Skits
On A Grand Scale
By: Jake Watters & Jonathan Cone
Characters:
Scale - Male. One of those large Japanese goldfish that swims in ponds, however, he's able to walk on his tail fin. He has inverse-scuba gear on. His helmet is filled with water, and he has an oxygen tank in the back. What's worse is he's a chronic smoker and he's trying to quite because he has to risk his life every time he smokes a cigarette (he has to pop open his helmet real fast, puff one breath of the smoke, and then flip his helmet back on. It's tiring)
David - Male. Archeologist/Anthropologist. Always on a crusade to find some important relics and or remains.
Hailey - An intelligent English teacher whose life long dream is to make love to- I mean meet Stephen King.
Pablo - David's trusty, but clumsy assistant. Has a desire to be an archeologist just like David someday, but has a hard time remembering dates such as when he was born.
Ralph - Hailey's St. Bernard dog and only true friend.
Ranger Ruth - Head Park Ranger. Is in charge of guiding campers through the Grand Canyon. Thrives on challenge and pain, and is turned away by no amount of danger.
Setting: USA Grand Canyon National Park
Scene One: David, Scale, Hailey, Pablo, and Ralph are all friends and have traveled out to the Grand Canyon as a vacation of sorts. They have already parked their vehicle and are just getting out.
David: All right everyone! We're finally here!
Hailey: (clutching a Stephen King novel to her bosom) Oh, thank heavens! My legs are so cramped.
Scale: (beating on window) Let me out! Damn it! I need a smoke! Step aside! (pushes Pablo out of the way) Skinny boy! (struggles with van door and finally opens it) Yes!
Ralph: What's your issue, man? I've been cooped up in here just as long as you, without my own private reserve of oxygen, I might add, and I'm not complaining.
Scale: Ha ha ha! I'm free!- (Scale plummets to the ground, having forgotten about that one big step down from the door)
Pablo: Ha ha ha! Little (makes sucker-face with lips) es stupido!
[Scale remains face down for a few moments]
David: (sees Scale out of the corner of his eyes) Oh my! (shuts door and runs over) Look at this! This must be from the Jurassic period! Pablo! Come here!
Pablo: Yeah?
David: Look at this! It must be some vital component to a long dead social people!
Pablo: There were people in the Jurassic period? What kind of archeologist are you? There weren't people in the Jurassic period! People weren't around until like 1970s.
David: (hits Pablo with hat) Who's yer daddy! I'm the teacher. Don't you ever back talk me.
Pablo: (rubs head) Sorry…
Ralph: (trots over and sniffs) Dave, I hate to break this to you but that's just Scale. He fell face down out of the van.
Hailey: Is he all right? I know he didn't go tinkle at that last pit stop. Probably a good thing, too. It was dark and gloomy. Some evil monster was probably waiting behind every bush! (eyes a suspicious looking tree nearby. Cautiously steps away)
David: (looks up to Pablo) Is that right?
Pablo: Yeah, he fell out about fifty minutes ago.
David: We just got here…
Ralph: It was about three minutes ago.
Pablo: That's what I'm saying, we got here yesterday, and he hasn't gotten up yet.
David: Right…
Hailey: (bends down to Scale) I'm going to switch out his oxygen tank. (she puts a new tank on his scuba gear)
Scale: (pops up) Ha ha! I'm free! (looks at everyone angrily) All right… who's got my smokes?
Ralph: (scratching at a flea) I thought you were quitting.
Scale: Ha ha ha! You thought wrong! Oh you weak-minded mammals. Now, who's got 'em?
[Everyone looks around whistling]
Scale: Oh, I see! Let's dis the fish! Is that it?! Fine! I don't need my smokes. (tries to look patient. After a brief moment he starts shaking) Damn it! (finds a twig) I'll just whittle my own damned smokes! (starts trimming twig with a pocket knife) I'll show you…
Hailey: Ralph! Come here boy! (Ralph runs over. Hailey spends a moment scratching his belly) Him's such a good boy! Yes him is! You like that, don't you?
Ralph: (leg starts kicking) Oh yeah.. right there… that's the money spot…
David: Well, isn't that exciting! Pablo, help me with this tent. Scale…? (sees Scale still whittling away at the twig) Never mind.
