Last Chance Saloon
Shari Gledhill
Genre: Comedic Drama
Cast size: 2
Duration: 40 mins approx
Shari Gledhill | Comedic Drama | One Act | 1m, 1f
Short synopsis
- Synopsis
- Characters
Karen and Tony meet in a hotel bar one night. They are both nervous and ill at ease. They are dressed up, but perhaps not in their usual style of dressing. Tony tries a little too hard to impress Karen. But Karen is a hard nut to crack and she comes across as slightly cold and brittle. Tony tries to convince her that he is a firefighter but Karen is not convinced. After a few false starts they agree to start again.
Karen opens up about her bad luck in the past and tells Tony the tragic tale of her husband who apparently committed suicide by walking into the sea, naked. Tony is intrigued by the story and very sympathetic, especially when he hears that the suicidal husband turned up in Australia a few months later married to someone else! In return, Tony is rather coy about his marital status. Despite having no wedding ring on his finger, Karen notices the groove on his finger and quizzes him. Tony admits that he is married but his wife has gone ‘far away’.
Just as we think that things are going well for the lonely couple, Tony makes the mistake of inviting Karen upstairs for a bit of ‘hanky-panky’. As Karen goes ballistic at this suggestion, it becomes clear that she and Tony are not strangers looking for love. They are, in fact, a married couple looking to put the spice back into their marriage.
Tony is trying to understand what has gone wrong between them; why Karen has been so distant lately. He feels she must be having an affair or has simply fallen out of love with him. When Karen tells him she can’t bear him to touch her, he nearly storms out, convinced their marriage is over. However, Karen finally confesses to her husband.
She found a lump in her breast and she was too scared to tell him or to even go to the doctors. Tony at last becomes the hero Karen needs him to be. He promises to look after her no matter what the future holds. And so, they decide to slip upstairs to make use of the room Tony has booked, vowing to start their new life the next morning.
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