It's like, progress, right? Take it step by step. Back in Neanderthal times, entertainment was like, two rocks. Boom boom. Then, in the Middle Ages, they had theater. Then came radio. Then silent movies. Then sound. Then TV. That's like, art perfected. When you watch TV, you can eat. You can talk. You don't really have to pay attention, not if you've seen TV before. Nice half-hour chunks. Or even better, commercials. Thirty seconds. Hot girl, hot guy, the beer, it's all there. It's distilled. I mean, when I go to the theater, I sit there, and most of the time I'm thinking - which one is my armrest?

I Hate Hamlet by Paul Rudnick

ANDREW.

I auditioned because my agent made me! And because Deirdre loves Hamlet! And because - because they asked me! Because somewhere, someone thought that maybe, just maybe - I could do it. That I wouldn't have to be just Jim Corman, rookie surgeon, for the rest of my life. On TV, no one cared if I was talented, I had the right twinkle, the demographic appeal. And after a while, I started to think maybe that's all I had. That if I didn't show up, they could just use the poster. But I came to New York and somebody said, wait. Maybe Andy Rally could do Shakespeare. Onstage. Say those lines. But they were wrong! I belong on TV, I know that. And it's not a crime. And I'm sorry I got you down here, and I'm sure that if you go back to talk to whomever, you can get this whole Hamlet deal cancelled. Because I'm really tired, and my girlfriend won't sleep with me, and I think my agent is very ill but she refuses to discuss it. And my life is an embarrassing joke, so if you'd please just leave, I'd appreciate it!

The Nerd by Larry Shue

WILLUM.

I was a draftsman for the Quartermaster Corps. I got sent to Nam to spend a year drawing pictures of officers' clubs. Fine. So I'm off the plane maybe forty-eight hours, by which time, never mind how, I've gotten myself into the middle of some rice field, VC country. I'm in dress uniform in a rainstorm, my collapsible PX umbrella has collapsed, I'm trying to find the road on a map that's turning into Malt-o-Meal in my hands - I'm totally lost. I'm so tired and disgusted I forget to be scared. And I start thinking of all these stupid war-movie quotes, and without realizing it I start saying them out loud. And I remember saying - "Well - it's a damn dirty job, but somebody's got to di it." Then I hear this sound, this loud, fluttering sound, like a playing card on a bicycle wheel? It's an AK-47. Next thing I know I'm sitting in a puddle, and even though I can't see myself through the mud, I realize intuitively I've been shot because there's all this great pain? And all I can think of is, I gotta let 'em know I'm a draftsman, right? - somehow, so they won't kill me. I'm trying to think of a universal sign for "draftsman", and that's when I pass out. I wake up, I'm in Japan, Navy hospital. Both my legs are in a cast; they look like two enormous cannoli, y'know? But I'm gonna be okay. Purple heart, honorable discharge. I'm going home. So what has happened - this guy, Rick Steadman, he was just a poor grunt, wounded himself, wounded in the arm, running from an attack that had backfired; but he saw me, and with his one good arm he dragged me a mile and a half through the jungle to his base camp - refused medical attention till I'd gotten everything I needed.

Voices From the High School by Peter Dee

TEEN SANTA.

I got this job to make extra money for Christmas. Working in a big department store downtown. The shipping room. You know, all these boxes come in; shirts, sox, jewelry, perfume - tons of perfume and garbage like that. All coming in for the Christmas shopping crush. So I carry stuff to the different departments, run the ticket machine sometimes that makes the prices for the junk. Some of the girls from school got jobs too. Selling crap upstairs. So we fool around. The two guys in the shipping room are career men. They tell me corny jokes between giving me advice on how to live. Anyway, the store manager comes in on Christmas Eve. She's about ten feel tall. Bigger than anybody else in the store. Looks and talks like John Wayne used to. She's okay. So she comes in and says, "I don't know how this happened but we don't have a Santa Claus today. Christmas Eve and the company hired the guy up to yesterday. Now there's a bunch of mother's and kids out there and an empty chair where Santa should be." Then she stands there, her head scraping the ceiling. Old Jon keeps unpacking the merchandise and Joe, the other guy, sort of nods his head in sympathy with her as he winks at old John and nods toward me and I'm finally mastering the ticket machine. I got perfume prices with the right department code flying out at a hundred miles an hour. "So what are we going to di?" She says again, casual; one hand on her hip, not her holster. "Peter'd be a great Santa," says old John as he keeps stacking up beautiful plaid Arrow shirts. She looks me over. "He's too skinny." "Not as skinny as Joe," says old John. "True," she answers. "You know I'm no Santa Claus," John continues, "and you're a little too tall." "Right," she says with a grin and they all turn and look at me. "Wait a minute," I say, "there's no way I'm gonna..." "Pillows," says Joe... "We'll stuff him with pillows." "Have him up on the chair in five minutes," she says, "there's a line building." And she turns around and rides off into the sunset. Next thing I know nobody's listening to me and I'm in this red suit, stuffed up with pillows and I got this white wig on and a red hat with a bell on the end of it and Joe and old John are laughing their heads off and calling all the sales ladies in from the men's department, which is right outside the door, to check me out. One of them, Mrs. Parnasus, puts my beard on and says she hopes I won't get stuck in her chimney that night. They give me this big red bag full of empty boxes to throw over my shoulder and shove me out into the store. "What am I going to say to these kids?" I'm thinking, I know they're going to pull my beard off and stick their fingers in my eyes. I sure don't believe I'm Santa Claus. Why should they? I'm going to be responsible for wrecked illusions. The mothers will probably sue the store. Well they stuck me out here, full of pillows from the houseware department, so it's not my fault. I'll do what I can. Off I go to my throne which is on the landing between the two floors. I lumber up the stairs with my big stuffed pack of empty boxes, sit down, mutter a couple of mild ho, ho, ho's and wait for the worst. Well let me tell you something. Everybody should be Santa Claus once in their life. I don't think I've ever seen belief like I did that day. I never took a break. Kid after kid after kid comes down the stairs to me, up the stairs to me. Fingers in their mouth, fingers in their nose, eyes wider than anything you ever saw. Sitting on my lap, looking up at me, hardly able to speak. Not one of them touched my beard. My voice kept getting deeper and deeper. A lot of them brought something for Rudolph and I said he'd share with the other reindeer. I mean I really felt like I'd just come in from the North Pole and has a lot of traveling to do that night so none of these heavy believers would be let down. I didn't even touch my beard. So it was really great. Oh yeah though. Something did happen to bring me back to reality. See, I'd really been sitting there a long time, over three hours, I think, in really intense continuing raps and negotiations with a lot of kids who knew what they wanted when they could finally talk. So what I didn't realize was that my Santa tummy pillows had all risen up into my chest. So when I finally got off my throne and started downstairs to go back to the room, I got to take about two steps when my red pants were down around my ankles. There was Santa Claus in his underpants and skinny legs standing in the middle of his hometown department store with the whole town doing last minute shopping. Talked about wreck illusions. I reached down and grabbed my pants back up, held on to them and my falling pillows and ran as fast as I could to the shipping room. I couldn't help it that my big red bag of empty boxes kept banging customers on the head as I made tracks. So if you hear about a legendary Santa Claus strip; relax it was only me.

