TALKING TO THREE BUSY DEBRAS

Jake Honig

Setting: Brooklyn apartment, present day.

Debra ……..….…..SANDY HONIG

Debra …….….…...ALYSSA STONOHA

Debra ……..……...MITRA JOUHARI

Interviewer …..….JAKE HONIG

LIGHTS FADE UP.

The THREE BUSY DEBRAS sit around a kitchen table. SANDY and ALYSSA stare directly into the microphone. MITRA chops garlic. The INTERVIEWER speaks: 

This is the beginning of the interview. You are the Three Busy Debras. Identify yourselves.

Mitra: Mitra.

Sandy: Sandy.

Alyssa: Alyssa.

What does it mean to be a ‘Debra’?

Mitra: Busy.

Alyssa: Busy.

Sandy: Busy.

Alyssa: One of three!

Sandy: It means you’re one of three.

It means you’re busy?

Sandy: It means you’re too busy to answer this dumb fucking question. I’m drunk.

Alyssa: You heard it here first, the Three Busy Debras are all drunk!

Sandy: Strike it from the record.

Alyssa: Yeah, off the record!

Sandy: Let’s start over. You don’t have to include that I’m drunk.

Alyssa: Me neither.

What does a Debra do?

Mitra: I mean always busy, lots to do.

Sandy: There’s always so much.

Alyssa: Everything. And she has brunch a lot with her two best friends, Debra and Debra.

Sandy: I would say Debra has a lot of tasks, a lot of errands, a lot of to-do list things to check off.

Three Busy Debras performed a show at the Annoyance Theater in Brooklyn, and then it went to Carnegie Hall.

Sandy: And now The Annoyance is closing. And so is Carnegie Hall.

Alyssa: We did a different show at Carnegie Hall from the one we did at the Annoyance. We didn’t take the show to Carnegie Hall, I just want to make that very clear for all of our fans and readers and listeners.

Sandy: We wanted to, that was the original idea. But if we wanted to do the show at Carnegie Hall that we’d done at the Annoyance it would have cost us $30,000.

Alyssa: We would have risked a lot because that show got messy. And that would have been really really bad for-

Sandy: The Hall.

Alyssa: The Hall.

Sandy: Laura Hall.

Alyssa: Anthony Michael Hall.

Sandy: The Kids in the Hall.

Alyssa: Balls to the wall.

Sandy: Let the record show Mitra is eating almonds!

Mitra: Raw.

Alyssa: And sliced!

Sandy: Now a thing about the interviewer, the interviewer cannot have almonds if they are raw because they make his throat itch. He can only have toasted almonds.

It’s true. I’m allergic.

Alyssa: I think my dad’s allergic to dried fruit? But then he always eats it and always has to go to the hospital. Well no, I’m being dramatic. For comedic purposes.

Sandy: (burps) Good luck transcribing this.

For those who don’t know what a Debra is, what are you?

Alyssa: Like Sandy, Mitra and Alyssa? Or Debra, Debra and Debra?

Sandy, Mitra, Alyssa.

Alyssa: Comedians.

Sandy: Comedians. Women.

Alyssa: Women!

Sandy: WOMEN!!!

Alyssa: Hot topic.

But let’s go to the essential question  –

Sandy: We met at Juilliard.

No. Are women really funny?!

Sandy: You know, we get this question a lot in the many interviews that we do.

Alyssa: You know what I really say about this?

I was just kidding, I’m not asking that question.

Alyssa: No but you know what I really say about this? Women are really funny in that you want to laugh with them. Men are funnier because you want to laugh at them.

Sandy: Because they’re stupid and ugly.

Alyssa: Because they’re stupid and their bodies are horrible and it’s just fantastic. I was watching an ACDC video and Bon Scott was mostly shirtless and was the funniest thing I’ve ever seen in my life, and also RIP, like I respect that  –

Mitra: I respect that?!

Alyssa:  – but his body! This is hilarious and I wanna kill myself that I can’t do this on stage.

Mitra: Cut to one week ago, Alyssa saying “I will never do an interview again.”

Alyssa: I was really jealous because women can’t take their shirts off onstage for a character and have it be funny. Even if I were to see a woman shirtless I’d be like ew, what? But men do it and it’s funny to laugh at them. So that’s where it’s unfair and the world is wrong. And also everyone says Free the Nipple? I say Men, Wear Shirts. If we’re gonna have equality I don’t want to see anyone with their clothes off.

Sandy: Yes! I agree!

Alyssa: And I saw my neighbor take out his garbage without his shirt on and I found it very offensive. Not because I couldn’t do that but because I had to see it. And so I say, Men Should Wear Shirts.

Sandy: Button up! I hope that didn’t sound like I was body-shaming.

Alyssa: I don’t care. I’m not body-shaming people loving their bodies, I’m body-shaming all humans for having bodies because it’s such a shame. It’s such a shame. I wish I was vapor.

So I have another question. When do you feel the most beautiful?

Alyssa: Oh god.

Sandy: When I’m directing…

Mitra: EWWWWWW.

Alyssa: Fuck you.

Sandy: WHEN I’M DIRECTING… sorry that’s my direct quote from Lena Dunham. Leave this part out.

Okay.

Sandy: Don’t type up anything I said.

Alyssa: Me neither.

Sandy: Don’t type up anything I said. (burps)

So what’s next on the Debra menu?

Alyssa: Filet mignon.

Sandy: High steaks.

Mitra: Brunch!

Alyssa: Hey guys can we meet in the other room really fast? We need to get on the same page for this interview.

Sandy: What’s next for the Debras? I would like to know too.

Alyssa: I think what’s next for the Debras is we got a Monday coming up. We’re all gonna be going to work.

Sandy: That’s true.

Mitra: I’d like to silently chop garlic for every interview.

Alyssa: I’m never giving another interview, this didn’t count.

Sandy: This doesn’t count.

Exeunt.