Waiting for Valet

A tragicomedy in one act starring Britney Spears and Paris Hilton

THEATER OF THE ABSURD Hilton and Spears get into character Outside Hyde. A valet station. Evening. Paris, sitting on a low curb, is trying to take off her Jimmy Choo. She pulls at it with both hands, panting. She gives up, exhausted, tries again. As before. Enter Britney.
PARIS:	(giving up, checking her Blackberry). So can't be done.
BRITNEY:	BRITNEY: Ain't that life? Blaming your pedi when your foot's the problem(advancing with half-drunken strides, sea legs unstable.) Totally. I've realized that too, you know? All my life, I swear, I've said to myself, Britney, be reasonable, you haven't tried everything. And I kept on struggling when the worst, most randomest shit kept happening. (She broods, musing on the struggle. Turning to Paris.) So, like, you're stuck?
PARIS:	Am I?
BRITNEY:	I'm glad y'all hung around. I totally thought you were gone forever.
PARIS:	Me too.
BRITNEY:	Together again at last! Woo-hoo! We'll have to bust a jam on this shit! But how? (She reflects.) Get up so I can hug you.
PARIS:	(irritably.) Not now, not now. There aren't any cameras around.
BRITNEY:	(hurt, coldly.) Where is this guy? I wanna get home to my babies.
PARIS:	In a ditch.
BRITNEY:	(admiringly.) A ditch! For reals?
PARIS:	(without looking up from her Blackberry.) Over there.
BRITNEY:	God, people in this club like totally groped on me. Did they grope on you?
PARIS:	Grope me? Of course they groped me.
BRITNEY:	Same shit all the time.
PARIS:	The same? Whatever.
BRITNEY:	PARIS: Grope me? Of course they groped meGod, I can't not think about Kevin... All these years... But for me... Where would he be... (Decisively.) He'd be nothing more than Mr. Shar Jackson right now, no diggity.
PARIS:	Whatever.
BRITNEY:	(gloomily.) It's too much for a girl. (Pause. Cheerfully.) On the other hand, right, what's the good of giving up now? We totally should get back together, you know, for my babies.
PARIS:	Stop blubbering and help me get this fucking thing off.
BRITNEY:	Hand in hand at the Teen Choice Awards, winners of the Hottest Couple Award. We were respectable in those days. Now it's too late. They totally wouldn't even let us up. (Paris tears at her Jimmy Choo.) What are you doing?
PARIS:	Taking off my shoe, you Debbie. Didn't that ever happen to you?
BRITNEY:	Yah. You gotta take off your Choos sometimes and walk around barefeeted, feel the concrete. I tell you that all the time. Why don't you listen to me?
PARIS:	Fuck! Help me!
BRITNEY:	It hurts?
PARIS:	(angrily, into Blackberry, which has been on all this time.) Hurts? She wants to know if it hurts!
BRITNEY:	(angrily.) You're on your 'berry phone? What, I ain't here? You don't even know what pain is until you've had two babies, and one was born with a big old pun'kin head, all right?
PARIS:	Does it hurt a lot?
BRITNEY:	(angrily.) Yah! It so hurts! It's like period cramps times a hundred.
PARIS:	(pointing.) Your tits are hanging out.
BRITNEY:	(looking down.) Totes. (She pushes her breasts into her shirt.) Never overlook the little things in life.
PARIS:	What do you expect, you dress like such a ho-bag.
BRITNEY:	(musingly.) Ho-bag... (She meditates.) The pot calls the kettle something, who said that?
PARIS:	Why don't you help me?
VALET GIRLS Paris and Britney do the classics
BRITNEY:	Lemme see. (She takes off her hat again, peers inside it.) Funny. (She taps the brim as though to dislodge a foreign body, peers into it again, puts it on again.) So can't be done. (Paris with a supreme effort succeeds in pulling off her Jimmy Choo. She peers inside it, feels about inside it, turns it upside down, shakes it, looks on the ground to see if anything has fallen out, finds nothing, feels inside it again, staring sightlessly before her.)
PARIS:	There's nothing to show.
BRITNEY:	Try and put it on again.
PARIS:	(examining her foot.) God, I so need a pedi.
BRITNEY:	Ain't that life? Blaming your pedi when your foot's the problem. (She takes off her hat again, peers inside it, feels inside it, knocks on the brim, blows into it, puts it on again.) This is so annoying, y'all. (Silence. Britney deep in thought, Paris chipping at her toenail polish.) Did that pazaratti get a photo of my cooter? (Pause.) A little? (Pause.) Daggit.
PARIS:	What?
BRITNEY:	What if I apologized? Maybe he'd delete it.
PARIS:	Apologize for what?
BRITNEY:	Oh... (She reflects.) We wouldn't have to go into details.
PARIS:	Our being born?
Britney breaks into a throaty, nicotine laugh which she immediately stifles, her hand holding in her breasts, her face contorted.
BRITNEY:	Don't make me laugh, y'all. I'll chuck up all those Jalapeño Poppers and Jager.
PARIS:	Ugh. Barf on accident?
BRITNEY:	BRITNEY: Don't make me laugh, y'all. I'll chuck up all those Jalapeño Poppers and JagerShoot, here come some pazarattis. Smile. (She smiles suddenly from ear to ear, bends forward, keeps smiling, ceases as suddenly.) Shit. He only wants you. (Pause.) Daggit.
PARIS:	(irritably.) What?
BRITNEY:	Did you ever read the Bible?
PARIS:	The Bible... (She reflects.) I saw one in The Real World suite at the Palms once.
BRITNEY:	Do you remember the gospels?
PARIS:	Wasn't there like a map in that book? I tried to use it to find the Hard Rock, but it was so out of date I got totally lost and missed Sum 41.
BRITNEY:	God, I love that band.
PARIS:	Whatever.
BRITNEY:	What were we talking about? How's your foot?
PARIS:	Swelling like Lindsay Lohan.
BRITNEY:	Oh, yeah. Well, in the Bible, there's this story of, like, two thieves. Do you remember the story?
PARIS:	No.
BRITNEY:	Y'all want me to preach it to you?
PARIS:	No.
BRITNEY:	C'mon. It'll pass the time till the valet comes back. (Pause.) Two thieves, crucified at the same time as our Savior. One—
PARIS:	Our what?
BRITNEY:	Our Savior. Two thieves. One is supposed to have been saved and the other... (She searches for the contrary of saved.) Damned.
PARIS:	Saved from what?
BRITNEY:	Hell, y'all.
PARIS:	Whatever. I'm going.
She does not move.