Michael Von Siebenburg by Greg Kotis

SAMMY.

Let me tell you something, something true. Once upon a time there were men - not very nice men - who would stand tall before a sea of troubles, and they would do it all for you - for women like you. Once upon a time, women like you - beautiful women, fierce and resourceful women - would spend their days tilling the fields and their nights dancing barefoot before the kettle fires. When called, the men - your men - would reclaim their pikes long hidden within cottage walls, they would form ranks and march out to meet the bloody Turk on the field of battle. You think you are strong now because you wear a power suit to work, you make long distance calls for free, and your secretary nearly always does as you command. But you are not strong. Not as you used to be. You are hungry, that's why. Hungry for a man - and I'm going to delve a little deeper here - for a man who would kill for you, who would burn for you, who would strip the baubles from off the Turken corpses and present then as gifts to you. You may not mention it at the office parties, at the Thanksgiving dinners, but you ache for a man such as this. You hunger for him. And you know what? He hungers for you. He hungers for you very, very much.

Your Mother's Butt by Alan Ball

CLIENT.

Weird. I just remembered... oh, I had this weird dream. I dreamed... I dreamed I was in this... house, it wasn't my house, but I lived there. And I was in this big room, and I was in a bathtub. This old-fashioned bathtub on pedestals. And I'm wearing clothes. This olive drab cardigan, just over a T-shirt, and these flax-colored, I guess, linen shorts. No pleats. Really nice. Well, they would be, wouldn't they? Dream clothes. And then I hear these voices in the hall and in comes my mother. Only she's a younger version of herself, and she's wearing these 1960's hip-huggers, and she has Mary Tyler Moore hair that she's tied a bandana around, and I think oh, she's trying to be hip, and it's really sort of sad for a moment... then she gets in the bathtub with me, only she won't look at me, and then she bends over and... she just sticks her butt in my face. And I'm thinking... okay. This is kind of weird. This is some weird kind of fuck-you gesture, and I'm thinking... this is really... it's really not quite right...

Power Lunch by Alan Ball

MAN.

Please, go on. But I don't want you to feel like I don't value your input. Because I made that mistake once before. Of course now, I can see just how she was trying to reach out to me, but then, I couldn't hear - No! I wouldn't hear! I shut her out! I left her no alternative, she had to leave me to save herself! The best thing that ever happened to me, and I drove her away! And you know why? Because she was the best thing that ever happened to me! What does that say about me? What kind of monster am I? So what if my father was cold and remote and terrified of his own emotional nature and that was the only role model I had? That's no excuse! No. Everything you said about me was true. I'm a despicable little man, and I deserve nothing more than to burn in hell for all eternity.

Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike by Christopher Durang

VANYA.

