Assembly Script

PRINCIPAL calls forth a CHOSEN STUDENT and hands her two figurines – one an Indian, one a Cowboy. The STUDENT comes on stage and places the figurines on a table on stage.

The curtains close (table now behind them).

Curtains re-open, but the table and figurines are gone. In their place are a stunned INDIAN and an equally stunned COWBOY. INDIAN is stage right, crouching w/ bow and arrow, looking right, apparently stalking a deer off stage. He cannot initially see the COWBOY across the stage. COWBOY is stage left, crouching, holding a cup or mug or pan over an imaginary fire, apparently warming his beans. He is looking off stage left. He cannot initially see the INDIAN across the stage.

*

Both INDIAN and COWBOY register shock and confusion. They each warily look
back and forth from audience to each other and back again. Each draws his weapon and
points it alternately at the audience and at each other. Back and forth. (This should not be done too fast. Play it for laughs. Let it take a couple of minutes. Hold the audience’s attention – and build their curiosity – before initiating any dialogue.)

Eventually, the COWBOY breaks the ice.

[Note: The COWBOY speaks in an exaggerrated Western drawl, w/ enthusiasm and w/out embarassment. The INDIAN, in contrast, is slow and dignified and wary, hardly ever even looking the COWBOY in the eye.]

*

COWBOY: (still wary and nervous) You don’t think we’re supposed to fight for them (thumbing audience), like them gladiators, do yeh?

INDIAN: (calming) Fight for who?

COWBOY: (indicating audience) Fight for them!

INDIAN: They not real. They part of dream.

COWBOY: A dream, huh? You mean lahk a hallucynation? ‘Cause they
shore look real as day to me.

INDIAN: Dream. Not real. (INDIAN goes over to COWBOY and gives him a good patient sniff, maybe more than one.) You real.

COWBOY: (offended) Yer darn tootin’ ahm real. (COWBOY sniffs back.) And darned if you ain’t real, too! A red-blooded Injun. Where’d you come from?

INDIAN: (swelling, very proud) Iroquois brave. Son of chief. Hunt deer.

COWBOY: You lahk to hunt, huh? Me, too. Shot me a rattler yesterday.

INDIAN: Where you come from? Why you wear funny clothes? Look like
French trapper.

COWBOY: French?! Ahm an American cowboy from the wild, wild West. We
wuz on a cattle drive. I was just about to get mah beans. (Ponders a
moment.) You say you’re a Iroquois? Don’t that mean you’re from New
York?

INDIAN: (Nods) Iroquois hunt and trade with English.

COWBOY: English. Dad-blum! The English have been gone for a hundred
years! Me – I’m from Texas. You know where Texas is?

INDIAN is mute.

COWBOY: It’s ‘cross the wide (gesturing) Mississippi River. You know the Big
Muddy?

INDIAN: Iroquois know of meeting of great rivers beyond mountains. (Steps upstage to gesture.) They flow from mighty lakes to the north.

COWBOY: (satisfied) That’s right. Ah’ll say this fer yeh. You do know
your geography. (Ponders) Say, do you want to get back to your
hunting party? ‘Cause I shore do want to get mah beans. Mebbe if we
close our eyes, that dream’ll go away and we can get back whar we came
from.

INDIAN: Close eyes?

COWBOY: Lahk this. On the count of three, you and me’ll both shut our
eyes real tight. See if that hallucynation’ll disappear and ah can get
mah beans, and you can go back to huntin’ deer. You ready? One, two,
three…

COWBOY and INDIAN both close eyes conspicuously tight. And curtain closes. After a
pause, curtain re-opens. The INDIAN and COWBOY are gone. But the table w/
the two figurines is back.

END.