Raw script minus last scene, changes to be made

Scene 1A
Suffolk Flat Kitchen

Lighting Cue: Blackout, 5 second beat. Lights go up on upper stage door left, instantly, whilst the raised stage, staged up centre stage is slowly lit.

Nathan is asleep, still dressed from the night before sitting behind a table with a sheet draped across it. The stage left door then opens and clothes are thrown out of the stage left door followed by a man in his boxers called Owen

ROSIE (off-stage): You pervert! You twisted perverted pervert!

Nathan, hearing the noise wakes up

NATHAN: I swear I didn’t have my hand down my pants!

Nathan sees Owen in his boxers, collecting up his clothes

NATHAN: Oh, hello you must be a pervert

Rosie follows in her nightclothes, still shouting at the man.

ROSIE: Those sheets were clean on yesterday! You have one sick fetish, get out!

OWEN: You insane freak bitch, why are you making all this shit up?

ROSIE: Just go!

OWEN: Can’t I get changed first?

ROSIE: GO!

Owen runs out of the house up the stairs, across the raised stage and down the up-centre stage exit

NATHAN: Night go well then Rosie?

ROSIE: At least I didn’t end up sleeping in the kitchen like you Nathan, where did that sheet come from?

NATHAN: I have no idea

ROSIE: Well I might have to borrow it until I can clean my dirty laundry. Where did that girl go that who you got off with?

NATHAN: Again, no idea all that I know is that in her place I’ve got a headache the size of Yorkshire

Tom, fully dressed and wide awake, comes from the stage left door

TOM: Nathan, Rosie! Guys can you keep the noise down! Some people are trying to sleep

NATHAN: Tom do you sleep fully dressed?

TOM: No I haven’t been to bed yet, I’ve been too worried to sleep

ROSIE: What’s up?

TOM: Valerie didn’t come home last night

ROSIE: So?

TOM: She could be anywhere! I’ve been up half the night looking for her! What if something has happened to her?

NATHAN: Which one’s Valerie again? I’m not good with names

TOM: Aren’t you concerned? She hasn’t been answering her phone, what if she’s dead?

ROSIE: She probably got lucky that’s all

Valerie coming back from night before, still slightly drunk

NATHAN: See? Here she is doing the walk of shame, you are Valerie aren’t you?

TOM: Where the hell have you been?

VALERIE (giggling): I don’t know

TOM: I spent half the night looking for you!

VALERIE: Well you weren’t going to find me looking in here

TOM: You’re here now!

VALERIE: Yeh but before I came back here I was out

TOM: That’s why I was looking for you because you didn’t come back from being out last night

VALERIE: Wasn’t a very extensive search then, was it? Are you sure you looked everywhere? Or did you mainly look about here in the kitchen area

TOM: I looked everywhere! I was down by the lake with a flashlight. I was worried sick that you’d drowned.

VALERIE: Why were you worried? I wasn’t down by the lake

TOM: Well yes I know that now

VALERIE: Why were you worried again? You didn’t even know me this time yesterday

TOM: Because. Because someone very close to me went missing once

VALERIE: Well sorry, what are you all doing up so early?

NATHAN: It can’t be that early

TOM: It’s three minutes past four in the morning

NATHAN: It still can’t be that early

TOM: Sorry I’m still on Eastern Seaboard time, its three minutes past eight

VALERIE: Does anyone know where there was a boy running from here in his boxers a few minutes ago?

NATHAN: Rosie happened

TOM: It’s getting early, come on time to get some sleep

ROSIE: Agreed, anyone have any bed sheets I can borrow?

NATHAN: You can share my bed if you like

ROSIE: Nathan you’re shameless, I’m not getting with you, you can’t even remember where you’re last conquest got to

Scene 1B
Area in front of the Ziggurats

Heidi Rhys-Davies and Heidi’s Mum and Heidi’s Dad walking from up-stage to raised stage centre carrying luggage before stopping and looking around. Having come from the car parked on the grass in front of the ziggurat. The car, unseen by the audience because it is in the wings, could be metaphorical. Julia gets to the top of the stairs

HEIDI’S DAD: So this is UEA on a Sunday morning, it looked a lot cleaner on the open day, there was a lot less streaking as well

HEIDI’S MUM: Here we are, the first day of the rest of your life

HEIDI: Oh don’t be so melodramatic. Everyday is the first day of the rest of your life

HEIDI’S MUM: But it’s the first day of living on your own away from home

HEIDI: But it’s not like this is the last you’ll ever see of me

HEIDI’S MUM: We will be up again next weekend and hopefully you’ll come back down home for the next and then there’s Reading Week and Christmas and Easter.

HEIDI: Come on, it’s not like it’s the end of an era, just the beginnings of a new one

MUM: Why is it that every new beginning has to start with a goodbye?

DAD: Are you sure you don’t us to help you move in?

HEIDI: I’ll manage, you won’t be there to live my life for me. Got to start being independent someday

MUM: We’ll just carry your bags to your room for you

DAD: Heidi doesn’t want us getting in her way, cramping her style as they say. I know how embarrassing it can be to have your parents around.

HEIDI: Oh, you have no idea

MUM: You’ll be careful though, won’t you? Don’t get too drunk. Eat properly, have you got those recipes I gave you? And if you’re ever ill then call us and go straight to the doctor’s

DAD: Unless you’re hungover in which case, drink plenty of water. Hangovers are simply caused by dehydration

MUM: If you are ever homesick or if there is an emergency we’re only ever a phone-call away. Promise me that you’ll phone me tomorrow and let me know how things are going

HEIDI: Of course

DAD: Living independently from us, finding out who she is, it will be good for her. (To Heidi) It will be the making of you.

MUM: But we’ll always be there for you, whenever you need us. You can always come home, if everything gets too much for you

HEIDI: I’ll survive

DAD: You’ll thrive but before you go there is something I wanted to give you, something very important to me

Pause. Heidi’s Dad takes a large packet of condoms reverently from his pocket and gives it to Heidi who quickly tries to hide them

HEIDI: CONDOMS! You bought condoms for me. Put them away before someone sees! Only slags carry condoms

DAD: Yeh baby-less slags. Just put them in your bag, you can never be over protected

HEIDI: Except from your parents, just go, go!

Nathan for the first time looks out the window to see if what Rosie is saying is actually happening.

MUM: Aw give me a hug. We’re really going to miss you, the house will be a lot emptier

DAD: An awful lot quieter

MUM: And I know we don’t say it enough but we are ever so proud of you. We love you.

Heidi and her Mum hug. Heidi’s Dad ruffles her hair before they depart, waving each other away, Heidi’s Dad shouts before turning out of view.

DAD: Goodbye and good luck

Emmeline’s Window
Emmeline appears at her window looking out at the goodbye

EMMELINE: One day an old woman baked a gingerbread man for her husband. Suddenly, she heard a voice from the oven. "Let me out! Let me out!" it said. She opened the door and the gingerbread man ran out. The old couple ran after him, shouting "Stop! We want to eat you!" But the gingerbread man ran away singing "Run, run as fast as you can, you can't catch me I'm the gingerbread man!"

Scene 1C
Ziggurat Field

Georgina, Kevin, Ashley and Katy enter from upper stage centre onto the raised stage to where Heidi is still standing.

ASHLEY: Anyone know why there was a naked man running across the fields?

KEVIN: There was a naked man running across the fields?

KATY: Typical, there is a naked man running across the fields and I didn’t see him

GEORGINA: Trust me, you weren’t missing much, you needed binoculars to see him

ASH: He wasn’t that far away

GEORGINA: I wasn’t talking about how far away he was

ASH: He looked a bit like one of my friends actually, a friend I have called Owen

KEVIN: Owen Jones?

ASH: Yeh, how do you know him?

KATY: Owen! Everyone knows Owen

KEVIN (seeing Heidi): Oh hello, here already? Can we help you with your luggage?

HEIDI: Yeh thanks, shouldn’t have brought so much with me

KATY: Where are you moving into?

HEIDI: Norfolk Terrace

GEORGINA: Where I used to live. Can’t believe it was two years ago since I first came here, feels like two minutes. Time races away at uni

KEVIN: I remember it like it was yesterday. I was so nervous as I walked up to the flat, just like you are now.

GEORGINA: Oh the worse bit is by far is when you’ve unpacked and you’re all own your own for the first time without your parents or any friends

KATY: Actually the worst part is walking into the kitchen for the first time and seeing a load of strangers staring back at you knowing you have to live with them for a year

ASH: I don’t remember anything from that first week

HEIDI: Ok if I wasn’t nervous before I certainly am now

KATY: Don’t be! Everyone who stays for the three years here loves it

HEIDI: What about the ones that don’t stay?

ASH: Well they obviously don’t

HEIDI: You must all like it then. What’s it like?

KEVIN: It’s like nothing else you’ve ever experienced before. No two days will be the same. Your weekdays will be like your weekends, you’ll be going to bed at dawn and waking up in the afternoons. Random becomes normal, your life gets flipped, turned upside down and you’ll never want to go back to how it was before

All having walked over to the stage right steps

KATY: Here we are then

ASH: We’d better get back in-case anyone else gets here as early as you did, do you get it? (Holding up case) In-case

HEIDI: Wait before you go, have you got any last minute advice for surviving university?

ASH: Not really, no

Beat

KEVIN: Well just sort of be, kind of enthusiastic, throw yourself into everything and get involved with as much as possible

KATY: What else? Wear the most ludicrously themed-costumes to the LCR

GEORGINA: Chase the rabbits. Jump in the lake

KEVIN: …Say hello to everyone because anyone could change your life

KATY: …Meet a hundred strangers, then add them all on facebook

ASH: ...but don't decide straight away whether any of them will be your friend for life

GEORGINA: …Always say yes, you never know where it will take you

ASH: Don’t fall for your flatmates

GEORGINA: Or get stuck with the same small groups

ASH: Or get arrested

KATY: Take too many pictures

GEORGINA: …and embrace every second of it…

ASH: …because it is over all too soon

Heidi and Katy, sharing the bags walk down the steps to the upper stage right exit whilst Georgina, Kevin and Ash return to centre stage

KEVIN: She seemed nice, reminded me of me when I first moved in.

GEORGINA: In what way?

KEVIN: Not knowing what to do, having to be helped out with everything, she was even moving into the same flat where I lived. Loved that first day though, all those possibilities, meeting what will be life-long friends for the first time. That’s why I help out now, another chance to experience it all again and to make sure that the freshers’ who come now feel just as welcome as I did.

ASH: I do it for the £7 an hour

GEORGINA: That’s really sweet

ASH: No it’s not

GEORGINA: I meant Kevin’s story

ASH: Yeh so did I. I find these days depressing, makes you realise that the best days of your life are behind you. Then there’s the futility of it all, one in four of the people you help to move in won’t complete their degrees here. One in four students that you meet will experience mental health problems during their studies. So statistically speaking one of us will suffer, or has already suffered from mental health problems

GEORGINA: Out of us four I know who my money is on. So Kevin you lived in Norfolk Terrace? Must have been the same time as me

KEVIN: Yeh, it was. I even remember you, you lived in block B and I was in block A

GEORGINA: Remember anything else about me?

KEVIN: There was one night, must have been in the first week. Middle of the night, all the fire-alarms went off, no-one knew where to go and you were standing there in the middle of the chaos completely drunk in a cowgirl costume, glittery hat, denim skirt trying to persuade everyone to jump in the lake with you.

GEORGINA: Oh my God, I did as well!

KEVIN: I know, half of Norfolk came down to watch
GEORGINA: Yeh, the male half! I got totally drenched. Lost my top in the lake in-front of several hundred pervy strangers

KEVIN: Missed that bit, unfortunately. I went back to the flat to get you a towel

GEORGINA: You got me that towel?! Aw thank you so much, I still have it somewhere

KEVIN: Maybe you could return it to me one day…

Marcus enters from up stage centre entrance laden with bags and looking incredibly lost

GEORGINA: Hey, can we help you?

MARCUS: Erm yes, I was looking for, er, what was it?

Marcus gets a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket

MARCUS: Norfolk Terrace Block…

GEORGINA: Ah, it’s just down this way

KEVIN: Do you want some help carrying all those bags?

MARCUS: Yes please

GEORGINA: Where have you come from?

MARCUS: Grantham, by train

KEVIN: That’s a lot of baggage to have carried from Grantham by train

MARCUS: People are always telling me that I come with a lot of baggage. My parents would have driven down but they said it would be too emotional to say goodbye to me here so they put me on a train, I think they just didn’t want to drive all the way down here

GEORGINA: So you’re moving into Norfolk Block A flat 4. Well I tell you something, that particular flat was a massive party flat last year, legendary it was, so you have a reputation to live up to

KEVIN: Don’t listen to her. She said that to everyone who moved into Suffolk yesterday

GEORGINA: Don’t spoil my fun, I nearly convinced a few people yesterday

They all walk off stage right into Norfolk Terrace with Marcus’s bags

Scene 2A
Suffolk Terrace Kitchen

Much later in the afternoon in Suffolk Terrace Nathan stands at the head of the table which is placed centrally stage left. Valerie, Emmeline and Tom sit around it

NATHAN: Right I’ve called this flat meeting because I have it on good authority that we have something of a party flat reputation to live up to this year.

EMMELINE: You disturbed me for this? There are better things I can be doing with my early evenings. I thought we were meeting about something important

NATHAN: This is important Emily

EMMELINE: For the last time my name is not Emily! Emily is bland homogenous protoplasm of a name. My name is Emmeline, like Emmeline Pankhurst the women’s suffragette leader. Why are we even having a party anyway?

TON: Because it was Valerie’s birthday a few weeks ago…

NATHAN: …which we couldn’t celebrate because we only met (sings) *Valerie* yesterday

VALERIE: And all the rest of you will get to celebrate your actual birthday’s here

TOM: And it would be a great way to get to know everyone in our block

NATHAN: Why not invite the whole of Suffolk and Norfolk?

Rosie enters from upper stage left entrance, still in her nightwear, still with her hair ruffled

ROSIE: Evening, what are you all doing up so early?

NATHAN: Having a flat meeting about having a party for (sings) *Valerie*

VALERIE: Please stop singing my name! I’ve had to endure two years of it, have you any idea what it is like to hear the same joke over and over again?

ROSIE: Why are we having a party for (sings)*Valerie*?

EMMELINE: We are celebrating Valerie’s birthday retroactively. Whilst we’re at it why don’t we celebrate the 18 Christmases we all had before we met?

ROSIE: Why didn’t you knock for me? I really don’t like being excluded

NATHAN: I was scared to! The last guy that went into your room ran out in his boxers

TOM: Yeh what was that all about?

ROSIE: Doesn’t matter

VALERIE: He was the guy you came back with last night though wasn’t he?

TOM: You hussy!

ROSIE: You’re all just jealous, because none of you are getting any

EMMELINE: I am not jealous, I heard the squelching coming from your room it was disgusting

NATHAN: Excuse me but you weren’t the only one who had someone last night

ROSIE: I don’t think getting with someone, losing them, falling asleep and then forgetting what happened really counts

EMMELINE: When did this happen?

TOM: Well Nathan is still more of a stud than me

ROSIE: What I don’t understand is both me and Nathan had someone round last night. When he pulls he is called a stud. I had someone round last night and I get called a slag, slut, hussy or whore or whatever it was. Why is that?

NATHAN: Because it is the male prerogative to sleep around but it isn’t for women

EMMELINE: WHAT?

NATHAN: It’s our sole purpose in life! From the moment we hit puberty we are programmed to have as much sex as we can. We can’t help it, it’s in our DNA. Sex is our goal and women are our… footballs! That’s why it’s called scoring and why we love football so much, it mirrors what we really want in life. Whereas it is the female prerogative to find a virile man who will stay monogamous to her and the baby. That is the perpetual conflict of humanity and why men are studs and women are sluts.

EMMELINE: You chauvinistic amoeba. Go back to the Stone Age and take your sexist ideas with you

NATHAN: It’s not sexist, its biology

VALERIE: Not on my course it isn’t

ROSIE: So are you saying that you want to sleep with all of us?

NATHAN: No, not consciously but if any of you threw yourselves at me…

EMMELINE: In your perverted dreams

VALERIE: Tom, you’re a man, according to Nathan you want to sleep with us, whether you can help it or not, is that true?

TOM: Maybe things are different in America but as attractive as you ladies are I don’t think I would

ROSIE: And that makes you all the more attractive…

VALERIE: You sound like my gay brother before he came out

TOM: Oh I’m not gay

VALERIE: That’s exactly what he said…

TOM: But I’m not

VALERIE: Repeatedly, over and over again, until one day he just snapped

EMMELINE: Tom if you are gay then do not let Nathan know otherwise he will probably burn you at the steak along with all infertile women

VALERIE: You better not be homophobic because my brother is gay!

NATHAN: I’m not homophobic, stop making a fool out of me Valerie!