WE USED TO LICK POSTAGE STAMPS BACK THEN. Obviously you've never heard of that. They didn't just peel off ready-made with sticky stuff on the back - the sticky stuff had to be triggered by your wet tongue. It took time. If you were sending out many letters, you could be licking postage stamps for ten minutes or so. We used typewriters back then. And white-out for corrections. And carbon paper for copies. We had telephones and we had to dial the number by putting our index finger in a round hole representing two or zero. If the number was 909-9999, it could take hours just to dial the number. We had to have PATIENCE then. And we used to lick postage stamps. It was unpleasant, but it had to be done. We didn't multitask. Doing one thing at a time seemed appropriate. But I guess you can sort of listen to a play and sort of send a message and sort of play a video game... all at once. It must be wonderful... I know I sound like a crank, but I don't like change. My play is about scary change in the weather. But there are other changes too that have happened. There are 785 television channels. You can watch the news report that matches what you already think. In the '50s there were only three or four channels, and it was all in black and white. And there were no child stars who became drug addicts like Lindsay Lohan. I mean, Hayley Mills was in the original Parent Trap, and she grew up to be a sensible, nice woman. There was no South Park. We saw Howdy Doody starring a puppet. Then there was Kukla, Fran and Ollie - starring two more puppets, and a sweet lady named Fran. We watched puppets back then! There was the Perry Como Show. He was soothing. The Dinah Shore Show. She was charming. The Bishop Sheen Show was on Sunday evening. A Catholic Bishop had his own TV show. And he gave SERMONS. On TV. We weren't Catholic, but we watched him anyway. He said sensible things. On television. The Ed Sullivan Show was on before Bishop Sheen, and he had opera singers on. And performers from current Broadway shows. Richard Burton and Julie Andrews would sing songs from Camelot. It was wonderful. It helped theatre be a part of the national consciousness, which it isn't any more. And he had Senor Wences on, who had a Spanish accent and was a ventriloquist. And he painted a mouth on his fist, and he would make it speak. "Hello," "Hello," "Hello," Hello. His act lasted about... seven hours. As a child I thought to myself, this must be what eternity feels like. And yet that's a good concept for a child to have. I'm inconsistent. I don't know what I'm saying. Be quiet. BE QUIET. We licked postage stamps, and we sent letters. I preferred Bishop Sheen to Senor Wences. Bishop Sheen was a good speaker, and he used his real mouth rather than one drawn onto his fist, and this made me take him more seriously. I remember him talking about the seed falling on rock. In other words, build your own life on a strong foundation. Of course, I haven't done that. But I meant to. Bishop Sheen said I should. I guess I lost. But it was interesting to hear him talk that way. It was articulate. I don't think much is articulate in the world anymore. And I'm saying this all in retrospect. I didn't think it when I was ten. I was just trying to get through life one day at a time when I was ten. And I didn't have a life ahead of me where I was going to be almost cast in Entourage 2. But I guess you're having a good life, and I had a foolish one. Tell me, do they have any older characters on Entourage 2? Do they need someone in their late 50s who has had a useless life and is looking back feeling bitter? Might I audition for that part? Could you check? I have the remainder of my life to take a nap. I'm not done yet. WE LICKED POSTAGE STAMPS! We didn't have answering machines. You had to call people back. We ate Spam, just like the soldiers in World War II did. Have you heard of World War II? We played Scrabble and Monopoly. We didn't play video games, in some virtual reality, where we would kill policeman and prostitutes as if that was some sort of entertainment. The popular entertainment wasn't so insane back then. It was sometimes corny, but sincere. We all saw the movie Davy Crockett and wore coonskin caps. That may not sound sane, wearing those caps, but it was very innocent. And we all did it, there was a solidarity about it, unlike being alone in your room killing prostitutes in a video game. We followed The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet. Which starred the real life Ozzie and Harriet Nelson. But Adventures was a strange word for the show because it was extremely uneventful. They did things like... make popcorn in the kitchen. Or... look for missing socks. In retrospect they seemed medicated. It was a stupid show, but it was calming. You didn't feel it was stirring people up and creating serial killers. I'm sorry I'm getting off the point. But my point is the '50s were idiotic but I miss parts of them. When I was thirteen I saw Goldfinger with Sean Connery as James Bond, and I didn't get the meaning of the character name of "Pussy Galore." Went right over my head. Nowadays, three-years-old get the joke. They can barely walk and they know what Pussy Galore means. The weather is changing, the culture is very weird. I'm not a conservative, but I do miss things in the past. I Love Lucy was pretty wonderful. And the whole country watched it. We saw Davy Crockett. And The Mickey Mouse Show. Buys just past puberty would fixate on Annette Funicello. We didn't identify with rock stars, we identified with Mouseketeers. Annette, Darlene Gillespie, Cubby O'Brien. My favorite was Tommy Kirk who was one of the Hardy Boys on the Mickey Mouse show. Later he starred in Disney's Old Yeller, about a boy and his dog. His father was fighting in the Civil War, but Tommy was the one who took the responsibility for being the grown-up. Not his mother or younger brother. And initially he didn't want the dog, but then he bonded with it. And at the end of the film Old Yeller gets rabies and foams at the mouth, and poor Tommy Kirk has to shoot his dog, crying his eyes out as he does so. It was a traumatic moment in our national past. A shared one. I wondered what happened to Tommy Kirk, and I did a Google search and I learned that sometime after he was in Son of Flubber, Walt Disney found out that Tommy Kirk was gay and he fired him. He dropped his contract. Meanwhile Tab Hunter was gay too, but HIS studio just saw to it that he went on pretend dates with starlets. They didn't fire Tab Hunter. They starred him in movies opposite Sophia Loren, for God's sake. Tommy Kirk on the other hand was mistreated, and I TAKE IT PERSONALLY. As I expect he does too. He stopped making movies. He took drugs for a period. And then later he got better and became a minister. And now he runs a rug cleaning business. I guess he's alright. But he's had to go through the same changes I have - no more licking of postage stamps, no more typewriters or letters, no more shared national TV shows like Ozzie and Harriet, which even though it was boring still it was a SHARED MEMORY BETWEEN US. There are no shared memories anymore. Now, now there's Twitter and email and Facebook and cable and satellite, and the movies and TV shows are all worthless, and we don't even watch the same worthless things together, it's all separate. And our lives are... disconnected. And you come in here and say you almost had a part on Entourage 2 as if that's an achievement of some kind. And I don't know what you're talking about. I'm worried about the future. I miss the past. I don't want to talk anymore. I'm going to go sit in the other room. I don't know why I exploded. Sorry.

... and stuff ... by Peter Dee

GUY.

We're teenagers, this is our world. Boring. Most of the time. Yeah. I know, when you see us on TV or the movies we're either possessed, rock-and-rolling or preventing rape and pillage with our natural goodness and high ideals. In my opinion these scams are full of shit. Pardon the vernacular. Tensest moment in a month happened three weeks ago when I almost got caught passing a note to Valerie Horn. You know, like a private joke and stuff so that if some teacher didn't know what it really meant, they could make a definite point to the principal that we were a real hard core case of three times over sexual deviates. And the particular teacher in this situation is also the basketball coach who's always stepping into the wastebasket during class so you can imagine what his perspective on anything is like. No kidding, something like that can be a real hair raiser. Teddy Lynch, a friend of mine, got a day's suspension and a month with a psychiatrist over this inspiration that he penned during a lull in the Problems of Democracy Class. "Some guys dream/ Of making millions/ Others of recording/ Fifty thousand hits/ I just dream of/ About twenty minutes/ Playing with Brenda Murphy's..." I'm sure you can fill in the rest/ I mean they treated Teddy like he had fanged teeth and stuff. Teen dreams are just like anyone else's; most of the time they don't come true. Take Dagmar Anderson for instance. She has this intense desire to create crossword puzzles her grandmother can solve so she'll stop talking to her during MTV. I love crossword puzzles. They teach me so much more about language than anything my English teacher can muster up. Wow, talk about a boring class. I've invented these ways to keep from falling asleep; like seeing how many times Eleanor Costello unbuttons and buttons her blouse after Mr. Lonagan, the teacher, speaks to her. I don't know what she sees in him. I mean, that guy puts all the sleeping pill manufacturers in the country out of business every time he opens his mouth. Oh, sure. There's a bizarre, exciting incident every now and then. The time that Cosmo Santucci knocked over the drinking fountain when he was running away with the gym teacher's jock that was supposed to be a present for Sally Whiting's surprise birthday party. Cosmo was so scared with the ripoff that he ran down the up hallway and thought that the fountain was across the hall but instead it was right in front of him when he came around the corner. Water was shooting everywhere and stuff. Mr. Ruggles, the tyrannical trigonometry teacher, who came out to check the noise, got it full blast in the crotch of his light tan pants. He taught for the rest of the day in his raincoat. Sally loved the present though. It's on the antenna of her car. But a typical day, week, month, year is actually inclined to be more occupied with hours of lead than ones of gold. But like everyone else we have our salvations, like sports, drama club, field trips, throwing rocks at trains. Salvations are what I call these kind of sprinkled blessings that wash over you every now and then and I'm not talking about overhead pigeons and that kind of stuff. When these blessings come you no longer remember words like "depression" or "loneliness" or "It's your turn to take out the garbage," even exist. You go on some kind of quiet rocket to this magical place without even moving. What really brings the salvation blessings down for me is one particular things. Remember back before radio and movies and television and VCR's, there were these things called books? You like to read too? I love it. For long as I can remember I have loved to sail away in a good read. And even before I could, all my mother ever had to say way, "Shall I read you a story?" and I'd stop throwing my dead rice krispies against the wall and become two huge waiting ears. Which reminds me that today something did happen to me. I was standing outside this store window that has a huge display of children's books. Fantastic covers full of animals and castles, and outer space and stuff. Just as I was almost totally lost in the display three little kids came up to me and the oldest, who might have been pushing nine and was a definite businessman, asked me point blank, "Mister, wanna buy a raffle ticket?" I realized they - two boys and a girl - thought I was an old man because of my slouch hat, dark glasses, black, tattered, street length wool coat, funky shoes and stuff. Hey, being a preppie my voice accordingly and played roughly... eighty two. I recorded the incident immediately after they left. Oh yeah, I also combat boredom by writing. I'll read it to you. The rainbow goblins/ Raffle ticket sellers/ Brown eyes of trusting children/ "Mister, wanna buy a raffle ticket."/ "How much?"/ "One dollar."/ "What am I going to win?"/ "A radio, you have to be there."/ "That's our school over there. The kindergarten is haunted."/ "Really?"/ "Uh huh."/ In a slow arthritic motion I set my dollar free./ The businessman takes it into a fast pocket./ "Don't you want my name and address?"/ "Yes," says the little girl with eyes of bossyfriendlistars./ The old man is given a stub to fill out./ And we all grow ancient/ As I record the information/ With the shaky retardation of a dying/ Spider./ "Here you go," say I, "Good luck."/ Speechless third little boy/ Watches my act/ With an are-you-for-real-mister eye./ And then they sail away/ I turn back to the book filled children's window/ While the rainbow goblins/ Bounce on/ Book bags and dark hair flying/ Little muscled robins of promise/ Dancing on their bounce back up to the sidewalk/ In the uninterrupted/ Magnification/ Of their eternally possible/ Dreams. Still awake out there? Well... see you later.

