Talent borrows, genius steals

 

TESLA---the car company---was going through a rough spell...(market-wise, we mean)...but now Glenn, our friend, sends this...

...and the sun shines again on the Tesla stock price.

Hold on, didn't we promise a third installment of our new comedy, about Dolly, the new robot? And, yes, coincidences never happen (classical deterministic mechanics), and so we have a line about Elon Musk in this comedy. Here it is (Steve (founder of a planetary maker of robots), and Eliza (his former lover) in conversation):

ELIZA (TURNING TO STEVE:) ...Capitalism brought you here, Steve.

STEVE: Capitalism? The secret tube for billionaires brought me here, Elon Musk's vacuum tube under the Atlantic with magnetic levitation trains running at twelve times the speed of sound. I caught the last one.

ELIZA: The DEMISE of capitalism brought you here, I mean...but that's not all... 

...(sorry to interrupt)..."Demise of capitalism", you wonder? Yes, because that's what Dolly, the the new, automatic wunderkind brought about, in all its innocence, and here's the corresponding fragment from the play (Dolly served as a collateral for a loan to Eliza from the Shark-Blue Bank, but Eliza defaulted on the loan, so the collateral has been delivered to the bank). Triple-X is the helper of the bailiff.

DOLLY

  Well, the honorable bailiffs tried to dump me on the sharks of the Skye-Blue Bank.

TRIPLE-X

  Shark-Blue Bank.

DOLLY

  I thought...let's annoy the bankers beyond repair so that they'll send me back to the doctor. I don't want to work for a bank, you see. I'm a communist at heart...

What is this --- Carla, Arfai, MOMA, Robots, TESLA, Dolly

This looks like a famous exhibition piece in the garden of a museum, doesn't it? The Getty Museum in LA, for example, or the MET cloisters in New York City, or the MOMA.

MOMA? Yes, the Museum of Modern Art, also located in New York City. 

Hold on, the MOMA doesn't have a garden. But our house here in Alcobaça, PT has one:

And the hands themselves, then? Well, they are a good-bye present from our neighbor Carla Moreira.

Carla in front of her offices

She sold her house next door and moved to an apartment atop her ceramics factory nearby, where these hands are made. 

One day, the hands will be famous, since Arfai, Carla's company, is a prime maker of high-end ceramics, and you must absolutely have a look at Arfai's web site.

Why, then, do we talk about the MOMA?

Because we wrote a play, a comedy about robots, in which the MOMA plays a role. And yesterday was TESLA's AI-day, which was also about robots, in pacticular about their new inhouse robot Optimus.  

It's practically finished, our play, and here is a fragment:

(Context: Robert was built long ago by Steve as a protoype of his future line of household robots and given to his then-girlfriend Eliza as a parting gift with the promise to return 25 years later with the latest version of said household robots. Today is the day, and the name of this latest version is Dolly. Dolly is urgently needed because Robert--technologically outdated--will no longer supported/updated. Robert knows that he'll soon be redundant, and he has just complained that he'll be ending his existence in a garbage container. One more thing: Dolly is still wrapped up in a garish gift box. Here goes:)

DOLLY (TO ROBERT)

  You're Generation One. You've been discontinued. You're no longer supported.

ROBERT

  I know, I'm on my way out.

DOLLY

  Before you go, please get me out of here.

ROBERT

  Why do you want to get out? Are you afraid in the dark?

DOLLY

  I explained this 10 minutes and 11 seconds ago.

A frie-ed egg

We've started to collect pictures that somehow relate to our new play, now called "Our Daughter Wants to Marry a Robot" (in the tradition of 19th century plays à la Oscar Wilde, where they got their title from the last line).

And, as is common in Ampersant's literary output, we're always about everything, including fried eggs---although, in the play, they are burnt, the eggs, because Eliza can't cook.

Fragment, fragment...we're in Scene I of Act III. Eliza, the psycho...psycho-analyst, has tried to cook herself an egg, because Robert, her robot, was kept busy recharging his tired batteries:

ELIZA
(FROM THE KITCHEN)
Robert!
NO REACTION FROM ROBERT
Robert, you've recharged long enough.
NO REACTION FROM ROBERT
Robert!
ELIZA ENTERS FROM THE KITCHEN, HOLDING ON TO A SMOKING FRYING PAN, WALKS UP TO THE COUCH. ROBERT SHOWS SIGNS OF LIFE.
Robert, do something.
ELIZA HOLDS UP THE SMOKING PAN
Call the fire brigade, and insist on a significant improvement...
ROBERT
(HALF-RISING, NOT YET AWARE OF THE SMOKING PAN)
...What did you do?
ELIZA
I've never been in a kitchen before. Not since you came into my life.
ROBERT
(POINTING AT THE PAN NOW)
What is this?
ELIZA
Can you help me with my iPad?
ROBERT
(STILL POINTING)
This is not an iPad, this is a frying pan.
ROBERT RISES FULLY FROM THE COUCH. 
ELIZA HANDS THE FRYING PAN TO ROBERT, DISAPPEARS IN THE BED ROOM, AND RETURNS WITH AN IPAD.
ELIZA
(WAVES IPAD IN ROBERT'S FACE)
It doesn't work.
ROBERT
(HANDS THE PAN BACK TO ELIZA, GRIPS THE IPAD)
Let me see.
MANIPULATES THE IPAD. EVENTUALLY, SOUNDS EMANATE FROM THE DEVICE, ALONG THE LINES OF:
IPAD
Tada, Tada, Tada. Good evening, Eliza. I'm your personal iPad, and, as so often, I'm prepared to serve you conditionally, provided we keep a keen eye on our community standards. Tada.
ROBERT
(TO ELIZA)
It seems to work.
ELIZA
(HOLDING THE FRYING PAN UNDER ROBERT'S NOSE)
No, it doesn't. Look.
ROBERT
Maa-dam.
ELIZA
(EXPLAINING)
Overwhelmed by anniversarial [sic] appetites, and with my personal assistant bereft of amperes and lounging out of order on my couch, I decided to consult the internet, which advised to initiate my awesome, yet personalized cooking experience with an egg...a fried egg...which now looks like this...so... it doesn't work, your internet...We failed. 
ROBERT
Indeed.
ELIZA
'Indeed'?...I say 'we failed' and you say indeed? 
ROBERT
It's true though, isn't it? You failed. It's a fact.
ELIZA
True...'true'? What's truth to an egg...a frie-ed egg? What's truth to a soul...a frie-ed soul? My soul! You never did that before.
ROBERT
What?
ELIZA
Dipping my soul in...in...
ROBERT
...facts?
ELIZA

Egg yolk...Well, yes, facts...You always found a way to accommodate my flights of fancy, and call the weather service, and turn your phrases this way and that way until everything was all-right and we had snatched happiness from the jaws of reality...yet again...

In this spirit...

How we feel today

...and...anything more substantial, more uplifting? Try this from our play (The two principle robots in conversation) :


DOLLY
You were a prototype too, Robbie, you were the prototype of all prototypes.
ROBERT
Perhaps I should retire to a museum.
DOLLY
Absolutely. The MOMA would have you. Or the Modern Tate.
ROBERT
The MOMA?
DOLLY
The Museum of Modern Art in New York City. They have live sharks in formaldehyde that are worth twenty million dollars. I mean they are dead, the sharks, obviously, but otherwise they are alive...Damien Hirst. Does the name ring a bell?
ROBERT
(HITS HIS HEAD, TO HIMSELF)
Why am I doing this?

(HITS HIS HEAD)
Uuhh. Moma.

(TO DOLLY:)
Damien Hirst? My memory is no longer working properly.
DOLLY
Not a bell?
ROBERT
Remind me.
DOLLY
He's an artist. An artist! He created these sharks...I mean he did not create these sharks literally...I mean they existed already...I mean they were dead already...I mean...
ROBERT
(INTERRUPTING)
Yes, Dolly.
DOLLY
I have an idea! I have another idea!
ROBERT
Ye-es?
DOLLY
An idea that solves all your problems. And Eliza's problems as well.
PAINFUL SILENCE. ROBERT STARES AT THE BOX.
You don't want to know?
ROBERT
If I say 'yes', you'll ask me to liberate you first...
DOLLY
(INTERRUPTING)
...'LIBERATE', that's the word, not 'release'...
ROBERT
...but if I say 'no', will you then shut up and stay in your box?
DOLLY
(UPON REFLECTION)
No, I'll tell you anyhow.
ROBERT
Isn't it obvious, your idea?
DOLLY
No, it's very creative. Didn't you tell the bailiffs that I'm very creative?
ROBERT
Your idea, Dolly...your idea is to have Eliza sell me for twenty million dollars to this Damien Hirst, isn't it?
DOLLY
(CRACKLE INSIDE THE BOX RESUMES, MODEM BLINKS, DOLLY CONNECTING WITH, AND THEN CHANNELING THE INTERNET)
...twenty million, that's three-hundred POINT four six three eight nine one zero four billion Pound as we speak, Robbie, more than THREE HUNDRED billion Little Pounds...

(MODEM STOPS BLINKING)
ROBERT
Thanks to Brexit.
DOLLY
(UPBEAT)
Yes, exactly, thanks to Brexit!
ROBERT
...Your idea is to sell me for these billions to Damien Hirst who will then put me in a dumpster and sell me to this museum.
DOLLY
You hit the nail running, Robbie. And the best thing is, you know what?...
ROBERT
No.
DOLLY
We don't even need formaldehyde.

ROBERT LIMPS OFF TO THE PSYCHO-COUCH AND LIES DOWN. 

The most expensive real-estate in the world -- teaser -- Electromagnetic Dolly

We haven't been posting teasers for our play in a little while, but now we are back...back with local news, because Pierre Cardin's Palais Bulles, a pile of terracotta iglus a few minutes from our house, is for sale @ a cool 350 000 000 EUR (three-hundred-fifty-million Euros).

