The Boundary
by Tom Stoppard & Clive Exton
Cast: 3 men, 1 female, & 1 shim (operator can be a man or woman)
Characters:
Johnson: Male, an old lexicographer
Operator: A male or female voice (unseen role)
Bunyans: Male, another old lexicographer with an unfortunate name
Brenda: Female, Johnson's wife
Cricketeer: Male, a cricket player (silent role)
Summary:
In this made-for-BBC collaboration between Tom Stoppard and Clive Exton, The Boundary begins with Johnson entering a library that has been completely torn up to pieces. There are papers upon papers covering the entire office floor, furniture, etc. He peers into a telescope through the window to see a cricketeer, and then snaps back to his reality. He tries to call the operator to report that he has been burglarized, when in comes Bunyans. Bunyans is Johnson's co-lexicographer, and throughout the one-act, we discover the men have been hard at work on compiling a dictionary, yet also have some bad blood boiling between the two. They argue, but become tangled in their own words as well as trying to place their dictionary's words back in order. Under all of the mess of papers, they both spot Brenda's feet, thinking she is dead, but do not voice this to one another. Eventually Brenda awakens and confronts the two, with the two men thinking Brenda committed the crime out of spite, as she is a bad lexicographer. They then hear glass breaking, and all turn towards the same window Johnson earlier peered through where he saw the cricketeer. The window is broken, and Brenda is now lying on the floor, unconscious, with a ball rolling on the floor. Johnson and Bunyan look at the window (which is a French window), to see it open and in enters the same cricketeer. Wind blows through and the papers are all rifled up again. The cricketeer collects his ball from the floor and exits through the window. Moral of the story: dictionaries are lost causes and cricketeers are assholes.
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