CHARACTERS:
LaBARSHA, 32, attractive, emotionally crippled but socially functional to a limited extent, physically strong, truly uptight, guarded, intelligent, fearful, insecure, good hearted, puts on a convincing front.
ZINGA WELLS, ,34, LaBarsha's best and only true friend, dresses in African fashion, free spirited, fun loving.
SISTA CORNDEW, 40-50, very religious, but not ridgidly so, fellow worker, playful, but serious, a sense of humor.
MR. RICHARD GOSHAN, a white man, 60 or so, formally middle class, now a bum who thrives on his well practiced delusions, intelligent, articulate, but broken.
LARRY, 40, a white man, construction worker, very decent man, an army vet, became a loner after the first Gulf War, falls in love with LaBarsha.
MAN, early 80's, black, LaBarsha's stepfather, selfish, cruel, cowardly, fearful, crude predator.
WOMAN, early 70's, black, LaBarsha's mom, cruel, selfish, self-deceiving, hurt, let her life get away from her due to her personal, mid life desperation.
BONES, male, young, a performer as in modified minstrel interlocutor, a cultural atavism and multipurpose signifier.
DOCTOR EFFIE ELLIS, Barsha's doctor.
SYNOPSIS OF KILLA DILLA:
A young woman who was severely molested for eight years-8 to 15 years old-was emotionally handicapped for the rest of her life. She had few friends, never liked to remember the past, never had a relationship with a man, was almost totally reclusive, spending the bulk of her time alone. She did, however, have an imagination and that imagination was consumed with hatred of what had happened to her and hatred of her mother and stepfather who molested and abused her. She even began to hate the hatred that consumed her life. When she was thirty-nine, she finally, inadvertently, met a man who fell in love with her, but the hatred had damaged her irreparably by then. She loved for the first time in her life. But by then the hatred in her had transformed itself into a permanent revenge fantasy, a fantasy that in turn became a physical ailment that hastened her early tragic demise. The style of the play is extremely unusual, freely adapting a form of theatre that has been popular in Nigeria. The usual Western dramatic form only partially obtains in KILLA DILLA. There's also some influence of the American blackface minstrelsy lurking throughout in the character of BONES. KILLA contains both theatre and drama and is sometimes unashamedly metatheatrical.
ACT I
(PROCESSION: Through
the audience spaces enters BONES. Bones is there to perform and his performance
may or may not have any but the slightest relevance to the stage story he, nonetheless, prefaces. Bones
is a multiply talented performer who can act, sing, dance, play instruments, do
magic tricks, do acrobatics, do stand up, do excellent improvisation and loves
to be loved by the audience which he loves in return. He will be called upon to
quick change costumes possibly many times during the evening, perhaps right in
view of the audience. The playing space is a bare black stage. There should be
projection screens about and/or the entire cyclorama used as a screen upon
which images should be projected where indicated or where discovered appropriate.
He enters preaching in a singsong
manner like a charismatic, fundamentalist black country preacher, REV. SPLATTA,
one of the several characters he will play. )
SPLATTA (preaching)
“Verily
I say unto you, this generation shall not pass away until all be
fulfilled.” (St. Luke 21:32)
We
are all the children of one Mother.
On
this earth we are all of one kin.
There
is so such a thing as the “other.”
In
the woman’s body we all begin
To
move from darkness to light, to life.
Mama,
we all cry when we first arrive
Mama,
we all coo and sigh
Love
to be alive (command)
Love
to be alive
Love
to be alive
Give
God a high five!
When
I call it, let me hear you shout: HUMANITY!
(hand
up to ear to hear audience)
Humanity!
Humanity!
Walking
on the land
Breathing
in the air
Eating
of the fruit
Drinking
from the streams
Humanity!
Looking
at the sky
Thinking
about why
Why
were we put here
To
lie and to die
Humanity!
Black
brown beige light bright
Sun
color, soft red
Eyes
blue green black brown
Soft
like fire in bed
Humanity!
We
search for our God
In
someplace apart
It
is very odd
We
don’t search our hearts
Oh
Humanity!
Can
you see the fear
That
stalks in our streets
Whispers
in our ears
Makes
our love retreat?
Humanity,
There
are too many locks on your prison doors
Too
many locks on your prison doors
On
your prison doors
Too
many locks.
