Lava by Spyros Vrettos
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This Play is the copyright of the Author and may not be performed, copied or sold without the Author's prior consent
Act 1 Scene 1
The stage is lit in two areas. One is an interior of an apartment. The
walls are decorated with posters of paintings of artists like
Kadinsky, Miro and Turner. In a side of this space there is the
kitchen. SOFIA, a beautiful 43-year-old woman is there cooking chili
con carne. She is wearing a thick kitchen glove, stares the food. She
then takes a spoon and tastes a bit of the food. She adds some pepper.
Then she walks slowly towards the window and opens it. Some lights of
the city can be seen in the night and sounds are heard like cars
passing, the siren of an ambulance etc. Then she hears music
apparently coming from the radio of a neighbor. It is a beautiful song
sung by a woman and speaks to a man who left abruptly. Sofia stands
and listens at the song. She then closes the window.
The other lit area of the stage, is in a higher level than the
apartment and to the left side of the stage. Is shows the room in an
inexpensive hotel. In that area GEORGE, a 48-year-old handsome man is
lying on the bed. As the song develops George slowly sits on the bed.
He seems thoughtful. He stands up and walks indecisively here and
there. He then approaches the telephone. He takes a little piece of
paper from his pocket but hesitates to dial up the number. He walks
again in the room. Then more decisively he picks the phone and places
it on the bed. Then looks at the little paper and dials the number.
Note: Throughout the 1st Act George's face is under-lit and shown as
a black silhouette.
The phone at the apartment rings. Sofia, approaches her cordless phone
and picks it up.
SOFIA: Hello?...
GEORGE: May I speak to Sofia, please?
SOFIA: Speaking…
GEORGE: Hi Sofia. This is George.
SOFIA: Who?...
GEORGE: George…
SOFIA: G… George?
GEORGE: Yes.
SOFIA: It can't be…
GEORGE: Well, it can.
SOFIA: George…Hi, George. How are you?
With the help of her armpit, Sofia takes off the oven glove and walks
slowly towards the kitchen table, as she continues to talk to George
on the phone.
GEORGE: Fine…
SOFIA: Gee…
Sofia sits on a chair by the kitchen table. On the table a manuscript,
laptop computer and several books on the History of Art can be seen.
On the other side of the table there is a wash basin containing dirty
laundry, as well as clothes pins and a plastic bottle of detergent.
SOFIA: It's so unexpected…
GEORGE: For me too, to be honest.
SOFIA: (still surprised) George…
GEORGE: I said, that's it! I've got to call her.
SOFIA: After so many years. It's sixteen years, George.
GEORGE:
For me it's only like sixteen days. (pause) Look… I
was wondering if you would like to go to a nice restaurant, where we
can talk.
SOFIA: No…
As she talks into the phone, Sofia organizes her books and the pages
of the manuscript.
GEORGE: You have something to do tonight?
SOFIA: I'm married… I have a daughter…
GEORGE: Is that right? Great. And how is life? Going okay?
SOFIA: Well…okay…
GEORGE: What does "Well… okay…" mean?
SOFIA: What do you want me to tell you? That married life is not
like love?
GEORGE: What do you mean?
SOFIA: (puts a shirt into laundry wash basin) It's not a fairy
tale. You know what I mean…
GEORGE: I don't know what you…
SOFIA: George, you do know.
GEORGE: Anyway, I'm just asking if you want to go out to eat and
talk. Nothing more.
Sofia goes to the kitchen and stirs the food as she continues to talk
on the phone.
SOFIA: I told you, I can't go out, and besides that, I don't want
to…
GEORGE: Are you happy, Sofia?
SOFIA: Happy…
GEORGE: I'm not hearing it in your voice.
SOFIA: What do you want me to say, George?
GEORGE: Well, tell me how you feel with this man you live with.
SOFIA: (briefly and a bit reluctantly) He works with the tax
collection department. From nine to five everybody treats him as if he
is the bad wolf and when he comes home, I try to make him feel like a
human being again. That's all.
There's a pause. Sofia puts down the wooden spoon and leans back on
the wall next to a picture frame in the shape of a lifebuoy. In it's
center there is a photo of her and her husband STANLEY, a sixty years
old man. Stanley's arms pass under Sofia's arms and encircle her,
mimicking the lifebuoy.
GEORGE: You pay a high tax to your tax man, don't you?
SOFIA: Do I pay a high tax?
GEORGE: That's how it sounds, Sofia.
SOFIA: I don't know… (pauses then changing the subject) Tell me
George, how are you doing?
She takes two books off the table and walks into the living room. This
middle class apartment is decorated with style. On the walls hang
posters of famous painters: Kandinsky, Miro, Turner, Pollock etc.
