SKY

WIND

MAN

WOMAN

CHORUS (LARGE MAN, DANCER, MUSICIAN)

​

An empty stage.

​

A voice:

​

SKY

In the beginning there was—

 

Another voice:

 

WIND

A Sun-light strip, stretching throughout space!

 

A strip of light appears.

 

SKY enters.

 

SKY

Yes. Sure, we can call it that. And it was—

 

WIND enters.

 

WIND

Not so dark anymore.

 

SKY

This went on for sometime and there was peace.

 

WIND

Well, there wasn’t much of anything else.

 

SKY

Right. This went on for sometime and there was not much of anything else… And then, after the beginning, there was a—

 

WIND

Tick, tick, tick. (repeats the ticking through SKY’s line.)

​

SKY

A sound. Yes. Sure. It repeated, over and over and over, and it was… not so quiet in the not so dark space. This went on for sometime. There was—

 

WIND

Repetition.

 

SKY

Repetition. Yes. Sure. Everything stayed the same.

 

WIND

It was harmonious.

 

SKY

And then, after the beginning and the part just following the beginning, there was—

 

A naked MAN enters.

 

MAN

Hello.

 

SKY & WIND

Who are you?

 

MAN

I don’t know. But I feel –

 

WIND

Chilly?

 

MAN

Perhaps.

 

SKY

There was a thing, man. And man was chilly because even though he occupied the light strip he was naked. It was cold being naked—

 

WIND

And alone.

 

SKY

Yes that too. It wasn’t comfortable. This went on for sometime. There was light, and a ticking (gestures to WIND to resume ticking), and a cold, nude man. But then, sometime later, the man—

 

MAN

Act!

 

WIND

Huh?

 

MAN

I will act. I will take action!

 

WIND

What do you mean?

 

MAN

I’ll do this! (Makes a gesture.)

 

WIND

I don’t get it…

 

MAN

It’s a way of saying, “thanks.”

 

WIND

Thanks?

 

SKY

Man was thankful that he existed. And that he occupied the light strip with the insufferable ticking.

 

WIND

As opposed to?

 

SKY

The vast dark silent nothingness surrounding the light strip with the ticking.

 

WIND

Yeah it was probably better to be cold and nude in the light.

 

SKY

And then, all of a sudden, there was—

 

A naked WOMAN enters.

 

WOMAN

Hello.

 

MAN

Hello.

 

WOMAN

I look kinda like you

 

MAN

I look kinda like you

 

MAN & WOMAN

Except, different.

 

SKY

There was woman. She looked kind of like man but different. Together, they were—

 

WIND

Not so alone.

 

SKY

Yes. And they were thankful. So they did the gesture.

 

WIND

And they repeated it

 

MAN

Again

 

WOMAN

And again

 

SKY

And again

 

WIND

Repetition.

 

SKY

It worked for them.

 

Silence

 

WIND

Wait. (Pause) Is that it? Then what happened?

 

MAN

(Still doing the gesture) Yeah, we can’t keep doing this forever.

 

WOMAN

It gets tiring!

 

SKY

Okay, Okay! I’m getting to the next part!

 

MAN & WOMAN

OKAY!

 

 

WIND

You could speed it up a bit…

 

SKY

We need to emphasis for how long this part went on…. (Pause; scowls from MAN, WOMAN, & WIND) Fine. So in the beginning there was a light strip and then a tick tick tick (gestures to WIND) and then a man and then a woman, and then, quite some time after that, things started getting crazy.

 

WOMAN

It’s about time.

 

SKY

Learn some patience! More men and women showed up. It was—

 

WIND

Procreation?

 

SKY

Yes. Sure. They procreated, I suppose.

 

MAN

Is that what this is about?

 

SKY

No! Who is telling this story here, you or me?

 

WIND

I thought I was the one who was going to tell—

 

SKY

No! You’re just the wind that makes the ticking sound. And the other sounds. I’m the sky! I see everything that is happening and explain it.

 

WOMAN

Seems kind of… hierarchical. If you ask me.

 

MAN

She makes a good point.

 

SKY

(Frustrated) AFTER THE BEGINNING, and the other stuff, more and more men and women showed up, there had been procreation—

 

The CHORUS enters.

 

CHORUS

Hello everyone!

 

WIND

Hello people! How do you like your light strip and your ticking sound?

 

CHORUS

It’s better than nothing.

 

SKY

And all the people started to do the gesture to show thanks. And they were all naked and yes, it was repetitive, but they were together and they were happy.

 

WOMAN

Are we though?

 

CHORUS

We’re happy because this is better than nothing.

 

MAN

But it is kind of… windy.

 

WIND

Why do I have to be the bad guy here!

 

SKY

Deal with it, okay. It’s part of what happened, and it was better than nothing.

 

WOMAN

I got an idea.

 

CHORUS

What’s that?

 

WOMAN

Hang on. Just keep doing (she does the gesture).

 

WOMAN exits.

 

SKY

Woman went away and the people kept right on at it. They were a very homogeneous group –

 

MAN

And the wind still made them cold.

