Welcome to the Featured Playwright of May 2023! This month we are delighted to have Mark Rosati with his play Conflagration.
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Mark Rosati, a Chicago-area writer, is the author of 28 plays and numerous short stories, and a member of the Dramatists Guild and The Company Theatre Group in NJ. His plays and short stories have had numerous productions, publications and public readings in New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston, Michigan, Philadelphia, New Jersey, Brighton (UK) and Canada. Recent productions include “Entrenched” on Audible Theatre of New York’s podcast series in October 2020, “Exposed” at Between Us Productions’ Take Ten Festival in New York, “Duet” in Theatre East’s 5x5 Drama Series in all five NYC boroughs, “Restoration” in Between Us Productions’ Take Ten Festival, and “Extinct/Extant” at Manhattan Repertory Theatre’s February Event. His one-page play “The Sound of One Hand, Etc.” was published January 2023 in the international anthology Contemporary One-Minute Plays and in January 2021 by the online journal Barely Seen Poems of short plays and stories. His short story “Fermata” was published in 2022 by the online magazines You Might Need to Hear This and For Page and Screen. Another short story, “Ditched,” was published in the Canadian online literary magazine Fleas on the Dog in March 2021. Fleas on the Dog also published his short story “Last Stand” and play “Restoration” in January 2020. “Last Stand” was included in a public reading of new works on the theme of “sanctuary” by Cast Iron Theatre in Brighton, UK in June 2019. His one-act play “Our Daily Bread” received a public reading in Boston in the “Pinning Our Hopes” pre-inauguration Resistance event in January 2017.
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CONFLAGRATION
CHARACTERS AND SET
DEBBIE, young or middle-aged
DAVE, DEBBIE's husband, roughly the same age as Debbie
DIANE, a female neighbor, young or middle-aged
RONALD, a White male neighbor, young or middle-aged
The play is set in the living room of a modest family home. There is a window looking out into
the “yard.”
The play will require lighting effects simulating fire and haze from smoke, and sound effects of
fire engines and of people walking up a flight of stairs.
CONFLAGRATION
(DEBBIE and DAVE are seated in their living room, scrolling
through their phones.)
DEBBIE
Do you smell something?
DAVE
No.
DEBBIE
I do.
DAVE
I don’t.
DEBBIE
How can you not smell that?
DAVE
What do you smell?
DEBBIE
Smoke.
DAVE
Huh.
DEBBIE
Maybe there’s a fire.
DAVE
Or not.
DEBBIE
There’ve been a lot of fires in the neighborhood —
(DEBBIE rises and goes to the window.)
DAVE
I haven’t seen any and no one I know has seen one. Whatever you’re smelling could be
cigarettes, or weed, or —
DEBBIE
Oh my God!
DAVE
What?
DEBBIE
Come look!
DAVE
Just tell me.
DEBBIE
There’s a fire!
DAVE
You sure?
DEBBIE
Yes, of course I’m sure. Ronald next door — he’s starting fires in his backyard!
DAVE
You mean in his firepit?
DEBBIE
No, Dave, on his lawn, in the woods, along our fence — he’s like a crazy man —
DAVE
Huh.
DEBBIE
And he’s — he’s picked up a burning torch and can of gasoline! He’s going over to the trailer
park —
DAVE
How do you know that?
DEBBIE
He’s walking right toward it!
DAVE
Debbie, let’s not jump to conclusions.
DEBBIE
There’s smoke and fire, and it’s spreading into the woods —
DAVE
Maybe he’s just trying to root out some rodents.
DEBBIE
They have chemicals for that!
DAVE
Those are regulated, hard to get. Fire is cheap and right at hand. I mean, I’m not in favor of this
if that’s what’s really happening, but —
DEBBIE
He just set fire to that field with all the dead brush, next to the trailer park. It’s starting to burn!
DAVE
Maybe someone asked him to — you know, to clear the brush? Or maybe it’s a big barbecue, like
a pig roast?
DEBBIE
There are kids who live there!
DAVE
Around here, people have a right to start fires outdoors to keep warm, or to cook. It’s a tradition.
DEBBIE
It’s eighty degrees out, and those flames are five feet high! He’s not gonna grill hot dogs!
DAVE
We don’t know his reasons, and every right carries some element of risk.
DEBBIE
He’s standing there, laughing like a madman. My God, all those people in the trailer park —
DAVE
Most of them will love it even though it might be bad for them. Like free fireworks.
DEBBIE
Some of the residents, they’re coming outside — will you come and look at this? — they’re
throwing liquor bottles into the fire. The bottles are exploding and they’re all laughing!
DAVE
What did I tell you?
DEBBIE
Someone should stop them!
DAVE
You can’t regulate liquor bottles. They tried that during Prohibition, didn’t work.
DEBBIE
They’re not drinking out of these, they’re using them for bombs!