The Actor's Nightmare by Christopher Durang

GEORGE.

Oh don't go. Maybe someone else will come out in a minute. Or course, sometimes people have soliloquies in Shakespeare. Let's just wait a moment more and maybe someone will come. Oh dear. To be or not to be, that is the question. Line. Line! Ohhhh. Oh, what a rogue and peasant slave am I. Whether tis nobler in the mind's eye to kill oneself, or not killing oneself, to sleep a great deal. We are such stuff as dreams are made on; and our lives are rounded by little sleep. Uh, thrift, thrift, Horatio. Neither a borrower nor a lender be. But to thine own self be true. There is a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. Extraordinary how potent cheap music can be. Out, out damned spot! I come to live it wealthily in Padua; if wealthily, then happily in Padua. Brush up your Shakespeare; start quoting him now; Da da... I wonder whose yacht that is. How was China? Very large, China. How was Japan? Very small, Japan. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Line! Line! Oh my God. O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended thee, and I detest all my sins because I dread the loss of heaven and the pains of hell. But most of all because they have offended thee, my God, who art all good and deserving of all my love. And I resolve to confess my sins, to do penance, and to amend my life, Amen. That's the act of contrition that Catholic school children say in confession in order to be forgiven their sins. Catholic adults say it too, I imagine. I don't know any Catholic adults. Line! When you call for a line, the stage manager normally gives you your next line, to refresh your memory. Line! The quality of mercy is not strained. It droppeth as the gentle rain upon the place below, when we have shuffled off this mortal coil. Alas, poor Yorick. I knew him well. Get thee to a nunnery. Line. Nunnery. As a child, I was taught by nuns, and then in high school I was taught by Benedictine priests. I really rather liked the nuns, they were sort of warm, though they were fairly crazy too. Line. I like the priests also. The school was on the grounds of the monastery, and my junior and senior years I spent a few weekends joining in the daily routine of the monastery - prayers, then breakfast, then prayers, then lunch, then prayers, then dinner, then prayers, then sleep. I found the predictability quite attractive. And the food was good. I was going to join the monastery after high school, but they said I was too young and should wait. And then I just stopped believing in all those things, so I never did join the monastery. I became an accountant. I've studied logarithms, and cosine and tangent... Line! I'm sorry. This is supposed to be "Hamlet: or Private Lives" or something, and I keep rattling on like a maniac. I really do apologize. I just don't recall attending a single rehearsal. I can't imagine what I was doing. And you also came expecting to see Edwin Booth and you get me. I really am embarrassed. Sorry. Line! I have always depended on the kindness of strangers. Stella! It is a far, far better thing I do than I have ever done before. It's a far, far better place I go to than I have ever been before. A, b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, o, p, q, r, s, t... Oh, good. Are you Ophelia? Get thee to a nunnery.

The Altruists by Nicky Silver

RONALD.

Don't do that - You are really a gift. A very wonderful gift-like thing. I don't know what cosmic force drew you to that bar last night. I'd never been in that bar. I don't go to bars. I don't go out. I don't leave the house. I don't leave the room. Socially, really. But last night, there was a flood - the toilet backed up because the people upstairs flushed a sweatshirt down theirs. The toilet backed up and I went out. I had to go, you know what I mean? I didn't even know that was a gay bar. I had no idea. I suppose the name might've tipped some people off, Ramrod, but I had no idea. And when I looked across the room and saw you there, sitting at the bar, drumming away, like a frenzied, hopped-up maniac, I knew that kismet drew me there, kismet drew me to that bar, and into your eyes and your arms - and your heart, I hope. Because you're in my heart. I hope you believe me. I haven't loved anyone in a very long time. I haven't been with anyone, it seems. Sine the continents were connected. I haven't given my heart to a living soul. You're beautiful. What do you weigh? Do you know? It doesn't matter. You're perfect. You have the most beautiful eyes. Did I mention that? What is that color? What do you call that color? "Blue." "Blue." It's poetry. It's a song. And when I looked into them, from across the sea of disaffected poseurs, when our eyes met, I knew that my life was at a fork in the road. I knew that something bigger than you and I am God was at play. And then last night when we made love, I found out that I was right. What I'm trying to say is, I know it's irrational, but I have feelings for you. Real feelings. Not imagined feelings. I mean, I know it's fast, but is there really a time table for this sort of thing? What I'm telling you is, I believe, don't laugh, I believe that I am in love with you. I believe... that I have fallen in love with you.

