(You can listen to the text in Dutch but follow with the English translation)

Five persons survived the big bang. They are living in a big city.
They just have food-supplies, a hi-fi installation and the 150 most beautiful melodies in the world. They learned those records by heart and to the music they start to tell stories.
Stories about long-ago, a past they are constantly mixing up with subconscious dreams and desires.
That way they are creating new myths. They have chosen pseudonyms :
Xerxes, Einstein, Mata-Hari, Nina Ricci and Puccini.
These persons are now hazy prototypes for a synthesis of the past history of the world.
Xerxes, the ruler ; Einstein, the scientist-Shaman ; Mata-Hari, the traitress-adventuress ; Nina Ricci, the seducer and Puccini, the artist and man of feeling.
These characters should come Forward as real persons, that’s why they are speaking a common language or even dialect.
By these means the actors and actresses were able to emphasize the epic strenght of the language in their own way.
After the big bang, civilization is reduced to a minimum and so it is only logical that the characters, who appear to be actors, speak a language which shows the basis.
The actors had to train hard in order to tell the stories to the existing music. By using the musical rhythms to read their texts, that music has become an essential partner. The music is not only
supporting the stories, but is also showing their origins. Every listener should be able to create his own story.
This intermediate form, between song and text, will emphasize the epic value of the stories, so that the contents often contrasts with the stereotype contents of the music.
In my search for a new type of radio play I tried to unite sound and text. The music is no longer a background for the text. Music and text are functioning equally or even changing functions.
The spoken language is getting rhythmical impulses and emphasis from the music, and that music is showing us surprising new elements.
In “Short Stories” I was looking for dynamic contents, in common language and in popular classical music. Usually we call those elements stereotype or sentimental. But underneath we can find
many different things. When these things are confronted with each other, we’ll discover unknown moments of originality.

WE HEAR SOMEONE RUNNING UP THE STAIRS ( IN A STAIRCASE)
NOW AND THEN HE STOPS AND PANTS. THEN CONTINUES. .
HE THUMPS ON A DOOR.
WE NOW HEAR THE THUMPING FROM THE INSIDE

Mata : (WHISPERING) : They found us.
Xerxes : I told you to lower that amplifier, didn’t I ?
Nina : It’s Einstein.
Xerxes : You are wrong. He knows the signals
Five times short, a pause and then twice long.
Nina : Something happened !
Puccini : (APPROACHING) What happened ?
Nina : Listen . . . .

THEY LISTEN T0 THE THUMPING

Xerxes : I’ve got my.machine-gun ! (CLICK)
Mata : And twelve bullets !
Nina : It’s Einstein.
Xerxes : But why . . . .
Mata : Listen.

NOW THEY HEAR THE SIGNAL SEVERAL TIMES : 5 TIMES SHORT, TWICE LONG
THEY ARE SPEAKING TOGETHER : ..DIDN’T I TELL YOU ? . . AND WHY DOESN’T HE USE THE SIGNAL . . . .
THEY REMOVE THE BARRICADES AND OPEN THE DOOR

EINSTEIN : Did you fell asleep ?
THEY ARE SPEAKING TOGETHER, AGAIN
EINSTEIN : I never gave it a thought. I got…..I got confused.
MATA : What happened ?
EINSTEIN : The town smells of corpses.
NINA ; Did you see the garage gang ?
EINSTEIN : No; only a nine or…..ten-year-old child . . . .
MATA : A child.
EINSTEIN : With a police-gun. But I only saw it when it was right next to me.
XERXES : Why do you do that ?
EINSTEIN What ?
XERXES : Go towards a child ! Don’t you ever learn
EINSTEIN : He limped, and he had black…..
XERXES :, Children are dangerous, Einstein !
Einstein : Yes (SILENCE) _
He pointed his gun at me, but I was faster. I jumped like I haven’t been jumping for a long time.
And then with my right foot, waw, and bang.
Nina : What have you been doing to him ?
Einstein : To the gun ?
Nina : To the child !
Einstein : Let’s talk about something else !
Nina : Did you really…
Puccini : Let’s listen to the music
Mata : What have you been doing to him, Einstein
Einstein : Yes, I think we better listen to the music.
MUSIC : WATERMUSIC HANDEL, FIRST SUITE, BEGINS….INTERRUPTED AFTER
UNE SENTENCE
Puccini : Xerxes, what are you doing ?
Xerxes : We have had enough of that music, Puccini.
Mata : I want to know what he has been doing to that child !
Einstein : Let’s say it was self-defense.
HE TURNS UN THE MUSIC. IT STARTS AT THE BEGINNING.

