Mr Heere / Mr Reyes / Scary Stockboy

Dialogue not songs

JEREMY. Dad! Haven’t you heard of pants?

MR. HEERE. We’re all men in this house. Pretend we’re

in the army.

JEREMY. But you’re driving me to school.

MR. HEERE. Oh… I know I promised, buddy. I’m just…

not sure I’m up for going outside today. You understand.

JEREMY. Just, when I get home please have clothes on.

Okay?

MR. HEERE. Ten-hut!

(MR. REYES enters.)

MR. REYES. Oh thank god, the popular students have

arrived. Hellooooo, everyone! My name is Mr. Reyes, and I’m pleased to announce that this year we will be staging William Shakespeare’s classic A Midsummer Night’s Dream –

CHRISTINE. YES!

MR. REYES. Completely rewritten –

CHRISTINE. What?

MR. REYES. By me!

CHRISTINE. No!

MR REYES. My version is set in a post-apocalyptic

future. Instead of frolicking with fairies, there will be fleeing. From zombies.

CHRISTINE. Don’t you care about Shakespeare?

MR. REYES. The man is dead. Let it go. We will now take

a five-minute break so I can hit my vape.

JEREMY & MICHAEL. ZOMBIE!

MR. HEERE. (Knocks.) Hello?

JEREMY & MICHAEL.

BLOOD!

MR. HEERE. Son?

JEREMY & MICHAEL.

CLAWS!

MR. HEERE. Jeremy?

JEREMY. AAH! Dad! Pants!

MR. HEERE. Is that a girl? Are you here with a girl?

(Beat.)

Oh. Hi Michael.

MICHAEL. Hey, Mr Heere.

MR. HEERE. I was going to order pizza. If there’s

something you boys want…

JEREMY. Did you get dressed today? Like at all?

MR. HEERE. Oh… They didn’t need me at the office. So

I worked from home.

JEREMY. Most people wear pants at home.

MR HEERE. That’s why most people… aren’t your father.

(Beat.)

Good talk.

JEREMY. I like your sideburns. Wolverine, right?

SCARY STOCKBOY. Let’s see the money. (JEREMY pulls

out his money.) That’s four hundred?

JEREMY. Four?

SCARY STOCKBOY. Is that a problem?

(The SCARY STOCKBOY opens the box and pulls out a small grey pill.)

SCARY STOCKBOY.

IT’S FROM JAPAN

IT’S A GREY OBLONG PILL

QUANTUM NANOTECHNOLOGY CPU

Just so we’re clear: this is untested technology. And

it’s not exactly legal. Which is why you’re paying for

it with cash in the back of a shoe store. To activate, take it with Mountain Dew. Don’t know why. Just something about Mountain Dew. And, this is important, to deactivate –

(JENNA ROLAN enters the store, and the SCARY STOCKBOY barks at her.)

I’m sold out!

JENNA ROLAN. Of… shoes?

SCARY STOCKBOY. Oh, you’re here for shoes.

JENNA ROLAN. It’s a shoe store.

SCARY STOCKBOY. My bad. (To JEREMY.) Scram, kid.

JEREMY. But –

SCARY STOCKBOY. Scram! (To JENNA ROLAN as he

leads her off.) Right this way. I got a fresh order of Crocs that are lit AF…

JEREMY. Hello? (He taps his head.) Are you on?

Hellooo???

MR. HEERE. (Offstage.) Jeremy? Are you talking to

yourself?

(CHLOE and BROOKE walk away. JEREMY enters with his SQUIP.)

MR. REYES. Let’s begin, people! Curtains rise on

Athens… Georgia. The Centre for Disease Control.

JEREMY. So where’s Jake?

(The rehearsing actors turn to stare at him.)

MR. REYES. Mr. Heere! Your script is closed. Which I can

only assume means you’ve memorised your entire part. Please: regale us.

(But JEREMY is frozen.)

