Sunday 15 February 2015

Day 15: Summoning Rhyme

So today we had to write a play entirely in rhyme. I really enjoyed this actually, and would quite like to expand the concept when the challenges are over. In broader terms at some point I would like to write a musical (with a partner handling the music portion most likely) so getting used to telling a story with the constraints of rhythm/rhyme was quite a fun challenge. It's a super sketchy piece though, some lines are clunky, but overall I'm quite happy.

                                                           Summoning Rhyme
                                                            By Jeremy Linnell

A messy student flat. A door is kicked open
Gary: Have you seen the news?
Stu: No it gives me the blues.
Gary: Just turn it on.
Stu: Is something wrong?
Stu turns the television over to the news. The television is a boxed off area of the stage
Newsreader: Disasters around the world, planes falling out the sky / Pilots can’t communicate and people die. / The world keeps rhyming and we don’t know why
In Ipswich this morning a man butchered his wife / Her rhyming was driving him crazy so he used a big knife
A big pile up happened on the M5 / We go to the scene, there’s almost no one alive.
The screen shows a reporter standing on a road with smoke and cars and screaming. So much screaming.
Reporter: We can’t see very much because off all this smoke / it’s filling the air and we’re starting to choke
Over here we’ll find two men alive / lucky for them as they only just learned to drive
A conflict has arisen, a clash between the two / Unsure of who’s to blame, sir let’s hear from you
Bruce: I know that he’s to blame / He dresses really lame / I don’t mean to moan / But he was on his phone
Terry: That’s not true, sorry to cause a flap, the man is a liar / He dropped a lit cigarette in his lap and lit his dick on fire
Reporter: As you can see the clash continues / Let’s return to the studio and the rest of the news
The screen returns to the main studio
Newsreader:  With all these accidents the world is in a state / So I’d like to change the topic to one of a lighter fate
The entertainment world is where we now turn our eyes / We’re not bothered when bad things happen to these guys.
Big star from the movie world, I can’t say who / Embarrassed themselves on stage with a dress that’s new
So new that it wasn’t completely finished / The threads fell apart and her coverage diminished
Fans on twitter requested we averted our eyes / But seeing her breasts was an irresistible prize
I don’t think I’m allowed to say that on air / I blame the rhyming, which also ruined my hair
They’re telling me to end the show, any how, any way / So that’s the ten o’clock news, have a great day
Gary turns off the television
Gary: Now do you see?
Stu: Looked normal news to me
Gary: The world is all fucked up, everyone is speaking in rhyme
Stu: It’s quite nice really, like some musical time
Gary: I don’t think that existed, your sense of history is twisted
Stu: Well that’s just rude, you great big sack of pus.
Gary: Look we’re getting off topic, this is all because of us.
Stu: I don’t see how that can be right / All we did was stay in last night.
Gary: I think it’s because we decided to stay in.
Stu: Shouldn’t that have kept us out of trouble, be considered a win?
Gary: Don’t you remember with the band going nowhere / We decided to do something drastic, boost our careers in the air.
Stu: Now that you mention it something does come to mind / This piece of brimstone, underneath the sofa I did find
Gary: Great now it’s messing with our syntax too / We better figure this out before our grammar’s down the loo
Stu: It seems to me that something satanic based curse / Maybe we did a ritual that left the world speaking in verse?
Gary: We had that book full of latin words / Although I wasn’t sure which ones were nouns or verbs
Stu: So we read some out in the dead of night / A satanic boost to our music talents in sight
Flashback to the night before
Gary and Stu are bathed in red light and chanting in latin, mostly just making up random things that rhyme. They clearly have no idea what they are doing.
Both: Allzo felth muhhhhnatoo / Wiinnble emny shooooooritooooo
This style of chanting continues for a few moments when in a flash of smoke and light a demon appears.
Gary: Oh my god it worked, he’s appeared before us
Stu: If I’m being honest I expected him to be enormous.
Demon Of Seuss: Exactly who were you expecting / With your awful Latin inflecting?
Gary: Satan was our stated goal / To help our music out the hole
Stu: One thing Gary, have you twigged it / That our talking is poetic
Demon Of Seuss: For the rhyme you have me to thank / Your new benefactor’s filled your lyrical tank
Gary: I’m confused
Stu: I’m confused
Demon Of Seuss: That couplet was pretty lazy / Let my clarify if things are hazy
I was summoned from Hell’s Hole / Forcing the world to rhyme is my goal
The Demon Of Seuss is my name / Making words whimsical is my game
Now I’ve told you and you know it / You have set me free to do it
Gary: As evil plans go it’s shit / it’s hardly cursed to epileptic fit
Demon Of Seuss: You say that now, but you will see / What a world of rhyme means eternally
Flashback ends and we’re back with Gary and Stu in their living rooms
Gary: Well that clarifies the issue / Althoguh I have no plan on what to do.
Stu: What we need is someone a rhyming demon would fear / The master of pentameter Zombie Shakespeare
To the graveyard I say we go / And from his grave we raise that verse mastering bro.
SCENE CHANGE
We are now in a graveyard. Gary and Stu are in their robes chanting again
Gary: We’ve dug you up so please come to life / It’s our fault the world’s in strife
Stu: We fucked up with the Demon Seuss / So please help us out from this noose
Zombie Shakespeare arises
Zombie Shakespeare: You disturbed my slumber for some lyrical hack / I’ll sort it quickly if you promise to put me back
Gary: Of course we will, whatever you wish / Would you like a snack, your favourite dish?
Zombie Shakespeare: I’m not hungry, so this will all do / Just bring that demon who’s bothering you.
More chanting. The Demon Of Seuss appears.
Demon Of Seuss: What do you two little cunts want / I was fucking a succubus, my rhyming makes her hot
Zombie Shakespeare: I’m sick of you dragging this beautiful language down / I’m the king of verse, it’s me that wears the crown
They fight. Possibly a rap battle. At the end Zombie Shakespeare is victorious
Zombie Shakespeare: With Seuss defeated my work here is done / I ‘m not going to lie and say it’s been fun.
Put me back in the ground, you useless twats / And get back home and clean your flat.

END

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