The Altruists by Nicky Silver

RONALD.

I grew up in a beautiful house. Two parents, two children, three bedrooms. Two cars. A woman for cleaning. A man in the yard. A sky that was extremely blue, an azure blue, or cobalt. And I had no idea that the world was unfair. And when I saw, as I grew up, the world as it is, I dreamed that I could make a better place. Where people lived in rooms not doorways. Where children were cared for by parents until they no longer could, when, gladly and freely, the parents were cared for by children. And I had no idea what work, what draining work, what all-consuming, to the point that I have nothing, nothing in my life but work, kind of work it would be. I had no idea that making anything meant giving up everything. I had no idea apartments even came as small as this. But then, how could I? I grew up in a beautiful house with a swimming pool with a diving board and a changing room and fresh towels, put there by someone whom I never saw... Good work, I found out, as I grew up, good work, my God, is just exhausting.

The Philadelphia by David Ives

AL.

Yes, physically you are in New York. But metaphysically you are in a Philadelphia. You see, inside of what we know as reality there are these pockets, these black holes called Philadelphias. If you fall into one, you run up against exactly the kinda shit that's been happening to you all day. Because in a Philadelphia, no matter what you ask for, you can't get it. You ask for something, they're not gonna have it. You want to do something, it ain't gonna get done. You want to go somewhere, you can't get there from here. Just remember, Marcus. This is a condition named for the town that invented the cheese steak. Something that nobody in his right mind would willingly ask for. Sure. Millions of people have spent entire lifetimes inside a Philadelphia and never even knew it. Look at the city of Philadelphia itself. Hopelessly trapped forever inside a Philadelphia. And do they know it? You try to kill yourself in a Philadelphia, you're only gonna get hurt, babe. Best thing you can do is wait it out. Someday the great cosmic train will whisk you outta the City of Brotherly Love and off to someplace happier.

The Universal Language by David Ives

DON.

It's a con game. A swindle. A parla trick. Believe it, Dawn! I should know - I invented it! Granted, it's not a very good con, since you're the only person who's ever come knocking at that door, and I'm obviously not a very good con man, since I'm refusing to accept your very attractive and generous money, but I can't stand the thought of you walking out there saying "velcro belljar harvardyu" and having people laugh at you. I swear, Dawn, I swear, I didn't want to hurt you. How could I? How could anybody? Your beautiful heart... It shines out of you like a beacon. And then there's me. A total fraud. I wish I could lie in any language and say it wasn't so, but... I'm sorry, Dawn. I'm so, so sorry.

John Buchan's The 39 Steps by Patrick Barlow

HANNAY.

Well - ladies and gentleman I must apologize for my... hesitation in addressing you but to tell you the simple truth, I'd entirely failed, while listening to the chairman's flattering description just now, to realize he was talking... about me. Anyway when I... er... journeyed up to Scotland a few - days ago, traveling on the Highland Express over that magnificent structure the Forth Bridge - I'd no idea that in a few days I should be addressing an important political meeting. But may I say from the bottom of my heart and the utmost sincerity how delighted and relieved I am to find myself in your presence at this moment. So - anyway, um - what was I saying? Ah yes - delighted. Not to say - relieved. Because so long as I stand on this platform I am delivered for the moment from the cares and anxieties that are always the lot of a man in my position. Anyway ladies and gentleman as you know we're here tonight to - to - discuss erm - what shall we discuss? I know - let's discuss er - how about - the herring trade? Or haddock perhaps? Or the idle rich! Not that I can talk about that because I'm not rich and I've never been idle. Well I've been pretty busy all my life really. Well actually not recently. Recently I've been in a bit of a slump to be honest. Catching myself in the lonely hours, full of damned - thoughts and what have you. Well not that recently. Recently, the last few days - well the last day really, everything's done a bit haywire frankly. Wouldn't say it's been easy. Pretty damned difficult actually. But the odd thing is - the odd thing is - you carry on! And it's pretty bracing when you do. Pulls a chap out of himself if you know what I mean. There it is. No idea what's happening. Who to trust. Where to turn. Whether it'll be worth it at the end of it all. But something - I don't know - stirs the old bones! Gets the old ticker pumping again! And there's no time to think. And your mind's singing. And your heart's racing. And you're meeting people. Real people! Doing the best they can! Yes! Doing the best they can in all the terrible situations the world throws at them! Suffering things no man or woman ought to suffer! And yet they carry on! They don't give up! They damn well keep going! And I'll tell you what else they do. They do the best they can for other people too! Whatever problems they've got, they damn well look after each other! Is that such an - 'outmoded sentimental notion'? Is it!? Well is it? So look here - let's just all set ourselves resolutely to make this world a happier place! A decent world! A good world! A world where no nation plots against nation! Where no neighbor plots against neighbor, where there's no persecution or hunting down, where everybody gets a square deal and a sporting chance and where people try to help and not to hinder! A world where suspicion and cruelty and fear have been forever banished! So I'm asking you - each and every one of you here tonight - you and you and - you and you and you and - definitely you! Is that the sort of world you want? Because that's the sort of world I want! What do you think? Let's vote on it! Come on! Vote for a good world! A better world! A new world! And above all - vote for Mr. - McCrocodile! There! That's all I have to say. Thank you.

John Buchan's The 39 Steps by Patrick Barlow

HANNAY.

London. 1935. August. I'd been back three months in the old country and frankly wondering why. The weather made me liverish, no exercise to speak of and the talk of the ordinary Englishman made me sick. I'd had enough of restaurants and parties and race meetings. No pal to go about with - which probably explains things. Hoppy Bynge lost in the Canadian Treasury, Tommy Deloraine married off to a blonde heiress in Chicago, Chips Carruthers eaten by crocodiles in the Limpopo. Leaving me. Richard Hannay. Thirty-seven years old, sound in wind and limb. Back home. Which was no home at all if you want to know. Just a dull little rented flat in West One. Portland Place actually. And I was bored. No more than bored. Tired. Tired of the world and tired of - life, to be honest. So I called my broker. He wasn't in. Dropped into my club. Full of old colonial buffers. Had a scotch and soda, picked up an evening paper, put it back. Full of elections and wars and rumors of wars. And I thought - who the bloody hell cares frankly? What does it all matter? What happens to anyone? What happens to me? No-one'd miss me. I wouldn't miss me. I could quite easily just - And then I thought - wait a minute! Come on Hannay! Pull yourself together man! Find something to do, you bloody fool! Something mindless and trivial. Something utterly pointless. Something - I know! A West End show! That should do the trick!

