THE STORY: Sitting alone amid a wasteland of nuclear destruction, his head covered by a brown paper bag, Phythick laments the loss of all that was and could have been. Then a girl walks by, her head also covered by a paper bag. They talk: he revealing that he was a science teacher; she that she was “Miss Europe.” They fall in love, but cannot kiss, cannot remove their paper bags for fear of radiation. The bags are a crinkling barrier between them—and perhaps must always be so. Yet can there be hope? Do they dare? A cloud comes over the moon as Phythick slowly raises his hand towards the bag covering his face.
Touching and illuminating, this highly imaginative play deals with the hesitant meeting of the last two survivors of the nuclear holocaust.
Included in the collection
A Smell of Burning and Then.