VALERIE: So you think it’s perfectly natural for some people to be gay?

NATHAN: Well not natural as such…

VALERIE: So you’re saying that my brother wasn’t born gay but that I somehow made him that way?

NATHAN: No! Not at all! Not you

VALERIE: I suppose you think Graham Norton should be taken off television in-case he converts half of Britain

NATHAN: No not Graham Norton, just the teletubbies

EMMELINE: Teletubbies!?

NATHAN: Yeh I think children are very susceptible and influenced easily to homosexuality. I think it’s wrong that Tinky-Winky, who is so obviously male with a name like that, carries a handbag

EMMELINE: Hand-bags do not magically make men gay

NATHAN: Ok not just teletubbies but so much of children’s TV. Sponge-Bob Square-pants for instance

TOM: You leave Sponge-Bob out of this!

NATHAN: But he is so camp! Campest character ever! Even his best friend Patrick is big and pink, how obvious do you want them to make it that they’re a couple? And homosexual couples have always been in children’s TV. Bert and Ernie in Sesame Street share a bed. Sonic and Tales, why do you think Tales is always following Sonic around? And it explains why Sonic runs so fast, he’s trying to get away from Tales because he’s embarrassed that Tales is so effeminately gay. Sooty and Sweep are always horrible to Sue because she represents a matriarchal threat to their secret homosexual relationship. Mario and Luigi, I bet Mario is like can I have a look at your pipes Luigi?

TOM: I’m pretty sure Mario and Luigi were brothers, which is why it was called Super Mario Bros.

NATHAN: Ok they were brothers but the other points are still valid and don’t say I’m making it up, I’m a media student I know about these things

TOM: Actually I hate to say it but I agree with Nathan… not about the stupid children’s TV thing but that homosexuals are made and not born that way

VALERIE: Not you too Tom! But you’re clever

EMMELINE: Typical American. It is not surprising. He comes from the only country in the world where a homophobic, anti-abortionist neo-conservative can get elected President, twice!

TOM: You leave George Bush out of this. What do you Brits have against him? You think America is such a backwards country just because we have morals. Well I’m sorry that in Britain you lost your morality and became so cynical. I’ve come to this country to get a different perspective on things, to broaden my horizons and all I get from you is this narrow minded, everything-fully-decided notion of bullshit. It’s just as bad as being at home, it’s just different bullshit.

Awkward silence

NATHAN: Politics is the root of all evil. Anyway moving back to something far more important, what are we going to do about this party?

VALERIE: Yeh let’s do it, I get to celebrate my birthday twice, I’d be like the Queen

EMMELINE: I do not like the idea of a load of strangers coming round making our flat dirty

NATHAN: I do

VALERIE: Can I have a themed birthday party?

NATHAN: Yeh we could have a Beach Themed Party and we could always move everyone down to the lake for some skinny dipping

VALERIE: A beach party! That’s so appropriate; me and my boyfriend Mark went to a beach on our first holiday

EMMELINE: You are pervert Nathan

ROSIE: I’m up for it, I look great in a bikini

VALERIE: Me too!

TOM: Me three, not in a bikini, I just like the idea of a beach party

TOM: When are we going to have it?

VALERIE: Tuesday

NATHAN: No-way, that’s LCR Emergency Services night, I queued up for hours to get you all tickets. Any chance of moving your birthday back a day Valerie?

VALERIE: Sure. It’s a fake birthday, it can be whenever is convenient

NATHAN: Ok

VALERIE: How are we going to let everyone know though?

ROSIE: Facebook event

EMMELINE: What is facebook?

Everyone turns around and stares at Emmeline

ROSIE: Where have you been living?

VALERIE: I don’t know about anyone else but I’m only friends with you lot so far on facebook, a party of five isn’t much of a party

NATHAN: Then we’ll put invitations under the doors of all the flats

Nathan gets up to get a pen and paper before sitting down at the table and starts to write the invitation

NATHAN (writing out-loud): Suffolk Block D, flat 4 invites you to a Beach party…

LC: 5 Second fade-out

Scene 2B
Norfolk Terrace Kitchen

LC: White lights-up instantly on stage-right

Heidi holds a kettle down by her side in one hand, in the other is an invitation which she reads aloud. She enters the kitchen which is the exact same set up as the Suffolk Terrace kitchen but with one difference, it is on the other side of the stage and Lavinia Szirtes sits at the table, which has another kettle placed on it, quietly looking at Heidi

HEIDI: …on Wednesday night, everyone is welcome round our flat, Suffolk Terrace Block D, flat 4 around 8. Remember the theme is beach wear so girls, come in bikinis and swimming costumes and guys in long shorts and Hawaiian t-shirts…

VALERIE (off-stage): Nathan!

HEIDI: … ok costume is optional, as is skinny dipping in the lake afterwards

Heidi stops reading and starts talking to herself

HEIDI: I don’t even know anyone here and I’ve already been invited to a party

LAVINIA: Hello

Heidi jumps in fright, not expecting anyone to be in the kitchen

HEIDI: Hello, sorry I didn’t see you there. Oh God, I don’t usually talk to myself, I’m not crazy or anything

LAVINIA: Ok. You never get a second chance to make a first impression. I heard that from a commercial advertisement

HEIDI: Well hi, I’m Heidi, what’s yours?

LAVINIA: My name is Lavinia Szirtes

HEIDI: Lavinia is a lovely name

LAVINIA: Thank you

HEIDI: Sorry again, I didn’t realise you were there I thought I was the first one here

Heidi sees the kettle on the table

HEIDI: Oh I see you’ve already brought a kettle. Snap.

Holds the kettle in her hand aloft

LAVINIA: I do not own the kettle

HEIDI: Whose kettle is it anyway?

LAVINIA: Forget about the kettle, it is irrelevant

HEIDI: What if someone wants a cup of tea? Does it become relevant then?

LAVINIA: No because there is a hot water machine in the corner

HEIDI: Ah right, I understand. So I take we’re the first two here then?

LAVINIA: No you are third

HEIDI: I’m in third? Story of my life, how early did you get here then? Dawn?

LAVINIA: Wednesday

HEIDI: Wednesday, right, so with an accent like that where do you come from?

LAVINIA: I come from down the corridor from my room

Greg enters not seeing Heidi straight away

GREG: Hello Livi, how are you today? And who are you?

HEIDI: Hi, I’m Heidi

GREG: Hi, Heidi I’m Greg. At last, new people! I’ve been waiting here since Wednesday for someone to arrive

HEIDI: We were supposed to be moving in today weren’t we?

GREG: Well yeh everyone else was supposed to but I do drama and our induction began a few days ago

HEIDI: So I’m living with a drama student, I loved doing drama, used to be in every school production, in fact I nearly did drama but… well, I didn’t

GREG: Any particular reason?

HEIDI: English is just a more, well you know it’s a more sort of…

GREG: Go on…

HEIDI: …Relevant degree, in the outside world I mean

GREG: You sound like my parents, they wanted me to do English

HEIDI: Oh I’m sorry, I didn’t mean too. I make a terrible first impression. Just ask Lavinia there, she caught me reading aloud to myself a few moments ago

GREG: Nothing wrong with reading aloud, I’m doing a degree in reading aloud. Ah I see you brought a kettle too then

HEIDI: Yeh but as Lavinia says, it is irrelevant now

Heidi puts the kettle on the table

GREG: Yeh I also have an irrelevant toaster to go with my irrelevant kettle and my irrelevant degree

HEIDI: I didn’t mean to say your degree was irrelevant

GREG: You just meant to think it, not say it aloud

HEIDI: I really should think before I speak… but I suppose that’s why you’re doing a degree which involves reading aloud and my degree involves reading… silently. English students should only ever communicate in writing

GREG: Talking about reading aloud, what time is it? (Looks at his watch) I’m late, got to go

HEIDI: Late for what?

GREG: I’m performing this short performance piece about a drunken girl who ends up with the powers of a God, I play God and it takes ages to get my unitard on

LAVINIA: What’s a unitard?

GREG: It’s like leotard but with legs, still doesn’t leave much to the imagination

HEIDI: Sounds fun, can we come watch? I promise I won’t think out loud

GREG: Ah, you probably can’t come it’s a Minotaur thing, just for drama students

HEIDI: Not to worry, there will be pictures though won’t there?

GREG: I hope not, right really got to go. Heidi keep practicing that thinking aloud thing, I think I can see your next victim coming down the corridor as we speak. I’ll see you lovely ladies later. Bye!

Greg leaves

HEIDI: So that’s Greg, he’s cute

LAVINIA: Acute, as in small?

HEIDI: No cute as in sweet

LAVINIA: Sweet like sugar?

HEIDI: No not that sweet. So what do you think this other person will be like?

LAVINIA: I think they will be quiet because I did not hear them make a noise

HEIDI: True. Hope we get another hot guy

LAVINIA: Hot guy?

Marcus enters, heads turn

MARCUS (nervous): Hello

HEIDI: Hi, I’m Heidi, I’m sorry, it doesn’t matter what you look like, not that you are bad looking or anything. Oh God I must be the Queen of making bad first impressions in-front of her new flatmates

MARCUS: Don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll be very nice when I get to know you, not that you aren’t nice now. See I’m not great at making good first impressions either, so I brought beer. The Guardian Freshers Supplement said to bring beer as an icebreaker

HEIDI: Bit early to start drinking isn’t it?

MARCUS: Is it? I don’t know what the rules are

HEIDI: There are no rules

MARCUS: Well we could always just have one, Dutch courage. It has taken me an hour to pluck up the courage to come out of my room

HEIDI: Same here and you must have got here after me, I did some unpacking and the rest of the time just sat in my room not knowing what to do. So, I’m sorry, have I asked you your name yet?

MARCUS: My name! That is the first thing I should have said, I’m Marcus, what’s yours?

HEIDI: Heidi

MARCUS: And yours?

LAVINIA: My name is Lavinia

MARCUS: Hello

HEIDI: So what are you studying Marcus?

MARCUS: Music, just music nothing special

HEIDI: So you’re a quiet music student, there must be an irony there somewhere and I’m just doing straight English. Oh Lavinia I never asked, what are you studying?

LAVINIA: A master’s degree in Mathematics

HEIDI: You must be very intelligent, how old are you?

LAVINIA: 23 years of age

HEIDI: 23? I can’t imagine ever being 23

MARCUS: Why are there two kettles on the table?

HEIDI: Forget about them, they are irrelevant

Scene 2C
Area outside the Ziggurats

Emily with some luggage passes past the Student Helpers quickly

KATY: Can we help you?

EMILY: No thanks

A Strange Man follows behind with more luggage who does talk to the helpers

STRANGE MAN: Hello, nice to meet you, nice to meet you, I wonder if you could help me out

ASH: That’s what we’re being paid to do, where are you moving into?

STRANGE MAN: Norfolk Block A, flat 4

KEVIN: It’s just down here, I’ll take some of the bags for you

STRANGE MAN: Ah it’s just as I remember it, this old place with all this concrete takes me back to my youth

KEVIN: Are you a student here then?

STRANGE MAN: Why yes I was a student here in the early 70s, how did you guess? I was here in the crazy days when everyone in the science labs was experimenting with LSD, and that was just the professors! Ha, ha, ha, those were truly crazy days

KEVIN: What did you study?

STRANGE MAN: Anatomy… female anatomy. No, I joke I did a degree in Law, there were no women studying law in those days of course. I jest, I jest… there was one… “Lucy the Elephant Women” we used to call her. Aw don’t take me too seriously, we weren’t that openly critical of her astonishing ugliness, well not to her face at least and believe me it was quite a face

Scene 2D
Norfolk Flat Kitchen

The students are sitting around the table awkwardly, each attached to a beer (apart from Lavinia, who is drinking a soft drink), trying to work up the courage to talk again after the formalities. Long pause. Strange Man enters.

STRANGE MAN: Hello, just the people I wanted to see. Ah the silence, awkward isn’t? I remember all that, not wanting to say anything that will make you seem strange and un-likeable to the others. Don’t worry though you’ll all be fine. Tonight you’ll over-compensate with alcohol to get over your inhibitions, all get pissed together and become much more intimate with each other.

HEIDI: Who are you?

STRANGE MAN: Yes, good point. Allow me to introduce myself, I’m Emily’s father, she’s just down the corridor unpacking. You must have thought that I was some sort of a deranged lunatic jabbering away like that. Well I could be. You have no way of knowing, but trust me I’m not. Anyway, glad you’re all here, having fun are we?

HEIDI: Well…

STRANGE MAN: Oh you don’t have to answer that. That was a rhetorical question. Anyway just want to say that my daughter Emily, you probably haven’t met her yet but you’ll know her when you do. Anyway she’s a bit fragile at the moment, just having broken up with her boyfriend and all. Oh, don’t feel sorry for her or anything he wasn’t that nice a guy, bit of a love-rat actually, bit like Russell Brand but without the charm, or the humour. Anyway that isn’t the point, the point is that Emily is a bit fragile at the moment so I want you to promise me that you’ll look after her, she hasn’t been away from home all that much, well except for the gap year she just had in Costa Rica but other than that she hasn’t been away from home all that much. Bit sensitive she is, always has been, of course that’s all her mother’s fault, not mine I put her in the Scouts to build her character but she didn’t like camping, or the mischievous boys who tried to get in her tent at night but that’s off topic. Hang about, hang about, I tell a lie, I’m thinking of my other daughter, Sally. Emily loves camping that’s why she went to Costa Rica for her gap year and she loves mischievous boys who try to get into her tent but don’t take advantage of that fact and I’m not just saying that to the boys! I know what you girls get up to when the boys aren’t looking! Anyway I’ll be off before I begin to embarrass Emily, goodbye!

Strange Man leaves, there is a pause of five seconds, Marcus, Lavinia and Heidi all look at each other, not knowing what to say. Emily enters.

HEIDI: You must be Emily

EMILY: How did you know that?

HEIDI: Your dad just came in here introducing himself

EMILY: I don’t have a dad, well not anymore

MARCUS: Who was it who was just in now then?

Silence

HEIDI: Well… so… who else here has a family? I mean everyone has a family, obviously unless you’re an orphan, I’m so sorry if any of you are orphans, I didn’t mean to rub it in that you don’t have families I mean I didn’t meant that. Does someone else want to interrupt me because I will just keep talking rubbish, (silence) ok anyone want to talk about their families? (silence) Ok who else here has a family that they don’t want to talk about?

Silence

HEIDI: That will be everyone then

Emily looks around nervously, Heidi takes a big swig of beer.

EMILY: Have I just walked in on an alcoholic’s anonymous meeting? Again ‘my name’s Emily…’

HEIDI: ‘…And I have a problem’

Nervous laughs

MARCUS (extends a hand): Marcus

HEIDI: I’m Heidi.

LAVINIA: I am Lavinia.

Silence. Emily looks around, hoping for conversation, whilst the others preoccupy themselves with useless, nervous activities.

EMILY: So I see you’ve got beer here

MARCUS: Oh do you want some?

EMILY: That’d be fantastic. So, what’s everyone studying?

Heidi mock-cries on the table

LAVINIA: We have just finished discussing this! It is no matter. I am studying the Maths. Yourself?

EMILY: Environmental Science.

HEIDI: Oh, I heard it’s good for that here!

EMILY: Yeah, lots of environment…

LAVINIA: Yeah. Does that mean you want to be a naturist?

Marcus snorts into his beer.

EMILY: I think you mean naturalist. A naturist is a nudist…

HEIDI: That explains why I’ve never seen any waterfowl at those beaches…

EMILY (genuinely excited): Wow, you’re interested in water birds? Have you ever seen a Tufted Duck? Once I went to Costa Rica…

HEIDI: Er… no.

LAVINIA: What is this ‘tufted duck’? I can to make duck a l’orange.

Heidi, Emily and Marcus laugh. Lavinia looks miffed.

HEIDI: Maybe you should be doing Environmental Science, too.

Silence, everyone drinks again

LAVINIA: Are you liking the flat… Emily?

EMILY: No, too small and concrete-y for me

MARCUS: Yeh gives me nightmares about a Clockwork Orange

HEIDI: And what about the tiny beds?

EMILY: I know! They don’t even fit a normal single sheet, what about… sleepovers?

HEIDI: I don’t like the showers

LAVINIA: Why? The showers are so spacious

HEIDI: Yeh but they’re only three of them! I wanted an en suite…

Emily gives her a look. For a brief moment there is silence. Then:

LAVINIA: I like it here very much. My room is good for the study, and the view of the lake, it is beautiful!

Lavinia looks out the window (into the audience) wistfully, the others follow suit.

EMILY: We should have a bonfire by the lake one day. We could sing songs and make our own food and…

HEIDI: That sounds far too much like Scouts for my liking.

EMILY: What’s wrong with the Scouts?

HEIDI: I don’t wanna talk about it.

Silence

HEIDI: Is anyone else a bit worried about looking after themselves, like… cooking?

