Lights up on a break room, beige, boring, and bleak. The audience knows it’s a break room because it has sad, round dining tables (none of which are entirely clean), mass-produced molded-resin chairs (one step above the metal folding kind), and paper napkin dispensers. There’s also a large counter with a sink, a microwave, some depressing MDF cabinets, and a bargain-basement fridge. The lighting is criminally offensive. 

Stage right, two men are seated. One (Omar) looks distraught, his head in his hands. The other (Daniel) leans in, trying to comfort his friend. Stage left, someone is seated at a different table, facing mostly upstage. Their head rests on the surface of the table. Are they sleeping? Weeping? Dead? Maybe we’ll find out. 

OMAR: I don’t know, man.

DANIEL: I get it.

OMAR: No, you don’t.

DANIEL: I do, I promise. It’ll be fine.

OMAR: You don’t, and it won’t.

(Daniel sips sad, cold coffee from a sad paper cup. Grimaces. Pause. He decides to take a different approach.)

DANIEL: I think you’re looking at this the wrong way. She was an amazing human being, and we were blessed — 

OMAR: (Without looking up) Ew. 

DANIEL: We were fortunate to have breathed the same air. How many people accomplished as much as she did?

OMAR: (Thinking for a moment) Oprah. Madonna. Meryl Streep. George Clooney. Patrick Stewart. Ian McKellen. Dame Judy Dench. Patti LaBelle, but only in grocery stores…

DANIEL: Well — 

OMAR: Cher, obviously.

DANIEL: Okay —

OMAR: (Looking up. Realization!) Oh, god, what if we lose Cher?

JAVIER: (Wailing and sobs)

DANIEL: (To Javier) Cher is fine.

OMAR: But she won’t be around forever.

DANIEL: Despite the rumors, probably not.

OMAR: A world without Cher? That…that is something I just can’t face. 

DANIEL: What is it, you cuntface?

OMAR: Is that some kind of joke?

DANIEL: A very good one, actually. Before your time. 

OMAR: I’m not that much younger than you. And I’m sitting here worrying about Cher, who predates both of us! (Daniel raises his hands in apology.) What happens when she goes? And Oprah? And Gandalf? They shouldn’t be allowed on the same plane!

DANIEL: They’re all fine. Madonna, too.

OMAR: Fuck Madonna.

JAVIER: (Wailing and sobs)

OMAR: (To Javier) Sorry. (To Daniel, whispering) I mean, I’m sure she was fun back in the day, but what even is she now?

DANIEL: My money is on sentient botulism.

OMAR: But Cher!

JAVIER: (Sobs)

DANIEL: Look, it’s natural to grieve. It’s natural for a lot of fears about mortality to surface at times like this.

OMAR: Spare me. I’ve stared down the barrel of the grief gun more times than I can count.

DANIEL: “Grief gun”?

OMAR: When I was seven, my boyfriend Nelson left me. I cried for weeks!

DANIEL: You had a boyfriend at seven?

OMAR: Then, in junior high, I came home from school to discover that Aunt Sarah had thrown out all my pogs.

(Silence)

OMAR: It was a tragedy! Do you know how many bootleg Tasmanian Devil pogs I’d collected over the years?

DANIEL: (Pause. A lightbulb goes off) I have so many follow-up questions, but first: do you have a Looney Tunes fetish I don’t know about?

OMAR: No! What’s wrong with Taz? He’s adorable. 

DANIEL: Uh huh. It’s all coming together now. The pogs. This Tweety Bird tee (poking Omar’s shirt)…

OMAR: (Swatting away Daniel’s hand) Begone, peasant!

DANIEL: And I’ve never seen you naked —

OMAR: I blocked you on Grindr and J-Date. 

DANIEL: — but I have a hunch that you’re sporting a teeny tiny Taz beside your teeny tiny — 

OMAR: (Pause) Fuck you, honey.

DANIEL: Drop your pants.

OMAR: Quoth I: “Fuck you.”

JAVIER: (Finally upright) Silence! The issue at hand has nothing to do with the tattoo of Marvin the Martian hidden in the jungle of Omar’s ass crack.

DANIEL: (Shocked and delighted) Marvin?!

JAVIER: Clearly, you’ve not discovered Chaturbate.

OMAR: (To Javier) Jungle? Queen, you know I wax.

JAVIER: No, the issue at hand has only to do with a dearly departed country singer’s goodness and aggressively branded cheesecake.

OMAR: I’m listening. (To Daniel, who is not-so-slyly trying to pull down Omar’s pants) The fuck are you trying to do?

DANIEL: Show me your ass.

