Anger Management

Anger Management

A dark stage slowly lit to reveal one man in his early sixties. He is healthy and robust looking perhaps a former army man, rough spoken with a booming voice. He is sitting in a chair placed center stage looking down at a piece of paper in his hands and mumbling.


Charles: (looks up startled and stands quickly) Ummm. Hello? It’s my turn is it? Okay just give me a minute here now… (Fumbles with paper)
Okay here we go. Umm my name is Charles Mark Burelli, that’s a good Old Italian name now, my Granddad himself came over from Sicily. I’ve still got his passport on my dresser at home… or in the sock drawer…. What the hell good is a drawer just for socks anyway, I swear it was a woman who thought that one up and…..( pauses and looks over the audience as if talking to someone out there) What? Oh sorry Bob, (waves to someone in the back) That’s my mentor out there I think he feels I’m getting a little off the track. Sorry.
Anyway my name is…. Oh wait I said that, lost my place now.. (crumples paper) Ah , the heck with it! I’m Charlie to my friends and since all of you out there are listening to me rambling on you must be friends or you would be booing me off by now…( starts coughing, takes out handkerchief) Excuse me…. Damn cigarettes. You know if I’d had known back when I started smoking what I know now I would have…. Probably smoked anyway. I was stubborn as a mule back then and haven’t changed much since.
I guess that’s why I’m here. See I have this problem…With anger..
I can’t always control it and this past year it’s gotten….well a little out of hand…
Oh nothing serious mind you. I still got a clean record.. I think … I do.
If I hadn’t my wife would have found out by now and nagged me to death already.
My wife. Yeah she’s another reason I’m here. I hate her.


Now don’t start hissing, I’m a religious person, a decent Catholic, but the same time I can’t help myself
I hate her guts
And I just can’t get that hate that anger out of my mind you know, so one day I see this ad in the paper for anger management classes and I figure what the heck I might as well stop in, just to listen mind you and before you know it here I am in front of you all spilling my guts and ( starts viciously crumbling paper even more then notices what he is doing)
Oh crap, look what I….stupid speech took me ten times as long to write on that new fangled computer machine then it would on my good ol ink typewriter. What the heck good is all this techno stuff…it’s too delicate that’s the problem pick it up wrong and it breaks in half….( looks up again) What Bob? Read it? All right if I still can. (clears throat)
My name is Charles and I am writing this to empty all the anger out of my soul, to cleanse and purge…(pause) Wait I didn’t write this part. One of those brainwashing cult people was sitting next to me in this class. Sorry Bob you know I think the best of you but remember that guy Roger? The one with the red contacts and the purple hair…Never mind…Sorry…

Anyway I am writing this so I will no longer be so angry at my wife. I hate my wife but I don’t want to hate her. She is a good woman from a fine family. I married her exactly 45 years ago and even though God never gave us a baby we were happy. You see we were HAPPY. I didn’t always hate her.
She maybe me mad for sure I mean what woman couldn’t at times drive a man to pull out his few remaining hairs, right?
Look I don’t have to justify myself to you. I don’t even know you people. You might all be a bunch of criminals, or bums, or republicans for all I know.
Hmmm... So anyway I don’t mean to yell but no judging ok?


You know I think that was part of what made me hate my wife. Always judging. How would that LOOK Charlie? Or What would people say?
Like I cared what people thought. I mind my business and they can mind theirs.
Women!
Who knows what they’re thinking!
Who wants to?
Does this dress make my skin look sallow Charlie?
What in the heck is sall-ow? Is it like fat because you sure know I can’t say yes then!
My wife.
A good cook though. I gotta say that. Makes a lasagna you could drool over. Not bad meat loaf either. Wouldn’t touch the fruitcake though. (laughs) I swear our wedding fruitcake is still making the rounds as a Christmas present, last time it came back my way I used it to keep the draft out the back door.
Her smile
Nice smile. I used to think of ways to make her laugh just so I could see it.
You know you probably think I’m just a nutty old man up here. Going back over the old days. The good times, the bad times. I wish I was but I’m not because not matter what I say or who I say it to, nothing changes.
I still hate her.
I still hate my wife with every bit of my heart, and now I’m sorry Bob I know you said I would feel differently, but I don’t.
I HATE YOU!!
I HATE YOU MRS. CHARLES BURELLI!!
Now don’t worry folks I’m leaving but I have to read this stupid poem first we all have to end with, and I’m no writer it’s terrible.
(clears throat)
You made me mad on the day we wed
When you pointed out my balding head
Not just to me but to our friends

The laughs I thought would never end
You made me mad, yes you did
When you kicked out my cousin Sid,
He only smashed that vase made of clay
It was a cheap wedding gift anyway
You made me mad when we took that trip
And you convinced me to skinny dip
In that quiet place with all the trees
The cop missed you but he sure found me
(a pause, reads more slowly)
You made me mad when you got so sick
And the stupid Doctors and all their tricks
Couldn’t make you fine and well
I think they all should go to hell
Cause they didn’t care the way I did
They didn’t need you to smile and live
I need you now and I needed you then
Cause I can’t start all over again
I hate you most because you had to die
And how you had to watch me cry
But what I hate the most
The most of all
Is that I could never really hate you
Not even a little bit
Not even at all
(crumples paper then folds it and sits)
BLACKOUT