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English Studies Forum
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Dark All Day Dennis Bohr
CHARACTERS
NULLANNE VOID—Frozen Oaties salesperson DEE VOID—Nullanne’s partner CUSTOMER HOLLY JOLLY—radio announcer DR. LUKE WARM—scientist PRESIDENT WANKER—U.S. president DR. GRAHAM CRACKER—evangelist MOLLY BLOOMERS—radio guest OTIS MEAL—Nullanne’s boss RUFF LOOKING—a thug MELINDA SUE LOU—a Martian
SETTING: The year 2020 in America. The set should be quite simple, with minimal props that are representational rather than concrete. Doubling of roles is suggested. Some roles can be done as voices only.
(Ethereal music at opening in darkness.)
VOICEOVER Take me to your Oatmobile!
(Lights up on NULLANNE waking from a dream. With her is her partner, DEE.)
DEE (nudging NULLANNE) Turn off the alarm.
NULLANNE (turns off the alarm and speaks directly to the audience) Hey! I’m Nullanne and this is my partner Dee, who wakes me every morning because I’m a little deaf. I have this ringing in my ears. I think it’s Martians trying to contact me with an important message, but the doctors say it’s tinnitis.
DEE Sleep well?
NULLANNE Yes, but I had a weird dream. It was really dark and a voice was saying, “Take me to your Oatmobile.” And you had run off with a biker chick or something.
DEE Don’t be late for work.
NULLANNE I won’t.
(Lights down on DEE. NULLANNE addresses the audience.)
I sell Frozen Oaties door-to-door in my Refrigomatic truck. You’ve heard of Frozen Oaties, haven’t you? You might not think there’d be much of a market for it, but I’ve been America’s Number One Frozen Oaties Seller four years in a row since 2016, and Frozen Oaties is now a global empire with franchises all over the world.
Now today starts like any other day. The alarm goes off, Dee nudges me, and I turn off the alarm—but you already saw that, right? I make the coffee and hop in the shower; Dee comes in, uses the toilet and flushes it—and I get scalded in the shower, fall in the cat’s litter box and have to re-shower.
(She gets into her truck.)
Eventually I get out on my route in my custom-made ZXKG Refrigomatic truck. It has dual carbs and overhead prehensile timing—or something like that. Top-of-the-line, you know. It has a great radio, and while I wait for the sun to come up, I tune in every morning to Holly Jolly on BBC World News:
HOLLY JOLLY (HOLLY JOLLY appears at a desk. Other speakers will enter as they are introduced.)
…with prehensile timing. Economic analysts are optimistic that the economy is recovering, citing the reduction of gasoline prices below $50 per gallon for the first time in ten years. The U.S. Congress has approved a plan to allow homeowners to mortgage their houses in order to purchase gasoline for their vehicles.
In politics, the United States Supreme Court announced today that President Wanker has been named President-for-Life, due to the continuing war on terror. The President, speaking from the Steel Room of the White House, had this to say:
PRESIDENT WANKER This is a great day for me and all my fellow Americans. The last three elections were contentious ones that served only to drive our country farther apart, with people questioning the rights of the Court to decide what is right for the country. We are at war, folks, and it is not the time to change horses in the middle of the road. We must show our ally, Tony Blair, that America will stand strong; we will not cut-and-run; we will stay the course in our continuing war on terror, drugs, the economy and all evil people who stand against us. These are hostage times, my fellow Americans, and having elections every four years merely distracts me from doing my patriotic duty to see that America is on the godly path to global domination.
HOLLY JOLLY Democrats who raised polite objections to the plan were arrested under the New and Improved Super Patriot Act, which makes it a treasonous offense to question a war-time President. They are now in custody at Guantanamo Bay where televised interrogations and executions will continue throughout the upcoming sweeps week. In a related story, weapons of mass destruction were not found in the nation of Halliburton Ltd. (formerly known as the Middle East), but the search continues….
NULLANNE I turn off the radio and decide to make a few house calls. Today has been like any other day—only something’s not quite right. I check my pants, but they’re zipped. Then I realize it’s dark, and it’s been dark all day. Usually it’s light by the time I get to my first house, but today it’s still dark. I don’t think much about it, but by noon I begin to get a little concerned. I can’t make any sales. No one even opens the door.
