Excerpt from JUST ANOTHER ROBOT play

TAROKUN I'm...bored and lonely.

EGO What?

TAROKUN

Bored! There's nothing to do, no one to do it with and no time with which to do it. I need a change of pace. Maybe I should get a new apartment.

EGO

What good is that going to do you? I don't know, it would be newer, cleaner than this place.

EGO

This place was once newer and cleaner.

TAROKUN

I just want to start over though, get a new perspective on life or something, make some new friends.

EGO

What's wrong with the friends you have now?

TAROKUN

They don't have time for me. Or maybe I don't have time for them. They work like I do. I feel like just another robot. I go to work at 8 o'clock and I get off at 6. I'm too tired or hung over to do anything on the weekends. Besides, Yuki got married, Haruo got moved by his company to Yokohama and Kyoshi has a new girlfriend. There's no one left.

EGO

But don't you have a few drinks afterwards with the guys at work sometimes?

TAROKUN

They are not my friends though. They are my co-workers and my boss. I have to go. That's not friendship, that's networking, that's "nomunication," part of my job. I'll never get a promotion if I don't go out with them.

EGO

What about that young lady you went on a date with last month? You haven't called her in a while. Why not?

TAROKUN

Hmmm. Could that be because she looks like a horse and laughs like a seal? Besides, she's boring.

EGO

What do you mean by boring?

TAROKUN She never does anything interesting.

EGO Oh, you mean kind of like--

TAROKUN

Don't say it!

EGO YOU?

TAROKUN

(just looks and Ego for a beat or two and then hangs his head in his hands)

EGO

What do you want?

TAROKUN

(standing) I want...I don't know what I want exactly. I just feel lonely that's all.

EGO

What would your life look like if you weren't lonely? Appearing not to listen,

[Taro picks up the remote control and turns on the TV and sits down again.]

TAROKUN

It might look like that. See how happy they are? They have a new apartment with new appliances. (switches station) These guys are happy about pizza. (switches station) There, that man, now he looks happy.

EGO

(reads like an announcer from a commercial) Maybe if you drove the car he's driving, drank the tea he's drinking, you'd have the girl he's having and you'd be happy, too.

TAROKUN

But that's not real! I know that's not real!

EGO

What is real?

THE END

The Napkin Man

DENNY'S -- MORNING

FUMI is sitting at the table with his coffee. The WAITER and the COOK are standing off to the side.

WAITER

Oh, it's him again.

COOK

The weeper?

WAITER

Yeah, he just comes in here and cries into his coffee. I go through half a package of napkins a night on this guy.

COOK

Why?

WAITER

He cries into the napkins, blubbering that that he's lost his way or something. He's been used up. He says God is done with him.

COOK

Well, it looks like he brought something to read today.

WAITER

That would be his Bible. He pours over it looking for a clue.

COOK

Does he tip good?

WAITER

WELL. Does he tip WELL?

COOK

I don't know, I'm asking you.

WAITER

Nevermind. OK, I guess, but it's depressing. The poor Japanese guy thinks he wants to be a pastor but he doesn't have a church.

COOK

I didn't even know Japan had churches. I thought they were all Hindu.

WAITER

Buddhist.

COOK

Same dif.

WAITER

Anyway, he came here to Hawaii to be refreshed. He thought maybe the sunshine and the beauty of this place would refresh his heart.

COOK

Did it work?

WAITER

No.

COOK

Speaking of refreshing, he looks like he needs his coffee topped off. Better bring some extra napkins.

WAITER crosses to FUMI. He sets down the napkins and starts to pour the coffee, but FUMI stops his hand and looks up at him with a smiling face.

FUMI

I won't need your paper towels today. I found my way.

WAITER

Really? In there?

FUMI

No, in here.

(points to his heart)

WAITER

I see.

(rolls his eyes)

FUMI

God hasn't given up on me. I was reminded by the stones.

WAITER

Oh, yeah, I listened to The Rolling Stones, also. I also smoked some pretty serious--

FUMI

(standing)

No, the boundary stones. I needed to look back at the boundary stones I've placed in my life to memorialize what God has done.

WAITER

Yeah.

(starts to back away)

I've gotta another customer to get to.

FUMI

God hasn't given up on me! God hasn't given up on me! He told me so! He has a plan and a vision for my life.

(quickly gathers his belonging from the table and exits the restaurant)

WAITER blows through his lips and rolls his eyes. COOK crosses over to WAITER.

COOK

He seemed excited.