 

CHORUS

Very cold!

 

WIND

Why don’t you just get off my back, okay…

 

WOMAN returns, clothed.

 

WOMAN

Everyone look.

 

SKY

The woman returned, and she was…

 

WIND

The same?

 

SKY

She was the same… but different.

 

MAN

What is that?

 

WOMAN

I don’t know, but I’m not as cold as before.

 

SKY

The woman had on clothing. The people did not know what to make of her transformation.

 

CHORUS

You’re…different! This is somehow offensive—

 

MAN

To our sensibilities. Shame!

 

CHORUS

Shame on differences.

 

WIND

I’ll bet she doesn’t mind me so much anymore.

 

WOMAN

You know, you’re not so bad now.

 

WOMAN does a new gesture.

 

SKY

People tried to carry on as before but things were—

 

WIND

Different?

 

SKY

Different, yes. Then everything got weird.

 

LARGE MAN steps out of the

CHORUS, goes off, comes back clothed in

the same uniform as WOMAN.

 

LARGE MAN

Hey. Hey guys! HEY EVERYONE! Listen up. Maybe she’s right. This clothing thing isn’t so bad. It makes our light strip more—

 

He distributes uniforms for the

others. MAN doesn’t put one on, he just

keeps doing his gesture.

 

WIND

Comfortable?

 

LARGE

Yes, what Wind said! I like it more. I think we should all do this.

 

DANCER

Hey everyone, I got an idea!

 

DANCER goes off. Comes back with

a different style of clothes.

 

EVERYONE ELSE

(Gasping) What is wrong with your clothes!?

 

DANCER

What do you mean?

 

CHORUS

They’re… not like our clothes.

 

DANCER

Yes, but if I put on these clothes then I can do this! (Does a new gesture.)

 

EVERYONE ELSE

(Gasps)

 

WOMAN

Check this out. (Does a new gesture.)

 

SKY

These gestures were different from the one man had started—

 

WIND

You mean the only one they had ever known…

 

SKY

Yes. Sure.

 

MUSICIAN

Hold on just a sec.

 

CHORUS

What?

 

MUSICIAN

I got another idea.

 

MUSICIAN goes off.

 

MAN

I don’t like the sound of this…

 

WIND

The man was a purist.

​

SKY

He remained steadfast. Even when the others started putting on clothes and doing new gestures he did not. In his view, the light strip and the ticking were just fine the way they were.

 

MUSICIAN returns with an

instrument.

 

MUSICIAN

So about my idea.

 

MAN

Count me out.

 

MUSICIAN

I can make that awful ticking noise go away if I do this. (Plays)

 

EVERYONE ELSE

(Gasps) Remarkable! Amazing! Unbelievable!

 

SKY

That’s when things went haywire. Individualism became—

 

WIND

Anarchy.

 

LARGE MAN

I can do this!

 

DANCER

And I can do this!

 

MUSICIAN

And I can do this!

 

An explosion of movement and

sound. (MAN keeps right on doing his

original gesture.)

 

WIND

(Over the noise)

Wild movement

Sequence patterns

Devised to flatter

And the sounds

Scape the surrounds

​

WIND (CONT.)

Filling the space

And the light strip

Shifted and flipped

A burst here

Sonic boom there

Crashing waves flow

Through and drip drip drip

Men got dirty

Nasty unique

And women decided

To strip and to tease

Nudity was not

What it had used to be

No longer accepted

Now unnatural

And throughout this insanity

The man just stood there

With his single gesture

And bottom ass bare!

 

MAN stops; pulls WOMAN aside.

 

MAN

Look at what you started.

 

WOMAN

Me?

 

MAN

Yeah. Ever since you went and put clothes on nothing is the same.

 

 

WOMAN

But look how happy everyone is!

 

MAN

Are they though?

 

WOMAN

What do you mean?

 

MAN

Look at them.

​

SKY

Man saw humanity and they were fighting and it wasn’t dark anymore, or peaceful, or repetitive. It was complicated. And this went on for sometime.

 

       The movement and sounds, that had

turned into warfare and chaos and violence,

peter out.

       CHORUS exits one after another

 during the speech below, followed by

WOMAN and finally MAN.

 

SKY (CONT.)

But eventually things began to fade away. The music and the dancing and the people with their thoughts and ideas, imposing their wills, they all began to fade away. The light strip came back but it was… different. It was changed. The ticking too came back but it was…calm and repetitive.

 

MAN

Just the way I like it.

 

SKY

Just the way he liked it. And then woman took off her clothes, and rejoined man, and they looked up to the sky and they repeated the gesture as he had done all along. They were thankful. And the world forgave them and slowly, over time, they too faded away. And over time, the ticking too stopped. And over time, the light strip too rejoined…the darkness. And existence—just at it had once begun—ended. And it had been good, and so too had man and his habits been good, and woman and hers, and the people and theirs, and even the Wind had not been so bad, I guess.

 

WIND

HEY!

 

SKY

And the sky? The sky was happy. The sky got to see it all.

 

Blackout.