SOFIA: Did you get married? Do you have children? How is your job
going? What have you been doing lately? Speak to me, George. Don't be
a miser.
GEORGE:
At the beginning…I had a three-year relationship then…
she was pushing me to get married… I didn't feel ready and…
SOFIA: And you split. Right?
GEORGE: Right.
She puts the books on a shelf.
SOFIA: Then?
GEORGE:
Then I met another woman and I stayed with her for two
years. But you see…
SOFIA: You split again.
GEORGE: I felt a big void…Somehow scattered and confused…
Sofia shakes her head as if to say “Give me a break”. She takes a
piece of cigar-shaped chocolate out of a packet and bites off the
end.
SOFIA: So?
GEORGE:
So… I met another woman. We had an eight-year
relationship…
SOFIA: Eight-year relationship!
GEORGE:
This time I couldn't tolerate breaking up again. I
admitted… I admitted that there was something wrong with me.
Sofia sits on the couch.
SOFIA: Well…It was about time…
She takes another bite of chocolate and slowly chews it.
GEORGE:
Yes. I couldn't go on like that. So… I made a big
decision.
SOFIA: What decision?
GEORGE: I went to a therapist.
She stops chewing.
SOFIA: I don't believe it!
GEORGE:
Yes, I'm telling you, I found the guts to go to a
therapist.
SOFIA: Go on, go on…
She stands up and walks around the living room.
GEORGE:
Well, I admitted that I must have made the same mistakes
all these years.
SOFIA: You admitted such a thing, George!?
GEORGE:
Sure. I saw that throughout my whole life, when a
relationship started becoming very precious and valuable, I worked out
ways to destroy it… you know.
SOFIA:
Wow! I would give a thousand bucks to have the chance to
see you talking to this man… I mean your therapist.
GEORGE: It was a woman.
SOFIA: A woman!
GEORGE: Yes, a very clever woman.
SOFIA: Well… I would give a million then. So what did you say to
her? This is getting interesting.
GEORGE:
You want me to tell you in a few words what I was talking
about for four years? Are you joking?
SOFIA: No, I'm not joking…
GEORGE: Isn't it enough to tell you the result of my work with
her? That I feel fine, that I have…
SOFIA: (interrupts him) George, you call me up after sixteen
years…so, I want to hear important stuff. Tell me, what did you say
to her?
GEORGE: Not on the phone. Let's go out for a drink…or eat
something…
SOFIA:
I said no! There is no need to go for either a drink or
food.
GEORGE:
Look here. The degree of contact between two persons,
besides the delivery of words as sound messages, gets increased by…
SOFIA: (frustrated, interrupts him) George! I'm going to hang up
the phone. (pause)
We lived together for two years. I believed in
our relationship because you have a talent for fairy tales. But when
that winter day you blew everything and abandoned me, I realized that
everything was…scenery…in a well-staged play.
GEORGE: I wasn't acting…
Sofia walks towards the kitchen.
SOFIA: Oh, come on…
GEORGE: I'm telling you the truth…
SOFIA: Don't bullshit me, George…I don't buy it anymore.
In the kitchen, Sofia throws chipped potatoes into the burning oil of
a frying pan and there's a loud sizzle as the potatoes start to fry.
GEORGE: My feelings were sincere, Sofia.
SOFIA: Oh, come on, George! This is me you're talking to!
GEORGE: Real and genuine, I'm telling you.
SOFIA: Please don't open old wounds…
GEORGE:
Listen to me please, Sofia. Hear that I was blind and
frightened then. But I was honest.
SOFIA: (aggressively) George!
She presses the button of an air ventilator and a loud hum is heard.
GEORGE: Don't speak to me in this tone of voice, please Sofia.
SOFIA: (explodes) What do you mean, not to speak to you in this tone
of voice?! And why should I care if you were blind and frightened! You
abandoned me and after sixteen years you say "I am sorry"!?...
The chili con carne boils on the stove.
GEORGE:
When the time comes and the mist disappears, every person
starts seeing things clearly. He sees everything. Himself…the other
persons…the pain he produced… Forgiveness doesn't mean a thing to
you?
SOFIA: No…it doesn't.
GEORGE:
Isn't it important to see that people change, Sofia? I
mean this part of their lives that was misunderstood or misjudged?
SOFIA: No!
GEORGE:
Isn't it important to know that you were the beginning of
a chain reaction and…and it's positive energy has spread to all my
students…and…
Sofia knocks the wooden spoon rhythmically on the pot containing the
chili con carne.
SOFIA: (interrupts him) All this is fucking bullshit!
GEORGE: Why are you taking it that way?
She shakes the frying pan containing the potatoes. Pause.
SOFIA: Because that's what it is.
GEORGE: Sofia…I ask for your forgiveness.
Sofia switches the ventilator off and walks towards the kitchen
table.