Pablo: (looks in the van) So we only brought nine tents?
David: Nine? No, you idiot! We brought one big community tent.
Pablo: Are you deaf? That's what I keep saying! Nine tents!
David: (sighs) Ralph? You want to get the cooler?
Ralph: (grumbles) Yeah, yeah. (looks at Hailey) He always does that once I'm relaxed. (trots to cooler)
Scale: (stops whittling and looks at Ralph and the cooler) Ha ha! You tricky bastards! You hid them in the cooler didn't you? (starts running towards Ralph) AH!!
Ralph: (steps aside. Scale splats into the cooler) Hee hee… I like him. He's funny.
Hailey: So we're setting up camp here? (looks around nervously) This reminds me of the scene in The Stand--
David: (interrupting) Where everyone gets slaughtered in a bloody mess all over the dirt? (looks at Pablo) Once you've read one you've read them all….
Pablo: Yeah I read the first one that he wrote in 1945 under the pen name Samuel Clemens. I haven't read one since then. They're all the same.
David: Can we please just set up camp?! And will someone give that poor fish a cigarette? I'm starting to feel sorry for him.
[Scale scoops up sand in his fin and tries to smoke that, meanwhile everyone else scurries around setting up camp]
Pablo: Whew! I'm glad that's done. It took us all afternoon to finish.
Hailey: Uh, Pablo it only took us about twenty minutes to do it. It was pretty easy. In fact, it seemed to get set up too easily…
[Suddenly a park ranger comes crashing through the bushes]
Ranger Ruth: A ten-hut!!!!!!! What are you people doing?! You call this a camp??? Tear all this down and start all over again. I want to see perfection people!!!
Scale: Can I bum a cigarette? Or maybe just a piece of paper or something that will catch on fire that I can smoke?
Ranger Ruth: No!!!!! There will be no smoking in my park. In fact, the only thing that will catch on fire around here is wood for a campfire. Since you seem to like to burn things, why don't you go gather some up, fish boy? And take you're little dog too!
Ralph: Umm ma'am I'm not little, I'm a St. Bernard.
Ranger Ruth: I don't care if you're St. Patrick, you can carry firewood!
[Ralph and Scale wander off to look for twigs to use for a campfire]
Pablo: (aside to David) Wow, she's only been here 2 hours and she's already taken charge of everything. I don't know if I'm going to enjoy this or not.
Ranger Ruth: What was that, taco boy? I'll have you know I'm a professional at what I do. I will be in charge of this group and you will obey, and enjoy it! Here's a schedule of tomorrows events. (pulls out map and slams it down on hood of the van) We'll be hiking from here (slashing motions with hand on map) down to here. There will be rest points here (points to map) here (jabs finger) and here (presses down finger maliciously onto map). Any questions?
Hailey: Is this safe? I mean I've read stuff about people getting stranded in the Grand Canyon and buzzards coming and pecking their eyes out and stuff.
Ranger Ruth: You will be safe with me. I will not tolerate insolence. If you die under my watch I'll kill you, so you better be careful out there.
David: Wow I can't wait. I bet there are tons of artifacts down there! All the Seminole Indian activity in these parts. I'll bet we find hundreds of arrowheads!
Pablo: You dummy, the Seminole Indians weren't around when the Grand Canyon was formed. They were way before that.
[Scale and Ralph come walking back up]
Scale: We couldn't find any firewood, but we did find lots of these dry brittle twigs. I hope they work. Plus some Indian gave me a funny cigarette to smoke. Hey, why's everyone turning pink?
[there's an awkward silence]
Ranger Ruth: Ok! Everyone get settled and get ready for sleep! We've got a long day of hiking tomorrow! And we'll enjoy it…or else.
[Everyone looks expectantly at Hailey]
Hailey: What?
Ranger Ruth: Ok everyone, it's getting dark, let's get camp set back up and this fire going.
[End scene]
Scene Two: An hour or so later. Scale, Ralph, Pablo, David, and Hailey are around the fire. Ranger Ruth is nowhere to be seen.
