RODAK
FREE LUNCH
A play in Two Acts
The Characters
A Man: middle-aged, normal looking, casually dressed
A Woman: non-descript, middle-aged, working a booth at a fair
Granny: the Man’s grandmother.
A small crowd: wandering amongst the booths at the fair
Act One
On the stage a row of booths as in a small local carnival are set up with the first close to the apron, stage left and the others, five or six in number, arranged diagonally across the stage in a gentle arc, so that the last is near the black backdrop, stage right.
Each booth has an open counter and a rectangular sign above, that says “Ring Toss” or “Kisses 4
Several people are wandering around the area, stopping for awhile in front of this booth or that before moving on to the next. A man enters from the wings, stage left, and saunters towards the right, hands in pockets. He stops in front of the booth named “Free Lunch” drawing the attention of the woman behind the counter.
Man: What have you got?
She: Shit sandwiches.
Man: I think I’ll take a pass. (He turns to walk away)
She: Shit on rye!
Man: (Back over his shoulder) No. Thanks.
She: (A bit louder) They’re free…!
Man: (His ears perk up) I beg your pardon?
She: Free! I said they’re free.
Man: You just…give them away?
(She holds out her hands, palms up, at right angles to her shoulders, grinning)
Man: Completely free of charge?
She: What would you charge for a shit sandwich?
Man: I suppose that’s true. But free? To just anyone at all?
She: First come, first serve! (She continues to beam)
Man: Okay, then. I guess I will have a couple.
She: Stay or go?
Man: I’ll eat ‘em here.
(She hands him two sandwiches, wrapped in paper. He places one on the countertop, opens the other, hands her the empty wrapper to dispose of)
(He lifts the edge of the top slice of bread and peeks in)
Man: What kind of shit is this anyway?
She: Who knows? The label on the crocks just says “The Straight Poop”.
Man: I guess it’s just the usual shit then?
She: I haven’t noticed anybody looking surprised as they swallowed it.
Man: Well, here’s how! (He takes a big bite) Geez! This tastes like shit!
She: Another satisfied customer!
Man: This is terrible!
She: (Frowns now) You don’t like your sandwich?
Man: No, it’s not that. It’s this dialogue. It’s so contrived. It’s all built around one overextended, sophomoric ca-ca joke.
She: Yeah! Pretty shitty, huh? (She has a little giggle at her own wit)
Man: And this interlude of self-awareness of ourselves as dramatis personae is such a redolent post-modern cliché!
She: (She makes quote marks in the air) Utter crap, says John Simon. (They both explode with laughter)
(He finishes the last of his sandwich and commences licking his fingers clean)
She: You going to eat your other sandwich?
Man: I think not. (Chuckles) I’ve had a bellyful of your shit already! (Again they are both convulsed with laughter) You got a doggy bag?
She: Sure… But I wouldn’t feed this shit to a dog! (More rib-cracking laughter)
(She starts to pick up the second sandwich to put it in a brown paper bag)
Man: Wait a minute! (Sputtering) Before you pack that up—
She: Yeah?
Man: Could you, please—(Convulsed with laughter, he can barely gasp) –cut the crap?
(They both go completely hysterical)
Man: Whew! Gosh! Sorry! E-e-e—hah!
She: ‘S okay! I’m used to this shit!
(They are again staggered by laughter for several seconds, after which she recommences packing up his sandwich)
She: You gotta admit. The price is right.
He: Say. Do you think you could pack me up a couple more to take home to my granny? She loves free sandwiches!
(Fade to black)
Act Two
On an otherwise dark stage, a spot illumines an old woman seated in a bentwood rocking chair. She looks as nearly as possible like the Old Lady in the Tweety and Sylvester cartoons. The Man from the first act walks into the light from stage left, carrying his brown paper bag of sandwiches.
Man: Granny, I’m home!
Granny: Who’re you? (She painfully rises, shuffles towards him)
Man: It’s me, granny. I live here.
Granny: (Sniffs) Well, whoever you are, you smell like the cushion on my rocker!
Man: Oh, ho! No, granny. You’re smelling the treats I brought you!
Granny: Brought me treats from where?
Man: I’ve spent the morning at the World’s Fair, granny. There was free lunch!
Granny: Don’t you start with me, sonny!
Man: (Hands her the bag) I brought you some free sandwiches!
Granny: (She takes the bag, opens the top, peers in, sniffs again, then holds the bag out at arms’ length) Why you little sack of shit!
Man: Now, granny. Don’t you start with me!
Granny: Well, I’m not eating this crap! I want some corn chips!
Man: But, granny. You don’t seem to understand. Those sandwiches were free. That’s the God’s truth!
Granny: Everything’s free, you ninny. I live on a gummint check! Now fetch me them corn chips! And no more of your crap!
(The spot follows the Man as he walks slowly to toward the apron of the stage. Granny is soon left in darkness)
Man: And so, after decades of protracted, unrelenting angst, it has come to this: a sack of shit, a bag of Fritos, and a senile old woman in a stuffy apartment above a dog grooming parlor in the heart of a rust belt slum. Palookaville. (He assumes a fighter’s crouch, throwing a right and left hook in the direction of the audience. When he speaks again, he does Marlon Brando) I coulda been a contender!
Oh, yeah. There was a day, my friend. There was a day! In a bar. At a party, to a woman. Or to any one of my many friends. Hey. I was wont to explain. To explain exhaustively. Exhaustively, providing details. Illustrations, supposedly drawn from real life experience. Seamless logical word pictures, allowing for no contradiction whatsoever, of precisely why, precisely why, my life, my only life, was a living hell!
(He paces back and forth, hands clasped at the small of his back)
Ah, but here. And now. With the sack of shit. The bag of Fritos. The malodorous old woman that swears up and down that she doesn’t know me. Now that it has come to this I will humble myself to the extent that I’m going to admit that it was my perverse joy, my very raison d’être, to do so. To lie. To make things up. Endlessly. To do so endlessly, even though, inevitably, it drove them away. The guy next to me at the bar. Gone. The woman at the party. History. My friends: what friends? The null set. Gone where the woodbine twineth. Every one.
And there’s the kicker: it wasn’t even true. My life was not a living hell at all. I was young. Things weren’t actually that bad…
Ah, but now. Now, these many years later. Now that in truth my shitty life has long since reached critical mass, experienced melt-down, and has verifiably become that living hell that I took such joy throughout my relatively care-free youth in claiming that it was, when it was not. Honestly, folks. The truth is. Now that all this shit has gone down? Well, I’m just saying.
(Fade to black)