BONNIE & CLYDE ON THA WESTSIDE!

Synopsis:

A rap play in three acts.

It's Summer 2001, a simpler, innocent time on the West Coast with raves, teddy bears, free love, molly, acid trips, peace, love, unity and respect, America’s last summer of innocence, a time of youthful free celebration. Bonnie, a poet with a broken past, born on the American Bicentennial, and Clyde, a Midwest rapper loyal to hip hop's bygone hardcore origins, arrive, leaving the past behind, to find their fortune. 

May Day. BONNIE and CLYDE barely escape a failed heist inside the US Pharmaceutical warehouse in a California desert outside Los Angeles. Clyde’s new gang includes JELLY, a shady insider at US Pharma who turns on the gang for bigger rewards. After the failed heist, Clyde tries his hand as a rave event promoter, a mind-revealing trip for Bonnie on ecstasy, but none of Clyde’s money plans pan out and they can’t cover the back rent they owe. They’re evicted and squatting in a desperate city. Facing homelessness, Bonnie turns her back on Clyde and their poetic dreams, and strikes out on her own, finding a job at a big bank. She starts as a bank teller, handling the cash, and then asserts her pluck, beauty, empathy and Midwest charm for a promotion to a private accounts rep in a new world of high-finance white-collar crime.

On Bonnie’s last day as teller, Clyde reappears in her life in dramatic fashion in an old-style hold up, escaping with the bank loot. Worried she'll be implicated, Bonnie dresses to the nines and takes her last pay to buy herself a drink at an upscale Beverly Hills bar where she’s approached by a young self-proclaimed assistant film producer who gives Bonnie more drinks and promises than she can handle. The night doesn’t go well. Bonnie’s phone rings the next morning. Clyde can't let go of Bonnie and Bonnie can't forget her soulmate Clyde. Bonnie accepts Clyde’s invitation to the new Electric Daisy Carnival, the new EDM super rave at Hanson Dam with DJs spinning and party-goers high on life. She makes the long bus ride to jump into the arms of her old man. Clyde shares the free drugs he scored from Jelly. But the drugs are tainted and Bonnie’s bad trip ends in a hospital. Clyde doesn’t make it. A friend reappears to take Bonnie home and the women have a heart-to-heart about life and Bonnie's dream to be a poet as they drive through the night back to Los Angeles.

The next day at the bank Bonnie seems in the clear until she’s presented with her new client on the first day of her promotion, Mr. Jelly Nash of US Pharmaceuticals, who’s surprised to see Bonnie still alive. Bonnie escapes the bank and is handed a small box on the way out. Inside the box is an engagement ring Clyde bought with the stolen bank loot. Bonnie returns the ring from her deceased fiance and buys an old used VW getaway van, loads in all her belongings, and drives to the beach. The play ends with poet Bonnie amid the climactic and explosive bangs of fireworks on that California beach on her 25th birthday on the Fourth of July, 2001.

Notes: This play is a madcap fun romp meant to be played by an ensemble of versatile actors, with multiple speaking roles played by each actor, including the nonspeaking ensemble roles. This can create a psychological effect for an audience to see an unfamiliar world through the eyes of Bonnie, where characters in her life seem to cycle in a repeating relational dynamic. This has flexible casting as additional actors may be added to play any one or more of the doubled roles. All roles are ethnically nonspecific. Some roles require rhythmic speech (rap, poetry) and one requires a bit of fluent Espanol.