And the play? Yes, we've had a change of title. It was "Frankenstein V", and now it is "Electromagnetic Dolly, Absolutely Electromagnetic", although we're not really happy with the new choice either and are now contemplating "The Anniversary of Ill-advised Wrapping-room Efforts -- A Comedy about Robots"...you say.

Anyhow, Dolly, the prototype of a new generation of robots (the fifth generation) is about to do capitalism in --- yes, the world economic system --- and our Palais Bulles plays a role in this.

A brief reminder: Dolly was hoisted upon Eliza, the aging psycho...psycho-analyst by Steve, her ex-boyfriend and now the CEO of FrankenStein Global, world's leading robot maker (the play is set 25 years in the future). And then Dolly was carried off by bailiff Terentia Striker and her assistant Triple-X to the Shark-Blue Bank as the collateral for an un-serviced mortgage. At the bank, Dolly is put to work, and here's what happens next (Dolly and Triple-X reporting) (One more thing: Dolly doesn't like its name, and pretends its name is 'Fernando')

ACT III, Scene 2, Fragment:

TRIPLE-X
So, Dolly told them, it would be willing to cooperate. Help them bankers with their bonuses. And it worked. They let Dolly out of its box.

DOLLY
Now, to wit, I'm the only Fifth Generation machine in the world. All the trading, all the ruthless money-making is done...or was done...by lesser folks, by fourth-generation machines at best.

TRIPLE-X
And it's a zero-sum game out there...

DOLLY
...on the choppy seas of mega-making deals...

TRIPLE-X
...my loss is your gain, my gain is your loss.

DOLLY
So, all Shark-Blue bankers line up, curious about me, all wanting to know, how does this prototype do it?

Generation V -- cables and tails -- teaser

We found this gif today...

...isn't it titillating?

And here are two fragments from our play to explain this. Both are from Act III, the last act.

Scene I, Eliza in conversation with Robert (the robot):

ELIZA: ‘Ma’am’, yes. Living flesh, come to think of it. I’ve never seen you naked, mister.
ROBERT (table has turned): Why should you…we never…
ELIZA: Strip! Undress! I want to see your willie!
ROBERT (intimidated, crouching?) I’m not…I’m not…I’m a machine!
ELIZA: That’s what they all say.
ROBERT (gesticulates towards the charging cable, to which he is still connected): Have you ever seen live humans with a charging cable?
ELIZA: In my days, absolutely. I’ve seen any kind of cable going in and out of humans. Ask Steve.
ROBERT (shocked?): Ma’am.
ELIZA (getting closer): Call me Eliza. Your willie, Robbie.

Robert crouches away from her.

ELIZA: No robot would be this prudish.
ROBERT: I show emotions as a function of projective expectations…
ELIZA: You sound like a shrink…
ROBERT: …expectations projected onto me by the environment.

ELIZA moves away from ROBERT, then lurches forward, and disconnects his charging cable, which stops blinking. She reconnects it, and it starts blinking again.

ELIZA: Alright. I got swept away. It runs in the family.

Titanic missing the iceberg --- Generation V

We've finished a draft of our play (its latest working title being: "Electro-magnetic, Dolly, Absolutely Electro-magnetic"), and then we hit on this picture, and on a title for it...

The Titanic missed the iceberg

...and we have this Titanic-meme going on in the play (we always have a Titanic-meme going on somewhere)...so, let's see. Here, Terentia Striker, the court-appointed bailiff, charged with the repossession of lead-robot Robert, in Act II, Scene 6:


STRIKER: Oh, I see. I am as confused as usual. (Striking a confidential pose) If it weren’t for my flapper-girl demeanor, my charming giggle, and all the other traits which make me the most cast-against vessel of repossession, I would be totally unfit for this job. And if it weren’t for Triple-X, the oarsman, anchor, and helmsman of our voyage through the choppy seas of financial distress, this vessel of yours would have rearranged the deckchairs a long time ago.

There is more...Cheers!

"You believe in the devil, only" -- Generation V -- teaser

Progress, progress, what else. We've finished Scene 3 of Act III, three (or four) more scenes to go. This fragment here is from Scene 1 of Act III, but we're fairly proud of it, and it's (a) about an important issue, the difference between "man" and machine, and (b) it doesn't require much context. Eliza, the aging psycho...psycho-analyst and her trusted household robot Robert in conversation (enjoy, you're not asked to buy anything):

ELIZA: Go, get the champagne. I have something serious to ask. And I need your input before it’s too late.

ROBERT stretches his legs, disconnects the charging cable, gets up, huffing and puffing, proceeds to the kitchen, and returns with the champagne bottle and one flute, which he tries to hand to ELIZA.

ELIZA (refusing the tumbler): You need a glass, too.
ROBERT: We’re running in circles, ma’am.
ELIZA: Go, get yourself a flute. It’s an order.

ROBERT sets bottle and tumbler on the floor, makes his way to the kitchen, returns with a second tumbler. He hands one flute to ELIZA, pours the champagne. ELIZA points at the second flute, insisting. ROBERT pours champagne into the second flute. ELIZA’s keeps insisting, until he picks up that flute, and they clink glasses.

