Confronting The Truth

The CROWD faces a stadium at a skate park, ULAP and MISHA are onstage.

MISHA could see a CROWD of faces beyond the draped curtains. Out there beyond the whispers there was a chaos of chatter. He stepped from the shadows to the spotlight and shouted aloud.

MISHA: (to CROWD) "Questions, all I have are questions, does anybody know what the answer is ?"

Suddenly the chatter died down into a whisper of confusuion.

ULAP: (whispering confused) "Questions? The answer? This is great. I love riddles. Can you give us a hint? Let's talk it through. Tell us more."

MISHA: "My friend was arrested last night. I think he was set up. I've got lots of questions but no answers."

ULAP: (interested) "Set up. How do you mean ?"

MISHA :"We were all just sitting round the campfire and the police came and dragged him away ."

ULAP: (pause to absorb this. Still interested in what MISHA is saying, but aware of the crowd, turns to MISHA and crowd) "Your friend? Dragged him away? The police? A campfire? Now I am fascinated. I love a good story. Were you there when this happened?" (Announcing very loudly to CROWD) Ladies and gentleman!...but ...wait...

MISHA: (To the crowd) "Will someone answer me ?"

SOMEONE in CROWD (stands up and says): "You've got to be true to yourself!"

MISHA: "What is truth when your friends set you up. What is a true friend ?"

ULAP: (straining with cupped hand) "Is that a police siren I can hear?"

A police siren is heard over the PA and at three armed police entered the scene and approach MISHA.They grab him. A small crowd entered the scene and surrounded the police. ULAP moved in and informed the crowd that everything was OK. The crowd stood, never listened and began shouting at the polce.

OFFICER 1: (patting tazer on hip) "Good thing we came armed, I wasn't expecting a riot"

OFFICER2: "Then why are there three of us?"

OFFICER 3: "Shut up you lot and look for Misha - Hey there he is (to crowd) Get out of the way! Move along now! Nothing to see here."

OFFICER 1: "Misha?"

MISHA: "'smee, whaddya want?"

OFFICER 2: "Misha we are arresting you under a warrant of the police force of our great Australian state. You have the right to legal representation. you may remain silent while taken head-quarters for questioning."

MISHA (Lashing out) "Get lost"

OFFICER 3 (Taking Misha in a brutal headlock, speaking to crowd) "If you chose to speak, your testimony may be recorded and may be used against you in a court of law, do you understand? " (to Misha) "Excellent, now we have an understanding."

ULAP: (reassuring crowd) "Everyhting is under control. It's OK."

MISHA: (to crowd) "Arrestingly prosaic, isn't it?"

CROWD surrounds the police momentarily as they depart.

OFFICER 3: (releasing Misha and twisting his arm behind his back) "Prose is over-rated sunshine, but action and dialogue are king." (Giving an extra twist) "Describe this if you dare. Let your character speak of this to your granchildren."

BYSTANDER 1: "Boo!"

BYSTANDER 2: "Police brutality! You can't do that!"

BYSTANDER 3: (aiming camera phone at officers) "Smile for the camera, boys"

BYSTANDER 2 Pulls a knife and lunges at officer 3 bringing him to the ground.Misha is free and runs. The crowd block the other officers giving chase.

BYSTANDER 2: (to Officer 1) "Hey dude. You used to be one of us. You don't know what is true anymore."

OFFICER 1: "It’s a little late for that don’t you think? Where is the gear?"

BYSTANDER 1: "Its out there. (Pointing to the crowd) In someone's pocket."

OFFICER 1 calls for back up and an ambulance. A man in the audience stood up and walked on to the stage,

AUDIENCE MEMBER : (taking something from his pocket) "A group of street kids ran past and told me to give this to you."

(The police officers were not interested in any of that. TWO AMBULANCE OFFICERS arive and after assessing and treating the injured officer took him away on a stretcher. Enter STREET DUDE)

Lights dim and after a few minutes a spotlight falls on a man sitting beside a tree. Around him about a dozen men sat and slept on benches and some on the ground. The Sounds of the city rose up and lingered like a serpent preparing to strike. Orange light from the patrol car strobed the buildings and the park. The smell of smoke hung thickly on the air. Those left lingering felt an urge alight within them. Something passed which seemed like another moment, but this was nt long enough to be another instance considered before the world seemed to move on. They thought of Misha and of Ulap and the events before them. Such violence was repugnant. Finally Ulap himself rose up, dusting himself off. There was something within him urging him to step forward and address the crowd once more. His lips quivered and began to move. His tongue felt heavy and exalted by the fight. The light caught his eye and he flashed with emotion. Suddenly all this pent up energy started to erupt from him until he would burst.

