TW: Xenophobia, Rape Mention, Child Molestation, Incest, Gaslighting, Nudity, PTSD, Psychosis, Demonized Mental Illness
SYNOPSIS
Susan and her new boyfriend have arrived at the Brabissant manor to see a photo of the middle daughter, Veronica, that Susan looks strikingly similar to. John and Maureen, the old retainers, convince Susan to pretend to be Veronica for just a few minutes because Veronica’s sister, Cissie, is dying of cancer and believes her sister to be alive and angry with her. Susan hesitantly agrees and they refresh the room while Susan changes into Veronica’s clothes from 1935. Everything is in order when the boyfriend goes downstairs until John and Maureen leave to get Cissie and bolt the door shut. Maureen returns with warm milk completely changed into 1935 dress and dismisses any remarks Susan makes about their charade while relentlessly referring to her as Veronica. John returns, also dressed for 1935 and referring to Susan as Veronica. They have become Mr. and Mrs. Brabissant and act as if Veronica has gone mad and call for the family doctor. Just when Susan has almost given up, she hears her boyfriend knocking on the door only for him to enter as the doctor. Susan continues to refute the nonsense until the doctor holds up a syringe to sedate her. Susan then complies an admits to being Veronica who’s locked in her room for killing her younger sister that found out she had been molesting their younger brother. Once Susan confesses, Mrs. Brabissant suffocates her to death. The three begin undressing and the doctor also undresses Susan’s body while they argue and discuss this being the last girl. The doctor admits to hating his role in this and only participants to get the bodies. He leaves with Susan’s corpse. The remaining man and woman reveal themselves to be Veronica and Conrad, the younger brother, while the doctor is actually their son that Veronica wanted to kill when he was a baby. They put on this ruse so that Veronica can punish “herself” for what she did to Cissie and Conrad as children. Just as Conrad thinks Veronica is finally free of her afflictions she starts slipping into a psychosis believing herself to be Susan and then back to a younger version of her actual self that’s still locked in the room, begging for her parents to let her out even though Conrad freed her once their parents died and the door is fully open at the moment.
CHARACTERS
Young Woman – Polish German-American, Susan
Young Man – Belgian-American, Plays the boyfriend Larry and Dr. Simpson
Man – Belgian-American, Conrad, Plays John Mackey and Mr. Brabissant
Woman – Belgian-American, Veronica, Plays Maureen Mackey and Mrs. Brabissant
POTENTIAL MONOLOGUES
Woman has a monologue as Mrs. Brabissant explaining why Veronica is locked in her room to Susan. It’s lengthy and could use a few cuts not only for timing but keeping the monologue self contained. Even then, it’s a list monologue and may not hold up well for cattle call auditions.
Young Woman has a monologue that stands better alone where she rants about who she actually until she sees the needle an back pedals into agreeing to be Veronica. I would suggest cutting from her term paper being do to the line asking about the needle and then cut to her going “No No!” I highly recommend stopping when Young Woman says she was only pretending instead of getting into the grittier details.
PERSONAL THOUGHTS
Well it’s certainly a dark show. The first act takes a while to get going, but once the latch is locked and we move into Act II the audience understands that Susan is a prisoner. The gaslighting goes quickly getting worse and worse for Susan before the illusion begins to drop with the girl being murdered. The reveal of the truth is quite twisted and I could see this being made into a short horror film.
About the trigger warnings, while the people playing them are descended from Belgians, Larry makes multiple pejorative remarks about them bring Irish as John and Maureen speak with a brogue accent in addition to the term welshing being used as a synonym for swindling someone.
Although the stage directions clearly say that the doctor removes the bra from Susan’s body, it would be easy to have him take the body while she’s still dressed in undergarments if a theatre wishes to avoid nudity on stage. She keeps her panties on so any theatre that just doesn’t want the actress’s bare breasts exposed could also have her wear pasties under the bra and be carried out with her chest hidden from the audience.
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