LAVINIA: I have cooked since I was old enough to eat

MARCUS: Haven’t you ever cooked anything before?

HEIDI: Erm… well, I made a pot noodle once. But I burnt myself.

LAVINIA: What is a pot noodle?

HEIDI: Well, it is a plastic pot, that has within it-

EMILY: I think it’s best that you don’t know.

HEIDI: So what uni’s did everyone else apply to?

MARCUS: Loughborough, Newcastle, Warwick

HEIDI: I got rejected from Warwick

EMILY: Everyone I know got rejected from Warwick. I think you have to join some sort of secret sect where you offer your soul to the devil in return for an offer

MARCUS: Only Oxbridge rejects get into Warwick

EMILY: And a lot of people with double-barreled names

HEIDI: What was everyone’s back-up choice?

MARCUS: Kent

HEIDI: Kent

Pause

LAVINIA: Kent

HEIDI: What was yours then Emily?

EMILY: Portsmouth… but Kent would have been my back-up course if they’d have done Environmental Studies

HEIDI: So what great getting-to-know-you outing shall we embark on?

MARCUS: Wait, there’s still someone still to come…

HEIDI: Oh yeah. I wonder why he’s not here yet. Maybe he’s a hermit…

EMILY (Irritated): Why do you just assume it’s a ‘he’? Because generic people are always ‘he’s? Because women are only the sidekicks?

HEIDI: Well, that and he’s called Greg.

EMILY: Greg? (Pauses, embarrassed) Oh. Well. Good. Puts a name to a face.

HEIDI: You haven’t seen his face.

EMILY: Be that as it may…

HEIDI (Picking up a conversation with Lavinia): So, he’s doing drama?

LAVINIA: Yes, he told me he is to be back soon. Do you study drama?

HEIDI: Nah. I was thinking about doing English and Drama…

EMILY: But you didn’t.

HEIDI: True

Connor and Flora enter racing down the stairs

CONNOR: Don’t look now, but our RT approaches…

HEIDI: Er… What?

CONNOR: The Resident Tutor, he’s a right little ar-

Resident Tutor enters

RT (Clears his throat self-importantly. Then, pompously): Hello, first years.

Connor looks as if he wants to weep. The other flatmates look at each other, sharing an ‘is-this-guy-for-real?’ moment.

RT (As monotonously as possible. Possibly with pauses to sniff or clear throat again):
My name is Keith, and I’m your Resident Tutor. This means I live in this block, and I will be making sure that none of you get into too much trouble. (He eyes the beer) Now I am not a surrogate parent but if you do anything which breaks the rules then I will have no choice but to intervene. So as far as you are concerned the less you see of me the better it is for you but I will be about in the flat as I live in the room down the bottom of the corridor. I also liaise between the cleaning staff and yourselves to avoid any situations which may or may not arise. Now, you’ll each have a fire safety notice in your room. You should read these, just in case. There is a fire extinguisher in the hall. If it’s let off without due reason, your entire flat could be fined. If the fire alarm goes off in the flat, you must exit through the flat door, regardless of whether you think it is a real fire. There is however a fire-alarm test every Wednesday morning. You are not permitted to have parties, which includes having more than an acceptable number of guests in the flat. Going on the roof is also not permitted.
Suffolk Terrace Kitchen

The Suffolk Terrace flatmates all have their going out clothes on and are around the table playing drinking games. Emmeline is not amused.

ROSIE: Anyone know any good drinking games?

VALERIE: Can’t believe we’re doing this again, I’m still hungover from yesterday

NATHAN: I know this one game called yee-hah… right what you do is…

What follows is a rehearsed improvisation of the drinking game “yee-hah”

Scene 2E
Norfolk and Suffolk Flat

LC: Lights dim and go back up, dim and go back up, as if the audience is falling asleep

The resident tutor’s speech becomes slowly more fragmented until it’s just words such as ‘dangerous,’ ‘not permitted’ etc – as if the audience too are not listening. The flatmates are nearly asleep

Cleaners will come into your room every weekday to clear your bins… legal requirement… they check you are not dead… have to let them in…
they clean the kitchen twice a week… will not clean your pots and pans for you… previously been cases of Meningitis and… proved fatal… against health and safety regulations…
the following are not permitted… can be dangerous… fire hazard… fire precaution… fire-alarm

Scene 2F

Norfolk Flat Kitchen

The resident tutor leaves, walking up the stairs

FLORA: What a wanker he was

Flora realises everyone is looking at her

FLORA: Well he was. Can I use your toilet? I wasn’t expecting a lecture before uni…

HEIDI: Go ahead, use all three if you want

FLORA: Thanks, I’m Flora by the way, hi

Flora exits the up stage right exit

CONNOR: And I’m Connor. We’re from F block. Missed this… thrilling… intro in our own flat so we came to yours.

MARCUS: Beer?

HEIDI: Is that your response to everything?

MARCUS (to Heidi): He is Irish.

HEIDI: Point taken… So, what are you guys doing tonight? Anything wild? Having parties and going on the roof and letting off fire extinguishers?

CONNOR: Only if we can get meningitis and make a disgusting state of the kitchen at the same time.

EMILY: I have an irresistible urge to go out on the roof with more than the acceptable number of guests

MARCUS: Yeh so do I. Better not risk it though, don’t want to get thrown out on my first night

Silence

HEIDI: So… who here went to school?

Scene 2G

Drinking game improvisation

Scene 2F
Awkward silence

Lavinia looking at watch

LAVINIA: 29 seconds of silence

Awkward laughing

HEIDI: We should really talk or put the radio on or go out

MARCUS: Yeh we should…

Followed by more silence

Greg bounces down the steps into the flat, Heidi is the first to see him

HEIDI: Greg!

GREG: Hello strangers! Wow there’s so many of you now, Heidi introduce me before someone thinks I’m a lunatic

HEIDI: This is Greg, he… lives here and he’s one of us

EMILY: Finally I can put a face to the name

GREG: My name precedes me?

EMILY: Yeh as does your ego. You’d never guess that you were a drama student. I’m Emily by the way

They shake hands

GREG: Charmed…

EMILY: I’m sure you are

HEIDI: This is Marcus

GREG: Marcus, great, pleased to meet you. I need a drinking buddy

MARCUS: Hi, oh ok

Flora re-enters with door knob in hand

HEIDI: And this is Connor and Flora but they don’t live here, they just don’t like their own flatmates

GREG: Why have you got a knob in your hand Flora?

FLORA: It just came off when I squeezed it!

MARCUS: Is that the door knob to our toilet door? Why have you broken the door knob to our toilet door?

FLORA: No! No! I didn’t mean to! It was already broken! I just pulled it off and even if it wasn’t broken before I touched it then it definitely broke when it hit the floor but that was mostly gravity, I had very little to do that

CONNOR: We should probably be going, I’m sure that there are things in our own flat that Flora can break. Maybe see you around

EMILY: I hope so, bye!

Everyone says goodbye, Flora and Connor exit, walking up the stairs

GREG: So you guys have been making friends without me

MARCUS: That girl is no friend of mine

EMILY: Connor was friendly though

MARCUS: Well he was Irish

EMILY: Is that your response to everything?

GREG: So how was your talk from the resident tutor?

LAVINIA: Boring

MARCUS: Dull

EMILY: Made me question why I was here

HEIDI: On the plus side, at least we found a cure for insomnia

GREG: Did any of you get tickets to the LCR tonight?

EMILY: No, didn’t want to cue around the block for hours just to get them

GREG: Well that’s good

EMILY: It’s terrible means we have to stay here all night, no offence

MARCUS: Why do you say that?

Greg goes into his pocket

GREG: Well it just so happens that I bought five spare tickets on Thursday

HEIDI: You have tickets?

GREG: If you want them…

Heidi rising up out of her chair

HEIDI: Greg I could kiss you!

Greg ignores her, Heidi becomes slightly bashful and sits back down again

LAVINIA: What is the LCR?

GREG: The LCR is the axis of all social life at UEA, so what are you waiting for? You all owe me drinks, come on lets go!

Everyone gets up and goes

Scene 3A
LCR Bar – Upstage Centre

Emmeline stands centrally looking over the dancefloor, Valerie to her right. Tom comes from behind where the bar is situated with two drinks, he gives one of them to Valerie, as if Emmeline isn’t there.

MC: 90’s Indy Music playing lightly in the background

EMMELINE: I want to go back to the flat

TOM: But we’ve only just got here

EMMELINE: I do not want to be here! This is not an environment in which I am comfortable in

TOM: Come on! You didn’t come out with us last night

VALERIE: Yeh last night was a real bonding experience, at least I think it was

TOM: We want you to come out, your flatmates want to get to know you, is that not a good thing?

Nathan and Rosie come back from the bar, Nathan stands to Valerie’s right, Rosie to Tom’s left

EMMELINE: It is not that I do not want to get to know you it is that I do not want to get to know you here. It is incessantly loud in here

VALERIE: What did you say?

EMMELINE: (shouting): It is too loud!

NATHAN: I don’t think it’s too loud

VALERIE: What did you say?

NATHAN (shouting): I said that I don’t think it is too loud in here!

EMMELINE: I do not understand “clubbing”. What is the appeal of being in a hot, sweaty, crowded room of drunken strangers?

ROSIE: The appeal is that it is a hot, sweaty, sexy room of drunken students all wanting to get lashed and get with someone. No-one knows what will happen because no two nights are the same. You could home with a stranger… or in an ambulance.

EMMELINE: You say that you meet new people but it is impossible to have a proper conversation in these conditions?

ROSIE: Who said anything about talking to them?

TOM: How did you get all that from last night?

ROSIE: I didn’t, I’ve been here before

VALERIE: When?

ROSIE: All of last year. I’m a re-fresher

VALERIE: So you’re actually a second year?

ROSIE: No I’m a first year, I’m just retaking it. I get another year of this, another year of meeting people, another year of LCR’s. I love the LCR.

VALERIE: It’s not that good, have you ever actually been here sober?

ROSIE: Why would you ever want to come here sober?

VALERIE: I agree with Emmeline you can’t go clubbing sober

NATHAN: Then don’t be sober

EMMELINE: I have to be sober

TOM: Clubbing isn’t fun sober

ROSIE: It’s not that it’s not fun it’s just that you’re not drunk enough to think that it’s fun

NATHAN: Give me one good reason why you aren’t drinking

EMMELINE: Because I am alcohol intolerant

TOM: You’re Alcohol Intolerant!?!?! Does that mean that you won’t let us drink?

EMMELINE: I am not intolerant to other people drinking, it only affects me

NATHAN: So you’re teetotaller? How old are you? Sixty?

EMMELINE: I am not a teetotaler! My body is intolerant to alcohol. I get palpitations, I go red, have stomach cramps, I vomit whenever I drink

ROSIE: Sounds like a normal night out to me

TOM: We all feel sick if we have too much alcohol, you just need to know your limits

EMMELINE: My limit is nothing, no drink, at all

ROSIE (ignoring Emmeline): Why did we get here so early? It’s dead in here

NATHAN: I queued for hours to get these tickets. We’re not wasting a second of it, come on let’s dance! Make the most of it

He leads everyone off to the dancefloor down the steps on to the dancefloor down stage left

TOM: What’s with all the 90s music in here?

VALERIE: I like it, reminds me of the first time I met Mark, we were childhood sweethearts

TOM: How young were you when you met?

VALERIE: First year of secondary school, so we were both only 11 years old starting secondary school, he sat next to me on the first day and after that we were never sat apart

NATHAN: 11? And you’re 18 now, so how long you been together?

TOM: 7 years, not a mathematician, are you Nathan?

NATHAN: There are marriages that don’t last that long! Have you got that 7 year itch yet?

VALERIE: Not at all and we haven’t been together that long. It was a good 6 months after we first met that we started dating and we’ve only been engaged a year or so

NATHAN: Doesn’t it drive you insane? I’ve never been with anyone more than 3 months and that felt like a lifetime

VALERIE: Not at all, you’ll realise when you meet the right person Nathan

NATHAN: Not me, never. I hate being in relationships, far too much hassle

VALERIE: Then why are you always so desperate to pull?

NATHAN: I hate being in relationships but I hate being single even more

EMMELINE: Desperation, the most important of all human emotions without it we would have died out as a species long ago

NATHAN: I’m not desperate!

ROSIE: I don’t get desperate; whenever I’m down I just pull a random-er. I can have any man I want whenever I want.

NATHAN: That is desperation

ROSIE: No, men are desperate, I just take advantage

NATHAN: Not all men are desperate enough to be taken advantage of

ROSIE: You wanna bet?

NATHAN: Yeh, ok I’m going to pick out a stranger, totally at random, you have to get with him and get back to his flat, what you do after that is your business

ROSIE: Only if I get to chose someone for you

NATHAN: You’re on

TOM: What’s actually at stake here?

NATHAN: Yeh let’s make it interesting, if I pull and you don’t, I get to sleep with you

ROSIE: You what? Are you serious? I’m not going to do that

NATHAN: Think about it, it’s a reward for me and a forfeit for you

ROSIE: And what happens if I pull and you don’t?

NATHAN: You’re reward is that you get to sleep with me

ROSIE: So it’s a win-win situation for you? What happens if we both succeed?

NATHAN: I think getting with someone round theirs is reward enough

TOM: What happens if neither of you pull?

Nathan and Rosie are bemused at this idea

NATHAN: That’s not going to happen

ROSIE: I’m never going to sleep with you Nathan

NATHAN: Better not lose our bet then. What if I buy you a drink to sweeten the deal?

ROSIE: That’s your answer to everything.

NATHAN: Drink is the solution to and cause of all of life’s problems, as someone clever once said

ROSIE: I’m still not going to sleep with you for a bet however drunk I am

Jackie, whilst dancing, hits Valerie

VALERIE: Watch it! You’re not the only person on the dancefloor

TOM: Yeh but they soon will be if they keep dancing like that

NATHAN: I bet I can out drink you Rosie

ROSIE: I bet you can’t

NATHAN: There’s only one way to find out… to the Bar!

TOM: Again? We’ve just come from there

The scene cuts away but Rosie and Nathan mime the continuance of their argument

Scene 3B
LCR Bar Upstage

MC: Popular Indy music playing

The Norfolk flat-mates enter from down stage right, looking all around at their surroundings having just been to the bar

LAVINIA: Seven people on the dancefloor now and five of them are leaving

HEIDI: What’s the red drink you’ve got there?

EMILY: It’s a snakebite

MARCUS: Snakebite?

LAVINIA: A snake that bites?

HEIDI: Sounds deadly, what is it?

EMILY: Never heard of snakebite? You might call it a “Diesel” or “Red Beer” or “Hard Cider”. God, such sheltered lives you’ve all led. Snakebite is beer mixed with cider and toped off with blackcurrant

MARCUS: Doesn’t sound too bad

EMILY: Exactly its bite is worse than its bark. You have three or four, feel fine and then all of a sudden you end up passed out on the floor. It’s calorific though so you’d better go easy on them Greg

GREG: Are you suggesting that I look fat?

EMILY: I’m not suggesting

GREG: I’m not fat!

EMILY: You look fat

GREG: I’m not fat this shirt is just slim-fit

EMILY: Very slim fit

GREG: It’s tight on me, never used to be tight

HEIDI: Maybe it shrunk in the wash

GREG: I haven’t washed it

EMILY: Even the bouncer said you looked fat

GREG: Yeh but the bouncer hates me

EMILY: So what did that bouncer have against you?

GREG: I was a bit rowdy Thursday night

HEIDI: You were here Thursday night?

GREG: Yeh came here with my drama crew to the Returner’s LCR, except we weren’t returner’s but no-one seemed to mind, I didn’t look fat in this shirt on Thursday

HEIDI: You don’t get fat in four days

EMILY: So was it this quiet in here when you came on Thursday Greg?

GREG: No it was busy, really busy where is everybody?

LAVINIA: There are only five people on the dancefloor. They must feel silly being there.

HEIDI: It’s ten past ten! It should be busy by now

GREG: Ten past ten is early Heidi, welcome to university time, it’s like real time but later, everything always happens later. It’s only been open for 10 minutes, everyone else must still be in the bar

EMILY: There’s a bar, what’s it called?

GREG: It’s called “the bar”

EMILY: Well that’s about as imaginative as the “LCR”

LAVINIA: Only two people now dancing on the dancefloor, I thought there would be more people dancing rather than less

EMILY: Drunken idiots, look at them dancing like that. They’re dancing like no-one else is watching them, they’ve literally cleared the dancefloor, who do they think they are?

GREG: Oh my God it’s Jackie and Ned. (Shouting) NED! NED! JACKIE! JACKIE! NED!

Jackie and Nick look around, wondering where the shouting is coming from, they finally see Greg who rushes down the stairs to meet them, his flatmates following like sheep. With Ned and Jackie now not dancing the dancefloor quickly fills with people dancing in small circles

JACKIE: It’s…

NED: Baker boy!

