OR
WOMEN AROUSED
by
Bob Flicker
12/9/86
cast
SOPHIE.....the realist
NORA.......the optimist
BELLE......the cynic
SCENE
We see three, young women (early twenties) standing before a nine foot, concert grand piano. They are dressed in work clothes.
SOPHIE Whose brilliant idea was it that we become piano movers?
NORA Mine. We have to make a statement!
BELLE Some statement. That’s a nine-foot, concert grand piano. Must weigh a ton!
SOPHIE The owner told me it took four guys, built like gorillas, to move it in.
NORA (Enthusiastic) That’s what’s so great!
SOPHIE What’s so great?
NORA We’re women!
BELLE Big deal! I knew that before we came here.
SOPHIE Not only are we women—there are only three of us.
NORA That’s O.K.! We’ve got an advantage.
BELLE Like—what?
NORA The female brain, times three!
BELLE Right now I’d take the male body, times four!
SOPHIE I never knew a concert grand was so big.
NORA You’ve seen a concert grand before.
SOPHIE Yeah, from the third balcony at Avery Fisher Hall. Up there a concert grand
looks small enough to lift by myself.
BELLE What are we trying to prove, anyway?
NORA My God! Don’t you know?
BELLE Look Nora, right now we are looking at the biggest, damned piano I have ever
seen. A piano we have to lift out of that double-sized window—(She goes to
the window and looks down.) and lower it fifteen stories to the street.
(Pauses) If we do that, I know what we’ll prove.
NORA Good! Now, explain it to Sophie.
BELLE (To Sophie) If we do that—we’ll prove that we are fuck’n magicians.
NORA What’s the matter with you two? Don’t you realize that we are about to blaze
a new trail for women? Knock down another barrier erected by those pigs!
SOPHIE Pigs? What pigs?
BELLE She’s talking about men.
SOPHIE I don’t have anything against men.
NORA I can’t believe you said that! Do you like being oppressed?
SOPHIE Who’s oppressed?
BELLE We are. By that goddamned concert grand.
SOPHIE Suppose we somehow manage to get this monster through the window—
BELLE I can’t even lift the bench!
SOPHIE (continuing) How do we get it down fifteen stories to the street?
NORA Not to worry. I brought pulleys.
SOPHIE (Examining the pulleys) Wonderful! They won’t work!
NORA Of course they will work. Physics was my best subject in college. Even a child
could lower the piano, using the pulleys.
SOPHIE Without rope?
NORA There’s no rope?
SOPHIE No rope.
NORA Belle, you were supposed to bring the rope!
BELLE I did.
NORA Where is it?
BELLE Here. (She removes a 3-foot piece of clothesline from her bag.)
SOPHIE There isn’t enough there to hang ourselves with.
NORA Belle, how could you do a thing like that?
BELLE Don’t bug me Nora. I’m an actress not a piano mover. How the hell was I
supposed to know what you meant when you told me to bring rope?
SOPHIE Well, so much for our piano moving business.
NORA We just can’t quit! We would set back women’s rights for years.
BELLE Moving pianos? I’ll take that chance.
NORA Don’t you understand? Piano moving is symbolic.
BELLE Of what?
NORA Of women’s right to do anything men do!
BELLE Let’s not get carried away.
SOPHIE (Thinking) You know, Nora is right. If we fail here, we could just as well fail
elsewhere. They’re watching.
BELLE Who?
SOPHIE Men.
BELLE You can bet it won’t be the piano they’ll be watching.
NORA The pigs!
SOPHIE (Excited) That’s it!
BELLE What’s it?
SOPHIE Belle, you just came up with the answer.
BELLE What answer?
SOPHIE The problem is that we have the brainpower but not the muscle power but
we do have our own female, physical power.
NORA Our female, physical power? What you’re talking about involves our boobs
and asses, right?
SOPHIE Right.
NORA They don’t move pianos.
SOPHIE They could.
NORA How?
BELLE (Looking out of the window) There are six guys standing out in the street.
NORA (Joining Belle at the window) They look like cavemen.
SOPHIE (Joining the others at the window) Here is how we use our female, physical
power. They are going to move the piano for us.
BELLE How do we get them to do that?
SOPHIE Advertising.
BELLE (Smiling) You mean, we use our equipment to get them to use their equipment
to move the piano.
SOPHIE Exactly.
NORA If we get those guys to move the piano it defeats our whole purpose. We are
supposed to be breaking down the barriers of discrimination against women
in work like this.
SOPHIE We will be breaking down the barriers.
NORA By using those men to move the piano?
SOPHIE Don’t think of them as men. Think of them as lifting equipment and we are
the operators.
They join hands in agreement and begin waving and calling out to the six men down on the street.
BLACKOUT