BYSTANDER 4: (whispering loudly aside to BYSTANDER 5) This is boring. Can you see or hear what the playwright is trying to do? I want to see some more action. What is happening? Who are all these people?

BYSTANDER 5: (in reply to BYSTANDER 4) Can I borrow your binoculars? I think that guy with the knife is smirking or something. I think they are enjoying a moment of internal dialogue. That might work on film but I can't stand these long silences. Why don't they use each others names? Why aren't they talking? Where is the dumb sidekick that needs everything explained twice? Where is the narrator? Why have we flashed back to the middle of the story?

The city gloomed. The city had a gloom that was tangible. The gloom was so oppressive that the countryside seemed to be invading by comparison. Ulap felt the cold and shivered. He still could not move his mouth. A large plugget of prose has lodged there and calked off the dialogue. seconds ticked past. Would there be any commentary from the bystanders to reieve the tension and carry the story? That seemed to be the question on eveyones lips. The muteness had descended on others in the park. They began falling asunder like film show zombies, clutching at their throats aching for the chance at expression, with a growing panic at the rising tide of prose lapping at their ankles. The city gloomed. The gloom was silent and motionless and hung there like an ectoplasm of artistic merit, silent, still and speechless. An explanatory and descriptive gloom like an underfoot monument, lurking expansively unnoticed. A gloom that could fill pages with a journalists log like a political speech. a spectacle of quietude.

ULAP : (to STREET DUDE) "You have been well paid for information. Now, tell us, where he is Misha?"

STREET DUDE: "I don’t know who to trust anymore. I don't know if I am doing the right thing telling you."

ULAP :"I'm tribe, dude, you better start trusting somebody."

STREET DUDE: (pointing to an area near the Skate Park) "He’s over there in the park. Misha got a few of the tribe keeping a lookout."

ULAP: “Ok Dude, then lets go. You're coming with me."

The street dude led the way. From no where, two squad cars crossed over the road in front of them and made their way towards the skate park. A group of street kids ran off. The police were not interested in any of them. They pulled up their cars by a hole in a fence. They rushed from their cars and entered the domain of a large skate park. They made their way to a tall tree. High in ther branches a man was sitting there alone. Enter CHIEF OFFICER

Officer 1: "Is he up there?"

Officer 2: (patting tazer on hip) "I'm ready and waiting."

Officer 3: "Misha. Come down or you'll face another charge of resisting arrest. It's going to real hard for you and we can make it a lot worse. So come down NOW!"

A dozen lads from the street made their way across towards the tree.

Officer 1: "Oh no... At three O'Clock! We've got company!"

Officer 2: "I am unlocking my weapon."

Officer 3: "I'm calling for back up."

Misha slid down the branches and ended up on the ground in front of the three police officers. The STREET DUDE arrived with ULAP and went over to the police.

ULAP: (aside to police while pointing at Misha) "Thats him all right."

MISHA: (looking STREEET DUDE in the eye) “So it's come to this. Tell me, after everything I did for you Dude."

STREET DUDE: (looking away, aside to police officer) “That’s him. He’s the ringleader."

OFFICER 2: (with handcuffs toward MISHA) "Hands behind your back."

At once Misha was handcuffed. A scuffle broke out with some of the lads who rushed at the police. Police back up arrived. Three of the police were injured. STREET DUDE ran away into the shadows. More street gang members arrived the skate park was littered with people.

MISHA: (Shouting aloud ) “That’s enough. All of you STOP!"

There was an authority about the way he spoke. It had an immediate impact and when the confusion and chaos ended. Everything went quiet. A police officer who was bleeding from the side of his head looked astonished.

OFFICER 3: (to MISHA) "Who are you?"
MISHA: “I am who I am. Those who know me have heard the truth. Those who have heard the truth know me."

The police man smiled.

OFFICER 3: "Is it true what they say about you?"

MISHA "What do they say?"

OFFICER 3: "They say you're the ring leader behind all the trouble round these parts."

MISHA: "Well what do you think?"

OFFICER 3: "Well I don't know."

MISHA put his hand over the wound on the officers head and when he removed it, the bleeding had stopped.

The police officer in charge approached and said, “Can you show me some ID .“

MISHA: “No.”

CHIEF OFFICER: "Have you a drivers license or a credit card ?

MISHA: “No.”

