Panacea: A solo show

I thought I'd share my own work with everyone here, mainly for some credible feedback from fantastic writers like yourselves In my Advanced Theater Performance class, we have to perform a 30 minute solo show all by ourselves. I wrote mine, but we also had the option to adapt a piece or do a published one. (Also, I performed the first bit [which you're about to read] in class and got fantastic reviews, so I thought I'd share it with you guys )

PANACEA

Lights up. Sally sit’s center stage.Hello. Today is November 3rd, 2049. You will see this tomorrow; when this video will be uploaded to the internet and go viral. My name was Panacea. I am now simply Sally Elizabeth Creed. I’m dying. I’m currently in an old laboratory somewhere in Greenland. Please remove my body once I am dead. You will be able to track this transmission back to my location. I know you all may not remember me, but you all know what I have done. So I ask that you please just LISTEN to me. The following two clips I’m about to show you are of who I was and what happened to me. Please, watch everything. Black out
Lights up. There’s a voice from offstage right. Sally Creed is a 17 year old girl who has the power to heal simply by touching someone. This is her public debut to the world. She is speaking in front of an international audience. She steps out onto stage and crosses to center, where there is a (podium).
Sally: Hello, Hola, Bounjour, Ciao, Privet, Guten tag, Nin hao, Namaste. I thank you all for coming today. I am Panacea. I have a unique ability that allows me to heal the sick and wounded with a touch of my hand.

PANACEA cont.d


When I was very young, I think I was 18 months old, I slipped into a relatively high fever of 103.5 Fahrenheit. My parents took me to the hospital right away, only to find that the fever had jumped two whole degrees in the time it took them to get me to the hospital. I was put into intensive care and was given freezing IV solutions and put in an ice bath, but the fever only increased. If you check the record books, the highest fever ever was 112.7 degrees Fahrenheit. Mine reached a blazing 113.5. At that point, I only had 24 hours before every enzyme in my body unfolded and I would cease existence. I flat lined for about 30 seconds, and when my heart beat differently than it had before. Instead of the normal heartbeat (She demonstrates on the podium) thu-thud, thu-thud, thu-thud, mine was, and still is, tap tap tap tap tap tap tap, and never ends. My heart beats continuously. The doctors didn’t think I’d live more than a week because my heart would give out. But obviously that wasn’t the case. An enzyme that was hidden in my genes appeared- because it only works in extremely high temperatures- and started to take the old proteins and create new products. The doctors call them super proteins, because they repair everything in my body at an amazing rate. The reason I can heal people by touching them is because the super-proteins have mutated the collagen on my skin into extremely aggressive enzymes. Because of the fast heartbeat, the enzymes are created at such a fast rate they pile up and fall of when I touch people, and my enzymes enter you.

That's an interesting premise, Tin. I always feel weird reading plays or performance material since I start to imagine how it would be performed but I know that it would be different to actually see it for real. That said, I like what you have so far and I'd be interested in reading more if you're intersted in posting it!

yes you have to continue Tin I want to know what happens, I like your use of the word Panacea which means all healing. I knew you had magic hair, but you have magic fingers too?

Eldorion wrote:That's an interesting premise, Tin. I always feel weird reading plays or performance material since I start to imagine how it would be performed but I know that it would be different to actually see it for real. That said, I like what you have so far and I'd be interested in reading more if you're intersted in posting it!

That's actually good Eldo, because I don't find the bulk of the peice very theatrical at all haha! But anyway, here's some more

CONT.D

That’s the technical stuff. I’m not an expert. But when they start to give me the odds of this happening to anyone, I tell them to stop. You can’t give a miracle odds or ratios. They are not something you can fathom ever happening. They just do, and when you are given a blessing, you don’t ask why it was sent. Throughout history, we humans have always imagined and even worshiped beings that were greater than us. They were Gods. Now, we imagine them as super heroes who use their special powers to help the human race. Even in religion, we seek help from a higher power to end our human suffering. But with my help, we can help ourselves. I am neither science nor magic. I am Panacea, the cure to all things. I’m able to cure cancer, paralysis, and AIDS. I can make the blind see and the deaf hear. I’ve even been able to cure depression and schizophrenia. In the blink of an eye, I can cure diseases people have spent lifetimes trying to destroy. Utopia has often been glorified in literature, but due to human error has never been achieved, nor will it ever. But we now can come as close to it as we ever could. I have seen the world ransacked by illness. I have seen my fair share of dying faces. No more I say. I first discovered that I had this ability when I was 7. My neighbor and I were climbing a tree, and he put his hand on a bees nest. Out of fright he fell out of the tree. I jumped down after him and put my hand on his forehead, and a minute later he was up and running. You should have seen what he looked like. His face was swollen, his arm was bent backwards behind his head, and all I did was touch him… the memory is still fresh in my mind, the way he changed before my eyes. (Starts tapping her heartbeat absent mindedly) I could hear my pulse raging in my ears. There’s something in human nature, some sense, that takes hold when power is in your grasp. I felt it then. And I realized as the years went on that a choice had been made for me by fate. That I had too much power to waste. That my life was meant for the world, not for myself. (Starts to get anxious) I always had the feeling that I was stalling in childhood. I feel like this announcement has come all too late; that I should have started this years ago. But in the back of my mind, I knew that once I went down this road, there would be no going back. That on the international stage, every day of my life would be held under a microscope. Every country in the world would want my allegiance. That every cemetery would start losing business. That every person on the planet will no longer see sickness as inevitable, but preventable. And they’ll be angry when I’m not there to stop it. (She stops and looks up realizing what she has just said) But that is the price every hero must pay. I am willing to take on this huge responsibility. To error is human, but aren’t we all striving to be better than human? I will be, because in many ways, I am. You may say that I am just a girl, that I’m naive and arrogant. No one can handle the burden of the world. But I’m not handling the burden of the world. I cannot prevent wars or heal corrupted hearts, but I can help the people. In time, maybe I will be able to do those things, but as of now, the only thing I can promise is that I will do everything in my power to return as many vices as possible back into Pandora ’s Box. Let us rise out of the ashes of sickness and burst into the flames of immortality as one race. The human race; God’s chosen race. And as God as my witness, I vow to forever change the human race for the better! (Blackout.)
“Clip 2: 20 years later”