Scale: (staring at fire) Wow… that just looks like the hot end of one giant cigarette… (starts reaching towards the flames)
Pablo: (slaps the fish's hand) Back! You heard what Ranger Ruth told us not thirty seconds ago. No smoking!
Scale: Damn you! (pointing at Pablo) Damn you and your rules! (falls to knees. Starts crying in scuba gear) You don't understand… It's all my father's fault! He caught me smoking when I was ten-
Pablo: One!?
Scale: Ten!
Pablo: Oh… that's a little different.
Scale: Damn it! Now you've ruined the mood… (turns aside) I don't want to talk about it any more. I'm going for a walk… You want to come, Ralph?
Ralph: (being scratched by Hailey) What? Oh, I'd like to man, lord knows I need to drop the kiddies off at the pool, but I'm really into this belly rub. I may catch up to you later.
Scale: (sighs and walks off into the forests)
[Some strange bird calls out]
Hailey: Ah! It's coming to rape me!
David: Hailey, calm down. It's Just a raven- (sees Ralph giving him the cut-throat signal) I mean it's just… just… well, to tell you the truth, I don't know what it is.
Ralph: (looks defeated) Oh no…
Hailey: I bet it's the corpse of some dead lover man who's come back to life to avenge his adulterous, dominating woman who left him for her career.
Pablo: No, no it's just a flock of ravens.
David: You mean a raven.
Pablo: Damn, you're just relentless! I know why Scale went for that walk now. That's what I said! A flock of ravens.
David: You didn't do so well in Math as a kid, did you?
Pablo: I did okay, except for those times I forgot to carry the two.
David: You mean the one.
Pablo: Sometimes I wonder why I even try.
Ralph: Don't worry, Hailey. Nothing messes with a St. Bernard.
[A war-cry comes from some bushes. Hailey jumps behind Ralph. Scale pops out of the brush wearing a grass-woven Mohawk.]
Scale: Owbah owbah owbah! (dives to towards the fire with a whittled twig placed at his mouth just on the other side of the glass. He lights it.)
Ralph: Nooooo!
David: Nooooo!
Pablo: No.
Ralph: Scale! You've got to quit!
Scale: (ignores the canine and lights the twig. He stands upright, flips open his helmet, and puckers around it for one puff. The water then drowns out the cigarette. His helmet flips back) Ah… I just wish there was a less expensive way to do this. I get one puff per cigarette.
Hailey: (Walks up to scale with a frown and kicks his shin)
Scale: Ow!
Hailey: I thought you were a big, mean, nasty, dead monster!
Scale: You haven't seen what I can do with my fins, have you? (wink wink)
Hailey: Oh, that's gross! ... but strangely erotic at the same time... tell me more!
Ranger Ruth: What's that? (snags the wet cigarette from Scale) Been smoking, huh?
Scale: (points to Ralph) The dog made me hold it for him.
Ranger Ruth: Is that so?
Ralph: No. He's lying. He's trying to blame it on me.
Scale: (look of disbelief) Oh! Come on! Yeah, right, a talking fish that walks around on his fins and has to stay in his little wetsuit to stay alive is able to smoke? Pah-lease!
Pablo: What's the big deal? He only smoked a hundred and forty-seven in the last 2 hours.
Ranger Ruth: A hundred and forty-seven!?
Pablo: Well…give or take 146.
[Strange bird call is heard again]
Hailey: Scale, I told you that wasn't funny! Quit it!
Scale: That wasn't me I don't think… (looks under arm) Nope wasn't me
Pablo: Wow that's the 5th time that's happened tonight. It's starting to get spooky.
Ranger Ruth: That sounds awfully familiar…
Hailey: What? Is it like your dead husband come back from the dead in the form of a bird to haunt us all and peck us to death one by one?
Ranger Ruth: Oh my god! That's the sound!
Pablo: Are you telling us that hundreds of years ago you and your husband went hiking in these very woods a few miles away and there was a tragic accident?
Ranger Ruth: Something like that, except it was in these very woods, at this exact campsite, actually. And it wasn't hundreds of years ago. It was more like 15.
Ralph: But it wasn't like you were in charge of a hiking group and for some reason things got out of hand was it?