CHIEF OFFICER: " You must have some kind of identification on you ."

MISHA: " No."

CHIEF OFFICER: " What kind of person walks around with no ID? Are you some kind of weirdo then?"

MISHA: (defiant) "What is it that identifies you with anything? Is it a name or where you come from ? Is it the colour of your skin or is it what you choose to believe in?"

CHIEF OFFICER: (punches and kicks MISHA. MISHA falls to the ground.) "Listen trash, don't try to be some kind of ethical hero. You're a criminal not a politician. Don’t lecture me on idealism."

The crowd grew and bottles and stones were being thrown.

MISHA: (to officer) "You say I am a criminal because you don’t know the truth. I know what is in your heart and it is you who have broken the law many times before today. I have my sources and you will soon be brought before a judge to answer for your dabbling with drug money and extortion." (Misha stood up and looked CHIEF OFFICER in the eye. CHIEF OFFICER took his baton and began to bash MISHA around the head and body again and again.)

MISHA: (getting up smiling, to chief police officer) "Violence is what is in your heart. Those who live by it shall die by it."

CHIEF OFFICER: (shouted back, frightened) "You have the right to remain silent if you wish. You have the right to an attorney. You are under arrest for organizing revolt against the state, trespassing on private property, destroying a taxation office, recruiting an army to stage a riot and we have an eye witnesses who saw everything. We don’t like your kind around here. You're a trouble maker and we're going to teach you a lesson you piece of trash."

MISHA: (to CHIEF OFFICER) "The only lesson you are able to give is one of violence and destruction, but the lessons I am going to teach will be of justice and compensation. Do you understand?" (Misha pointed to the hill and there was a man with a TV camera who had recorded and broadcast everything that had just taken place.)

CHIEF OFFICER: (lost for words, turning to his men) “Take him away and lock him up in the cell at the station until his court hearing. Arrest any of his gang that are not out of here in ten seconds.“

Another man approached and introduced himself.

OMBUDSMAN: "I'm the ombudsman and you're in trouble. The cruel abuse you handed out was just witnessed by millions of people on national TV. You'll be facing charges of police brutality in court. Expect to hear from me."

MISHA: (to cheif police officer) "I think you better go home while you can. Its a long walk back to the station and the night is dark."

All the police veiches had been torched and as fate would have it, one of the police officers who Misha had helped took a key and unlocked the handcuffs. The chief of Police had just been humiliated in front of all those who were gathered there. Other media were also in the crowd and had taken photos of his Misha getting bashed and all the wounds and blood on his body. Before the dawn the CHIEF OFFICER had taken his own life. CHIEF OFFICER could not face the truth and had tried to cover up his crime but the truth had got out. In the early hours of the dawn they put his body in a bag and took it away to the morgue. That morning on the news there was a cover up story about how a prisoner had escaped from jail during the night and visited the home of the CHIEF OFFICER .Some people even believed the story, because they didn't know the truth. So who was Misha and how could he heal wounds with the touch of a hand. No one really knew. There was an investigation into the violence on the skatepark. With the help of forensics and some eye witness reports a lot of new facts were discovered. The police who had been on duty on the night in question were interrogated extensively. Misha was found to be innocent of all the charges and in the end they had a result. Six hundred thousand dollars from the police slush fund was to be paid to compensate for wrongful arrest and police brutality.

MISHA: (looks to the audience and points a finger) "You can never bury the truth "

CURTAIN - (Two BYSTANDERS are visible despite curtain)

BYSTANDER 4: "Happy now?"

BYSTANDER 5: "Hmm?"

BYSTANDER 4: "The Hawthorne effect. I hope you are happy"

BYASTNDER 5:" The what?"

BYASTNADER 4: "Oh, what wicked denseness. All the DULL man now aren't we?"

BYSTANDER 5: (rising) "I beg you pardon? I have no idea what you are talking about"

BYSTANDER 4: (Exasperated) "The hawthorne effect. The bloody Hawthorne effect. Do you think that was meant to happen?"

BYSTANDER 5: (nonplussed) "I don't follow"

BYSTANDER 4: "Why couldn't you just keep quiet?"

BYSTANDER 5: "We were both talking. What difference does it make?"

BYSTANDER 4: "The Hawthorne effect. Nothing we observe is independednt from our observation."

BYSTANDER 5: "Research? Science? Method? I'm afraid you have completely lost me. Sir, this conversation was a script exersize and not an experiment. This is a stage and those actors are not laboratory mice."