WAITER

Nutso, that one.

COOK

Why do you say so?

WAITER

Acting like that in a Denny's at four in the morning.

COOK

How would you act if you received a vision from God?

Joseph in Egypt . . . Still

JOSEPH: OK, so I might have been a little arrogant.

INMATE: A little?

JOSEPH: OK, so maybe a lot. But then you wouldn’t believe what happened next.

INMATE: Probably not, but let me guess, you’re going to tell me, anyway.

JOSEPH: (unfazed by this last comment) Here, I was thinking that God was going to deliver me from the well.

INMATE: You’re here aren’t you? You must not be in the well anymore.

JOSEPH: He did but not the way that I thought that he would. My brothers pulled me out of the well only to sell me into slavery to a bunch of hairy Ishmaelites. Then I thought God had let me down again. But then when I got to Egypt, I was sold to Potiphar and it was all good. I had the run of Potiphar’s house. I wasn’t ruler over my brothers or anything like that, but I didn’t care. Everything was going smooth but then this dude’s wife tries to offer me household privileges.

INMATE: Household privileges?

JOSEPH: You know? Household privileges. Nudge, nudge, wink, wink, know what I mean, know what I mean?

INMATE: Oh. (gets it) OH! His wife? That’s pretty tricky business. Did you? You know…

JOSEPH: Land of the dead, no! I would not sleep with another man’s wife and so disgrace the name of my God. I shunned her advances and being scorned she said that I approached her! So I was thrown into prison just like that! I wasn’t even guilty.

INMATE: Oh. Well it doesn’t sound like your god is on the ball. You are still in jail.

JOSEPH: My God is still with me! I’m treated well here. Did you see what God has allowed me to do while I’ve been here? The Pharoah’s baker and wine steward came to me and God gave me the interpretations for their dreams. Was not the baker hung? Was not the wine steward restored to his position? I might be still waiting for God’s promise to be fulfilled, but in the meantime, He will still allow me to do good where I am at.

INMATE: OK, that was a pretty nifty trick with interpreting those guys’ dreams, but soothsayers come at a shekel a dozen around here and besides, so what. What’s important is that you be able to interpret your own dreams. Here’s the name of my god (hands JOSEPH a business card). I usually bow down before his statue at sunset, burn a little incense and…

Excerpt from Any Day Now by Eric Stapleton. Copyright 2006, all rights reserved.

The Nature Worshipper

MARK: Oh, yeah well, of course we wouldn’t need beer at church. I mean heck, I don’t even really need it here. Just a cold one ever’ once in awhile to warsh dem tater chips down. You know? I’m sure God could appreciate that with that miracle he did with the water and the wine and all. Yeah, well you see…it’s like this...I got this great property out by this here lake. The weather has been perfect these last few weeks and I just don’t know how much longer the weather is going to be this nice. I’ve got to enjoy it while I can. I’m sure God can understand. I’ll get to church sometime. I figure that I’m worshipin’ God in my heart while I’m enjoying all this nature.

Copyright 2001 Eric Stapleton. All rights reserved.

Abiding Love

Mckenzie: …Before I started looking for love, I didn’t think that love was what I wanted, but now that I think about it, I believe I do want love. I want a love that is giving; not just out of the extra that a person has to give but a giving that costs the giver something that makes me feel special. I want a love that rejuvenates me and covers over the things that I don’t like about myself. I want a love that makes me not afraid of stepping out of my front door. I want love (out, appealing to rest of vendors [the audience]. I want fresh love. I want fresh, abiding love. (turning to AL) Well?

Excerpt from Love for Sale Copyright 2004 Eric Stapleton. All rights reserved.

The Building Project

Wife: The sky? Water is going to come from the sky!? Honey, water doesn’t come from the sky, it comes from the ground like has for hundreds of years.

Noah: Things are going to change.

Wife: (Starts to exit) Just make sure that this “flood thing” is done before supper.

Noah: My love, look at me. I’m building an ark. God is going to bring a flood. He’s going to wipe everything off the face of the earth and start from scratch. We get to be a part of that.

Wife: How?

Noah: We’re going to be on the ark. We’re going to live on the ark until all the water goes away. We get to be the ones who start over.

Wife: How long is this going to take?

Noah: I don’t know.

Wife: Where will we live?

Noah: On the ark until it’s over. After that, I don’t know.

Wife: What about our neighbors?

Noah: That’s why I’m building this ark. Everyone can see it. They’ll come by and ask what I’m doing and I’ll tell them I’m building an ark. I’ll invite them to come with us and when they ask why they should want to come with us, I’ll simply tell them about the flood.