Relatively Speaking by Alan Ayckbourn

PHILIP.

Absolutely fantastic. Couple of weeks, that's all, and you ought to see it - absolutely knee deep in them. Weeds, nettles, thistles. The lot. And those creeping things - whajermacallits? Look like French beans lying down. Of course, knowing that garden, they might well be. Don't think so though, they look far too healthy. Have to be careful, though, hacked my way straight through the rhubarb last time. Do you remember that? All that ruddy rhubarb? Even had it for tea. This book's no help either, never seems to mention anything I grow. I can't recognize them from the illustrations anyway. Still, I suppose all nature looks different in black and white. I think we ought to get a man in, you know. Be better off in the long run, someone from the village - someone who really knows. Your chap doesn't know anything about gardens, does he? Might have worked out quite well if he had.

Relatively Speaking by Alan Ayckbourn

GREG.

It was rather odd really. When I got up just now I was a bit dozy, you know, and I did what I do at home - I fished with my feet under the bed for my slippers. One of my habits, that is, one of my idiosyncrasies - it helps me to recognize myself when I'm half asleep. I always think that's important, don't you? That the first thing you do when you wake up in the morning is to make sure you know who you are. I have a terror of that, losing my identity in the night. Some people are frightened of burglars breaking in. With me, it's stealthy midnight brainwashers. Anyway, I did this fishing with my feet business, and I thought to myself, steady lad, you're in for a shock. They won't be there. This is her flat you're in. Don't panic now. You're the same person you were when you went to sleep. Only the bed has been changed. And then, the blow. A pair of alien slippers attached themselves to my toes. I can tell you that was an experience I wouldn't care to go through again. It could have split my personality right up the middle. Did you know that? Very nasty.

Visiting Mr. Green by Jeff Baron

MR. GREEN.

So there was a toilet out in the hall, and the Garelicks - there were six of them and one boarder, and the Greens - there were six of us and no border - my father wouldn't have it - all thirteen people shared this one toilet. I'm twenty-five years old, I'm just getting home from work. I run up the steps cause I gotta go. I get to the toilet, and wouldn't you know it - someone is in there and someone else is waiting. The someone else who's waiting, I never saw her before. She's the cousin of the Garelicks, seventeen years old, just arrived from Russia. This she tells me in Yiddish, because she doesn't know from English. The only thing on my mind is I gotta go, I gotta go, and wait a minute - Now fourteen people are gonna share the toilet? So we're waiting, we're waiting, I'm dancing, we're waiting. We keep talking, and now I'm starting to think, "This is a very nice girl." Then, finally, my brother Marvin comes out of the toilet. My brother Marvin, you should understand, probably didn't even have to go. He just liked to be alone, and in those days, the only place to be alone was the toilet. So Yetta says, in Yiddish this was, "You go ahead." And I say, "No. You were here first". And that was it. We got married six months later. Fifty-nine years we never once had an argument.

The Little Dog Laughed by Douglas Carter Beane

ALEX.

I don't know that I like guys... as a gender. They're kind of pretty much jerks. Like, they're really nice when they want something from you, but once they get it they could pretty much give a shit. Like, this one time, it was actually the first time I tricked. This first trick guy was all distinguished, with gray in his hair and suit. Took me out to dinner and was all interested with what I wanted to do with my life. What books I read, what art I liked. Like interested in what kind of music I was listening to. I'd make a pretty decent joke and he'd laugh all warm and shit. Anyway. We go back to his place, he's taking my clothes off all slow and calling me, wait, magnificent. No wait, really. And I'm all naked and whatnot, and he's walking me back to his bedroom, and we stop on the way, and we step into his bathroom, and he puts me in the bathtub, which was empty, and puts me on my knees, and he pissed on me for like three minutes. He must not have peed for a really long time and drank a lot of liquid. And then he looks at me all disgusted and says, "Clean yourself up and get out of here," and then he goes to bed. Like, I have to show myself to the door. So... I did. I took a shower, and toweled off, and then left with. I left with - like fifteen of his CDs.

The Musical Comedy Murders of 1940 by John Bishop

KEN.

Well, it's been a couple of months, sure, but I've... What do you care anyway? You're going to die. All of you. It just remains to determine how. A fire! Of course! What could be more natural with so many lanterns burning. This house burning to the ground will keep me warm enough till help comes, don't you think? Roger, get up. Elsa, sit down. Bernice, put your hands on the piano. Act natural! Nice. Don't look at the gun! Nice. Good composition. Reminiscent of the final scene from "Berlin Calling," the picture I made with Paul Lukas, Helmut Dantine, Conrad Veidt, George Coulouris, Oscar Homolka, and Merle Oberon. A picture which I assume you have all seen, since you've seen everything else I've done that hasn't been released. Little matter, since you're all going to die. Now, let's see... what can I use to make the flames spread more quickly?

The Musical Comedy Murders of 1940 by John Bishop

EDDIE.

Great, now come back up. I can't believe you're doing this when there's a killer loose. I mean, there's someone, maybe a raving maniac in this house, with a knife or a sabre and you're walking around down there in the dark instead of staying up here in the light where it's safe. Oh my God! Hi! Can I help you? All the dancers are out now, but if you'd care to leave a message... No thanks, I shaved earlier. Besides, I have a regular barber. Frank, at the Astor, you know him? Oh I get it... you think I'm a dancer. That agent of mine. He'll tell anybody anything to get me work. No, I'm a comic.

The Norman Conquests: Round and Round the Garden by Alan Ayckbourn

NORMAN.

When I was at my Primary school - mixed infants - we had a little girl just like you. She was very pretty, very smart and clean - beautifully dressed - always a nicely starched little frock on - nicely ironed bow in her hair... butter wouldn't melt anywhere. Let alone her mouth. And she ran that little school with more sheer ruthless efficiency than the head of the Mafia. She asked you to do something for her and you did it. You never argued. It was no good arguing with her. She was cleverer than you were. Precociously clever. She could reduce a nine year old thug to tears with her sarcasm. And it was no use trying to thump her either. She'd seduced all the best muscle in the place. She had a bodyguard five deep. Not that she ever needed it. For some reason, she took a real dislike to me. Maybe because she could see what I really thought of her. She made my life murder. I was terrified to go to school. I used to pretend to be sick - I used to hide - play truant - anything rather than go... And then one day, in the holidays, she came round with her mother to our house to see my mother. A sociable tea and chat. And they sent us two out on our own to play together. And suddenly there we were, not in the school, not in the playground - which was definitely her territory - but on mine. My garden, my patch. And we stood there and we just looked at each other. And I thought what am I frightened of you for? A skinny little girl with knock knees and a front tooth missing - what on earth have I been frightened of you for, for heaven's sake? So I picked her up, like this under one arm and I carried her right down the bottom of the garden by the rubbish tip - she never made a sound during this, not a word, nothing - and I found the biggest patch of stinging nettles I could find and I pulled down her knickers and sat her right in the middle of them. I felt marvelous. It was a beautiful moment. Magic. And she sat there for a very long time - not moving, just looking at me - weighing me up, you know. Then she got up, pulled up her knickers, very quietly took hold of my hand, gave me a big kiss and we went in and had our tea. I've never been in love like that again.