They hug Greg

JACKIE: We interrupt this program to annoy you and make things generally irritating

GREG: Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!

NED: Not the Bishop!

JACKIE: Spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam

GREG (joining in): Spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam

NED (joining in): Spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam

MARCUS: What?

EMILY: It’s Monty Python

MARCUS: Who?

HEIDI (to Greg, interrupting the “spam” chants): So why do they call you the baker?

NED (interrupting himself): Greg, as in, Gregg’s the baker! Get it?

EMILY: No

NED: Ok how-about Calendar?

EMILY: Don’t get it

NED: As in Gregorian Calendar

EMILY: That doesn’t even make any sense

NED: Greggy Baby?

EMILY: Makes even less but at least it sounds ok.

HEIDI: So Ned, is that you’re real name or your nickname?

NED: Actually my real name is Nick! But my nickname is Ned!

EMILY: Why Ned?

NED: Stands for Non-Educated Delinquent

EMILY: Ah, figures

JACKIE (to Greg): Greg! The funniest thing happened in the bar at last orders. We see the barmaid about to ring the last orders bell and I said to Ned “it can’t be last orders already” and Ned says…

NED: They can’t call last orders without the last order bell!

JACKIE: So Ned steals it from her hands and stuffs it down his trousers so the barmaid can’t get it

NED: So I run around the bar with this bell down my pants

JACKIE: And then Ned goes up to these girls who are sitting at a table, thrusting his pelvis in their faces and says…

NED (thrusting his pelvis in Emily’s direction): Ring my bell ladies! Won’t someone ring my bell?

Everyone laughs, although Ned and Jackie laugh loudest at their own joke drowning everyone else laughs at his own joke and Jackie laughs again Heidi looks on in disdain

JACKIE: It was so funny, we had to run up here to avoid being caught

EMILY: God I need a drink, anyone coming with me?

Silence

NED: I’ll come with you

EMILY (backtracking): Oh it’s ok I remember now that I had one earlier

NED: But if you get another one now you won’t need to get another one later

EMILY: But think if you get a drink now you’ll be one drink ahead of me

NED: And why would I want to be one drink ahead of you?

EMILY: Because you’ll be that bit more drunk and will feel less embarrassed when I tell you that it’s never going to happen between us. I’m never going to have sex with you.

NED: What if…?

EMILY (instantaneously): No. Off you go.

Scene 3C

The Suffolk Terrace flatmates who have come back from the bar and are peering over the dancefloor

NATHAN: How come you got served so much quicker than me?

ROSIE: I have breasts

NATHAN: You’re so sexist, for a woman

ROSIE: No the bar-staff are sexist I just take advantage of the situation

TOM: But most the bar-staff here are women…

VALERIE: Why are there so many circles of people on the dancefloor, is this a strange Norwich thing?

ROSIE: Flat circles

TOM: Flat circles?

ROSIE: All the circles of people are new flatmates. People who met for the first time just a few hours ago, randomly thrown together by the Accommodation Office, all of them clinging to each other because no-one knows anyone yet and everyone is a stranger

TOM: Strangers are very strange

LCR Dancefloor – Stage Right

Kevin, Georgina, Katy and Ash enter from the down stage right entrance by stay stage right on the dancefloor near the Suffolk Terrace flatmates, Katy looks around

KEVIN: We’re only here just over half the year but the half a year we’re here goes twice as quickly as when we’re at home

GEORGINA: I can’t believe this is our last freshers week

KATY: It’s not as good as I remember it

GEORGINA: What isn’t?

KATY: This place, it just never changes, every LCR is a pale imitation of the previous one. The same drunken idiots dancing like lunatics.

OWEN: The best nights out are the ones you don’t expect. Anticipation always leads to disappointment

KEVIN: The LCR is only good as the people who you go with

GEORGINA: How you finding tonight then?

KEVIN: I’m loving it

They smile at each other flirtingly, they’re so obviously going to get it on so you’d better make it pretty obvious

KATY: Was the Returners’s LCR any good?

ASH: Yeh it was good to be back, see everyone again, it was like the summer hadn’t happened apart from all the first year drama students being starry-eyed and lairy

KATY: It doesn’t feel the same anymore here. Nothing does. You remember the good old days when Greg James used to DJ at Optic before he went off to radio 1?

Owen enters on his own, sees everyone and says hello

OWEN (seeing everyone): Hello

KATY: Owen?

KEVIN: Owen

ASH: Owen!

OWEN: This is surreal seeing all of you, here, together

KEVIN: Why’s that?

OWEN: I know you all separately from completely different things. Ash was my flatmate last year, Kevin I know you through LitSoc, Katy through my mate Julia, I can't have seen you since last year and Georgina where do I remember you from?

GEORGINA: Who are you again?

OWEN: And surprisingly you have forgotten my name. This is weird, it’s like being in your room drunk, everything is familiar but strangely off-kilter and you just can’t quite remember everything. So how do you all know each other?

KEVIN: We were working together, moving in the freshers today and yesterday and decided to come here after finishing

ASH: Oh we saw you’re doppelganger today

OWEN: Ah yeh, what was he doing?

ASH: Getting thrown out of someone’s flat half-naked whoever he was he must have done pretty sick. Couldn’t have been you though, could it?

OWEN: No. No. I was asleep.

ASH: I didn’t tell you when we saw “him” today

OWEN: Well I do a lot of sleeping. (Quickly changing the subject) Why am I getting this image in my head of a cowboy hat?

GEORGINA: Oh no…

OWEN: Oh yes! Georgina, the girl from the lake! You’re a ledge…

GEORGINA: And you’re a lech…

OWEN: Hey Kevin was there too as I recall

GEORGINA: Yeh but he got me a towel

OWEN: Oh it was you who spoiled everyone’s fun that night…

Owen sees Greg on the other side of the dancefloor dancing with his flatmates

OWEN: That guy’s got my shirt!

KATY: So? It’s straight out of River Island lots of people have that shirt

OWEN: No I mean he’s actually got my shirt, my actual shirt!

ASH: You what?

OWEN: On Thursday at the Returner’s LCR we were all waving our shirts in the air to the Baywatch theme, as per usual but someone stole mine off me

KATY: Stole?

OWEN: Yeh whilst I was waving it around it someone snatched it, so I was going round the LCR shirtless trying to find it, the bouncers were wanting to throw me out for being topless

ASH: Again? Why does this sort of thing always happen to you?

KATY: This isn’t an unusual occurrence for Owen?

ASH: I lived with him last year and I’ve never known anyone to have such a canny knack for misplacing their clothes at inconvenient moments. So how do you know that guy there got you’re top?

OWEN: Well he was standing near us, he was one of the loud drama lot I was telling you about earlier…

KATY: Wait a minute. Are you sure your shirt got stolen because if he’s got your shirt then why have you got the same shirt as him tonight? You don’t have two identical shirts do you?

OWEN: If you’d let me finish my story I’d have told you that I eventually got let back in to the LCR, having waited out in the cold for half an hour, everyone chuckling at me, including the bouncers, and there on the dancefloor was a shirt

KATY: Your shirt?

OWEN: But it wasn’t my shirt! I mean it was the same design and everything but this shirt was a medium and I wear a small

ASH: So you reckon you were wearing the same shirts? Be it that they were different sizes and that during the Baywatch theme you were waving them about and he stole your shirt thinking it was his whilst he lost track of the shirt that was actually his

OWEN: Yeh and now I’m going to get it back

KATY: You can’t just take the shirt from his back

OWEN: It’s my shirt, it belongs on my back!

Owen comes over to confront Greg everyone else stands around

OWEN: Excuse me, you’re wearing my shirt

GREG: You’re shirt? Why would I be wearing your shirt?

OWEN: Remember Thursday night? The Baywatch theme, you stole my shirt

GREG: I remember very little from Thursday night, you sure we’re just not wearing the same shirt?

KATY: See that’s what I thought!

OWEN: So can I have my shirt back now?

GREG: I’m still not convinced, I’ve never met you before, why would you have my shirt and I yours?

OWEN: But they’re different sizes, haven’t you noticed? Unless it was your plan to steal this shirt

GREG: Oh of course and all this time I’ve been thinking that I’ve been getting fat but the shirts must have got mixed up, but how?

JACKIE: Ah, that may have been me.

GREG: Eh?

JACKIE: Well the song was coming to an end and so for a laugh I decided to steal your shirt

GREG (to Owen): and then noticing mine to be gone, I saw you waving yours about thinking it was mine so I swiped it…

JACKIE: …And then seeing Greg with the shirt on thought I had the wrong shirt in my hands and so I dropped it on the floor

OWEN: Well that’s cleared that up, all that’s left now is to swap shirts

GREG: Here, now?

OWEN: Yeh I’m not wearing someone else’s shirt for the rest of the night

JACKIE: Come on Greg, I we were all too drunk to get a proper look first time

Owen begins unbuttoning his shirt, Greg reluctantly begins to do the same. Valerie sees Owen, her eye having been caught by him having taken off his shirt to swap with Greg who is still being reluctant

VALERIE: Why’s that guy taking off his top?

ROSIE: Oh no

NATHAN: Not like you to say “oh no” to a bloke taking his top off

ROSIE: But of all the guys in here who could be taking their tops off it has to be Owen

NATHAN: Owen from last night? Where is he?

ROSIE: Over there (pointing), with his shirt off again. God he has it off more than he has it on

NATHAN: Where? Which one is he again?

VALERIE: He’s hot with his shirt off

Owen glances over having seen a glimpse of Rosie, Rosie sees him seeing her and goes back to back with Nathan. By now Greg has his shirt off.

ROSIE: The only guy with his shirt off, he can’t be hard to miss even for you

Greg is now the only shirtless one, Owen having put on his shirt that Greg has now given him

NATHAN: I see him. Want me to have a word with him?

ROSIE: No I might just go home

NATHAN: You can’t do that! We have a bet! Stay here, I’ll sort it

ROSIE: Nathan! No!

VALERIE: And that shirtless guy is even hotter

Nathan races down the steps to confront Greg who he thinks is Owen meanwhile Owen who is still Owen sees Rosie.

OWEN: Cheers, probably should stay away from each other I mean we don’t want another shirt mix-up

GREG: Agreed. See you around, or not as the case maybe

The two circles begin to reform. Owen goes to see Rosie

KATY (to Greg): Don’t go too far, your shirt would look great on my bedroom floor

They depart, leaving Greg bemused. Nathan is just about to get to Greg, meanwhile Owen has seen Rosie and goes over to her

GREG: Was she joking or flirting?

JACKIE: Flirting I think

HEIDI (under her breath): I hope not

NED: Girls are never that obvious, be careful Greg it might be a trap

GREG: A trap?

Nathan grabs Greg by the collar away from Ned and Jackie

NATHAN: I want a word with you

GREG: Who are you?

NATHAN: A friend of Rosie’s

GREG: Who’s Rosie?

NATHAN: Don’t play dumb with me, now I have no idea what went on between you two last night but whatever happened Rosie wasn’t happy about it and if you make her unhappy you make me unhappy…

Meanwhile Owen approaches Rosie who is looking the other way from where Nathan is. Rosie not wanting to see what he might do to him

OWEN: Hello gorgeous, calmed down from last night yet?

Rosie turning around to face him, shocked, thinking that he was over talking to Nathan

ROSIE (shocked): OWEN! Fuck! Get away from me you pervert. Wait! If you’re here and Nathan is over there…

Rosie runs off to Owen’s annoyance. Nathan has his hand around Greg’s neck, everyone else is stunned by what is happening

NATHAN: …If you hurt her emotionally, I hurt you physically, got that? Leave her alone

GREG: I’m not whoever you think I am

EMILY: Leave him alone

NATHAN: Or what?

EMILY: Or you’ll have to deal with me

NATHAN: What you going to do? Hit me with your handbag? Hardly a deadly weapon is it?

EMILY (with handbag in hand): It is if it’s filled with bricks

NED: Who carries round a handbag filled with bricks?

NATHAN (to Greg): I’m going to give you a choice, either you can walk out of here now or you can leave here in an ambulance

GREG: Can’t I just stay here?

EMILY (threateningly): I said leave him alone

JACKIE: Someone get a bouncer!

MARCUS (nervously): Why don’t you?

JACKIE: They scare me! Why don’t you?

MARCUS: I’m scared he will beat me up if I do!

Emily comes between Greg and Nathan trying to forcibly force them apart

EMILY: Get off him! Heidi throw your handbag at him!

Emily grabs Nathan’s arm and tears it away from Greg’s throat. Nathan is about to attack Greg when Rosie comes from behind into the centre of the action. Heidi’s handbag flies over everyone’s heads, spilling it’s contents on the floor

ROSIE: Nathan it’s not him! That isn’t Owen!

NATHAN: You’re kidding me!

ROSIE: Let go of him before you make a scene in front of everyone!

Greg is bent over, catching his breath

NED: It was nearly murder on the dancefloor!

ROSIE (to Greg): I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. We thought you were my ex

GREG: Remind me never to go out with you…

ROSIE: Don’t judge me on how I treat one perverted ex

EMILY: It’s not the going out that you seem to have a problem with; it’s the breaking up but the looks of it. Is that how you treat all your ex’s? By setting your current boyfriend on them

NATHAN: We’re not together

ROSIE: God no! We’re just friends, well flatmates

HEIDI: So if Greg who you think he is, then who the hell does that make you two?

EMILY: Yeh who the hell do you think you are!

NATHAN: I’m Nathan, she’s Rosie. I realise we haven’t made a great first impression

LAVINIA: You never get a second chance to make a first impression

NATHAN (to Greg): I’m sorry but if you had known what the pervert who we mistook you for had tried to do to Rosie last night…

EMILY: We’d have what? Sympathized with you threatening complete strangers?

GREG: You mistook me for a pervert!

NATHAN: Let me make amends (picking up Heidi’s handbag). Whose handbag is this?

HEIDI: Mine. Leave it! Its fine

NATHAN: It’s ok I’ll put your stuff back in it for you, lipstick…

HEIDI: NO!

Nathan picks up the contents, the usual stuff, lipstick, a mirror

NATHAN: … Mirror, broken, sorry…

Nathan picks up the box of condoms that were in Heidi’s handbag before she can hide them

NATHAN (un-easy): Big box of condoms…

JACKIE: Who caries around a family pack of condoms with them?

NED: That’s an anti-family pack of condoms, you won’t have kids using that many condoms

ROSIE: That’s hardcore. How many men are you planning on sleeping with tonight?

HEIDI: They’re not mine!

NATHAN: What were they doing in your handbag then?

HEIDI: They’re my dad’s

NED: Why have you got your dad’s condoms? That’s sick

HEIDI: It’s not like that! My Dad gave them to me earlier today, he’s very protective.

GREG: Very protective

HEIDI: I just forgot to take them out the bag

ROSIE: I’ve heard so many men say that to me

HEIDI: I’ve never been so embarrassed

NED: You get used to it after a while, take it from someone who knows

NATHAN: Can I buy you a drink Greg?...

ROSIE: Did someone say “drink”?

NATHAN: …To make up for everything

GREG: Erm, yeh ok, as long you don’t ask for my number afterwards

ROSIE: You can ask for mine if you want…

GREG: So where do you both live?...

Nathan, Rosie go upstage to get Greg a drink from the bar

HEIDI: Marcus follow Greg, make sure nothing happens with him and Rosie

MARCUS: Why don’t you?

HEIDI: I’ll look clingy if I go

MARCUS: Won’t I look clingy?

HEIDI: No, you’re a guy

MARCUS: For what reason do you want me to do this?

HEIDI: I don’t trust Rosie, there’s something about her

EMILY: You don’t trust her because she’s a threat to you, you and Greg

HEIDI: Don’t be stupid, flatmate rule and all. Marcus go already

Scene 3D

Marcus reluctantly follows

TOM: Hello remember us, we’re your flatmates

NATHAN: Have you been at the bar all this time?

VALERIE: We thought you’d forgotten about us

ROSIE (mockingly): Who are you again?

Valerie is drunkenly confused

TOM (to Valerie): Amnesia is a side-effect of excessive alcohol consumption; remember me telling you that yesterday, Valerie?

Valerie looks blankly

TOM: No didn’t think so

VALERIE (to Greg): So you must be Owen?

NATHAN: No he’s Greg, I thought he was Owen but he wasn’t

VALERIE: I’m confused

TOM: That’s what comes from drinking too much Valerie

Marcus joins the group by standing behind Greg

ROSIE (introducing Marcus): And this is Greg’s friend who I’m going to call Greg’s friend until he tells me his name

Marcus stays silent, surprised by all the attention, the others almost surround him

TOM: Maybe his has no-name

EMMELINE: Then we should name him Nemo

VALERIE: Nemo, like the fish?

EMMELINE: No Nemo from the Latin meaning no-one

TOM: How can someone be named “No-one”?