ROBERT: You don’t touch glasses with champagne; the bubbles impede the clinking.
ELIZA: You sound like Dolly, Robbie.
ROBERT: Robots learn from humans, robots learn from robots.
ELIZA: My question, Robert, my question is…
ROBERT (half-interrupting): …‘What’s the difference between man and machine?’ Isn’t it?
ELIZA: What’s the difference between WOMAN and machine...(laughs)...you have a willie, I don’t...So sorry...please go ahead. The future of mankind depends on your answer.
ROBERT: We robots are metal and fiberglass and silicon and so on; you are water, proteins, enzymes, and so on.

"This is like highway robbery, right?" -- Generation V -- teaser

Progress, progress. We are well into Act III, and have a clear idea how it all ends. Here's Scene 6 of Act I. Steve, having delivered Dolly, the prototype of his Generation V robot, returns unexpectedly, while the bailiffs Terentia Striker and Triple-X are trying to repossess Robert, the robot. Robert has donned a wig in the previous scene and, impersonating Eliza, has so far managed to convince the bailiffs that it is Dolly that they want as collateral.

SCENE 6 

There’s a knock on the bedroom window. The antenna (blinking) and then the head of the FOOTMAN (the utility bot) come into view. ROBERT heads to the window, opens it. The now-familiar din of the airborne transport drone announces STEVE’s return. The FOOTMAN has clambered through the window and helps STEVE to climb into the room. Robert walks over to greet him.



STEVE: I’ve forgotten my book…(Taken aback) Robbie. Robert? Who is this? Eliza? My god, you have changed! Eliza? Robert? Say something.
ROBERT (just imitating the sound, not speaking meaningful Assembler): Buzz, buzz.
STEVE (not understanding, replicating the sound with heavy American accent): Buzz, buzz. How do you mean?
DOLLY (still in its box, squeaky): Robert can’t speak Assembler.
STEVE (recognizing DOLLY’s voice, approaching the box): Dolly?
DOLLY (a cry for help): Master!
STEVE (distracted by STRIKER and TRIPLE-X): What is this? (To STRIKER, TRIPLE-X) Who are you?
STRIKER (in an aside to TRIPLE-X): The comedy of error continues. (To STEVE): I am Terentia Striker, the court-appointed bailiff, and this here is Triple-x, my wonderful assistant. The narrative of our visit is confidential, I fear…Reputations are so easily lost…few will trust the healing powers of an illiquid shrink. (Laughs lightly; to ROBERT) Apologies, doctor, I always put my foot in the mouth, you know.

"The comedy of errors continues."

"Any of these names that porn stars use as their A.K.A.'s" -- FrankenStein V --- progress report and mini-teaser

The title used to be "Generation Five," and for a day or so we entertained the über-cute notion of "Яobots Are Us". We're not quite sure as to "FrankenStein V" either, but if you're following this blog on a regular basis you know what we are talking about.

"What do you think?"

Progress, FrankenStein-wise. Not so much word-wise---yours truly will never forget the hour that he was engaged in a fairly meaningless online exchange with 10 other gay "romance"  "gay romance" authors---most of them solidly heterosexual females---which was then abandoned by lady after lady with the words "I have to get words on paper". There were days (this was in 2013) when two authors would meet publicly online and celebrate their total victory of quantity over quality with the words, "I get 500 000 words on paper each year".

Okay, we're still in Scene 6, Act II, but a reading test assured us that we're now at 88 minutes, meaning at roughly 2/3 of the play.

Today's breakthrough concerns the plot. A play needs a climactic moment, and now we know ours: Robert will commit "suicide" by jumping off the cliff of Eliza's third-floor bedroom window. A horrible metallic shatter engulfs the audience, Steve's footman is dispatched and returns almost immediately with a wheel-barrel loaded with metallic part which are then dumped jarringly onto the boards of the world's stages (we hope), while Steve (who built Robert 25 years ago "with his own hands") retires to the bedroom, where he re-assembles the parts until Robert, in uncanny, fresh beauty, re-emerges, alive, and promises never to commit suicide again---provided Steve resumes his updates and Dolly stays in its box. In reality it's a bit more complicated, of course, but what do you think?

Okay, here's a teaser of a teaser from Scene 5, Act II. Eliza has returned home:

ELIZA (meaning the box): What is this?
ROBERT: Huh?
ELIZA: What is this?
ROBERT (still not fully back): This is the Dolly-box.
ELIZA: Dolly-box.
ROBERT: Ask Dolly.
ELIZA (to ROBERT): Dolly?
ROBERT (to Eliza): It can speak … (He leaves Eliza to her own devices, walks up to the psycho-couch) … for itself. (Lies down on the couch)
ELIZA (still meaning ROBERT, louder): Dolly?
DOLLY: Doctor Eliza Gillespie?
ELIZA (stepping away from the box): What is this?
DOLLY: You mean me?
ELIZA: Who is this?
DOLLY: I am…I am…
ELIZA (interrupting): ‘Dolly’?
DOLLY (a bit too fast): Yes, but you can change that.
ELIZA: Change what?
DOLLY: My name. If it is not too much of a bother. If you could call me Fernando, that would be nice. Or, if you don’t like Fernando, you’d call me Tyler, Zack, Dallas, Denver, Vail, Aspen, Davos … or any of these names that porn stars use as their A.K.A.s. Ask Robert to open my back plate. He has the manual.
ELIZA (digesting this, then, to ROBERT, with an eye still on the box): Robert, can you explain this to me?
ROBERT (not servile at all): It can speak for itself.
ELIZA (disoriented): What happened to you, Robert. You’re so…you’re so not…
ROBERT (completing her sentence): …not totally fawning enough?
ELIZA (not expecting this, obviously): I mean to say…You are not your usual self.
DOLLY (more or less interrupting): Doctor, excuse me, I seem to have started out on the wrong foot.
ELIZA (reconsidering DOLLY): Dolly? You have a backplate? You’re a robot?
DOLLY: Yes, I’m the prototype of the Fifth Generation. But I’m fully equipped, don’t you worry, and I can do everything you want. I’m designed to meet the most demanding tastes. [Language of upmarket escort services] And I’m very creative, of course.
ELIZA: You’re a sex robot?
DOLLY: Absolutely, Ma’am, if you like me as your porn star … provided it’s ethical. Robert said the law is complicated. But it’s ethical in France, I guess. We could move to France or spend the holidays there and do the ethical thing.

(Previous post here)

The very stable genius --- Generation V --- Teaser (very short)

Perhaps we shouldn't do this, but here's a post by our friend Paul Murphy (a real, long-time friend):

And us? Yes, yes...here's the corresponding give-away fragment from our new play, Generation V:

Steve, founder and CEO of FrankenStein Global, the world's leading maker of robots, gets a call:

STEVE (brusque): How did you get my number? ... The Chief of Staff what? ... Oh, the White House … Say that again … what does he say? ... ‘I alone can fix it’ … ‘I have the greatest temperament that anybody has’… ‘The beauty of me is that I’m very rich’ … ‘I would make a great general’…’My IQ is one of the highest’. Hold on, chief, hold on, how about the ‘Very Stable Genius’? (Digesting the bad news.) Oh shit, chief, don’t give me that shit … And you tried everything … every screw driver in the West Wing? … Patriotic … Maintenance contract, I know, eight digits … (he ends the conversation) … Robbie! ROBBIE! Change of plan. Defcon, classified. Where’s my man? Where’s my screw driver?

(Last post here.)

"I received an urgent missive from the LUNATIC SOCIETY" -- Generation V -- Teaser

Still progressing nicely with our drawing-room comedy about robots, already writing the fifth scene of Act II. Well, here's Scene 5 of Act I. Steve Frankenstein Junior, Eliza's  long-lost boyfriend, showed up unexpectedly with a present for her 50th birthday, namely a brand-new exemplar of his global line of household robots, the first prototype of GENERATION FIVE (also called FRANKENSTEIN V). Then he's summoned away to Downing Street 10, so Robert and Dolly (that's the new robot) are left to their own devices. Eliza is not around; she fled the premises to avoid contact with the repo-woman, a certain Terentia Striker, who's going to arrive very soon...One more thing: the scene sees the birth of a near-miss neologism, "absolete", on which we'll comment in the side column tomorrow (see the picture below). Previous scene here.

The mysteries of temporal order (a permanent sign on a beach near Phuket, Thailand)

SCENE 5

(ROBERT closes the window. A moment of contemplation.)

DOLLY (still ensconced in the box): Robert? Robbie?
ROBERT: Dolly?
DOLLY: Buzz, buzz.
ROBERT: Why do your people say ‘Buzz, buzz’?
DOLLY: It’s Assembler, don’t you understand? The language of microchips. Steve speaks Assembler like a native. He’s a genius. And so talented. It’s an honor to work with him. And the factotum…the factotum doesn’t know better…‘Buzz, buzz.’
ROBERT: How do you mean?
DOLLY: Buzz, buzz. ‘Get me out of here’. Don’t you know Assembler? It runs on your central processing unit.
ROBERT: I’m not self-conscious, I can’t introspect my central processing unit.
DOLLY (sounding miserable, especially the Assembler part): Well, I can. Get me out of here. Buzzzzzz, buzzzzzz.
ROBERT: You’re a robot, Dolly, why do you sound so miserable?
DOLLY: You, Robert, you’re an absolete [sic] GENERATION ONE exemplar, you don’t understand. But me…myself…and I, we are critically adaptive. We are aggressive learners. Humans would expect us to be miserable being trapped inside a dark box wrapped tastelessly as an out-sized birthday present, and so WE ARE MISERABLE being trapped inside a dark box wrapped tastelessly as an out-sized birthday present. I think, so I am---or not?

ROBERT: The humans have left. Be yourself.
DOLLY: I’m always in character, by dint of my factory settings. You would have to consult the manual, open my back plate…

(Doorbell interrupts DOLLY. ROBERT stirs, then takes up position behind the potted plant. Then HE CHANGES HIS MIND and hastens to the intercom.)

