Abbott I Think We Are Alone

1. Auflage 2020
ISBN: 978-1-78850-321-1
Verlag: Nick Hern Books
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 96 Seiten

Reihe: NHB Modern Plays

From those electric moments of discovery and connection to the dark hours of isolation, we all seek community and resolution. But sometimes the things that connect us are the very things we need to escape. Sally Abbott's I Think We Are Alone is a delicate and uplifting play about fragility, resilience and our need for love and forgiveness. The play was commissioned by Frantic Assembly as part of their twenty-fifth anniversary and premiered on a UK tour in 2020 as a co-production with Theatre Royal Plymouth and Curve, Leicester. The original production was co-directed by Kathy Burke and Frantic Assembly's Artistic Director Scott Graham.

Sally Abbott is a playwright and screenwriter. Her plays include I Think We Are Alone (Frantic Assembly, 2020), and she co-wrote the stage monologue Borough Market, One Saturday (2017) with Michael Begley, winning the TCN Monologue Slam. Her writing for TV includes the award-winning original BBC drama The Coroner, and has contributed to Vera, Death in Paradise, EastEnders and Casualty. She has worked in theatre as associate producer, director and dramaturg for Manchester Contact Theatre, English Touring Theatre, National Association of Youth Theatres and Liverpool's Everyman Theatre, amongst others.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Abbott, Sally

Leseproben

JOSIE

JOSIE. I like animals more than people. Dogs are my thing. When you have a dog, well, for the first – maybe only time – you’re given unconditional love.

It doesn’t matter what mood you’re in, they still love you. Dogs.

They love people who don’t deserve to be loved. People who hit ’em and –

Ooh.

People who hurt animals. Don’t get me [fucking] started.

See, people in general, I’m not a big fan.

We got Queenie from the rescue. Battersea Dogs Home. Me and my boy, Manny. Greyhound. Used to be a racer. The dog. Not my boy. She was in a bad way. Half-deaf, dodgy hip. The wind. Oh my God… She was put to sleep, ten weeks ago. I had to. It’s fine, it’s fine. It was for the best. Better two weeks too early, than a day too late. Sometimes, when you love someone, you have to do what’s right for them, even if it hurts you. Queenie had dementia. She’d stopped sleeping. Didn’t know where she was. Kept barking at rabbits. I live on the first floor. There were no rabbits.

She wasn’t well. I knew what I was doing was right, didn’t make it any easier. But I couldn’t let her know I was scared cos then she’d sense it. She’d be scared. So, me and Manny pretended it was all okay. Just having a little cuddle. Last thing she did was lick some bacon off my fingers.

What a way to die. With the person you love and a little bit of bacon.

She’s in here. That way she’s still with me. I keep her near the window. The sun’s rays coming in, it was her favourite place to sleep. With the sun on her back.

Hot dog.

It’s too quiet now in the flat. Sometimes, I think I hear her breathing, the little rattle of her tags when she shakes herself. It’s what I miss most. Her breathing.

ANGE. I think death is very frightening for people. The most frightening thing they can think of. But for some, it’s a relief. They’re ready. They’re in so much pain, they’re so tired. They want to go. Some just sleep into it, just disappear.

That’s what I’d want. Something quick. I’ve thought about it a lot. How I want to die. Not an accident because. It’s too messy. There’ll be blame and other people involved.

That sounds very morbid. I’m not obsessed with death. I work in a hospice. It’s busy. Never stops. Always full. Oversubscribed. Fifteen deaths a month minimum.

That’s not my favourite thing about the job. People dying. Although it is a. This might sound weird but. It’s a gift to be with someone when they die.

But once they’ve left. Once they’re not suffering. Well, then you’ve got the ones who’ve been left behind and… If there’s one thing I’ve learned, you’ve got to make your peace before it’s too late. You’ve got to deal with your shit. This is your life. This one. It’s not a practice one.

You get one life. One.

You don’t want regrets. And you don’t want to live your life thinking it’s all about what happens on the other side cos, well. That’s like buying a lottery ticket only, y’know, worse odds.

I work a lot with people who have faith. Staff. Patients. Volunteers. And some do have faith. But for some, it’s just their get-out-of-jail-free card. It’s why they volunteer – so God will look down and give them Brownie points.

But I don’t think it works like that. I think God – if she exists – would know exactly what people are like on the inside. I reckon that’s how it would work. Cos, I mean, take Jimmy Savile. No matter how many marathons he ran, how much money he raised, how many times he saw the Pope, Jimmy Savile was always going to Hell.

When people ask me if I have a faith, a religion, I say yes. My religion is Hypocrisy.

