The Scheme
Rom-com, three years at a distance
- Romantic comedy
- Scene for 4
- 3 min
- Female role
- Young adult
- Intermediate
Casting
8 lines- MEG Female role, Young adult your role
- SAM No gender marker, Young adult
- LOU No gender marker, Young adult
- RÉMI Male role, Young adult
Full text
(A wedding hall. Two friends scheming in a corner; two others, at a distance, politely ignoring each other.)
MEG
Right. Lou and Rémi have loved each other for three years and are the only two who don’t know it. Tonight, we fix this.
SAM
Plan: we sit them at the same table, we “forget” a chair, they’re forced to squeeze together.
(Further off, Lou and Rémi, each with a glass in hand.)
LOU
Funny, there’s only one chair for the two of us. Go on, take it.
RÉMI
No, you. I’ll stand. I’m perfectly fine standing. For three years, I’ve been perfectly fine at a distance from you.
LOU
…What did you just say?
RÉMI
Nothing. The buffet. I said something about the buffet.
(Across the room, Meg and Sam watch, motionless, as if at the theatre.)
MEG
He almost did it. He ALMOST did it.
SAM
Patience. It took three years. We can wait until dessert.
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.
The same text, elsewhere
Close to this one
-
The Balcony Scene
O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo? Deny thy father and refuse thy name;
-
The Last Copy
I was here first. My hand got here first. I have witnesses.
-
The Breakdown
“Technical incident.” It’s been an incident for forty minutes. At what point does it become a life? I’ve missed my connection. And the wedding at the end of it. I was a bridesmaid.