CUSTOMER (voiceover) Go away! It’s still dark out!
NULLANNE I know that, but I don’t argue. I decide to eat my lunch—a Frozen Oaties and artichoke-heart sandwich and a Zucchini Cola Lite—and listen to the news:
HOLLY JOLLY …dark all day.
NULLANNE I know that.
HOLLY JOLLY To repeat: the sun has not come up today. It is a cloudless sky, but it’s still dark, and no one seems to know why. Scientists are offering conflicting theories, some claiming that it is a solar eclipse. With us is Dr. Luke Warm of the National Institute of Eclipses with his theories of this dark all day. Dr. Warm?
LUKE WARM There are no scheduled eclipses, therefore it is not an eclipse. We have postulated the “Sleeping Sun” theory, however: the gravitational hemispheric rotation of the ethereal cosmology has caused a scoliation in the inherent helixical diaphonies, causing the sun to over sleep, as it were. (pause)
Actually, we have no idea.
HOLLY JOLLY Government experts on global warming insist that temperatures in the nineties at Christmas are no indication of a climate change and have assured Americans that the President’s environmental policies are in no way a contributing factor to this dark day.
Some politicians in Washington blame meteorologists for their weather satellites; the electric companies for not keeping track of this energy shortage; the American public for driving S.U.V.s; the liberal media; the economy; the cultural elite; the homeless; gays; and black people.
Televangelists and theologians are claiming that the darkness signals the “end of times,” as prophesied in the Bible. Here in our studio is televangelist and Secretary of State Dr. Graham Cracker.
(enter DR. CRACKER)
DR. CRACKER Brothers and sisters, this darkness is a sign from God that we are all doomed sinners. Once more the liberal elite and activist judges who have not yet been eradicated under the Super Patriot Act are clamoring for homosexuals to marry! But friends, this would be the ruination of marriage, the downfall of our great, god-fearing Christian nation! Allowing gays to marry would destroy the sanctity of marriage! This is further proof of the decline of morals in our great country, and God has decided to take us in the cover of darkness. Are you ready to meet your Maker, friends? Are you in need of some salvation? If not, I, Dr. Graham Cracker of the Church of God the Economist, am here to help you pave your way to heaven. All you gotta do is send me, Dr. Graham Cracker, five thousand dollars in small, unmarked bills, and I will personally see that you sail into God’s arms on a superhighway of love! Yes, friends, God came to me the day b’fore yesterday and said, ‘Brother Cracker, I’m fed up with all this fornicatin’ and cheatin’ and all these gays, blasphemers and stenographers. You just tell my people to send you $5000, and they’ll get a front row seat on Judgment Day.’
HOLLY JOLLY Thank you, Dr. Cracker.
(Lights down on DR. CRACKER)
In other areas, philosophers, gurus, shamans and other long-haired weirdos are suggesting that it is still night. With me is Molly Bloomers, left-wing radical, teacher, and spokesperson for the Grim Reefers and Rad Wymmyn.
(Enter MOLLY BLOOMERS)
MOLLY BLOOMERS May the power of the goddess be with you. And it’s wymmynist—with two m’s and two y’s, the y’s representing the yin, the yang, and the yoni.
HOLLY JOLLY Ms. Bloomers, what exactly is your group’s position on this crisis?
MOLLY BLOOMERS People should care about Mother Earth and the Goddess, and—
HOLLY JOLLY I meant the darkness.
MOLLY BLOOMERS But it is all a oneness, is it not? If we could just groove to the Goddess, we could all be one with the earth, and we would be the land, and the land would be we. Besides, what is wrong with it being dark? The Goddess has obviously decided that it should be dark.
HOLLY JOLLY You consider your self a “time-ist.” What exactly is that?
MOLLY BLOOMERS Time is an arbitrary dimension ascribed to men and others who are phallic-impaired. Clocks are the patriarchy’s attempt at categorizing an uncategorical concept, and they have finally come to their senses and gone berserk. Clocks are only random quantifiers at best, and we never trusted them. Now our spirits are free to wander the psychotropic universe free from the stifling vectors of pure randomnicity.
HOLLY JOLLY The clocks. Uh-huh.
