Unboxing Pandora

By Rita DiSibio Department of Theatre and Dance

Primary Thesis Advisor Dr. Cecilia J. Pang Department of Theatre and Dance

Thesis Committee

Dr. Marcia Douglas Department of English

Theodore Stark Department of Theatre and Dance

University of Colorado, Boulder Defense Date: March 31, 2021

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Abstract

“Unboxing Pandora'' is an undergraduate thesis work analyzing the process behind the creation of my first full-length play, Pandora, an adaptation of the Greek myth known as

Pandora’s Box. The play itself is an exploration of the question “did Pandora really open the box?” In asking this question, I hope to uncover the possibility that Pandora was not to blame for releasing darkness, and I hope to reimagine her world to show how Pandora and her story have been put into their own box.

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Table of Contents

I. Introduction 3

II. The Playwright’s Process: Explanation of Methods 5

1. Unboxing the Thesis 5

2. Writing the Play 7

III. Where I Am Now: Evaluation of Methods 13

IV. Conclusion 16

V. Pandora : The Script 17

VI. Works Consulted 90

VIII. Works Cited 91

Appendix A: Original Poem from Exercise at Curious New Voices 92

Appendix B: One Act Version of Pandora 94

Appendix C: Improv Sessions 120

Appendix D: Example of Early Poetic Scene 121

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I. Introduction

The art of adaptation in the theatrical business is the process of taking an already established story and reimagining any of its elements to create something new or different. Some of the elements of a piece that can be rewritten include its language, location, locale, time, or a combination of any or all of these types of elements. Often the purpose of an adaptation is either to modernize an already popular story that has withstood the test of time, such as Shakespeare’s plays, to engage newer and younger audience members, or to present a story through a new lens that possibly offers commentary on the socio-political climate of the time. The purpose of my play Pandora , an adaptation of the Greek myth known as Pandora’s Box, is to explore the question “did Pandora really open the box?” Through this exploration, I want to see if I can uncover secrets within the myth through the reimagination of tangible elements, such as the language and characters, without completely changing the original plot of the story. In other words, I want to see if I can offer a new perspective on what actually happened in the story that fits into what we already know and have been told.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the process of how I wrote the play and how I explored the question “did Pandora really open the box” through the play. I will show how I used a combination of traditional writing methods, such as writing exercises and drafting, as well as theatrical methods, such as staged readings and improvisation sessions, to reach a full length draft of my play. I will also discuss how questioning the myth allowed me to discover the lens the story was asking to be looked through, rather than arbitrarily picking a lens and trying to blindly apply it to the story hoping that it fit.

While a student at the University of Colorado, Boulder, pursuing a BFA in Acting, I have found myself incredibly interested in the process of creating my own work. The acting industry 4 is a brutal business that often feels behind its time in relation to important issues such as race, gender, and disability representation. Now more than ever feels like the time for actors to become artists and create their own work that indulges in what they wish to discuss or see represented on stage and film. The process of writing and developing a full length play allowed me to further explore this area of self creation that I hope to continue working in post graduation.

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II. The Playwright’s Process: Explanation of Methods

1. Unboxing the Question

Like most of Greek mythology, the story of Pandora’s Box has been told and retold by storytellers and historians over thousands of years. While the finer details of this well known myth vary from scholar to scholar, there are several distinct plot points that seem to remain the same; Prometheus steals fire from the Gods to give to mortals on Earth, the Gods make Pandora as a punishment for Prometheus’ crime, and the punishment is enacted after Pandora marries

Epimetheus, the brother of Prometheus. The punishment consists of Pandora opening a box, or a jar, which then releases darkness and evil into the world. In some versions of the myth, Pandora even appears to release everything but “hope,” which is subsequently trapped inside the box

(Britannica).

Another plot point of the myth that has also seemed to remain steadfast among the different variances was the notion that Pandora was the first woman (Britannica). As an AFAB1 nonbinary person who constantly thinks about gender, the phrase “first woman” immediately caught my attention. I tried to envision what being the first woman could have possibly been like in a world already dominated by men. I then began to think about how women are often victim-blamed, and I wondered if this horrific behaviour could be traced all the way back to

Pandora, the first woman. Perhaps she was the first woman to be victim-blamed, and perhaps what we know of Pandora’s story is not the whole truth. From these inquiries, I began to question if there was a possibility Pandora did not actually open the box. Perhaps Pandora was simply blamed for releasing darkness into the world without actually opening or releasing anything.

I decided writing a play was the best method to explore these questions partly because writing a play is simply something I wanted to do, and partly because I was immensely inspired

1 A FAB = Assigned Female at Birth 6 by the playwright Sarah Ruhl, who achieved a similar goal in her play Eurydice. In Eurydice,

Sarah Ruhl questions and reimagines the Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice in a wonderfully poetic way that really impacted me as an audience member when I first encountered the script.

In the myth, we are told Oprheus turns around to look at Eurydice because he doubts that she was actually following him out of the Underworld. This moment of uncertainty causes him to lose Eurydice to the Underworld forever (Russell, 68- 72). Through the use of poetic realism, and through the addition of the character of Eurydice’s father, Sarah Ruhl turns this myth on its head by exploring the question “What if Eurydice wanted to stay in the Underworld? What if she made Orpheus turn around?” This type of reimagination is exactly what I hoped to achieve with my play, Pandora, and if I could make one audience member feel an ounce of what I felt after first experiencing Sarah Ruhl’s script, that would be the icing on the cake.

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2. Writing the Play

Writing Exercises, Poetry, and Prologues

Pandora first began development in summer 2020 during the Curious New Voices playwriting program at Curious Theatre Company in Denver, Colorado. During this program, the playwrights are given a variety of exercises and prompts to jumpstart their creative juices until an idea sparks and sticks. Since I had already predetermined my topic for the play I wanted to write, I tried using the exercises to see if I could start finding my way towards this hidden world

I wanted to uncover. The first exercise I did that sparked the beginning of this play was an exercise in which we were told to pick a character and write a birth announcement, a milestone, and an obituary for them. I started writing a birth announcement for Pandora, and I decided to write from her own point of view because I thought having her speak on her creation would be an interesting take. I ended up writing this long, poetic reflection that questioned the nature of

Pandora being the first woman (Appendix A). After writing this reflection, I felt as though

Pandora was calling to me to examine the role gender played in the outcome of her story. This feeling helped solidify that I wanted to play with the idea that perhaps Pandora was unjustly blamed for opening the box because of her gender.

Through edits and rewriting, this birth announcement eventually turned into the prologue of the play. In classic Greek plays, there is often a chorus who speaks to the audience and helps explain the exposition and the subtext of the play. I wanted to honor this style in my version of the myth, especially because Sarah Ruhl also utilizes a modern Greek chorus in Eurydice with the characters of Big Stone, Little Stone, and Loud Stone. I felt called to have the already named characters in the play speak in the prologue as the Greek chorus because I wanted them to foreshadow their own arcs in the story. In the prologue, Pandora recites a monologue while the 8 other characters interrupt her by telling her story as we know it to the audience. In her monologue, Pandora questions what being a woman means, which prepares the audience to think about the role of gender when watching the play. Pandora also questions how her story will be passed on after she is no longer around to advocate for herself. The juxtaposition of having the rest of the characters speak over Pandora as questions these vast concepts prepares the audience to question whether her story has been passed on correctly as they visually see how she is not being listened to by the others.

New Characters and Lenses

In the one act version of Pandora I wrote over last summer (Appendix B), the characters from the myth I included in the play were Pandora, Prometheus, Epimetheus, and Hope, a new character not in the myth. I was really interested in the idea that “hope” was the one thing trapped in the box after Pandora supposedly released darkness into the world, so I wondered what this part of the myth would mean if Hope was a person. This decision was also inspired by the addition of the Father character in Sarah Ruhl’s Eurydice . To complicate things even further,

I decided I wanted to make Hope nonbinary. Up until that summer, I had written several short plays and poems about being nonbinary, and in most of the plays, the plot revolved around the fact that the character was nonbinary. I wanted to try writing a play in which a character was nonbinary without having that part of their identity be the main focus of the play.

Plot Points and First Drafts

With the addition of the character of Hope, the plot of my play began to develop mostly through trial and error, like I was putting together the pieces of a puzzle where every piece is the same color. One of the first discoveries I uncovered was that Pandora and Hope were in love with each other. Off of this discovery, I decided to make Prometheus the father of Hope, and I 9 incorporated the idea that Pandora grew up with Hope, Prometheus, and Epimetheus. Because gender became involved in the story with Pandora being the first woman, I decided I wanted

Epimetheus to represent toxic masculinity, I wanted Prometheus to represent controlling masculinity, and I wanted Hope to represent a lack of binary, which Pandora grows to desire since Prometheus and Epimetheus have made her feel wrong for being a woman.

As some of these pieces began to be uncovered, I knew that in order to create an interesting play, I needed to create conflict (Ball, 25 - 31). I decided I wanted to open the play with the audience discovering Hope has disappeared and Pandora is now unwillingly engaged to

Epimetheus by the demand of Prometheus, who has trapped Pandora inside his home since

Hope’s disappearance. Epimetheus then becomes the giver of the famous box because he gifts

Pandora the box as their wedding gift.

I eventually decided that Pandora does indeed open the box at the end of the play. She is not, however, the first person to open the box, and therefore she does not release the darkness. At the end of my play, the audience learns Epimetheus opened the box first. I wanted Epimetheus to open the box first because I wanted the blame to truthfully not belong to Pandora. I also wanted to imply that toxic masculinity, which Epimetheus ideally represents, is the darkness that is released that plagues the world. I achieved these wants for my play by writing that Epimetheus opened the box because he needed a place to bury Hope’s ring after he killed them and burned their body. He killed Hope because of his jealousy for their relationship with Pandora. He greedily wants Pandora, this new first woman, all to himself. In opening the box, which was given to him by the Gods to give to Pandora, Epimetheus released the darkness, which are the toxic consequences of his masculine self importance.

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Young Pandora and Second Drafts

While these plot points mentioned above were all in the original one act version of

Pandora , the story felt extremely rushed. There were a lot of points I was trying to cover in 20 pages. As I expanded Pandora into a full length, I wanted to focus on taking my time developing these points and developing the relationships between the characters. Part of this goal was achieved through the addition of a character called Young Pandora. She was added to help show the budding relationship between Hope and Pandora as they grew up together, which was important to show in order for the intensity of the stakes of the marriage between Pandora and

Epimetheus to make more sense. From a practical acting standpoint, I also wanted to give the actor playing Pandora a break to go offstage since before the addition of this character, Pandora would have been onstage for the entire full length play without any breaks for water.

Staged Readings and Productive Stress

At the end of the three week Curious New Voices program, the shorter version of

Pandora received a staged reading by professional actors in Denver. During this part of the process, I received feedback from these actors and from my director on their thoughts on the play so far, on the characters, and on where I could go next with the play. I remember I received my director, Sabin Epstein, on Wednesday of the third week during the day, he read my draft that night, gave me feedback the next morning in which he alluded that I needed to restructure/rewrite pretty much the entire one act. My performance of the play was supposed to be that Friday evening, so I furiously rewrote the draft before Friday night. As stressful as that particular situation was, I really enjoyed the process and feedback I received during the process of putting on the staged reading, so I decided I wanted to utilize this process in the creation of the full length version of Pandora. 11

I decided to work with my colleague Samantha Piel on this project, with the goal of producing a zoom staged reading by the end of April 2021. Samantha Piel decided to cast the show at the end of January 2021 while the play was still being written and edited, which allowed me to develop the play alongside a cast of actors over a period of two months rather than the one week I was used to during Curious New Voices. This longer time frame with actors gave me the ability to write a scene and be able to hear it out loud within the next week. I was also able to receive feedback from the actors on what their thoughts were on their characters and on the plot of the play as I was writing it, rather than hearing these thoughts as sort of wishful thinking when a final draft needed to be finished and due already.

Improvisation and Collaboration

Many writers often suffer from writer’s block, and I am no exception. Besides hearing the actor’s thoughts on the play while I was in the middle of writing it, another method I used to help with writer’s block was improvisation. After the actor’s became a little more familiar with the story and the characters, I asked if certain characters could try improvising a scene or moment together to see if anything sparked (Appendix C). I would start by having them improvise whatever they wanted to or whatever they naturally gravitated towards. I would then give a more specific scenario, perhaps one I was thinking about trying to write, and I would see what the actors would do or say. After these first two sessions, I would then ask the actors to focus on a smaller dialogue or conversation if something intrigued me. For example, in a rehearsal with the actors playing Hope and Young Pandora, I had them first improvise without any guidance. The actors gravitated towards talking about love and their relationship. I then prompted them to maintain this same idea, but in addition I wanted them to have a conversation about marriage and asking Prometheus about getting married to each other. During this second session, the actors 12 began touching a little bit on gender, so on their third improv session, I asked the actors if they could talk a little bit about gender as their characters. This particular set of improv sessions eventually turned into Scene 4: The Plan.

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III. Where I Am Now: Evaluation of Methods

Starting this play the summer before senior year was an element of this process that worked extremely well. I have always wanted to write a full length play, and until this process, I did not realize just how much time goes into writing and perfecting a draft of a play. I am the kind of writer who struggles with getting a draft done in any sort of form because I tend to edit while I write. Going into the process of finishing a full length with a short draft of the play already done was extremely beneficial because for the first couple of scenes, I felt more like I was editing rather than trying to write from scratch.

Another element of the process I thought worked well were the use of writing exercises.

When I started the writing program over the summer, I had an inkling of an idea of what I wanted to write about, but I had no idea where to start. Writing exercises were a relatively easy, no pressure way for me to experiment with different ideas until I found something I liked. Had I not given the birth announcement exercise a shot, I would have never written the prologue that is currently in the play, and the play itself would have probably been completely different from the product I have today. So much of the play was based off of the prologue, and the prologue was based off of what I wrote in the exercise.

