3.27.2007: Bleak House (Not From Dickens)

The Guy is met onstage by an Actor, expressing deep concern.

AN ACTOR
Hi.

THE GUY
Hey

AN ACTOR
Oh my God, are you okay?

THE GUY
What?

AN ACTOR
Well, I’ve been watching the plays from backstage, and you just seem so… so…

THE GUY
So what?

AN ACTOR
Sad.

THE GUY
What are you talking about?

Another actor emerges, with a casserole.

ANOTHER ACTOR
Hey you.

THE GUY
Hey.

ANOTHER ACTOR
I made you a casserole.

THE GUY
Why?

ANOTHER ACTOR
It’s what you do. When people are grief-stricken. You make them a casserole. So… here. A casserole. I baked it myself.

THE GUY
Grief-stricken?

Yet Another Actor appears, with three Sicilian mourners.

YET ANOTHER ACTOR
I got em!

THE GUY
Got what?

YET ANOTHER ACTOR
Professional mourners. Sicilian and everything. To mourn with you. Watch em go.

Yet Another Actor bows a whistle. The mourners mourn brilliantly.

THE GUY
What the hell is going on?

AN ACTOR
Your plays. They’re so…
How do I put this?

Ponderous.
I mean not all of them of course,
but a good number of them.

Ponderous.

I mean
sitting alone
on an empty stage
pondering the vastness of the universe…

You know,
hilarity doesn’t really ensue.

THE GUY
But I’m not sad. I’m not sad at all. I’m actually a pretty happy fella.

AN ACTOR
Then why is so much of this so…
bleak?

THE GUY
It’s not bleak to me.
It’s hopeful.
In the face of every sort of difficult and unexpected change…

AN ACTOR
And here we go.

THE GUY
What?

AN ACTOR
Ponderous!
Jesus, you writers don’t know when to stop, do you?

THE GUY
Well what am I supposed to do?
Life happens to me.
I try to make something out of it.

It just comes out so…

so…

AN ACTOR
Ponderous?

THE GUY
Okay, fine. Ponderous.

AN ACTOR
Dude, just write what happens.

THE GUY
Okay. I’ll try that.

The Fella appears.

THE FELLA
Hi.

THE GUY
Tonight, when you hugged me goodbye…
It was a really good hug.

THE FELLA
Aw. Thanks.

THE GUY
You’re welcome.

AN ACTOR
See? How hard was that?

Sadness lifts. The mourners no longer have anything to mourn about.

So they all share the casserole.

The lights go down.