(BONES
exits dancing. Lights to black. Images of the current big public issues are
projected on screens throughout the playing and audience spaces. These images
might be those of terrorist attacks, murder, natural disasters, the latest
political and corporate scandals, the latest popular but controversial fads
like diets, outrageous celebrities, slick tv evangelists, riots, binge
drinking, stock market graphs, bikini ads, theatre reviews—overall, a sometimes
humorous collage of the current times.)
END PROCESSION
(Rise
on LaBARSHA. DOCTOR ELLIS, with clipboard, enters a nearby light. A medical
clinic or suggestion thereof is projected.)
DOCTOR
LaBarsha,
you’re in good health; your physical was excellent.
BARSHA
Are
you sure? I know I felt something, just for a second, but it hurt.
DOCTOR
Trust
me, the lab reports look great: Every test, glucose, urea nitrogen, creatinine,
sodium, potassium, chloride, calcium—every level is well within the limits.
Cholesterol is excellent. Girl, I wish mine was just as good: 139 and HDL 48.
Hematology? Superb results. Kidneys in great shape. Colonoscopy? Clear. No
polyps at all. Cardiology? You could
just as well be 17 instead of 32. Breasts completely healthy. This is the third
exam you’ve had in a year. I mean, it’s your insurance, but why waste it?
BARSHA
You’re
right. I just, sometimes I…I don’t know how I feel, except uncomfortable.
DOCTOR
Physically?
BARSHA
That
too.
DOCTOR
Is
something worrying you?
BARSHA
Well…
DOCTOR
Like
your job or something?
BARSHA
I
been doing it for 10 years.
DOCTOR
Do
you like your job?
BARSHA
I
used to.
DOCTOR
You
have a boyfriend?
BARSHA
No.
DOCTOR
Are
you dating anyone?
BARSHA
No.
DOCTOR
When’s
the last time you went on picnic?
BARSHA
A
picnic? Hmmm, about, maybe when I was 6.
DOCTOR
How
about a dinner party?
BARSHA
I
don’t do dinner parties.
DOCTOR
Do
you have some friends?
BARSHA (miffed a bit)
Yes,
I do, thank you.
DOCTOR
What
about family?
BARSHA
I
have none at all.
DOCTOR
Do
you socialize with your neighbors?
BARSHA
In
this city I do not get in my neighbors’ business and don’t want them in mine.
We speak, that’s all.
DOCTOR
Honestly,
Barsha, you should talk to a counselor.
I know one who…
BARSHA (stiffly)
I
don’t need that, thank you.
DOCTOR
How
about I prescribe a very very mild anti-depressant?
BARSHA (angry)
Doctor
Ellis, I don’t need to be medicated. Effie, you know better than to ask me
something like that.
DOCTOR
Physically you’re fine, so it must be
something on your mind.
BARSHA
Just
tired that’s all. I need some rest.
DOCTOR
Sure.
Okay. Barsha, you’re a beautiful soul, a kind, compassionate, hardworking,
healthy woman. Take care of yourself. Relax a bit. Ok?
(Lights
out on DOCTOR; remain on BARSHA. Only her eyes give the slightest indication of
the pitiful moans that erupt from the blackness behind her. Dingy attic space
projected.)
MAN’S VOICE (tears, sobbing)
Oh dear God, please God,
Oooooooooooh aaaaaahhhhhhhhhh! Help me!
WOMAN’S VOICE
This
isn’t right what you’re doing to us, LaBarsha. You know better. Please God, show her thy merciful
ways!
(Lights rise on an elderly, physically
enfeebled couple, MAN and WOMAN, tied
to chairs in an enclosed space carved from the blackness. They are surrounded
by filth, their clothes are torn, ripped, filth encrusted; they reek of feces
and garbage.)
WOMAN
We
gave you what we had. It’s life. Don’t treat us this way.
MAN
Oh
God, the handcuffs are too tight; My hands are numb. I can’t feel my fingers.
WOMAN
He
can’t feel his fingers. Help us, God!
MAN
I’ll
do anything! Anything you want. Okay! Just anything!
WOMAN
Please
take the cuffs off us. Let us stand up!
MAN
I
been handcuffed to this chair for almost 2 days.
WOMAN
I’m
getting sores on my bottom.
MAN
At
least let me use the toilet. The chairs are slippery with piss and shit.
