Setayesh Yavari

“MAURICE. And I wanted to join you. I got in the queue to buy a ticket.
ROSALIND. All right, so what happened?
MAURICE. It's not what happened ... It's what could happen. Now.
ROSALIND. What are you talking about, Maurice?
MAURICE. January, 1951. This time, I attend the play. And I see you across the theater. (He looks to her. She remains still unmoved)
MAURICE. This time, we make eye contact. And afterwards, we meet in the back. By the bar. (She doesn't move.) This time I say,
"Did you enjoy the performance?" (She stares at him. Says nothing.)
«Gielgud is excellent, don't you think? (Beat.)
ROSALIND. Yes, very lifelike. Very good.
MAURICE. And the incredible thing is we're both there, watching
him. Experiencing the very same thing. Together.
ROSALIND. It is incredible.
MAURICE. Boch watching.
ROSALIND. And when Hermione died, even though it was Leontes' fault, I felt for him. I truly did.
MAURICE.
Come, poor babe:
I have heard, but not believed -
ROSALIND and MAURICE.
The spirits o' the dead
May walk again.
MAURICE. And they do. I love that Hermione wasn't really dead.
That she comes back.
ROSALIND. (Sympathetically.) No, Maurice. She doesn't. Not really.
MAURICE. Of course she does.
ROSALIND. No.
MAURICE. Then how do you explain the statue coming to life?
ROSALIND. Hope. They all project it. Leontes projects life where
there is none, so he can be forgiven.
MAURICE. But don't you think he deserves to be forgiven?
ROSALIND. Do I forgive myself?
MAURICE. What? For what? (Beat.)”
― Anna Ziegler

“ROSALIND. I do love the shapes of things, you know. I love them
even before they mean something.”
― Anna Ziegler

“MAURICE. (Matter-of-factly.) It's the loneliest pursuit in the
world. Science. Because there either are answers or there aren't.
There either is a landscape that stretches before you or there isn't.
And when there isn't, when you're left in the darkness of an empty
city at night, you have only yourself.”
― Anna Ziegler

“RAY. But she never went to Leeds. Rosalind was thirty-seven when
she died. It was a particularly cold April that year; there was frost on
the trees in London; the Alps stayed snow-covered well into June.
MAURICE. No, no, no ... I won't have it.
RAY. Eulogies about her focused on her single-minded devotion
to work, the progress she made in her work, the lasting contributions
she made through her work.
MAURICE. (To Ray.) Stop that! I said: stop that right now.
RAY. I can't. It's what happened.
DON. It's the tricky thing about time, and memory. I tell my grandchildren: whole worlds of things we wish had happened are
as real in our heads as what actually did occur.
MAURICE. Stop that right now. We start over. At the beginning.This instant.
JAMES. You've got to be kidding me, Wilkins. I mean, you won.
We won. Your name on the Nobel Prize. Remember that part? For
god's sakes: this was the finest moment in your life.
MAURICE. No. It wasn't. (He turns to Rosalind.) We start over.
Just us this time. (Everyone else exits.) Please ... You see, I need ...
ROSALIND. (Gently.) What is it you need, Maurice?
MAURICE. There's something I need to tell you ... It's important.
ROSALIND. Then tell me. (Beat.)
MAURICE. I saw you. The day you went to see The Winters Tale at the Phoenix.
ROSALIND. This is what you needed to tell me?”
― Anna Ziegler