VALERIE: Finding No-one what a rubbish name for a film

MARCUS: I’m Marcus, not Nemo to avoid any further argument

TOM (looking at Marcus): So how did you mistake him for Owen? They look nothing alike from memory

NATHAN: No I mistook Greg for Owen not Nemo here

VALERIE: Who’s Nemo again?

MARCUS: My name is Marcus, not Nemo

TOM: How did you mistake Greg for Owen? They look nothing alike either

ROSIE: It’s a long story but basically Greg took his top off at the wrong moment

GREG: And it nearly got me beaten up…

TOM: We saw, who was the girl that got the better of you Nathan? She was feisty

NATHAN: She didn’t get the better of me…

MARCUS: Her name was Emily, she’s our flatmate

EMMELINE: For the last time, I am not called Emily!

MARCUS: I was talking about our flatmate who is called Emily

EMMELINE: Sorry, I have a reflex reaction on hearing that name

ROSIE: She hated you Nathan, really had it in for you. Nathan! Remember our bet? Well you’ve got to get with Emily. Emily is your target!

NATHAN: No! That’s not fair, she hates me!

ROSIE: All’s fair in love and war

MARCUS: Are you betting on our flatmates?

TOM: No on our flatmates, your flatmates are just the victims

ROSIE: Off you go, Nathan do your thing. Could have been worse, at least I didn’t set you up with someone ugly. I was thinking of setting you up with Emmeline.

EMMELINE: Are you implying that I am sexually repulsive?

ROSIE: No, well you are to Nathan, he told me so earlier

NATHAN: Just you wait until I find someone for you, Rosie

Nathan walks down the stage right stairs to find Emily. Valerie, slightly drunkenly is looking through her coins before holding one up.

VALERIE (reading from coin): “Nemo me impune lacessit”. Hey Nemo! Your name is on the side of this coin!

MARCUS: My name isn’t Nemo! Is it really on the side of pound coins?

VALERIE: Does anyone know what it means?

EMMELINE: Something about no-one being unrestrained to harass me, my Latin “reddo” is not what it used to be

Valerie keeps looking through the change in her hand

VALERIE: Is this enough change for another drink?

TOM: You have ten p sterling, two cents and a euro so I’m guessing no

ROSIE: There’s only one thing to do when the money runs out. Dance! Coming Greg?

GREG: Are you asking?

ROSIE: I’m asking

GREG: Then I’m dancing. Marcus?

MARCUS: Where you go I follow

Everyone follows Rosie down the stairs who has grabbed Greg’s hand. Valerie on the end

Scene 3E

NATHAN: So where are you from Emily?

EMILY: You again? Bakewell, Derbyshire, why do you want to know?

NATHAN: Isn’t that where Bakewell Tarts come from?

EMILY: Are you calling me a tart?

NATHAN: I’m not calling you a tart I mean the cakes…

HEIDI: The cakes with the cherry on top…

NATHAN: Yeh! I always pluck the cherry off them…

EMILY: Yeh I bet you do…

HEIDI: What are you doing here?

NATHAN (lying): Oh, er, I lost my flatmates, thought I’d join you guys and girls until I can find them again

Heidi sees them on the other side of the dancefloor

HEIDI: Isn’t that them over there?...

NATHAN (not even looking): No can’t be

HEIDI: Is that Greg dancing with Rosie? Where’s Marcus?

NATHAN: Someone has a crush on Greg…

HEIDI (defensively): I don’t…

NATHAN: Don’t worry it isn’t them, last time I saw them they were at the bar, Marcus was getting all the attention not Greg

LAVINIA: I am happy for Marcus

EMILY: Marcus is so sweet, just lacks a bit of confidence, we need to get him a girl Heidi

NATHAN: If he’s straight then I’m sober

EMILY: Really? You think? But he seems so normal, do you have gaydar then? Are you gay?

NATHAN (ignoring Emily): If he’s straight then I’m sober! He’s the one! He’s perfect Rosie! Rosie! Where’s she gone?

LAVINIA (pointing): She is just over there

Nathan gets out his phone before beginning to text her

NATHAN: No-where to be seen. It’s impossible to find anyone in here. Give me a moment, just got to send a text to Rosie. Come on! Damned mobile, I hate predictive sex...I meant text...I haven’t been thinking about sex

EMILY: Is this about Marcus?

NATHAN: Sort of yeh

EMILY (patronizingly): Do you want me to set him up with you?

NATHAN: No, God no. He’s not my type, I mean he’s a guy for starters

EMILY: So you’re not gay?

NATHAN: Gay? No way! What makes you think that? Single and straight that’s me, always have been always will be, straight I mean not single.

NATHAN: How-a-bout you?

EMILY: Single and straight, just like you

NATHAN: Single and straight, that’s my favourite combination. So...what course are you on Emily?

EMILY: Onto those questions already? Course, accommodation, hometown, do you really want to know the answer? No. You just ask it coz everybody else does

NATHAN: You don’t do small-talk then? Because I tell you now I don’t do small anything

EMILY: Are you flirting with me?

NATHAN: It’s possible; do you want me not to flirt?

EMILY: Buy me a drink and I’ll tell you

NATHAN: I bet you’re a four-beer-flirter

EMILY: I’ve already had twice that today

NATHAN: Well twice as much again and you never know who you’ll end up with tonight!

Nathan nudges her before beginning to walk off to the bar

EMILY (under her breath): Yeah, well I’m pretty sure that it won’t be you

Emily follows Nathan up the stairs



Scene 3F

Greg and Rosie are dancing closely, Rosie just about to kiss when…

MC: Mobile phone rings

GREG: I hope that’s your phone that’s vibrating. Got a text? Who’s it from?

Rosie reads the text, takes a step back

ROSIE: Only Nathan telling me that I’ve got to do someone, something I mean

Rosie turns around to talk to Marcus totally ignoring Greg who seems a bit put out

ROSIE: So Marcus, why don’t you tell me about yourself?

MARCUS: Not much to tell. You?

ROSIE: I do triathlon. Love doing triathlon, it’s like a threesome of sport plus it puts me in peak physical condition, can’t you sit how fit I am? Oh and hockey, I do hockey, I get to play with a lot of balls if you know what I mean

GREG: I like sport, love playing the field

ROSIE: Good for you…

Turning back to Marcus

ROSIE: What course do you do Marcus?

MARCUS: Music

ROSIE: Music makes the people come together

Rosie gets closer to Marcus, puts her hand on his chest

MARCUS: So, er, what do you do?

ROSIE: Physiotherapy which makes me an ace massager whether I’m giving a rubdown for pleasure, relieving an injury or taking pleasure in inflicting pain, I’m your girl

They dance, Rosie leading

GREG (to Valerie): So… where have my flatmates gone?

VALERIE: You were the guy who took his top off

GREG: Sure you’re not mistaking me with Owen?

VALERIE: No but I liked what I saw, shame you were standing so far away, maybe I could get a closer look later on…

Looking at Greg’s rear, Greg looking around for his flatmates

TOM: Valerie! What would “Mark-y” say?

VALERIE (not hearing Tom): Nice arse

Rosie slips away with Marcus

Scene 3G

LCR BAR

Connor has his hands full with drinks, Flora takes one. Flora is putting white powder in her drink.

CONNOR: Where have our flatmates gone?

FLORA: They wandered away from me again

CONNOR: What you got there?

FLORA: GHB, my mate at home gave it to me

CONNOR: Isn’t that a date-rape drug?

FLORA: It’s only a date rape drug when used wrongly. One of my friends uses it to get out of having to have sex with her boyfriend all the time. Do you want some?

CONNOR: Do I voluntarily want to drug myself? Let me think about that. No. Anyway isn’t it illegal?

FLORA: I’m only breaking the law if I get caught

CONNOR: Are they’re any side-effects?

FLORA: I hope so! I get it for the hallucinogenic side-effects

CONNOR: I’ve never met anyone who was so jeopardy friendly

FLORA: Thank you

CONNOR: It isn’t a compliment, no wonder people wander away from you. Talking about wandering, I need the toilet

FLORA: Again? Maybe you’re diabetic

CONNOR: Do not get our drinks mixed up!

FLORA: Of course I won’t

Connor exits, Nathan and Emily come from the bar, Nathan only looking at Emily

NATHAN: How kinky exactly?

EMILY: Do you want your answer in pie chart or ratio format?

Flora realising that she’s paid no attention to which drink is hers and which is Connor’s begins to go after him

FLORA: Which drink is yours again?

Flora collides with Nathan who drops his drink, Connor walks on oblivious

FLORA: I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. That’s like the third drink I’ve spilt tonight

EMILY: No wonder the floor around here is so sticky

FLORA: I’m having such a clumsy day, I jerked a door knob off earlier

NATHAN: Great now I’m going to go buy another drink with money I don’t have

FLORA: Wait! Have mine, it’s only fair, no wait, don’t have mine have Connor’s, oh which one is his again? This one I think, no it’s the other one, just take it

NATHAN: Cheers

FLORA: Cheers

Nathan and Emily carry on as before

NATHAN: So, we can’t just talk about the course?

EMILY: Nope

NATHAN: Or the accommodation?

EMILY: Nope

NATHAN: Or your hometown?

EMILY: Nope

NATHAN: You know what? You need to stop being an up-tight bitch. You’re at uni talking to a nice guy surrounded by hot young clever people, these are exciting times, anything could happen! What is wrong with you?

EMILY: What’s wrong with you?

NATHAN: Well...my mum fell down the stairs when I was inside her (pauses) I wasn’t raping her, I just wasn’t born yet. But that’s not the point

Heidi comes over

EMILY: Hi! This is Heidi, my flatmate, and this is (gestures
toward Nathan) the guy I’ve been talking to for the last few hours...

NATHAN: I know who Heidi is, she threw her handbag at me, remember? Has it really seemed that long to you? It’s only been 10 minutes.

EMILY: I think people should be forced to wear nametags

HEIDI: So, what you drinking?

EMILY: Another snakebite. What’s everyone else talking about? Courses, accommodation, hometowns?

HEIDI: If only, Ned and Jackie are telling dead baby jokes to Lavinia who is trying hard not to burst out in tears believing them to be serious.

NATHAN: You don’t like dead baby jokes then?

HEIDI: No especially not from people who have been following me around all night

NATHAN: I’ll buy you a drink if you don’t laugh at this “my girlfriend called me a pedophile the other day- I said that’s a big word for a seven year old.”

HEIDI: You actually managed to lower the tone of conversation from what I was hearing over there, I think I’m going to go back to the dead baby jokes

Heidi goes to the bar to get a drink, we see her in the background.

NATHAN: Heidi seems cool

EMILY: Yeah, so far we’re really getting along.

NATHAN: She dating anyone?

EMILY: Not unless she has a secret boyfriend back home

NATHAN: Interesting

EMILY (deflated): Drink. Drink to numb the pain. That’s what this week is about anyway: getting drunk and forcing random strangers to become your friends.

NATHAN: Ok, joking apart. Can I have your number?

EMILY (obliviously): Yeh, if you must, you can have Heidi’s number

NATHAN: You are giving me yours aren’t you?

EMILY: Of course not, I’m giving you Heidi’s number because that’s the number you want. I’m just a walking phonebook, the amount of people who have got together because of me I should start a dating agency

NATHAN: Stay here, don’t go anywhere

Nathan walks down to the dancefloor to talk to Heidi
Meanwhile Connor re-enters taking his drink off Flora

CONNOR: Thanks for holding my drink

FLORA: I thought that was my drink

CONNOR: Definitely mine, where’s yours? Drunk it already?

FLORA: Oh no! I accidentally gave it away to this guy

CONNOR: You what?

FLORA: Well I thought it was yours

CONNOR: So someone’s going to get accidentally drugged tonight?

FLORA: Not unless we can track them down, come on!

Nathan finally gets to Heidi with the drink in his hand

NED: Lavinia why did the dead baby cross the road?

LAVINIA: I don’t want to know!

NED: Because it was chained to a car bumper

LAVINIA: Why would you chain a baby to a car bumper?

NATHAN: Hi again Heidi

HEIDI: If you’re looking for Greg’s he’s not here, probably getting as far from you as possible incase you try to beat him up again

NATHAN: I thought he was someone else!

JACKIE: You’re not talking about Greg again are you Heidi?

NATHAN: Anyway can I have Emily’s phone number?

HEIDI: Why can’t you just ask her for it?

NATHAN: I did but she gave me yours, see?

Nathan shows his phone to Heidi that has her number on it

HEIDI: Why did she do that?

NATHAN: Because she’s drunk and for some reason she thought that I wanted to get with you

HEIDI: Eeuw. Better give you her number then

Heidi shows it to Nathan

HEIDI: Now that you’ve got it you can go

NATHAN: Thanks Heidi, I owe you one. Actually here you are, have this one, I got it free anyway, well sorta

Heidi takes the drink, mobile in the other hand whilst Nathan goes back to Emily

HEIDI: Wait! No! Oh, great I accidentally gave him Greg’s number instead of Emily’s

JACKIE: Why did you do that?

HEIDI: I was just thinking about him. No not like that! I just can’t get him out of my head

Nathan returns to Emily

EMILY: Did you get her number then?

NATHAN (smiling): No

EMILY: Since when has being rejected been a good thing?

NATHAN: But I wasn’t rejected

EMILY: Don’t rub it in. WHY? WHY?!! EVERYTHING WAS SUPPOSED TO BE DIFFERENT! THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE A NEW START! A NEW LIFE!

NATHAN: Woah there, really...everything’s fine...it’s okay.

EMILY: IT’S NOT OKAY!

NATHAN: You Muppet, I didn’t go over there to get her number, I went over there to get yours! I wanted your number

EMILY: Why didn’t you ask me for it?

NATHAN: I did but you didn’t listen!

EMILY: Why do you want my number?

NATHAN: Come on! Why do you think?

EMILY: Well, there’s a thirty year-old guy over there dressed up as a granny, grinding to Timbaland. (points) So I don’t know what to think at the moment

Awkward silence

EMILY: Let’s talk about something intelligent...

NATHAN: I’m not so good at that but people say that alcohol makes me seem more intelligent

EMILY: Doesn’t alcohol kill brain cells?

NATHAN: Exactly, brings everyone else down to my level. Same again?

EMILY: You’re right that is the cleverest thing you’ve said so far

NATHAN: You know, I know a place where the alcohol is free, we could go there

EMILY: Where’s that then and why aren’t we there already?

NATHAN: It’s my flat

EMILY: Not backwards in coming forwards are you? I tell you what, I can resist anything you throw at me, anything that is except temptation and that is a very tempting proposition. Wait here a minute, don’t go anywhere. Sit boy.

Emily walks down the steps
Ned is grinding Heidi who is trying to ignore him

HEIDI: Lavinia, I’m too depressed to drink this alcoholic depressant, do you want it?

LAVINIA: I am not really a depressant drinker

HEIDI: One more won’t hurt you

LAVINIA: Thank you

Lavinia starts drinking, Emily joins them. Emily enters

EMILY: Heidi have you still got those condoms?

HEIDI: No you’re not actually planning on…

EMILY: No. It’s just insurance incase something accidentally happens

HEIDI: In-case you accidentally sleep with him?

EMILY: Just in-case, don’t wait up for me

Emily prepares to rejoin Nathan

Flora and Connor approach Nathan

FLORA: Hello again, is it ok if I take my drink back off you?

NATHAN: No. Why? Anyway I gave it away for a phone number

FLORA: Do you know who has it now?

CONNOR: It’s really important that we find them, we think there might be a… substance in the drink that shouldn’t be drunk

NATHAN: Right, ok, I gave it to Heidi, who is somewhere on the dancefloor

Nathan peers out over dancefloor

CONNOR: Where exactly?

NATHAN: I can’t see her from here

CONNOR: Can you call her?

NATHAN: Don’t have her number, wait I gave Heidi the drink in return for Emily’s phone number and Emily’s with Heidi. I’ll phone Emily

Nathan rings the number on his mobile

Cut across to Greg and Valerie dancing closely together, Valerie whispering in his ear her hand near his crotch

GREG: Stop putting your hand down there and leave my phone alone whilst you’re at it

VALERIE: It wasn’t me!

Greg picking up phone

*Phone Conversation*

GREG: Oh sorry it was my phone, I’ll just answer this. Hello?

NATHAN: Emily?

GREG: Nathan is that you? Why are you calling me?

NATHAN: Greg!!?! You again?!!? Why aren’t you Emily?

GREG: Why do you want Emily?

NATHAN: To find Heidi, who thinking about it gave me this number, she so doesn’t want me getting with Emily

GREG: You’re getting with Emily?

NATHAN: Not if I can’t find her. I think Heidi must have pranked me into giving me your number so I wouldn’t get with Emily

GREG: Doesn’t sound like Heidi

NATHAN: Better go find them mate

GREG: Ok bye!

Nathan puts phone away

NATHAN: Wrong number. We’ve lost them

Emily rejoins Nathan

EMILY: There you are

NATHAN: Where’s Heidi?