WOMAN
We’re
wild animals. We’re dying of unspeakable cruelty to each other under God’s sun.
And we don’t care. We don’t really care! Barsha, you donate to all kinds of
charities. Can’t you have a little charity toward us your elderly parents? When
the press finds out…
MAN
We’re
starving. A crumb of bread, LaBarasha. Just a crumb of bread. The press would crucify you.
WOMAN
There’s
no need to keep us handcuffed to these chairs. I promise we won’t try to leave
the attic. Honest. You got three locks on the door! There’s no windows.
MAN
We’ll
stay in the attic, I swear ta God!
WOMAN
How
can you treat your parents this way?
MAN
Black
people don’t treat their elders this way.
WOMAN
You
remember your black studies? The ancestors. Respect.
MAN
Yes,
the ancestors. Our ancestors didn’t suffer slavery and hatred just so we could
ack like beasts in modern times.
(WOMAN prays and MAN punctuates her prayer with
affirmations, shouts, amens, humming as in black fundamentalist church
tradition.)
WOMAN
Let
us pray: Dear Lord, we call upon you once again in our times of sorrow and
tribulation and injustice. We beseech thee, dear Lord to provide the means for
our daughter to come to her senses, to free us from this insane bondage that
she has put upon us. Give us the strength, oh Lord, to forgive her and to show
her thy true ways. In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, Amen
BARSHA
So,
you think I’m insane, huh? Well, ya’ll
just stay right where ya at for awhile. You so full of yourselves you must not
be hungry. Stay up here in the dark with your stench.
WOMAN (screaming)
No,
Barsha, no. You gotta feed us at least.
MAN (sobs uncontrollably)
Dear
God, dear God, dear God, dear God…
(Lights fade out on them as their moans segue
into music, an old Africamerican spiritual from the Sea Islands, “The
Watchman.” Lights rise on BONES as an ancestor figure, ghostly, dressed in the
tattered clothes of an Africamerican slave passing through the space.
BONES hoes in rhythm with the song he
sings, worksong style. OTHER VOICES and musical instruments, pre-recorded, can
accompany Bones depending on the production vision and resources. )
SINGER (singing)
HOW
LONG, WATCHMAN, HOW LONG
(repeat
three times or more)
(call)
I
ASK THE WATCHMAN HOW LONG
(response)
HOW
LONG, WATCHMAN, HOW LONG
(call)
WELL,
HE DON’T KNOW HOW LONG
(response)
HOW
LONG, WATCHMAN, HOW LONG
I
ASK MY MOTHER HOW LONG
HOW
LONG, WATCHMAN, HOW LONG
AND
SHE DON’T KNOW HOW LONG
HOW
LONG, WATCHMAN, HOW LONG
I
ASK MY FATHER HOW LONG
HOW
LONG, WATCHMAN, HOW LONG
WELL,
HE DON’T KNOW HOW LONG
(etc. until Watchman exits. Lights rise on the
homeless MR. GOSHAN, a heavily bearded, long-haired, middle age, badly dressed
in rumpled clean clothes, white man reading a magazine, sitting on a milk
crate. A park scene is projected. There is a sign next to his upturned hat:
VIETNAM VET NEEDS JOB/FOOD/LODGING. He is totally relaxed as if on his own back
porch. Traffic sounds, voices in the
distance, a radio playing somewhere near. BARSHA enters, power
walking, carrying a bag. She puts two
dollars in his hat. He looks up, instant smile. She sits, breathing heavily.)
GOSHAN
Ah,
the generous lady has arrived!
BARSHA (chuckles at this)
Thank
you. How are you today, Mr. GOSHAN?
GOSHAN
Richard,
huh? You’ve known me almost nine months. Call me Richard.
BARSHA
I
like calling you Mr. GOSHAN. You’re
smart like a professor! Here, I got you a chicken sandwich.
GOSHAN (genuine)
You’re
the kindest person I ever met in my life.
BARSHA (touched)
Oh
now, I’m certain that you….
GOSHAN
Listen,
Barsha. I mean that! Most people would never just bring me food or give me two bucks almost everyday, especially if
they know I ain’t a veteran of nothing ‘cept
the corporate wars. And
they damn sure wouldn’t give me nothing
if they knew how much I hate white folks!
BARSHA
Please
don’t start, Mr. GOSHAN. Hating white folks is your favorite topic. (gently
chiding) You oughtta be ashamed of yo’self.
