The Script: Romero and Julie
A homeless man, ROMERO, and his foil, a city worker named JULIE, battle over the possession of a home, aka a bench, in Golden Gate park.
Okay, this was a rough morning and play to get through. All I had was a basic premise that I thought about for like the longest time: A homeless person is confronted by a city worker telling him that they’re taking the bench which has been his home for some time. And I was adamant about how the play was going to begin: The homeless man is holding an umbrella up to the city worker like a sword to defend his home!
That’s all and for the first 2 pages, I didn’t think it would go any where else. But being the trooper I am and actually really trusting in my abilities I stuck it out. I gave the homeless man a British accent and wondered what it would be like if his mind thought in Shakespeare. So without studying it as fully as I’d like, or wish I had time to, used as much thou, doths, and haths, as I could. And let the characters talk.
One tip I got from a playwright, mentor if you will, Jeannie Barroga, taught me that if I was ever in a jam, I should write a monologue of the character I was stuck on. The monologue doesn’t even have to be in the play, it’s just something to get your character in the overall plays mindset from her or his perspective. Being stuck, that’s what I did from the Huntsman, later ROMERO’s, perspective on to why the bench means so much to him.
Then another device I use, though I don’t proclaim to be really good at it, I used spoken word to counter the soliloquies ROMERO uses by JULIE (who originally was named Genero). But the more I saw where this was going, I just took my hands off the wheel and let them take over.
Oh, I should also note, that I wanted the play to end with the city worker telling the homeless person that they were only going to move the bench to another place in the park. Where to specifically and why was all generated by the situation my characters were living in at the moment of writing. Take a step back from what I just wrote… I love being a writer/weirdo.
At any rate, even though, this is a REALLY short looking play, 5 pages which will probably run 6-7 depending on the actor’s pacing in the soliloquy and the spoken word patches, I’m proud of it. It was a STRUGGLE, but I knew I had to just get through it and keep writing. I didn’t want to let my characters down.
Word about the script, it’s still really rough, but wanted to finish it this morning since I’m taking a friend out to dinner tonight, so I might not get to finish it for submittal! It was all written between 6:00 – 8:00am. Hence, the turn in of a rough cut, albeit I’m happy with it, of ROMERO AND JULIE.
The Script: Romero and Julie