SOME (FEW) ARE HUMMING, OR THEY ARE SINGING A PART OF THE MELODY
SO THAT IT BECOMES CLEAR THAT THEY KNOW THE MELODY BY HEART.
ON A HIGH NOTE, JUST WHEN THE THEME IS GOING TO BE REPEATED, THE MUSIC IS STOPPED.

Xerxes : I was saying that we have had enough of that music.
We have learned 150 of the most beautiful melodies in the world by heart.
Nina : We have nothing better.
Xerxes : I’m sick and tired of listening to it.
The aria in the key of G, the Largo, the Elisabeth serenade…..
Mata : Plaisir d’amour, The dying swann, Habanera from Carmen and Cavalleria Rusticana.
Puccini : One never gets tired of a beautiful thing.
Xerxes : I do.
Nina : Einstein, did you really kill that child..
Einstein : (SHOUTING) I strangled it. Are you happy now, damned !

THE MUSIC BEGINS ONCE AGAIN AND EINSTEIN SPEAKS IN TIME…..

EINSTEIN : (MUSIC) ‘ He stood still and watched….he was going to shoot,
and……(MUSIC CONTINUES)
I went up to him, kicked the gun out of his hand, strangled him…and…(MUSIC)
And even when he was lying there without air in his lungs, het watched me…and . . . . .(MUSIC)
I thought of visiting 3 men and 2 woman in an appartment on the top floor, and…(MUSIC) and then I ran up the stairs as if he was chasing me, and… (MUSIC)
(END OF THE MUSIC)
One never gets tired of a beautiful t isn’t that so, Puccini.

SILENCE

Mata : It reminds me of former days.
Xerxes : Oh, not again !
Puccini : What else can we do ? In former days we had everything, now have nothing.
Nina : Let us each talk about our memories, that smell in town disappears.
Xerxes : A comique opera !
Mata : Don’t you have the nerve to talk about former days, Xerxes ?
Xerxes : What is there to talk about ?
Puccini : I have an idea. Each one of us choses his own record. A melody which remind of something before the bomb. And each time we invent a story. We continue till we have 150 of the most beatiful stories in the world.

THEY CLINK THEIR GLASSES. . . . …AND DRINK

Nina : I can’t sing !
Xerxes : That doesn’t matter, it’s just a comique opera.
Nina : So I’ll tell you a story with a lot of music.
Puccini : I’ll give the example : here is the first record, and….the first story.
Xerxes : I’ll bet (you) that this music will be blue.
Puccini : Wrong ! First of all let’s drink to the last stories presented to you by the Antwerp Road top Flat Company.

DRINKING . . . . . . …THEY COMMENT UPON…….THEN : SSST !
MUSIC : HABANERA FROM CARMEN, AND AT THE SAME TIME

Puccini : (INTRODUCTION) The wooden woman.
My story is about the most beautiful woman.
I met her when I was a boy.
She was blond, but her eyes were black.
And everything she touched, was set on fire.
And she laughed, and she watched,
and she kept silent, and she beckoned me
And she nodded, and she pointed at me,
and she came, and she said :
You are mine, I’ll never let you go.
But if you want to go to bed with me,
mind you that I won’t be there any more
I cou1dn!t stand it
I undressed her.
I kissed her
on her mouth.
I searched my way :
the greatest fight,
till the world
exploded in my brain.
But she got cold…..
And whatever I did
and whatever I said :
She turned into wood.
And whatever I did
and whatever I said
she remained a statue of rotten wood.

MUSICAL SENTENCE

I burned and destroyed
the only woman I loved.
She was made of wood
And wherever I looked for her,
and whatever I did,
whoever I loved instead of her
She still was made of wood.
And our children,
smoke in the rusty sky.