GOSHAN
Why?
I’ve been white 62 years; I know what I’m talking about.
BARSHA
Mr.
GOSHAN, right now I need to talk about something else.
GOSHAN
Of
course. I can be overbearing which is due to my tenacious refusal to be a root
or branch clutching this stony rubbish they erroneously call Western
civilization. But I promise to leave the unfairly maligned white world alone
for now. What’s on your mind, daughter?
BARSHA
Well….
(Dim
lights abruptly rise for a few seconds on imprisoned
MAN
AND WOMAN moaning and crying before slowly fading out. Only BARSHA sees them.)
BARSHA
Did
you ever feel you needed a change?
GOSHAN
What’samatter?
I smell?
BARSHA
No,
not you. Me.
GOSHAN
Oh.
What is it you wanna change?
BARSHA
Everything.
GOSHAN
What’s
to change? You’re not unemployed, you don’t use drugs, you don’t steal, you
don’t forget about others in need, you don’t miss your mortgage payments, you
don’t drink, you don’t smoke, you don’t watch tv. You didn’t default on your
student loan. What’s to change?
BARSHA
I’m
tired of being a bunch of things that I don’t do.
GOSHAN
Oh…uh…well…take
up drinking! A little tv on the side maybe. Tv and alcohol. Great match.
BARSHA
Mr.
Goshan, I’m serious.
GOSHAN
I
know, sorry; go on.
BARSHA
My
life is running in place. Get up, catch a bus, go to work, come home, heat a tv
dinner, get upset reading the newspaper, listen to ventilation pipes rattling
in my attic everytime the wind blows, get headache. Take an aspirin. My only friend visits every Thursday night.
Weekends, clean, do laundry, pay a bill, shop, get my hair done, take a walk,
rent some movies, order a pizza---routine, never changing, month after month,
year after year. My life was never easy. In fact, I’ve never been that
enthusiastic about being alive. That’s all I can say about my life after 32
years. I want to change everything!
GOSHAN
Okay. Everything. Whew! There’s only one way to deal with everything
at once. (pause)
BARSHA
Yes?
GOSHAN
Jump
off the cliff.
BARSHA
Jump
off…I…No, I don’t mean…
GOSHAN
No,
no, no, dear. Not suicide. Listen. I never told you this: I was the chief
executive of Hatch and MacEldowny Investments. I was a filthy rich American
prince. I once went to Washington, D.C. and scattered 50 million bucks among
various elected officials who then changed federal tax policy regarding one of
our clients. The client went to jail, unfortunately, but not before he made a
fortune only a portion of which he had to pay back in fines. Small price to pay
for a fortune that will sustain his family for generations.
BARSHA
Mr.
Goshan, I’m not talking about money;…
GOSHAN
Me
neither. Listen. For 30 years, six days
a week, sometimes seven, I sat in my office, watching Bloomberg’s stock quotes,
keeping certain information from greedy shareholders, cleaning up fraudulent
subsidiary reports and busting the hell outta unions. I started hating the
corporate world. I hated all the dishonest legal jargon that hid evil
intentions. In my mind the world
suddenly became a colossal fiction conjured in some Midwestern business school
by a free market fanatic weirdo whose sole credo was: “Buy low at any human
cost and sell as high as the market will bear. If there’s no market, create one
and enforce it with the military and lots of prayer.” One day my mind suddenly
exploded into a million pieces. They
carried me outta there screaming. In time I transformed myself into an honest
hunter/gatherer. I jumped! You see?
BARSHA
What
about your family?
GOSHAN
I
had a wife and two income tax deductions, a boy and a girl. I left the house
before they got up and came back after they were asleep. I gave ‘em a choice.
Come be a bum with me or divorce me.
BARSHA
That’s
no choice.
GOSHAN
It’s
all I had to offer.
BARSHA
What
about love and stuff?
GOSHAN
The
word love; it’s like fast food; it fills ya up and makes ya feel satisfied, but
there’s no nutrition. The kids are better off with their mother. She’s loaded,
got everything I left. I…I couldn’t…I
really fell apart quite literally, and put myself back together as an honest
bum. That’s change.
BARSHA
I
respect you and all, but I don’t wanna be a bum. I wanna…well…I just…Sometimes
things get on your mind and won’t go away, like you feel like you’re in the
middle of an avalanche, and pieces of a mountain keep rolling down at you and
you can’t move.