Wife: And they’ll simply lock you up in the booby hatch! Where are you getting the money to pay for all this?

Noah: I’m borrowing it. I got a loan.

Wife: That’s going to be a lot of interest to be paying. It’s going to take a long time to build this.

Noah: It’s not like it’s going to take a hundred years to build it. Besides, they told me I could pay it back after the flood. (he laughs)

Wife: Where will we get wives for our sons? What about our future?

Noah: I don’t know. I just know that God is leading us into a future that we can’t see yet.

Copyright 2006 Eric Stapleton. All rights reserved.
This is an excerpt from the play The Building Project

The Next Level

[The following is and excerpt from The Next Level by Eric Stapleton]

STEVE: It’s like this. This yahoo with the gloom and doom message sees things from a skewed point of view as if there is only one way to understand truth and that he has the corner on it. There are lots of truths out there and many different points of view. It all comes down to preferences. Some people like to go to church on Sundays while others like to fishing. Some people like coffee and others like tea. And those are all well and good. But they aren’t right or wrong.

KIRK: So what you are saying is that we determine for ourselves what is right or wrong. I find that philosophy very useful.

STEVE: Exactly. You know my friend, I think that you are having an epiphany. What’s not ‘fashionable’ if you will, in the moral sense, today, may change in a few years. You see, we’re all evolving to the next level where we will be free of the shackles of oppressive absolutism.

KIRK: Well, I must be going. Boy all this really lifts a weight off of my mind. I was beginning to think that some of my choices in life were wrong.

STEVE: There are no wrong choices! Be free and at ease my friend!

KIRK: I really must be going. May I have your wallet please?

STEVE: (taken aback) No, you may not.

KIRK: I insist (pulls out a revolver or does the finger in coat pocket routine).

STEVE: B-b-but that’s wrong.

KIRK: Says who? Gimme your wallet.

STEVE: It’s against the law. (handing over wallet) It’s against the common good.

KIRK: Maybe in a few years it won’t be. Maybe I’m already at the next level.

© 2002 Eric Stapleton, All rights reserved
[The preceding is an excerpt from The Next Level by Eric Stapleton]

Excerpts from a Doll's Life

GIRL: I love you. You are my favorite dolly in the whole world! When we get home we’re going to have tea and then I am going to tuck you in to bed for your afternoon nap. You are my favorite dolly in the whole world and I am never never ever going to get rid of you.

DADDY: Honey, I got a surprise for you!

GIRL: What is it, daddy? (puts doll to the side)

DADDY: Well, I’ve thinking. You’re a big girl now and I think that it is time for you to have a big girl surprise!

GIRL: (jumping up and down) What is it, daddy? What is it?

DADDY: I got you your very own purse just like mommy!

GIRL: Oh daddy! It’s just what I’ve wanted! I’ll never never ever get rid of this.

DADDY: Well, let’s go home and show mommy.

GIRL: OK. (both exit)

GIRLFRIEND: (coming to sit on the bench) We have so got to see that movie again. Omigosh! That was so good.

BOYFRIEND: Maybe. There was too much kissy kissy boy meets girl, boy loses girl romantic stuff in it. I like the chase scenes and when that guy’s head exploded, that was so sweet!

GIRLFRIEND: Gross! See, I don’t think that needed to be in the movie at all. I don’t see why that gory stuff has to be in a love story!

BOYFRIEND: It wasn’t a love story! It was an action film! You don’t name a love story Death Chasers Part Four! Arnold Schwarzeneggar is not a romantic movie star, he—(sees that GIRFRIEND is getting sad) Baby, what’s wrong?

GIRLFRIEND: (sobbing) You don’t love me anymore!

BOYFRIEND: Sure I do!

GIRLFRIEND: No, you don’t. You’d rather take me to see an action film than a love story. What? Do you want to see my head explode?

BOYFRIEND: I think it is.

GIRFRIEND: What?!?

BOYFRIEND: Honey, I can be romantic, really I can.

GIRFRIEND: No you can’t. You never get me any gifts or buy me flowers like Arnold did for the girl in the movie.

BOYFRIEND: The girl in the movie was a spy and tried to kill him later on.

GIRLFRIEND: See what I mean, you think that I’m a monster! (starts to exit)

BOYFRIEND: Wait honey. I did get you a gift. Here, I got you this doll!

