Katherine Elliot is one of the most spectacular stage actresses of her time. She has recently been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and is trying to make sense of her life. She is devastated that she can no longer remember the simple things in life and also the most precious thing, the words of the plays that she has performed in. Her dream is to one day play lady Macbeth but through the performance we see that though disease is taking away her memories she is not going to let it take her life without a fight. And maybe, just possibly she will pick up a script and be able to look at the famed words of Lady Macbeth and make them come to life, if only for this moment in time.
DI/ Female- Moments Of Memory
(Scene opens with Katherine. She is writing small notes and putting them on things and organizing.)
Cake, jelly, flour, spoon, fork. This is my test for the day. I always test myself on at least five items every single day. I try to spread the test throughout the kitchen. And later on in the week I'll move to the living room, bedroom, and bathroom. (She picks up the five items that she had labeled earlier to test yourself.) This is cake. (She checks, she's right.) This is a spoon. (She checks, she is right.) This is...this is a ...(She throws it in frustration.) Pen? Is it a pen? (She looks, she is wrong, we can see it on her face.)
For long I can remember the only thing I ever wanted to be was an actress. My mother put me in acting classes from the age of three until I graduated from high school and decided to major in the arts in college. My favorite movie was a version of William Shakespeare’s Hamlet from 1969 with Nicol Williamson at Hamlet, Judy Parfitt as Gertrude and the benevolent Anthony Hopkins as Claudius. But my favorite actor was Laurence Olivier and my favorite play of all time was Macbeth. Or the Scottish play, but you’re not suppose to say the name of it because it brings bag luck they say. (Beat) Maybe that is how my luck changed so much, so drastically. (She shrugs) My dream was to play Lady Macbeth. There was something that attracted me to being the leading lady. Something about Lady Macbeth and her conniving ways in the way that she manipulated everyone in the entire play and spun her web oh so perfectly. Arguably the most perfectly written female character of any Shakespeare play. She was a queen and beautiful and manipulative and crazy bitch all in one. (Laughs) I mean what could be a better role than that? (She begins to perform)