GOSHAN
I
felt that way whenever our stocks fell more than 2 points. Jump off the cliff.
Get outta that psychiatric institution. They fill those people up with fast
drugs insteada showing ‘em how to live in harmony with chaos. Ya got “order” on
one hand and “chaos” on the other. People need help balancing order and chaos.
Instead, ya got them drug addicted crazies! Get another job!
BARSHA
My
job is no problem. The crazies know they’re crazy; it’s the “normal” people who
think that they’re not crazy; they’re the problem. Like some of the folks who
run our institutions. They hurt folks, real bad, without even knowing it, or
maybe not even caring.
GOSHAN
Now,
you’re learning, daughter. Didn’t I once tell you the same thing?
BARSHA
Yes,
you did. But when you jump off a cliff, everything inside you is going off that
cliff with you. All that weight could
smash you at the bottom.
GOSHAN
As
an atheist once told me: “Nothing is more deadly than a metaphor taken
literally.” Forget the cliff. Step away from the crowd. Join yourself. Have
some fun!
BARSHA
I
have to get back to work.
(BARSHA
exits as BONES, in blackface make up or mask, flips in and lands on the
downbeat of JUMP JIM CROW, the famous 19th century blackface
minstrel tune that was purportedly taken from an elderly, crippled slave by one
Thomas D.Rice circa 1830. The lyrics are set to current style rap music,
perhaps from a “boombox.” HE dances to the music, dressed in hip hop style but
wearing blackface makeup. GOSHAN dances
as if inside his own mind, oblivious to BONES.
The lighting is now focused on just Bones; the rest of the playing space
is black. There is either a live singer and musicians or the music and lyrics
are pre-recorded and BONES lip synchs the words. The lyrics below are segments
of one of the “original” versions of the song which the musical director can
arrange to the rap music. On the projection screens are images of the Urban
Black and Spanish ghettos, current images of Southern sharecropper and worker’s
homes, images of old slave cabins, the white house in D.C. )
SINGER
(Chorus,
intersperse as necessary)
Come
listen all you gals and boys
I’se
just from Tuckyhoe,
I’m
goin’ ta sing a little song,
My
name’s Jim Crow
Wheel
about and turn about
And
do just so,
Every
time I wheel about
And
Jump Jim Crow
(End
Chorus)
-I
wip my weight in wildcats
I
eat an alligator,
It
ain’t no big thing
Like
eatin’ sweet potater
-I
sit upon a hornet’s nest,
I
dance upon my head,
I
tie a snake ‘round my neck
And
den I goes to bed.
-I’m
a full blooded nigga,
Of
de real old stock
And wid my head and shoulder
I
can split a horse block.
-I’m
so glad dat I’m a nigga,
And
don’t you wish you was too
For
den you’d gain popularity
By
jumping Jim Crow
-What
stuff it is in dem
To
make de Devil black
I’ll
prove dat he is white
In
de twinkling of a crack
For
you see loved brudders,
As
true as he hab a tail,
It’s
Satan’s stone wickedness,
What
makes him turn pale.
(Song ends and lights rise on LaBARSHA and SISTER CORNDEW, mid forties; plump,
excessively religious, a good friend at work, but they seldom socialize outside
work. They wear white lab coats, plastic gloves. They are filling little paper
cups full of pills for the mental patients, the audience.)
BARSHA
Sista
Corndew, Sista Corndew, last night I dreamed that a man in a gleaming white
suit visited me. He just stood over me, smiling at me, like I was the most
precious thing in the world. And he was singing some beautiful song that made
me cry. He was so beautiful I wanted to get up and follow him, wherever he was
going, but I couldn’t; I had to get up and get to work. That man was a sign of
something good coming into my life.
CORNDEW (radiant with her
understanding)
“For
as a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the whole
earth.” Luke, 22:35 The Lord grabbed ya. You had a vision.
BARSHA (slightly believing)
I
did?
CORNDEW
You
saw the Lord. He came and snared you.
BARSHA
Snared
me? Is that good?
CORNDEW
It’s
good! Praise God! You saw the Lord!
BARSHA
But
he wasn’t a blonde. He looked like…ah…ghetto with dreadlocks. He wasn’t wearing robes. He was wearing a
glowing white suit with bellbottom pants and a big white Rasta hat.
