Title: “Ego or Self-Esteem”.
Author: Silvina Carrasco
5 Characters:
- Sandra: Young woman of about 22 years old, she is the main protagonist of the play. At the beginning she has a combative personality and the need to be always right. In the end, she understands that she feels more at peace and with more joy when she is not guided by her ego but by her self-esteem.
- Maria: Young woman of about 22 years old, she is Sandra’s roommate. She has a personality similar to Sandra’s, so they fight and argue about everything; both always trying to be right.
- Juana: Young woman of about 22 years old, she shares the apartment with Sandra and María. She is the least temperamental of the three, so she usually acts as a mediator.
- Cecilia: Sandra’s mother. She has inherited her daughter’s habit of always trying to impose herself.
- Pedro: Sandra’s father. He has inherited to his daughter the habit of always trying to impose himself.
ACT I
Characters involved in this act: Sandra, María and Juana.
Scenario: Small apartment shared by the three young women. Open concept; the kitchen and the dining room communicate.
Sandra reads a magazine at the table. Maria enters the scene, opens the refrigerator door and stays for a moment observing the interior.
-Maria: Sandra, did you eat my light desserts?
-Sandra: (looks up from the magazine and looks at her in annoyance) No?
-Maria: No? o No. Yesterday I left two desserts and now they’re gone.
-Sandra: (Angry) Are you going to ask me the same question every day? You know I don’t eat that light crap.
-Maria: (Wanting to provoke Sandra even more) What a mystery! Because my cereal bars also disappear as if by magic.
-Sandra: Maria, why don’t you eat a bowl of ice cream and stop bothering me! Anyway, it’s the same as eating the twenty light desserts you eat every day.
-Maria: Great, now you’re going to teach me about food! Do you have any idea how many calories are in the things you eat?
-Sandra: Of course I know more about food than you do! All you do is repeat what you hear on those programs you watch on TV.
(Juana enters the scene)
-Juana: Girls! So early in the morning and you’re already arguing? Can’t you be in the same place if you’re not shouting and fighting? (Ironic and tired of the arguments) And what’s the most important issue you’re debating about today?
-María: It’s that my desserts are mysteriously disappearing…
-Joan: Is that what you are arguing about?
-Sandra: No. The problem is the know-it-all attitude of some people.
-María: If he know, he know. A little humility please.
(Sandra gets up and storms off the stage).
Sandra: (stammering as she leaves) It turns out that now we are all doctors and nutritionists… But what does this girl know about anything?!….
ACT II
Characters taking part in this act: Sandra, Cecilia and Pedro.
Scenario: Cecilia and Pedro’s kitchen.
(Cecilia and Pedro are cooking. Sandra enters with a serious face and gives them each a kiss).
-Sandra: Hi dad, hi mom.
-Cecilia: Hi daughter, you’re here! (Looks at Sandra) Mmm… What’s that face?
-Sandra: Maria! I can’t stand having to see her every day anymore, she can never recognize when I’m right! Because I’m right, I’m always right! But, no, she makes that face of….
-Cecilia: Okay, okay. Let’s forget about Maria. Now we’re going to eat some delicious meat with herbs that I’m cooking.
-Pedro: Cecilia, that food is not going to be ready for dinner now, let’s buy something ready.
-Cecilia: (Looking at Pedro very angry) Pedro, what’s new, you trying to make me feel bad!
-Pedro: It’s a very big cut of meat and you put it on the stove twenty minutes ago.
-Cecilia: (Furious. As if she wanted to pierce him with her eyes and with a small cut between each word) What-It’s-It’s-It’s-That-It’s-taking-so-long-In-Cook-ing.
-Pedro: It’s not going to cook in such a short time, let’s buy a pizza and that’s it.
-Cecilia: Buy yourself a pizza, if that’s all you can appreciate. We are going to eat a more gourmet meal.
-Pedro: Since when did you become a chef?
(Sandra watches her parents, seeing herself reflected in their habit of elevating every little thing into an argument. The oven/kitchen doorbell/alarm rings. Cecilia and Pedro walk over, open the door and look in).
-Cecilia: Perfect! (To Pedro) I told you so.
-Pedro: It’s raw.
-Cecilia: Please! It’s perfect!
-Pedro: From here you can tell it’s red.
-Cecilia: It’s just about ready.
-Sandra: (uncomfortable) Mom, Dad, excuse me, I just remembered I promised a friend to help her with something important. We’ll leave dinner for another day, excuse me.
(Sandra leaves the scene.)
ACT III
Characters that intervene in this act: Sandra, María and Juana.
Stage: The same stage as in Act I.
(Maria prepares a tea on the counter, Sandra eats a sandwich at the table. Juana enters through the door with a travel bag in her hand, looks inside in surprise and leaves it by the door).
Juana: (Surprised) Ah, hello girls, I thought there was no one there, as I didn’t hear screams, voices from outside, I thought there was no one there.
-Sandra: How did it go? Did you have a long trip?
-Juana: Yes, my mother convinced me to stay a few more days.
-Sandra: Yes, with Maria we imagined that your mother would not let you come back.
-Maria: Yes, we thought you wouldn’t come back.
(Sandra and María laugh in an accomplice tone and Juana is more and more astonished. )
-María: Well, I’m leaving because I’m late. (She leaves the stage.)
-Juana: (To Sandra) I don’t remember when was the last time I walked through that door and they weren’t arguing.
-Sandra: Ha, that. Yes, in these weeks some things happened. (Small pause). The day you left on your trip, I went to dinner with my parents. I stopped to watch them come to the brink of a world war over the doneness of a meat, and I was so identified that I had to make up any excuse and run away.
-Joan: Why identified?
-Sandra: I realized that when we were fighting with Maria, the important thing was not the topics of discussion but to be right, and with my mom and dad it was the same: they didn’t care about the food, they just wanted to be right.
-Joan: I understand.
-Sandra: My ego demanded that I win every argument with Maria. It was as if I had to prove that I knew more, that I was smarter, that I was better than her.
-Joan: Your ego?
-Sandra: Yes, they were my ego battles, not mine. I actually felt very stressed and insecure and was angry all the time. I couldn’t stand living in that tense environment anymore.
-Joan: So you stopped arguing and that’s it?
-Sandra: (Laughs) No, the first few days it wasn’t that simple. Maria was used to provoke me and I had to bite my tongue or go somewhere else to avoid answering her. But as the days went by it became easier.
-Joan: (In a joking tone) Maybe your ego got weaker because you stopped feeding it.
-Sandra: Although you think it’s funny, that’s how it was. And with time Maria got tired of me not answering her, and as fighting alone is not funny, she stopped provoking me and we started to get along better.
-Joan: I’m happy about what you tell me. Besides, you look very well, happier, calmer.
-Sandra: I feel that way. I have a more positive image of myself. Now I prefer to feed my self-esteem that asks me to feel good and at peace, not that I am right.
THE END