Let's Not Talk About the Empire

A dining room.

            (MOTHER, MOM, HUSBAND, and WIFE are all seated at the table.)

WIFE:  Now what did we promise?

MOTHER/MOM/HUSBAND:  No talking politics./No talking about bad stuff./No politics.

WIFE:  That’s right.  No politics.  We’re going to have a nice holiday meal.

HUSBAND:  Mom, you okay with that?

MOM:  Sure.

WIFE:  Mother?

MOTHER:  I have lots of other things I can talk about.

WIFE:  Wonderful.

            (They begin to eat.)

MOTHER:  The weather’s been so nice lately.

MOM:  That’s because the Rebels blew up the ship that was blocking our second sun.

HUSBAND:  Mom—

MOM:  What?  She brought up the weather.

MOTHER:  That ship never blocked the sun.

WIFE:  Mother, please—

MOTHER:  It didn’t.  It was barely near that sun.

MOM:  You’re delusional.

MOTHER:  You’re a cow!

WIFE:  STOP!  This is not good for the baby.

HUSBAND:  She’s right.  We all need to try and have a civilized evening together even if we are on different ends of the political spectrum.

MOM:  At least I’m on the light side.

MOTHER:  You mean the side that’s going around damaging property?

MOM:  Compared with blowing up planets, I’d say a few ships are—

WIFE:  Mom, please, there is no defending what the Rebels are doing.  Now, I appreciate their cause, but their approach is very misguided.

MOTHER:  Thank you.  It’s nice to see that my daughter-in-law agrees with me.

HUSBAND:  Well…I think she might be a little confused, Mother.

WIFE:  No, I’m not.  I’m not at all confused.

MOTHER:  You know, I met Lord Vader once.

HUSBAND:  Here we go with Lord Vader.

MOTHER:  I think he gets portrayed very negatively in the galaxy.

WIFE:  Darling, why would you say I’m confused?

MOM:  How would you portray him?

HUSBAND:  Because you are.

MOTHER:  As a man with a vision.

WIFE:  No, I’m not.

MOM:  How do you have a vision when you can’t see through your helmet?

HUSBAND:  Sweetheart, it sounds as if you agree with the Dark Side.

WIFE:  Do we really need to go throwing around labels like Light Side and Dark Side?  All they do is divide us.

HUSBAND:  Yes, which is a good thing, because otherwise, we could end up being, you know, evil.

MOTHER:  It’s a label.

HUSBAND:  I like labels.  Labels are good.  If it weren’t for labels, we would never know when tauntaun milk has gone bad or which fences are electric.

WIFE:  Darling, you’re starting to sound like a Jedi.

HUSBAND:  I WISH I could be a Jedi.

MOTHER:  There goes my blood pressure.

MOM:  I dated a Jedi once.  He was very…impressive.

WIFE:  Enough about the Jedi, Mom, it was one date.

MOM:  He thought I was charming.

MOTHER:  And yet he didn’t marry you.

MOM:  I didn’t want to marry him.

WIFE:  Thank god.

MOM:  I wasn’t a fan of the ponytail, and he was always talking in riddles.  Do this or do not do this.  It was like dating a fortune cookie.

HUSBAND:  I happen to think that being a Jedi is—is—

WIFE:  Insane?  They’re nothing but magicians.  They do parlor tricks.

HUSBAND:  They have light sabers!

WIFE:  Is that what this is about?  I told you, I will buy you a light saber, provided you only use it in the garage.  I don’t want the baby going anywhere near it.

MOM:  What if the baby’s a Jedi?

WIFE:  The baby is not a Jedi.  The baby is going to be raised to be an upstanding citizen of the Empire.

HUSBAND:  The hell he is!

MOM:  This should be interesting.

MOTHER:  My grandson is not going to be a Jedi.

WIFE:  Agreed.

MOM:  How do you know it’s a boy?

WIFE:  I’ve been throwing up for six weeks straight.  Only a man could make you that sick.

MOM:  She’s got a point, Son.

HUSBAND:  I wish you’d brought all this up before we got married!

MOM:  I tried to warn you about her.

WIFE:  Mom!

MOM:  You take after your father.  He was a very depressing man.

MOTHER:  I loved your father.  I remember when I was having trouble with my neighbors and he offered to slaughter them all for me.

WIFE:  He was very considerate.

HUSBAND:  Don’t you see that we’re talking about right and wrong here?

WIFE:  Don’t go throwing around your liberal terminology to try and make me change my mind.  Just because one group of people tortures and oppresses another, that doesn’t automatically make them the bad guys.

MOM:  It doesn’t?

WIFE:  No!  Some people like being tortured and oppressed.  They’re used to it.  They wouldn’t know what to do if you DIDN’T torture and oppress them.

MOTHER:  God, it’s been forever since I was really oppressed.

HUSBAND:  Mother—

MOTHER:  Or tortured.

HUSBAND:  My child is not going to be pulled to the Dark Side!

WIFE:  He’s not going to have any choice.

HUSBAND:  We’ll see about.

WIFE:  Oh, we certainly will.

HUSBAND:  We will.

WIFE:  We CERTAINLY will.

HUSBAND:  WE WILL.

WIFE:  WE CERTAINLY WILL.

            (A beat.)

MOM:  Did anybody make cranberry sauce this year?

            (They ALL look at her.)

            End of Play