CORNDEW
The
style done changed. The Lord stay in style, girl! Dreadlocks and all. That’s a
fact.
(fake
Jamaican accent) Lord love Rasta man too, ya know?
BARSHA (laughing)
Oh,
stop, Sista Corndew.
CORNDEW (intense)
No,
I will not stop in the name of my Lord and Saviour. Please come to my church. I
bet you everybody will tell you that you
had a vision. The Lord came to
bring light into the darkness of your life; it made you feel good. Your heart
understood even it you didn’t. You always claiming you gon’ come to my church
one day. Now, today, I want you to promise to come to church with me this
Sunday, okay?
BARSHA (overwhelmed)
Okay,
okay. I’ll come just to make you happy.
CORNDEW (elated)
You
don’t know how happy you just made me. If I can bring in just one more soul for
Christ, I can win two free tickets to The Lion King!
BARSHA (joking)
That’s
all it mean to you? Free tickets to Lion King?
CORNDEW
That’s
the Lord’s bonus. You gon’ love my church. You should see all the souls Rev.
Splatta done brought to Christ. “I know your folks musta taken you to church.
BARSHA (blank eyed)
My
folks.
CORNDEW (not hearing)
Yeah,
I knew it. My folks was good too, real good Christians; you do something evil,
they beat you ‘til ya tongue hang out yo’ mouth.They teach ya how bad hell is. Say, hell is where the
beast make you sit in a lake of fire and walk on red hot brimstone while he
pours tar and gasoline on your body to make you burn brighter. They was good
Christians. No no no, Barsha.
BARSHA
What?
CORNDEW (pointing at pills)
Look
what you fidden ta do.
BARSHA
What,
Sista Corndew?
CORNDEW
You
put the green pill in Sasha’s cup.
BARSHA
Oh!
I’m glad you caught that.
CORNDEW
Sasha
take that green pill, we have to call national guard up in here. Since you in
charge, I don’t have to tell you about making mistakes. (referring to the
audience) You know how them peoples get to actin’ when they can’t get they
drugs.
BARSHA (confidential)
I
don’t think Sasha got any business up in this asylum. She not crazy; she
married.
CORNDEW
And
fidden ta git electro analysis treatment tomorrow.
BARSHA (appalled)
No!
Shock treatment? She does not need shock treatment! That could really mess her
up. The medicine they pushing on her is bad enough as it is.
CORNDEW
Oh,
you her doctor now, suddenly?
BARSHA
No,
but…
CORNDEW
“No
buts” gits lots of butts in trouble, girl!
BARSHA
Sista
Corndew, when I was sitting out on the floor filling out medication forms,
Sasha sat across the table and just started talkin’. I didn’t ask her to talk.
She just talked; told me all about her husband. Been married three years. That
man emptied her bank account, maxed out her credit card, took out a secret
mortgage on her house and was running around with 2 other women. She claim he
just weak-minded and them other women talked him into doing what he did. She
say he a unemployed actor, ya know? Somebody need to set her straight, that’s
all.
CORNDEW
I
undastan’ how ya feel, but front office hitting up Sasha’s insurance company
for $1500 a day, plus her pills. You need to let that alone.
BARSHA
And
all these pills they feed her and everybody else are a real problem.You feel
sad; here’s blue rectangular pill. You mad at your mama; here’s a square white
pill. You hate yo’ job. Here’s a round
yellow pill. You hate chopped liver. Here’s a triangular purple pill. Pills
don’t fix things; they postpone them.
CORNDEW
I
bet Christ can fix things. And what he can’t fix, pills hafta do. Show you what
I mean: I had a uncle once who believed he was Jesus Christ. He walked around
in raggedy robes that he made from bed sheets. He got his hair permed and dyed
it blonde. He like ta drown call his self walking on water. He kept giving away
all his money that he earned doing carpenter work. Every bum, every fool, every
child, every hustler would be laying for my uncle on his payday. He just give
the money to the street.
BARSHA
Yeah,
but he didn’t need no pill. At least he was doing good things.
CORNDEW
Let
me finish. He lived with his mama next door to us in a condo. He didn’t let
nobody in that condo, family, nobody. His mama, she was almost 90, blind, her
mind mostly gone. They lived off her pension and social security. He liked to
call her Mary, but her name was Agatha. He built hisself a bed that looked like
a manger and filled it with straw. He slept in it for 22 years, never did
change the straw. Now, I don’t remember Christ doing nothing like that.