The Norman Conquests: Round and Round the Garden by Alan Ayckbourn

REG.

Ah. Well. I was only joking. I would never... Don't believe in that personally. Mind you, I've been tempted. When you've been married a few years... you can't help window shopping You know, the old urge. But you keep it under control, don't you? You have to. Well, you may not have to. But I have to. Not that there isn't something to be said for it. I've often thought it might actually help a marriage sometimes. It gets a bit stale between you, you know. I'm not thinking just for me. For her too. Sarah. I'm not being selfish. Perhaps is she - went off for a few days with someone - she might - well, it might make her a bit more... you know, give her a fresh... get her going again, for God's sake. If you follow me. Mind you, it'd never work for us. Sarah would never dream of going off. Pity. If she did, I could. But we're not like you and Ruth, you see. You're - easier. No, I didn't mean easy like that, I meant - well, let's face it - you've always had, what shall we say - an unconventional relationship. Ruth was always nonconformist you know. Even when we were kids. I envy those types, sometimes. Mother was another, you know. In a different way. That old lady up there's had a life, I can tell you. Wouldn't think so now. But she led our father a dance. Poor man really wasn't up to it. Shut himself in up there - pretended it all wasn't happening. Of course it was. Under his own roof sometimes. Well, it was bound to have an effect. Not so much on me - I was the eldest. Don't know what it did to Annie. She was younger. Think she just let it drift over her. Like she does now, most of the time. But Ruth. Ruth altogether was different. Putting it bluntly. She's got Mother's looks, mind you. Attractive wouldn't you say? Difficult for a brother but - striking? Annie and I always said she had our share as well. Certainly had mine. I don't think Sarah married me for my looks. I wonder why she did. I must ask her that sometime. Well, get going. Have a good trip. Think of me.

The Norman Conquests: Living Together by Alan Ayckbourn

TOM.

It's on a night like this, you know, one could really fancy going out and sleeping under the stars. I used to do that when I was at College. I did take someone out one year but we didn't really hit it off. He was very - ebullient - I think that's the word. I don't honestly think you can possibly share a small tent for any length of time with someone who's ebullient. I remember he used to lie there in his sleeping bag, night after night, whistling under his breath. Maddening. It was no good saying anything to him because he had a frightful temper. He couldn't bear it if you criticized him. He'd take it very personally. Practically go berserk. I remember, he once threw y canvas bath on the camp fire. Just because I said something he didn't care for. So I mostly went on my own. Watched for badgers. Impossible to watch badgers with a man like that.

The Norman Conquests: Table Manners by Alan Ayckbourn

NORMAN.

Ha-ha! You spoke to me. Caught you. Caught you. All right, I'll talk to myself then. Hallo, Norman - good morning, Norman - how are you, Norman - I'm very well, Norman - that's good news, Norman - Ha-ha! Caught you again. That's two of you. Just got to catch the old Reg now. Two out of three. Just Reg left... Look out, Reg! Ah - can't catch him that way. Hey, Reg! ... oh well. If that's the way it is. Don't talk to me. I don't care. Doesn't bother me. I don't know why you're all being so unsociable. All right, I had a few drinks last night. What's wrong with that? Hasn't anyone found this table ever had a drink then? Come on, I don't believe it. You've had a drink haven't you, Reg? Ha-ha! Ha-ha! Caught you. You spoke. Ha-ha! Three to me. I've won. Nothing wrong in a few drinks. Don't speak. I don't care. Going to be a pretty dull Sunday if we all sit in silence, I can tell you. Well, I'm not sitting in silence. I'll find something to do. I know, I'll go up and frighten Mother. Ah-ha! Nearly got you again. Is it too much to ask for something to eat. May I borrow your bowl? That's awfully nice of you. And your spoon? Thank you. Now then, what shall I have? Puffa Puffa rice. Ah-ha... No Sunday papers. Dear, dear. Ah, well I shall have to read my morning cereal... Cereal. Do we all get that? Apparently we don't. Stop! Stop everything. Listen. A free pair of pinking shears for only 79p and six Puffa Puffa tokens. Hurry, hurry, hurry. What's this? Is nobody hurrying? Do you mean to tell me that none of you want them? Where's the spirit of British pinking? Dead, presumably. Like my relations. Hang on, I've got another game. Mind reading. I'll read your minds. Now then, where shall we start? Sarah. Sarah is thinking - that noisy man up there should be home with his wife. What is he doing shattering the calm of our peaceful Sunday breakfast with his offers of reduced price pinking shears? Why is he here, shouting at us like this? Why isn't he at home, like any other decent husband, shouting at his wife? He came down here to seduce his wife's own sister said, at one stage anyway, that she was perfectly happy to go along with his is beside the point. The fact that little Annie here was perfectly happy to ditch old reliable Tom - without a second thought - and come off with me is beside the point. We won't mention that because it doesn't quite fit in with the facts as we would like them. And what is little Annie thinking, I wonder? Maybe furtively admiring my pajamas, who knows? Pajamas that could have been hers. With all that they contain. These nearly were mine. Or maybe she is thinking... Phew, that was a close shave. I could have been shacked up in some dreadful hotel with this man - at this very moment... what a lucky escape for me. Thank heavens, I am back here at home amidst my talkative family exchanging witty breakfast banter. Knowing my two-legged faithful companion and friend, Tom the rambling vet, is even now planning to propose to me in 1997 just as soon as he's cured our cat. Meanwhile, I can live here peacefully, totally fulfilled, racing up and down the stairs looking after Mother, having the time of their life and living happily ever after until I'm fifty-five and fat... I'm glad I didn't go to that hotel. Well, let me tell you so am I. I wouldn't want a weekend with you, anyway. And I'll tell you the funniest thing of all, shall I?... I didn't even book the hotel. I knew you wouldn't come. You didn't have the guts. Oh, well. It's a bit quieter without those two. Hear yourself speak. Too damned noisy before. All that crunching of toast. Like a brigade of Guards marching on gravel. Well now, Reg - Milk? A. Sugar? Nice peaceful morning. Just the two of us and - hark! The soft crackle of my Puffa Puffa rice. 'Tis spring indeed. I suppose you think I'm cruel too, don't you? Well, I've damn good cause to be, haven't I? I mean, nobody's thought about my feelings, have they? It's all Annie - Annie - Annie... what about me? I was going to give her everything. Well, as much as I could. My whole being. I wanted to make her happy for a weekend, that's all. I wanted to give her... It was only a few hours for God's sake. Saturday night, back on Monday morning. That was all it was going to be. My God! The fuss. What about your wife, Norman? What about my wife? Don't you think I'd take Ruth away, just the same? If she'd come. But she won't. She has no need of me at all, that woman, except as an emotional punch bag... I tell you, if you gave Ruth a rose, she'd peel all the petals off to make sure there weren't any greenfly. And when she'd done that, she'd turn round and say, do you call that a rose? Look at it, it's all in bits. That's Ruth. If she came in now, she wouldn't notice me. She'd probably hang her coat on me... It's not fair, Reg. Look, I'll tell you. A man with my type of temperament should really be ideally square jawed, broad shouldered, have blue twinkling eyes, a chuckle in his voice and a spring in his stride. He should get through three women a day without even ruffling his hair. That's what I'm like inside. That's my appetite. That's me. I'm a three a day man. There's enough of me in here to give. Not just sex, I'm talking about everything. The trouble is, I was born in the wrong damn body. Look at me. A gigolo trapped in a haystack. The tragedy of my life Norman Dewers - gigolo and assistant librarian. What's inside you, Reg? Apart from twelve bowls of cornflakes? What do you feel with Sarah? Do you sometimes feel like saying to her, no this is me. The real me.

