ECHO AND NARCISSUS
by Tony Devaney Morinelli

CAST 2 (one man, one woman)

INTENT: A study in understatement. This piece works best with older students. The interest lies in the subtext, in what is not said.

STAGING: An empty (kitchen/room) . A table: Two chairs.

On the table, two cups, a sugar bowl. A milk carton. Two teaspoons.

No one is in the room.

Enter NARCISSUS. He has a book. He sits, adjusts the book, looks into the coffee pot, swirls it, puts it down.

Enter ECHO. She goes immediately to the coffee pot. Looks in. She touches the pot.

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ECHO: You want your coffee?

NARCISSUS: Yeh, sure.

(ECHO pours the coffee)

ECHO: I made it just before you came down. It's hot.

NARCISSUS: Thanks.

(NARCISSUS looks into the spoon .)

ECHO: You still walkin' around with that book?

NARCISSUS: Yeh... great stuff in here.

ECHO: Drink your coffee. (She puts sugar in her coffee.)

It's gonna get cold. (Pause)

(NARCISSUS opens the book he had brought to the table. It is a movie history with full page photos.)

ECHO: How long you gonna stare at that thing? (She puts sugar in her coffee and stirs it.)

NARCISSUS: I dunno.

ECHO: Don't you get tired of the same ol' thing?

NARCISSUS: Didn't they always make you laugh? Pass the sugar.

ECHO: Who? Here you go. (She passes the sugar.)

(NARCISSUS puts sugar into the coffee and stirs it.)

NARCISSUS: All the ones in this book.

ECHO: I dunno.. (She puts milk in her coffee and stirs it.)

NARCISSUS: Even now, just when I think about them, it makes me smile.

ECHO: You want milk? Here's the milk.

(ECHO passes the milk. It's in a quart or gallon milk container - not a pitcher)

NARCISSUS: When I think about all those great names....(He pours the milk into his coffee.)

ECHO: Your coffee's gettin' cold.

NARCISSUS: No, it's ok. (He looks into the book and points at a page.)

There's some great pictures in here.

ECHO: I suppose. (She cranes her neck over with little interest) I suppose.

NARCISSUS: No, really. Look.

ECHO: (very non-committal.)Yeh.

NARCISSUS: (Pointing deliberately on the page.) These were stars. These were movies.

ECHO: I don't remember them much. (She puts her finger in the sugar bowl and licks her finger.)

NARCISSUS: (thoughtfully to himself) Maybe it was the person you saw them with that made them what they are. (Moves his coffee cup to the side.)

Weren't they something?

ECHO: Nice. (She stirs her coffee.)

NARCISSUS: Look at that face. Lombard. Nobody had a face like Carol Lombard.

(He starts to sing to himself as he pages through -"Look at that face, just look at it, you have a face that the world adores..." (Roar of the Greasepaint))

ECHO: (She leans over the coffee cup and blow over it to cool it as she says:)

There are plenty of pretty faces these days.

NARCISSUS: Plastic. Barbie Dolls.

ECHO: How would you know. We never go out. You never go to the movies. ( She moves his book a little to the side and moves the coffee cup on front of him.)

NARCISSUS: Boring.

ECHO: You won't even watch TV.( She holds her cup to her mouth and sips lightly.)

NARCISSUS: It's all junk. (He moves the cup away again.)

ECHO: It's not all junk. There's some funny stuff on.

(She moves his cup back.)

Drink your coffee.

NARCISSUS: Always the same. (He picks up the cup.)

I will. ( He puts down the cup without drinking.)

(Thoughtful.)

Bathroom humor, little boy locker room jokes, bitchey women jokes. Not real humor.

ECHO: It's just not your kind of humor.

NARCISSUS: I suppose not.

(He picks up the coffee cup and holds it just under his lips. He does not drink.)

But they're all gone now.

ECHO: Watch the cable stations. Nostalgia TV . They're still on there. (She drinks. )

NARCISSUS: Shadows - black and white shadows.

(He slumps down in the chair and puts the spoon in his cup. He moves the spoon from side to side - not stirring.)

ECHO: You like black and white.

