Brutal Cessation

Milly Thomas

• Publisher: Oberon Books
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9781786822734
• eBook ISBN: 9781786822741
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: British Drama
• Index: Literature

A relationship rotting. Purgatory. Is having no reason to stay a reason to leave? At what point does the abuser become the abused? And why aren't we more afraid of women? Two actors, one couple, swapping roles. A savage new play exploring violence in relationships, our expectations of gender and what happens when we're no longer in love but refuse to let go.

SCENE 1

R and C are eating food. They’re watching a programme. Laughing.

R: Ha.

C: Stop

R: I’m –

C: Oh god.

R: I’m

C: Oh god.

R: Oh god I’m crying. Ha.

R: Ha.

C: Ha.

R: Stop

C: I’m –

R: Oh god.

C: I’m

R: Oh god.

C: Oh god I’m crying.

R: I can’t breathe.

R: The bit with the –

C: Where he –

R: No, I like it when he’s screaming behind the door.

C: That bit?

R: Don’t you – ?

C: Yeah.

R: Yeah?

C: But he’s in pain.

R: Sure. But it’s funny. You were laughing.

C: I was laughing at the snooty woman – the guest who’s all confused about the – the

R: – alarm –

C: Yeah.

R: But the bit with the –

C: But the bit with the –

R: – the typewriter. The –

Mimes.

C: Yeah and his little arms all –

Mimes.

R: Like he’s gonna just…

Mimes.

C: Yeah. Yeah. Would you love me if I looked like that?

Beat.

Would you be my friend if I looked like that?

R: No.

C: Fair. Would you be my friend if every time if…every time we met your sister she just…uncontrollably shat herself.

R: No.

C: Cool.

R: Would you be my friend if it turned out all this time I’d been hiding your pubes?

C: What like, from me?

R: No, like, in a jar.

C: I mean…yes but I’d always wonder where we went wrong.

R: You’re too forgiving.

C: Would you be my friend if – no, would you still love me if –

R: D’you know what I think is mad?

C: What?

R: That you can lock someone in a burning room and no one will notice.

C: I suppose he doesn’t know its burning.

R: Right – that you can lock someone in a room and have them bang and scream on the door and shout for help and have no one come and save them.

C: But they think it’s part of the drill.

R: They do not.

Beat.

D’you know, watching that, the thought struck me that they wouldn’t let you do that now.

C: Racism or violence?

R: Semi-tonally different alarms.

C: Semis?

R: Yep. That’s exactly what I thought.

C: Ooh. Look at you thinking.

R: I have thoughts.

C: A single thought.

R: That thought is single, yes. But in general.

C: But this thought you thought?

R: Yes, I was struck by the thought that they wouldn’t let you get a semi nowadays.

C: The thought ‘struck’ you did it?

R: Yes, it did.

C: It struck you?

R: It struck me.

C: I didn’t hear you yelling.

R: Just because I didn’t yell doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt.

C: Did it hurt?

R: It was a proper brute.

C: Was it now?

R: It snuck in through the window, pinned me down and struck me.

C: Like the bit where he smashes the top of his head?

R: Just l...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Cast
• Scene 1
• Scene A
• Scene 2
• Scene B
• Scene 3
• Scene C
• Scene 4
• Scene D
• Scene 5
• Scene E
• Scene 6
• Scene F