Susana Cook's "100 Years of Attitude" mocks the title of the Latin American novel "One Hundred Years of Solitude" by Gabriel García Márquez. The play approaches the theme of execution, imperialism, invasion, and colonialism making several explicit references to the war in Afghanistan, the invasion of Iraq, and the official discourse of the US president George W. Bush's administration regarding the role of the United States in the international context. The play talks about the end of the world as a subjective experience, that is captured in the following sentence: "When everybody around you is dying... that's the end of the world." In the piece, a Christian executioner prays before killing and an American family comes to live in town taking over the local homes. The people of this fictional lesbian town are executed several times, always coming back to life; the life of a community prevails over that of the individual. Some other themes that appear in the show, that are a constant in Cook's work, are the theme of the "Hero" --through references to Odysseus-- and the corrupting effect of power.

Scripts

 100 Years of Attitude (eng) (195.58 kB)

Excerpt

The three Aurelianos come on stage. They have an ash mark printed on their forehead. A black cloth is covering their eyes and their hands are tied up in the back. They are lined up by the wall, waiting to be executed by a firing squad. We hear loud electronic music and shots. The music ends, but they are still standing up.
Aureliano de Troya – Are we alive?
Aureliano Solo - I think we are
Aureliano de Troya - I thought they were going to shoot us
Aureliano Solo - Well, yeah
Aureliano Cansado - I think they shot, I heard the noise.
Aureliano Solo - Why aren’t we dead then?
Aureliano de Troya - Maybe we are
Aureliano Cansado - No, we are alive! We are alive! I love this! We are alive!
Aureliano Solo - Shut up, they’ll hear you
Aureliano Cansado - Who?
Aureliano Solo - I don’t know, shut up
Aureliano de Troya - Maybe they forgot about us
Aureliano Solo - They are so unorganized, they suck Aureliano de Troya - I was so ready to die. I was thinking how beautiful life is
Aureliano Cansado - Yes, life, life is so beautiful.
Aureliano de Troya - I was thinking about a river, with the little plants floating in the clear waters, and the fish, and a little bit of wind. I used to go there when I was a kid, I am sure. Life is so beautiful. The little things, those simple things, that’s what I miss Aureliano Cansado - I was thinking about my mother. We were in the kitchen, eating brownies, homemade cake. It smelled so good. My whole life went in front of my eyes in one second, and then I stopped at my mother’s house, because it smelled so good
Aureliano de Troya - I think we are dead
Aureliano Solo - You seem to be, with your cookies and your little plants in the river. Why were you getting executed? Because you ate too many brownies?
Aureliano Cansado - Let’s get rid of this