Worms in Ermine

Stop SOPA/PIPA

2012-01-18T11:29:00.002-07:00

4. A Freakin' Waiver?

2010-02-27T08:55:00.066-07:00

Act I Scene 1.2
Back at the restaurant in the Bucksmore Luxuriously Wonderful, but Absolutely Discreet Resort.
Bang! Bang! More gunshots stage right.
Lights up...
Amae, eyes wide, pulls herself tightly against Big Willie.

AMAE
Please tell me that was a backfire!

WAITER
I'll tell you anything you want,
sweetcheeks,
but that was probably a trey-eighty.
There are a lot of them in this neighborhood.

AMAEA
trey-eighty?
Sounds awfully weighty
Is that a truck of some kind?

BIG WILLIE
Sounds more like a car.
Something sporty perhaps

Bang! Bang! More shots, stage right

BIG WILLIE
No, that's nothing exotic
But one of those cheap little sedans
that people drive themselves.

AMAE
No!
That cannot be true
There are people who drive their own cars?

WAITER
(aside)
Idiots...
A gun
A gun
A big honkin' gun
(cocks his index finger at Amae)
You know a gun...
bang, bang.

AMAE
(dives under the table)
It cannot be!
Not here!
Not now!
Interrupting our supper
when I haven't even had my appetizer!

BIG WILLIE
Well damn it then, son
You'd better call the police

WAITER
(sings)
He wants me to call the police!
He wants me to call the cops!
Just drop what I'm doing
and run to the phone
and like that! the shooting just stops

But there are no police in this burg
Not a single flatfoot on the streets
They all went away
to a city that pays
Enough for their families to eat

BIG WILLIE
Never mind then
Surely we're safe in here
(he looks under the table)
Please come out my dear.

AMAE
(crying)
No I won't
I want to go home

BIG WILLIE
Then stay where you are for now I'll order for both of us
(to the Waiter)
Take our order now
And be quick about it

WAITER
(puts a piece of paper in front of Willie)
'Er... in a moment sir,
but first,
the waiver...

BIG WILLIE
Waiver?
A Freakin' Waiver?
A Freakin' Waiver for What?

WAITER
In case there is a problem with the food
and you find you need medical care
You see the emergency medical people
won't work for minimum wage
Most have left the city,
and some...
like I (winks at the audience)
have taken up the stage.

Big Willie waves the waiter away and ponders the situation. He looks at Amae, still under the table.

BIG WILLIE
Uh, while you're down there...

Lights fade...

3. Sweat on Me, Baby

2010-02-24T11:10:00.108-07:00

Act I Scene 1.1 (Huh? 1.1???? - Chill, this is an electronic medium.)

Lights up, stage left...
Inside a gaily striped cabaña off the coast of some unnamed Latin American country where you should probably drink tequila or cerveza rather than the local water unless you want to be paying homage to the porcelain goddess for the duration of your holiday.

URSULINE WINKLE DUMONT, tanned, nude, and five-ten even without heels, lies face down on an ultra-fabric-softened terry cloth bath sheet, which covers a moderately decent knock-off of a Louis XVI chaise lounge. A handsome, toned, young man, with brown skin glistening in the beams of light which pierce the netting of the cabaña's roof, massages Ursuline's feet. A handsome, sculpted, young man, with his lighter brown skin also glistening in the beams of light which pierce the netting of the cabaña's roof, massages Ursuline's shoulders.

If Ursuline Winkle DuMont was a sophisticated woman, (filthy rich doesn't necessarily mean sophisticated, look at Al Pacino in Scarface) the phrase menage a trois might come to mind. However, since Ursuline grew up behind a deep-fried bull testicle plant in Gonads, Oklahoma, we'll call it a threesome.

URSULINE

(Aria)

Oh, José?

FIRST YOUNG MAN

(Baritone)

My name is Bill.

URSULINE

Oh, Pédro?

SECOND YOUNG MAN
(Tenor)
My Name is Fred

URSULINE
Oh, Boys...

TWO YOUNG MEN
(In 2-part Harmony)
Now You're Talkin' Sweetie
But if you tip us right
At the end of the night
You can call us Sylvester and Tweetie

URSULINE
Well dig in, boys...
There's a lot of me left to knead
So, at the end of the night
If you do it just right
You'll get ten times more than agreed

ALL
(in 3 part harmony)
Panting, heavy breathing and moaning...

URSULINE
(that really high note that only great sopranos can hit)
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh......
YES!
Sweat on me, Baby
Sweat!

An impish gray-haired LITTLE MAN, a waiter wearing flip-flops woven from dried banana leaves and carrying a wooden tray, steps through the cabaña door. Ursuline thinks he looks a lot the the How Are Ya guy at the SeemsFree store closest to her house. Normally, someone of her financial resources would never enter a SeemsFree store, but since she and her sisters own the freakin' company...

LITTLE MAN

(so as not to confuse him with the waiter in scene 1)

(Basso Profundo)

Can I get you a margarita, Señora?