BARSHA
Okay,
he was peculiar, but he wasn’t hurting anybody.
CORNDEW
You
just ain’t gon’ let Sista Corndew finish, is you?
BARSHA
I’m
sorry, Sista Corndew; I thought you were finished.
CORNDEW
One
day, the police saw him walking around in his bed sheets, dragging this big
wooden cross in the middle of the street. They stopped him. He told them he was
Christ. They took him home, and when he opened the door, they smelled something
stink real bad. They search the place and guess what they find.
BARSHA
His
mother had died and…
CORNDEW
No.
There was five dead womens in the basement. All of them was raped and
strangled. He had one in the freezer, one under a pile of clothes and three
behind the washer and dryer.
BARSHA
Good
God!
CORNDEW
Now
if he just coulda had one of these square brown pills and maybe three of them
purple rectangles and maybe one or two white round pills, a few aspirins, them
five women would be alive today.
BARSHA
I
understand, but, still, I mean, why did he do all that?
CORNDEW
Because
he was crazy! The Devil was in him.
BARSHA
Was
it a devil or was he just… afraid or lonely, maybe?
CORNDEW (exasperated)
Girl,
the man was crazy, that’s all. Five dead womens ain’t much company, LaBarsha. I
believe the Lord visited you just in time. Oh, look at the time! We better get
these pills out to them (gesturing toward the audience) patients before they
start World War Three.
BARSHA
You
take those out. I’ll lock up and bring these.
(Lights out on BARSHA. CORNDEW approaches the
audience singing PRECIOUS LORD.)
CORNDEW (singing)
PRECIOUS
LORD, TAKE MY HAND
LEAD
ME ON WHERE I STAND
I
AM TIRED I AM WEAK, I AM WORN
(talking
to the audience as houselights rise slightly)
Alright, ya’ll, line up fah yo’ medication.
And no pushing and shoving. We got enough to go around. Keep quiet in line.
You, hush up that giggling. Don’t make me hafta call security up in here.
(Lights crossfade; rise on LADY DOCTOR, making
notations. BARSHA enters, pulling on her blouse or whatever.)
DOCTOR
Barsha,
I really don’t understand you.
BARSHA
What?
DOCTOR
Why’d
you come back here so soon?
`
BARSHA
I
told you, I felt…well…like something is…
DOCTOR
Are
you in any pain, whatsoever?
BARSHA
Not
really, just, sometimes I hurt, but…
DOCTOR
Where
do you hurt?
BARSHA
It
jumps around. Might be my head or my leg or my side or my arm. It comes and
goes; it’s really not pain; it’s…uh…like, I don’t know…
DOCTOR
Well,
Barsha, we’ve done a battery of tests, cat-scan, blood work, xrays, everything,
and, I swear, you’re one of my healthiest patients. We can’t find anything
that’s wrong with you. Look, when people are as healthy as you, I always
prescribe a nice long vacation. That’s the only way to cure your uneasy feeling
that moves around like a Mexican jumping bean. Now get outta here; I’ll see ya
next year.
(Lights crossfade to MAN and WOMAN in the attic,
handcuffed to chains.)
WOMAN
Her
friend is coming tonight.
MAN
It’s
Thursday? How do you know? We never see the sun.
WOMAN
I
kept track since last Thursday. She come every Thursday; they cook food, eat,
watch a movie, laugh and talk, just like everything is normal.
MAN
Yo’
daughter’s crazy! Eight months of this!
WOMAN
I
didn’t know. She sounded like she meant it.
MAN
We
were stupid to fall for that shit ‘bout she wanna take care of us!
WOMAN
We
had a tidy little home.
MAN
Two
social security checks. Food, water, drugs and discounted cable.
WOMAN
I
used to read in the newspapers about people being kidnapped and kept prisoner
in a basement or attic for years, but I never believed it would happen to us.
MAN (screaming)
Didn’t
I tell ya not ta let her read newspapers when she was kid, huh!?
WOMAN
What?
Follow her ‘round all day or something?
MAN
Slap
her face off! Fear works.
WOMAN
Why
didn’t you do that when she snatched yo’ ass and body slammed you into a chair
and tied you down?