The Dumb Waiter 2026

By HarryC

Fri, 30 Jan 2026
  • 183 reads
10 comments
 

A play for today in one act

Apologies to Harold Pinter

(image: mine)

 

SCENE: A basement room. Two beds, flat against the back wall. Between the beds, the closed hatch of a dumb waiter with an electric bell on the wall beside it. To the left, a door labelled KITCHEN. To the right, a door labelled TOILET.

Two men, BEN and GUS, are the only characters. BEN is lying on the left bed, GUS on the right bed, both fully-clothed. Both are scrolling through their phones.

As they read items on their screens, or watch videos, they give a variety of laughs, sighs, head shakes and exclamations: surprise, horror, shock, merriment, anger, outrage, etc. These are improvised by each actor. Exclamations should include: "Kaw!" "Unbelievable!" "Oh my God!" "Jesus!" "Get away!" "Wanker!" "Caarr!" "Shit!" "Awesome!" "Fuck me!" "What?" "Really?" "Stupid cunt!" etc. The reactions should show the actors going through the range of emotions each, often with one laughing as the other is raging. They never acknowledge one another's presence in any way.

At intervals throughout the play, the electric bell should sound for a few seconds, followed by the sound of the dumb waiter operating. The dumb waiter hatch opens automatically and remains open for a few seconds, each time revealing something different inside: a plate of hot food; a radio playing loud pop music; a severed human head covered in blood; a ticking time-bomb; a parakeet squawking loudly in a cage; two bottles of scotch; a bag of laughs operating. Each ring of the bell and action of the dumb waiter is ignored by both BEN and GUS, who continue to be engrossed with their phones.

At other short intervals throughout the play, one character should switch to thumb-typing a text message and sending it. The other character's phone plays the scary strings theme from 'Psycho' at ear-blasting volume to notify the text arrival. That character stops and reads the text, thumb-types a reply, sends. The first character's phone plays the main theme from Wagner's 'Ride of the Valkyries' at ear-blasting volume to notify the text arrival. This action continues for two or three short exchanges each. With each exchange, BEN and GUS look up and glance at each other for a beat, before returning to their phones.

Also at intervals during the play, each character should separately get up and go into the toilet for a minute, continuing to be engaged with his phone. A flush is heard, and then that character returns to his bed and continues with his phone. Each character should also separately get up and go into the kitchen, coming back with a biscuit or a mug of tea, all the time continuing engagement with his phone.

The above actions continue for two hours.

At the end of this period, BEN and GUS are both back in their original positions - on their beds with their phones. Suddenly, both of them become consternated, making angry exclamations. It becomes clear that they have lost signal. They shake their phones, slap their phones, bang their phones, becoming angrier and angrier as they do. Finally, in desperation, they both throw their phones to the floor, smashing them. They each then draw their legs up to their chests and fold their arms over their heads in despair and frustration. They begin rocking and showing other signs of agitation and anxiety.

The bell rings and they both stop and look at it. The dumb waiter is heard operating. They both get up and go to the hatch. When it opens, it contains two guns.

BEN and GUS take a gun each. BEN aims his at GUS's head, GUS aims his at BEN's head. They pull their triggers. The guns go off and both characters fall to the floor dead - their brains splattered each way across the stage.

CURTAIN

Certificate 18
Other
Phombies
Miscellaneous

Comments

Submitted by Jane Hyphen on

Gosh that's quite a dark scene, a metaphor for today's zombie-like, distracted way of living. The disparate items on the dumb waiter, quiet signals of some other reality, too much like hard work to think about. And life without the distraction, too painful to contemplate.  

I can imagine this working as a play, Harry. A gloomy set, except for the drama of the items on the dumb waiter.

 

Submitted by HarryC on

Thanks, Jane. I toyed between labelling this 'absurdist' or 'realist'. The abnormal becomes normalised in society. As Will Self put it - it's the ultimate realisation of anomie in our culture.

I suppose the only problem with the ending is that no one else was there to film it on their phone for upload to TikTok... frown

Submitted by GlosKat on

mm this sounds like the scene every Saturday in the gym where I go (minus the dumb waiter and guns).  Sometimes I'm the only person in there not scrolling on their phones or texting.  I'm running on the treadmill flanked by two strolling, scrolling zombies.

Excellent story making a good point. I particularly liked the bit where two people close enough to actually talk, are texting each other as if they had totally lost the ability to communicate as humans.

What can we do about it ?

 

 

Submitted by HarryC on

I dunno, Kat.  I think that horse has long bolted. Craziest thing I ever saw in a gym was a guy using a rowing machine - pulling the oars with one hand while he looked at his phone with the other. Showing off, of course. I wouldn't like to think about the physical damage that would do.

