Dreaming and Drowning E-Book

Kwame Owusu

• Herausgeber: Nick Hern Books
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Serie: NHB Modern Plays
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 51

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Beschreibung

'The supernatural is possible and the impossible is natural and life teeters on the edge of the unreal' Malachi's been looking forward to a fresh start at uni for months. He's settling in, he's got a stack of books to read and he's met someone new – Kojo, a musician with a megawatt smile, who's basically perfect. But something doesn't feel right. He keeps having the same nightmare – sinking, crushed by the weight of the ocean – and it's getting worse… A beast grows in the water, hungry, relentless, hunting him but always just out of sight. As the boundaries between nightmare and reality fracture, Malachi must fight harder than ever to stay afloat. Kwame Owusu's play Dreaming and Drowning is an intimate and visceral deep-dive into the boundless mind of a young Black queer man wrestling with anxiety. It won the Mustapha Matura Award, was shortlisted for the Alfred Fagon Award, and was one of the winning plays in the RSC's 37 Plays competition. It was first performed at the Bush Theatre, London, in November 2023, directed by the playwright, performed by Tienne Simon, and produced by WoLab.

Leseprobe

Kwame Owusu

DREAMING AND DROWNING

NICK HERN BOOKS

London

www.nickhernbooks.co.uk

Contents

Original Production Details

Dedication

Epigraph

Character

Note to Creatives and Actors

Dreaming and Drowning

About the Author

Copyright and Performing Rights Information

Dreaming and Drowning was first performed at the Bush Theatre, London, on 28 November 2023, produced by WoLab. The cast was as follows:

MALACHI

Tienne Simon

Writer and Director

Kwame Owusu

Stage Manager

Aïsha Kent

Production Manager

Lisa Hood

Set and Costume Designer

Tomás Palmer

Sound Designer

Holly Khan

Lighting Designer

Joshua Gadsby

Movement Director

Ingrid Mackinnon

Dialect Coach

Mary Howland

FOR WOLAB

Creative Director

Alistair Wilkinson

Producer

Sarah Allen

To my mother, Naluwembe Binaisa.

Thank you for your infinite inspiration, courage, imagination, and love.

‘The sea had jeeringly kept his finite body up, but drowned the infinite of his soul.’

Herman Melville, Moby-Dick or The Whale

‘Who’s there?’

William Shakespeare, Hamlet

‘Something’s in the water. I think there’s something in the water.’

Kojey Radical & Mahalia, ‘Water’

‘I’ll tell you what freedom is to me. No fear.’

Nina Simone

Character

MALACHI, nineteen. Black. MLE accent.

Note to Creatives and Actors

There are two worlds in this play: ‘Nightmare’ and ‘Reality’. ‘Nightmare’ takes the form of Malachi’s bedroom stranded at the bottom of the ocean. ‘Reality’ takes the form of Malachi’s day-to-day existence. During the play, his anxiety worsens and a beast grows in the ocean – trying to break down the walls between ‘Nightmare’ and ‘Reality’, and consume Malachi. Over the course of the play, the water begins to bleed through these beast-induced cracks in the walls. Threatening to drown Malachi permanently, and make him prey for the beast.

This play is written for one actor. All additional characters should be fully and vividly embodied. Use everything at your disposal – different accents, voices, physicality – to make the characters as distinct as possible.

Embrace the strangeness of this world. Embrace the surreal, the joy, and the anxiety.

Be sonically and visually bold.

A dash ( – ) is used to mark an interruption – either by another character or Malachi interrupting himself.

Three asterisks (***) are used to make a scene transition (i.e. a change of time and/or location).

This ebook was created before the end of rehearsals and so may differ slightly from the play as performed.

MALACHI is trapped in his bedroom at the bottom of the ocean.

He is underscored by a soundscape deep from the ocean.

He begins, urgent and anxious.

I’m drownin.

Drownin under seas like heavy lava on my skin

Meltin my insides inside out inside

I’m fallin fadin down into the damp

From open air to liquid blue, cold hue, where my lungs are heavy, thick, I’m drownin

Drownin, sinkin, four walls surroundin

Under under, I’m drownin

Drownin under blue and clutchin my throat fillin up upside down

I’m turnin, blood rushin to my head

Legs like lead sinkin, thrashin gaspin

Lungs contractin, cracked

I’m drownin

Drownin under waves crashin miles above eyes

I see nothin but murky grey shiftin fadin fallin out of sight with my mind losin light

I’m tryna kick up, push down, get up, breathe

Ocean ocean pushin down on me

I’m sinking

I’m falling

I’m drownin under blue my body’s thrashin, kickin, gaspin, gaspin

He gasps for air.

***

I wake up gasping for air from a mad terrifying dream

A nightmare

A nightmare I’ve had every single night for the last four weeks.

And it’s like –

First bad dream you’re like alright cool

Get up, glass of water, go sleep –

Easy.

But then it comes back.

One night, two nights, three nights –

I start countin

Five nights, six nights

I keep countin

Eight nights, nine nights

Try ignore it

Ten nights, twelve nights

Keep tryna ignore it

Twenty nights, thirty nights later

Get here, go sleep, and have the same nightmare again.

Dreamin I’m drownin in my bedroom at the bottom of the ocean

Then I wake up –

Thick water slippin through my mind’s eye

Tryna shake it off

Tryna shake off a dream

Tryna shake off a dream I was so sure would stop when I got to uni.

I’m in this greyed-out-flat-pack-too-tight room

Which is nothin like it looked like on the website

And I didn’t realise but official arrival day’s tomorrow, not today

So I’m on my ones

Waitin

Waitin for a hundred strangers and not gonna lie –

I’m nervous.

Like I’m excited and whatever but really and truly

I haven’t had to make new friends since Year 7

I haven’t had to make new friends since man were pourin ice over their heads

And puttin it on Facebook.

Like – it’s been a long time.

And it was so much easier when I was eleven

I swear everything’s easier when you’re eleven

Sat next to this guy –

Femi

In Maths and English and French cos our surnames began with the same letter

And we clicked like that.

And it was ideal cos I couldn’t do algebra for shit

So he’d let me copy his answers before class

I was sick at English

I helped him back

And yeah… not gonna lie we were both shit at French

But we were a team, man.

Like me and him against the world type shit!

Like –

Couple months in we’re playing ball

And we played football every single break

Him on the wing

Me up top

He’d deliver, I’d score

Like clockwork.

But this one time

He passes me the ball

And

I dunno

I dunno!

I was down bad that day!

I take a touch

Shoot

And I was so sure I was bout to be carried round the pitch in triumph

Like –

I had it!

Except…

I didn’t have it.

It went wide right of the post and straight through the wing mirror of the head of form’s car

Mr Wilson

And everyone’s like –

‘OHHHHHH MYYYYYY’ –

Cos you know when somethin breaks at school?

When anythin breaks at school –

Pandemonium.

Drop a plate in the canteen whole room goes mad

For no reason.

Like why are you being so loud for??

So a ball hittin a teacher’s car…?

My ear drums are still recoverin.