The War Ends This Weekend

Final Weekend - buy tickets today!

Apartment Hunters

Playwright, Joshua Aaron Weinstein, and his girlfriend, actress, Madeline Long, are looking for their first apartment together. They have seen almost a dozen places in the past week and haven't found anything...yet. Still over a month away from their expected moving date, things are tense, but optimistic. A nice place matters.

So, they enlisted the help of an Irish born rental agent, whom we will call, Sean, to protect his anonymity. They arrive late to the meeting due to the need for sustenance and he is on the phone when they arrive. Five/ten minutes later he is off and they all get in his car to check places out. The first place is nice and the three are engaged in conversation that is key to Sean's success as an agent. Customer Service. As long as he's friendly and attentive, Sean feels he does a good job. Madeline and Josh decide to pass on the first look as the bedrooms are small and the layout is odd.

The next place they look at seems to have been built and designed in the 70s. it lays right next to the el and a train goes by as the couple looks over the place. Not for them. They move on.

By now, Sean knows Madeline is an actress and Josh a writer. He inquires more about their work and they tell him about the play currently being produced by LiveWire Chicago Theatre, which is a dark comedy on the war. Sean bounces into a diatribe about America's presence in Iraq and how it is never mentioned that an estimated 1 million Iraqis have been killed since the invasion. On the other hand, Sean goes on, it is important for America to establish a presence in the Middle East due to the price of oil, and our dependency on it. It's a necessity to remain there for another 10 years while we find alternative resources, right?

In the midst of his statement, Sean relates an image of chickens stuffed in cages and how at first glance this is disturbing, but when you think about it, if we were humane and only kept a certain amount of chickens in the cages, the price of chicken would go up. more chickens equals less cost.

They walk into the third apartment on this note and there is a photo shoot going on. Madeline and Josh peak in, though they both know the place is not for them. Neither is the agent. The ride back to the office is awkward. Even though Sean is not getting a sale, he tells one last story about a woman he met in the back of a taxi. You see, she had crutches on and as she was getting in, at 3 in the morning, she didn't hear the driver over the clatter say the cab was occupied. Sitting in the back was Sean, who didn't care much because she was going his way and within two blocks, he had convinced her to go dancing at at bar open until 4am. Our assumption here was that Sean is a ladies man, but he finishes the story with, "I went to her wedding. so, that worked out."

Later, Madeline and Josh talk about the day like it was the end of the world because nothing is out there that they like and looking for apartments is general misery... until they realize that 1) if America stays in Iraq for another 10 years, the Iraqi body count would reach over 3 million (and chances are, the price of gas will remain the same); 2) Madeline is a vegetarian, so why not let chicken prices go up, and show some humanity for once?; 3) Sean is apparently a loner and quite possibly jealous that these two are in love and moving in together; and 4) the city is vast, more apartments can be found and the perfect place is out there.

the search continues...