| General Script posted April 8, 2020 |
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Toast to the love of my life
Justification
by Elizabeth Emerald
MONOLGUE voiced by a man in mid-forties A BARE STAGE WILL SUFFICE Truth, they say, is stranger than fiction. I'm sure not going to argue! They're preaching to the choir with that one. I remember all the times we would watch those True Crime shows: Dateline, 20-20, 48-Hours. Each more convoluted, more outlandish, than the next -- but every single one of them true. Dead true. Of course, parts of the shows were somewhat contrived, that is, the actual crime re-enactments. But there was no way around that, considering that the victims were by then long since dead. We used to marvel, Jane and I, at the killers. How devious. How devoid of conscience, they had to be, to do what they did. Whenever the murder was husband-kills-wife-or-vice-versa, they'd start the segment with some Wonderbread-white wedding photos. Jane and I always agreed that the most chilling thing about the whole show was that those bride-and-groom pictures always looked utterly unremarkable. That is, they could be any ordinary, happy newly-wed couple. Who would have ever guessed? Jane and I always said that we could understand a crime of passion, but premeditated murder? Where they plan, meticulously, weeks -- months -- in advance? Where a man brutally bludgeons the woman who bore his children, bashing her skull, with a baseball bat, or else slaughters her with a butcher knife, as if slitting the throat of a helpless pig? No, we could never, ever, understand that, Jane and I. How diabolical, how evil, could someone be, to commit such a monstrous crime! Unless, there were extenuating circumstances. Very extenuating circumstances, there would have to be. For instance, say, the husband was always beating the wife to a pulp and swore each time that the next time he'd kill her, and he'd already come too damned close, and that if she ever tried to leave him, he'd kill her, so she felt there was no way out. Well...maybe, maybe in that case, we would agree, Jane and I, that he had it coming. So, in that case, you could sort of justify killing in the sense of self-defense. As another example: Suppose the wife just wants a divorce, no reason at all, none whatsoever, the husband has never, never once, touched her, but, hey, rather than stay home with Mr. Boring-Good-Provider, she goes out on the town, every damned night, flitting around, like a floozy, meets some guy, some boozing barfly, and decides to run off with the loser, to Texas! and is going to take the kids, not to mention his hard-earned paycheck for child support, and he'll probably never, ever, see his kids again, how the hell can he afford to fly to Texas when the bitch has taken all his money? and for all he knows this soon-to-be-step-daddy Stevie is an effing pervert who will fiddle around with his poor defenseless boys, well then doesn't he have the right, indeed, the obligation, as a father to defend them? Mind you, I myself, could never, ever, bring myself to kill the mother of my children, not under these, or any circumstances, could never, ever, bear even the thought of her brutalized body, the terror, the torture, she would endure, in such an overkill of rage. A quick, clean shot to the back of the head, is really all that's necessary. My guy assures me it'll be over before she even knows what's hit her.
Thanks to VMarguarite for artwork: Intimate Toast
Pays
one point
and 2 member cents. Stage directions are not needed; scenery, props, and costuming are not specified because this monologues is meant to be recited from a bare stage. I like to keep production costs down! Artwork by VMarguarite at FanArtReview.com 
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