The Night Shift
Supernatural, the clock floor
- Supernatural
- Scene for 3
- 3 min
- Female role
- Adult
- Intermediate
Casting
10 lines- JONAS Male role, Young adult
- LE VEILLEUR Male role, Senior
- MILA Female role, Adult your role
Full text
(A museum, 3 a.m. Two guards at the lodge. A third arrives, in a uniform from another era.)
JONAS
You’re early. Shift change is at four.
LE VEILLEUR
I am always on time. It’s your clocks that hesitate.
MILA
Is he on your roster?
JONAS
I thought he was on yours.
LE VEILLEUR
I’ll take the clock floor. Same as every night.
MILA
Nobody takes the clock floor. It’s been closed since the fire.
LE VEILLEUR
Closed to the public. Someone still has to wind the clocks. You can hear them, can’t you?
(A ticking, far away. The floor has been empty for twenty years.)
JONAS
…What time did they strike, before?
LE VEILLEUR
Twelve past three. The hour everything stopped, up there.
(He touches his cap.)
LE VEILLEUR
Good night. I’ll resume my round.
(He goes up. On the lodge clock: 3:11. It begins to strike.)
What you can do with it
Original text written for Acto. Read it, print it, work on it in class, perform it at an audition or on a self-tape: that is what it is for, and you need no permission. For a public performance or any commercial use, write to us at contact@acto.re.
In these selections
The same text, elsewhere
Close to this one
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The Viewing
Double-aspect living room, original parquet. The fireplace works, the previous owners had stopped using it. No, they hadn’t. In winter. The draught jams when the wind comes off the sea; you…
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The Double
You wanted to see me. I almost didn’t come. You don’t have coffee with your own face. I know. It’s unsettling. Believe me, on my side too.
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The Night Bus
Good evening. A ticket, please. …How much? For you, it’s free. It’s always free, this line.