Is there the second clip? 20 years later? I would like to know what happens. I envy actors being able to remember their lines, I dont know how you do it, I honestly think I would go blank after the first sentence, so well done for the excellent memory, plus having everyone looking at you too, it must be scary and thrilling , its probably much easier being a film actor as they probably can stop after a few lines, and re do them.

I like the theme of duty that you raise -- the idea that it's her responsibility and obligation to help the world. I'd be curious to see how you develop that further if you've written more.

Also, I'm wondering, is there any context developed for why Panacea is talking to the audience? Like, maybe she's recording her thoughts somewhere. Or maybe she's been seen as a symbol for so long that she hasn't been able to open up? That's just guess work on my part, of course, since the story intrigues me.

You'll see....

CONT.D

Lights up. There is a woman sitting in a chair.
Host: Good evening. Tonight is the 20th anniversary of when Sally Elizabeth Creed, known to many as Panacea, gave her moving speech at her international debut. Little did we know, nothing good would become of that charismatic young girl. Join PBS as we delve into the hectic life of one of the most hated people in the world. She rises. Sally’s story is well known worldwide. She was an infant whose extraordinary illness became and extraordinary gift. Immediately after her speech, the world went into an uproar. Everyone wanted Sally. Some countries tried to make her abandon her United States citizenship. The next year, Sally would do very little of what she promised to do. The UN wouldn’t allow Sally in any country until a worldwide treaty had been made. Countries bickered over who needed the most medical help. The U.S. claimed the right to decide where she was allowed to go, but Sally herself would not be claimed by any country. In the weeks that followed, the 18 year old girl fiercely fought off offer after offer until she was given one that was fair to every country.
Switch to someone else: It took several weeks for all of the countries in the United Nations to come to an agreement over how Panacea was to be distributed, but they finally came to a conclusion known as the Panacea Creed, which was quite ironic considering that was her actual name. But the treaty stated that Panacea would be dispatched to a country for one month only. She was allowed to spend her Sundays as she wished, but had to go to at least 3 hospitals each day. In return, the country offered free transportation and accommodations. If she couldn’t finish her work by the end of the month, than it was too bad for that country!
Switch back: Sally was sent away almost immediately after the treaty was signed to her first country; Japan. The order of the countries she visited was selected at random, and was calculated to take her a little over 16 years to go all over the world once. Each country took a blood sample and tried to create new drugs and vitamins from her “super-proteins,” but no country could find a way to replicate her blood until much later.
Another expert: Some countries tried to replicate the process in which Panacea received her power by taking orphaned infants and giving them high fevers and hoping the same incidence would occur. This enraged Panacea because she believed she was unique in her genetic makeup and that the enzyme she had couldn’t be found in any other human being. She even threatened to break the treaty, which actually turned out to be an empty threat because she wasn’t allowed to, but still, it scared countries enough to make them stop. The common people of the world loved her. They saw Panacea as an average citizen with the power to almost manipulate world leaders into more humanistic actions. She won the Nobel Peace Prize at age 22 , she was on the cover of every magazine, she had a cult who proclaimed she was a prophet sent from God, I mean she was as bigger than Christ! Switch back: However, it was at the end of this prosperous year that she learned that her father had had a massive stroke. At this time, she was in Mexico and her father was in the United States. Some other Expert: No one could blame Panacea for wanting to go back to the United States for 1 day to heal her father, but if she did countries would be outraged if she broke the treaty. So she did something rather desperate, and that was to go to the media. She made a public plea to the world to allow her one day to go and help her father. She argued that one day off was well deserved. One couldn’t say that Panacea didn’t know how to appeal to the common audience. If anything, it was her greatest trait. Switch Back: The world was divided in half; some claimed that she made a commitment, and that turning back on it know would render the treaty useless in the future. Others said that she deserved a chance to see her family again and it would be tragic if her father died knowing she could save him. This is a clip from her address to the media. ( Switch to Sally)
Hello everyone. I’m here today to plead with you as another human being. I may not seem like one, but I am. I still grieve, I still feel joy, I am recently made a widow, and soon, an orphan. I beg that you please feel some empathy for me. Or at the very least, sympathy. My blood flows through many of your veins, I have touched several of you. I have stood up for your rights and for the rights of your children. I have done as I have vowed to do. Never once have I asked for anything from you. Now all I ask for is one day. Just, one. One day to go home to America and touch my father, to heal him. Haven’t I healed your fathers? Don’t you remember the fear you felt as he became sicker each day and you could do nothing to help him? Didn’t you feel helpless? Then I came along (leaning in toward audience) and I SAVED him. I’ve helped you defy nature. Please, one day is all I ask. Just one touch, and I’ll go back to Mexico and continue my tour. I trust you will do the right thing. Thank you.
(Switch Back) In the end, the treaty was upheld, and she was not allowed to leave Mexico. The argument was that if she went to America even for just one day, there would be mass mobs of people trying to get touched and she also could touch more than just her father, giving the U.S. the upper hand because they would get more people healed than any other country. [left]