SOFIA:
What is forgiveness!? You appear like a UFO and you ask for
forgiveness. Okay, take it! I give it to you. Then what?! (pause)
Don't bring the hell out of me, George.
She presses the speaker button on the phone, puts the phone on the
kitchen table and flops down on a chair. She's tired of the attack.
Pause.
GEORGE: Sofia…Sofia, you see…
SOFIA:
A month after we split, I cut all my hair off. Remember the
shock you got when you saw me? I wanted to see if in this fucking
world there was somebody less of an ass- hole who was interested in
what was under the hair…
GEORGE: Such beautiful hair…
SOFIA:
Only decoration. Just like painted nails, perfume, high
heels… All those superficial things that make shit heads like you
write poems - my beautiful inspiring ebony black hair…
She stands up in an explosive way. Her hand bangs on the table. At the
same time her head knocks the overhead light above the table and it
moves violently. Parallel to that she shouts:
SOFIA: What fucking devil made you call me George?!!
GEORGE: (after a pause) I caused you much pain…I admit it.
Sofia walks towards a collection of four beveled mirrors on the wall,
three of which somehow distort her face into grotesque shapes the
forth shows her realistically but it is a shattered mirror. Silence.
SOFIA:
You admit it…but you admitted too late. I went to a
bar… The tax man found me in a hell of a mess in a bar. I have drunk
a tone of whisky… I fell and hit my face against the metal edge of
the bar. Blood covered my face… I still have the scar…. (pauses)
It was Stanley… He got me to a hospital…
She falls onto the couch.
SOFIA: Then he came to see me… (pause)
One day, six weeks after I
got out of the hospital, when I saw him approaching me, I don't
know…I had the desire to let my hair grow again. That's all.
(ironically)
But now it's not ebony black as you used to know, but
white… ivory.
GEORGE: And then?
SOFIA: Then…we got married.
George doesn't speak.
SOFIA: George?...
George doesn't speak. Sofia sits up.
SOFIA: Are you there?
GEORGE: Yes.
SOFIA: What's the matter with you?
GEORGE: I'd like… I'd like something more, Sofia.
SOFIA: What?
GEORGE: You have to calm down first.
SOFIA: I'm calm. Say it.
GEORGE:
When we separated, you were calling me a hundred times
every day. Morning, noon, midnight, at dawn… Until… until you made
me say a phrase that you were asking me persistently to say to you.
(pronounces the words one by one) "I never loved you". Well, this
was the only lie I told you, because I did not believe it.
SOFIA: (ironically) Yes… you did not believe it…
GEORGE:
I only said it to make you stop calling me so many times.
How can I say it, Sofia? I was not ready for any sort of commitment.
SOFIA: Oh…
GEORGE: It is true, Sofia. Listen to me please.
SOFIA: Oh, drop it. Will you?!
GEORGE:
I would like you to hear it and acknowledge it and…
(pause) Oh, well, maybe I should wait a few more years.
Pause. There is a beeping sound indicating that another phone call is
coming through.
SOFIA: George, wait a minute I have another call.
She presses a
button on the phone.
SOFIA: Hello?
A third area of the scene is lit. It is above the apartment to the
right. It shows an office with lots of folders. It is STANLEY'S
office. Stanley is Sofia's husband.
He is a rather nice man in his 60ies, not too much intellectual. Sofia
walks towards the kitchen with the phone.
STANLEY: Hi darling, it's me.
SOFIA: Hi, Stanley.
STANLEY: Look, I'm in the office and getting ready to come home.
Do you need anything from the super-market?
SOFIA: No, nothing. Guess what, I'm preparing a chili con carne.
She stirs the chili con carne.
STANLEY: Fantastic!
SOFIA: Stanley.
STANLEY: Yes, darling.
SOFIA: If I tell you who is on the other line, you won't believe
it…
STANLEY: Who is it?
SOFIA: It's incredible, I'm telling you.
STANLEY: Who is it? Santa Claus?
SOFIA: It's George.
STANLEY: George who?
SOFIA: You know… George…
STANLEY: George… that…
SOFIA: Yes, him.
STANLEY: (pauses) And what does he want?
SOFIA: Well…he admitted his personal insecurities. He told me
what trouble they caused him…that he went to a therapist for four
years…and that he felt…he felt the need to call me up and ask me
for forgiveness for all he did to me then.
STANLEY: Is that so? And then? Will he stay in New York?
SOFIA: No, he is leaving in a few days he said.
STANLEY: And what did you tell him?
SOFIA: Well I gave him hell…
Sofia presses the speaker button and leaves the phone on the kitchen
table while she takes the fries out of the frying pan.
SOFIA: ... and to tell you the truth, I enjoyed it, you know. I
don't know. Maybe I shouldn't…but ...I've been waiting for this
moment for years.
