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MARGARET. Have you ever seen them?
OSSOLI. What?
MARGARET. The caricatures?
OSSOLI. What are they?
MARGARET. Have you seen this morning’s paper?
OSSOLI. I can barely read Italian.
MARGARET. Do you want to see one? Here. “The Adventures of Miss Regret Fully. Regret storms the Polling Booths.” It’s not even funny. Is it?
OSSOLI. I don’t know.
MARGARET. I don’t even think it looks like me. I never wear my beard that long.
OSSOLI. You? That’s you? I’ll kill the man.
MARGARET. No…no, you’d better not….
OSSOLI. Will you be at home tonight?
MARGARET. Hm? No, not tonight, my friend. Tonight I must sit in a noisy theater reviewing a bad play about an idiotic woman. (Checking the press release). This one takes place in ancient Rome. Have you ever seen “The Ruin of Oblivia?”
OSSOLI. I do not get to the theater very much.
MARGARET. How sad. Have you only the fate of a country to occupy your time?
OSSOLI. (A great lover of stories) What is it about?
MARGARET. Oblivia is mourning the death of her lover—who’s just been brutally murdered by her family.
OSSOLI. They did not approve of the match?
MARGARET. No. She’s just found his freshly buried body.
OSSOLI. Poor woman.
MARGARET. Yes. At first she sees only his hand—but she knows it’s him.
OSSOLI. His ring.
MARGARET. Yes. She begins digging frantically with her bare hands…
OSSOLI. Mother of God.
MARGARET. She sees his face. (A scream) She’s distraught.
OSSOLI. Of course.
MARGARET. She knows her chances now of getting through Act V without killing herself are next to nothing.
OSSOLI. What? She knows this?
MARGARET. She grabs his knife and stabs herself repeatedly in the breast—as with her free hand she begins to dig a grave next to his.
OSSOLI. Margherita…I do not like this ending.
MARGARET. Sorry. It’s easier to get a rich man into heaven than a rebellious woman through a play alive.
OSSOLI. Well, Margherita, then you must write for me the one in which she lives. Come to Rome with us and we will give you a theater.
MARGARET. What a dear friend you are.
OSSOLI. I can show you my favorite cathedral where I used to pray when I was a child.
MARGARET. I would love to see it. Someday.
OSSOLI. Not someday, Margherita. This day. Come back with us.