APPLAUSE – THEY ARE DRINKING

Mata : That’s a poetic story.
Xerxes : He doesn’t know anything about women.
Nina : He understands everything about women.
Women always turn into wood when they are conquiered by men.
Einstein : I prefer true stories.
Puccini : It’s a true story. I saw with my own eyes how they changed
Mata : Yeh, your head is made of wood.
Your eyes are made of wood, that’s why you think that the whole world is made of wood.
Puccini : Cold wood. Usually wood feels warm, but they don’t.
Xerxes : Nice picture to hide your impotence.
Nina : There are no pictures that match your potence.
Xerxes : I am a man. A ruler.
Einstein : That’s (quite) another story, Xerxes.
Xerxes : The oldest stories ever told are storie about men and women.
Do listen. This is my music, and Mata Hari’s or Einstein’s, because he too is a man.

THE LOVER’S CHOIR FROM LOHENGRIN

music intro :

The iron bride (music)
A story about passion and fire.
A story full of pure adventure.
A story about blood and tears
About the dead acting as if they were alive.

HORNS

Once upon a time I lived in the woods.
In a castle made of pure gold.
And the pigeons on top of the parapets
were made of marble, some of salt
I was the ruler of the bears,
the man before whom the trees trembled with fear.
And the other strong castellans. knew I had them at my mercy.

MUSIC, 2X THEME — LOUD ; THE OTHER REJUICE, THEY PLAY THE GAME.

But the heart, still empty inside,
was looking for a filling of the purest gold.
Someone to love for ever.
Someone young, because any one who is lonely, grows old.
And so this ruler started an uncertain search for love, and found an iron bride
who had destroyed and eaten her lovers.

This was the bride !
This was the only bride
This was the iron bride,
with under her coat a searing fire.

This was the bride
This was the iron bride
with a body full of volcanoes for men who were able to conquer her.
Puccini : Yes, and then ?
Mata : It hasn’t started yet.
Nina : He conceals the rest.
Einstein : The music has ended
Xerxes : Yes, the music has ended although I still have a lot to tell you.
Mata : Take another time. There is a wide choice. The Bolero, or Clair de lune ?
Puccini : He doesn’t know what to say. That’s the truth.
Xerxes : I can tell you much more. I’ll tell you a part of it without music and the end…….the final I’ll wrap it up in music from the 150 most beautiful melodies.
Puccini : A real “opera comique”
Einstein : Shut up. He was standing next to his iron bride.
Xerxes : She was made of a very pure metal, platinum, I presume, or red copper.
Mata : A while ago you said that she was made of iron !
Einstein : He means : metal.
Xerxes : She was quite a woman. No robot, no imitation, no statue or hologram.
Nina : a real woman.
Xerxes : And those she didn’t like….she allowed them to come very close to her.
Puccini : How close ?
Xerxes : Very close, I told you. Are you deaf ?
Puccini : Inside you mean ?
Xerxes : Yes. And then, if she didn’t like them, they couldn’t get out any more and they were stuffed with red-hot metal.
Nina : A man’s story !
Xerxes : It’s a true story. I have seen her.
Einstein : And since that day he is rust-proof. But he is not allowed to drink too many
soft drinks.
Xerxes : It’s no laughing matter. If you could see her once, you’d want her.
Puccini : Or she’d like to have you.
Xerxes : I takes two to possess.
Mata : A good and a bad side.
Xerxes I want her.
Nina : And she ?
Xerxes : She wanted to test me like the rest of her lovers.
Einstein : Admission free, and then psst. I cannot bear to think of it.
Xerxes : I tamed her.
Mata : He extinguished her.
Xerxes : No, on the contrary. I looked her in the eye. She was glowing so intensly that her metal started to smelt.
Nina : Only by looking at her ?
Xerxes : Yes, I kept looking at her. Very patient.
Puccini : That was the first time,….that patience I mean.
Xerxes : And under that metal skin appeared the most beautiful woman of flesh and blood.
Mata : Really ?
Xerxes : Yes. It appeared that she was a crazy -professor’s testee. He had safeguarded her, like they say
Nina : A typical man’s story.
Xerxes : And now the music for the final.

