Public Performances

Every moment in an airport terminal is filled with drama playing out for all to see. A girlfriend slaps her boyfriend for following a sexy looking woman with his eyes. A wife scolds her husband for not backing her up when she tries to discipline their kids' bad behavior in public. A teenager moans at his parents for disturbing him as he listens to his MP3 player.

As we wait for our flight, we try to ignore the drama that's taking place around us. However, when the emotions flares pass the boiling point, it's hard not to look away. They are the pedestrian equivalent of a automobile accident. We want to look away because, it's bound to be gruesome but we can't because the action is too captivating.

What normally is hidden in the privacy of the home, is now stripped of its mask of normalcy.

Of course, it doesn't have to be at an airport terminal. It can be in a restaurant, in a hospital emergency room waiting area, in a checkout queue at the local supermarket...

We don't even have to hear what they are saying. Their body language provides sufficient dialog.

One of the best example is the opening scene from the movie "Before Sunrise". Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy's characters watch as a couple duke it out in a rail car traveling between Budapest and Vienna. The woman shouts and presses the man's chest with her finger. The man shouts back. Then, the woman hits the man's head with a rolled up magazine. The arguing went back and forth. Finally, the couple left the car and Ethan Hawke's character turned to Julie Delpy's character, "Did you understand what they were arguing about?" Julie Delpy's character answered, "No, my German is not so good."

But are these dramas real or are they contrived scenarios played out to shock and entertain both the players and their audience?

My friends and I play a game in public in which we improvise a scenario suggested by the initiating player through his/her first move.

One of my favorite took place in an elevator. The target audience was an elderly woman who unknowingly stepped into this little seven feet by seven feet moving stage. As the elevator progressed to the next floor, one of the girls unexpectedly fell to her knees sobbing. Her action took her boyfriend by surprise causing him to stammer as he asked her, "Wha... Wha... What's wrong?"

She stood up and with tears in her eyes, fell on him, pounding his chest as she screamed, "I thought you said that brothers can't get sisters pregnant!"

Ah, the game begins, but what can he do to respond?

More stammering, "But... but... but..."

Suddenly he has it, the perfect comeback for her ridiculous opening line.

"But, how do you know it's me and not daddy?"

By this time, the elderly was so flustered that the color of her cheeks matches the bright red tone of emergency telephone in the elevator.

The elevator door opened and she sprint out like no elderly lady ever did.

The most effective player that I know is the father of a friend of mine. My friend's father was a police officer which makes any improvised public performance even more believable and shocking.

One time my friend, his sister, and their dad were eating out at a restaurant. They were discussing the events of his shift which, in Baltimore, is never dull. Then, my friend's dad noticed an older couple listening to their conversation. The elderly lady was, now, tilting her chair on its two hind legs to hear better.

With a smile, my friend's dad turned to my friend's sister and said, "How does it feel to be out of jail and cleaned up? Looking at you, no one would ever suspect you of being a teenage hooker picked up on your way to entertain a bachelor party."

At that instance, the elderly woman slipped and literally fell to the floor.

So, the next time you are having a hard time ignoring a relationship drama boiling in public, remember, it may be some of us improvising a public performance to entertain and shock ourselves as well as the audience.