Enjoy!
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Circa Winter, 1998
The Dead Monkey
by Blake Cotton & Erin West
by Blake Cotton & Erin West
Dramatis Personae:
Erin, a woman
Blake, a man
Prologue (to audience):
Erin: Have you ever treasured something so much that your life would be over without it?
Blake: Have you ever been so jealous you would kill?
Erin: Have you ever had something you loved wrenched away from you? Did you feel your soul go with it?
Both: Was it a monkey? Hello, we are _____ and we will be performing the original scene: The Dead Monkey
ACT I, Scene I
Blake is in a kitchen by himself. After a short interval, Erin enters the room.
Blake: Hi, hon. How was your day?
Erin: Hello.
Blake: What's the matter with you?
Erin: You know what's the matter with me.
Blake: Huh?
Erin: Did you think I wouldn't find out?
Blake: I don't know what you're talking about.
Erin: The monkey, you killed the monkey.
Blake: What monkey?
Erin: The monkey I raised since it was a baby monkey. The monkey I spent my days with while you were at work. The monkey I was going to give to my first daughter on her wedding day. The monkey that meant everything in the world to me.
Blake: Oh. That monkey. I didn't do anything to your monkey.
Oh yeah? Well, what's this then?
Erin walks to the side of the kitchen and pulls out a trash bag, from which she pulls a dead monkey.
Blake: Looks like a dead monkey, but I've never seen that monkey before in my life. It doesn't look a thing like your monkey.
Erin: Don't you think I know my own monkey? My pride and joy?
Blake: No. Your monkey was a lot smaller.
Erin: No. This is my monkey.
Blake: No, it's not.
Erin: Yes, it is.
Blake: NO, IT'S NOT.
Erin: Yes it is.
Blake: Okay, if I admit that I killed your monkey, would you be nicer to me?
Erin: No.
Blake: Good, 'cause I didn't kill him.
Erin: Who killed him then?
Blake: Well, it wasn't me.
Erin: You are always lying about stuff, like when little Bobby mysteriously died after falling off the house.
Blake: I only tried to save him. I saw him fall off the house so I climbed up on the roof to have more empathy for him.
Erin: You pushed him and you know it. But what about my monkey?
Blake: What about the monkey? Who cares about your monkey? What about my three toed sloth? Do you really think I'd believe he got on the treadmill and turned it up to 45 all by himself? I loved that sloth. He reminded me of my deceased brother Beau.
Erin: The one with one eye?
Yes. And three toes on each foot. The one YOU loved!
Erin: He DID have wonderful toes, all six of them (pause) But that's not the point here. What we have here is a dead monkey. My monkey. And you killed him.
Blake: Alright, I admit it, but what are you gonna do, send me to the monkey police?
Erin: I hate you!
Blake: I hate you too, that's why I killed your monkey. You only married me because I reminded you of Beau (pause) but with one more eye and (pause) four more toes.
Erin: That is a lie! I married you because I was drunk. Don't flatter yourself like that. You don't look a thing like Beau, even if you took out four toes and an eye. Beau was beautiful.
Blake: Well, fine. What are you gonna do about it? What are you gonna do about me? What are you gonna do about the monkey? What are you gonna do about our children?
Erin: What children? You killed Bobby!
Blake: I didn't kill Bobby, and I didn't kill the monkey.
Erin: You killed my monkey, you admitted it.
Blake: Yeah, well you killed my sloth.
Erin: That's it.
Erin picks up the dead monkey and hurls him at Blake, knocking Blake out cold. She picks up the phone and dials
Erin: Hello? Is this the Idaho Falls Monkey Police?
CURTAIN