OMAR: (To Javier) Can you believe this? If he weren’t so pathetic, I’d call HR.

DANIEL: I bet you say that to all the boys.

JAVIER: I must insist that you both cut the codswallop and SHUT THE FUCK UP! (Violently hurls a napkin dispenser across the room. Everyone stops.) There has been a great ebbing in the force, a dimming of light in our corner of the multiverse. We have lost our best and brightest honky tonk angel. (Pause. Lights out, narrow spot on Javier, who says quietly, maliciously.) And someone is going to pay! (Lights up again.)

OMAR: (Pause) I like where this is going. Proceed.

JAVIER: Now, what would Dolly do in a situation like this?

DANIEL: The situation of her being dead?

JAVIER: I refer to the lamentable state of the world. We are beset on all sides by overlapping threats from Trumpworld, AI slop, data centers, fast fashion, mega-gonorrhea, climate catastrophe —

OMAR: JK Rowling!

DANIEL: I’m not sure —

OMAR: Those books were EVERYTHING to me, and I can’t even read them anymore thanks to that red-pilled bitch.

JAVIER: The whore speaks the truth. Fuck Rowling!

DANIEL: Is it ROW-ling like a rowing a boat or RAO-ling like a super-gay lion roaring?

JAVIER: The real question is: how much more are we expected to take? How much more can we take?

OMAR: Jump to the recipe, sugar: what are you planning?

JAVIER: The time is nigh for an uprising! To the streets!

OMAR: Bold choice. 

DANIEL: Before I sign on, what’s the goal of this uprising, Robespierre?

JAVIER: I…have not gotten that far. Just open Canva and throw together some flyers. We march tonight!

DANIEL: From where and to where?

OMAR: We’ll need a folksy battle anthem. Dear god, how will we find enough lesbian guitarists on such short notice? 

JAVIER: From here!

DANIEL: From Target?

JAVIER: We depart from Cosmetics, and we won’t stop until we reach city hall!

DANIEL: You realize that city hall is nearly ten miles away. It’s also, like, 100 degrees out.

JAVIER: It will be nighttime!

DANIEL: So, 90 degrees and ten miles —

OMAR: Probably closer to nine. 

DANIEL: Nine miles, at night — that’s hours of walking. And tomorrow’s Sunday, so the building will be closed.

OMAR: We could leave a note? “Sorry we missed you! Love, the Revolution.”

DANIEL: Should I dress as Wendy or Lisa?

OMAR: How are you so old?

JAVIER: You are both terrible at this.

DANIEL: In our defense, we aren’t trained revolutionaries. Are you, Madam Castro?

JAVIER: I’ll have you know that I recently watched a documentary on Josephine Baker!

DANIEL: Uh huh.

JAVIER: She was a spy for the French Resistance during World War II!

OMAR: So why aren’t we spying instead of marching?

JAVIER: Enough! Can’t you dickbutts see that Dolly was one of the few things holding this hellish world together — 

OMAR: I resent being called a dickbutt.

DANIEL: Though your diet includes both.

OMAR: But I’m picking up what you’re putting down.

JAVIER: Are you?

DANIEL: You are?

OMAR: Duh! This is a pivotal moment in history, and we should capitalize on it. Like how Judy Garland’s death triggered the Stonewall Riots!

DANIEL: Where did you get that?

OMAR: Telegram? Blue Sky? No, Instagram. 

DANIEL: It’s true, her funeral was the day before the riots, but that’s probably more of a coincidence than a cause.

OMAR: So a bunch of gays, lesbians, and trans people just happened to let their rage boil over the day after their beloved icon was laid to rest a few blocks away? That’s a goddamn iffy coincidence.

DANIEL: Coincidences are always iffy. 

OMAR: Well, I think the Judy angle makes for a good story! And it feeds into the message that we’re trying to get across: “Turn your sadness into rage”. 

JAVIER: Exactly.

DANIEL: You know that’s what white supremacists say, right?

OMAR: No!

JAVIER: No!

DANIEL: Yes!

OMAR: Well, it’s a good slogan. I’ll give them that.

DANIEL: Look, I understand the emotions here, and I absolutely understand the urge to do something in this moment. But if we’re gonna do anything, we need a better plan. 

OMAR: Fine, start with the goal. What do we want?

JAVIER: People being nicer to us!

OMAR: Ew. No one likes a whiner. 

DANIEL: Be more aggressive.

JAVIER: RFK Jr. hung from the Washington Monument by his balls!

DANIEL: Too aggressive.

OMAR: Too vivid.

JAVIER: How about solidarity? Unity among BLTs, is that too much to ask?