DAVE
They’d argue it’s not the bottle, it’s the person using it.
DEBBIE
Maybe you could go out and talk to Ronald.
DAVE
And say what? No good can come out of that conversation. I’ve tried in the past. He says what
he does on his property is his right and has been since time immemorial.
DEBBIE
At least try! For the sake of the other neighbors. There are children on the block, they could be
trapped in the trailers or the houses and burned alive —
(DIANE, another neighbor, comes rushing in.)
DIANE
Did you see?
DAVE
Hello to you too, Diane.
DIANE
There’s a fire!
DEBBIE
I’ve been trying to tell him.
DAVE
I don’t doubt there’s a fire, but we don’t know his motivations. Besides, he could have it under
control. For all we know, he was a firefighter once. Trained and ready to —
DIANE
He’s in the woods behind your house, pouring gasoline on the flames!
DEBBIE
Quick, before it spreads! Let’s douse it with water. Is the hose connected?
DAVE
Should we do that?
DEBBIE
What?
DAVE
Are we being alarmists? What if we want to start a fire someday, will he come after us with a
bigger hose? And what if the water floods our basement, or someone drowns in it —
DIANE
He’s got more gasoline.
DAVE
Huh.
DEBBIE
Is that all you can say?
(she stands at the window and shouts)
DEBBIE
Ronald, what are you doing? Why are you doing this?
(RONALD appears at the window, in a rage.)
RONALD
I hate you!
DEBBIE
Why?
RONALD
Fuck you, fuck all of you!
DIANE
You’re going to hurt people!
RONALD
You take care of yourself, I’ll take care of myself.
DEBBIE
What have we done?
RONALD
It’s not what you’ve “done,” it’s what you ARE!
DAVE
That’s irrational! You’ll burn down your house, too.
(RONALD disappears.)
DEBBIE
Now are we going to do something?
DAVE
Like what?
DIANE
Like go out and stop him! There’s three of us and one of him!
DAVE
So might makes right?
DEBBIE
We’re going to lose everything! We might die!
DAVE
If we resort to being a mob, aren’t we reducing ourselves to his level?
(sound of fire engines)
DIANE
Thank God! The fire department! They’ll save us.
(DEBBIE and DIANE peer outside the window.)
DEBBIE
Ronald’s blocking them —
DIANE
He won’t let them down the street.
DEBBIE
Why don’t they push him aside?
DAVE
It’s his neighborhood, too. We share the same land, the same heritage. We need to find a way to
work together.
DEBBIE
The firefighters, they’re all just standing around!
DIANE
The fire’s in your backyard, and it’s spreading all around the house!
DEBBIE
Some of the trailers are on fire! People are running out, their clothes are burning!
DIANE
The police have arrived!
DEBBIE
Thank God, they’ll — they’re just standing around, too. What are they afraid of?
DAVE
This is a rural area, people here don’t live by the same rules as city folk. You know, they say
modern people fighting forest fires is actually bad because the fires used to cull out the
deadwood and enrich the soil. When this country was founded, a fire like this would have burned
for days, and that was a good thing. Maybe the fire burning down the forest will be part of the
natural cycle and lead to rebirth.
DEBBIE
Maybe our ashes will help nourish the new trees, too!
DIANE
Why don’t they arrest him?
DAVE
Sometimes the evidence of your own eyes isn’t enough.
DEBBIE
That’s it, I’m going outside —
DAVE
All right, all right.
(rises and goes to the window, calling to RONALD)
DAVE
Ronald, can we talk? What are you doing? It’s not in anyone’s interest to have an inferno. Can’t
we find common ground?
(RONALD appears at the window again)
RONALD
Die!
DAVE
I understand, some people find flames beautiful and fire powerful, I get that —
DAVE
(RONALD disappears. DAVE calls after him.)
We’re neighbors, we live on the same street. A house divided against itself — you know!
(to DEBBIE and DIANE)
DAVE
This home is our nest egg. And it’s our nest! We’ll be poor, homeless —
DEBBIE
We’ll be dead!
(rising lights indicate a raging fire)
DIANE
The fire is surrounding the house!
DAVE
This isn’t the kind of neighborhood I grew up in.
DEBBIE
It’s the kind we’re going to die in.
DIANE
It’s getting hotter. I can’t breathe.
DAVE
We’ve lived through worse. I’m sure we have. And we’ll emerge from this stronger and more
united.
DEBBIE
Maybe we should go downstairs? You know, go low?
DAVE
(pointing upstairs)
No, we should go high.
DEBBIE
If you’re sure.
(The trio exits and there are sounds of footsteps going upstairs. Soon the stage
becomes flooded with bright red light, followed by the sound of screaming.)
THE END
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Thank you for reading this month's featured playwright! Come back next month for more plays by talented writers!
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