Being able to have a cast of actors throughout a small portion of the editing and writing process was the final element I thought worked really well. I was used to receiving a cast for a week at maximum with a play, and having actors for two months really helped me to hear the dialogue and character’s voices while I was writing rather than as more of an afterthought. I was able to assess what I heard and make edits in the moment based on what did or did not sound natural. 14

Although working with a cast and being able to start working on the play last summer were two of the elements that worked well, they also happen to relate to the elements that did not work so well. The biggest part of the process I thought did not work well was my time management. I wish I had started working with cast during the fall semester, rather than the spring semester. I was so afraid to have people hear an unfinished draft that I pressured myself to only work with a cast once a full draft was done. By the time spring semester rolled around, a full draft of the play still was not complete. I was still scared to start working with a cast, but I had to start working with them due to the timeline of this project. My biggest fear turned out to be a huge blessing as I realized how helpful working with a cast of actors on an unfinished draft is.

Another element I struggled with was the writing style of the play. My writing experience consists of two summers with Curious New Voices, a playwriting course through the Department of Theatre and Dance at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and two introductory creative writing and poetry classes through the Department of English. I love poetry and I love playwriting, and I am fascinated by playwrights who are able to master the art of writing poetic plays. Sarah Ruhl is a great example of a playwright who writes poetically. One of my goals as a writer is to write a play that is poetic, and since my idea for Pandora was already so inspired by

Eurydice, I thought the play would be a perfect chance to try and add some poetic elements. As I was writing, however, I realized that writing poetic dialogue that flows nicely is extremely challenging. I was struggling with scenes sounding too poetic without sounding like actual dialogue people might have. Even with knowing that I wanted to be poetic, the structure and flow within the scenes was missing as I was trying to be poetic. Some of the first drafts of my scenes from way back in the summer reflect this struggle I was having (Appendix D). 15

If I were to do this project again, I would definitely bring in the cast of actors to work with earlier, and I would take more time fine tuning the structure and dialogue of the play. This experience has given me a closer look and a better understanding of the time and effort needed to write a full length play, and if I were to move forward with the project, which I would like to, I would continue using these methods I discovered worked so well during the process of this project.

I would also plan to work more closely with someone in a dramaturgical position. In my

Devising Theatre class I am currently taking, we have recently been learning about various methods for adapting and devising pieces based on Greek mythology. One of the methods is to read as many primary and secondary sources of the myth, as well as any adaptations we want, in order to gather as much information as we can about the script. We then start talking about the parts of the myth that really resonate with us or stand out to us, and from there we pick a theme or a lens that we want to make sure all the elements in our devised piece relate back to. While I certainly did a small portion of this “deep diving,” I definitely do not think I dived as much as I could have into the mythology of this particular myth. Working more closely with a dramaturg who specializes in this type of research can help me to make more specific choices of what plot points I want or do not want to include and why.

As I continue to work on this play, I hope to continue exploring its language, and finding a better balance between poetry and my own contemporary curse word filled voice. I hope to continue editing the play to add more physical action, and I hope to keep trying to answer questions I have left unanswered. Eventually, I hope to get the play to a place where it can be produced professionally, but after this project, I feel like I have a much better understanding of the steps I could take to reach that goal. 16

IV. Conclusion

At the beginning of this process in the summer of 2020, I set out to write a play. I knew I wanted the play to be poetic, and I knew I wanted the play to be a reimagining of a Greek myth.

Over the course of the three week Curious New Voices program, writing exercises and discussions with a cast of actors and directors led me to the first, 20 page one act version of

Pandora , a play exploring the question “Did Pandora really open the box?”

Over the course of the school year, I attempted to edit this one act into a full length play. I discovered that the world Pandora lived in was a world full of love, mistrust, and questioning gender roles. I discovered that Pandora did open the box, but she wasn’t necessarily the first person to open the box. I discovered that toxic masculinity was the darkness that was let out into the world. And most importantly, I discovered just how much time and effort is needed to write a play, as well as playwriting methods I hope to carry with me as I continue to write plays.

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V. Pandora: The Script

PANDORA

By Rita DiSibio 18

CHARACTERS: PANDORA - 22, the first woman, made by the Gods from clay and water . YOUNG PANDORA (abbreviated Y.P.) - first 11 then 17, her past self HOPE* - First 10, then 16, Nonbinary, made by Prometheus from clay and fire, hasn’t been seen for 5 years. EPIMETHEUS - 25, Pandora’s fiance, Prometheus’ much younger brother PROMETHEUS - 40, He took Pandora in when she was younger and acts as a father figure but is not her father.

CASTING NOTE: None of these characters need to be white. None of these characters need to be cisgender. None of these characters need to be able-bodied. *While I always encourage diversity in casting, I do not allow Hope to be played by a cisgender actor or actress.

KEY: “--” = the next line interrupts this line “/” = the next line interrupts this line at the slash, but the line with the slash finishes what they are saying

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Prologue

SETTING: The stage should resemble the common/kitchen area of a home. Nothing that indicates a specific time period or place. The walls appear rock-like and the floor could resemble dirt. There is a table and some chairs that look handmade. There is a place to sit, similar to a couch. And plants. Like, so many different plants. An abundance of plants. Plants on the floor, plants on walls, plants growing on the walls, plants coming out of the walls, plants on ceilings, and plants in pots. Archways rather than doors lead to other areas of this living space. On the table there is a chess board with a chess game in motion. Somewhere else there are several journals and pens.

AT RISE: Pandora, Hope, Epimetheus, and Prometheus enter. The following is a reflection of what’s to come.

PANDORA They will tell the world I was the first woman.

HOPE She was the first with her mind.

EPIMETHEUS The first of her kind.

PROMETHEUS The first with her heart.

PANDORA They will tell the world I was carved from clay and water, that man too was carved from the same--

PROMETHEUS clay-

HOPE and water.

PANDORA But I was not man. I was not the same. I was--

EPIMETHEUS different--

PROMETHEUS Holy--

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HOPE good.

Beat.

PANDORA What does it mean to be a Woman? Being the first confines definitions to what is already known. How long will they insist the word “woman” means “out of man;” A persecution. Words are subjective, weighted irrationality. Will they ever stop reducing us to a translation?

PROMETHEUS Zeus commanded Hephaestus, blacksmith of the Gods, to sculpt her, Pandora, the first woman, from clay--

HOPE and water--

EPIMETHEUS As a punishment for the fire Prometheus decided to steal from the Gods.

PANDORA Man steals what he cannot imagine himself.

PROMETHEUS She was a lesson.

EPIMETHEUS She was a punishment.

HOPE She didn’t ask to be anything.

PANDORA If He tells my story, will they forget I was made by the Gods?

PROMETHEUS She became a pawn in their eternal war with mankind.

PANDORA Maybe I was made for the Gods. Is there a difference? Beat. I often wonder how man is kind if he could never think to make woman. 21

Man just kept remaking man, Creation without imagination. But copy and paste sculpting does not make him a God. Am I a God if the Gods made me? If they gave me their gift of creation?

PROMETHEUS The Gods bestowed her with gifts,

HOPE Her mind, her hands--

EPIMETHEUS Her voice:

PANDORA Is this what it means to be a Woman? Life being made from birth, A lineage passing down the dust that made me, Inherited by my children and my children’s children, A legacy. I am still a woman if my hands do not, If my hands cannot, Grow new fruit from their roots.

EPIMETHEUS The Gods painted her in Beauty

HOPE We can always see beauty if it is written to be remembered as such.

PANDORA Yes, they say, as if my existence without creation is a question, if I possess this mystery called Beauty I am still a woman. I do not understand beauty Am I not a woman if they think I am not beautiful? If man does not think I am beautiful. Seems silly. Everything can be beautiful. And not. What if my beauty became all they ever saw? All I was ever worth.

EPIMETHEUS I, Epimetheus, wanted Pandora--

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HOPE But Pandora wanted me, Hope-

PROMETHEUS And I, Prometheus, didn’t know what to make of Pandora, the first woman, the first lesson for my mistakes.

PANDORA Like a prize to be won from some competition I never knew I was a part of.

PROMETHEUS The Gods gave her Curiosity,

HOPE -insatiable hunger

PANDORA I want to know

HOPE So they made a box

Hope pulls out a wooden box.

PANDORA I want to know

EPIMETHEUS And they gave her the box.

Epimetheus takes the box from Hope .

PANDORA I want to know

PROMETHEUS And the world will believe this box was filled with darkness--

PANDORA When I am not a wife or a daughter, a sister or a mother

EPIMETHEUS Evil

PANDORA Who am I 23

HOPE Death.

PANDORA What does it mean to be a woman?

EPIMETHEUS The world will think Pandora opened the box.

PANDORA What does it mean to be the first?

PROMETHEUS And the world will blame Pandora, the first woman, for releasing what was in this box.

PANDORA Who am I when I am not?

HOPE It is easy to blame the one who was different.

PANDORA I want to know.

Exit all but Pandora, who remains alone on stage. End of Prologue.

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1: The Box and the Hound

PANDORA retrieves a watering can and begins to water the various plants around her. Her routine is very coordinated and perhaps dance-like. At some point in this routine, EPIMETHEUS enters, unnoticed by PANDORA.

EPIMETHEUS ( clearing his throat) Ahem.

PANDORA Can I help you?

EPIMETHEUS I brought you something. He gives her the wooden box. I know it’s early, but-

PANDORA I hate gifts.

EPIMETHEUS I know, but I thought for tomorrow, it could be different.

PANDORA “Tomorrows” will never be different.

EPIMETHEUS But-

PANDORA It’s just another birthday, E.

EPIMETHEUS Pandora-

PANDORA And birthdays mean boxes or or or other shapely silhouettes wrapped in paper and bows that force me to make these grandiose guesses that create high expectations that always lead to disappointment.

EPIMETHEUS It’s our wedding tomorrow.

Beat.

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PANDORA Prometheus wants us to marry on my 18th birthday. I’m 17 tomorrow.

EPIMETHEUS You turned 17 last year.

PANDORA Well, I must have made a mistake.

EPIMETHEUS And the year before that. And the year before that. And the year before that.

PANDORA Oh...

EPIMETHEUS I’m starting to think you don’t want to marry me.

PANDORA I guess I just still don’t really understand what marriage is , or why we need it.

EPIMETHEUS Well, Prometheus wants us to get married.

PANDORA Okay, but what is marriage?

EPIMETHEUS It’s something that will keep you safe.

PANDORA So why not teach me how to protect myself?

EPIMETHEUS Because it’s not that easy, Pandora. The rest of the men out there aren’t like me or Prometheus, they’re like...like starving animals! To them, you are-- you are like the sweet juice that bursts from the ripest fruit in the middle of the summer. None of these low-lifes have ever seen anything like you before, and if they did, oh…. well, wouldn’t they be hungry to taste you? If you aren’t careful, you could drip right down into their mouths, and I’m afraid they wouldn’t be able to get enough of you.

PANDORA What makes you different?

EPIMETHEUS I want to marry you. I want you to be my wife. 26

PANDORA You want me to belong to you?

EPIMETHEUS No-

PANDORA To be your prized possession sitting on a shelf collecting dust?

EPIMETHEUS No-

PANDORA You just want me all to yourself, don’t you.

EPIMETHEUS NO. Are you listening to me?

PANDORA The word wife sounds like an abbreviation for “wasting life.”

EPIMETHEUS Pandora, I’m only trying to help you. If you go out into the world alone, those barbarians out there might try to hurt you, or worse.

PANDORA Lock me away for five years?

Beat. EPIMETHEUS Prometheus did that for your own good.

PANDORA I shouldn’t have to suffer for the choices a man might make.

EPIMETHEUS Prometheus never wanted to hurt you, remember he chose to take you in when he found you all those years ago to keep you safe from the world.

PANDORA He took me in and kept me in. Maybe he wanted to keep the world safe from me.

EPIMETHEUS He wanted to take care of you.

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PANDORA Like he took care of Hope? Beat.

EPIMETHEUS Hope’s disappearance wasn’t his fault.

PANDORA Then whose was it?

EPIMETHEUS I don’t know. I kind of thought it was yours. From what you told me, I mean. Pause. If you’ve wanted to leave so bad, why don’t you just marry me? See, you don’t make any sense. You’re irrational. This is why you need me, why we need each other.

PANDORA If men didn’t exist and I didn’t need to protect myself, what would marriage be then?

EPIMETHEUS I don’t know. You ask too many questions. What I do know is this conversation is a drag. You’ve worked yourself up over nothing! Let’s try something else. Epimetheus gestures to the box. You could try saying “thank you.” After all, it is the proper response to receiving a gift.

PANDORA Right. Sorry.

Pause.

EPIMETHEUS “Thank you for the gift, Epimetheus.”

PANDORA Yes, sorry, thank you. For the gift. Epimetheus. She looks the box over What is it?

EPIMETHEUS (mimicking Pandora/what he wishes Pandora would say ) How about “You’re so strong, like an ox,” and if I tell you, that’ll ruin the surprise.

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PANDORA (teasing in return) Maybe a baby ox.

EPIMETHEUS “and beautiful like...like the sky when the light of the moon and the morning sun intertwine.”

PANDORA I hate sunlight.

EPIMETHEUS These plants say otherwise. Don’t you love sunlight and moonlight and starlight and everything ethereal and big and unreachable that isn’t standing here with you right now?

PANDORA I will hate sunlight and moonlight if you compare yourself to it intertwining-ly again.

EPIMETHEUS Honesty doesn’t suit you.

PANDORA Is that how I sound to you? Like “I love the sun, and the moon, and the stars?”

EPIMETHEUS What’s wrong with that?

PANDORA It’s been said before.

EPIMETHEUS Yes. By you. You and Hope used to talk to each other like that all the time.

PANDORA Hope was a writer. Is a writer. Is. You’re not Hope.

EPIMETHEUS I know. Don’t forget it. I’m a lover, not a writer.

PANDORA Are they not the same?

EPIMETHEUS Writers spend all of their time looking down at a page. They’re too distracted with describing love to actually feel it.

29

PANDORA Because they’re trying to understand it, they’re trying to sift through what’s real and what’s not. The consequences of misguided love are monumental. I think.