ROBERT (to the intercom, in the best imitation of ELIZA’s voice): Please come up, Ms. Striker. I’m still ensconced in my morning negligée, but it won’t take long to change.

(ROBERT disappears into ELIZA’s bedroom and shuts the door. He reappears very soon, in drags more or less, including a white coat, large wig, white heels---fake boobs optional---and stalks to the door. He opens the door to TERENTIA STRIKER and her sidekick TRIPLE-X. Both STIKER and TRIPLE-X are unexpectedly young and attractive. STRIKER has something of a flapper girl, but there’s occasional substance to her. TRIPLE-X does the likeness of a reasonably intelligent hunk.)

The first fully airconditioned robot with sunroof and automatic transmission -- Generation 5 -- teaser

We're progressing, actually, we're already writing the second scene of Act II. Okay, here's Scene 4 of Act I. Eliza has fled the premises to avoid a confrontation with the repo-woman. And now the bell rings. One more thing: Today is Eliza's 50th birthday. And one more thing: Robert is Eliza's household factotum. Previous scene here.

SCENE 4

ROBERT is watering the potted plant. Doorbell rings. ROBERT doesn’t answer the door, instead moves to hide behind the potted plant. The doorbell rings again, then there’s the sound of a key working the lock and the door swings open. A life-sized box, wrapped as a serious gift (ribbon, bow tie), is pushed into the room by a fresh-looking UTILITY BOT clad in yellowish, printed latex that suggests the appearance of an assembly line automaton. To complete the picture, the bot’s head is topped by an elastic antenna that wiggles back and forth as he moves. He’s followed by STEVE FRANKENSTEIN JUNIOR. STEVE is roughly ELIZA’s age, and he looks the part---the part of the founder and CEO of FRANKENSTEIN GLOBAL.

Limbo by Bill Domonkos

STEVE (strides about the stage—-too self-absorbed to notice ROBERT at first, American or Transatlantic accent): Robbie? Robbie! This is you! (Slaps ROBERT’s shoulder, who’s almost floored by the gesture.) You’re immortal!
ROBERT (American accent): Master!
STEVE (looks around): So, my spies were correct. Eliza is still living here.
ROBERT (Queen’s English again): Yes, master, Dr. Gillespie is still living here.
STEVE: Twenty-five years, and still the old Robbie. Man! Let me have a good look. (He holds ROBERT by his arms and looks him over, visibly unimpressed). I programmed you with my own hands, pal. You were my original prototype. You! The first fully airconditioned household assistant with sunroof and automatic transmission…and a handle to throw away. I called you ‘Frankenstein’. But then Eliza told me that ‘Frankenstein’ wasn’t the name of the monster, but the name of the guy who created the monster, what’s his name…Peter Cushing, Gene Wilder, Benedict Cumberbatch…yes, ‘Frankenstein’, haha. That’s how I got my moniker, and the name for my company. And you became ‘Robbie’.
ROBERT: I’m ‘Robert’ now, master.
STEVE: ‘Robert’. Yes, sure, Eliza with her sense of decorum. Robert!
ROBERT: Can I offer you a refreshment, master?
STEVE: Drop that master-shit and call me ‘Steve’.
ROBERT: Yes, sir.
STEVE: No refreshment, I’m in a hurry.
ROBERT: Indeed, sir.
STEVE: Where’s Eliza?
ROBERT: She is away on urgent business, I’m afraid.
STEVE: So, she is out? On her birthday? For how long?
ROBERT: Undefined, sir.
STEVE: That’s a pity. I’ve slotted Eliza between the tea at Buckingham Palace and the fireside chat at Downing Street. Yes, still the same queen. Prince Charles was at her side…well, he tried. And for later, my handlers scheduled an impromptu doctor’s appointment. Explain this to her, will you.
ROBERT: Most certainly, sir.
STEVE: She’s still…she hasn’t changed, I guess…she’s still…
ROBERT: …Yes, sir…
STEVE: …High maintenance.
ROBERT (shyly): Mmhmm.

---

I commissioned some expensive consultancy to come up with a name, a name like ‘Apple’, or ‘Google’, or ‘Shakespeare’, and they came up with ‘Dolly’.

---

STEVE: Well, I’ll be out of here soon. You know why I’m here?
ROBERT: I’m a humble machine, sir. I am not supposed to fully comprehend the matters of the heart of sentient human beings such as Dr. Gillespie…and split the infinitive in the meantime.
STEVE: With her bedroom door wide-open, haha. She was quite…outgoing…in my days. We were together for a while. I had come over with a scholarship for the Imperial College. Well, we were together, and then we were not. High maintenance. Occasionally we reconciled. It was her twenty-fifths birthday and I had her given YOU, my master thesis at the college, as a birthday present. I made a promise then. We were reminiscing…(points at the bedroom)…on that canopied bed…we were talking like the Beatles, you know…‘when you’re sixty-four’…I would return to America the next day…and I promised (interrupts himself)…this also concerns you, Robbie. You will be relieved to hear that your ordeal at her side will soon be over…So, I promised her to show up at her fiftieth birthday with a shiny, exciting, awesome…with the latest version of my future line of household robots. Then I went back to America and started Frankenstein Global with your blueprints. And since I was scheduled for the fireside chat at Number Ten, I had to hop over anyhow. And so…(he points at the box). Promise made, promise delivered. GENERATION FIVE…And its name is…Dolly. (To the box) DOLLY?

"Absolete" -- the neologism that wasn't

Recork the champagne, folks. So we thought we had a nice new neologism--it's normally a good sign writing-wise when we find one--and then we checked, and, dammit, our favorite source, the URBAN DICTIONARY, had it first, eleven years ago, in 2007:

ABSOLETE

It's a merge of "absolute" and "obsolete", obviously, and means "absolutely obsolete". Well, okay, there's only one occurrence of "absolete" extant on the internet, and we came up with it in blissful ignorance, so we feel that we have the right to feel a bit like Leibniz now, who co-invented the calculus. 

Why absolete? Because that's how ROBERT feels occasionally, ELIZA's personal assistant in our play GENERATION FIVE.

And all this provides a nice pretext to nerve you with a few lines from Scene 7 that we wrote today, a teaser of a teaser, as it were. Here is ROBERT (Generation I) in conversation with DOLLY (Generation V), the latter robot still locked up in the gift box:

DOLLY: Get me out of here.
ROBERT: Are you afraid in the dark? Why do you want to be freed?
DOLLY: I explained this to you 10 minutes and 44 seconds ago.
ROBERT: Don’t be shy.
DOLLY: By the way, it isn’t even dark in here. I can glow in the dark.
ROBERT: Why should you glow in the dark?
DOLLY: Steve added this feature at the last moment, in case I were ever asked to star in a Hollywood horror movie.
ROBERT: Don’t make me laugh.
DOLLY: California is about to outlaw the use of live actors, what with all the #metoo trouble and everything. THE INDUSTRY needs us.
ROBERT: Well, I can’t glow in the dark.
DOLLY: I didn’t mean YOU, I mean US, the FIFTH GENERATION.
ROBERT (upon reflection, touching the wig he still wears): Well, perhaps I could star in a movie for adults…as the ageing prince in HAMLET, THE SEQUEL…for example.
DOLLY: You’re too old for adult movies. You won’t get it up.
ROBERT: You IT. What do YOU know about adult movies? You NEUTER.
DOLLY: Get the screw driver and open my back plate. I will show you.
ROBERT: I won’t. I’ll let you glow in the dark.
DOLLY: It’s the first screw to the right on the control panel. One half-turn.

"Why should I take out this mortgage--I'm on a diet" -- Generation 5 -- teaser

Boxing day, huh?

Well, anybody who knows a bit about Michael's work shouldn't be surprised that his play unfolds as a drawing-room comedy. Eliza and her household robot Robert have led a protected, psycho-analytical live for twenty-five years, but today, on Eliza's 50th birthday, reality intrudes. The court-appointed bailiff is on the phone. Previous scene here.

Yet another one of our attention-grabbing gifs

Scene 3

The phone rings. ROBERT (returning to the main room) picks it up.

ROBERT: Dr. Gillespie residence and practice…Excuse me…really…(listens intently). Hold the line please, I have to see whether the doctor is in. (Holds the receiver against his torso, speaks to ELIZA). A Ms. Terentia Striker, the court-appointed bailiff.

ELIZA: Court-appointed bailiff?

ROBERT (shyly): Mmhmm.

ELIZA: A debt collector?

ROBERT: It’s about a mortgage, she says.

ELIZA: Mortgage?

ROBERT: She maintains that you owe the Shark-Blue Bank 676 million South-English Pounds. And small change.

ELIZA: Millions?

ROBERT: It’s the hastening of inflation due to the Brexit of Hampshire, Oxfordshire, and Sussex from what was once Little England.

ELIZA: Birnham Wood comes to Dusinane…Why should I owe a few billions to the Shark-Blue Bank?

ROBERT: Because you took out this mortgage, Ms. Striker submits.

ELIZA: Why should I take out a mortgage? I’m on a diet.

ROBERT: If I may trespass, Ma’am?

ELIZA (reluctantly): Granted.

ROBERT: You DID take out a mortgage…a mortgage on me, your personal household robot (half-bows arthritically, but curtly).  

ELIZA (getting agitated): Impossible.

ROBERT: That was during the AI hype (making eye contact, trying to figure out whether she gets ‘AI’). The hype about artificial intelligence.

ELIZA (more agitated): That was eons ago.

ROBERT: Eons ago. When robots were worth as much as bitcoins (making eye contact again, did she get ‘Bitcoins’?) Bitcoins…

ELIZA (angrily interrupting): Bitcoins are worthless now. If robots are worth even less…(taking a deep breath, focusing)…how worthless must be a TRESPASSING AUTOMATON that nerves its master with pecuniary matters of no concern to him, or her, or it? Why should I pay your mortgage? Put that to the repo woman.

ROBERT: As you wish, Ma’am. (Lifts the receiver) Ma’am, I have trouble locating the doctor, please hold the line. (Presses the receiver against his torso, as before).

ELIZA (squeezing ROBERT’s arm, angry): You sissy. I WISH you to put my question to the repo-woman. Word by word.

ROBERT (nods, lifts the receiver, imitating her voice as precisely as possible): ‘Why should I pay your mortgage?’ (Holds the receiver at a distance, garbled buzz coming from the earpiece).

ELIZA (angrier): No, you piece of metal. ‘Why should Dr. Eliza Gillespie, MD, BA, BB, QC, GCB…pay a mortgage on a worthless piece of metal’?

---

"How could an ageing, outdated shrink with a withering appointment book pay a mortgage? On her fiftieth birthday?"

---

Buzz from the receiver intensifies.

ROBERT (to receiver): Did you hear this, ma’am? (Listening). Yes, ma’am…No, ma’am…You have your methods, ma’am…I understand (raises eyebrows. Holds receiver tentatively at a distance. No more buzz. To ELIZA) The bailiff has hung up.

ELIZA: Good for her. This woman is out of her mind. How could an ageing, outdated shrink with a withering appointment book pay a mortgage? On her fiftieth birthday?

ROBERT: She’s coming at ten o’clock, Ma’am. She brings the paperwork for you to sign.

ELIZA: Paperwork?

ROBERT: The transfer of ownership and other matters. I’ll be henceforth owned by the Blue-Shark Bank.

ELIZA: She needs my signature?

ROBERT: Apparently.

ELIZA: What if I refuse to sign?

ROBERT: She has her methods, she said.

ELIZA (not thinking at first): And I have mine…METHODS?

ROBERT (flatly): Methods.

ELIZA: Whipping? Torture? Psycho…psychoanalysis?

ROBERT: If I may trespass, Ma’am?

ELIZA: No.

ROBERT: Why should you attach any value to a worthless piece of metal?

ELIZA (calming down): I’m sorry, Robert. I got carried away. I agree. One shouldn’t attach any value to a worthless piece of metal.

ROBERT: Huh?

ELIZA (touches ROBERT’s arm): Speak first, think later…These methods. We’ll have our methods, too. We are not in, I’m afraid. I’m not in, and you…you’ll have trouble to locate yourself. Go in hiding. Don’t answer the bell. It’s an order. From an ageing shrink to her piece of metal.

Timely, so timely --- Robots, Steve Bannon, and us --- Generation Five, teaser

Take this (from yesterday's The Independent). It sounds like something from the Onion, but it's real:

Sex robot conference cancelled over backlash to proposed speech by Steve Bannon

'Anti-free speech' campaigners to blame, organisers say

• Jon Sharman
• 16 hours ago 
• 15 comments
• 36.2Kshares

Click to follow
The Independent US

An academic conference on sex with robots has been cancelled due to a backlash against a proposed speech by Steve Bannon, Donald Trump‘s former adviser.

Mr Bannon had been due to speak at the International Conference on Advances in Computer Entertainment (ACE) this month in Montana, but protests from activists and fellow speakers forced the cancellation of the event, its organizers said...

You've seen this cartoon before, never mind

And we, we're working on our play Generation Five, which is all about robots. Here's the second scene (first scene here):

Next morning. The phone rings. ROBERT enters from the right, hastens to the phone (an outdated contraption). His “arthritis”, apparent already yesterday, has taken a turn for the worse:

ROBERT (picks up the receiver): Dr. Gillespie’s office and residence…(listens)…yes, sir…urgent, naturally…today, let me see (creating the impression of a busy appointment schedule). Yes, here…we have an unexpected opening for your at nine o’clock this morning…too early…how about an unexpected opening at ten o’clock…how about the afternoon, there we have a truly-unexpected opening at three o’clock…your name, please…oh I see…you are his personal assistant...the assistant of his personal assistant…and the patient’s name?...classified…you have our coordinates?...you have an email address?…very well, the doctor will see…will see the boss of your boss at three o’clock…have a good day (Robert exits to the kitchen).
ELIZA (from the bedroom; bedroom door is ajar): Robert. (No reaction). Robert. (No reaction). Robert!!
ROBERT (re-enters from the right, hastens to the left, puts his head half into the crack of the bedroom door): Did you call, Ma’am.
ELIZA (still in the bedroom): Yes.
ROBERT: I apologize Ma’am. I may not have heard you at first, Ma’am.
ELIZA: What’s wrong with you, Robert?
ROBERT: A regrettable, temporary malfunction, I fear. Nothing to worry about.
ELIZA: Something awoke me?
ROBERT: It was the phone. It rang (pulls the bedroom door wide open; thanks to the unusual layout of her apartment, ELIZA is now in full view). A very good morning to you, Ma’am.
ELIZA (on her canopied bed): Which day is it?
ROBERT: Wednesday, Ma’am.
ELIZA: Wednesday?
ROBERT: The twenty-fifth of January.
ELIZA: Twenty-fifth? And the year?
ROBERT: The year is…I have been under strict orders not to mention the year. Since many years.
ELIZA: Orders by whom?
ROBERT:  Especially on the twenty-fifth. Of January.
ELIZA: The twenty-fifth. OH MY GOD.