GREENSLEAVES :
INTRODUCTION

Xerxes : There she stood completely naked (THE VIOLIN…)
with a pool of melted metal at her feet.
She still was goose-flesh all over.
How would you react ?
She embraced herself.
And she acted uncertain, as if she didn’t realize what was happening to her.
Being of flesh and blood, she wasn’t used to it any more.
And believe it or not, she came up to me and we danced in the middle of the bones and knuckles of her former lovers.
I lifted her, and she lifted me, because she was strong.
Untill we held each other up in the air.
There we were hanging.
In the air she undressed me. And the birds, the ravens and the sea-gulls unbuttoned my clothes, the blackbirds took off my underwear. We were both naked.
We made crazy pirouettes in the evening-air.
We stood upside-down and that way we kissed each other.
Blossoms rained from the trees. With soft breeze we drifted towards the sea.
We landed on the tapid water, and we slept in each other’s arms.
We drifted like leaves, because we were very light. We didn’t realize where we were.

But in the morning I woke up all alone.
I couldn’t find her anywhere.
And I poured the rest of her armour over my body.
For ever.

END OF THE MUSIC

Nina : Why don’t you take off that armour, Xerxes ?
Xerxes : There are several kinds of goose-flesh. This kind could damage my heart.
Mata : I didn’t realize that you were so sentimental.
Einstein : He’s only a child without his armour.
Puccini : That’s a beautiful phrase.
Einstein : It sounds quite common. He/is/only/a/child/without/his/armour.
Puccini : The meaning. That’s what matters.
Einstein : It doesn’t mean a thing. Words like “money” have no value any more.
Puccini : Words are all we have.
Nina : And music.
Mata : 150 of the most beautiful melodies in the world.
Nina : And our stories, they are a kind of mariage between the words running free
and the music which sticks them together.
Mata : I prefer music which sets the words free. So disintegrate. Let it get rotten. I never was very fond of music. It doesn’t affect me. That’s why my story will be a tale about disintegtrating, about rotting. You’ll hear her die, my swan.

MUSIC : THE SWAN

So . …The dying swan (SHE LAUGHS)
Once I had a child. A child. Long before the explosions. Yes a little boy.
A child with only one wish : wings !
Every morning he looked in the mirror to see if the wings were coming out.
And every morning he said : they are coming, I can feel it mama, they are coming!
One morning he really was hanging outside the window. Still a bit unstable. But he was flying. He was already able to fly in circles and sometimes he still landed on his head, because his legs weren’t strong enough.
And at night he folded up his wings like insects do.
In the morning they were a little bit crumpled up. But then, he shook them, like he shook his hair when he came out of the bath-tub, and then they were perfectly flat again.
And hop, there he went.
But people can’t stand a thing like that.
Children shouldn’t fly. They have to go to school.
It started with one stone.
And then another, and then the whole neighbourhood. They were throwing with everything they could find.
Come down, little boy, I shouted.
But he wanted to stay up there. He was so in love with the air.
What can one do against so many stones?
They hit him in forty places.
Self-defense, they called it.
The dying swan.

THE END OF THE MUSIC

Einstein : Science has proved that a child is unable to fly
Mata : Was it your child ?
Einstein : I hate children.
Mata : Did I see it with my eyes ?
A Well, the I saw it with my own eyes.
Einstein : Let’s say it was your imagination.
Nina : I think it’s a very beautiful story. I believe it really can happen; I do.
Some children are able to fly. But they are concealing it.
Mata : Forget it.
Mina : What do you mean ?
Mata : That flying !
Nina : But . . . . .
Mata : He just fell off the roof when he was turning the aerial towards the east. You didn’t expect that, did you !
Puccini : A sort of treason.
Einstein : Women’s whims
Puccini : They take us with them, and then they give us the sack.
Nina : She acts that way to coneal her sadness.
Mata : Not at all. To be honest with you, it was a relief to me.
Nina : A relief ?
Xerxes : She was glad that her child died in the accident. That’s what she means.
Nina : Why ?
Mata : It was a terribly boring child. Just like his father.
Nina : But that doesn’t mean you . . . .
Mata : Yes, I do. I gave him a very beautiful grave. And a rather well-known poet, who
cared more for him than I ever did, made a poem for him. I took the image of the flying child from his poem.
Puccini : We shouldn’t be so severe with ourselves.
Einstein : Oh no ? Why not ?
Puccini : We have to tell stories. And we have to believe they are true.
Nina : Yes. Stories are much more beautiful than our memories.
Einstein : To forget. Yes. If we tell more stories, we’ll forget quicker.
Einstein : Choose your music, lady !
Nina : I’d like to sing something. Together with Mata Hari.
Puccini : She’s a traitress.
Nina : Something everybody knows. Well, you can all sing along with me. Just the refrain.
Mata : I had enough of that.
Nina : Come on, Mata Hari. Do me a Favour. Women should support each other.
Einstein : I always thought she was one of those . . . . .
Nina : Plaisir d’amour.