EPIMETHEUS You don’t think the lover “sifts”?

PANDORA The lover blindly throws a fishing line out to sea, praying this time it will stick. The writer finds new ways of saying “I love you.”

EPIMETHEUS Love is not something you understand or find in words, it’s something you feel. And something you need in return.

PANDORA Is marriage love?

EPIMETHEUS It could be.

PANDORA Is ours?

EPIMETHEUS Sure, if you want it to be.

PANDORA Is that how love works?

EPIMETHEUS Love is universal. We all long to be the object of someone else’s desire.

PANDORA What do you desire?

EPIMETHEUS You, Pandora. Always you.

PANDORA Do you think Hope had desires?

EPIMETHEUS I don’t know. Maybe we shouldn’t-

30

PANDORA They used to talk about wanting to be a honeybee.

EPIMETHEUS How pathetic.

PANDORA Bees spend their whole lives working, doing something they love.

EPIMETHEUS So do birds.

PANDORA What do birds do?

EPIMETHEUS They hunt.

PANDORA Not all of them.

EPIMETHEUS The good ones do. Like hawks and vultures.

PANDORA Bees work together to build hives filled with honey, a gift that can feed other people, they make something good, and the world is big and colorful to them all the time. They don’t hurt others.

EPIMETHEUS They sting.

PANDORA Out of protection.

EPIMETHEUS They sting and they die.

PANDORA Only if there’s no other choice.

EPIMETHEUS It’s in their nature to die. Beat. If I were a hawk, I could soar into Mt. Olympus undetected, a man among Gods, perhaps mistaken for a God. What do you desire, Pandora? 31

PANDORA I want to be a flower pretty enough for a honeybee to land on.

EPIMETHEUS What do you desire now ?

PANDORA Does it change?

EPIMETHEUS Yes. All things change with time. I said I desire you, and people need love in return, so you say--

PANDORA Oh, sorry. You too.

EPIMETHEUS Kiss me.

PANDORA Right now?

EPIMETHEUS Come on.

PANDORA I’ll kiss you at our wedding.

EPIMETHEUS It’s just one day.

PANDORA Or one more year.

EPIMETHEUS If you can convince Prometheus.

PANDORA Right...

EPIMETHEUS Hope hated waiting for things, they would be so disappointed to see you so... complacent.

Pandora kisses Epimetheus, then pulls back confused.

32

PANDORA Hm.

EPIMETHEUS What?

PANDORA Nothing.

Epimetheus smiles.

EPIMETHEUS I can’t wait for tomorrow, Pandora. Or for next year. It’s your choice.

PANDORA Promise?

EPIMETHEUS Promise. But make me happy, will you?

PANDORA (Gesturing to the box) When should I open this ?

EPIMETHEUS Anytime, today, tomorrow. All that matters to me is that you open it.

PANDORA Who else would?

Epimetheus smiles.

EPIMETHEUS Let me know if you decide to open it early. I want to see your reaction.

Epimetheus exits.

33

2. The Kiss Alone, Pandora begins to examine the box. As she begins to feel around it’s nooks and crannies, Hope (10) comes racing into the room carrying a wilted, dying plant in their hands.

HOPE HURRY!!

PANDORA Hope?

Y.P. ( offstage) I’m hurrying, I’m hurrying!!!

Young Pandora (11) comes barreling into the room and begins rushing over to find an empty pot and some water. Pandora realizes she is watching a memory , and sits back, out of focus, perhaps exiting. The memory continues. Y.P. and Hope rush to get the plant into the pot and pour the water in. After this is finished, they set the pot down, take a step back, and breathe.

HOPE Phew! That was a close one.

Y.P. Tell me about it!!

HOPE Now this little guy can get aaaaall better.

They both wait for a bit, staring at the plant.

Y.P. Any second now.

They both wait some more.

HOPE Uuuugh Pandoraa why is it taking so looong!!

Y.P. I guess these things take time or something.

HOPE Time? Who has time? Not me.

Y.P. 34

Me neither!

HOPE Wanna play a game?

Y.P. What kind of game?

HOPE I don’t know, you tell me.

Y.P. But you asked!

HOPE Yeah, I came up with the idea, help me out a little.

Y.P. Fiiine. Uhhhh…… Y.P. looks around, thinking. Hey, what’s the red hot stuff that comes out of those mountains with the holes that go BOOM

Y.P. mimics a volcano erupting.

HOPE Lava?

Y.P. Yeah!

HOPE And they’re called volcanoes, dumbass.

Y.P. Whatever, it doesn’t matter because GUESS WHAT

HOPE You’ve decided to grow a brain?

Y.P. What? No! I mean-yes-but NO! THE FLOOR IS LAVA.

Y.P. starts jumping around pretending the floor is lava.

HOPE What are you talking about, no it’s not? 35

Y.P. Use your imagination, it’s the game we’re playing.

HOPE Ohhhhhh….. Beat. AHHHHHH!!!!!!!

Hope and Y.P. both start playing the floor is lava, jumping on furniture and surfaces and what not to get away from the floor. After a couple minutes, both Hope and Y.P. end up standing on the table, clutching each other.

Y.P. You may have surrounded us, evil lava, but at least we have each other! Right, Hope? Hope?

Hope smiles then quickly pushes Y.P. into the lava.

HOPE I have made the ultimate sacrifice to become the supreme ruler of the lava! Bow down before your new leader, O orangey death blob! Hope bows back to the imaginary lava, then jumps down. Y.P. is sulking on the floor. Y.P. says nothing. ( to Y.P.) What?

Y.P. Why did you do that?

HOPE Do what?

Y.P. You betrayed me.

HOPE People will betray you when you least expect it.

Y.P. But I trusted you.

HOPE You should never trust anyone.

Y.P. It was just a game!

36

HOPE Life is a game!

Y.P. Shut up, I hate you.

HOPE No you don’t.

Y.P. Yes I do.

HOPE No you don’t.

Y.P. Why can’t you just say you’re sorry??

HOPE Because apologies are just words.

Y.P. So? You love words.

HOPE I do, but words are subjective. They don’t mean anything other than the meanings we assign to them.

Y.P. So assign a meaning to the words “I’m sorry” and then give it to me.

HOPE Fine. If it’ll make you feel better. I’m sorry.

Y.P. Thank you.

HOPE I’m sorry the world is too big for us to be safe and I’m sorry we’re just too small of kids to protect ourselves, I’m sorry I care enough to try and teach you these things because I don’t want you to wake up one day and not be able to take care of yourself.

Y.P. But you’ll always be there for me, right?

37

HOPE Yeah.

Beat.

Y.P. Wanna play another game?

HOPE Sure.

Y.P. Okay.

HOPE But maybe no lava this time.

Y.P. Okay. Uhhhh…..do you have any ideas?

HOPE Hmm...what about the question game.

Y.P. Oh! Yes!

HOPE You first!

Y.P. Okay okay….got it: Why are you so mean to me?

HOPE Pandoraa, you know that’s not how it works. You have to ask a “what is” question and then I have to answer with either what I know or I’ll make up an answer. Then you say if you think it’s a truth or a lie.

Y.P. I know, I know. What is….the sun?

HOPE A big ball of fiery gas.

Both Y.P. and Hope try to be mature and hold in laughter.

38

Y.P. ….gas… She makes a toot sound with her tongue and both Hope and Y.P. burst out the laughter they’ve been holding and make several toot sounds at each other reigniting the laughter. Don’t let Apollo hear you say that! She looks around And don’t let him hear me say this….truth!!

They both burst out laughing again.

HOPE Okay okay, my turn. What is a...tomato?

Y.P. It’s a yummy red vegetable you can grow and-

HOPE LIE.

Y.P. What do you mean!

HOPE Tomatoes are a fruit!

Y.P. Nuh uh.

HOPE Yeah huh, they have seeds. If a food has seeds, it’s a fruit.

Y.P. Really?

HOPE Yep!

Y.P. Okayyyy. What is...the moon?

HOPE A big ball of cheese. What’s with the astronomical obsession today?

39

Y.P. Lie. And I don’t know, no asking double questions.

HOPE It was a clarifying question and are you suuure it’s a lie?

Y.P. Yeah, I’m pretty sure the moon isn’t cheese-

HOPE But how do you know?? Have you ever been to the moon?

Y.P. ….no.

HOPE Exactly.

Y.P. Fine. Truth. Maybe. Partially.

HOPE What is Epimetheus?

Y.P. What do you mean?

HOPE I don’t know, you tell me.

She thinks.

Y.P. Epimetheus is a stream of water.

HOPE Explain.

Y.P. Like...imagine you’re out exploring and you’re wandering around and you hear the sound of water nearby. And like, the day isn’t super warm, so you’re not really super thirsty or anything like that, but the sound still gets your attention and you want to find where it’s coming from. So you go and you find a little stream of water and that’s cool! But then you become interested in where that stream of water seems to be going, so you follow it for a bit and you end up finding a 40 pond or a lake or a waterfall and when something like that happens you kind of just forget about the little stream you found in the first place.

HOPE Truth. Who's the waterfall?

Y.P. No double questions.

HOPE Clarifying.

Y.P. I don’t know! I can’t say...I mean. AH. Don’t look at me like that, I’m asking my next question. What is..a woman?

HOPE You.

Y.P. I’m a girl.

HOPE Girls turn into women.

Y.P. When?

HOPE I don’t know. I’m not a girl.

Y.P. I know. Well what is “me”? What am I?

HOPE I can’t tell you who you are.

Y.P. Try me.

HOPE Isn’t this a double question?

41

Y.P. Clarifying.

Pause.

HOPE I mean, you were made by the Gods, Pandora. That makes you holy. And it makes you have something right there inside you, in your blood and in your birth, that so many men die looking for: you have purpose. Your existence was scripted and it was meant to happen and…. When you enter a room, all eyes turn to you and your brilliance as if everyone can see that you are the father of all fathers...wait no, Prometheus is a father. You’re different, you’re...you are a mother. The mother of all mothers. You are the beginning, and you can do no wrong and--

Y.P. Stop, stop! These are lies.

HOPE No, they aren’t!

Y.P. Well you said you can’t tell me who I am, so.

HOPE Yes, but-

Y.P. I don’t want to talk about this anymore.

HOPE Okay.

Y.P. It was a bad question anyway. Let me think of a different one. What is... an eclipse?

HOPE An eclipse is when the sun and the moon finally get to meet for a brief moment and they give each other a kiss. A big, gassy, cheesy, kiss.

They laugh, breaking the tension.

Y.P. What’s a kiss?

42

HOPE Oh my god, Pandora, you’ve asked like 5 questions in a row, it’s my turn to ask a question.

Y.P. No, no, I know. I just actually don’t know. Clarification, remember?

HOPE Okay fine. A kiss is….

Y.P. What ?

HOPE A kiss can’t really be described in words.

Y.P. Well can you show me? Hope looks at Pandora. Then swoops in and gives her a gentle kiss. Woah

HOPE Yeah.

Y.P. Truth.

Hope smiles.

HOPE Truth.

Y.P. Do you think the plant would like a kiss?

HOPE Oo, good idea!

Y.P. Maybe he’ll feel better if we do?

HOPE How do you know they’re a he?

43

Y.P. Good point. They both walk over to the wilted plant. They should get a kiss from both of us so they don’t feel left out or anything.

HOPE Right. They both give the plant a kiss. They step back, waiting for something to happen. Y.P. Maybe they're embarrassed?

HOPE We should give them some privacy.

Y.P. To absorb the kiss.

HOPE Yeah.

Hope and Y.P start to exit. Right before they exit, they can be seen holding hands. End of Memory

44

3: The Plant

Pandora comes back into focus, staring from the box to the empty space where the memory has just occurred. Prometheus comes in and starts examining the plants in the room. Her demeanor quickly changes. She sets the box down by some of the other plants and stands sort of at attention watching as Prometheus rather clumsily looks through her plants, grabbing handfuls of soil and sniffing or examining them.

PANDORA (hesitantly) C-can I help you? Nothing. Prometheus? PROMETHEUS Hmm?

Prometheus grabs some dirt from the wilting, dying plant and starts examining it. As he grabs the dirt from the plant, he almost knocks it over.

PANDORA Careful!

Pandora rushes over to make sure the pot doesn’t fall/catch the pot if it does start falling. Prometheus glares at her.

Sorry, it’s just, that was- that’s my favorite plant.

Prometheus looks around the room.

PROMETHEUS The dying plant is your favorite?

PANDORA Yes.

PROMETHEUS What difference does one make?

He grabs the plant and begins to exit.

PANDORA Respectfully, it makes all the difference. What are you doing?

PROMETHEUS Currently, attempting to exit the room.

45

PANDORA With my plant?

PROMETHEUS Yes.

PANDORA May I ask why?

PROMETHEUS No.

PANDORA Well it’s mine. So- if it’s okay, I’d like to know.

PROMETHEUS Inquisitive are we? I need it for my work if you must know.

PANDORA Were you going to ask me if you could take it?

PROMETHEUS I wasn’t aware I had to. Curiosity doesn’t become you, Pandora.

PANDORA Do you need that one specifically? It’s just- You can take any of my other ones, you can take all of them, just can you please leave this one? Please. Don’t take it. It was Hope’s favorite.

Pause.

PROMETHEUS Seeing as I have asked you never to speak that name in this household again, I don’t think that will be an issue. Nothing in this house has been or will ever be yours, Pandora.

PANDORA Okay. I’m sorry.

PROMETHEUS I will try to give back whatever’s leftover when I’ve finished.

PANDORA Whatever’s leftov- 46

She stops. What are you mak- She stops herself again. Breathes. I’d love to know what you’re making.

Prometheus considers.

PROMETHEUS As of right now, the world knows how to make new life from scratch, from clay and water. But what if we could breathe life back into someone after they’ve died, save them a premature or accidental trip across the Styx? There’s something in this soil that just might work.

PANDORA Something in the soil of the dying? plant?

PROMETHEUS ….Yes. Now if you’ll excuse me

Prometheus begins to exit again.

