Lance & Lana
(Full length, 2M, 3F, 2 M or F)
A bittersweet love story wrapped in a satire of modern royal families disguised as a bedtime story, with its plot lifted from Georg Büchner's Leonce and Lena. Prince Lance and Princess Lana flee the arranged marriage meant to unite their respective kingdoms, only to meet by accident, or providence, and fall in love. Multiple, simple settings.
Characters:
STORYTELLER*
PRINCE LANCE
QUEEN OLGA
KING ALBERT
REGENT*
QUEEN MIRIAM
PRINCESS LANA
(*can be M or F)
SAMPLE SCENE
STORYTELLER
A very short time ago, in a kingdom not at all distant… Not a kingdom, really, but a constitutional monarchy fully integrated within the European Union, there was a Prince, whose handsomeness is a matter of individual taste and whose loneliness a matter of speculation, as are his marriage plans. One day he was sitting in the palace, counting all his gold – so to speak – when Their Majesties the King and Queen approached.
(LIGHTS UP on PRINCE LANCE at a video console.
A noisy, violent game that demands his total attention.
KING ALBERT and QUEEN OLGA enter.
PRINCE LANCE doesn’t notice.)
QUEEN OLGA
Ahem.
PRINCE LANCE
Shh!
(Screams, explosions, death metal music from the game.)
QUEEN OLGA
What are you –
PRINCE LANCE
Trying to finish this level.
KING ALBERT
Turn off the laser tracking beam. It eats up energy you’ll need for the photon blast which is the only way to stop the legions of the undead.
PRINCE LANCE
When do they show up?
KING ALBERT
Right about…now.
(PRINCE LANCE frantically fires away.
A final agonizing scream from the game.
“Game over” music.)
Do you have any lives left?
PRINCE LANCE
Too many.
(Puts console aside.)
What a bore.
QUEEN OLGA
If you’re not too busy, your father and I would like to have a word with you.
PRINCE LANCE
What about.
KING ALBERT (to QUEEN OLGA)
Shall I? Or would you prefer to?
QUEEN OLGA
I leave that to you.
KING ALBERT
Oh, you do?
QUEEN OLGA
I naturally defer to Your Majesty.
KING ALBERT
You’re a Majesty too. And the boy’s mother. And this is your idea.
QUEEN OLGA
I thought we were in agreement.
KING ALBERT
We are. Or at least we are not in disagreement.
QUEEN OLGA
Then I believe it proper that you should be the one to say what we have to say.
KING ALBERT
Or say who shall say what we have to say.
QUEEN OLGA
Of course.
KING ALBERT
In which case it is you who says that I have the say to say who says what we have to say.
QUEEN OLGA
I didn’t say that.
KING ALBERT
Then what did you say?
(PRINCE LANCE, no longer paying attention, has
manipulated the controls of a drone, which now
hovers over his head. He gazes at the screen of his iPad.)
QUEEN OLGA
I very clearly said – what is that?
PRINCE LANCE
The top of my head. I’ve always wanted to see it.
QUEEN OLGA
The very least you could do is pay attention.
PRINCE LANCE
Is that a bald spot?
(KING ALBERT takes a look.)
KING ALBERT
Only the beginnings of one.
PRINCE LANCE
I’m going to inherit your baldness.
QUEEN OLGA
His Majesty looks very dignified. Noble. Wise. Serene.
PRINCE LANCE
Bald.
KING ALBERT
I’m young at heart.
PRINCE LANCE
That’s just what you have the publicists say.
KING ALBERT
I could be young at heart, though, if I wanted to be.
PRINCE LANCE
Can we get to the point?
(Pause.)
QUEEN OLGA
We’ve found just the girl for you.
PRINCE LANCE
Not again.
KING ALBERT
Please hear us out.
QUEEN OLGA
She’s young, she’s pretty, she’s intelligent.
KING ALBERT
She’s everything you like.
QUEEN OLGA
And everything like you.
PRINCE LANCE
She’s a royal, isn’t she.
(KING ALBERT and QUEEN OLGA look at each other.)
Okay, details. How many horses? How many cars? How many houses, and where? Marbella? Gstaad? Monaco? Miami? How many times has Hello magazine followed her shopping or dining or sunbathing? How many journalists are already typing up reports of rumors about us? Have I met her?
QUEEN OLGA
No, you haven’t.
PRINCE LANCE
That’s no problem. Have them Photoshop us into the same picture, with the palace in the background, or a crowded dance floor, or a deserted beach at sunset. Better still, choose an enthusiasm we can be said to share. Squash. Water polo. Skydiving. Paste in our faces and voila!