MUSIC – PLAISIR D’AMOUR
MIXED WITH THE FIRST WINDS OF SANDSTURM

Xerxes : There will be a sandstorm.
Einstein : Don’t worry, that’s quite normal.
Nina : Did we close the windows ?
Puccini : Plaisir d’amour. Yes
AT THE BEGINNING DF THE SECOND SENTENCE : NINA AND MATA ARE
SINGING THE REFRAIN
Nina : Plaisir d’amour, ne dure qu’un moment
Chagrin d’amour dure toute la vie.

Before God created men, he created the woman.
The first human being was a woman
God’s own woman.
And the garden of Eden was their love-nest
There God and the man kissed each other.

NINA AND MATA ARE SINGING THE REFRAIN

NINA IS SINGING THE REFRAIN

Nina: But God was God after all, and he was afraid to lose his balance, the way he was
hanging there : his ass still in the air and his lips in the garden of Eden.
He said to the woman : Love, come with me.
The earth is beautiful, but up there everything is much more beautiful.
And she went with him.

THE END OF THE MUSIC

Puccini : And then ? And then what happened ?
Einstein : Was God a good lover ?
Nina : More or less. He could read her thoughts.
He knew everything the woman liked.
Mata : And did they have a child ?
Nina : Yes, Adam. A little boy.
Einstein : Half divine, half human.
Nina : Yes, that was the problem.
Xerxes : Can you believe that, yourself ?
Einstein : Shut up, do you know something better ?
Nina : Now you know why they call God, “God-the-father”.
Puccini : But what happened to that woman ? Did she stay with God or did they have
a quarell ?
Nina : No quarrel. But she got homesick.
Xerxes : This time, there is a strong wind blowing.
Nina : Yes, homesick, when she saw Adam in the garden of Eden. A young chap with a well-knit frame, whereas God is ageless.
Mata : I know everything about ageless men.
Nina : Even if he were her son, she’d fall in love with him.
Xerxes : Incest, yes, yes. Even that.
Puccini : Take your armour and stick it on your mouth.
Nina : That was allowed in those days. It was necessary indeed. God anticipated that.
And although he knew that the end of it would be hard working and having children, he didn’t stop her.
Mata : This means that God wasn’t a man.
Nina : He gave Adam a sedative, made him believe that Eve was made of one of his ribs, and then saw what happened.
Puccini : Plaisir d’amour !
Nina : Yes. But soon God was irritated. He could stand a lot, but he couldn’t stand it no longer that his former love was always romping with that Adam. He disguised himself as a serpent and what was due to happen, happened : of course they ote the forbidden fruit.
And so, God, who calls himself a righteous judge, had an excuse to expel her from paradise.
Xerxes : The wind stopped blowing. Who is going into town with me ?
Puccini : Everybody will stay indoors ! Einstein is going to tell HIS story.
Einstein : My relationship with God is not so good. But . . . .

MUSIC – AIR ON THE G-STRING BEGINS

Einstein : If you listen carefully, you’ll hear someone walk. That’s me, Eisntein Ahasverus the eternal walker. I don’t feel my body any more. It doesn’t exist.
It-be-came-two-feet. Two-e-ter-nal~wal-king-feet.
If you ask me : why all that walking, then I have to admit : I don’t know.
The day I was born, I started walking
They didn’t have to teach me. I already could do it.
I wanted to walk along, as if there would be rest and peace behind the horizon.
A country, a woman, a child, an ideal, a football-team.
Something to dwell on.
Yes, that’s what I believed in.
But wherever I went, I found nothing or nobody.
I made love to the most beautiful women, but after the kissing and the coming, I wanted to walk along. My lovers were the most beautiful and the cleverest boys, but after the reasoning and the courting, I had to walk along. Further. Further. Further.
Always further and further and further.
But one day I found a well. A pure, splashing well. I looked at the water that was bubbling out of the ground and I thought : I surrender. I’ll never catch up with those water-drops.
I built a shack and sat there full of devotion for hours, by the well.
I was happy.
The water ran to the sea in my place and came back. To the sea and back, And I imagined that I was following the water, while I was sitting by the well. That I evaporated, rained and crawled under the ground towards the well, like a child looking for his mother.

