Conversations of the Politically Incorrect: A play

By Dimitri Ternezis

"They don't care, and they don't care that they don't care"

Set in Tent City under a freeway, jobless Andy stumbles in the rain, lost and without a destination. There he meets Terry – a wise moral guide in a grim homeless world and Marko – a lost grown man with the heart and spirit of a child. When food runs short and the days grow long, brutal honesty is the only way out.

Conversations of the Politically Incorrect showcases the resilience of the human spirit and reminds the audience of the importance of confronting reality – wherever they may be, on the roller coaster of life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tablo Publishing
• Release date: Oct 10, 2020
• ISBN: 9781649693136

Book preview

 Act I

Scene 1

The stage is set in darkness. A single street lamp post, a dumpster, some plastic shaped like tents. Centre stage is a pillar holding up the busy freeway above. Traffic and a light rain can be heard. (Author suggestion – this can be happening whilst audience are entering the theatre)

Rummaging is heard as Andy wanders onto the stage looking through bins. Narrators voice releases the play from the darkness.

NARRATOR:

All Andy wanted was to get away.

Working for one of the most affluent trading houses in Sydney, Andy fell fast and hard from his glory days. His peers had picked him as the scapegoat to explain the money away. All the trust he thought he had, led him down a road of financial chaos and debt. He had been set up as the traitor. Innocent in his heart, his pain was intense. And as if financial ruin wasn’t enough, his wife of ten years filed for divorce faster than it took to settle a trade. Now the money was gone; Sylvia was gone; his kid saw him as a loser and a new mythology had started to be associated with his name.

Filing for bankruptcy, he walked out.

Now, finding himself alone in the streets, he wanders aimlessly sifting through emotions that strangle his heart. Hate. Anger. Disbelief. Regret. Vulnerable to everything that had touched his life - the money, the pride, the ego – all meaningless.

Hungry.

Tired.

Confused.

Andy needed rest but had no destination.

A dim streetlight comes on. The rain starts to pour. Audience can see Andy stumbling. Spotting the cover of the overhead freeway, Andy sees a way to avoid the rain and his embarrassment. He stops under the pillar and feels something near his leg like plastic.

TERRY: (yells from inside a tent) Who the hell’s out there?

ANDY: (nervous) Sssorry mate – just trying to get out of the rain.

TERRY: (angry) Well keep away from what’s mine!

(Andy rests against the pillar beneath the freeway. Stage Dark.)

NARRATOR:

Too tired to think. Too tired to be scared. Sleep finds Andy.

Scene 2 

Early Morning. Light. The rain has stopped.

As Andy wakes, the chill of the night having worked through his body; the cold concrete having become one with his back; he scrutinises the new surroundings and thinks he sees a person inside the plastic.

ANDY: (standing alert) Hey what are you doing?

TERRY: (a dishevelled person steps out of the tent) Ah so you’re the one who was making all the racket last night. Just waking up. Did you get any sleep?

ANDY: Yes I did. I slept leaning on the pillar just over there (pointing).

TERRY: Oh over there? That’s where Frank died last week. He tried to find material for his tent but didn’t make it. Oh well, what can you do? When you gotta go – you gotta go (nervous laugh).

ANDY: Someone died there? Horrible! Did you know him well?

TERRY: No just a few months. Seemed nice enough. So what’s your story? Why are you in this rat hole?

ANDY: Well I lost my job, my family and my life - all within a three-month period.

TERRY: (smiling) Hmm sounds good. How did you manage all that?

ANDY: (proud) Well I used to be a futures trader. You know what that is right? Anyway I was making big money, was really good at my job, married to a gorgeous woman and had a kid who adored me. One day my boss asked me to take more risk to help our bottom of line. There’s a good bonus in it for you he’d said. So I did as I was told. More risk more return – you may have heard of that. Unfortunately for me the market tanked, the losses piled up and they were all booked against my account. I was blamed for the firms’ downturn - sacked - and my life spiralled in the wrong direction - fast. To be honest I am still confused about what exactly happened.

TERRY: Sounds like you’re a gambler to me.

ANDY: No - not a gambler – just in the business of taking risk.

TERRY: That’s what I said! A gambler. There’s heaps of them here. You’ll fit right in.

ANDY: (frustrated) Forget it! I don’t expect you to understand. So why are you here?

TERRY: (shrugging, nonchalant). Well, my father was a wealthy man but the poor sod died without putting a will together. My brother and sister took everything and left me with nothing. So I got mad and took to them with the axe.

ANDY: (shocked) With the axe? Did you kill them?

TERRY: No. But the police were called. I served six months in an asylum and by the time I was released there was nothing of the thirty houses left for me. So here I am! (Nervous laugh)

ANDY: Amazing. So why don’t you fight for what’s yours and get your share?

TERRY: Get my share? With what? Firstly, I‘m now in the books for having a ‘mental condition’ and secondly, to fight them in court you need bullets - you know - money - to hire the crooked lawyers in the hope they might get you something back. Which they usually don’t! So here I am. (nervous laugh)

ANDY: Wow, you really are stuck.

TERRY: Not as stuck as others. Still breathing. Still good. (nervous laugh)

(silence)

ANDY: (taking some time to fathom what he is hearing. Feeling his life no longer has meaning or direction, blaming fate for bringing him to this nightmare; contemplating what other way out he could find.)

TERRY: (snappily) Anyway I gotta go. I gotta start work. I don't want to go hungry tonight.

ANDY: (clutching his stomach) I’m hungry now. And I don’t see how to control it.

TERRY: You don't control it. We eat when there’s food. Simple. No luxuries here.

ANDY: Actually what do you mean ‘you have to go to work’?

TERRY: I have a spot in the city on the concrete. Office workers are the best givers.

ANDY: Sorry I don't understand. Do you mean begging?

TERRY: Call it what you want but you’ll go hungry without a job or a plan. How have you survived since your mishap?

ANDY: (embarrassed) I’ve been taking food from bins.

TERRY: