Sissi!

A Play

Cast The Instructor · Sissi · The Other Students · The First Student
The New Student · Napoleon · The Caretaker

(A classroom at the Institute for the Advancement of Dictatorships. The tall window, the lake beyond it, flat and grey in the morning light. The far shore is just visible. The students sit at their desks. The Instructor stands at the front. Beside him, a girl in a simple white dress.)

The Instructor

We have a new student. Please welcome her.

(He glances at her. She does not react.)

The Instructor

Perhaps you would introduce yourself.

Sissi

My name is Elisabeth, but everybody calls me Sissi. I'm seventeen.

(A beat.)

Sissi

When I was sixteen, I became an empress. But that's a long time ago.

The Other Students

An empress!

Sissi

It was less fun than you might think.

(A beat.)

Sissi

My hobbies are poetry and horse riding.

The First Student

(pointing at the New Student) He has a beautiful mare.

The New Student

She's called Veritata.

Sissi

That's a beautiful name.

The New Student

You can ride her anytime.

Sissi

I'm looking forward to that.

(A knock on the door. Enter the Caretaker and Napoleon.)

Napoleon

Sissi!

(Sissi curtsies.)

Sissi

It's such an honour, Your Majesty.

(Napoleon takes a seat at the back of the room. The Caretaker leaves.)

The New Student

Which country did you rule?

Sissi

I didn't rule at all. That was my husband's job. But to answer your question, it was Austria and Hungary.

(A beat.)

Sissi

And Bohemia, Dalmatia, Croatia, Slavonia, Galicia, Carinthia, Moravia… I forget the full list.

The Other Students

Wow!

Sissi

My last ever trip was to here. I stayed on the other shore.

(She turns to the window.)

The First Student

You were stabbed there.

Sissi

Yes, I was, wasn't I. The man was called Luigi.

(A beat.)

Sissi

I still find that comical.

(She looks at the water.)

Sissi

It was the tenth of September, 1898.