The Threshold
Tragedy, one step too far
- Drama
- Two-hander
- 1 min
- Male role
- Young adult
- Advanced
Casting
7 lines- THÉA Female role, Young adult
- ELIA Male role, Young adult your role
Full text
(Before a closed door. Théa blocks Elia’s way.)
THÉA
One more step and you’ll no longer be my brother, but his murderer.
ELIA
I’ll only be the hand. The sentence was pronounced by the blood, not by me.
THÉA
Blood doesn’t hold the knife. You do.
ELIA
And if I step back? They’ll say a man was afraid where honour commanded.
THÉA
They’ll say a man chose to live hated rather than die by the rules. Is that so terrible?
ELIA
Yes. For people like us, yes.
(She slowly steps aside.)
THÉA
Then pass. But know this: this threshold, once crossed, is never crossed back the other way.
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 Message
Are you sending that message, or rereading it until it stops meaning anything? If I send it, there’s no going back.
-
The Sisters
The law is clear. Whoever buries him dies with him. The law of men. There is another, older one, that says a brother does not rot in the sun.
-
The Last Train
You’ll miss it if you keep talking to me. I know.