QUEEN OLGA
I told you he’d be this way.
KING ALBERT
My son. Don’t you want to see us happy?
PRINCE LANCE
You’re not happy?
KING ALBERT
Well of course we’re happy, but…
QUEEN OLGA
You know nothing would make your father happier than to be a grandfather.
PRINCE LANCE
And to have the succession settled?
KING ALBERT
That too, of course.
PRINCE LANCE
We’re speaking of the family nose. I’ve got it. You’ve got it. Your father, his father, grandfather, great, great great, and great great great grandfathers all had it. What is important is that the nose continue. Thanks to modern genetic research, a royal egg can be found whose gene for nose shape can be determined to be recessive and therefore not likely to interfere with the nasal prerogative of the carefully selected royal spermatozoid. Long may the nose reign over the realm!
QUEEN OLGA
We’ll come back when you’re ready to be reasonable.
PRINCE LANCE
I’m sorry. I’m ready to be reasonable.
KING ALBERT
You are?
PRINCE LANCE
Well, no. But I’m curious, and I don’t have anything else to do.
QUEEN OLGA
We’d like you to meet her.
PRINCE LANCE
I’d like to meet her, too. By accident. The way people meet, not the way royals meet.
QUEEN OLGA
The problem with meeting people that way is you run the risk of meeting the wrong person.
PRINCE LANCE
Oh what I wouldn’t do to meet the wrong person! Make the mistake of my life! Make a mess of things, screw things up! All my life I’ve been carefully trained to do everything right. Here in the palace you’ve got think tanks and consultants whose job it is to determine all the right things for me to do. My every day is meticulously programmed with activities carefully calibrated precisely to avoid the slightest possibility of anything being left to accident or chance. And look at the result.
KING ALBERT
You’re a fine young man.
QUEEN OLGA
You’re a thoroughly adequate heir to the throne.
PRINCE LANCE
What if I don’t want the throne?
KING ALBERT
Don’t think of yourself. Think of the realm.
QUEEN OLGA
They look to us – to you – for continuity, for stability –
PRINCE LANCE
For distraction –
KING ALBERT
In times of insecurity and doubt.
PRINCE LANCE
Whose? Yours? You’d love to distract everyone from those tax inspectors going over our holdings.
KING ALBERT
Please don’t bring that up.
PRINCE LANCE
The gossip journalists looking into your love life…
QUEEN OLGA
That either.
PRINCE LANCE
Paternity suit lawyers...
KING ALBERT
Especially not that.
QUEEN OLGA
But since you bring it up, all the more reason. A new king and a new queen would be just what the people need to put these scandals behind them.
PRINCE LANCE
For you to put these scandals behind you.
KING ALBERT
All right, that too.
QUEEN OLGA
In times like this, we perform a valuable service.
KING ALBERT
One we have a duty to perform.
QUEEN OLGA
We give them something to look at.
KING ALBERT
Something that fills them with pride.
QUEEN OLGA
Takes their minds off their troubles.
KING ALBERT
Reassures them there is order in the world.
QUEEN OLGA
Order, beauty, stability.
KING ALBERT
We put on a show.
QUEEN OLGA
It’s a good show.
KING ALBERT
They enjoy it. They believe it.
QUEEN OLGA
We believe it too.
KING ALBERT
Yes, sooner or later, we believe it too.
QUEEN OLGA
As will you.
KING ALBERT
And your queen.
QUEEN OLGA
And your children.
PRINCE LANCE
Sure. And if we don’t, there’s always divorce. Custody battles. Divided loyalties among the population. Flaming high-speed auto wrecks in Parisian underpasses.
(Pause.)
QUEEN OLGA
She’ll be here tomorrow.
(KING ALBERT and QUEEN OLGA start off.)
PRINCE LANCE
Oh, what was I thinking. Of course. You’re right. Prepare the wedding festivities.
(KING ALBERT and QUEEN OLGA stop.)
KING ALBERT
But you haven’t even met her.
PRINCE LANCE
I don’t need to meet her. You know what’s best for me, and for the realm, and for the institution of the monarchy.
KING ALBERT
Well, we try our best.
PRINCE LANCE (kneeling)
How could I have doubted you, Your Worships?
(QUEEN OLGA gives him a kiss on the forehead.
PRINCE LANCE watches her and KING ALBERT go.
He takes out his mobile phone and places a call.)
PRINCE LANCE
Yes, hi. I’d like you to schedule a couple of appointments for me.
As soon as possible. This afternoon.
Yes. A hair weave. And a nose job.