Brilliant Lies

David Williamson

• Publisher: Currency Press
• Year: 2016
• eBook ISBN: 9781760620745
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Drama
• Index: Literature

Williamson turns his penetrating eye and sharply focused wit to issues of political correctness and sexual harassment. A serious comedy, Brilliant Lies is a stimulating contribution to the continuing debate on our changing social values.

ACT ONE

SCENE ONE

A conference room. Functional but soothing. MARION LEE, an attractive woman in her mid-to-late thirties sits facing SUSY CONNOR. SUSY is in her mid-twenties, very attractive, very vivacious, very personable.

MARION: Can you give me examples?

SUSY: Of the harassment? Sure. It went on continually from the moment I arrived, but if you want the highlight, it was the time I was asked to stay back late just before I was fired.

MARION: What happened?

SUSY: What happened. When we were the only two left in the building he turned to me and said, ‘This is boring. Let’s talk sex’. Gary’s not subtle.

MARION: What did you say?

SUSY: I said, ‘Gary, you have been talking sex to me for the last seven months. I don’t find it titillating, and I don’t find it amusing, so please stop’. Then he said, ‘Do you want to keep your job here?’ I said, ‘Yes’. No prizes for guessing what happened next.

MARION: [with her notebook poised] Unfortunately I do need to know what happened next—with as much precise detail as you can remember.

SUSY: [frowning, concentrating] I was sitting at the computer. He came up behind me. I concentrated as hard as I could on the screen, then suddenly there were two hands on my breasts and he said something sick making like, ‘The twin peaks of womanhood. Soft, sweet, seductive’. I froze and when I turned around Gary’s member was inches in front of my nose. I ran.

MARION scribbles furiously on her notepad, then looks up at SUSY.

I went to Vince—Vince owns the business—next morning and told him what had happened. He called Gary into the office and asked if it was true. Gary denied everything. Vince sent me out. I heard them arguing. Vince called me back in and fired me.

MARION looks at her.

MARION: You heard Vince and Gary arguing?

SUSY: I’m sure Vince must know what a sleaze Gary is, but he depends so heavily on Gary that he had no choice.

MARION: Before this incident Gary talked sex over the inter-office phone?

SUSY: [nodding] Gary had an office that overlooked my wordprocessor. I’d pick up the phone and Gary would start to tell me some vile fantasy.

MARION: What kind of fantasy?

SUSY: Which position he was screwing me from, how he was doing it—I was usually so shocked he got two or three seconds in before I hung up. And the fantasies got progressively worse.

MARION: Why didn’t you go to—[Consulting her pad] Vince, earlier.

SUSY: I just thought Gary was pathetic, and that I should be able to cope with it myself.

MARION: You didn’t talk about it to any of the other women there?

SUSY: There were only four and they weren’t exactly friendly.

MARION: Why not?

SUSY: Who knows.

Pause.

Because they …

MARION: Because they what?

SUSY: This is going to sound snobbish but they were—they resented the fact I wear decent clothes, that I didn’t talk—[Imitating a broad Australian accent] like I just drove in from Rooty Hill, that I know most of the movers and shakers of this city, that I had a decent education—those sort of things.

MARION: Decent education?

SUSY: I went to a good private school—and they didn’t. Not that that makes any difference to me, but it obviously did to them.

MARION: Did you go to University?

SUSY: I went for a term, but I couldn’t stand it. I went to Europe and ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Playwright’s Biography
• Perceptions of Truth
• An Inevitable Part of Life
• Acknowledgements
• Dedication
• First Production
• Characters and Setting
• Brilliant Lies
• Also by David Williamson
• Copyright Page