Or perhaps you’re simply wasting our –

JEREMY. “If we zombies have offended, think but this and

all is mended / that we have but landed here / while these spaceships did appear / and this weak and idle theme / no more yielding but a dream… Or is it?”

MR. REYES. Well! It seems the rest of you can learn from

Mr. Heere’s commitment to the craft.

(Beat.)

Pop Tart break!

(Jeremy’s kitchen. MR. HEERE confronts JEREMY.)

MR. HEERE. A house party? You took my car to a house

party? And the house turned down?

JEREMY. Wait, what are you talking about?

MR. HEERE. It’s all over the news! It says people got hurt!

You could’ve been hurt! What were you thinking?

THE SQUIP. Disengage.

(JEREMY raises his phone and busies himself with it.)

MR. HEERE. Hey, don’t hide behind your phone! I’m

worried about you, son! You come and go with this new attitude and these new clothes. I don’t even recognise you anymore! I know things haven’t been easy without your mother, but I’m still your buddy. Just tell me, what is going on?

JEREMY. I took a pill-sized supercomputer called a squip

and it’s in my brain –

MR. HEERE. Hey, I’m trying to be serious!

JEREMY. Well, try harder!

MR. HEERE. Excuse me?

JEREMY. You want to act like my friend? You can’t even

act like a dad! Ever since mom left, you sit around like you’re waiting for her to come back! If she did, you know what she’d find? A loser who’s so afraid to have a life, he can’t even put PANTS ON! No wonder she’s gone.

MR. HEERE. I could ground you.

(Later, MICHAEL is on his porch, smoking a joint, when MR. HEERE approaches.)

MR. HEERE. Michael!

MICHAEL. Mr. Heere, what are you doing here?

MR. HEERE. We need to talk about Jeremy.

MICHAEL. Sorry, Jeremy and I aren’t friends anymore –

MR. HEERE. Do you love him?

MICHAEL. What?

MR. HEERE. He can be a little shit sometimes. We both

know that. But that’s no excuse to sit around burning incense while he turns himself into a monster!

MICHAEL. Look, I already tried to help him and he called

me a loser.

MR. HEERE. He called me a loser! So what? Jeremy’s in

serious trouble, and if we give up on him now, we could lose him forever. Then we would be losers! Is that what you want?

MICHAEL. … No.

MR. HEERE. Say it like you mean it!

MICHAEL. No?

MR. HEERE. Say it like you’re in the army.

MICHAEL. No! … Sergeant?

(A beat. MR. HEERE smiles and salutes.)

MR. HEERE. Ten-hut!

(The night of the play. MR. REYES addresses the audience in a pre-curtain speech.)

MR. REYES. Welcome, everybody. Thank you so much for

coming to our production of A Midsummer Nightmare About Zombies. It has been a trying time for all of us here at Middleborough. But I know that, if Richard Goranski were here with us, instead of in the intensive care unit at Beth Israel, he’d say: “The show must go on! With Mr. Reyes as my understudy.” Our story begins in Athens… Georgia, where the mad Doctor Theseus is planning her wedding. But what is this mysterious illness plaguing the guests? And could it possibly be related to the sudden arrival of space aliens… from space??

(MR. REYES enters. He’s squeezed himself into Jeremy’s costume.)

MR. REYES. (Improvised vocal warmup as he enters.)

Oh… Mr. Heere. I suppose you’ll be wanting your costume back.

BROOKE. (She’s horrible.) “What… angel wakes me

from… my… flowery… bed.”

MR. REYES. “Some potion, m’lady?”

(MR. HEERE enters. For the first time in the play, he is wearing real pants.)

MR. HEERE. Jeremy, are you okay?

JEREMY. Dad! Actually, I’m great –

MR. HEERE. I’m glad. Because you’re grounded. You’re

going to see some serious changes, young man, starting… (He notices JEREMY is grinning.) What?

JEREMY. Dad… You’re… Wearing…

MR. HEERE. Don’t look so surprised. I’m your father. And

I wear the pants around here! Now let’s get down to business: who’s this Christine person, and why did I have to hear about her from him?