about the (re)making project
Please feel free to take the plays from this project and use them freely as a resource for your own work: that is to say, don't just make some cuts or rewrite a few passages or re-arrange them or put in a few texts that you like better, but pillage the plays as I have pillaged the structures and contents of the plays of Euripides and Brecht and stuff out of Soap Opera Digest and the evening news and the internet, and build your own, entirely new, piece--and then, please, put your own name to the work that results.
But, if you would like to perform the plays essentially or substantially as I have composed them, they are protected by copyright in the versions you read here, and you need to clear performance rights. For professional performance rights, contact Thomas Pearson of International Creative Management at tpearson@icmtalent.com or 212-556-5600. For amateur performance rights, contact Libby Edwards at charlesmeeplays@yahoo.com.
- Charles Mee
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The Mail Order Bride
by C H A R L E S L . M E E
Coney Island Avenue, Brooklyn.
A street of Turks and Pakistanis and Russians
of Muslims and Jews as business partners
of Sikhs in turbans wearing sweatshirts that say
"Brooklyn, N.Y."
1. Argan
[Argan enters,
a whirlwind energy, motion, and fast talk,
a blood pressure monitor attached to his arm.
He is followed by
Tina, his stylist and arts advisor,
with a little bowl of hair coloring in her hand
and Angie, in sweats,
his alternative medicine physician and fitness advisor,
carrying towels.
Argan's hair is done up in pieces of aluminum foil
and Tina is putting blonde streaks in his hair.
ARGAN
I don't see quite why
I should have a sore throat
if I've taken my hawthorn berry this morning
and my horehound stems
and my back
I have a little
whatchamacallit in my back
what do you call it?
a little
stitch
is that what you call it?
the medical term?
TINA
Can't you sit?
ARGAN
No, I can't sit!
ANGIE
He has to keep his heart rate up.
ARGAN
I have to keep my heart rate up!
You've no idea what I have to do to stay alive.
TINA
and young
