#ipromiseiminquarantine

{30} 91-DIVOC

by JouskaXu (4958 words)

A Play on ZoomSince we are in quarantine and live theater has been put on hold, I wrote a play that can be read through Zoom about our world right now if it was even worse. _______________________________________

Characters

Mak: male or female. The they/them pronoun is used to refer to Mak because the gender is to be decided by the director. Looks college age.

Vee: female but can be changed to Victor if needed, preferably African American. Late teenager or older.

Roommate: Mak's lower range voice. Gender depends on Mak's gender.

Bodies: can be directed to not be seen.

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PART ONE

The screen is dark. A record label and details pop up on the bottom of a black screen like a Zoom video recording. This image is shaky like someone is holding the recording device. Between each new journal recording there is a cut and it is like someone starting a new video entry or a quick black screen to represent the start of each new entry. The short entries are quick and almost a montage. This play can be filmed in several chunks and put together or performed in a one take.

[Intense panicked music plays softly]

[MAK runs out of the apartment]

MAK: Hello? Hello? Is this working again?

The recording shows a guy holding a video recorder to his face. He looks scared but is relieved his video is working.

I don't know how much time I have. Ya know, [laughs] we knew life would be this way for a little while until things started calming down. But they didn't. Obviously. No social contact whatsoever was allowed. You weren't even allowed to talk to someone from your door. The virus spread through physical contact they think. And that's when people started refusing to leave their homes at all. That's why I'm in this situation now. Trying to find someone. I've been YouTube live streaming and saving these videos for a while now. Hopefully this is all over the internet. My one semester as an MIT assistant had to have been for something.

If anyone is listening, I had to leave because of the virus. What the virus made people. Anyone who has technological access should be able to hear this. Come on, please. I've been trying for ages for someone to hear this. Gosh, I'm just really scared. Things just got way crazier.

[MAK is panicked and almost crying]

And that's saying a lot. I don't know why I keep trying to reach someone. Because everyone's dead now.

Camera flips and shows MAK is outside their apartment. The scenery looks like it was torn apart.

I'm trying not to freak out but-bu-

[The screen slides down as MAK slowly sits against a tree]

The virus made people go crazy.

In the corner of the screen you can glimpse two dead bodies.

[Transition music]

Scene change. The screen is MAK inside the apartment. It is much different from the opening speech and he is calmer like nothing bad has happened yet. MAK sits at a table, couch, etc. You can tell this was from a while ago. Some journal entry days may be cut out for time's sake.