PANDORA So it’s my birthday tomorrow.

PROMETHEUS Is it? Already?

PANDORA Yes.

PROMETHEUS Wonderful. How old?

PANDORA You don’t remember?

PROMETHEUS Should I be preparing for a wedding?

PANDORA No. I’ll be 17 tomorrow.

Prometheus looks Pandora up and down.

47

PROMETHEUS 17?

PANDORA Yes.

PROMETHEUS But you’ve already become a woman.

PANDORA Have I?

PROMETHEUS When did this happen?

PANDORA I don’t know.

PROMETHEUS You’ve grown.

PANDORA That doesn’t mean anything.

PROMETHEUS It means I’m not so sure you’re turning 17.

Prometheus exits.

48

4: The Plan

Pandora has but a moment to grieve her lost plant before Hope (16) and Young Pandora (17) come running back in, a little older, a little more in love (if possible). A new memory. Pandora recognizes that this is a memory and sinks back to watch as she had done previously.

Y.P. Tell me the story of how Prometheus made you?

HOPE Pandora, I’ve told you this story a thousand times already.

Y.P. And I’ll ask a thousand times more! Please????

HOPE Alright, alright. ( melodramatic) It was a dark and stormy night.

Y.P. Hooope!

HOPE If you want to hear the story, I have to start from the beginning and I have to do it my way.

Y.P. Fine. Proceed.

HOPE It was a dark and stormy night. But not as dark as any of the previous nights on Earth had been. No, this night was different. On this night, Prometheus finally succeeded on his quest to steal the exquisite and elusive Fire from the Gods on Mount Olympus. And while this of course is in itself an incredible, amazing, awesome feat that had never been done before and could have brought Prometheus eternal glory, what’s even better is he didn’t just steal it for fame and fortune, as many men are wont to do. He wanted to bring this mini, portable sun back to Earth to share it’s warmth and light with everyone. He wanted to save humankind from suffering through any more long nights of fear and uncertainty. And he did.

Y.P. And then?

HOPE And then, while he was racing back to Earth, with the adrenaline coursing through his body, eager to find someone, anyone to share his success with before the Gods discovered what he had done, he was stopped dead in his tracks. For right before him, he began to witness the most 49 amazing miracle: life being born from the clay beneath him and the water pouring down from above. Now, Prometheus had seen the birth of man from clay and water before but this life was no man-- no hardened hearts, no desire for domination - there was something different. He could sense Hera’s strength and Athena’s wit, Aphrodite’s beauty and Artemis’s kinship to the moon all in this one body. And this magnificent wonder was you, Pandora, the first woman. In you, Prometheus saw the future of humankind held gently in your palm. He was overcome by the sheer magnitude of your greatness and power. Anyone would be if they saw you in the full glory you appeared to him with that night. He wanted to have you and hold you, to serve you, to teach you, to love you and care for you, and to give you everything good in the world wrapped up in a bottle to drink at her command.

Y.P. That’s a lot to live up to…

HOPE But you already do.

Y.P. I don’t remember that last part.

HOPE You ask me to tell you this story like five times a week, I’m gonna switch things up every once in a while.

Y.P. You can switch up your style, but you can’t switch up facts.

HOPE Perhaps. But I’m allowed to put myself in my stories, aren’t I?

Y.P. ( teasing) I suppose I can allow it.

HOPE Thank you for your generosity.

Y.P. I wanted to hear about you though! Not me...

HOPE Yeah, I’m getting there!

Y.P. Okay, okay!

50

HOPE As Prometheus stood before you, watching your future play out before him, you suddenly dropped into his arms, an infant at the beginning of your life, in need of a parent, a role Prometheus would take upon himself. He brought you back to his home to live together with him and his little 3 year old baby brother, Epimetheus, as a family

Y.P. And not realizing that there were more possibilities than just mankind, Prometheus was inspired to imagine new bodies to live in. He had experimented with clay and water before, with no luck, until that fateful day. After that day, he truly believed anything was possible and he decided to make a new life, not from clay and water, but from clay and fire!! And out of the burning earth was finally born his most beloved creation, neither man nor woman, but both man and woman at the same time. His Hope. His radiant, smart and strong Hope with eyes like thunder and lightning strikes, and hands like the flutter of a thousand butterfly wings, and with words like...like….heartbeats.

HOPE Da dum, da dum, da dum.

Y.P. Da dum, da dum, da dum.

HOPE You’re not so bad yourself.

Y.P. Hey!

HOPE Kidding.

Y.P. Can I ask a question?

HOPE Of course. Unless you’re about to ask me to tell that story again, in which case I may just have to kill you.

Y.P. No no no, I wouldn’t do that. At least, not today.

HOPE Just when you have a death wish.

Y.P. Exactly. 51

HOPE What’s the question?

Y.P. I was wondering what a family is? You mentioned that’s what me and Prometheus and Epimetheus were. But what is that exactly?

HOPE Hm. I think a family can be one of two things; they can be the people you are obligated to live with, or, they can be the people who you choose to surround yourself with, because they make you feel at home, wherever you are.

Y.P. Hm. What makes a house a home?

HOPE Love.

Y.P. Do you think love is definable?

HOPE No. And Yes. As a writer, I think it’s my life long quest to put something wordless into words.

Y.P. Try it now.

HOPE I don’t know.

Y.P. Just the first thing that comes to your mind.

HOPE Hmm….well, I think that if anything, love is like a home. A home that goes with you wherever you are.

Y.P. But you just said love is what makes a house a home?

HOPE Yes.

Y.P. And love is also a home?

52

HOPE Yes.

Y.P. How is love both what makes a house a home and also a home? That doesn’t make sense.

HOPE But isn’t that the point? Love never does make sense. Until you feel it. Until you experience yourself working in tandem with another person constantly filling each other up. Effortlessly.

Y.P. How do you know it’s effortless?

HOPE Because I know you. You are my home. And you are my love. You are my home and my love.

Y.P. Oh. I think I get it now. My love. My home. You are my love and my home.

HOPE Pandora?

Y.P. Yes?

HOPE Is there anything you wouldn’t do for me?

Y.P. What do you mean?

HOPE I don’t know.

Y.P. No, Hope. I don’t think so. There is nothing I wouldn’t do for you.

HOPE Are you sure? 53

Y.P. Yeah, I’m pretty sure. Are you okay? What’s on your mind?

HOPE I’ve just been thinking a lot recently. About you and me and this place and the future and...I don’t know, I want to go somewhere. Somewhere new. Just us.

Y.P. Like for a trip? That sounds fun! Let’s do it.

HOPE No no I mean like...forever. Like. I want to go somewhere new with you alone forever.

Y.P. What do you mean?

HOPE I want to run away with you, Pandora. I want to get out of here. What do you say?

Y.P. I’m not sure I--.

HOPE We could run away together and we could build a house and make it a home, and live there with each other, and we could start a family, and it could be just us, alone and away from everything bad in this world. Just us for forever.

Y.P. I mean, I’d love to Hope, but Prometheus would never let us--

HOPE No, but the thing is I think he would.

Y.P. Does he even know about us? That we’re-

HOPE There’s no way he doesn’t know, we’re like, so obvious about it.

Y.P. True.

HOPE And he’s been working on that new thing, something he calls marriage. 54

Y.P. Marriage?

HOPE I’m not really sure exactly what it is yet, but I think it’s supposed to, like, bond two people together for life.

Y.P. But I don’t want to be with anyone else but you. Why does someone else need to tell us that?

HOPE Because then other people know we belong to each other and only each other.

Y.P. What other people?

HOPE I don’t know. Epimetheus. I don’t know.

Y.P. Hope, I would never EVER want to be with Epimetheus.

HOPE I know, I’m sorry. It’s not you, it’s him. I don’t trust him.

Y.P. Do you really think this marriage thing will stop him?

HOPE That’s exactly my point -- if we run away together, we never have to be bothered or interrupted by him again. And I really really think Prometheus would let us get married if we asked him. I want to ask him tonight. What do you think? Hope pulls out a ring. I even made this for you to show you how much I love you. I thought you might want to wear it so people know you and I are meant for each other and no one else. What do you think? Pandora?

Y.P. Hope…

HOPE What?

Y.P. I don’t know Hope, this is all really sudden--

55

HOPE Oh my god.

Y.P. I’m just a little overwhelmed right now--

HOPE You don’t want to do this, do you.

Y.P. No, it’s not that I just--

HOPE Shit shit shit shit shit--

Y.P. I don’t know this is just a lot!

HOPE I’m sorry for bringing it up, I thought...I guess I thought we were on the same page about….our relationship, and--

Y.P. No no, we are Hope, you’re my love and you’re my home, remember? I meant that, I promise I meant that. It’s just...I mean as you said, as everyone I’ve ever met says, I’m the first woman. Everyone’s always telling me that, and like...there’s this expectation they all have of me to be this glorious being and it’s really overwhelming and I don’t know how to handle it! I don’t know what everyone wants from me! I’m new to all this, I don’t know what’s going on, and on top of all that all eyes are on me and I’m so scared all the time, I’m so scared to make mistakes, I’m so scared some days that I think if I breathe wrong, I might ruin the entire image of womanhood for an entire lineage to come after me that I will never meet. I don’t want to be a disappointment, you know? There’s so so so many people on the line, I have to think about more than just myself and it sucks so much, but I need to be the best role model to ensure that no harm ever comes to anyone just because they are a woman. I don’t have room for mistakes. And I don’t know if running away is the best example, you know? I don’t want to mess up what I’m supposed to be doing with my life.

HOPE Who cares what you’re supposed to be doing?

Y.P. You aren’t listening to me!

HOPE You need to do what makes you happy.

56

Y.P. You just don’t understand.

HOPE Pandora, there isn’t even a name for what I am. And even if there was, I don’t think it would ever fully describe exactly who I am or how I feel about me, about this body. I am also the first of something, and you think I don’t understand you? You think I don’t experience pressure? Expectations? Try having everyone stare at you constantly, invasively trying to figure out what you are, what’s underneath your clothes and your skin. Try having no one else make another person like you because no one else wants another person like you. Try having everyone think you’re either a failed woman or a failed man. Everyone thinks I’m a failure. Do you know how that feels? I wish people expected something from me, I wish people dreamed of a world with me in it so I wouldn’t have to feel so damned guilty and helpless and wrong all of the time. I’m so tired of feeling wrong.

Y.P. Hope…

HOPE I’m leaving tonight.

Y.P. Wait--

HOPE With or without you.

Y.P. You won’t.

HOPE I will.

Y.P. I don’t believe you

HOPE I’m going to whether you believe me or not. If you want to come with me, you can meet me at the door after sunset.

Hope exits. Young Pandora watches the space where Hope left, and after a moment follows suit. End of Memory

57

5: The Celebration

Pandora re-enters focus.

PANDORA If only I knew how badly I’d want to leave now.

PROMETHEUS ( calling from offstage) Pandora!

PANDORA I’m still here.

Prometheus and Epimetheus enter.

PROMETHEUS Pandora, remind me again how old you’re turning tomorrow?

PANDORA 17.

PROMETHEUS Are you sure?

PANDORA Yes.

PROMETHEUS Because according to my calendars, you are turning 18.

PANDORA Epimetheus can also confirm I’m turning 17, we talked earlier.

PROMETHEUS He just confirmed you’re turning 18, actually.

PANDORA Oh. Am I.

PROMETHEUS Unless you are lying to me.

PANDORA No, I would never lie to you. I must have made a mistake. You know how I am with numbers.

58

PROMETHEUS Excellent! Just as I thought. Now that business is out of the way, we must celebrate! You two are to engage in marriage tomorrow. The first of its kind! I’ll grab the wine.

Prometheus exits briefly.

PANDORA (to Epimetheus) I thought you said this was my choice.

EPIMETHEUS Did I?

PANDORA Yes.

EPIMETHEUS I don’t recall.

PANDORA You said you were fine waiting another year if I could convince Prometheus I was turning 17.

EPIMETHEUS Well. I guess you just weren’t very convincing.

PANDORA He just said you confirmed it!

EPIMETHEUS I don’t think I told him anything he didn’t already know.

PANDORA I trusted you.

EPIMETHEUS And I didn’t trust you to make the right choice.

Prometheus enters again.

PROMETHEUS Here we are! Come, sit, sit. They sit at the table and pour out their drink. A toast! To marriage!

EPIMETHEUS To man and wife! 59

PANDORA To woman.

Pause.

EPIMETHEUS And?

PANDORA And…?

PROMETHEUS Husband, perhaps?

PANDORA To woman and husband.

They toast.

PROMETHEUS Woman and husband...that doesn’t ring quite the same as “man and wife.” I like that much better, don’t you think?

EPIMETHEUS Yes, I agree.

PANDORA Why does man always have to come first?

PROMETHEUS Because man came before woman.

EPIMETHEUS It’s respectful.

PANDORA Cronus came before Zeus, that doesn’t make him better.

PROMETHEUS Well, that’s different. Cronus was evil.

EPIMETHEUS And man is not evil.

60

PROMETHEUS Cronus simply tried to stop his own prophecy. Never fight against your own prophecy, you won’t win.

EPIMETHEUS Good thing she doesn’t have one of those.

PROMETHEUS And remember what I’ve said about talking back, Pandora, it’s not becoming of a woman. As the first, you have to be the best example. All other women will look up to you and your behavior. We don’t want you to set the wrong example.

PANDORA How do you know it’s not becoming?

PROMETHEUS Excuse me?

PANDORA How do you know talking back is something I shouldn’t do if I’m literally the first woman. That doesn’t make any sense. You and Epimetheus are both constantly telling me what I should and shouldn’t do as a woman, but how would either of you know what it’s like? Shouldn’t I get to decide?

EPIMETHEUS No. You don’t know anything.

Pause.

PANDORA Tell me, what’s it like being a man?

PROMETHEUS ( stammering) Well…

EPIMETHEUS It’s like.

PANDORA Let me rephrase. What’s it like having no expectations? As a man. It must be so easy.

EPIMETHEUS It is NOT easy. Men have been around for years, we know how the world works, we created the world as we know it.