MOLLY BLOOMERS Because of testosterone poisoning, men make schedules and create rules because they have to confine and control and put everything in a little box. But the Goddess is too big for their boxes! She has finally gotten pissed at all the crap men are puttin’ down, and She’s taken it into her own hands to remedy the situation! No longer will women be subjected to the whims of the penis-worshipping, maturbatory patriarchy—!
(HOLLY JOLLY cuts her off quickly. NULLANNE again addresses the audience.)
NULLANNE That seemed a bit radical, but it made sense too. I mean, think about time. We have the past, present, and future, right? But when exactly do we exist? Now? Well, when is now? Is it now? Or now? I mean, right now? By the time I say now, and by the time your ears grasp that idea, now is already gone. You know? We are always in the now—but we are always in the past too, wondering about the future. It makes my head hurt.
HOLLY JOLLY We’ve just received word that MAJOCO CORP, an environmentally friendly power company, will hold a press conference later in the day in which former Vice-President Hard Dick, newly elected King of Halliburton Ltd. and C.E.O. of MAJOCO, will announce an important breakthrough that impinges on this dark all day.
In related news, Osama Bin Laden’s newest musical, Seventeen Vestal Virgins, opened in New York this week to rave reviews. And despite interviews with Bin Laden on Entertainment Tonight, CNN, and a guest host appearance on Saturday Night Live, the Pentagon has been unable to capture the elusive leader.
NULLANNE I thought I would try another route but nobody would come to the door. They’d still me it was dark out, and I already knew that. I decided to call it a day—or night, depending.
HOLLY JOLLY Yes, we know it’s still dark outside! Please do not call the radio station and tie up our switchboards! This is not a drill! I repeat: this is not a drill! Let’s go live to U.S. President Wanker at the White House.
PRESIDENT WANKER …the highest level of security alert—the puce alert. The axises of evil have expanded, my fellow Americans, to include most countries other than ours and our ally, Tony Blair, and they are jealous of our obviously superior way of life. We have some special intelligence that this darkness may be a plot of the French government to discredit us in the world’s eyes. Evil Islamic terrorists armed with WMDs may have stolen the sun’s light in retaliation for some of the alleged prison abuses the liberal press has written about. We have deployed our Star Wars Defensive Shield just in case. We shall remain vigilant, friends, but let us not cower in darkness. God has chosen me as your President in this time of crisis, and he has assured me that we will prevail in this ongoing war against terror.
HOLLY JOLLY The President has declared a state of emergency and has urged all Americans to go home and stay there! Lock your doors and windows and don’t open the door to anyone! Terrorists may be prowling the streets and may be trying to steal your light! All available military forces not engaged around the world have been mobilized! Gangs of hooligans and hoodlums are prowling the streets, causing all kinds of mischief.
NULLANNE No wonder I’m not making any sales today. Everyone has panicked. It’s only dark. I decided to go home. I thought I should call Otis Meal, my boss, but he was once a mailman and thinks the Oaties must get through. But what’s the point? The President has ordered everyone to go home, but I know what Otis’s reply will be.
OTIS MEAL (voiceover) Does the President pay your salary, Mrs. Nullanne Void?
NULLANNE He always refers to people that way, using the Mr. or Mrs. (he refuses to even consider Ms.) and the person’s first and last names. I’ll call anyway and say I’m going home.
(she takes out a cell phone)
Great. A recording.
VOICEOVER We’re sorry, all of our Frozen Oaties’ agents are busy at the present time. Your call is important to us, so please hold the line. If you have an emergency need for Frozen Oaties, the breakfast of runner-ups, the breakfast that’s not just for breakfast anymore, the breakfast that has absolutely no nutritional value whatsoever, press “one” now. If you wish to leave a message, press “two” now. If you’d like to talk to a real human being, wait until the sun shines again.
NULLANNE I thought I ought to leave a message saying I’d gone home, but all I got was another computer with other options, so I just hung up. ‘They have all gone home,’ I thought. ‘So shall I.’ And yes, I often think in grammatically perfect sentences. I used to teach English before it became a foreign language.
(A hand reaches out of the shadows and grabs NULLANNE by the arm. Enter RUFF LOOKING, dressed in Army fatigues or the like.)
RUFF LOOKING Whatcha doin’ out here in the dark, girlie?
NULLANNE Oh—you startled me!