Perhaps a daiquiri, or cosmopolitan?

A Manhattan?

A Drambuie?

Or one of those things with a fan?

URSULINE

Just water?

LITTLE MAN

Do you know where you are Señora?

Nobody drinks water here.

URSULINE

Bring me water,

It's water I crave

If I drink water at home

I'll end up in a grave.

Please, I beseech you

It's water I need

You can touch my body...

Just bring water with speed.

Lights dim...

2. Is it Really Mine?

2010-02-23T09:50:00.001-07:00

ACT I - SCENE 1

Restaurant, Bucksmore Resort, southern Boulder-Springs, early on a Tuesday evening.

Curtain...

In a discreet booth surrounded by ferns violently ripped from the ground in the Brazilian rainforest and flown by private jet to be repotted in the early morning hours, then discarded like so much leafy trash at closing time, AMAE (pronounced a-MAY) ZINGRACE snuggles her surgically-enhanced nineteen-year-old body against the overstuffed yet neatly tailored Savile Row three-button suit of CEO BIG WILLIE DUMONT. The suit, of course, unbuttoned at the time to provide cleaner lines beneath the warmth and paleness of Ama's swelling bosom. DuMont's ample poundage (weight, not British money, although he has plenty of that as well) sinks into the upholstery, fine ostrich leather, stripped from living birds as henchmen from Oakwood Heights held their heads in the sand and then tanned in desert salts under the Moroccan sun.

As Big Willie had planned, the massive weight of the diamond brooch he'd given his paramour when she gathered him at the airport tugged the front of her "Chocolate and Men, both better when Rich" designer t-shirt low enough to expose just a tiny peek of her left areola.

Lights up. Cue music (contemporary chick-a-boom beat-box but without the F-word every two measures.)

Amae caresses the diamond brooch with the epoxy-nailed fingers of her right hand, notices the extra bit of exposed anatomy, and demurely tugs her t-shirt up a fraction of an inch, which causes a bright flash of light to reflect from the diamond across her silken-smooth-but-recently-augmented cheekbones.

AMAE (Sings)

(OK, the actress really lip-syncs to a male falsetto voice coming from the wings, stage right, because the director didn't really hire her for her singing voice but for her shiny-stretched-skin-recently-augmented cleavage that reminded him of the view up Lexington Avenue from the roof of the Soldiers, Sailors, and Marines Club.)

Look at it shine

Big Willie

Is it really mine?

It sends chills up my spine

Big Willie

Is it really mine?

THE WAITER approaches the table, with a bottle of 1994 Mouton Rothschild, removes the cork and pours a small amount in Big Willie's glass. He looks at the diamonds, then at Big Willie, then back at the diamonds.

WAITER

(spoken aside to the audience)

How naive can this girl be?

(turns back to the table and sings)

What'll it be tonight?

The wine is on the house

As it is every night

(aside) That you're here without your spouse.

AMAE

The wine looks very tasty

But I don't want to be hasty

Could I have some water, to start?

WAITER

No, no

You mustn't

AMAE

But why?

When my throat is so dry.

WAITER

(aside) And what a lovely throat it is

But water isn't safe

(what a dumb slut)

Bugs and creatures and

Who knows what?

BIG WILLIE

Bring us bottled water, then

WAITER

Sorry, all out.

None left in the city.

BIG WILLIE

How can this happen?

Don't you know who I am?

WAITER

(Hmmm, Yes, I do)

A man of power and clout

A seasoned political sage

Who ordered the engineers out

Unless they worked for minimum wage

With blood rushing to his face, Big Willie's flapping jowls turned maroon and he slammed his palm on the tabletop.

BIG WILLIE (Sings)

Get out of my sight

Before you ruin my night

This job, you don't deserve

Send your boss to me

He'll fire you with glee

Then send your replacement to serve.

Waiter exits, stage right.

Amae looks shaken by the exchange, so Big Willie lifts her fingertips and guides them back to the brooch.

AMAE (Sings)

I look so divine

Big Willie

Oh, Willie

My Big, Big Willie

Is it really really mine?

WILLIE (Sings)

It's yours for the night

Babe

I hope that's all right

Babe

Here, have a little more wine

(aside to the audience)

This works every time

Gunshots stage right. Lights dim...

1. Overture....

2010-02-22T06:30:00.001-07:00

Da-dum-da-da-da Da-dum-da-da-da... (think helicopters, jungle, and Robert Duvall...)

You know. That Wagnerian part that plays at the very beginning, when everyone is still at the bar or going off to the head (john, toilette, W.C....), or doing something else so you can make an ENTRANCE when you finally do walk in the freakin' auditorium with a "niece" on your arm wearing twenty-thousand dollars worth of diamonds you "borrowed" from your wife's safe while she is vacationing among the cabaña boys off the coast of Belize or some other unnamed Latin American country.

Be patient! The friggin' show is coming! Oh, and by the way, the show might go on for a while without music you can actually hear, while I'm waiting for my union card.

Ludvig (no, the "v" is NOT a typo...)