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category: short play genre: absurdity running time: fifteen minutes setting: a pastoral landscape; a college lecture hall; a grand theater period: contemporary characters: Professor Arnold Conway, a very dry academic Dame Galeata Hastings, a very enthusiastic patron of the arts Sondra, a vampire sorority babe Tia, one of her kind Ron, an inter-galactic frat zombie Balthasar, one of his brethren A Ghostly Messenger Other vampires and zombies story: Professor Arnold Conway and Dame Galeata Hastings have one thing in common- a love for the underground ballet, The Vampire Sorority Babes vs. the Inter-Galactic Frat Zombies. From their respective natural habitats, to their very different audiences, they present this seldom-performed masterpiece about the forbidden love between Balthasar and Tia, two young undead in love and willing to defy the conventions of their kin to have a shot at happiness. For Galeata this work is the epitome of high art and every childhood dream she’s held onto since birth. For Arnold, it’s a fascinating study of social dynamics, politics and philosophy. For Balthasar and Tia, it’s life and death, and it all happens in less than twenty minutes. author's comments: This play was first penned in August of 1998 while I was sitting home alone in my then-boyfriend’s apartment in Beaverton, Oregon, waiting for him to return from work. It was intended to be part of the Quicksilver Productions, Inc. short play collection, I Laughed, I Cried, I Shot The Person Next To Me but my friend Kodiak read it first and Reed College audiences ultimately saw the original production staged as part of Midnight Theater, an informal sketch comedy revue. Eventually the ballet did make it to the Quicksilver stage, functioning as the finale to I Laughed, I Cried…and quite effectively bringing down the house both nights, thanks in no part to the decision to have the narrator roles played in drag (something every production should decide for itself). Of all my plays, it is the most flexible and the most absurd- a combination that really makes sense when you think about it. Each production is encouraged to cut and paste the show to their heart’s content, picking which parts of Galeata and Arnold’s speeches they like best, finding new music for all the various dances, deciding how good the dancers should be, how real their choreography and costumes, etc. Since the piece is a satire of both the academic and the sentimental response to the arts, the fun lies in making the most of what really amounts to nonsense and stage directions in the end- the catch being that whatever is present be taken with the utmost seriousness by the “audience” personified in the two commentators. When the final line arrives, it should come not as a punchline, but a benediction- a great truth imparted by a very wise man, delivered with the knowledge that “wise men” everywhere, in college campuses across the country, are saying equally absurd things every day to equally captured audiences. |