61

PANDORA Then teach me how the world works, if that’s all you’re good for.

EPIMETHEUS If we let women do everything that men do, what makes you different from us?

PANDORA I don’t know because neither of you will let me find out!

EPIMETHEUS Well we have to keep some things separate, wouldn’t you agree Prometheus?

PANDORA Or maybe you just need me to rely on you for the rest of your life to feel some sense of self importance.

PROMETHEUS That’s enough, both of you! Pandora, I need you to trust us a little more. We know what’s best for you. And please, try to refrain from raising your voice and talking back to us. How many times do I need to remind you? Now, isn’t this a celebration?

EPIMETHEUS It is.

PROMETHEUS How about a game of chess? Pandora?

PANDORA No thank you, not tonight.

PROMETHEUS But we’ve never missed a night!

EPIMETHEUS Perhaps she doesn’t want to add another mark to her losing streak.

PROMETHEUS Oh come on, indulge me, Pandora. This could be our last chance to play together.

PANDORA I’m not going anywhere, we can play tomorrow.

EPIMETHEUS Well…

62

PROMETHEUS It’s alright Pandora, I know all about you and Epimetheus’s plans to move out tomorrow. And as I’ve promised, you are allowed to leave my house once you are married.

PANDORA This is the first I’m hearing of this.

EPIMETHEUS I meant to tell you earlier, it must have just slipped my mind.

PANDORA Well, we’ll be coming back right? It’s just a short trip?

EPIMETHEUS I think it will be nice if it’s just you and me for a while, Pandora. It’ll be good for us.

PANDORA Where are you taking me?

EPIMETHEUS Somewhere far away.

PANDORA I don’t want to go, I want to stay here, I want to look for--

PROMETHEUS I think this will be good for you, Pandora. It will allow you to really set a well rounded example for the women who will come after you.

PANDORA Will all these women after me also have to get married?

PROMETHEUS I don’t imagine they will, but I think it’s good for you and Epimetheus to do it and be the first to try.

EPIMETHEUS I’m here to keep you on track. Remind you of what men want in a woman.

PANDORA And what about what a woman wants?

PROMETHEUS Pandora, please.

63

PANDORA No, because I don’t think you get it. I don’t want men. I don’t think about men, and I don’t care about men, but for some reason that’s all you two think I’m good for. You think I’m just here for you but I’m not.

PROMETHEUS Pandora, what has gotten into you.

PANDORA Answer me one more question- does this marriage thing have to happen between a woman and a man?

PROMETHEUS Well--

EPIMETHEUS Who else would there be for you to marry?

PANDORA Another woman, or someone who is neither a woman or a man. Someone like Hope. Prometheus slaps Pandora.

PROMETHEUS That’s enough. Clean up this table and go to your room. Pandora grabs the wine bottle and glasses and proceeds to the kitchen. Are you sure you can handle her on your own?

EPIMETHEUS She’s dangerous. But you won’t have to worry much longer. I’ll be taking her far away from here.

PROMETHEUS Do you think that’s the best option?

EPIMETHEUS I think it’s absolutely necessary. I mean you saw how she was acting tonight. She’s getting out of hand.

PROMETHEUS Right, I’m just not sure-

EPIMETHEUS We have to make sure she won’t make anyone else disappear.

PROMETHEUS Of course, what am I saying. 64

He begins to exit. I’m off to bed, then.

EPIMETHEUS Goodnight, brother.

PROMETHEUS Goodnight.

They both exit.

65

Scene 6: The Wishing Well

PANDORA re-enters from the kitchen and goes to grab the box from where she last placed it. She’s about to go to her room as Prometheu told her, but she gets distracted again by the box, looking around for any more clues as to what may be inside. At some point during this exchange, HOPE enters unnoticed by PANDORA.

HOPE Go on. Startled, PANDORA turns around. You know you want to.

PANDORA (thinking this is another memory of Hope) I don’t remember this one.

HOPE Open the box.

Pandora looks between them and the box, realizing Hope is actually there with her.

PANDORA Hope?

HOPE Hello, Pandora.

Unsure what to say, Pandora collects herself, and, remembering their last interaction with each other, treads carefully with the conversation. There is a sense of awkwardness and formality.

PANDORA Does anyone else know you’re here? Prometheus? E? I can go get them, they should still be awake.

HOPE No that’s okay, not yet. I came to see you. If that’s okay.

PANDORA Of course, of course it is. Is everything okay?

HOPE Yes, I think so.

66

PANDORA Are you okay? I mean, have you been okay?

HOPE I’ve been better, but you know.

PANDORA Well, you look good. I mean, it's good to see you. Is there something I can help you with?

HOPE (they chuckle) So many questions. Am I surprised?

PANDORA You’re right, I’m so sorry, you just got here.

HOPE No, don’t be. It’s my favorite part about you.

PANDORA Okay. Thank you. You just said you came to see me, so I think I was just trying to ask why without sounding rude or anything but I probably should have just asked that, huh.

HOPE I missed you.

PANDORA I’ve missed you too. So much, Hope. It’s been so long.

HOPE 5 years, right?

PANDORA Yeah.

HOPE Yeah.

PANDORA Have you... met any new people? Friends?

67

HOPE No one that’s stuck around, no.

PANDORA Oh. So you’ve been alone this whole time?

HOPE It’s not that bad actually. Plus you’re never alone when you’ve got the stars and the bugs and your own thoughts, you know?

PANDORA What thoughts have had the pleasure of keeping you company?

HOPE Death.

PANDORA Really?

HOPE Death is something we can never really know about when we’re alive, you know? That’s so interesting to me. Like do we experience some sort of new life after death? Or is that just...the end. And what must that be like? Do we feel that ending? Is it like time? Or do you think time changes when we die? Like, do you think it feels longer or shorter? Do we feel the effects of ending eternity?

PANDORA Oh.

HOPE I don’t know. What about you?

PANDORA What about me?

HOPE What’s new with you?

PANDORA I’ve just been here. Like, actually. Prometheus banned me from leaving the house after you...left.

HOPE What, why?

68

PANDORA I don’t know.

HOPE Anyone new in your life?

PANDORA Oh no, no.

HOPE ( genuinely) Good.

PANDORA Good?

HOPE Yeah. If that’s okay.

The awkwardness subsides.

PANDORA Yes, Hope, it’s more than okay. I thought maybe you didn’t want me anymore, with the way we left things and then you never came back and-

HOPE I just needed some time.

PANDORA I’m so sorry. For everything.

HOPE Hey, you know what I say about apologies.

PANDORA Yes, apologies are just words, and words are subjective, they don’t mean anything.

HOPE And I’m here now. Everything’s okay.

For a brief moment, instinct takes over and Pandora runs to hug Hope, touch Hope, make any sort of contact with Hope, but Hope backs away.

HOPE Hey--hey,woah--wait!

69

PANDORA What’s wrong?

HOPE You shouldn’t.

PANDORA But it’s been so long.

HOPE Five years is nothing.

PANDORA Do you not want to anymore? It’s okay if you don’t, I just--

HOPE No no, I- I’m afraid it won’t be like what you remember.

PANDORA But I don’ t remember.

HOPE Give me some time.

PANDORA Okay.

Pause. HOPE What’s in this box?

PANDORA I don’t know.

HOPE You should open it.

PANDORA Why?

HOPE I’m curious. Aren’t you?

PANDORA I seriously don’t think it’s anything important, it’s just a gift from Epimetheus. 70

HOPE Why is Epimetheus giving you gifts?

PANDORA It’s a wedding gift.

HOPE Wedding? Since when?

PANDORA After you left, Prometheus also decided to make Epimetheus and I do that marriage thing.

HOPE You said no, right?!?!

PANDORA I didn’t have a choice. But he said he’d let me leave the house when I did marry him.

HOPE When is this wedding supposed to happen?

PANDORA When I turn 18.

HOPE Didn’t you turn 18 (counting) four years ago?

PANDORA Yes.

Pause.

HOPE So you were just sitting here?

PANDORA I mean, no I wasn’t just sitting here for five years.

HOPE But you’ve been here. For five years.

PANDORA Yes?

HOPE So why didn’t you try to find me? 71

PANDORA ( Stammering) I don’t understand, I-

HOPE Why didn’t anyone try to find me?

PANDORA What do you mean?

HOPE Didn’t anyone care that I was gone?

PANDORA Of course we did, we-I thought about you everyday, Hope.

HOPE And that was enough to make me come back?

PANDORA No, of course not.

HOPE I could have been hurt, or freezing, or starving-

PANDORA But it wasn’t my fault-

HOPE I wasn’t thinking about fault, I was thinking about how no one came for me!

PANDORA You don’t think I tried?

HOPE You could’ve tried harder.

PANDORA Prometheus wouldn’t let me leave! I begged him to let me go out there, I told him my life was worth the possibility of you still being out there, but he wouldn’t let me, Hope!

HOPE You could’ve married Epimetheus!

Beat. 72

PANDORA It’s more complicated than that.

HOPE Doesn’t seem like it.

PANDORA What do you want me to say?

HOPE Admit you made a mistake! Admit you’ve been sitting here waiting for a solution when there was already one right in front of you! Stop pretending like all of this is out of your hands when you chose not to look for me, you chose not to care about me anymore.

PANDORA What about you?! You never wrote! You never came back to visit, you just left, no warning! What was I supposed to think? Because I couldn’t think! For five years, all I could do was feel, and I felt you left because of me. I felt that I said something or did something, and you were running away from me, and you didn’t want to see or talk to me anymore. And it felt like being eaten alive by thousands of infected, parasitic bugs, and if I could even sleep I would go to bed and wake up only to realize I somehow had more body for them to eat. Five years.

HOPE Five years is nothing.

PANDORA Five years is everything when you don’t know anything, Hope. Five years is a fourth of my life, a fourth of my life I spent craving for you with no fix, you don’t get to tell me it’s nothing. You weren’t here when I begged Prometheus and the Gods and anyone who would listen to me to please just trade my life for yours, to just bring you back. I begged until my throat dried and my knees bled and I cried enough tears to scrub that blood off the floors and water the plants three times over. I punched enough walls to make this house a little bigger, and I imagined you next to me enough times to create another universe, but nothing compared to the hole “I miss you” dug in my chest. Of course I didn’t marry Epimetheus, Hope. I didn’t want to share that part of my life with anyone but you. I can’t and I won’t, and every scenario I imagined where I was able to find you after marrying him, if I was even able to find you, all ended with you never forgiving me and never seeing me again. So either way, you were gone.

PROMETHEUS (calling from offstage) Pandora?

HOPE I should go. 73

PANDORA Can I -

She indicates touching or hugging or loving Hope. Hope shakes their head.

HOPE Not yet.

PANDORA When?

HOPE Aren’t you engaged?

PANDORA I’ll end it. I’ll actually end it. Right now.

HOPE Okay.

PANDORA Okay.

HOPE Break off the engagement. Open the box. Find me. HOPE looks around the room at all the plants. What happened to our plant?

PANDORA turns towards the empty space where the plant Prometheus took used to be. HOPE exits, unnoticed.

PANDORA Prometheus happened.

PANDORA turns back around, unsure where Hope went.

74

7: The Chess Game

PROMETHEUS enters.

PROMETHEUS What’s all this noise? I told you to go to bed.

PANDORA No noise, you’re just getting old.

PROMETHEUS I am not old.

PANDORA I’d like to take you up on that offer.

PROMETHEUS What offer?

PANDORA For a game. Let’s play.

PROMETHEUS I made that offer during dinner.

PANDORA I’ve changed my mind.

PROMETHEUS The offer is not still on the table.

PANDORA No, but the game is, and I’d like to play.

PROMETHEUS What has gotten into you?

PANDORA And I’d like to propose a bet. If I win, I get to ask you as many questions as I want about Hope.

PROMETHEUS Absolutely not.

PANDORA If you win, I’ll marry Epimetheus tomorrow and I’ll go with him to whatever place he wants to take me, and I won’t fight it. You’ll never hear me question you again. 75

Prometheus considers.

PROMETHEUS Alright. Let’s play.

He sits. They begin to play, Pandora as white and Prometheus as black. The tension is….palpable.

PANDORA So….

PROMETHEUS So…

PANDORA How are you?

PROMETHEUS Fine.

PANDORA Good.

PROMETHEUS How are you?

PANDORA Fine.

PROMETHEUS Good.

PANDORA Good. They play. Ha! Check!

PROMETHEUS Already?

PANDORA Yes, see?

She points to the move she did to get to check.

76

PROMETHEUS It’s not a checkmate.

PANDORA I know, but it was my first check...sorry.

PROMETHEUS Don’t be. It was well played.

PANDORA Thank you. I guess I’ve learned a thing or two after all.

PROMETHEUS Have we ever missed a night?

PANDORA No, I don’t think so.

PROMETHEUS Impressive.

PANDORA It was nice to have a routine. Even when the game stopped being fun.

PROMETHEUS I’m sorry?

PANDORA Is this still fun for you?

PROMETHEUS Yes, I enjoy this game.

PANDORA Oh.

PROMETHEUS Have you not… do you not….when did it stop being fun?

PANDORA When-- well. I don’t think I’m allowed to say.

She is implying that the game stopped being fun after Hope left.

PROMETHEUS Oh. 77

PANDORA But when I win, I’ll be happy to say more.

PROMETHEUS Don’t get ahead of yourself. Check.

PANDORA Where did that come from?

PROMETHEUS Don’t let your cockiness give you a blind eye.

PANDORA Says the man of the house.

PROMETHEUS Hey!

PANDORA Sorry.

PROMETHEUS Check. Again.

PANDORA But--

PROMETHEUS You won’t win this.

PANDORA If you want me to leave so bad, why did you...I mean, I would have been happy to leave you. By myself, that is. If that’s what you wanted.

PROMETHEUS That’s not what I…. it isn’t safe.

PANDORA What isn’t?

PROMETHEUS The world.

78

PANDORA The world isn’t safe?

PROMETHEUS Yes.

PANDORA From what?

PROMETHEUS You.

