PLAY by Romain Reboulleau

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and theatre" performance at the Ecole Polytechnique on the 17 February 2010.

"PLAY" By Romain Reboulleau.
Acted by Manuella Boujard
and Tristan Picard
(Tree and butterfly: ? tba)

Characters:
Sean: 20 years old, has always lived in New York, kind of a bad boy.
Mary: same age, whimsical, with a permanent smile on her face

Setting:
Countryside. Some cows in the far background, a little river on the right. A broken bottle of gin lies next to a mobile phone, at the bottom of an old green tree. The summer sun rises slowly, the time must be around 8 a.m.

[Both characters are asleep: Sean on his back, outspread arms; Mary comfortably installed with what seems to be her sweatshirt under her head. Sean snores suddenly loudly, which awakes Mary. She opens her eyes and sits cross-legged.]

Mary: Hey, are you awake ?
[Snore]

Mary: Can you hear me ?
[Snore again, Mary gets closer]

Mary: Nope, I guess you're still sleeping... [Pause] I hate snoring people. I'm going to try that trick.
[She whistles, the snoring stops. Big smile on her face, and little innocent laugh. Then the snoring starts again]

Mary [shaking Sean violently]: GET-UP-I-CAN'T-STAND-IT-A-NY-MORE !!
[Sean awakes suddenly, and gets on his feet. Little innocent laugh again from Mary, who gets up]

Sean [visibly drunk]: My head... Where am I? Whohoooo...
[He falls and lies on his back again, in the same position as before. Mary stands over him, behind his head. She bends to get closer to his face]

Mary: Hi, my name is Mary. So what are we here for?

Sean: Hmm, what? What do you mean? How did I get here?

Mary: I don't know, you were already here when I arrived. I thought you were here for a purpose, so I stopped and decided to take a nap.

Sean: A nap? In the middle of the night? This is all insane!

Mary: Oh, no, don't worry, I must have slept, like, 20 minutes or so. The sun was already rising when I arrived.

Sean: Yeah, all right. I kinda don't care. Where are we?

Mary: How should I know? You tell me.

Sean: Do I look like I know what I'm doing here? I don't even remember leaving the house.

Mary: How come people don't remember what they do? [Little laugh] Must be funny!

Sean [still not moving, breathing with some difficulty]: You're already boring me. Where are we?

Mary [thinking]: As far as I can tell, we are in the middle of a field. A field where there are many cows. And a tree.

Sean: Oh, come on...

Mary: What? I don't know where we are, I was following a butterfly and I lost its trace when it went in that tree. Then I heard you snoring, I thought you were here for some important reason, like you were waiting for a nice white rabbit to get out of his burrow, or something of that type. [pause]
Were you?

Sean: [Sigh] No way... Get me my iPhone.

Mary: What is an eye-phone? Do you mean that kind of phone you can put on your eye, to see the person you're talking to? What does it look like?

Sean: Oh come on! My iPhone, my cell phone. Must be over there.

Mary: Oh, I see it!
[She gets to the phone with little jumps, takes it in her hand and watches it for a moment]

Mary: Nope, must be some kind of mirror. Useless.
[She throws it to the ground, next to Sean. He reacts and sits up to grasp his phone]

Sean: Hey, what are you doing? Are you crazy, that phone cost me three hundred bucks!

Mary: Oh, is this an eye-Phone? But there is no button...

Sean: Yeah, whatever. Cool, it's still working. [with a very common tone, like he's saying he will buy some tomatoes instead of potatoes] I would have killed you, I guess. Password, check; GPS...
[long pause] Come-ooon!!!! Shit. And no network, perfect. Guess we're stuck here with each other.

Mary: And the cows.

Sean: Probably.

Mary: So how did you get here?

Sean: I'm trying to remember. It could help me get back home. I was at my friend's, having a good, alcoholised party. [Thinking] Man, those tequila shots!! [Back to his reflexion] Then we went out because it was too hot inside, I think, and that's when I decided to go away. I remember something was telling me to leave. But I don't remember what...

Mary: Oh, I know, it was a rabbit. It happens to me all the time, they talk to me and ask me to help them to go somewhere. This morning one of them told me to follow the butterfly, so I did. But when I lost it, I needed to have another instruction, that's why I stayed here with you. [Explicative tone] You know, there is a reason why I do strange things like following butterflies... [Almost laughing] I'm not crazy, huh!

Sean: Yeah... No, I think it was someone's voice. 'Go away, go away!' So I ran. But I didn't stop...
Why?

Mary: Because you were scared?

Sean [with a contemptuous tone]: Haha, sure.
[He starts thinking about that last question. Mary looks at the tree.]

Mary [talking to the sky]: Oh, come here, come here... Please, no... No !! [To Sean] The butterfly left, I can't see it anymore. I'm going to get a telling off from the rabbit...

Sean: Oh, come ooon! Rabbits don't talk, are you crazy or what? No, I know, you must be that girl from the book: Alice's adventures in Wonderland. That would explain everything, the rabbits, the butterfly...

Mary: [Little laugh] You're talking nonsense.

Sean: Probably. I'm still drunk, you know.
[Sean tries again to make his phone work. Mary walks slowly around the tree, looking at the countryside.]

Mary: Hey, look, this is a sign from the rabbit! There is a smoke sign, over that house!

Sean: What? Shut up a minute, I'm trying to... [Interrogative tone] Smoke sign? Yes, I remember! The house burnt, that's why we were leaving!
[He looks at the house, while she returns to the tree, unconcerned. She sits in front of the tree, as if she wanted to see something in the trunk]

Sean [visibly waving at some people far away]: Hey, hey!
[Mary seems to be very concerned by the bottom of the trunk, nods at it. Sean is still looking at the burning house and the place where his friends seem to be]

Sean: Listen, I have to leave.
[She starts walking towards the other direction, as if something guided her, absolutely indifferent to Sean]

Sean [still looking away]: I don't know how to get you back home, maybe you can join us until we find your house... [Not sure about the name] Lily?
[He looks around, but she has left.]

Sean [heading off in the direction of the house]: Whatever!

END