Drama Project - Narrative Title ?

Synopsis A psychoactive substance user avoids dealing with his mothers illness, instead searching for a higher state of being in which to escape the mundanity of life. Following a erce argument with his sister, he turns to his usual habits, only to embark upon a mindexpanding spiritual experience that forces him to choose between the easy way out, or facing up to his problems in the realm of the living. Treatment We enter into an argument between brother and sister, the latter openly disgusted at the former for his absence during their mothers illness. Despite being older than his sibling, the brother abandons his responsibility and rests the weight of the familys troubles on his sisters shoulders. The sister storms out of his apartment as he tries to brush off any feelings of guilt, and focusses his mind elsewhere. On the wall are a calendar and a picture of Albert Hoffman, alluding to the present date: Bicycle Day. Determined to alleviate his stress, he reaches for a blotter paper square. Cheers he mouths to the image of Hoffman, before placing it on his tongue. A series of distortions and colour shifts illustrate the effects of Lysergic Acid Diethylamide through POV, and as our protagonist steadies himself we switch back to a third person perspective, until he collapses in a heap to the ground. Overdose? He perhaps tries to remember from whom he got this particular supply. We descend through the protagonists pupil, into a deep black void. Geometric, kaleidoscopic shapes spread like the explosions of reworks, penetrating the darkness and growing more intense. A white-out brings us back into the apartment, though it is barely recognisable. Beads, dream catchers, all kinds of hangings and decorations ll the space, with all furniture having disappeared. A fog of smoke drifts through the space, and sounds both natural and articial, indoor and outdoor, terrestrial and cosmic create a sickly ambience. Our view shifts to stereoscopic image, although without the aid of 3D glasses we simply see a distorting effect. Strobing ickers across a wall, while shifts in lighting continuously alter our perception. The protagonist stands in awe of all of this, running his hand against a wall as its pattern shifts and the shapes of the room are warped. Its not until he moves that he realises he is underwater. A window lies open: beyond, the vast array of stars that makes up our universe. We travel between the panes into the cosmos, pulled through galaxies and clouds of cosmic gas, into the heat of a star itself. The hot white overtakes the screen, and we pull out again. The white gradually fades, now coming from the Moon as we tilt downwards to a dense forest at night. Among the trees lies an open campre, a couple of logs providing seating. As the protagonist approaches, there is one element that appears not to t in with reality. A cosmonaut sits by the re, silent and still. The moonscape is reected in his helmet, a bizarre echo of the Apollo missions. The heat from the re, situated between the two characters, warps the protagonists view of the cosmonaut as it rises, like tarmac in the distance on a hot summers day. The re itself changes colour periodically, though its glow remains steady and warm. The nearby trees are all etched with large Tibetan scripture, reading vertically along the trunk. Prayer ags hang between them, and the ambient and cosmic sound is joined by echoing Buddhist chanting and ethnic instrumentation. The ags now glow in the dark, that luminescent and ghostly white-green usually reserved for novelty items. In the depths beyond this campre

circle, streaks of colourful light pass by: shooting stars that just as easily resemble glowstick streaks. The starry sky whooshes along in time lapse, while everything else remains in real time. An ominous voice which may or may not belong to the still-unmoving cosmonaut bellows through the trees, questioning the protagonists readiness for ascension. He contests that he is, and the cosmonaut stands, gesturing into the darkness. We move into this void of black, and remain there for some time. Eventually a white light appears, allowing us to see the protagonist oating in nothingness before us. More ominous words echo around us, as the light draws near and we enter it. The protagonist now oats here in bright whiteness, and in front of him is the cosmonaut, gracefully levitating. Doves y past as the voice continues to speak. The protagonist is given the choice (in an ambiguous, Eastern proverb kind of way) to either depart from the spheres of his existence, or to fulll a greater purpose and return to his mother. He again gestures, this time towards a point of darkness. As it gets closer we begin to make out colours within it, and by the time it arrives we are lost in a sea of geometric shapes and colours. A whiteout connects to a tilt down from a uorescent light tube in a hospital corridor. As we track along, the protagonist passes by, meeting his sister outside the door of a hospital room. Through the door we can just about see someone lying in a hospital bed, out of focus behind the protagonist and his sister, who is surprised but glad to have him there.