PANDORA The world isn’t safe. From me.

PROMETHEUS. Yes-NO. No, Pandora, the world isn’t safe for you, FOR you, I thought that’s what you said, I--

PANDORA Why are you so scared of me? Check.

PROMETHEUS I’m not scared of you, Pandora! Look, checkmate. Game over, I win, no more questions.

PANDORA What?!

PROMETHEUS You’ll marry Epimetheus tomorrow--

PANDORA No--

PROMETHEUS --you’ll leave with him--

PANDORA --but how did you--?!

PROMETHEUS --and you’ll leave me alone!

Prometheus starts to exit.

79

PANDORA Wait! Prometheus!

PROMETHEUS I’m going to bed!

PANDORA Please!

PROMETHEUS Goodnight!

PANDORA What did I do wrong?! Prometheus stops. Why are you scared of me? Was there something I did? To make you hate me?

PROMETHEUS Pandora--

PANDORA Please. I just want to fix it. Whatever I did. And then I’ll leave you alone. You won. Fair and square.

PROMETHEUS You didn’t do anything wrong, Pandora! It’s the gods! The gods don’t just live for power and control, they lust for it. They watch us closely and wait for us to do something, anything that they believe goes against their plans for the world because they want to punish us. And do you think any of them have the same plans? No, of course not. There is no way for us to know how not to offend any of them because this is all just a game to them. A game that’s rigged against us. All they want to do is outdo each other with the most elaborate and creative punishment. They are addicted to our pain and suffering, they crave our fear. And for as long as we’ve existed, they all seem to agree on one thing: Love. Love to them is a weapon, and it is their weapon of choice in this hunt against us. When we love someone, it leads the gods directly to who they can use against us, who they can take away from us. We’re just like disposable, little pawns they can push around for fun. He knocks over the pawns on the chess board. I knew all of this when I went to steal their fire. And I did it anyway because...because I thought I could. I was young, I felt invincible, and I thought it was worth it. We needed the fire, and at the time, I didn’t think I had anything that wasn’t worth losing. I didn’t think the gods would wait. But they did. They waited and waited until I had something worth losing. And they took it. They took Hope.

Pause.

80

PANDORA And?

PROMETHEUS And…?

PANDORA What does this have to do with me?

PROMETHEUS What more do you want from me, Pandora, please. We had a deal.

PANDORA Yeah, we did.

PROMETHEUS Okay. Goodnight.

He begins to exit again.

PANDORA One more thing-- How many pawns does each player have in a game of chess?

PROMETHEUS Pandora--

PANDORA 8, right?

PROMETHEUS Yes?

PANDORA So why are there 9 black pawns and 7 white?

PROMETHEUS What?

PANDORA You cheated.

PROMETHEUS I didn’t--

81

PANDORA We had a deal. But you didn’t win. So I want to know why you hate me.

PROMETHEUS I don’t hate you!

PANDORA Then why didn’t you let me look for Hope?!

PROMETHEUS What are you talking about?

PANDORA You don’t remember?

Y.P. walks in. Memory and reality collide. . Y.P. Prometheus, please!!!!

PROMETHEUS No….

PANDORA How I begged and begged for you to let me look for them?

Y.P. They’re all alone out there, we need to help them, we need to find them!!! Please Prometheus, I don’t care if I die, I don’t care, I just--we have to find them before it’s too late, I don’t want them to die, please, PLEASE!!

PROMETHEUS No!

PANDORA But you wouldn’t let me. You didn’t care.

PROMETHEUS Pandora, enough!

Y.P. exits. End of memory.

PANDORA If you loved Hope, why didn’t you look for them? Why didn’t you let me look for them?

82

PROMETHEUS I needed to protect you.

PANDORA Bullshit. You needed to protect the world from me because you think it’s my fault Hope left. Isn’t that right? You think I’m the punishment because you found me the day you stole the fire, and you think I’ll make someone else disappear the way I made Hope disappear because I loved Hope and you hated that, you hated that I loved Hope and you hate me and--and--

PROMETHEUS Is that what you think?

PANDORA That’s what you made me think!

PROMETHEUS Pandora… I didn’t let you leave because I didn’t want you to disappear. The gods-- they just take and take, especially the people we love and… I didn’t want to lose you, too.

PANDORA What?

PROMETHEUS And I did look for Hope. I looked for Hope every night. For months I stayed up sunset to sunrise looking for Hope, but after a while, I had to accept that maybe they were gone for good. Maybe the gods finally took what they wanted from me after all these years.

PANDORA I would have gone with you. We could have looked together. I just wanted to help.

PROMETHEUS I know. I’m sorry.

PANDORA Me too.

PROMETHEUS I didn’t know you loved Hope.

PANDORA You didn’t? We thought it was so obvious.

PROMETHEUS No, I really had no idea.

83

PANDORA We were going to ask you if we could do that marriage thing with each other.

PROMETHEUS Really?

PANDORA Yes. We wanted to help you with your invention, and we thought we were perfect for it. Hope thought we were perfect.

PROMETHEUS You were. I would have said yes, you know.

PANDORA Really?

PROMETHEUS That would have been a beautiful marriage.

PANDORA If Hope was still here, would you still say yes?

PROMETHEUS I mean, yes, but--

PANDORA And I could marry Hope instead of Epimetheus?

PROMETHEUS Yes, but Hope isn’t here. And I still don’t think it’s safe for you out there alone.

PANDORA Do you think Hope could come back?

PROMETHEUS Pandora, it’s very unlikely considering--

PANDORA Prometheus, Hope is here.

PROMETHEUS What?

PANDORA I wasn’t supposed to tell you yet, but-- 84

PROMETHEUS Are you sure?

PANDORA Yes, I talked to them earlier, they’re probably around here somewhere.

8: The Confrontation Pandora starts looking around. Epimetheus enters as Pandora is yelling for Hope.

PANDORA (calling) HOPE! HOPE!!

PROMETHEUS Pandora, are you feeling alright?

PANDORA HOPE!

EPIMETHEUS What’s going on?

PROMETHEUS Pandora thinks she saw Hope.

EPIMETHEUS What?

PROMETHEUS I know, I know, I want to believe her, but I don’t know…

PANDORA Hope! Where are you?

EPIMETHEUS That’s impossible.

PANDORA Nothing’s impossible, Hope is alive, and I am going to marry them.

EPIMETHEUS What is she talking about?

85

PANDORA Wait…( remembering) “Break off the engagement. Open the box. Find me.” The box, I need the box.

Pandora runs off to find the box.

EPIMETHEUS You are not breaking off our engagement.

PANDORA I am.

EPIMETHEUS You’re marrying me.

PANDORA I won’t.

EPIMETHEUS You will if I say so!

PROMETHEUS Epimetheus!

PANDORA I just need to open this box.

Prometheus walks over to Pandora if he isn’t there already. Pandora opens the box. In the box lies a ring on top of a pile of ashes. Hope’s ring. Hope’s ashes. As Pandora pulls out the ring, Hope enters behind Pandora and Prometheus, unseen by everyone except Epimetheus in a short memory.

EPIMETHEUS SHE’S MINE.

HOPE She’s not an object, what’s wrong with you?

EPIMETHEUS She will always need a man in her life.

HOPE No, she won’t.

EPIMETHEUS Someone like me. 86

HOPE You’re disgusting.

EPIMETHEUS Not a confused half breed like you.

Beat.

HOPE I’m asking Prometheus if I can marry Pandora, and there’s nothing you can do about it. Please get out of my way.

EPIMETHEUS NO. As Epimetheus lunges for Hope, the memory ends and merges with real life. He is lunging for the ring instead. THIS ISN’T SUPPOSED TO BE IN THERE.

He knocks the ring out of Pandora’s hands, but Prometheus grabs it instead.

PROMETHEUS This is Hope’s ring…

EPIMETHEUS The gods promised me--

PANDORA So these must be...their ashes…

EPIMETHEUS They lied to me!

PROMETHEUS (To Epimetheus) WHAT HAVE YOU DONE!

EPIMETHEUS I ONLY DID WHAT I HAD TO.

PROMETHEUS I can fix this….I can fix this!!

Prometheus runs out of the room for a brief moment.

87

PANDORA (to Epimetheus) What have you done.

Throughout Epimetheus’s monologue, Prometheus comes back in with the wilting plant and his new elixir. He tries to put some on the ring in hope that it will bring Hope back to life.

EPIMETHEUS This is all your fault, you ungrateful bitch, you’ve ruined everything! You are MINE, you’re supposed to marry me, and love me, and there’s nothing that will get in my way, NOTHING! Not you, not Hope, not anyone. I’ve done nothing that wasn’t asked of me by the Gods themselves. I am Epimetheus, brother of the man who stole fire from the Gods, I am special, and I deserve you and I will burn you, Pandora, do you hear me, I will BURN YOU. The elixir isn’t working. Don’t you get it? They're not coming back! They’re with Hades now, burning for their sins. You should have never loved them, Pandora, you were supposed to be mine. They weren’t supposed to get in the way but they did and I burned them and they’re burning forever now DO YOU HEAR ME DO YOU HEAR ME-- Epimetheus is cut off by Pandora punching him in the face. Epimetheus is about to retaliate when Prometheus comes in and starts choking Epimetheus. Epimetheus is inches from death when he kicks Prometheus in the stomach, causing him to lose balance and fall to the ground. You will NEVER win. I am telling the world you opened this box, Pandora, this box that was sent by the Gods!! YOU opened the box and you released darkness into the world. That makes sense right? Darkness as a punishment for light? That’s what the Gods told me. That’s what they told me to do and they told me to give you the box and that you would open it and now I am going to tell the whole world and you will NEVER have a legacy NEVER EVER EVER.

Epimetheus runs out into the world.

PROMETHEUS (Wailing) Oh god...oh...Hope….

PANDORA Hope…

Pandora walks over to the ring. She mourns for a moment, but is distracted by something she sees on the bottom of the wilted plant, which has since been knocked over. It’s a letter, taped to the bottom of the plant.

Prometheus, is this yours?

Prometheus shakes his head. Pandora opens the letter.

88

PANDORA “Pandora,

HOPE I am writing this down because writing is easier than talking. At least for me. You somehow never seem to run out of things to say or questions to ask. It’s my favorite thing about you.

I wanted to say I’m sorry. I’m sorry I got mad at you, I’m sorry for being such an idiot, and most importantly I’m sorry I didn’t trust you. I know you love me and you know I love you and we don’t need Prometheus or whatever a marriage is to tell us otherwise. At least, not until we’re both ready.

And Pandora, please know I would wait lifetimes for you to be ready if that’s how long you needed. We could be two pine trees growing on top of a snowy mountain and if that’s when you’re ready, then and only then will we interlock our needles and live the rest of that life in each other's arms.

My love will never die for you, Pandora. Not in this life, and not in any other. And you might think it’s not possible that we will find each other in our lives to come, but when I’m with you Pandora, nothing makes more sense than this. When we’re alone, the world feels limitless, and full of colors I have never seen before, and nothing seems impossible.

Have I told you about the worms growing inside me? The ones that are hungry to kiss every inch of your body and hear every word inside your brain?

What am I saying, I should tell you all this in person. And I will. Someday. But for now, writing is easier. Oh, and I’m not going to run away. I’m sorry I said that. I was being dramatic. Besides, I’d miss you too much.

Pandora Pandora Pandora. You are my love. You are my home. You are my love and my home.

And I will always find you. Yours always,

PANDORA “Hope.”

PANDORA gently folds the letter and hugs it close to her chest. She takes the ring, kisses it, and places it on her wedding finger. She fixes the plant and sprinkles the ash on it. After a moment, the plant springs back to life for the first time. Pandora picks up the plant, walks over to Prometheus, helps him up, and offers up the plant as a peace offering. They hold it together, and they both turn to look out the door where Epimetheus has exited.

89

Epilogue Young Pandora, alone onstage.

Y.P. And so, Prometheus is left to finally grasp his long awaited punishment for stealing fire from the Gods. But he gets through it. In a way, he is proud to suffer his loss because the world continues to thank him for bringing them light. And Epimetheus runs out into the world to spread the lies that Pandora opened the box and that Pandora released darkness back into the world. “It’s the woman’s fault!” He screams. “Pandora killed our Hope!” And thus, the world blames Pandora for bringing back darkness. A darkness different from night, a darkness deeper in meaning, filled with horror, evil, and death. And Pandora….Pandora. I can’t remember what happens to her. Why can’t I remember. Does anyone know? What happens to me? Do you know? Maybe Pandora has no ending. That could be a truth. Or at least, historians didn’t care enough to memorialize her ending. She served her purpose as man's scapegoat. No redemption arc for her because redemption means man is wrong and flawed. How horrible. A man taking responsibility? What a thought. Pandora is the mother of all mother’s. Truth. She is the mother of her legacy, the mother of womanhood. She is in every woman, and every woman is in her. She is in every woman, and every woman is in her, she carries every woman, and every woman carries her, she has no ending, and she is in every woman, and every woman carries her, and if every woman carries her, doesn’t every woman carry her ending? And so, her story goes on. Her story made of lies goes on. Her story made of lies with no ending goes on. And on. And on. And on. And on. And on. And on. Hope appears on stage for a brief moment. Young Pandora turns to ask this final question to Hope. Truth?

Lights go out on the two of them, frozen in this question.

End of Play 90

VI. Works Consulted

Ball, David. Backwards and Forwards: a Technical Manual for Reading Plays. Southern Illinois University Press, 2017.

Editors of Britannica. “Pandora.” Encyclopædia Britannica , Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., www.britannica.com/topic/Pandora-Greek-mythology.

Ruhl, Sarah. Eurydice. Samuel French, 2008.

Russell, William F. Classic Myths to Read Aloud. Crown Trade Paperbacks, 1992.

91

VII. Works Consulted

Kenneth. “Jose Rivera's 36 Assumptions About Playwriting.” Jose Rivera's 36 Assumptions About Playwriting, 1 Jan. 1970, allbleedingstopseventually.blogspot.com/2007/01/jose-riveras-36-assumptions-about.htm l.

