The Effects of Psychotic Parents on Gifted Children
CHARACTERS:
LYNN, high school student, 15-17
MOTHER and FATHER, LYNN’s parents
SCENE: a typical suburban home
AT RISE: MOTHER and FATHER are frozen upstage, within a typical interior house set. LYNN is seated C, legs crossed, back straight, staring straight at the audience. She stays perfectly still for a moment, then slowly rises and points offstage. Stage
emains unlit during the first part of her speech.
LYNN. It’s a hard job being gifted. You can’t do anything half-assed. Everybody wants you to do your best. Everybody wants a part of you. Everybody thinks that if one of your achievements is less than stellar, you aren’t trying hard enough. But you
ow what?
(Spot LYNN.)
Everybody is wrong.
(Lights up on interior of LYNN’s house. MOTHER and FATHER remain frozen.)
My parents are the epitome of everybody. My father, the sarcastic businessman who believes anything creative should be squelched. My mother, the typical suburban housewife whose biggest fears are confrontation and build-up on the no wax floo
. I still remember the day it really hit the fan. My parents were having their weekly fight. Their fights are usually about me. Correction. Their fights are always about me. My grades, my hobbies, my future. They have my entire life planned out u
il I’m about seventy-five. These plans do not include retirement. Obviously, someone with my potential must continue achieving and overachieving up until their very last moment.
(LYNN exits. MOTHER and FATHER begin going about their business, perhaps sweeping or reading the newspaper.)
MOTHER. It’s simply out of the question.
FATHER. Why?
MOTHER. No daughter of mine is enrolling in karate classes.
FATHER. They’ll be good for her. They’ll help her with balance, concentration--
MOTHER. No! That is my final word on the matter.
FATHER. What makes you think you’re the one with all the deciding power? Last time I checked she was my daughter too!
MOTHER. Listen, Frank, I don’t want to go through this again. I said okay to the piano lessons. I let her take tap, ballet, and jazz. I even let her go ahead with taking voice. But karate is pushing it.
FATHER. Strangely enough, none of those were my ideas....
MOTHER. I don’t think it’s so strange. You say you don’t like anything that I say I do, just to be spiteful!
FATHER. In fact, if I remember correctly, I was completely against voice and piano!
MOTHER. Both of which will help her in her future career of course.
FATHER. Oh? You’ve already chosen her future career?
MOTHER. We have already chosen her future career.
FATHER. And what would that be, pray tell?
MOTHER. She’s going to be a musical professor at Julliard.
FATHER. Ah! At Julliard, no less! And of course, this has nothing to do with the fact that you wanted to be a music teacher until you married me...
MOTHER. No. It doesn’t.
(LYNN enters through door UC, wearing leg warmers and carrying a duffel bag.)
FATHER. Why, Lynn. How kind of you to arrive before midnight.
LYNN. Dad, you know that the dance studio is three miles away.
FATHER. As interesting as that is, Lynn...
LYNN. When you won’t let me drive, I have to either catch a ride with somebody or walk, and tonight I had to walk.
MOTHER. Frank, you should really let her drive.
LYNN. Cassie Stevens said she could drive me, but she left before I was ready.
FATHER. Lynn, that’s no excuse. You must be out of shape if it took you--
(looks at his watch)
--twenty minutes to walk three miles. Twenty minutes! Your soccer coach will have my head if you can’t do a mile in under six minutes.
MOTHER. Frank, I think that’s a little excessive.
LYNN. Dad, soccer doesn’t start for another month and a half.
FATHER. You’d better be in shape by then...
LYNN. Or what?
MOTHER. Lynn, really...
LYNN. Really, what? I want to know how he thinks he’s going to make me be Miss Athlete of the Year.
MOTHER. Lynn, that is enough.
FATHER. No, no, Margaret, let her continue.
LYNN. That’s all.
FATHER.(condescending) I had hoped that you would elucidate.
LYNN. Too bad.
MOTHER. Lynn, you are being extremely rude. Apologize to your father.
LYNN. I won’t! I want to know what he’ll do if I say I’m not going to play soccer this year!
MOTHER. Lynn!
LYNN. What? It isn’t like I’ve committed a sin...
FATHER. I believe we’ve been over this before, Lynn. You know that it would be a crime to waste your potential.
LYNN. See Mom? Not a sin, just a crime...
FATHER. With all your talents--
LYNN. I’m sick of hearing about my talents! Who cares about all my potential? I don’t!
MOTHER. Lynn, you have a gift. You should share it.
LYNN. And I don’t have a gift!
FATHER. What would you call it, then, pray tell?
(Pause.)
LYNN. I call it a curse.
(MOTHER and FATHER laugh.)
LYNN. Stop laughing at me!
FATHER. Don’t you think you’re being a little dramatic?
LYNN. I’m being dramatic? Dad, do you ever listen to the things that come out of your mouth? “Lynn, you should be able to run a mile in under six minutes. Lynn, that last painting was a little weak. Lynn, you lost half a point on your
st spelling test because your teacher couldn’t read your handwriting. Maybe we should get you a tutor.”
FATHER. I have never said a word to you about getting a tutor.
LYNN. But you thought about it! You and Mom even discussed it!
MOTHER. What are you talking about?
LYNN. Please, don’t bother lying to me. I heard you.
FATHER. Ah, the heroic teenager. She walks three miles, rebels against her parents, and still has the energy to eavesdrop!
MOTHER. Dear...
FATHER. To hell with Julliard! We’ve got ourselves a little Communist spy all cut out right here!
MOTHER. Frank.
FATHER. All this time we’ve spent with voice and piano, trying to train her for a career in music, when all we had to do was read her a book on Benedict Arnold...
MOTHER. You didn’t even want her to be a music professor!
FATHER. You’re right; I was looking forward to being the father of the first teenage girl to commit treason...
LYNN. Dad, stop it! You’re getting crazier every second. I just said I don’t want to play soccer! That’s all! That doesn’t make me a traitor to my country...
FATHER. Then what does, pray tell?
MOTHER. Frank, I think you may be overreacting...
LYNN. And Mother! You’re even worse than he is! Of course he’s overreacting. I told him I might not want to play soccer and here he is accusing me of being a Communist! You married an insane man.
MOTHER. Lynn, I’ve had about enough of this. Your father is not insane and you are going to play soccer this year.
FATHER. Thank you.
MOTHER. I’m not finished. I think that you need to let up a little on your daughter.
FATHER. Somebody has to make sure she lives up to her potential.
LYNN. Just leave my potential out of this!
MOTHER. Well, it isn’t going to be you.
FATHER. Then who will do it, pray tell?
MOTHER. And, for God’s sakes, will you stop saying “pray tell”?
(A silence of four to five seconds.)
FATHER. I don’t need to take this. I’m leaving.
(FATHER exits UC through door.)
LYNN. Maybe you shouldn’t have done that.
MOTHER. Done what? Defend you? Try to keep your father from running your life?
LYNN. No, no, that was all fine.
MOTHER. Well, what then?
LYNN. Well... you know how much he loves to say “pray tell”. Maybe you shouldn’t have told him not to.
MOTHER. Lynn, sometimes you just amaze me. Amaze and disgust me.
(MOTHER stomps off L.)
(LYNN looks around in bewilderment. She turns to the audience.)
LYNN. I guess the only way to explain it is that my parents are weird. That’s the best I can do.
(LYNN exits R.)
(Lights down.)
VOICE. This segment of the ABC Afterschool Special is sponsored by Prozac. And now, back to “The Effects of Psychotic Parents on Gifted Children”.
(Curtain.)
-MWE