BYSTANDER 4: "So you DO know what I am talking about. Do you refute the theory? Do you accept the observer as a variable in the equation?"

BYSTANDER 5: "Of course, everybody knows about dependent variables, but that has nothing to do with this situation. We were merely watchers in a sea of entertainment"

BYSTANDER4: "I see. And our heckling? Were our rude interpolations on the writers lines, then, merely background noise?"

BYSTANDER 5: "I know what you are driving at. We may have upset the performance with our chatter, but can a sturdy baulking really alter the story line?"

BYSTANDER 4: "I have no idea, but the hypothesis deserves some attention."

BYSTANDER 5: (reaching) "I am not sure how"

BYSTANDER 4: " The ending was so sudden"

BYSTANDER 5: "Abrupt"

BYSTANDER 4: " No. Not quite abrupt, there was plenty of warning - but somehow sudden. I mean...here we are at the park waiting for some entertainment, when a fight breaks out..."

BYSTANDER 5: " Not quite a fight, there was a story and some build up to let us know what was happening."

BYSTANDER 4: "It was realistic"

BYSTANDER 5: " It was experiential. I felt as though I were actually IN the situation as it unfolded right in frount of our eyes"

BYSTANDER 4: (Passing a lollie bag) "We were the audience. The sea of faces, the chaos of chatter. Except..."

BYSTANDER 5: (cheerful, accepting a jelly snake) "It was really quite good, wasn't it. I think if I were to write a review I could give it a few poitns for authetication. (growing aware of the cliffhanger) Except what....? Did you think there was something they could have done better?"

BYSTANDER 4: (chortling) "There is always something that could be better. No. I mean, we were given a part in this piece as an audience...except that nobody spoke to us"

BYSTANDER 5: "Upstaging"

BYSTANDER 4: "Great goodness, no! Upstaged by the actors? What a comical idea. (Mimicking a serious director) Perhaps we should have used more action to draw the eye."

BYSTANDER 5: " Ha ha. Oh, how very droll. (pause, explaining) Not the players in this case, I meant you. You are trying to upstage the whole piece"

BYSTANDER 4: "Not THAT again! Now, now. There is no need to get nasty"

BYSTANDER 5: "It isn't nasty. I was stating a fact. You got bored, because you weren't included, and lashed out, by talking aloud over a perfectly good story."

BYSTANDER 4: "We were both talking. Does that mean you were upstaging, too?"

BYSTANDER 5: (haughtily) "I'm NEVER going to read one of your reviews again..."

BYSTANDER 4: (interrupting) "...articles"

BYSTANDER 5: "...and furthermore. (abruptly stops and shifts character) Oh, drat! I have done it again, haven't I? (Pulls out a script) You are right. (reading script) Here it is. The word is _articles_."

BYSTANDER 4: "Have you had enough rehearsal yet? Can we go and get a cuppa?"

BYSTANDER 5: (moving off) "Sounds great"

BYSNATDER 4: "Can I ask you something"

BYSTANDER 5: "Fire away. What would you like to know?"

BYSTADER 4: " Do you think it's true? Can you bury the truth?"

BYSTANDER 5: "Are you kidding? In the production we are performing, in a few weeks, I am playing a charcter called JOURNALIST TWO. I mean, how demeaning is that? In fantasy pieces, I am the figure who is going to die or leave the show pregnant. Journalist two? I don't even have a name. I think it is our very human nature that leads us to simplify everything and to forget what is out of sight. There are only two universal constants. Firstly I believe facts are buried on a routine basis. We are the dog who is constantly wagged"

BYSTANDER 4: "Terribly Zen. I wish I could wag this conversation. Do you have a point?"

BYSTANDER 5: "You asked."

BYSTANDER 4: "The point is... people are dialogue. We are social animals. Our truth is not simple. We are selective. We abbreviate."

BYSTANDER 5: "But criminals? Surely the convicted have undergone a social process to arrive at the fact of their guilt."

BYSTANDER 4: "We negotiate the truth? Is humanity fit for the task of deciding truth? Can we create predictability just by talking"

BYSTANDER 5: "Text may be our leading cultural artefact, but text is also converted talk. Books. Internet. Create a reality? We ARE our relationships. I have heard the argument. We all rush and help when we hear the sirens calling us to a sociology emergency. But I am an actor, not a philosopher. I have no idea. I DO know, we are nothing without each other. Dialogue distinguishes us from the lower animals. Toss me a line and I'll show you."

By Paul McCann
and Bed Panner