Greek Legends and Myths. “Pandora's Box in Greek Mythology.” Gr eek Legends and Myths , www.greeklegendsandmyths.com/pandoras-box.html.

Spencer, Stuart. The Playwright's Guidebook. Faber and Faber, 2002.

Written by GreekBoston.com in Greek Mythology. “The Story of Pandora's Box.” ICal , 26 Feb.

2018, www.greekboston.com/culture/mythology/pandoras-box/.

92

Appendix A

Original Poem from Exercise at Curious New Voices:

PANDORA: They tell me I am the first woman. They say I was sculpted from clay and water. Man too is sculpted from clay and water. But I am not man. Man kept making man, but never thought to make Woman. What does it mean to be a woman? In this language the roots of a woman are “of man.” But I was made from a God. I was made for a God. I don’t know the difference yet.

They gave me gifts, my voice, my hands, my mind where I imagine creation I imagine birth, and life A lineage passing down the dust of the Gods that made me, they will make my children and my children’s children A legacy. Am I still a woman if my hands don’t, If my hands can’t, grow these new leaves from my branches? They gave me Beauty, which I do not understand Everything can be beautiful And not. Am I still woman if you don’t think I am beautiful? If man doesn’t think I am beautiful.

They gave me Curiosity, which I imagine is the insatiable hunger to know and know and know and No earthly food can satisfy.

And finally they gave me a box. A box they told me never to open. But I hear whispers I hear whispers but never from the box The box sounds...empty. 93

They say if the box is opened, things that are dark will be released to roam around Earth. So I vow to use my curiosity to open the box Without ever opening it. Because all I know is light. The light of the revolution. The light of Prometheus.

They say it is the Iron Age of mankind I wonder how man is kind if he never thought to make woman? Will they ask anyway What does it mean to be a woman? Is this something I know? All I know is that I am I am. I am.

94

Appendix B

One Act Version of Pandora:

PANDORA

Characters: PANDORA: 25 HOPE: Non-Binary, mid to late 20’s, Prometheus’s child EPIMETHEUS: Mid to late 20’s PROMETHEUS: Late 40’s to 50’s, brother to Epimetheus, took Pandora in after she was made

PLACE Mythological?

TIME Evening 95

(PROLOGUE)

SETTING: The stage should resemble the common/kitchen area of a home. Nothing that indicates a specific time or place. The walls appear rock-like and the floor could resemble dirt. There is a table and some chairs that look handmade. There is a place to sit, similar to a couch. And plants. Like, so many different plants. An abundance of plants. Plants on the floor, plants on walls, plants growing on the walls, plants coming out of the walls, plants on ceilings, plants in pots. All these plants are in different stages of their growth, except for one plant that sits, waiting and dying. Archways rather than doors lead to other areas of this living space. On the table there is a chess board with a chess game in motion. Somewhere else there are several journals and pens.

AT RISE: ALL enter for a prologue, a reflection of what’s to come.

PANDORA They will tell the world I was the first woman.

HOPE You, Pandora, were the first with your mind.

EPIMETHEUS The first of your kind.

PROMETHEUS The first with your heart.

PANDORA They will tell the world I was carved from clay and water, that man too was carved from--

PROMETHEUS clay-

HOPE and water.

PANDORA But I was not man. I was not the same. I was--

HOPE good--

EPIMETHEUS untrustworthy--

96

PROMETHEUS different.

Beat.

PANDORA What does it mean to be a Woman? Being the first confines definitions to what is already known. How long will they insist the word “woman” means “out of man;” A persecution. Words are subjective, weighted irrationality. Will they ever stop reducing us to a translation?

PROMETHEUS Zeus commanded Hephaestus, blacksmith of the Gods, to sculpt you, Pandora, the first woman, from clay--

HOPE and water--

EPIMETHEUS because Prometheus stole fire from the Gods.

PANDORA Man steals what they cannot imagine themselves.

EPIMETHEUS You were a punishment.

HOPE You didn’t ask to be anything--

PANDORA Will they forget I was made by a God?

PROMETHEUS --But you became a pawn in their eternal war with mankind.

PANDORA Or was I made for the Gods? Is there a difference? Beat. It is funny. I wonder how man is kind if he never imagined making woman. Man just kept remaking man. But being a sculptor does not make you a God.

97

PROMETHEUS The Gods bestowed you with gifts,

HOPE your mind, your hands--

EPIMETHEUS Your voice:

PANDORA I imagine creation I imagine life from birth, A lineage passing down the dust that makes me, Inherited by my children and my children’s children, A legacy. Am I still a woman if my hands do not, If my hands cannot, Grow new fruit from their roots?

EPIMETHEUS The Gods painted you in Beauty

HOPE We can always see beauty if it is written to be remembered as such.

PANDORA Am I still a woman if they think I am not beautiful? If man does not think I am beautiful? I do not understand beauty. Everything can be beautiful. And not. Or what if my beauty becomes all they see?

EPIMETHEUS And I, Epimetheus, wanted you, Pandora--

HOPE But you, Pandora, wanted me, Hope-

PROMETHEUS And I, Prometheus, didn’t know what to do.

PANDORA A prize to be won from some competition I never knew I was a part of.

PROMETHEUS The Gods gave you Curiosity, 98

HOPE insatiable hunger

PANDORA I want to know

HOPE So they made a box

HOPE pulls out a wooden box.

EPIMETHEUS And they gave you a box.

EPIMETHEUS takes the box from HOPE .

PANDORA I want to know.

PROMETHEUS And they will tell the world this box was filled with darkness--

EPIMETHEUS evil

HOPE death.

PANDORA I want to know.

EPIMETHEUS They will tell the world you opened the box.

PANDORA What does it mean to be a woman?

PROMETHEUS They will tell the world this was your fault.

PANDORA What does it mean to be the first?

HOPE 99

It is easy to blame the one who was different.

PANDORA I want to know.

Exit all but Pandora, who remains alone on stage. End of Prologue.

100

(ONE)

PANDORA retrieves a watering can and begins to water the various plants around her. Her routine is very coordinated and dance-like. At some point in this routine, EPIMETHEUS enters, unnoticed by PANDORA. He waits. He does something to draw her attention, and when she finally does notice him, he offers her the wooden box.

EPIMETHEUS For our wedding tomorrow.

PANDORA Prometheus wants us to get married on my 22nd birthday.

EPIMETHEUS I know.

PANDORA Tomorrow is my 21st.

EPIMETHEUS Last year was your 21st.

PANDORA Must have made a mistake.

EPIMETHEUS And the year before that. And the year before. And the year before.

PANDORA Oh.

EPIMETHEUS I’m starting to think you don’t want to marry me. PANDORA laughs. Is this a joke to you?

PANDORA No, no, I’m sorry. It doesn’t matter what I want.

EPIMETHEUS But I want you to marry me.

PANDORA I guess I just don’t really understand what marriage is? Or why I need to do it?

101

EPIMETHEUS It’s a way for you to stay protected.

PANDORA I don’t need protecting…

EPIMETHEUS There are a lot of people who won’t understand what you are. The world has seen men, but you-- you’re something new, and that scares people. They’ll want to take advantage of you.

PANDORA Like Prometheus?

EPIMETHEUS Yes. He took you in as his own because he couldn’t fathom letting someone else have you. But my brother can’t take care of you forever.

PANDORA Prometheus stopped caring about me a long time ago.

EPIMETHEUS Exactly. And he doesn’t really think for himself anymore, he needs someone to tell him what to do.Which is fine, I guess, but it’s not great when you have to take care of someone else. The sooner you marry me, the sooner you’ll be under my protection, and the sooner you can leave this house. Pause. And the sooner you can search for Hope.

PANDORA Do you think they’re still alive?

EPIMETHEUS Sure, I don’t see why not. It’s only been four years.

PANDORA Yeah, but he hasn’t even tried looking for them. I mean, who doesn’t look for their child? And he’s kept me trapped here. I hate him.

EPIMETHEUS When you marry me, this will all be over.

PANDORA Do you think he’s punishing me? For Hope?

EPIMETHEUS 102

I mean, you two were inseparable as kids. You were the only person they were ever around. Who else would they feel the need to run away from?

PANDORA Yeah.

EPIMETHEUS I could wait, you know, for the marriage. Anything for you. Beat. By the way, the proper response to receiving a gift is “thank you.”

PANDORA Oh, sorry!

Pause.

EPIMETHEUS “Thank you for the gift, Epimetheus.”

PANDORA Sorry, thank you. What is it?

EPIMETHEUS (mimicking Pandora/what he wishes Pandora would say ) “You’re so strong, like an ox,” and I won’t say anything that will ruin the surprise.

PANDORA (teasing in return) Maybe a baby ox.

EPIMETHEUS “and beautiful like...like the sky when the light of the moon and the morning sun intertwine.”

PANDORA Stop, I hate sunlight.

EPIMETHEUS These plants say otherwise. You love sunlight and moonlight and starlight and everything ethereal and big and unreachable that isn’t standing here with you right now.

PANDORA I will hate sunlight and moonlight if you compare yourself to it intertwining-ly again.

EPIMETHEUS Honesty doesn’t suit you.

103

PANDORA Is that how I sound to you? Like “I love the sun, and the moon, and the stars?”

EPIMETHEUS What’s wrong with that?

PANDORA It’s been said before.

EPIMETHEUS Yes. By you. You and Hope used to talk to each other like that all the time.

PANDORA Hope was trying to be a writer, they liked to be different. You’re not Hope.

EPIMETHEUS I’m not, I’m better. Don’t forget that. I am a lover, not a writer.

PANDORA Are they not the same?

EPIMETHEUS Writers spend all of their time looking down at a page, they’re too distracted with describing it to actually love.

PANDORA How can anyone love when love itself is too impossible to understand?

EPIMETHEUS Because love is not something you understand, it’s something you feel. And something you need in return. We all long to be the object of someone else’s desire.

PANDORA What do you desire?

EPIMETHEUS You, Pandora. Always you.

PANDORA Hope would always say how much they wanted to be a honeybee. Content to always search for flowers among weeds, and devoted to creating the sweetest nectar.

EPIMETHEUS I’d want to be a hawk. I could soar into Mt. Olympus undetected, a man among Gods, perhaps mistaken for a God.

104

PANDORA I would tell Hope I wanted to be the flower pretty enough for the honeybee to land on.

EPIMETHEUS But they flew away.

PANDORA Yeah.

EPIMETHEUS What do you desire now?

PANDORA Does it change?

EPIMETHEUS Yes. All things change with time. I said I want you, and people need love in return, so you say--

PANDORA Oh, sorry. You too.

EPIMETHEUS Kiss me.

PANDORA I’ll kiss you at our wedding.

EPIMETHEUS Where’s the thrill in waiting? It’s just one day.

PANDORA Or one more year.

EPIMETHEUS Hope hated waiting for things, they were always so adventurous. I can see why they decided to leave.

PANDORA kisses EPIMETHEUS, then pulls back confused.

EPIMETHEUS What?

PANDORA Nothing. I mean, that was my first kiss. Am I supposed to feel something? Sorry.

EPIMETHEUS 105

My gift might help answer your questions.

PANDORA Do you want me to open it now?

EPIMETHEUS All that matters to me is that you open it.

PANDORA Yeah, it’s a gift for me, who else would open it?

EPIMETHEUS I don’t know. Open it sometime today, or tomorrow. I’m going to rest now. Call me if you do decide to open it early. I want to see your reaction.

EPIMETHEUS exits.

(TWO)

As soon as he exits, PANDORA is immediately enamoured by the box, and almost opens it before looking around for clues as to what may be inside. At some point during this exchange, HOPE enters unnoticed by PANDORA.

HOPE Go on, open the box.

Startled, PANDORA turns around.

PANDORA Hope?

HOPE That’s me.

PANDORA Am I dreaming?

HOPE Maybe.

PANDORA Where have you been?

HOPE Out.

106

PANDORA What are you doing here?

HOPE So many questions. Am I surprised?

PANDORA Sorry.

HOPE Don’t be. It’s my favorite part about you.

Pause.

PANDORA You look good. I mean, it’s good to see you. I’ve missed you.

HOPE What’s in the box?

PANDORA Oh, it’s a gift from Epimetheus.

HOPE I’ve been thinking about him. And my father.

PANDORA I hate Prometheus.

HOPE Do you remember when we tried turning the house into a lake? We ran outside to the pond and filled buckets with water, and came back here to dump them?

PANDORA I remember Prometheus getting mad at us as usual. He hated seeing us together.

HOPE Actually, he laughed at us. Told us we were brilliant. He only scolded us after Epimetheus came home and talked to him. My favorite memory of my father is when he gave me his ring he made from the leftover wood of his stolen fire. He told me to “ never let anyone tell me who I am.” But I’ve since lost the ring.

PANDORA He’s changed a lot. 107

Should we tell him you’re here?

HOPE No.

PANDORA Are you sure?

HOPE What if we let it be just you and me for a while?

PANDORA I’d like that.

Pause.

HOPE Why is Epimetheus giving you gifts?

PANDORA It’s a wedding gift. After you left, Prometheus wouldn’t let me leave the house anymore.

HOPE That doesn’t sound like him.

PANDORA I told you, he’s changed. He said the only way out was to marry Epimetheus.

HOPE When?

PANDORA 22nd birthday.

HOPE Didn’t you turn 22 the year after I left?

PANDORA Yeah.

Beat. HOPE So why didn’t anyone try to find me?

PANDORA 108

I just told you, Prometheus wouldn’t let me leave. We thought about you everyday, I thought about you everyday.

HOPE And that was enough to make me come back?

PANDORA You’re here now. Did you think about me too?

HOPE You’ve asked this before.

PANDORA I remember. Do you have an answer now?

HOPE I thought about how you never tried to find me.

PANDORA That wasn’t my fault--

HOPE I could have been hurt, or freezing, or starving and no one came to save me, I wasn’t thinking about fault.

PANDORA I wasn’t allowed to leave!

HOPE You could’ve tried harder! You could’ve married, Epimetheus.