GIRFRIEND: No you didn’t. Some kid left that on the bench. That’s a used toy, I don’t want that old thing. (exits, followed by BOYFRIEND)

BOYFRIEND: Honey!

MASCOT: Never have to miss a call again when you sign up with Discount Wireless. Everybody needs a cell phone. Doesn’t anyone want a take advantage of this once in a lifetime offer? Anyone? If you sign up now, you’ll even get 23 free weekend minutes! I feel like such a loser. C’mon, anybody? I’ll even throw in this doll as a bonus. Anyone? Anyone? Oh, man, I’m such loser. (tries to sit down on bench, but can’t because his costume makes it awkward; looks over at doll) So, I guess no one wants you either. Hey, I’m stuck. I can’t get up. (GIRLFRIEND and BOYFRIEND walk by. BOYFRIEND is still trying to reason with GIRLFRIEND) Hey! You guys look like you need a cell phone. Hey! Wait up! (manages to get up and follow everybody else)

JANITOR: (enters with a push broom and humming tune) Ah, silly kids, leaving their toys behind! What am I going to do with this? It’s just a worthless old doll. No good anymore. Who would ever want this? Well, there is only one good place for worthless items…the trash. (starts to puts doll in trash)

DOLL MAKER: What are you doing?

JANITOR: I’m putting this old doll in the trash where it belongs.

DOLLMAKER: Don’t be absurd! That doll was created to be loved and adored.

JANITOR: What do you care?

DOLLMAKER: My card. Christopher H. Howard, designer of toys, dolls and other delights. The bringer of smiles, and the maker of dreams. (presents card)

JANITOR: (reading) Hmm. You designed this doll?

DOLLMAKER: Why yes! Yes, of course! (starts to ‘clean up doll’)

JANITOR: Well, it’s seen better days. Hardly much use of anything now.

DOLLMAKER: Nonsense! This doll has not yet begun to shine! Nobody, has thus far been able to care for it properly. Watch this! (DOLLMAKER touches back of doll and DOLL begins to dance around)

JANITOR: Wow! You know, I’d really like to take that home to my daughter. It would make a great toy.

DOLLMAKER: I won’t have it. This doll is far too valuable to be anybody’s mere toy. I designed it special. I put love into it. This doll is mine and I shall be the one to care for it from now on. (DOLL and DOLLMAKER exit)

Copyright 2006 by Eric Stapleton. All rights reserved.

[This is an excerpt from Excerpts from a Doll's Life by Eric Stapleton]

Worst Date Ever

OK, my wife digs ABBA...so this is my tribute to ABBA...

Proctor: Wow! You look great!

Abigail: Thank you. You too. I love that wide collar.

Proctor: Oh yeah. I dig the accent. Swedish?

Abigail: Yeah.

Proctor: Well, I've never done this before. I've dated a few women simultaneously but usually not with...

Abigail: ..them knowing about it?

Proctor: Right. Speaking of...where is your, um, friend.

Abigail: Inga had to freshen up.

Proctor: Yeah well, needless to say your ad got my attention, 2 girls for the price of 1.

Abigail: We're liberated we can share.

Proctor: Well, if she looks like you...

Abigail: People say I get my looks from her.

Proctor: Huh? What's that?

Abigail: Here she is...mom, meet our new boyfriend...where'd he go?

Cafeterianism

Patient: Doctor, I'm looking for something unique. Your list looks complete but--

Doctor: Well, take your pick.

Patient: I've already done my research though. I'm looking for God and I want religion but I want something different. I want the savior of Christianity but not the righteousness, I want the community aspect of Judaism but not the persecution, the fervor of Islam without the Jihad, the hipness of Buddhism but not all of the asceticism, what I want is—

Doctor: Cafeterianism.

Patient: Huh?

Doctor: You pick and choose which ideas you like. Instead of you being made in God's image, it's God made in your image.

Our Interview With Bill Stetson--Cowboy Hero in a Modern Age

DB: The bad guys are vanquished, you got the girl--with more of a struggle than the bad guys I might add-- put another key to the city on your ring and you've ridden off into the proverbial sunset. Just what are you going to do now?

BILL: Well lemme see. I could start a family, get inda debt puttin' up Walmart swingsets in the backyard of a cookie cutter house, get tired o’ all that, dump the wife and kids for another adventure and another sunset ‘cause beatin’ up bad guys is easy compared to commitment. Then I’ll write me a book about it. After that I will qualify for an appearance on Oprah, Dr. Phil or slum it on Jerry Springer.

DB: Oh.