There was a discussion about it throughout the 'Today' programme on Radio 4 today (worth listening again), particularly centred around the impact on children and young people. Various suggestions were put forward by 'experts' and callers about how to limit screen time for children, opinions about bans, etc. Personally, I've changed my view (having listened to Molly Russell's father) and believe bans are probably the wrong approach. The buck has to stop with the people designing, running and owning these platforms. What chance that, though, when the richest man on earth says that preventing Grok from producing sexualised images of celebrities amounts to a 'free speech' issue? These people have far too much wealth, power and influence. And they're in the pockets of Trump, too. No hope.

...and, at the end of that 'Today' programme, all of the experts said they were addicted to their phones, anyway! People can't be blamed. Addiction is the principal design feature. And no one wants to feel left out of the loop.

Submitted by GlosKat on

I've seen a girl at the gym on a machine using both hands, with her mobile tucked under her chin.  God knows what that was doing to her neck.

I have to put my hand up to that charge of addiction to a certain extent.  My mobile died suddenly last year.  It was 98% full but just keeled over.  The guys at the phone shop said they couldn't fix it (Maybe true, maybe not).

I was just about to go away on holiday and I was panicking.  My train tickets were on it, my travel arrangements, my travel insurance.  How could check train times ? How could I go a whole week without checking my emails, maybe somebody would send me something important? A whole week without ABC ?

That's when I was horrified to realize I was addicted, and how quickly my addiction had happened. Up until about 3 years ago,  I had resisted getting a smart phone.  I was quite happy with my dumb little phone which fitted into the palm of my hand, and made calls and texts so I knew I was covered for emergencies.

Then a well-off friend upgraded her smart phone and gave me her old one for nothing.  It was but a short walk from 'Oh look I can do this !' and 'Oh look I can do that !' to finding that I couldn't manage without this and that any more.

I try to minimize my engagement with my smart phone.  I have Wi-fi and mobile data turned off nearly all the time, and only put them on briefly when I need them.  I have no extra apps on my phone except for Kindle (so I always have something to read)  and the Wilts Council on- demand rural bus service. In spite of a lot of pressure and being made to feel like a weirdo ("you're the only one in our group not on it!") I have no interest in being sucked in to WhatsApp.

And it stays on silent in my locker in the gym.  Best I can do.

 

Submitted by HarryC on

I fully get that dilemma - and it's one shared by millions. I know people of the grandparent generation who have them and hate them, but say they have little choice because without them they couldn't keep up with their own children and grandchildren. That social pressure is enormous now - and as little as a generation ago, it didn't exist. That's what I find so insidious about it, and why I refuse to succumb to it (which is all very well for me as I don't have a lot of family or close friendships - not so well for other people, as I do also understand). I have a dumb phone and get unlimited calls and texts for a fiver a month, and that's all I want. I use the internet solely on my PC at home. And even then, if I'm writing or reading, I use the Cold Turkey app which switches off the internet for set periods of time or word counts (you can also get versions to shut down general internet on phones). It took me a while to wean myself off the smartphone (I have an addict personality, too) and it helped when I decided to no longer use any of the curation social media platforms - just ABC and YouTube. I use Messenger to keep in touch with friends from Facebook days, but that's all. I lost a couple of friends because they became impatient with my not answering messages immediately, or not answering texts and calls if I had the phone on 'Do Not Disturb'. Well... harsh though it might sound... that's their problem, not mine. I'm not going to sacrifice my privacy, spare time and attention to suit other people. My good friends understand that. And a few of them are like me, too, in using the tech as sparingly as possible. I've spent too many years of my life adapting to other people's demands. I've turned the tables on that now. And, I'm afraid, if people don't like it - they can do the other thing!

Submitted by GlosKat on

BTW I've just looked at Pinter's Dumb Waiter play and yours is a very close and clever adaptation of it. 

The only one I've ever seen live was 'The Caretaker', also set in a minimalist room.  I saw it in a studio theatre, so there was no stage, no 'fourth wall', you felt like you were there in the flat with them.  Very claustrophobic and it really worked.  

 

Submitted by HarryC on

I've not seen any Pinter for years - but yes, The Caretaker was/is a favourite. The Birthday Party, too - which I find even more disturbing and unsettling. Kafkaesque. I always liked The Dumb Waiter, though - the first of his I ever read, and I haven't yet seen it on stage! I was just listening to that discussion on the Today programme this morning and for some reason I thought of The Dumb Waiter as a way of demonstrating the absurdity of the current normal!

Submitted by Tom Brown on

"eckshian"

 

Submitted by HarryC on

Home Improvement Professional in Westfield, New Jersey. Sah!