(To audience)
And he had. And he was accompanied by people dressed in similar fashion as he—all pointing what appeared to be heavy weaponry at me. (to RUFF)
I—I was just going home, sir. I couldn’t make any sales today, so I thought I would just go home.
RUFF LOOKING ‘Course ya can’t make no sales. It’s dark out!
NULLANNE (to audience) ‘No shit,’ I thought, but, wisely, I think, did not tell him that.
RUFF Got any ‘dentification, girlie?
NULLANNE Sure.
(to audience)
I handed him my official Frozen Oaties Salesperson of the Year badge that was pinned to my shirt.
RUFF Nullanne Void, huh? What kinda commie-fag-pink name is that? Never mind. I’s just gonna call yer office an’ see if yer really a Frozen Oatie seller like it says.
NULLANNE But no one is there. They’ve all gone home.
RUFF An’ so should you!
NULLANNE But I was—
RUFF No backtalk, Void, or whoever you are. Ever’body’s been ordered home by the President of the U-nited States, and we’re gonna see that ever’body does. Maybe you’s a terrorist who’s ‘sponsible for it bein’ dark an’ all. Now get outta that car!
NULLANNE It’s a truck.
(to audience)
I couldn’t believe I said that. I’m usually not that assertive. It must have been all that Goddess talk.
RUFF You shouldna said that, smart-mouth! I don’t like bein’ corrected.
NULLANNE (to audience)
I could well imagine, which is why I did not tell him his tattoo contained a comma splice. But then I thought: who are these people and what do they want?
Ruff went off to call and returned bringing the “news” that no one was there. I did not think it wise to say ‘I told you so.’
RUFF Okay, boys, shoot ‘er!
NULLANNE What!? Wait!
RUFF Wait for what? You been knockin’ on good ‘Mericans’ doors all day, all night, whatever, h’rassin good ‘Merican folks. An’ you pacifically violated a di-rect order from our beloved President Wanker. We got orders to shoot anybody looks ‘spicious, and you shore look ‘spicious to me, girlie!
NULLANNE Wait! (to audience)
I tried to think fast, but that was never my strong suit.
(to RUFF)
Wait! I know where the light went! It was on the radio!
RUFF Oh, yeah?
NULLANNE Yeah—I mean, yes. Uh—uh—Martians have landed on the horizon and blotted out the light! The Goddess is fed up with the way men are running the world!
(to audience)
Ruff did something that I assumed was laughter or a heart attack—it was hard to tell—and then—
RUFF All right, boys! Shoot ‘er!
NULLANNE (to audience)
I really thought this was it. I closed my eyes, though I don’t know why. Maybe I thought it wouldn’t hurt as much. I thought of praying, but I knew no deity would be impressed by the litany running through my head: “Oh, shit! Oh, shit! Oh. Shit!” I waited and felt nothing. I thought getting shot would be a little painful, but there wasn’t even a little initial discomfort.
Then I opened my eyes, and they were gone! And so was my brand-new truck!
(to herself)
Oh, shit! All they wanted was my truck! But I didn’t hear the Frozen Oatie jungle as they drove away. I may be deaf, but—why am I still standing here, unshot, unharmed even, unless one considers talking to oneself harmful?
(to audience)
Then this green light shone down on me, and my brain reacted automatically:
(to herself)
Oh, shit! Now what?
(to audience)
Then I heard a voice that somehow sounded green.
MELINDA SUE LOU Now you are safe, Goddess Nullanne Void. We trust those were not friends of yours. They did not seem so.
NULLANNE Oh—uh—no, no, they weren’t friends. They were going to kill me.
MELINDA SUE LOU Kill? What is kill?
NULLANNE A verb, here used as an infinitive, meaning to murder, to destroy, to end a life.
MELINDA SUE LOU Goddess, how does one “end a life”?
NULLANNE Well—one dies. Quits breathing. Kicks the bucket. Cashes in one’s chips. Does the last tango. Gone. Defunct.
(to audience)
There was no
immediate answer and I began to wonder to whom I was talking (yes, still being
grammatically correct) or to what. And where was I? MELINDA SUE LOU You are here, Goddess Nullanne Void. And you are talking to us, the Mighty Poo-bahs from Mars, who have come for you. We have been trying to contact you for some time, but you seem to be hard of hearing.
NULLANNE I am. I have this ringing in my ears.
MELINDA SUE LOU That ringing is us.