[Ranger Ruth nods her head]
Scale: But it wasn't from smoking I bet. (picks up cigarette shaped pebble and tries to light it in the campfire)
David: But none of this makes sense. I mean the history of these campgrounds doesn't coincide with your story at all. I've been analyzing this skull that I found buried over there, and it seems the Aztecs were the only people who have died up here for centuries…
Ranger Ruth: Oh my god! You've found it. That's where I buried my husband and the 5 other campers that I led to their deaths. (starts crying)
Hailey: This can't be. How could you have led them to their deaths? Did you just neglect them? I mean did they walk off a cliff and you just didn't notice or something?
[Ranger Ruth points up above them at an overhanging piece of rock]
Ranger Ruth: They fell from up there, and hit the ground with such force I didn't have to dig a grave. I just kicked some dirt over them. They were hid in a few minutes.
Pablo: Wow that must have been the longest hours of your life.
Scale: (frantically clawing at the ground) I bet they still have the packages of cigarettes in their pockets!
Hailey: (pointing into the trees) Oh my god!! What's that?!
[A large, black Raven squawks]
Scale: (freezes. Fidgets. Looks around worriedly) What was that?
[Raven calls again]
Scale: (look of dread) Oh no! It's a raven!
Hailey: Too cool! I hope he pecks someone's eyes out!
[every stares at her worriedly]
Hailey: I mean, I hope it… pecks Ranger Ruth's eyes out… for all those awful things she did to her dead lover… ?
[All except for Ranger Ruth shout their approval]
Ralph: Yeah!
Scale: Shh! Silence! You idiots! Everyone knows that ravens live off a consistent diet of nothing but Japanese goldfish! He's going to eat me!
Ranger Ruth: Sweet!
Pablo: Aren't raven's just like crows?
Ranger Ruth: Except that they're about 10 times larger.
Pablo: One tenth the size? That's nothing. Scale, you should take that bird head on!
Scale: All right… (combs ficticious hair) I'm cool. I can handle this. After all, I survived that 48 hour car ride here without a cigarette-
Pablo: Thirty-six hours, 18 minutes, and twenty seconds, actually.
[everyone stares at him]
Pablo: What?
David: That's the first time you've gotten the number right…
Pablo: What are you talking about? I'm always right on my numbers.
David: Sure, dude. Whatever.
[Raven swoops down and captures Scale. Scale screams]
Ralph: Noooo!
Ranger Ruth: Frank! Just because I killed you accidentally and buried you doesn't give you the right to come back as a raven and take away an innocent camper!
Hailey: Yeah! Pablo… get the double barrel shotgun.
Pablo: Right! One single barrel shotgun coming up!
[Raven is drooling at Scale as the fish is bent against the tree by a talon]
Scale: Oh man! What a way to go! Well, if you're going to eat me… can I have one last smoke? (holds up a twig)
Raven: (Considers. Let's foot down)
Scale: (lights the twig. He brings it forward to his mouth. At the last moment, he bends over and undoes his oxygen tank, igniting it and engulfing the raven in bright flames) Yeah! Try to eat me, you bitch! (jumps down to the ground. Raven lands in the fire)
Ranger Ruth: Nooooo!
Hailey: (kicks Ranger Ruth's shin) You shut up! It was awfully mean of you to go and kill people like that.
Ranger Ruth: Ow!
[The fire fumes up. Stephen King walks out of the giant blaze]
Ranger Ruth: Frank? It's been so long.
Stephen King: Yes, my dear. It has.
Hailey: Oh my god! Your old boyfriend is Stephen King! Ugn! (eyes roll up and her knees wobble) Um… I think I need to change my panties… but not before Stephen and I have a looong talk, privately in the tent. (runs to Stephen and grabs his arm. Escorts him to the tent.)
Ralph: (tries to follow) Hey! Hey! Wait up!
Hailey: (puts out a hand) Stay! Sit! Stay! (enters tent with Stephen)
Ralph: Oh damn! She just talked to me like a dog!
Scale: Dude… you are a dog.
Ralph: Still, that was damned rude…
Scale: Yeah… want a belly rub?
Ralph: I am all over that shit!
[End Scene]