PANDORA It’s more complicated than that.

HOPE Doesn’t seem like it.

PANDORA You never wrote, you never came back to visit, I thought- -I thought you left because of me, I thought you ran away from me. I thought I said something or did something, and you left, and you didn’t want to see or talk to me anymore. And then days went by. Then weeks, months, years, I thought you were dead and rotting somewhere, but I never stopped thinking about you.

HOPE You always have such good thoughts. 109

PANDORA I’m sorry, Hope. I’m so sorry.

HOPE Apologies are just words. You know what I say about words.

PANDORA They’re subjective. They don’t mean anything.

HOPE You always get apologetic when you hang around Epimetheus.

PANDORA Yeah. He says he likes it.

HOPE Why?

PANDORA Because it shows when he’s right and I’m wrong. Since I’m the first woman, you know? I don’t know anything.

HOPE No, Pandora, that’s so wrong. He thinks he knows more about who you are than you do because his entire life has been centered around his existence. And he thinks everything new that comes into existence can only be understood in the context of what is already known. Epimetheus is making his own reality about you because he knows nothing about you and that scares him. Men are scared of what’s different from them, and they’re scared to make space for you to decide for yourself who you are. But that doesn’t mean you don’t deserve a space at all. The beauty of being the first is that no one can tell you you’re wrong. There are no standards for you to meet.

PANDORA I never thought of it that way.

HOPE No one can tell you who you are, Pandora. Not even me.

PROMETHEUS (calling from offstage) Pandora?

HOPE I should go. HOPE looks around the room at all the plants. Still caring for the plants I see. Any luck with the one we found yet? 110

PANDORA turns towards the one wilting plant. HOPE exits, unnoticed.

PANDORA No, I can’t seem to find anything to help it grow. PANDORA turns back around.

(THREE)

Not sure where HOPE went, PANDORA turns back towards the plant to tend it. PROMETHEUS enters. EPIMETHEUS lurks in the archway where they came from.

PROMETHEUS There you are.

PANDORA What do you want?

PROMETHEUS Epimetheus has just reminded you of your birthday tomorrow.

PANDORA He did?

PROMETHEUS Yes, and I can’t seem to remember which one. I hate time. How old will you be?

Pause.

PANDORA It’s--

EPIMETHEUS Her 22nd. Right, Pandora?

PROMETHEUS Which means the wedding is happening tomorrow?

EPIMETHEUS Yes. Just as planned.

PANDORA Right...

111

EPIMETHEUS smiles and slinks away. PROMETHEUS walks over to the chess game and begins to reset it. .

PROMETHEUS Want to play a game, Pandora?

PANDORA I’m busy.

PROMETHEUS We’ve never missed a night. Come, sit.

If she hasn’t already, PANDORA sets the box down near the wilting plant. She reluctantly goes to sit across from PROMETHEUS. They play in silence for a while.

PANDORA What did Epimetheus say? When he went to talk to you?

PROMETHEUS He just said it was your birthday tomorrow and that I should ask you about it.

PANDORA That’s it?

PROMETHEUS Yeah.

Pause.

PANDORA Do you think it’s possible Hope could come back?

PROMETHEUS I don’t want to talk about Hope.

PANDORA I do.

PROMETHEUS Please, Pandora.

PANDORA It’s important.

PROMETHEUS 112

Look, we can sit here and talk about hypotheticals and “what ifs” all day long, but at the end of the day I’m the one still stuck not knowing whether my child is alive or not. I have to assume they’re dead. Check.

PANDORA Why didn’t you let me look for them?

PROMETHEUS Because I needed to protect you too.

PANDORA Why?

PROMETHEUS You’re new, you don’t know anything about the world.

PANDORA Who says?

PROMETHEUS ...I don’t know.

PANDORA Epimetheus?

PROMETHEUS Maybe? I guess?

PANDORA Hmm.

Pause. PANDORA

PANDORA Why didn’t you ever look for Hope? Check.

PROMETHEUS What do you mean?

PANDORA Like, right when you found them missing?

PROMETHEUS 113

Epimetheus told me not to.

PANDORA Why would you listen to him about your child?

PROMETHEUS There was no point looking for them.

PANDORA They were your child, what do you mean there was no point? Did you even love Hope?

PROMETHEUS Of course I cared about my child.

PANDORA You can care about someone without loving them.

The chess game has stopped.

PROMETHEUS What was I supposed to do, Pandora? It’s what the gods wanted. They’ve been waiting to punish me since I stole their worthless fire! And love is their weapon of choice. When the God’s want to punish you, loving someone leads them directly to who they can use against you, who they can take away from you. So they waited, waited until I had something worth losing. I thought they would only punish me, I didn’t think….but they knew I didn’t care about my life. Their way of seeking so-called justice is never disconnected, never unrelated from the crime they think was committed. I brought light to humanity, so they wanted to take away mine. I did anything I could to try to make sure the God’s didn’t hurt Hope. I was so scared to make choices, I needed a second opinion on everything I did. So I turned to Epimetheus.

PANDORA (sympathizing) Oh.

PROMETHEUS When I heard the whispers of you, the first woman made by the Gods from clay and water, I thought that’s it, she must be the punishment I’ve been waiting for. I took you in to keep a close eye on you. I sat and watched as you and Hope grew closer and closer, while I slipped out of their mind. And then they were gone.

PANDORA So it is my fault then?

PROMETHEUS No, Pandora. It’s just a game to them, you know? The Gods, I mean. They see us as pieces in their games. Disposable, little pawns they can push around for fun. 114

PROMETHEUS knocks over one of PANDORA’s pawns on the chess board.

PANDORA I don’t know what to say.

PROMETHEUS I should have said something before. Earlier, you asked about Epimetheus? He told me tomorrow was your 22nd birthday and that you might try to say otherwise.

PANDORA I thought as much.

PROMETHEUS He also said I should ask you about it anyways to make it seem like it was your decision.

PANDORA He’s acting like a god.

PROMETHEUS I don’t like it.

PANDORA So how does marrying Epimetheus fix any of this? PANDORA sees the winning move on the board Checkmate.

PROMETHEUS It doesn’t. I’ve relied on him for too long, Pandora. He convinced me to let him have you, always going on about how the gods have a plan for you, and that once you were under his protection everything would be okay.

PANDORA He’s in contact with the gods? . PROMETHEUS Sometimes, yeah. He’s idolized them for ages.

PANDORA If Hope came back, would that mean their disappearance wasn’t your punishment?

PROMETHEUS I don’t think they’re coming back, Pandora.

PANDORA 115

Prometheus, they came back today. I don’t know where they went, but I saw them, they’re here.

PROMETHEUS Don’t play tricks on me.

PANDORA I’m not, I promise I saw them.

PROMETHEUS Are you sure?

PANDORA Yes. They didn’t want me to tell you just yet.

PROMETHEUS I see.

PANDORA runs over and grabs the box from where she set it down.

PANDORA Epimetheus gave me this box earlier today. If he’s in contact with the gods, and with Hope suddenly reappearing….

PROMETHEUS Maybe he’s planning something.

PANDORA What could be in here?

PROMETHEUS It could very well be nothing. A prophecy in which we seal our own fate by our curiosity.

Pause.

PANDORA But?

PROMETHEUS But maybe I made a mistake. Maybe the gods didn’t want to take anything...maybe they wanted to give us something in return, something that creates an absence of light, something like--

PANDORA Darkness.

PROMETHEUS Why is he giving something like that to you? 116

PANDORA I don’t know. He just told me to grab him whenever I was going to open it. And also that I specifically needed to be the one who opened it.

PROMETHEUS We shouldn’t.

PANDORA That’s what I thought at first, but Hope wants us to open it, too.

PROMETHEUS If it’s really from the gods….I can’t, I’m sorry.

PANDORA I’ll do it. (calling) EPIMETHEUS!

PROMETHEUS Are you sure?

PANDORA Yes. I can do it.

EPIMETHEUS enters.

EPIMETHEUS You called?

PANDORA Yes. I’d like to open the gift you gave me.

EPIMETHEUS I knew you would.

PANDORA Okay.

PANDORA opens the box. Nothing.

PROMETHEUS Is that it?

EPIMETHEUS No, no that’s not how this is supposed to happen. 117

PANDORA Prometheus...

EPIMETHEUS Why isn’t anything happening?

PANDORA I know why Hope wanted us to open the box.

PANDORA pulls out a ring buried in ashes.

PROMETHEUS Hope’s ring…

PANDORA Her ashes…

The next few lines can overlap each other.

PROMETHEUS (in utter shock) Epimetheus what have you done.

EPIMETHEUS I didn’t do anything!

PROMETHEUS It was your fault...

EPIMETHEUS The gods told me to do it.

PROMETHEUS You killed my child!

EPIMETHEUS I wanted Pandora and you wouldn’t give her to me.

PROMETHEUS She was never yours to have.

PANDORA I can speak for myself.

EPIMETHEUS She wasn’t yours either. 118

PANDORA I said I can speak for myself! Neither of you own me, neither of you are entitled to me. Epimetheus, you needed to open the box to put the ring in?

EPIMETHEUS I guess. I don’t remember.

PANDORA looks at PROMETHEUS

PROMETHEUS If you opened the box to put the ring in...and darkness was really in the box...that means-

PANDORA He released the darkness.

EPIMETHEUS tries to lunge for PANDORA. PROMETHEUS steps in front of PANDORA in time for EPIMETHEUS to grab him instead and throw him against the table. In horror at what he has done, EPIMETHEUS runs out into the world, fulfilling the prophecy and releasing darkness into the world. PROMETHEUS groans from the floor.

PROMETHEUS Pandora…

PANDORA I don’t know what to do, how do I fix this.

PROMETHEUS Never let anyone again tell you who you are.

PROMETHEUS drifts into unconsciousness. PANDORA takes the ring and begins to put it in the box. She notices something different, something new in the box. A letter. She opens it.

PANDORA “To Pandora,

HOPE I am writing this letter to you because writing is easier than talking. At least for me. You never seem to run out of questions and things to ask. It’s my favorite part about you. A week ago we were walking behind my house, and we found this little plant that was dying. You looked at it and without any hesitation said let’s take it home. We passed dozens of beautiful, colorful, healthy plants, but you wanted to take home the one that was wilting…

119

You asked me if I ever thought about you. And I didn’t answer. I didn’t answer because how could I tell you about the worms growing inside me have been hungry to kiss every inch of your body. That when we’re alone the world feels limitless, the world feels safe and manageable? That no combination of words will ever be right for me to tell you how special you are, Pandora.

I’m going to ask father if I can marry you. But I don’t know if he understands what love is. Or if he’ll ever let me or you get married, let alone to each other. But I can dream. And maybe one day, if you see this, if I ever give this to you, you’ll dream too.

Yours always,

PANDORA “Hope.”

PANDORA takes the box, walks over and sprinkles the ash on the dying plant. After a moment, it springs to life. PANDORA takes the ring, places it on her hand. She kisses the ring and places it on her wedding finger.

End of Play.

120

Appendix C

Improv Sessions:

● Improv Session 1: https://cuboulder.zoom.us/rec/share/PbwIMmjQRFt-s7LV36RAugE7TPbETT7Ll3Ip3tJ_ uaSVpE7ffMx-7VRM55MCvVrV.1KrtrKtjlTlih1qf ○ Passcode: 65vDwhw@

● Improv Session 2: https://cuboulder.zoom.us/rec/share/VLBAzSdvhweQyPzL1wQWEgeIMfm7JfEt3h3_uK i_S6uN3k7xBQW96aanO-sD1tCy.6_sTp9nuUMZQMev3 ○ Passcode: j5L$5CXh

121

Appendix D

Example of Early (attempt at a) Poetic Scene:

Scene

While the dialogue seems slightly theatrical, actors should do their best not to read as such. This is serious for Pandora. A la Romeo and Juliet PANDORA I am never in my life going to forget you, my dearest Hope. I think I love you.

HOPE ( very teasing, never explicitly angry) You think or you know?

PANDORA I don’t know! I think I know?

HOPE Is that enough to say you know?

PANDORA Does it matter? Let me love you!

HOPE As friends? Or as-?

PANDORA You always do this with the questions! What if I just don’t know! Is that okay? Oh, I feel worms growing in my stomach when I’m around you, and I’ve never felt them before, or at least I’ve never noticed them before, but they’re hungry, oh, so hungry and reaching out to touch every inch of you and that has to mean I LOVE YOU because I don’t know love and I think it’s special and this feels special.

HOPE Ah, but see just because you’ve never noticed does not mean they were never there. Love is....well, it’s not for me to say. What happens when you forget the worms are there?

122

PANDORA Forget the worms, Hope, why can’t you tell me you love me like you used to? You’re so far away.

HOPE You’re more curious than you were before. And that’s good. Knowledge is good.

PANDORA It’s not good if you can’t tell me you love me.

HOPE Pandora, there is more to love than just the three words “I love you.”

PANDORA Why? Why is there always more?

A noise. HOPE I should go.

PANDORA Won’t you stay! Please?

HOPE Pandora.

PANDORA He loved you before, he should still love you now.

PROMETHEUS (calling) Pandora!

PANDORA Hear that? He seems in good spirits today!

HOPE I’m not ready.

123

PANDORA We’ll be together.

PROMETHEUS (calling) Pandora I have a surprise for you!

PANDORA Just a second!

HOPE Are you sure you’re ready?

PANDORA Of course I am, what do you-

HOPE Everyone has secrets, Pandora.

PANDORA Not him, not my father.

HOPE Especially you’re.... He has secrets I don’t think you’re ready to see.

PANDORA No. You’re wrong.

PROMETHEUS Pandora, my darling, there you are.

PANDORA I’m always here, Father.

PROMETHEUS Of course, of course, silly me. Is everything okay?

PANDORA Why wouldn’t it be? 124

PROMETHEUS Oh, no reason. I thought I heard voices.

PANDORA Well -

PROMETHEUS There wasn’t someone up here, was there?

PANDORA No Father, just me. I was playing my little games with myself. What do you have for me? I heard something about a surprise?