CLARE. I can’t understand people who want to be on social media all the time. It’s so… shallow. There’s nothing social about it. Like. We had a work lunch the other day. Every single person was on the phone. No one was talking. Two of them were having a conversation on Facebook whilst they were sitting next to each other. Next to each other! And one of them wrote ‘LOL’ to a post. They wrote ‘LOL’ and they didn’t even actually laugh out loud.

I’m on it because… You have to be on social media. How else are you going to talk to people?

I work in HR. Human resources. Who works where, for how much, how to make the staff more efficient, more productive. Resolve issues. That wasn’t ever the dream. HR. The dream was being an Olympic show-jumping champion. But I couldn’t ride, I had no horse. So, I read pony books. I read a lot when I was younger. At night I’d read till after midnight. Every night. Under the cover reading.

Only… It wasn’t just because of the books, or cos I loved ponies, it was… It was… Umm.

Steve. Steve’s my boyfriend. He’s. He’s great. We’re great. We’re really great. He’s not ‘the one’. But he’s… He’s okay. And we live together. Which is. Great.

Because.

The reason I read so much when I was younger. Until I couldn’t keep my eyes open… Was because… Because I grew up in a haunted house.

Every night I slept there from the age of nine to seventeen, there was a ghost in my bedroom.

JOSIE JOSIE MANNY

JOSIE. I work at a garage in Lewisham. Front desk. It’s quiet, I don’t have to engage with too many people. Got two mechanics. They’re alright. Y’know…

We don’t bother each other. Which is good because the basic chat here is – one of them talks shit, another one talks shit, I point it out. End of conversation.

Same with the customers. Today, this woman came in. Posh sort.

GRAHAM. I’ve been driving a black cab since I was twenty-nine. I’ll tell you my favourite passenger. An Arab.

I love the Arabs. It’s like panning gold. They love a black cab cos it’s traditional. Once they get in, the meter could be running all day. One fella I had, had lunch at The Savoy, had me outside the whole time with the meter running. Even had some food sent out for me. It was lovely. Tiny portion, virtually nothing there but lovely. And I’d brought my sandwiches. Cheese and onion. The fare was four hundred quid and he gave me a tip. Two hundred and fifty quid! You gotta love an Arab.

Met my wife in the cab. She was sat in the back with her mate. Right chatterer. Came straight out and asked me for my number. Liked what I was playing on the radio, liked my aftershave, liked me. Asked me to pick her up the next day.

So, you know. I picked her up.

I don’t make a habit of picking up women. Unless they’re paying. Obviously.

Picked one up earlier. Near Fortnum and Mason. Heading for a garage in Lewisham. You know the kind. Posh. All in cream. Doesn’t do her own washing. I asked if she was having a nice day. She said ‘Hmm.’

I watched her in the mirror. Her eyes glued to her phone, like it was bluetoothing her lungs, like she couldn’t breathe without it. She looked up. Asked why I wasn’t turning left. So, I told her – said the road’s closed. Cyclist’s been hit.

Know what she said? ‘Oh, shame, that way’s much quicker.’

That’s what road casualties are now to people like her – an inconvenience. When did that stop happening? Compassion?

JOSIE. She was all in cream. Looking at her phone, not me. I was busy. Doing my Sudoku. After a while, she realised she had to talk. Said I’d called. Said her car was ready. I asked for her name. On account of how I’m not psychic. I knew it before she even said it. There could only be one Hannah Greene-Brady. Greene with an ‘e’ on the end.

She told me she needed to get the car today, she had to pick up her daughter from university, so if I could…

Now, right. This is my favourite kind of person. Thinks they’re all that. Well, if they’re gonna play top trumps they better know who they’re playing with.

I smiled. A rare occurrence. I said my son’s at university.

She smiled back. Patronising like. Oh really, well my daughter’s at Cambridge.

Oh yeah? I said. Which college? One of the old ones or one of the new ones?

Should’ve seen her face. Couldn’t work out how I even knew to ask that question.

Emma’s a first-year, Murray Edwards.

Oh. One of the new colleges. My son Manny’s at Trinity. Second year. It’s one of the oldest. Looks like Hogwarts.

Cash or card?

MANNY. My mum always said it was a level playing field to get into Cambridge. Just work hard, Manny. Get your grades. So, I did, I worked really fucking hard. And I got the grades. Two A-stars and an A. Everyone told me I deserved to be there. Mum, Granddad, my boys. Everyone was made up. The local paper even wrote about it.

But Mum and me spent so long thinking about the destination, we didn’t think about what it would be like to actually be there. It ain’t easy. It ain’t easy...