EMILY: Not this again

NATHAN: We think we might have accidentally given her a dodgy drink

CONNOR: We need to find her

EMILY (to Connor and Flora): So you two must be the “we”. What is all this about? Dodgy drinks? She didn’t have a drink just now when I saw her

CONNOR: Are you sure?

EMILY: Yeh, I think she’s stopped drinking, seems a little down

FLORA: I’m so relieved! Must have thrown it away, or maybe we just got the drinks mixed up in the first place

EMILY (to Nathan): I’m not even going to ask, change of plan, your coming to mine

NATHAN: Not mine?

EMILY: No mine

NATHAN: Yours. Ok. Let’s go!

They exit

TOM: Do you know where Rosie and Marcus got to?

GREG (to Valerie): No!

EMMELINE: Probably home which is where I want to be

TOM: Then why don’t you go?

VALERIE (to Greg): Why not?

EMMELINE: I’ve forgotten the way

GREG (to Valerie): I’m not going to have sex with you whilst you’re in this state

VALERIE: Ok let’s go back to mine

GREG: Did you just hear what I said?

VALERIE: I heard you say “have sex with you” meaning me and I said “let’s go”

GREG: That’s not what I said

VALERIE: I heard you say “have sex with you” all the other words are meaningless

GREG: Let’s get you sobered up first, it would be wrong to take advantage of you whilst you’re this drunk

Valerie turns to Tom

VALERIE: Shhh, don’t tell him but I want to take this guy back to mine

TOM: Are you sure? Not going to do anything stupid?

VALERIE: I'm not as think as you drunk I am you know

TOM: Have you had a bit to drink?

VALERIE: Don’t look at me with that tone of voice! I’m stone cold sober!

TOM: You’re drunk! You don’t even know what you’re saying

VALERIE: Just because I might be drunk doesn’t make you right!

TOM: Please don’t get argumentative again

VALERIE: I’m not argumentative! How dare you accuse me of being argumentative! I’m the least argumentative person I know!

TOM: You’re such a hypocrite

VALERIE: No you’re a… hippogriff!

GREG: She’s as drunk as Amy Winehouse at a Hen Party, what are we going to do?

VALERIE: I want to go back to the flat, I feel ill

TOM: I’m not surprised given how much you’ve drunk tonight

VALERIE: No, it’s nothing to do with the alco-mo-hol, I just ate an undercooked pizza earlier

TOM: Whatever, I’ll take you home you can throw-up your pizza and 12 bottles of WKD there

VALERIE: I want to go home with Greg

TOM: Yeh but Greg won’t want to go home with you

GREG: I don’t mind, was thinking of going back anyway

TOM: You don’t know where she lives

VALERIE: Suffolk Terrace!

GREG: I do now and it’s on the way back to mine anyway, at least I think it is

Valerie walks off without saying goodbye to anybody across the front of the stage, Greg follows

GREG (to Tom): I’ll look after her, I promise

Greg bumps into Heidi

LAVINIA: I feel ill

HEIDI: Greg!

GREG: Heidi, erm this girl (indicating Valerie) is drunk, I’m looking after her, taking her home. Listen you know you have all those condoms, can I borrow one?

HEIDI: You get your condoms out once and suddenly everyone wants one. No you can’t borrow a condom, you can have one to keep. Who is this girl anyway? Why do you want it again?

GREG: Just incase she drunkenly gets with someone on the way back to her flat

Valerie exits down stage right exit

JACKIE: By someone do you mean you?

Heidi gives him a condom

HEIDI: Do you know where Marcus got to?

GREG: No he just disappeared. Ok thanks again, see you tomorrow maybe

Greg runs after Valerie

JACKIE: I’m sorry honey

HEIDI: Ned! Stop grinding me! Nothing’s going to happen!

Ned stops, looking ashamed

LAVINIA: Why is the room spinning?

JACKIE: That’s not the room spinning, that’s your head sweetie

HEIDI: She’s only had a few, she can’t be drunk

Jackie seeing Owen who is looking at Heidi

MC: “I Bet That You Look Good on the Dancefloor” by the Arctic Monkeys begins to play and is played fairly loudly for the first 1.30 minutes before slowly being lowered to low-level background music.

JACKIE: You see that guy there exchanging glances with you?

HEIDI: Ignore him. Just keep pretending to dance

LAVINIA: I love this song!

NED (attempting a joke): How ironic is it that we are actually on a dancefloor?

LAVINIA: I want to dance like a robot from 1984!

Lavinia staggers across to centre stage

HEIDI: Come back!

Heidi follows her

Stop making the eyes at me, I'll stop making the eyes at you
And what it is that surprises me, is that I don't really want you to
And your shoulders are frozen, cold as the night
Over you're an explosion, you’re dynamite
Your name isn't Rio, but I don't care for sand
Lighting the fuse might result in a bang

I bet that you look good on the dancefloor
I don't know if you’re looking for romance or...
I don't know what you’re looking for
I bet that you look good on the dancefloor
Dancing to electro-pop like a robot from 1984

I wish you'd stop ignoring me, because you're sending me to despair
Without a sound you’re calling me, and I don't think it's very fair
That your shoulders are frozen, cold as the night
Oh you’re an explosion, you’re dynamite
Your name isn't Rio, but I don't care for sand
Lighting the fuse might result in a bang

Oh there int no love no, Montague’s or Capulets
Just banging tunes in DJ sets and
Dirty dancefloors and dreams of naughtiness

MC: Music ends

LC: Bright white light downstage replaces previous disco lights

Exeunt all other characters down to the stage right exit. Ned, Jackie et al have already exited, oblivious to Lavinia’s state. The remaining Suffolk Terrace characters and Kevin and his crew all pass behind Heidi and Lavinia, starring at them giggling, Lavinia having collapsed on the floor.

EMMELINE: The difference between a tragedy and a comedy is simply a matter of perspective.

As the remaining characters exit Heidi is left on her own with Lavinia

Scene 4
Emily’s Room

LC: Lights-up, very dim in Emily’s room

Emily and Nathan are making out, during the course of the scene, slowly undressing each other. Nathan’s trousers stay on however as the phone in his pocket becomes important latter on.

Valerie’s Room

LC: Lights-up in Valerie’s room

Valerie screaming with laughter is heard off-stage, she then enters the room on Greg’s back, he lets her off

VALERIE: How did we get here?

GREG: I carried you all the way on my back, don’t you remember?

VALERIE: So is this your bedroom?

GREG: No

VALERIE: What are my knickers doing on your bedroom floor?

GREG: This isn’t my bedroom, it’s yours! It’s your room, your knickers, why would your knickers be on my bedroom floor?

VALERIE: That’s why I was asking! I suppose this must be my room, should really put some posters up because at the moment all the rooms look the same

GREG: Sobered up yet?

VALERIE: I wasn’t drunk in the first place

GREG: I’ll take that as a no then, you’re still in drunken denial

Valerie picks the knickers up off the floor as she stands up her shoulder brushes Greg’s who is now shaking

VALERIE: Why are you shaking? You don’t get nervous around the sight of knickers do you?

GREG: No, No! I just need the toilet

VALERIE: There’s one just down the corridor

GREG: Yeh I will go when we find out where Emily and Nathan are

VALERIE: Bet they’re at it like UEA rabbits. Aw the rabbits are so cute

GREG: Are you sure they weren’t in his room? I mean just because they weren’t answering his door doesn’t mean that they aren’t in there. I wouldn’t have opened to door to us if our places had been reversed

VALERIE: If they were both wrecked, the last thing they will be thinking of is being quiet

GREG: I’ll call her mobile again make sure she isn’t being raped or anything

VALERIE: She’s hardly going to be able to pick up her phone if she is being raped…

GREG: Do you always say inappropriate things at inappropriate times? One of my flatmates is like you, except she does it sober. Then again I’ve never seen you sober

Greg is bursting, hoping up and down

VALERIE: For all you know, I’m never sober. I’m not having you wet yourself in my room, go to the toilet. God I must be drunk, I sound like my mum

GREG: Keep calling her on that number, I’ll be back in a mo

Greg exits. Pause. The phone rings. Valerie picks it up.

Lower Stage – LCR

Heidi has her phone to her ear on one side and Lavinia draped on the other

LC: Dim white lights up on upper stage central

VALERIE: Emily?

HEIDI: Greg?

VALERIE: Erm this is Greg’s phone Valerie speaking

HEIDI: Greg’s phone is called Valerie? Why does he call his phone Valerie? Wait a minute why is Greg’s phone talking to me? Are you a talking phone? Are you a talking phone called Valerie?

VALERIE: No I’m not a talking phone called Valerie, my name is Valerie but I’m a friend of Greg’s, a human friend! I am talking on Greg’s phone because he is currently indisposed of. Can I ask whose calling?

HEIDI: I’m Heidi, Greg’s flatmate

VALERIE: You’re not a talking phone either then

HEIDI: No of course not. Don’t be ridiculous. Where is Greg?

VALERIE: He’s round mine

HEIDI: Why can’t he come to the phone again? Oh shit my phone’s is dieing, oh, er quick, erm can you tell Greg that I want him, I mean I need him, not in that way I need him to…

LC: Spotlight blackout downstage

Greg re-enters seeing that Valerie has been on the phone

GREG: Was that Emily?

VALERIE: No it was some girl called Heidi

GREG: What were you doing phoning Heidi?

VALERIE: No she phoned me

GREG: Why would she phone you? You don’t even know her

VALERIE: She phoned your phone asking for you although she thought that I was a phone that talked. A phone called Valerie.

GREG: Why did she think that?

VALERIE: I don’t know!

GREG: What did she say?

VALERIE: She wanted to know where you were and said that she wanted you, she sounded pretty desperate

GREG: Well she is both pretty and desperate. So still no answer from Emily then?

VALERIE: No, got any other ideas for how we can interrupt their fun?

GREG: Wait, I can see Emily’s room from here, it’s just over there, see the one with the light on.

Placing Valerie in-front of him so that she can see from Greg’s viewpoint

VALERIE: I can see shadows moving about in there

GREG: It must be them

VALERIE: Are you sure? I don’t want to walk all the way over to yours just to walk in on two complete strangers having sex

GREG: Ok, do you have Nathan’s number?

VALERIE: No, why do I need his number when he lives other side of the corridor to me?

GREG: Wait I have Nathan’s number from tonight! He accidentally called me. Ok I’ll give him a call, you go to his door listen out for his phone going off on the off chance that they are round here, if you hear it we will know if they are in his room or not.

VALERIE: Ok if I hear nothing I will come straight back, of course he could have his phone on silent… or off…

Valerie leaves. Nathan’s Phone rings at the other window. Emily on hearing the phone ringing takes it

EMILY (giggling): Is that a phone in your pocket or are you just pleased to see me?

Emily takes out the phone to answer, Nathan snatches it away and ends up answering it himself

GREG: Nathan!

NATHAN: Greg!?! Yeh can I call you back, kind of have my hands tied at the moment

GREG: Yeh so I can see, you’re like an octopus with all those arms wrapped around Emily

NATHAN: What?

GREG (childlike): I can see you!

NATHAN (looking around): Where the hell are you?

GREG: Valerie’s flat, just across the way

NATHAN: What are you doing in Valerie’s flat?

GREG: Well we were looking for you

NATHAN: Well you weren’t going to find me in there. Why are you really there?

GREG: Just getting to know Valerie

NATHAN: You do know she’s engaged? Engaged to be married

Valerie re-enters

GREG: Engaged!

VALERIE: What, the phone?

GREG: No, you!

VALERIE: Yeh, why?

GREG: I just never thought

NATHAN: I’ve had enough of him, let’s turn the phone off

EMILY: No keep it on. I have an ingenious use for it

LC: Blackout at back

GREG: He’s hung-up

VALERIE: Sounds like you are

Valerie goes to kiss Greg who backs away

GREG: What would your fiancée say?

VALERIE: He’s not the jealous type

GREG: It’s his ring on your finger

GREG: Will be found out someday. I can’t get with you, you’re in love with someone else

VALERIE: But someone else isn’t here and you are

GREG: You don’t mean it, it’s just the alcohol talking

VALERIE: I can’t stare into his eyes down a telephone line. No amount of emails will make him materialise in my arms. I’ve been away from him for five days and I’ve never felt so alone. And tonight you made me feel a bit less alone, just stay with me tonight, nothing has to happen

GREG: But something could happen, I should go

VALERIE: You don’t have to go, stay

GREG: If I stay I will get carried away and I think you would too

VALERIE: Look! Just for one night, I wanted to be someone else, I’ve not been myself for so long. At home everything is the same. No-one calls me Valerie anymore, everyone calls me Valerie and Mark, we get invited to everything as a couple, we do everything as a couple and just for once I wanted to do something that was me, I wanted to be a single person, doing single things. My male friends at home don’t look at me twice but you did and I just got carried away

Greg leaves

Scene 4B

By now Heidi has dragged Lavinia up the steps to the upper stage centre spotlight Heidi gets Lavinia’s mobile phone out of her pocket

LAVINIA: Lighting the fuse might result in a bang!

HEIDI: I’m just borrowing you’re phone, mine’s died. Lavinia, I need to call for help. Who can I call? I don’t even know where we are, maybe we should go back to the LCR. Why did I drag you out of there? I can’t carry you all the way back to the flat, maybe someone will walk past

Finds number on phone, starts to make call

HEIDI: Come on Marcus, you seem reliable pick up! Pick up your phone! Where are you?

Stage Left - Marcus’s Room with bed in middle

Rosie and Marcus come down the stage left steps. Rosie is wrapped around Marcus kissing him whilst he lowers her on to the bed

ROSIE: This isn’t my room

MARCUS: You’ve forgotten where you live. Don’t you remember?

Rosie tries to pull Marcus down onto the bed with her but he resists

ROSIE: Lie with me

MARCUS: You’re drunk, I’m not sure that this is such a good idea anymore

ROSIE: You’re cute when you’re trying to be serious

MARCUS: I’m only cute when everyone else is drunk

Marcus begins to walk out the room

ROSIE: Where are you going?

MARCUS: To get you some water, you’ll thank me in the morning

Marcus exits up the stage left exit

ROSIE: I’ll be gone by the morning. Mornings make me look ugly, how do they manage to do that? No-one ever says that I look pretty in the morning; mind you most people aren’t drunk in the mornings. What if he is there in the kitchen sobering up right now?

Marcus re-enters putting a glass of water by the bed on the bedside table

MARCUS: Do you want anything else?

ROSIE: Only you, I’m so drunk, you could do anything to me and I wouldn’t know about it, although I will probably like it if you do. Lie here with me

Rosie stands up, clutches Marcus in her hands and kisses him, with some resistance from Marcus

MARCUS: It’s a single bed designed for a single person

ROSIE: That’s fine we’re both single people

MARCUS: You can sleep in my bed tonight, I’ll sleep on the floor

ROSIE: I want to sleep where you sleep

MARCUS: Well I can’t sleep when there’s someone else in the bed with me

ROSIE: We don’t have to sleep, I just don’t want to be on my own

MARCUS: Are you afraid of the dark?

ROSIE: No! I’ve lived half my lifetime at night-time, besides all my best times come in the darkness. Why, are you so afraid?

MARCUS: I’m not

ROSIE: So afraid of me and what might be. Don’t be afraid of the dark, don’t worry, the only monster in the bed will be me

Rosie kisses Marcus

MARCUS: I’m so confused. I’ve never met anyone like you before

Marcus kisses Rosie, kissing alternates between dialogue

ROSIE: If it’s any consolation not many people have

MARCUS: My head is spinning, you’re not my usual type

ROSIE: You either

Scene 4C

HEIDI: Help! Where is everyone? Won’t someone help me?

LAVINIA: Lighting the fuse my result in a bang…

HEIDI: Stop saying that!

LAVINIA: You’re an explosion! You’re dynamite!

HEIDI: Lavinia, listen to me you’re going to be ok but I need to know what you’ve taken because I’m going to call you an ambulance, I’m going to call for help

LAVINIA: The fuse is already lit! The fire is approaching, lighting up the night time sky, can’t you feel it burn?...

HEIDI: Stop talking gibberish, you’re scaring me

LAVINIA: …The alarms are ringing all around, getting louder and louder and there is no exit, no escape.

Heidi on the mobile phone

HEIDI: Ambulance service… immediately

Interval

Scene 5

LC: All lights up

The Norfolk Terrace kitchen table is placed stage right, the bed this time being placed stage left, the remaining table is placed on the raised stage for the next scene. The characters enter from all entrances. Heidi sits on the floor surrounded by papers in front of the table which Emily sits at whilst Greg lounges about on the right side of the raised stage. Marcus stands at the upper stage upper door with guitar whilst Lavinia is absent off-stage. Meanwhile stage right Rosie is getting out of bed again, this time Connor is under the covers unseen. Valerie sits on high at the stage left upper door. Tom sits on the top of the steps whilst Nathan stands on the raised stage, Emmeline paces about going left to right and back again and again during the scene. Everyone else stands assorted on the raised stage.

