Exquisite Corpse
A full original play I wrote for The Fiery Floods Theatre Company back in 2022, it was a fun brief because the scope of the project was so challenging. Through the play (which was composed of different tableaus) I had to weave in certain scenes from the Surrealist movement. The play was created to celebrate the anniversary of the Surrealist movement, as such it was full of weird, wonderful and sometimes slightly mad scenes. I've included a section here. Please note all rights to the play including this passage here is owned by Fiery Floods Theatre Company. I just wrote it but I do not own it!
ACT IV
SCENE I
Antonin Artaud is going into Sigmund Freud’s practice - this entire scene should be over the top at maximum volume and emotion on Artaud’s part.
Artaud: if i wanted to come at another time i would have come at another time
Freud: Artaud
Artaud: i do not want to talk to you. I want, to talk, to Freud
Freud: Artaud
Artaud: well frankly i don’t give a flying -
Freud: Artaud
Artaud: what. Do you want?
Freud: just get inside
Artaud: she wouldn’t bloody -
Freud: i know, i know my friend. Sit down…close the door first
Artaud: you can’t you do that
Freud: i can. That does not mean i want to
Artaud: look okay, you left of your own accord at least. I was kicked out. Like some sort of dog. Too surreal, too weird, too out of the box, too -
Freud: much
Artaud: precisely. Too much for their tiny abilities
Freud: well, perhaps it was just different abilities
Artaud: they said i was unnatural
Freud: Artaud, as a child your parents were cousins…
Artaud: Freud, cut me the bullshit. I am not going to be psychoanalysed and told i am having issues with my self-worth because i fancied my mother as a child
Freud: just a theory, you would be surprised how many people understand once they have talked it through
Artaud: yes but these are people who also believe that Heaven exists and Hell is a bad place
Freud: Hell is a bad place
Artaud: Hell is on Earth, as is Heaven. The rest is all a mass of idiocy as fantastic as anything i could have ever thought of
Freud: what’s wrong Artaud
Artaud: they didn’t kick you out
Freud: no, i left
Artaud: well i know that. What i want to know is why
Freud: why do you think i left
Artaud: because they didn’t all sleep with their mothers or fancy their fathers and you lost the base of your theory
Freud: no need to be vulgar
Artaud screams
Freud: nobody move! It is fine, he is fine