the efficiency monologues – Chuck Wood

Alex was an Efficiency Expert.

Not a sterling first line but it’s short, concise and gives you the information you need to move forward.

I was going to start with “Alex designed, developed and evaluated integrated systems for production processes to increase efficiencies across an organization” but then I thought “How would Alex say that?” Alex was an Efficiency Expert.

For the purposes of this story it doesn’t really matter what he does for a living.

Or does it?

You be the judge (without being judgmental, if that’s possible).

That night he had three dreams scheduled;

The one where he has sex with the neighbor (the wife… for a change).

The one where he wins the lottery.

The one where he designs a better integrated system for a production process and increases efficiency across his organization.

The first two dreams go off without a hitch.

The third however…

began with him rising from his bed and sleepwalking to his own front door. He took a few steps back from his front step and began a monologue;

“Oh boy, I promised Black Attack I wouldn’t cry, but . . . I was not expecting this. When I was a boy, I told my father that I was going to be the first Jew in the Basketball Hall of Fame, or a famous rock star, like Neil Diamond or Barry Manilow. My father looked at me and said, “Good for you, son, but some people don’t give a shit about basketball. Some people don’t even listen to music.” I know I don’t. Pointless. “But,” he said, “There’s one thing you can count on. One thing that unites every human being on this planet and it’s this: Everybody fucks. So if you’re the best at fucking … you’re the best human being.”

I did not understand these words at the time – I was only six — but when I made my first adult film in 1978, I thought of my father. Not at the time of shooting, of course, but in a general sense. The film was Bad News Boner. For my bone-tastic performance, I was awarded the Best New-Comer trophy, but sadly, my father died one week before the ceremony. I was devastated. I didn’t know where to turn. I didn’t understand that the answer was right in front of me. It was you. My fellow performers. You’ve opened your hearts and your legs to me, and while I keep giving it to you, you keep giving everything to me. So Papa, if you can hear me up there, I want you to know this: I may be the best human being. I may be the best at fucking. But I’d be nothing without all the people that I’ve fucked. Thank you, have a wonderful night!”

He then went back inside, climbed the stairs to his bedroom and went back to sleep. He only knew about what he’d done that night because he’d recently installed a new doorbell that records everyone and everything that happens in front of it. He watched himself the next morning.

He’d never seen David West Read’s play The Performers so he had no idea how he could recite something from it word for word.

He had no idea what it could possibly mean.

That’s where you come in.