The Shape of Things, by Neil LaBute

HI.

IT’S SHANNON.

Neil LaBute was one of the most controversial playwrights of the 2000s. In theatre school I either had teachers who handed him out to everyone saying “He writes like real people talk about things you’ll be able to relate to. Do it!” or refused to let us bring in so much as a monologue, saying “His characters are non-redeemable and he uses profanity in lieu of good writing”... Yeah, well, everyone’s a critic. I love LaBute. I’ve written papers on him, directed plays of his, and used this monologue time and time again. So I say go for it. He’s pretty identifiable, but if you can really do one of his pieces, go for it.

Therefore I bring you

THE SHAPE OF THINGS
by Neil LaBute

WARNING: This play is all about the twist, and I’m going to give it away in the paragraph below because it’s relevant (if not necessary) to the monologue. Please please please read the play instead. Here! (http://amzn.to/1RS5nNn) That’s a link to the Amazon page where you can buy it. Buy it and read it and don’t read the paragraph below. Trust me, the monologue I’ve chosen will be self-evident.

The play is about Adam, a nerdy, sweet literature major (MA) at an unspecified midwestern university who meets a young graduate art student, Evelyn at his job as a security guard at the art museum. She’s in the middle of defacing a statue, and instead of arresting her, Adam gets her number. They start dating. Slowly he begins to work out, loses weight, cuts his hair, dresses better, gets a nose job, and, in general gets a little darker, more interesting, and less nice. His relationship with his best friend’s girlfriend, Jenny, gets a little ambiguous. Evelyn, though evidently alright with the changes, confronts him about Jenny, and in defense he proposes. Before responding, she invites him to her thesis presentation. It’s him. His changes have been her project over the year, and the ways in which he has become more appealing overall are evidence of her ‘sculpting.’ At the end of the presentation, she rejects his proposal. He confronts her, and her argument is “it was real to you, therefore it was real. It wasn’t to me, therefore it wasn’t. It’s all subjective, Adam. Everything.”

Yeah. What a bitch, right?

I love this part, I love this play, I love the complete turn around it does and the ways in which everyone is wrong but no one is wrong.

So of course

EVELYN

This is the presentation monologue. She’s just spent the entire play making this man into exactly who she wants him to be and she knows that that’s not ‘okay.’ This is her reason, her defense, her thesis that she’s given up her life for the past year to prove. And she, in her mind (I won’t speak for yours or even mine), is right.

EVELYN:

And yet, open any fashion magazine, turn on any television program, and the world will tell  you  he's only gotten more interesting,  more desirable, more normal. In a word, better. He is a living,  breathing example… of our obsession  with the surface of things, the shape of them. Not bad, huh? And ladies he is available. This was a completely startling and unexpected gesture, but obviously, I can't accept. You can examine the stone and setting further when it's placed  in the exhibit.

As for me, I have no regrets, no feelings of remorse for my actions, the manufactured emotions - none of it. I have always stood by the single and simple conceit that I am an artist, only that. I follow in a long tradition of artists who believe that there is no such concept as religion, government, community, or even family. There is only art; art that must be created whatever the cost. With that in mind, I present to you my untitled sculpture and supporting materials tonight. Thank you.

Yeah, it’s kind of horrible. Amazing, but horrible. I’m not sure what it says about me that I adore this part (she’s kind of a modern-day Hedda Gabler), but I do. As with Sarah Ruhl last week this will not be the last LaBute play on the docket for this blog, but if you’re impatient, here are some others I’d recommend: In a Dark Dark House, Fat Pig and reasons to be pretty. The one thing I’ll say about LaBute is that if you pick him, make sure you’re casting yourself correctly. The casting director or teacher could put a lot of stock in which LaBute character you think you are.

Once again, this has been
SOMEONE MONO-BLOGGING

and

I’M SHANNON.

ENJOY!