STANLEY: And now you have him on hold you said?
Sofia tastes the chili con carne using the wooden spoon.
SOFIA: Yes.
STANLEY: Sofia.
SOFIA: What.
STANLEY:
Why don't you tell him to come over for chili con carne
tonight?
Sofia turns one of the knobs on the stove and suddenly all the lights
go out.
SOFIA: Ouch! I switched the wrong knob and the electricity went
out! Stanley, are you there?
STANLEY: I'm here.
SOFIA: Wait, Stanley, I'm in the dark. Wait.
She lights a candle.
SOFIA: I need to fix the fuse.
She carries the candle and approaches the fuse box in the kitchen.
STANLEY: Did you hear what I just said?
SOFIA: (searching in the fuse box)
I'm not sure Stanley, I guess
not.
STANLEY: I said why don't you tell him to join us for dinner
tonight?
SOFIA: Are you serious?
STANLEY: Sure. Why not? This is important for you, my love. (pause)
Since you like cleaning out old drawers and attics…
SOFIA: I just remove the dust…
STANLEY: Yeah, yeah…the dust and the spiders…
Sofia walks towards the living room.
SOFIA: Well… (pause) I find it difficult to believe you.
STANLEY: You see? I was right. It is Santa Claus! And he brought
you gifts.
SOFIA: Stanley…it's…so wonderful…
STANLEY: What.
SOFIA: You know…getting to know a bit more of you every day…
Stanley sighs.
STANLEY: I wish…I wish, even once, that you…
SOFIA: Stanley, please…don't speak about it.
STANLEY: But Sofia, I just need to hear it…
SOFIA: Stanley…
STANLEY: All right, all right. Tell him to come and eat with us
tonight. Okay?
SOFIA: Okay.
Pause.
STANLEY:
Since it's going to be a very special evening tonight,
we'll open that old bottle of wine. Okay?
SOFIA: Yes.
STANLEY: So, I'll be there soon.
SOFIA: Bye Stanley.
Stanley hangs up. The light on his office fades out to darkness.
In Sofia's apartment only the tick-tocking of the clock is heard as
she stands in the dark for a beat. She then walks towards the living
room holding a candle in one hand and the phone in the other. She sets
the candle down on the table, then pushes a button on the phone to
talk to George and sits on the couch.
SOFIA: George, are you still there?
GEORGE: Yes, Sofia.
SOFIA:
Well…I simply would like to tell you…before we hang up
that….
Small pause. Her hand trembles as she lights another candle.
SOFIA: ...if you want to come…let's say tonight…here in my
house…I'm preparing a dinner…and you're welcome to come. You'll
get to meet Stanley and Joanna
GEORGE: Really?
SOFIA: Really.
GEORGE: I can't believe what you're telling me. I call you up
after all these years…
Sofia sits on the carpet. Keeps lighting more candles.
GEORGE: ...I wake up painful memories. I make you mad for all you
suffered because of me…and yet you are inviting me to your house to
meet your husband and daughter. (pause)
There you are Sofia…you
always take a step ahead… (pause)
...and I follow at a distance,
full of childish admiration of a first experience… (pause)
I
remember the nights that you lit candles, opened a good bottle of wine
from Santorini and we were sitting in the dark on the carpet talking
till very late…
Sofia looks at the candles on the table. Watches the dripping wax.
GEORGE: And I was feeling sleepy, but you wanted me to keep
talking to you. And I was speaking in a state between been awake and
asleep I don't remember what I was talking about…surreal things I
guess. (pause)
Faintly I recall something about volcanoes in
love…
Sofia places her head on her knees.
GEORGE: I was explaining why the volcanoes spill their hot lava.
It's because they're in love… (pause)
... Like the two Mexican
volcanoes Popokatepetl and Ixtasiwatl… shooting huge fireworks -
a celebration for the rebirth of the earth… (pause)
And the hours
were passing…the candles were melting… And at dawn we fell asleep
surrounded by rivers of hot bright lava. The earth was giving birth to
islands in the middle of the ocean… (pause)
And I was asking
myself how long it takes before lava turns into fertile land…
(pause) I did not forget all that you know…
Sofia wipes tears away from her cheeks.
GEORGE: You are a unique person, Sofia…
Sofia tries to contain her emotions.
GEORGE: I'm sure your husband is also unique…and your daughter…
(sighs)
Now you are asking me to come to your house and have a dinner with all
of you…and it is so unexpected. Give me a little time to think about
it…
SOFIA: Okay…
GEORGE: Good-bye, Sofia.
SOFIA: Good-bye, George.
George hangs up. Sofia stands motionless in her living room and places
her hand slowly on the scar on her face.
[end of extract]
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