THE END OF THE MUSIC

Xerxes : And where are you walking feet now ?
Nina : And the well ?
Einstein : My feet are paralysed because of meditating, and the well is dry because I didn’t look after it.
Xerxes : That must be a great comfort to you, now you got rid of your walking-disease.
Einstein : Yes, but although I sometimes couldn’t stand it no longer, I could live on it.
Every horizon was a question-mark.
Mata : And what about all those women and boys ?
Einstein : Always another horizon. Sometimes a beach just to freshen up, then a shady spot under a poplar.
Puccini : One day you’ll find your feet again,
Einstein: As soon as the world has dissolved the corpses and the radiation, we’ll have to go.
Mata : Without me. I’ll stay here.
Nina : You can’t do that.
Xerxes : If she wants to stay, let her.
Mata: I want to die.
Puccini : Go outside. Let those living corpses kiss you.
Nina : Let’s first listen to the next short story.
Xerxes : Hush !
Mata : The 150 most beautiful short stories in the world.
Xerxes : Hush, damned ! I can hear something.
-HE PUSHES OPEN THE WINDOW-
Listen.

THEY ARE LISTENING. THEY CAN HEAR A BIRD SING.
A CUCKOU, VERY FAR IN THE DISTANCE

Puccini . A cuckoo.
Nina : They want to lure us to . . . .
Xerxes : No. That’s e real cuckoo. It’s the season.
Mata : Close the window. I am cold.
Nina : Let’s listen a while longer.

A SHOT, SILENCE
Xerxes : Did they . . . .
Einstein : He just flew away. We’ll hear him soon.
Mata : I have one story left. Then I go to bed.
Puccini : Not like the one you just told us. Don’t cheat on us.
Mata : No. A real story, one of the 150 most beautiful stories in the world.
But without music. It can’t stand the music no longer.
Puccini : Cavalleria rusticana, the intermezzo, a beautiful piece.
Mata : No. No music.
Puccini : Or Chopin’s nocturne in mi bemol.
Mata : Are you deaf !
Einstein : Is it a true story ?
Mata : Even better, Einstein. It will happen in the future. l
Xerxes : A science fiction ?
Mata : Yes, could be.
Xerxes : The futum doesn’t need much music, I presume.
Mata : I’m convinced that one day when God is busy working at the world, he’ll say :
this is enough. This isn’t bearable any more for people with two legs and one heart.
Einstein : God doesn’t even know the earth exists.
Mata : That he’ll send his angels, when the riders of the apocalyps are gone.
Xerxes : We have seen the riders, but the angels remained absent.
Mata : That he himself will appear, sitting on a cloud, with a kind of apologetic smile on his paternal lips.
Nina : That’s the way I’ve always seen him, Mata Hari.
Puccini : That’s a God of our imagination.
Mata : Once the trumpets cease raging he’ll gather the people and say : the good one and the bad ones, come in, because everybody had his black sides and his bright moments.
But when Gregory fell off the roof, where was he then ? He was there !
Xerxes : She is talking about Gregory whereas the whole world is in agony.
Mata : ThenI was thinking : God is a doll. We always misunderstood him because we made him of a kind of stuffing. He had to fill up every cavity in our soul, although we can do that ourselves, with love or murder, with booze or books, with stealing or receiving . . .you name it.
Ever since that moment I was dead sure : he is a doll. A mummy of our dreams.
He gathers all the dust we produce and the dust of all the universe. That dust makes him swell. The more wfi are in pain, the bigger he gets.
That’s why God is only acceptable in the worst evil.
Then we call him the devil, but that’s God’s only visible side.
Einstein : That isn’t a story, that’s theology.
Mata : Suppose we survive, we go looking for a new life. We, Xerxes, Einstein, Nina,
Puccini and myself. What shall we do ? I’ll tell you : we’ll raise a dust. Einstein will supply science, Xerxes makes soldiers out of our children, Nina stuffs them with pangs of love and Puccini will produce poets and painters, whereas I’ll guarantee adventure and treason.
Now that the dust of the explosions is clearing away, we are Immediately ready to produce nuw dust. We saw God. In dust-storms, millions of corpses, destroyed cities.
This way he revealed himself.
Mata : We stuffed our doll till it burst open with a loud bang.
Oh no, I refuse to produce more dust.
I don’t want to meet him once more.
I’ll stay here, I’ll refuse to eat and then I’ll go to bed.
I’ll listen to the 150 most beautiful melodies in the world, while you are raising the new dust of the earth.