OMAR: Yawn. “Florals for spring? Groundbreaking.” 

DANIEL: Tweety is right. Wanting to hold hands and sing “Kum By Ya” isn’t pushing any envelopes. 

OMAR: Dull, girl. 

DANIEL: And if unity’s our goal, marching on city hall would be marketing to the wrong audience. We have to start with our own peeps. 

OMAR: To Sniffies!

DANIEL: Also, I hate to ask this, but can our rainbow tribe even think about what we have in common? 

OMAR: Speak it, sister. “I have a unique point of view! Don’t devalue my lived experience, colonizer! Like and subscribe!” 

DANIEL: There’s a time and place for that, but would it kill everyone to speak about US instead of ME for a minute?

OMAR: We just have to identify one thing that all of US want. 

(Long silence)

JAVIER: Money?

OMAR: Everyone wants money, especially straight people with all of their sick, hungry, Labubu-loving rugrats. We need something specific that others have but we don’t. 

JAVIER: Healthcare?

DANIEL: Seriously? That’s the only level playing field in America. We’re all equally fucked.

(Another longish pause)

JAVIER: Sex. 

DANIEL: Come again? 

OMAR: Don’t mind if I do. 

JAVIER: Everyone wants sex, am I right? 

DANIEL: Apart from the Asexuals. 

JAVIER: Only thing is, our sexuality has been legislated. Conservatives don’t want us to have sex because when we do it, babies don’t come out.

OMAR: The Bisexuals would disagree. And side note, straight men love a non-baby-making blowjob. I speak from experience. 

DANIEL: Javier has a point. As uncomfortable as it makes us to put our sexuality front and center, that’s our brand. 

OMAR: If queers have a brand, I want to talk to someone about our color scheme.

DANIEL: Brand, calling card, whatever. It’s what separates the gays from the metrosexuals. 

OMAR: No one uses that word anymore, gramps.  

JAVIER: The long and short of it is, we like different things in bed.

OMAR: So you say, but show me the straight man who doesn’t like a rimjob, and I’ll show you a liar with his ass in the air. 

DANIEL: Just to be clear: are we calling for an orgy? Is this revolution going to hinge on the right to have consensual, oral-anal-frot-goon sodomy whenever we like? Because, I think we can already do that. 

OMAR: Well, some of us can.

JAVIER: But for how much longer? Remember Roe? The same thing could happen to Lawrence v. Texas.

DANIEL: It could, but it hasn’t. How do you revolt against a possibility?

JAVIER: I don’t know. Ask Schrödinger’s pussy. 

OMAR: But most importantly, how in the holy hoedown does Dolly fit into all this?

(Long pause. FX: sound of grandfather clock ticking. Lights begin to fade, get about 50% to blackout, then brighten to full in the blink of an eye. FX ends.)

JAVIER: I’ve got it! 

OMAR: Heartburn? Crabs?

JAVIER: A perfect Dolly-themed protest. 

OMAR: Well, I’ve got an idea of my own. 

DANIEL: As do I. 

JAVIER, OMAR, DANIEL: A live-streamed staged reading of The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas to raise money for Lambda Legal!

OMAR: (Continuing) Performed by sock puppets. 

(Pause) 

JAVIER: I don’t hate it. 

DANIEL: Then, call me Mrs. Birdseye, the show is frozen! 

JAVIER: We can do it at my place. I have a few lights, and we can set up a stage in Jorgen’s office while he’s out of town. (They begin getting up from their seats.)

OMAR: Tomorrow night, 7-ish? More views then, probably. 

JAVIER: Agreed! I’d better clock out a little early to begin setting up. Swing by after work, we’ll figure out the details over a cheeseboard.

OMAR: You bougie bitch. Dolly would roll over in her grave. 

JAVIER: Is rolling. 

OMAR: Sacrelige!

DANIEL: I’m walking out, too. I gotta start whittling down the screenplay so the TikTok crowd stays focused.

OMAR: Well, I’m off to Men’s Accessories — and I’m not coming back without tube socks and googly eyes.

(All  begin to exit. Daniel stops.)

DANIEL: This isn’t slacktivism, is it?

OMAR: Again, no one uses that word. 

JAVIER: And who cares? No one wants to riot in all that heat anyway. 

(FX: Loud clap of thunder)

OMAR: Or a thunderstorm. 

DANIEL: Well, someone wiser than me once said that if you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain.

Dolly Parton’s cover of “Free Bird” begins to play as lights focus downstage. Daniel, Omar, and Javier lead the audience in a singalong, then out into the streets.