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A farce in three acts

  • Farce
  • Comedy
  • 6-character play
  • 4 women, 1 man, 1 either
  • 80 min
  • Advanced
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Synopsis

At the Hôtel de la Gare in Vichy, everyone is waiting for tomorrow’s incognito visit from someone sent by a hotel guide. Odette, the owner, is drowning in debt and has secretly sold half of her hotel to two different people. Both of them turn up on the same evening, each convinced they are the only one. Getting through to morning will take doors, a boiler and a great deal of nerve, especially since her daughter, her receptionist and her oldest guest are each hiding something too.

The lobby, then the first-floor corridor of the Hôtel de la Gare in Vichy, France, from a Friday evening in October to the following morning, the present day.

Casting

866 lines
  • ODETTE Female role, Senior 68, has run the Hôtel de la Gare since 1979; widowed six years ago.
  • SOPHIE Female role, Adult 44, her daughter, moved to Lyon twenty years ago; works for a bank.
  • ZOÉ Female role, Young adult 23, the hotel’s receptionist for the past year; also does the cooking and the rooms.
  • IRÈNE Female role, Senior 81, has stayed in room 7 every autumn since 1979.
  • VICTOR Male role, Adult 54, a retired heating engineer from Saint-Étienne who sold his business in the spring.
  • CHARLIE No gender marker, Adult forties, left an office job in Paris; spent one night at the hotel last winter.

Contents

  1. Act One
    • Scene 1
    • Scene 2
    • Scene 3
    • Scene 4
    • Scene 5
    • Scene 6
  2. Act Two
    • Scene 1
    • Scene 2
    • Scene 3
    • Scene 4
    • Scene 5
    • Scene 6
    • Scene 7
  3. Act Three
    • Scene 1
    • Scene 2
    • Scene 3
    • Scene 4
    • Scene 5

Excerpt

Act One

Scene 1

(The lobby of the Hôtel de la Gare. A reception desk, a board of keys, a brass desk bell. A staircase leads up to the rooms. One door opens onto the lounge, another onto the kitchen. The front door is glazed. Friday evening. Zoé is polishing the bell with a cloth. Odette is sorting the post.)

ZOÉ

It doesn’t ring true.

ODETTE

It’s been ringing since 1961. It’s not going to change its tune for a guidebook.

(Zoé taps the bell. A dull clunk.)

ZOÉ

Hear that? It sounds tired. A guest walks in, hears that, and thinks: everything here is tired.

ODETTE

Everything here is tired. That’s why people come. Vichy is a town where people come to rest.

ZOÉ

Not the person from the guide. A guide comes to give marks.

861 more lines, 21 scenes

The rest is waiting in the file.

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