ScriptWorks 30/60/90 - 17 August 2013

Prompt:
After the funeral, I went into her bedroom and started going through things.  When I opened her the top drawer of her desk, where she kept her checks and other basic documents and necessities, there was an envelope I am sure had not been there before.  The envelope had no writing on it.  I opened it, removed the paper inside, unfolded it.  It was her handwriting.  In it, she...-Michael John Garcés, playwright/director

Response:

NATTIE, 43, an aging African-American woman sits across the table from a greying and handsome man, TOM, 52.  They sip ice tea.  A manuscript sits on the table between them.

TOM
(disbelieving)
You’re mother wrote this?

NATTIE
(nodding)
Forty-five years ago.

TOM
And it’s never been produced?

NATTIE
Nope.

TOM
Well, it should be; it needs to be!

NATTIE
(surprised)
Really?

TOM
It will need some polishing...

NATTIE
Who would do that?

TOM
I don’t know.  Why not you?

NATTIE
Me?  Tom, I’m an actor, not a writer.

TOM
Well, we can hire someone...

NATTIE
I don’t know.  They might try and change it.

TOM
They might.

Silence.  Nattie fidgets.
Finally, Tom leans in and reaches a hand across and places it on top of one of Nattie’s.

TOM
Nattie.  You need to do this.  You’re her child.  She entrusted this to you.

NATTIE
But... I don’t know the woman who wrote this play.

TOM
Of course, you do.

NATTIE
No, Tom!  This is different than... than the mother I knew.

TOM
This is not different from the woman sitting across from me.

Silence.

NATTIE
You really think I can do it?

TOM
Nattie, the woman I see on these pages, is so much like the woman I have known for years.

Silence.
Nattie shakes her head.

NATTIE
Alright.  I’ll try.

Curtain.