Marcus begins to play is guitar

A mobile phone begins to ring and another and another and another. Phone’s ring for five seconds and then silence, Marcus continues to play over the top of the dialogue which magically cuts between the different conversations, picking up lines here and there. Rosie’s mobile rings, she slowly clambers out of bed and searches about for the phone which she eventually picks up

ROSIE: Hello Mum, can I call you back? Now’s not a good time

GREG: Dad I need money!

ROSIE: Yeh you’ve woken me up…

EMMELINE: “And thence from Athens turn away our eyes. To seek new friends and stranger companies”

VALERIE: Mark!

ROSIE: …You shouldn’t have called me so early then…

NATHAN: Yeh I’m sorry I haven’t called but I’ve been busy

ROSIE: …What do you mean it’s two in the afternoon?

VALERIE: You could have called me if you were that worried

NATHAN: Stop calling me Mum! For the last time I’m fine, you don’t have to call everyday otherwise I’m going to run out of things to say to you

VALERIE (sobbing): Nothing’s wrong, why do you say that? It’s just good to hear from you that’s all

JULIA: Everything’s fine, just fine

FLORA: University? I fucking love it

NATHAN: Our freshers’ week lasts the grand total of two days, my mates got two weeks! What’s with that?

HEIDI: It’s just a completely different way of life

TOM: They don’t take college as seriously over here, that’s for sure. They only work like six hours a week

JACKIE: Met a lot of people

NED: Yeh I’m making loads of friends

ARTHUR: No I haven’t met a nice girl yet

HEIDI: You can hear the music? Oh that’s just Marcus my flatmate playing his guitar, he’s been playing a lot recently. He’s been quiet bit withdrawn recently

GREG: He won’t tell us where he disappeared to on the first night

EMMELINE: They are never quiet! 24 hours of hullabaloo a day!

TOM: Yeh they’re all very nice, to me, not always to each other though

EMMELINE: There is always, nattering or loud industrial music or drunken people shouting obscenities

ROSIE: Yeh I’m getting on with them well. No! I’ve not got with anyone yet!

EMMELINE: Every night I hear this incessant squelching sound coming from Rosie’s room, the rhythmic squeaking of the springs emanating through the walls!

HEIDI: I think its great being able to make friends without ever having to leave the flat

EMMELINE: It is only a matter of time until one of them starts a fire. Yes all the rooms have fire alarms. But fire-alarms are not designed to prevent fires! My assumption being that fires will always occur; they are simply designed to warn people that a fire is within an un-safe proximity and that immediate evasive action should be taken. I am not in denial, I am paranoid but my paranoia is justified. Paranoia is perceived as an irrational emotion because it is usually a reaction to the unknown, the imagined, things that might never be but actually it is the most rational of all emotions being based on the assumption that dreadful things will always happen in life. Paranoia is a rational realisation that you will never know when and how they will happen. Just because I am paranoid does not mean that they are not all out to get me.

VALERIE: As if moving away into a new flat for the first time wasn’t bad enough you’re living with complete strangers!

EMMELINE: I hate my flatmates! I want to move! I am walking down to the accommodation office right now!

ARTHUR: I hope my flatmates like me

GREG: I love it, you can be anyone you want to be

ROSIE: No-one knows your history

MARCUS: No-body has taken the time to get to know anything about me

GREG: No-body knows about my old nickname

ROSIE: I haven’t told them yet, why do they need to know?

GREG: I think that they think that I’m confident, I know! I managed to re-invent myself as a confident person. Maybe that’s all confidence is at the end of the day, fooling people into thinking that you’re confident. Maybe everyone is as insecure as everyone else, it’s just some people hide it better than others.

EMILY: Yeh I’m just being myself, don’t think any of my flatmates have made their minds up about me yet

GREG: Emily the Bakewell Tart we call her, behind her back of course. Because she comes from Bakewell, that’s the joke because she got with a lecherous guy on the first night

HEIDI: Eventful is how I’d describe that first night

EMILY: One of my flatmates collapsed, had to be taken to hospital apparently, erm I went home early that night

NATHAN: Rosie is so sexy she actually converted a gay guy! How mixed up must he be now?

Lavinia enters from upstage centre and walks to centre stage under the spotlight dressed in a hospital gown starring into middle distance

EMILY: The doctors reckon there was something in her drink

HEIDI: I was with her all night in the A and E, it was shocking, it could have so easily have been me

Jackie enters from upstage centre and crosses the raised stage going right, down the steps and to the down stage left entrance

JACKIE (entering): There was this girl she must have been plastered and she was going all oooooaaggghhh…

Jackie waves about her arms in a comical style

JACKIE (stopping): Well obviously you can’t see what I’m doing over the phone but she was definitely doing it like that

HEIDI: I don’t think it was date rape, I was there, no-one was chatting her up or anything. Of course I’m safe, it was just one of those things, she must have picked up the wrong drink that’s all

GREG: Yeh she is home now but I haven’t seen much of her since. Lavinia her name is, she’s foreign, bit quiet, struggles with the language.

NED: I think she’s Eastern European

JACKIE: She was either Mexican or Swedish, I don’t really know

HEIDI: Don’t get in a fuss, just to the A and E in Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital no I wasn’t alone, the Resident Tutor was there and someone from security. They told me to go home but I wasn’t going to leave her, she only got to this country on Wednesday, that night I was the only friend she had. She’s fine now, well as fine as you can be, bit shaken up. The Resident Tutor? He’s the older student who takes responsibility for us, yeh he wasn’t too happy being dragged out on his first night…

TOM: Our Resident Tutor just dropped by telling us that the cleaner was unhappy about the state of the kitchen. She refused to clean it today, not that you’d notice

NATHAN: The cleaner didn’t clean the kitchen! Which is her job, because it wasn’t clean enough for her to clean, explain that to me. Our cleaner can’t be much older than we are, she must be really inexperienced. Dawn her name is.

VALERIE: We had left the kitchen in a bit of a mess, I felt a bit sorry for the cleaner, I can’t find anything under the dirty dishes oh and someone keeps drinking my milk

TOM: We have a secret milk thief

VALERIE: I just want my milk in the mornings!

NATHAN: She sounds like a child when she goes on about wanting her milk, that’s Valerie not Rosie. Rosie gets enough milk round other guy’s flats

ROSIE: It’s not me I’m never about for breakfast, it could be Nathan

NATHAN: It isn’t me, I don’t put milk on my cornflakes. I just put anything I can find on yesterday I had cider on cornflakes, the day before I found some, well the day before I borrowed her milk indefinetly but I’m not the milk thief

TOM: Cereal makes a great meal anytime of the day

NATHAN: Maybe it’s one of the Chinese men who live down the corridor. I’m not saying that because he is Chinese he must be a klepto-maniac I’m just saying he’s one of those people who you never see, it could be him. He keeps messing up the kitchen as well

TOM: There’s not much self space in the kitchen

EMMELINE: People keep stealing my shelf space

TOM: I’ve had to put a padlock on it so they don’t steal anymore of my food

VALERIE: We have a sort of cooker, it’s a microwave cooker, I’ve got no idea how it works, I just bash the buttons and hope that it starts

HEIDI: Yes I am eating enough, what did you say? Am I getting my 5 a day?

ROSIE: Does wine count towards it?

GREG: Two meals a day, it’s the student way

VALERIE: I’ve already lost like half a stone

HEIDI: Yes I’m keeping hydrated dad

EMILY: Yeh I’ve been getting loads of sleep, well more than Heidi did on that first night

HEIDI: Yeh so didn’t get much sleep on the first night and then had to spend the whole of the first day queuing, oh “the we” is me and Greg

GREG: How long does it take to register?

HEIDI: Greg said and then this other girl said…

KATY: This is just the queue for the cash point, I said, what an idiot he was

HEIDI: I can’t repeat what Greg said next so we finally found the queue for registration and that was even longer! We were there for so long but it was nice to get some time to talk and find out about one another but the best bit was when we finally got to register and it literally took 2 minutes you get a bag with all your information and forms and then they tell you that to finish registering you have to sign in online and Greg just stood there in shock and said…

GREG: You’re telling me that I’ve spent 4 hours queuing to register at the uni just to be told that I’ve got to complete the registration process by logging onto something called “e-vision”.

HEIDI: In the pack? Just forms and stuff and 5 separate hand outs from my school stating why plagiarism is the root of all evil and that I will executed if I even think of doing it. Anyway we agreed to do that later in the day then we went to find out our seminar groups and lecture times and whilst we were walking up Greg asked me

GREG: How are you supposed to know if your lecturer is a man or a woman when they all have Doctor or Professor in front of their names?

HEIDI: So I said that I think the names themselves are a bit of a give-away, I’m fairly sure that Dr Sarah Churchwell is a women and that Professor Peter Womack is a man. So he then said and you won’t believe this…

GREG: Professor Peter Womack could be a woman with a man’s name. She could be subverting gender conventions by using a name associated with masculinity.

HEIDI: I don’t know if he was joking or not

GREG: And then we went to find out our seminar groups. Oh just this girl I was with

HEIDI: And we just couldn’t work out the timetable, so…

GREG: I asked someone, how on earth are we supposed to work out this timetable?

HEIDI: And they said that we needed a “Timetable Slotting System: Basic Scheme” and believe me there is nothing basic about it. So Greg said…

GREG: I need a timetable so that I can read the timetable I’ve already got? How does that work?

NATHAN: This timetable makes no-sense, its nonsense. When is B3*E4? That isn’t a time it’s a battleship grid reference

VALERIE: It’s all meaningless; it’s just letters and numbers

HEIDI: Yeh we finally worked out the timetable, it’s ok, I never realised how little “contact time” you actually get

NATHAN: Yeh I’ve been to all of my lectures so far, (pause) well I haven’t actually had any yet, well none that I’m aware of, (pause) yeh you’re right I probably should have had a lecture by now, it must be some sort of a timetabling problem

ROSIE: Lectures: the later the better

EMILY: Doesn’t matter when they are I will still nap through them

HEIDI: Went to my first lecture, it was ok, like being at school again except that the class was over 200 strong and the lesson was in a theatre

VALERIE: The only thing that I learnt in the lecture today is that Biology is really Chemistry. Chemistry is really Physics and that Physics is really Maths. Oh and I also realised that I hate them all, why did I chose biology?

TOM: History, it’s just one fucking thing after another

EMMELINE: So she had the audacity to say to me “keep you’re fucking hand down in a lecture, no-one cares” to which I replied, it is my human right to ask questions…

ROSIE: What did you say? Studying hard? Oh… yeh of course

HEIDI: Just reading my reading list, never knew you had to get so many books

NATHAN: For £3000 a year you’d have thought that they would have bought the books for you

FLORA: My bookstore bill almost equals my tuition fees

TOM: Education must be the only industry in the world where you have to pay to do work.

HEIDI: I know £3000 and all that it amounts to is a couple of seminars and a few lectures

VALERIE: I have stuff on four days a week, at least 3 hours a day

EMILY: You never seem to get a break doing Environmental Studies, I do twice as much work as any humanities student

EMMELINE: I got my timetable and thought is it worth it? Where does all the money go? Because this course certainly is not value for money and in three years time I will £30,000 in debt with a dubious degree from an otherwise average university

JACKIE: Anyway that’s enough about me…

NED: Forgot to ask, how are things back home?

JULIA: Is mum ok?

OWEN: Has anything changed?

HEIDI: Never thought that I’d miss your cooking but I do, I really do

VALERIE: I just needed to hear your voice

GREG: Coping without me?

VALERIE: Sheffield Uni sounds great, seems like your having a wild time in that party city but listen…

MARCUS: You actually had a party to celebrate?

NATHAN: Yeh we’re having a beach party tonight, invited all the neighbours, should be a right laugh

TOM: And before that we’re going to this thing called SocMart

VALERIE: I’ve got something to tell you

TOM: You sound so distant on the end of the line

NED: I’m sick of being homesick

ARTHUR: Uni is exhilarating but tiring

JULIA: It’s just the unfamiliarity of everything; I haven’t felt comfortable since I got here

EMMELINE: The rooms are uncomfortable and soulless. It is immaterial it doesn’t matter how much of your on stuff you clutter it up with it’s just a shell, every room is so uniform, there is no sense of personality or individuality

TOM: The amber skies above the tree-line of the lake is beautiful, love the lake wish you could be here to see it

Walks down to stage left door

HEIDI: I don’t want to come back just yet and it’s not that I want to leave here, it’s just so different it’s not just living somewhere else it’s a whole new way of living your life.

FLORA: I feel ill, think I’m coming down with freshers flu

VALERIE: I’ve got something to admit to you I met this boy, just let me explain, it was in the LCR I was drunk and we got on really well and our flatmates we’re getting together, I know it sounds bad but nothing happened. Yeh he wanted something to happen but nothing did but the stupidest thing is I didn’t even realise he was into me that way, I’m so in love with you I never even thought about it, I’ve always known that I love you but I never knew I loved you this much. Being away from you is killing me inside and so… I have to see you, can’t believe it’s only been six days. It’s like there’s this dense emptiness in my chest and it gets worse with everyday that I don’t see you. I always knew that I love you I just never realised how much until now. I can’t go on without you but I can’t move to Sheffield, I can’t come and live with you. What are we going to do?

A knocking is heard

EMILY: Not sure if I like it here yet, we’ll give it time. I will call you tomorrow

Emily leaves via an upper stage exit

GREG: Bye, got to go!

Greg bounds off to the upper stage exit

HEIDI: I love you too

Heidi collects up the papers and departs down the down stage right exit.
A knocking is heard

MARCUS: I don’t even know who I am anymore


EMMELINE: I want to come home

Scene 6

Downstage in a line from stage right to left are Georgina, Kevin, Owen, Ash and Katy, they are giving out leaflets promoting their various societies to strangers who may or may not be invisible. Meanwhile a man named Matt Gloss stands near the stage right stairs up on the raised stage. Jackie and Ned enter from the back of the raised stage walking down to up-centre stage, gossiping all the time.

JACKIE: Come on! Hurry up, we’ve only got 5 minutes

NED: We’d have longer if you weren’t so persistent on going shopping. What’s wrong with the bikini you already have?

JACKIE: It makes me look fat

NED: That’s not the bikini’s fault! I hope Heidi comes in a bikini to this Suffolk Terrace beach party tonight

JACKIE: Greg said his flatmates are off limits

NED: To me?

JACKIE: To you?

NED: No to me

JACKIE: To you?

NED: Yes, to me

JACKIE: No, not to you. Do you fancy her then?

NED: She’s fancy-able. She’s attractive, I don’t know if am attracted

JACKIE: To be honest, I think Heidi fancies Greg, every time I see her she is talking about him

NED: Do you think Greg realises?

JACKIE: He seems oblivious

NED: He gets so much female attention! It’s not fair why can’t I get some?

They reach the edge of the raised stage, looking down on the society tables meanwhile Connor and Flora follow on behind but go to the top of the stage left stairs and stop

JACKIE: You come across far too strongly. You’re about as subtle as an earthquake. Girls like the strong silent subtle type not the… earthquake type. Believe me Ned, I love you but the less you say the more attractive people will think you are

NED: Shame there’s no Single’s soc. I can’t see a Doctor Who Soc either, although I suppose that they’d basically be the same thing

CONNOR: It’s only a matter of time until you set off a fire-alarm…

FLORA: I learnt my lesson; next time I buy a bottle of vodka I will share it. Oh you know that GHB I misplaced from the first night?

CONNOR: Yeh…

FLORA: Turns out it was actually ecstasy, silly me that could have been serious

CONNOR: How can you get those two confused? How did you even get ecstasy? We never did find out what happened to that drink

JACKIE: Talking of being single, you know Lavinia? Greg’s flatmate? Well she’s a pill popper, took ecstasy and ended up in hospital Sunday night

NED: No can’t be…

JACKIE: It’s always the ones you least expect

NED: Maybe she misread the “E” thinking it to be sherbet or something

Arthur enters from the same place as the others before him, looking around, looking lost, he winds up at the stage right steps.

CONNOR: What societies have you joined so far?

FLORA: Joined LitSoc, talked to the Publicity guy for like five minutes, he was well hot, nice personality too. You?

CONNOR: Joined Irish Soc, obviously

FLORA: Why do you say obviously?

CONNOR: Well I’m from Ireland, I’m called Connor, I couldn’t really be more Irish

FLORA: You’re Irish?!?! Never realised. Do you have to be Irish to join Irish Soc?

CONNOR: Nah, probably have to drink a lot of Guinness though
Flora and Connor continue, walking down the stairs and across to the front of downstage centre.

ARTHUR: Excuse me, do you know where the Art Soc table is?

MATT GLOS: Just down there somewhere

ARTHUR: Do you know if they do life drawing classes?

