Five Political Plays
1997 / Cheap Thrill / Zero Hour / Learning to Live with Personal Growth / Sisters in the Great Day Care War
by
Book Cover & Preview Text
Scene 53 — Link drops in.
JEFF: Link. Hi.
LINK: How you guys doing?
JEFF: Pretty good. Pretty good.
LINK: And the beautiful, charming and intelligent Marla?
MARLA: I’m fine, thank you.
LINK: Listen, I’ve got some news for you guys, I hope you don’t take it too bad. It’s about our apartment building.
JEFF: What?
LINK: I, uh, I, we sold it.
JEFF: It’s not built yet.
LINK: No, we never even started.
JEFF: Why?
LINK: Well, I thought that because of certain financial considerations we better unload.
JEFF: So you just did it on your own, you didn’t even bother—
LINK: There wasn’t time, Jeff.
JEFF: Come on, Link, you can’t tell me—
LINK: Let me explain—
JEFF: Damn right, and you can start by—
MARLA: Jeff.
JEFF: What?
MARLA: Let him explain.
LINK: Um, it’s a bit complicated, it has to do with there being a tight market and—
JEFF: What did you sell it for? What do we get?
LINK: Your share? Eighteen thousand.
JEFF: You sold that place and you never talked to us and, and we’re—
LINK: Profit.
JEFF: Profit?
LINK: Yeah.
JEFF: Eighteen thousand dollars profit?
LINK: And change.
JEFF: In two weeks, we made twenty thousand dollars on a building that doesn’t exist?
LINK: Eighteen.
JEFF: Holy shit!
LINK: Hey. Schmuck.
JEFF: Twenty thousand dollars!
LINK: Listen to me. It’s not always this easy.
JEFF: (to Marla) Twenty thousand dollars.
LINK: Hey! Put a lid on it.
JEFF: We’ve got to celebrate. We’ve got to have a drink.
LINK: Well I just happen to have a little bottle of champagne with me. (He reaches for his cigarettes.)
JEFF: This is fantastic.
LINK: It’s a good champagne. I wouldn’t call it fantastic.
JEFF: This is amazing. Listen, Link, you can’t smoke in here.
LINK: Marla, get us some glasses.
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About the Book
This is a collection of five plays by Arthur Milner. They were first produced between 1984 and 1990, during a period when the author was playwright-in-residence at the Great Canadian Theatre Company in Ottawa, Canada. All feature Milner’s fast-paced dialogue, quick and unexpected humor, and sharp political eye.
About the Author
Arthur Milner has worked in theatre for 40 years, as a playwright, resident playwright, director, artistic director, educator and dramaturge. His most recent plays are Facts, a murder mystery set in the Palestinian West Bank (which opened in Ottawa, Canada, and has been produced in Palestine in Arabic, Istanbul in Turkish, and London, U.K.); and Getting to Room Temperature (“a hard-hitting, sentimental and funny one-person play about dying”). He is a featured columnist at Inroads, the Journal of Canadian Opinion. He lives with his wife, theatre director Jennifer Brewin, in Val-des-Monts, Québec; Toronto, Ontario; or Calgary, Alberta.