The Norman Conquests: Table Manners by Alan Ayckbourn

REG.

Norman. Goes on and on. Don't know what he's talking about. Makes me laugh though. I don't care, I like him. She doesn't but I do. Women don't, you know. Not many women like him. Don't know why. Sarah can't bear him. Won't have him in the house. Nor will his wife. Ah well. Annie. She's something special. You'll be alright with her, Tom. Take my word. If you decided to marry any of us, marry her. Not that I'm saying you should but if you did. Mind you, you can't marry Ruth and I don't think you'd fancy me so there's not much choice, is there? Never mind. Better go and see Mother in a minute. Sarah's up there at the moment. I'll wait till she comes down. Two of them, too much of a good thing. What did you go and marry her for? Biggest mistake of your life. You'll live to regret it. Trouble is, I can never think of a convincing answer. She's probably right. I mean, there are compensations. Children - sometimes. Even Sarah - sometimes. But when I sit here in this house and listen to the quiet. You know, I wonder why I left. I had my own room here, you know. All my books, my own desk, a shelf for my hobbies. I'd sit up there in my school holidays... happy as a sandboy. I'd make these balsa wood aeroplanes. Dozens of them. Very satisfying. Mind you, they never flew. Soon as I launched them - crack - nose dive - firewood. But it didn't really matter. It was a hell of a bore winding them up anyway. I built one for the kids the other day. They didn't really take to it. Where's the guns, Dad? Where are the bombs then? Oh well, what do you expect.

The Cocktail Hour by A.R. Gurney

JOHN.

That was the title of my play: The Red-Headed Dummy! Good God, Mother, I suddenly realize what I was doing in that play. What I was doing was parading my penis in front of my parents. I was! The bathing suit, the red cap, The Red-Headed Dummy! Get it? I was doing a phallic dance. No, no, really. I was playing with my own penis. Smart kid, come to think of it. How many guys in the world get a chance to do that? Especially in front of their parents. No, but wait. Listen, Mother. I'll put it in historical context. What I was doing was acting out a basic, primitive impulse which goes back to the Greeks. That's how comedy originated, Mother! The phallic dance! These peasants would do these gross dances in front of their overlords to see what they could get away with! And that's what I was doing, too, at three years old! Me! The Red-Headed Dummy! Dancing under the noses of my parents, before they went out to dinner! Saying, "Hey, you guys. Look. Look over here. I'm here, I'm alive, I'm wild, I have this penis with a mind of its own!" That's what I was doing then! That's what I've always done! That's what I'm doing right now, right in this room! And that's why I have to write plays, Mother. I have to keep doing it.

The Cocktail Hour by A.R. Gurney

BRADLEY.

Suit yourself. Soda water it is. What is it Lord Byron tells us? "Let us have wine and women, mirth and laughter; sermons and soda water the day after"... Maybe you'll change your mind later on. Of course, nobody drinks much these days. At least, not with any relish. Marv Watson down at the club is now completely on the wagon. You sit down beside him at the big table, and what's he drinking? Orange juice. I said, "Am I confused about the time, Marv? Are we having breakfast?" Of course the poor thing can't hear, so it doesn't make any difference. But you go to parties these days and even the young people aren't drinking. I saw young Kathy Bickford at the Shoemaker wedding. Standing on the sidelines, looking very morose indeed. I went up to her and said, "What's that strange concoction you've got in your hand, Kathy?" She said, "Lemon Squirt." I said, "What?" She said, "Sugar-free, non-carbonated Lemon Squirt." So I said, "Now, Kathy, you listen to me. You're young and attractive, and you should be drinking champagne. You should be downing a good glass of French champagne, one, two, three, and then you should be out there on that dance floor, kicking up your heels with every usher in sight. And after you've done that, you should come right back here, and dance with me!" Of course, she walked away. They all walk away these days. I suppose I'm becoming a tiresome old fool. Yes, well, I can still keep the ball in the air, occasionally. I gave a toast at the Shoemakers' bridal dinner. It went over very well. I made a few amusing remarks. I complimented the bride. You know, Sarah Shoemaker? She's terribly tall. She towers over the groom. So I began by saying she stoops to conquer. Yes, they liked that. I can still get on my feet if called upon. They still want me to be the master of ceremonies at the annual fund raiser for the art gallery. They still ask me to do that. Of course, we all know what Emerson says: "The music that can deepest reach, and cure all ills, is cordial speech." Doesn't Emerson say that? You're the publisher in the family. You should know.