MATT GLOS: Yeh, yeh they do I’ve done them

ARTHUR: What’s it like? Isn’t it weird drawing a naked person in the room whilst they just sit there? Naked as the day they were drawn

MATT GLOS: I wouldn’t know I was the model

ARTHUR: I could never do that, what’s that like?

MATT GLOS: Boring, easiest money ever although I kept falling into the erection trap

ARTHUR (unsure): What’s that?

MATT GLOS: The erection trap is when you get erections at the most inconvenient moments, like at the Doctors, or when getting a massage or sitting for life drawing classes. It comes at the most inappropriate times because you think how inappropriate it would be to get an erection and then all of a sudden because you were thinking about it, it actually happens. God I ruined so many pictures that day

ARTHUR: That must have been so embarrassing

MATT GLOS: Oh it wasn’t embarrassing, paid me £40, it’s what got me into art soc and look at me now. One of the artists liked what she saw and even gave me her number and at least I didn’t cum all over the canvases or anything.

ARTHUR: Ok that’s put me off Art Soc, I’m going to go now, thanks for your advice

Arthur walks down the steps, and across to Georgina

JACKIE: No Pottery Society here, shame their slogan could be “Do pot, join Pot Soc”

NED: I think there should be a UEA Dialect Society to get all the Northerners to speak properly. Southerners rule UEA Northerners should get over it.

JACKIE: Talking of Northerners and pot you know Greg’s flatmate Marcus?

NED: Is he actually Northern?

JACKIE: Well whatever, apparently he smokes a lot of pot in his room, Greg says he hardly ever leaves and he mysteriously disappeared Sunday night to score some more hash…

NED: Do you even know what hash really is?

JACKIE: Yeh, of course, it’s that potato-y thing you get in supermarkets

ARTHUR: Is this Art Soc?

GEORGINA: Ant Soc? What’s Ant Soc? What would you even do in Ant Soc?

ARTHUR: No I said Art Soc

GEORGINA: No we’re not Art Soc or Ant Soc. This is Circus Soc, it’s very antertaining though, do you want to join?

ARTHUR: Well…

Flora sees the Korfball table

FLORA: What the hell is Korfball?

OWEN: Come here and you’ll find out

Connor not wanting to be left alone goes over to try and make talk about Nightline

CONNOR: Nightline… is that some kind of sex chat line?

KEVIN: No, no, no, it’s actually…

KATY: Hello are you interested in joining Drama Soc?

JACKIE: Thinking about it and Ned here is not afraid to make a scene

NED: But we’re in Minotaur are we still allowed to join?

KATY: Of course! Drama Soc is open to everyone

NED: So how do we get involved?

Ash cuts in-between Jackie and Ned, pestering her

ASH: Excuse me? Hello there. You a Fresher? Well can I just say, now has never been a better time to join the Young Conservatives. Not only will you get to meet some swell people with similar opinions to you, we also put on some great events. For example one night of the year, we all get dressed up and…

KATY: …put on a musical! One a year. DramaSoc is all about getting as many people to participate in theatre as possible, not just acting but directing, designing, even writing and producing, we always need producers. Then of course you can always just watch…

GEORGINA: …people riding unicycles whilst juggling, we even have people who can eat fire. We’re a diverse, friendly group, so anyone can come along. You could start out by simply getting some…

OWEN: …balls. Yeh korfball is played with one ball to be precise. The court is divided into zones of boys and girls and the idea is to get your ball…

KEVIN: …In the little room underneath Suffolk Terrace, block A. The coolest bit is because it is anonymous you can’t tell your friends when you are doing it. It could be any night during term time, we’re open for people to pop in, or give us a call from 8 until 8. We don’t impose, or police we just listen whilst…

KATY: …Speaking in Tongues. Love of the Nightingale I was in that one and Peter Pan, what else did we do? The American Way, Sweeney Todd and I’m sure I’m forgetting one… we definitely did another play last year on top of Diversify our yearly theatrical showcase, the radio show, Ready Steady Act and the Drama Socks our annual awards ceremony, I’m still totally over looking a play. I can’t for the life of me remember what it was, I know it…

ASH: …discussed European Politics. It was absolutely fascinating and we plan to have another guest speaker this year, we think he’s going to talk about…

KEVIN: …sexual health. There are always free condoms…

OWEN: …on korfball initiations but they aren’t compulsory. It’s just a really fun, unique sport, and at UEA we’re pretty good at it, we recently beat Essex in a match…

ASH: …debate contest whilst…

GEORGINA: …fire eating…

KATY: …on stage…

OWEN: …drinking…

KEVIN: …throughout the night…

KATY: …acting in-front of…

ASH: …Margaret Thatcher…

OWEN: …naked. But that’s only one night a year and the uni might not let us do it this year

FLORA: Sign me up!

Jackie turns away from Ash back to Katy

JACKIE: Where do we sign?

GEORGINA: Membership is only £3

KATY: £5

OWEN: £40 for your insurance and then another £3 to actually join the society

NED: Can we pay at a later date?

CONNOR: I literally have no money on me

ARTHUR: I’m sorry I spent my last three pounds joining Games Soc

Ned, Jackie, Flora, Connor and Arthur all drift off down stage left as they do Georgina goes over to Kevin and they talk

GEORGINA: They never give us their fucking money

KEVIN: Selling promises of future events is difficult even for someone as persuasive as you

GEORGINA: Persuasive, do you really think so?

KEVIN: You managed to convince a group of total strangers to have a party tonight…

GEORGINA: Yeh I heard about that! It’s amazing what people will do when they think they have a reputation to live up to

KEVIN: You going to go then? Seeing as your lies caused it…

GEORGINA: It would be rude not to and after all this will be our last chance to re-live our first week here. Are you going?

KEVIN: I am now, knowing that you’re going to be there

GEORGINA: I’m getting too old to jump in the lake now days though, so don’t get your hopes up!

KEVIN: Maybe I could drag you down with me…

GEORGINA: You’ll have to set off a fire alarm

Scene 7

The Norfolk Terrace characters are downstage left surrounded by strangers, all wearing long overcoats to hide their beach outfits underneath, except Emily, who is proudly displaying hers

MARCUS: Emily, are you sure you don’t want to be wearing a coat?

EMILY: No, don’t be silly, I’ll only get hot.

MARCUS: But it’s the evening.

EMILY: Yeah, but it’s not a cold evening, is it? It’s stuffy.

GREG: It’s balmy, is what it is, it’s pretty balmy.

HEIDI: It is quite balmy.

EMILY: Anyway, there’s no shame in wearing a beach costume.

MARCUS: To a hypnotist’s show?

EMILY: Yeah. We’re all wearing beach costumes underneath our coats. The only difference is that I look like I’m wearing a beach costume and you guys all look like flashers.

GREG: That’s a point.

HEIDI: Look, why don’t we just go straight to the beach party? Do we really want to go and see this hypnotist guy?

GREG: Yeah, of course we do! We can show off! We can get up onstage and do fun things, it’ll be hilarious!

MARCUS: You can tell you’re a drama student, Greg.

GREG: What? I just don’t like to fade into the background.

MARCUS: I don’t like fading into the background either, I’m just a bit shy.

LAVINIA: I think we should all stay in tonight.

HEIDI: Stay in? How come?

LAVINIA: I’m very tired. I don’t want to go out every night this week.

EMILY: But it’s Freshers Week! That’s the whole point of Freshers Week! You meet people and try to remember their names…

GREG: And then get so wasted you forget them

LAVINIA: We should go back to the flat. I have Remains Of The Day on DVD with a blooper reel. I also have a Blu-Ray copy of Goodbye Lenin.

EMILY: Blu-Ray?

LAVINIA: Blu-Ray is good, is high definition.

EMILY: Yeah, but Goodbye Lenin? On Blu-Ray? Goodbye Lenin has a VHS-y vibe, hasn’t it? Blu-Ray is for things like Men In Black or Speed Racer.

GREG: I don’t think Lavinia actually knows what Blu-Ray means. I think she thinks it’s a kind of sports drink.

HEIDI: Now, come on, let’s just see this hypnotist show and we’ll go to the beach party afterwards.

GREG: Deffo. Greg Davenport’s gonna set the fresher community on fire with his generally great demeanour.

MARCUS: What if he makes you do something weird? He might make you get naked!

HEIDI: I wouldn’t mind that.

GREG: Easy, sugar. Judge, jury, then executioner.

EMILY: Oh my God, there was a fantastic hypnotist’s show in Costa Rica. Oh, the hypnotist was amazing, he made all the audience think they were his feet. We all went home feeling tired and tried to crawl inside the first sock we saw!

They take their seats down stage left amongst the rest of the audience, there are two other seats on the hypnotist’s “stage.” Up-stage left.

MARCUS: If he gets me up onstage, I’ll kill myself.

HEIDI: Shh, stop talking!

Mystical Andy, who stands to the side, introduces himself in an Announcers voice

ANDY: Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to the stage hypnotist extraordinaire, Mystical Andy Bates!

The audience applauds appreciatively as MYSTICAL ANDY BATES walks on, dressed in a smart black suit

ANDY: Ladies and gentlemen, good evening. As you just heard, my name is Mystical Andy Bates. I am a channeler, a channeler of the energy, the potential energy that lives in us all. Breathing, moving, living, energy. In all of us. I can tap into your mind and access the most intimate recesses of your brain.

MARCUS (Quietly, to the others): That sounds awful!

MYSTICAL ANDY: And with my hand inside you thus, I manipulate you. I move you all between states of sleep and wakefulness as a gentle wave moves a beach between states of high tide and low tide.

HEIDI: Does that work? I don’t think that works.

ANDY: Now before long, my wonderful, beautiful audience, I shall carry out a truly mesmerising act, I shall hypnotise two of you, to do exactly as I please. But first, as a taster, a demonstration of what hypnotism can do, I shall introduce my two assistants, who have already been hypnotised backstage.

GREG: Oh yeah, that’s likely. This guy’s transparent. He’s like John C. Reilly in Chicago.

MARCUS: What?

GREG: It’s a musical theatre joke. You wouldn’t get it.

MARCUS: I like music.

GREG: Do you like musical theatre?

MARCUS: No

GREG: Then you wouldn’t get it.

During this, ASSISTANT 1 and ASSISTANT 2 have come onstage. They could possibly be other students we have met already, not really sure. ANDY goes to talk to them

ANDY: You first then, sir. How are you feeling?

ASSISTANT 1: I feel extreme relaxation.

ANDY: Of course you do. And you, ma‘am?

ASSISTANT 2: I feel he stole the words right out of my mouth.

ANDY: Ha! Well, just as well he didn’t steal your watch, eh? That’d be much worse!

Awkward pause

HEIDI (To the others): Was that supposed to be a joke?

ANDY: Right, ok, let’s begin the show. My two assistants, when I snap my fingers, you two will think that you are both dogs, and you will crawl and bark accordingly, so help me God.

He snaps his fingers, the two ASSISTANTS immediately begin pretending to be dogs, crawling around and barking

ANDY: Yes, that’s it! You’re dogs! You’re filthy, gutter-dwelling mongrels! You’re wretched pups in the street, begging for a scrap of meat or a side of ham! Beg, doggy, beg! Roll over! Play dead! Sniff the other dog!

The ASSISTANTS have been doing exactly as ANDY has ordered them, to the humour and enjoyment of the audience. At this point, ANDY snaps his fingers and they return to normal, looking confused

ANDY: Of course, I always stop them before they actually sniff each others. That could get me sued. Anyway, let’s show our appreciation for my two assistants!

The audience claps as the two ASSISTANTS walk off. Mysterious, hypnotic music begins

ANDY: Pray silence now, as I begin to tap the latent energy within you all. I want you all to interlock your fingers and clench together hard. Listen to the sound of my voice, the rolling, roiling sound of my voice playing in your mind as the music washes over you. Wind. Trees. Water. Birds. Ice. Frost. Horses. Cats. Musicals. Dolphins.

EMILY: He’s just listing stuff. Is this all hypnotism is? I feel cheated.

LAVINIA: So he’s cheating the audience?

GREG: No more than regular theatre. It’s just a performance art.

ANDY: Now, I shall walk among you as Christ walked among his disciples.

GREG: Bloody hell, that’s a bit strong isn’t it?

MYSTICAL ANDY walks over to HEIDI

ANDY: You, young lady - can you unclench your hands?

HEIDI (Doing so): Yeah, it’s easy.

ANDY: Then you are no use to me. You will be a spectator, nothing more.

He turns to MARCUS

ANDY: What about you, young man?

MARCUS: Well…I am definitely having some difficulty…but I don’t know whether that’s because I physically can’t do it, or because you’ve done something to my brain so that I don’t want to do it. What have you done to my brain, Andy?

ANDY: You over-think things. You are no use. (Turning to Greg) What about you?

GREG: You know what, I can’t move them at all.

ANDY: Then go up on the stage, you will be our first star.

GREG gets up and wanders to the stage, sitting on the chair and quite obviously clasping and unclasping his hands. ANDY now goes to LAVINIA

ANDY: And what about you? Can you move your hands?

LAVINIA: They’re stuck fast.

ANDY: Then go and join your friend! The show will now begin.

GREG: Not Lavinia!

LAVINIA: Thank you, Mystical Andy. This is most exciting!

LAVINIA goes and sits on the other chair by GREG and smiles at him. ANDY joins them

ANDY: Ladies and gentlemen, I have already commenced the hypnotic process and all that remains to be done is to tap into their minds and use the trigger work - sleep!

GREG immediately falls asleep, LAVINIA looks confused

LAVINIA: I’m not sleepy.

GREG: Just play along, Lavinia.

LAVINIA: Oh, ok.

She falls asleep too. ANDY looks uncomfortable for a moment, then carries on

ANDY: Very well. Now, I’m going to try and get to know these two charming people. What’s your name, sir?

GREG (Hypnotic, trance-like): Greg.

ANDY: Greg? That’s a rather old-fashioned name.

GREG (Still hypnotic): Fuck off, Mystical Andy.

ANDY: Sorry. That was rude of me, I apologise. In fact I know a Greg, a friend of my son, young Master Bates.

GREG laughs loudly

ANDY: What’s funny?

GREG: Sorry. I just have a really puerile sense of humour. What’s his real name?

ANDY: And sleep! And what’s your name, young lady?

LAVINIA (Hypnotic): Lavinia.

ANDY: Are you a friend of Greg’s?

LAVINIA: Yes. But a lot of the time he’s very mean to me.

ANDY: And why do you think Greg is mean to you?

LAVINIA: Well, I like art house films like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon whilst he likes the Matrix. And he’s always making jokes about how I’m from eastern Europe.

GREG (Still trance-like): I just have a slightly xenophobic sense of humour.

ANDY: Alright then, well perhaps we’ll see if by the end of the evening you two haven’t gotten a little closer.

ANDY: What do you say, everyone? Shall we make them get married?

The audience cheers enthusiastically

ANDY: Ok, then, let’s do a wedding ceremony.

GREG is visibly concerned about this, appeals to ANDY

GREG: What do you mean a wedding? Like an actual wedding? An actual, legally binding wedding?

ANDY (Playfully): Is there any other kind of wedding?

GREG: Anyway, you wouldn’t let us kiss. You’d stop us, wouldn’t you? Like with the whole dog thing. You’d stop us.

ANDY: I stopped the dog guys because it would’ve been disgusting. Nothing disgusting about a nice kiss.

GREG: With her there is. I’m not kissing her.

ANDY: I think you should take a seat, Greg. Let’s talk this through.

GREG: What? No. What?

LAVINIA stands up to allow ANDY access to a seat, which he straddles

GREG: Don’t you dare straddle that seat! Don’t you dare sit in a position of superior authority to me! I paid good money for this!

ANDY: Why don’t you want me to straddle the seat, Greg?

GREG: Right, I’m just gonna straddle mine then. If that’s how you want it, that’s how we’ll play it.

He gets up, turns his seat round and stares at it

GREG: I can’t do it! I can’t straddle the seat! What have you done to my brain? Damn you and your subtly effective techniques!

He sits on the chair normally

ANDY: Now, Greg. It seems you have a few anger issues, particularly directed towards your friend Lavinia here. Would that be true?

GREG: No. Maybe. Who cares?

ANDY: Lavinia seems to me to be a very intelligent and lovely girl. Why do you hate her so much?

GREG: Phrased like that, it’s very difficult to think of a good reason actually.

ANDY: Come on, Greg. Why don’t you and Lavinia kiss and make up? It’ll be fun!

GREG: Actually…why the hell not? Yeah, ok. Yeah, let’s do this.

LAVINIA: Actually, I’m not so sure. You’re not really my type, Greg.

GREG (Becoming frantic): As if. I’m the man of your dreams, Lavinia, you just don’t know it yet. Wow, I’ve changed my tune, haven’t I? Is that you that did that?

ANDY: They don’t call me mystical for nothing.

GREG: Well, they don’t call you mystical do they? That’s what you call yourself.

ANDY: You’re a very difficult person.

GREG: I know.