Remembering Sharon: A Play in Two Acts

By Nick Pelino, Jr.

Remembering Sharon is a play Nick wishes did not have to be written. It is a personal story. Sharon iswas a friend, even after all these years, it is still difficult to write. Putting Sharon in the past tense is not easy. This project, talking about this project, considering this project, wondering about it, planning it, thinking about it, outlining it, and shaping it has kept Sharon in my present for many years since her death, her murder. I dont like that reality. I often wonder what her life might have been how we may have grown as friends. Would we have grown closer or drifted apart? Friends do that. I have stayed close with the rest of her family. Was that because of her murder? Did her death bond us more significantly? These things, all these things became the foundation for Remembering Sharon. How can empathy be shown? Can it be shown? Should it be shown? What is tasteful? Is that really my job as a playwright? In past works that dealt with unsolved crime, Sharon was my silent motivation. It didnt quite get the word out as forcefully as I wanted my Hall-Mills play was a Hall-Mills play. I am still OK with that. I seemed to have a knack for this kind of thing. I brought up Sharon in every interview, but good writers stuck to the main subject. I had to accept the best way to bring attention to Sharon was to write about Sharon. Remember Sharon! So with this play, I am remembering Sharon. As audiences are told very quickly, Sharon was my friend who disappeared from her home two days before her sixteenth birthday in 1982. She was found murdered in a wooded area only a few yards away from her family home. Remembering Sharon is probably not just a play; it is an experience. It is a hope for an opportunity for a community to come together to talk about this loss and perhaps bring a resolution to this unsolved murder in contemporary 2012. It may also serve as a reminder to all of us that we must take care of our loved ones and talk talk! Talk about safety and common sense issues about safety and crime prevention and a better awareness of how we can keep ourselves and children safe!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trafford Publishing
• Release date: Jul 17, 2012
• ISBN: 9781466946491

Nick Pelino, Jr.

Nick has worked in just about every aspect of the entertainment industry. He is most notably known to NJ and NYC audiences as a director, playwright, and casting director. Remembering Sharon is Nick’s fifth play published work with Trafford Publishing. His other publications include the following: The Watseka Wonder: When Mary Came Home; The Final Word: The Hall-Mills Murders; and Lizbeth of Maplecroft Lizzie Borden After the Axe. The Online Student’s Survival Guide is a work Nick published with Trafford to assist adult learners who are interested in returning to school as distance learners. This is a nondramatic work but perhaps the most dramatic thing he’s ever done as he returned to school to complete his education as a lifelong learner through brain cancer surgery and follow-up treatment that included aggressive chemotherapy and radiation treatment. Writing and publishing his plays kept him busy through his healing process. As of yet, he still has unpublished works, which are over thirty children’s play adaptations and which he is in the process of combining into a collective work. This work will include the timeless classics: Cinderella, The Wizard of Oz, Pinocchio, The Goose Girl, Jack and the Beanstalk (a play in rhyme), and the very popular Dickens’s A Christmas Carol. Nick believes every play should be released when the time is right and proper. The time for Remembering Sharon is right and proper.

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© Copyright 2012 Nick Pelino, Jr., MAED.aedl

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written prior permission of the author.

Printed in the United States of America.

isbn: 978-1-4669-4650-7 (sc)

isbn: 978-1-4669-4651-4 (hc)

isbn: 978-1-4669-4649-1 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2012912332

Trafford rev. 07/11/2012

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Contents

PROLOGUE

ACT I

ACT II

The New Information Game

CAST OF CHARACTERS

NARRATOR/NICK

MRS. THOR

FRANKIE

&

THE FIVE ENSEMBLE PLAYERS:

MALE CAST MEMBER #1

FEMALE CAST MEMBER #2

MALE CAST MEMBER #3

MALE CAST MEMBER #4

YOUNG FEMALE (12 Y.O. or UNDER) CAST MEMBER #5

A first reading of REMEMBERING SHARON took place on August 21, 2011 with the following performers: Al Contursi (Frankie), Marcus Scott (Nick/Narrator), Denise Fernandez (Mrs. Thor) and the following company: Ella Ackerman, Debbie Fell, Ellen Cusick, and Marie Fiorello. The assistance and support of this company has been inspirational and appreciated.

About this play, the mission of its author, collaborators and those for and from whom this piece has been created:

This script has been designed to be used with a company of performers that has accepted difficult work and understands the artistic process that must be used in defining dramatic intent that is not indicated through the implicit. This project is intended to be another in a collection of a phenomenological performance pieces that have been created by a company that does socially and spiritually relevant dramatic work. The body of this work is meant to be intangible. Feelings, emotions and the essence of the relationships between our audiences, the truth of our flesh and blood characters and the moments we create in our time on stage are a part of a spiritual and philosophical process. We respect our subjects. We do not believe murder is entertainment. We attempt to provide a voice to the potentially disenfranchised and dedicate ourselves to those who although, victims do not have to remain victimized. An unsolved murder is an injustice to our whole society.

NP

2011

[Author’s note, to be included in every program & playbill:

No royalties or fees for performances of this play will ever be accepted or required by the playwright and is strongly discouraged to be accepted to host a performance of this work, however donations to the following organizations are encouraged, endorsed, and recommended by the author:, Let’s Bring Them Home (LBTH), Parents of Murdered Children (POMC) | 100 East 8th Street Suite 202, Cincinnati, OH 45202 | 888 818-7662, The OVC The Office for Victims of Crime, HELP in Victim Services, [e-mail], ]

PROLOGUE

[Lights are low. It is night time The Narrator is with Frankie, Sharon’s older brother. Whispers can be heard from off-stage although quiet the voices are animate in their hushed tones, clearly these two are continuing a passionate discussion that has been going on for some time, although not arguing, they are in the habit of expressing themselves passionately in their conversations with one another, they use dulcet tones throughout their conversation with each other . . .

FRANKIE

I’m telling you! The cop told me, it was here, right here! They found her near that tree I showed you so this would be the closest path to the trail from the main road… this one. This has to be it!

NARRATOR/NICK

You’re right, no doubt about it Frank, I see what you’re saying and it does make sense. I just don’t get how no one would notice a disturbance if she disappeared from your house in a car and they went in the woods to that