NULLANNE That should be, “That ringing is we.” It’s a predicate nominative used with the linking verb is, and therefore—oh, never mind. What do you want with me?
MELINDA SUE LOU We were coming to that—or should it be “Us were”? We have come for you, Goddess Nullanne Void. We have found you.
NULLANNE (to audience) “Goddess?” I thought. All I could see was darkness, pure darkness—but can one say one can see darkness, or is it nothing one sees? And what does nothing look like?
MELINDA SUE LOU We have found you, our long-lost, little soul-sister. You are the Goddess that was prophesied by our Sayer of Sooths, the Toothless Sooth. When you were a mere babe, you were sent here to learn the language and customs so that one day we would be able to communicate with this world, and that you, Goddess, would lead us and this world to a higher plane of existence.
NULLANNE You’re kidding, right?
MELINDA SUE LOU I am Melinda Sue Lou.
NULLANNE I mean, you must be joking, having fun, pulling my leg. I—oh, never mind.
MELINDA SUE LOU You were also sent here to escape the clutches of the emperor Rufus, your father, who would have had you—well, perhaps your word killed applies here. Our term “engrossed-in-a-profoundly-boring-comma-tedious-comma-not-to-mention-nauseating-comma-liason-with-an-aardvark-in-heat-exclamation-point”—because you were destined to become the High Goddess as soon as you stopped messing in your diapers. And then we could not find you.
NULLANNE My parents did move around a lot.
MELINDA SUE LOU Indeed. We could not communicate with you when we did find you—you really are hard of hearing. But then we found a secret decoding ring in a box of Wheetabix and it worked.
NULLANNE You’re serious, right?
MELINDA SUE LOU I am Melinda Sue Lou.
NULLANNE I mean, you speak the truth.
MELINDA SUE LOU What is truth?
NULLANNE Oh, well, you might as well ask what is beauty or happiness. Love. Art.
MELINDA SUE LOU Are they all the same?
NULLANNE Truth is not false; beauty is not ugly—but those aren’t really definitions. Oh, never mind.
(pause)
MELINDA SUE LOU Goddess Nullanne Void, how does one “never mind”?
NULLANNE (to audience) They finally convinced me by pointing out how different I was: I had never watched Big Brother; I had never had penis envy; I had never faked an orgasm; and I had never disco danced. At school at Our Lady of Perpetual Motion, I always drew better and wrote more legibly when I used my feet.
My father Rufus had apparently contracted pneumonia in a meteor shower while chasing a Venusian princess and had “gone to Earth,” as Melinda Sue Lou put it.
I decided to go with them, but I thought I ought to go home and pack a few things and say goodbye to Dee—but Dee had left a note saying Ginger Spice had dropped by and they had run off together to play the slobber blues on each other until the cows come home.
Well, they’re waiting. Their ship, my ship, the Mars Bar, is waiting. I, the High Goddess, have my own High Chair and everything. (NULLANNE gets into her “spaceship” and sits next to MELINDA SUE LOU, who is piloting the Mars Bar with her feet and munching on a bowl of Frozen Oaties.)
NULLANNE (to MELINDA SUE LOU) Hey, are you really responsible for the darkness?
MELINDA SUE LOU Yes and no.
NULLANNE (to audience) I found this to be a common Martian answer—one that summed up all possibilities and therefore quite apropos.
MELINDA SUE LOU Time has slipped loose from its moorings, yes, and it may be because the Supreme Goddess has decided to fornicate with people’s heads awhile—she does love practical jokes—but there are a number of other complex factors such as the time/space/zero gravity/spaceship-in-the-pudding dichotomy that must be addresses and quantitatively analyzed before we can postulate a qualitatively definitive response to your inquiry.
NULLANNE (to audience) That’s the way she talks. That’s the way they all talk. I just love it, don’t you? I’ve found my element! (to MELINDA SUE LOU)
Can you get BBC America or NPR on this thing? Maybe we’re on the news.
MELINDA SUE LOU Sure. We never miss Ground Force.
HOLLY JOLLY …spaceship in the pudding. MAJOCO C.E.O. Hard Dick has announced new plans for the use of the sun’s light. MAJOCO will plug the sun back in when the initial payment of $8 trillion is made and when President Wanker apologizes for calling him a twat.
BLACKOUT
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