Call The Corpse
A show for two actors: a dead body in a room, and calls to the answering machine, each of which opens a scene.
Players
2
Full description
Setup and Launch
Call The Corpse is played by two actors.
Flow
The whole show is true to time, with no jumps in time.
1. The room and the corpse
One actor lies on stage as a dead body. The other actor enters the stage, acknowledges the dead body and starts painting the room together with the audience.
2. The call
After a few minutes the telephone rings β someone calls the dead person. The answering machine picks up. The actor who has just painted the room goes offstage and speaks on the answering machine as the caller. Mid-sentence the actor who played the corpse takes over the call and plays the caller from there.
3. The scene
A scene grows out of the call and lasts from 2 to 15 minutes. It can be one of three kinds.
- A two-person scene. A simple scene between two characters.
- A short monoscene. The whole story stays in one place.
- A macroscene. One big location; the actors play different characters inside it.
4. Back to the room
After that scene is done, you go back to the room. Now the actor who used to be the dead body at the beginning continues painting the room. Every time you come back, add detail to what has already been named.
5. The next call
Then another caller and another scene: two-person, monoscene or macroscene.
Format structure
Context
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