NARCISSUS: I do.

(He looks up but continues to slouch in the chair. )

That's not what I mean.

ECHO: I thought you hated the colorized stuff. (She pours a bit more coffee into her cup.)

This is getting cold already.

NARCISSUS: I do. (He points at Echo with the spoon.)

I'm not talking about color that way. Those shows. Those old shows are just their shadows. All the beauty is gone out of it.

ECHO: ( She gingerly sips her coffee.)

Ooh ! Too hot. (She sticks out her tongue and fans it.)

NARCISSUS: ( He straightens himself in the chair.)

I was watching "Gentleman Prefer Blonds"......

ECHO: (Interrupting) Don't know that one....

NARCISSUS: Diamonds are a girls best friend.....

ECHO: Oh! That's the name of it. (She pours more milk into her coffee.)

NARCISSUS: "Gentlemen Prefer Blonds". (He puts his two hands around the cup.)

ECHO: Marilyn Monroe. (She stirs the coffee)

NARCISSUS: Marilyn Monroe: (he flips to a page -her page - in the book.)

ECHO: I thought you liked Marilyn Monroe. (She puts the tip of her index finger in the coffee, licks it)

NARCISSUS: I do. ( He runs his palm down the page of the book, caressing it.)

It was kinda sad really.

(He leans his upstage elbow in the table and holds the spoon up in front of his face.

He stares into the bowl of the spoon. )

How old would she have been by now? (He continues to stare into the spoon.)

ECHO: Who knows. She's dead now. Drink your coffee.

NARCISSUS: I figure somewhere in her late seventies.

ECHO: How old was Kennedy? (She fans her hand over the coffee and bends to sip.)

NARCISSUS: She was so pretty- and so funny. Just to see that face.. It makes ya smile. Ya know. Ya can't even really help it. Your face just moves with hers. She makes you do it. You don't even think about it. It just kinds happens.

ECHO: (sips her coffee) This is about right.

NARCISSUS: She moves her lips that funny way, the little pucker ( he makes the face) and you catch yourself doin' the same thing. Kinda like "monkey see - monkey do".

ECHO: Your coffee's gettin cold.

NARCISSUS: When did we buy this set of silverware? (He turns the spoon about.)

ECHO: I dunno. 'While ago. I think your mother gave 'em to us.

NARCISSUS: Be here after we're gone.

ECHO: What will?

NARCISSUS: The spoon.

NARCISSUS: She's gone now. They're all gone. None of 'em left. Groucho, Lucy, .... all the ones that made ya laugh.

(NARCISSUS starts humming or singing the I Love Lucy theme.

(ECHO Gets up and fusses about more coffee. She pours, adds sugar, then milk, the stirs and licks the spoon.)

(NARCISSUS pages through his book. He stops abruptly at certain page. He puts his finger on it and almost buries himself in the page.)

NARCISSUS: I love that scene in Casablanca. Ingrid Bergman has that tiny drop of a tear in the corner of her eye. That tiny drop under the curve of her big hat. Just in the corner, and the camera makes it glow. You know, it looks like a little crystal. A little diamond. Real small, right in the corner of her eye. And that big round hat, sideways all across the screen.

(NARCISSUS hums or sings softly, As Time Goes By.

NARCISSUS goes to stir his coffee but stops short. He pauses with the spoon. His elbows on the table he holds the spoon with both hands right before his face.. He continues singing.)

ECHO: Don't you get tired of those old things?

NARCISSUS: Ya know. I just look at this spoon and the way my face curves in it. And one morning, the spoon is gonna be here all by itself.

You know, in Casablanca, the guy doesn't get the girl.

ECHO: What the hell are you talkin' about. Drink your coffee.

(NARCISSUS pages again through his book.)

NARCISSUS: They're all gone.

ECHO: Who's all gone?

NARCISSUS: All of them.

ECHO: I'm still here. I wasn't planning on going anywhere. ( she puts her spoon in her coffee, stirs and licks the spoon.)

NARCISSUS: Yeh, I know.

ECHO: You want some more coffee. (She touches the pot)

Look it's cold already.