Note:
An asterisk (*) indicates a change in the space in some way.
A comma on a separate line (,) is a pause, beat, a moment, a change in tone etc. This is context dependent.
The Company. A single room - barren, white walls. No personal effects. DANIEL talks to the audience. He’s corporate, clipped.
DANIEL: What do we mean by success? What does that mean? It’s elusive to find a singular definition. We all have our successes. But - success cannot be earnt. It is only bought. That is what we have done. We have bought her. We own her.
Let me tell you about her. Let me tell you about her and what she brought me. What she brought us.
What was this Company before her? You’ll remember, yes, we were nothing. Life is nothing without… (thinks) pleasure, satisfaction, (savouring) happiness even. She brought us that.
And what do I regret? One small thing, if I may: that I did not witness her transformation.
*
A taxi. Late. Speeding skylines. CLIFF, a taxi driver, and MARY, his passenger.
CLIFF: (looking directly at her through the mirror) You’re the face of it, no?
MARY: (deflecting) You must have seen me from somewhere else.
CLIFF: It’s you, isn’t it? Plastered everywhere: up on the billboards.
MARY: I have one of those faces.
CLIFF: No, it’s definitely you.
MARY: We have a tendency to attach significance to strangers.
,
CLIFF: Do you say that a lot?
MARY: (artificial) It’s been a tough day. Can you turn up the radio? I like to listen to the beat of the music.
*
The Company. DANIEL looks outward, his back to NICOLE.
NICOLE: What do you think?
DANIEL: She’s useful.
NICOLE: You’ll take her on?
DANIEL: We’ll use her. She’s popular, semi-attractive, a blank canvas. They project what they want onto her. Mindlessly satisfies them to the point of ineptitude. We can tell them anything.
NICOLE: Not too… (she tries to think of a word)
DANIEL: (turning to face her) What?
NICOLE: The way she looks.
DANIEL: Ah, no, they’ll go crazy. And they’ll drink it because she’s the face of it. They want to be her.
NICOLE: Do you drink it?
DANIEL: No. Read the label. Appears I’m the only one that does.
NICOLE: Right.
DANIEL: We’re two different classes of people: us and them. It doesn’t matter what I do.
NICOLE: But you’re behind it all.
DANIEL: I have that… privilege.
NICOLE: Protected behind glass walls.
DANIEL: An entirely separate world. Towering above them.
NICOLE: What are you looking at?
DANIEL: (not answering) We’re so much closer to the Sun.
NICOLE: You’ll fly too close.
DANIEL: (sharp) We’re committed to a responsible policy.
NICOLE: Responsible. And what does that even mean?
DANIEL: Due diligence.
NICOLE: We have no idea how she operates.
DANIEL: It’s your responsibility. We’ve made you responsible for her. It doesn’t concern me.
NICOLE: She developed the code, it’s unintelligible.
DANIEL: And she attracts attention regardless. They’ll lose their minds when they see her. Correct themselves within the nth degree.
*
A taxi.
CLIFF: Gives me some hope.
MARY: I am sorry?
CLIFF: Seeing you up there.
MARY: Thousands were made.
CLIFF: Yeah, but you got it, got chosen by them. You’re the every-person. The figurehead.
MARY: I do not think of myself as significant.
CLIFF: You’re special.
MARY: I am not a particularly confident speaker. I am always nervous. I know that something changes in my voice though I cannot identify it.
CLIFF: You sound good enough to me. I like it when you speak, it’s calming. Hear it all the time.
MARY: Do you buy the product?
CLIFF: Everyone buys it.
MARY: (with no hint of surprise) That surprises me.
CLIFF: You don’t know?
MARY: They do not tell me the numbers. They only tell me what to say. I suppose people must buy them then because of what I say.
CLIFF: They should tell you the numbers. You clearly work well for them. The expansion of the premises for one.
MARY: I am always in the same place. I walk down corridors to get there, to the back rooms, to white cubicle walls. I do not know how to feel about that.
,
MARY: Have you lived in this city long?
CLIFF: Grew up here. Born on the street down there. Worked before on that street there. Know it well.
,
MARY: How much longer?
CLIFF: (slight irritation) What?
MARY: How much longer until we arrive?
CLIFF: Traffic’s bad.
MARY: I’m sorry. The traffic is always bad. How much longer?
CLIFF: As long as it takes.
*
TO BE CONTINUED.