Sunset in Singapore
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About this ebook
It’s Mardis Gras, but not for Anna. She’s stuck working all night, serving drinks so that everyone else can have fun. And on top of that, all of her coworkers have disappeared at closing time. They’ve all met someone, except her. As she angrily cleans the bar, Anna remembers the night of Mardis Gras one year ago, when her ex (John) showed up unexpectedly, in costume, and made love to her. She hasn’t heard from him since, and she hasn’t been able to forget him. What would happen if he came back this year too, unannounced?
Amidst the anger, the memory of her ghosts and her daydreams, Anna receives various strange visits and meets mysterious characters in costume along the way. In a chain of surreal, dreamlike events, the line between what’s real and what’s imaginary seems to blur. Finally, the “real” John, her ex, appears, determined to talk to Anna about something that she doesn’t dare hear.
While Anna tries to get her head straight in regards to her past, but not forgotten, love, an Argentinian tango dancer seduces the bar owner, an ape is so drunk he’s barely hanging on, and Melanie Hamilton, the protagonist of “Gone With the Wind”, becomes a foul-mouthed mad woman. Scenes that are vulgar and sublime, “real” and imaginary, original and topical, and scenes stolen from films all mix together to make up this play that is at times sordid, at others poetic, always comical, and ultimately dramatic.
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Sunset in Singapore - Miguel Campion
Sunset in Singapore
(Tragicomedy)
MIGUEL CAMPION
Copyright © 2014 Miguel Campion
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 148953749X
ISBN-13: 978-1489537492
DEDICAtion
To all girls who sweep and dream
CHARACTeRs
1. Anna
2. John or Johnny
3. Charlie or Melanie
4. Marcela
5. Cornelius or Merlin
Introduction
There are phrases taken from film and theatre scripts interspersed throughout this text. They are written in italics and annotated with a number. Although knowing where they’re taken from is not necessary in order to understand the plot, I feel it necessary to give credit to the authors, with all my admiration and appreciation.
* * *
It’s a bar in New Orleans. It’s the middle of the night, and it’s Mardi Gras. But, it’s all a bit confusing...
Opening Scene
Suddenly, hundreds of colored lights come on and loud Carnival music starts playing. Dozens of drunks in costumes are dancing, shouting, and hugging each other in a crowded bar, all dressed up in costumes for a party. Some have their tongues down each other’s throats, some are getting handsy, some are elbowing each other, some are spilling drinks on the costumes of the person next to them, some are falling in love, while others hate each other. At the back, a few people start hitting each other, and the rest keep dancing. Darkness.
AcT One
The bar is covered in trash, left-behind costume props, decorations, broken paper chains, confetti, faded colorful balloons on the ceiling, deflated balloons, balloons that drift between mountains of masks, streamers, turbans, armor, pirate hats, tassels, shoes, and fallen crowns, a forgotten pair of panties, spilled cups, wasted money, horns, shreds of clothing, a plastic baby doll, a shopping cart, a wagon with giant wheels, flung condoms, fake pearl necklaces, plasterboard ruins, torn curtains, mountains of crap on the floor; and in the back there are walls, backdrops, white cork curtains, fake fur, and faded chiffon; Atlanta destroyed in Gone with the Wind
. The bar is like a small island, and Anna is about to drown in the swamp.
Loud party music is playing at full blast. Anna, dressed in period clothes
, shoves a drunk, hobbling, hunched-over Pope, who shakily lifts his hand to give her a blessing. Anna shouts over the music.
Anna: Come on, it’s time to get back to the Vatican now...
Pope: (suddenly waking up) Are we at an after party?
Anna throws him out and locks the door. She wades through the trash back towards the bar, and kicks a blow-up doll flaunting an obscene erection on her way. Anna reaches her arm over the bar and turns off the music.
Anna: Charlie! Charlie! (puzzled) Where the hell have you gone?
A few thuds and muffled laughter can be heard.
Anna: Charlie?
Anna, determined, leans over the staircase that leads to first floor of the bar. She bumps into Merlin the Wizard, who is very drunk and wearing a shiny cape with wide sleeves, a cone-shaped hat, and a long white beard stained with rum and coke.
Anna: Shit, you scared me! What are you doing? The bar is closed now...
Merlin: I was trying to leave.
Anna: You can’t go out that way; (pointing to the door that leads to the street) you have to go out over there.
Merlin: Merlin the charmer is a magician, and he can leave from whichever way he feels like it.
Anna: Merlin the charmer is going to leave right now through that door.
Merlin: But, well... You don’t know who you’re talking to. Who are YOU to kick ME out?
Anna: Scarlett O’Hara!
Merlin’s eyes wide like saucers, he looks her up and down. Then, he bursts out laughing.
Anna: Out!
Anna grabs him by the arm and drags him towards the door.
Merlin: Do you know why my friends call me Merlin the charmer?
Anna: Because you’re desperate, and you’ll hook up with the first hag that gives you the time of day?
Merlin: No. Because I make magic with my hands.
Anna: And yet you still haven’t managed to make any magic happen tonight.
Merlin: Neither have you...
Anna angrily pushes Merlin towards the door.
Anna: Get the hell out!
Merlin: Dance with me... This is the most magical night of the year, the night where anything is possible, and where I can be you and you can be me...
Merlin moves closer to Anna, trying to be seductive. Anna doesn’t move an inch.
Anna: (very serious) In moments like these, I’d very much like to not be me, and much less, be you. Your breath stinks, man. Go on, get out of here.
Merlin: It’s not daylight yet! Let the party continue! Anything is possible tonight! Ask for a wish!
Anna looks at him, thinking. She shakes her head no.
Anna: You’re very drunk, Merlin. Very drunk.
Merlin: Close your eyes and I’ll disappear.
Anna: If only it were that easy.
Merlin: It’s easy. Close your eyes.
Anna closes her eyes. Merlin touches her breasts and runs out.
Anna: Fucking pig!
Merlin: (mocking) A lady shouldn’t curse like that.
Merlin disappears.
Anna: Son of a bitch!
Muffled laughter