FAR IN THE DISTANCE, THEN CLOSE BY, WE CAN HEAR THE CUCKUO

I heard you. You want to go. Then go.
You’ll go mad here, indeed.
Puccini : These are our stories, our short stories.
Mata : Take those with you. Inside your brains.
No need for music. You know them by heart
Nina : She’s right.
Xerxes : Ur she sets a trap for us. Rememeber her name is Mata-Hari.
Mata : You’ll walk into your own traps.
Nina : But you can’t stay here. If we go, we’ll go together.
Puccini : We survived in spite of our quarrels for nearly three years.
Mata : Yes, we did. Five actors from the national theater, escaped because we were filming in the underground bunkers. Five actors, the ancesters of the new world.
Mata : Finally we believed so much in our theatrical names, that we lost our own identity.
Puccini : Now we are Puccini, Mata Hari, Einstein, Nina Ricci and Xerxes.
Mata : We are five actors, not very good ones, but still better than we expected.
Nina : The cuckoo.

THEY ARE LISTENING

Xerxes : I’ll take the lead. We have to carry on !
We’ll put on our anti-radiation suits and we’ll go as soon as it’s getting dark.
Nina : What about our stereo-pickup ?
Puccini : We can’t live without our short-stories.
Nina : Mata Hari is right. They live in our brains. If we manage to make instruments later on, we’ll try to put them together again.
Einstein : And my children will invent new records and tapes.
Mata : Dust. Nothing but dust. It will never end.
Puccini : I propose that we play one more record. While it’s playing, we’ll go.
Xerxes : A march !
Puccini : Something with new feet, Xerxes. The feet Einstein told us about.
Mata : I’ll stay here.
Nina : That will be your last treason, Mata Hari
What will become of a world without a fatal woman, a woman who dies like a
heroine and rises from her ashes as a traitress. Perhaps she’ll make the world go round.
Mata : I am afraid of the dust.
Einstein : It’s the only thing we possess. A cosmos full of dust. Together with the light it is the throbbing heart.
Xerxes : Perhaps we should destroy the records and throw the pick-up out of the window.
Nina : Why ? No one will come up here. The records will turn into dust, the pick-up
too, and we . . . . .

THE CUCKOU

Puccini : Listen. We shut up and let the music tell its story. It will help us to overcome
our fear. Let’s take our suit-cases and let’s go.

VIVALDI’S AESTRO ARMONICO

MUSIC STARTS SOFTLY, WE HEAR PEOPLE DRESSING, DRAGGING AWAY
A FEW THINGS, GETTING DOWNSTAIRS.
THESE SOUNDS FINALLY CONSTITUTE ONE RHYTHM, THE RHYTHM OF THE MUSIC.
WHEN THE MUSIC STOPS MATA HARI LAUGHS.
SOUNDS OF SHOTGUNS.

Mata : Fools. They fell into the trap.
Now, did they really think they could recreate the world as Puccini, Ein-
stein, Xerxes or Nina Ricci !
Damm fools.Well, I‘ ve got supplies for at least 24 years. “
The living death downstairs, my most dedicated servants and…the 150 most
beatiful melodies in the world.

(SHE KEEPS QN LAUGHING, WHILE STARTING A RECORD. IT’S A WALZ,
MAYBE. THE BLUE DANUBE) MUSIC
Dust, dust ….nothing but dust…