Alexander Hamilton - rough draft

by Jeff Goode

(RONALD REAGAN and ALEXANDER HAMILTON, s.r. Hamilton, depressed, stares out at the audience. He holds a $10 dollar bill. Reagan stands next to him, practicing for his big speech.)

Reagan: Mr. Gorbacev… Tear down this wall.

(Suddenly, Reagan snatches the $10 dollar bill away from Hamilton.)

Hamilton: Hey!

Allow me to explain why Alexander Hamilton is on the $10 bill…

Reagan:     Was it because of you were in all those movies?
Hamilton:     No.
Reagan:     Was it because you illegally funneled money to the contras,
     while you were President, and later pretended not to remember
     any of those meetings?
Hamilton:     I was never President.
Reagan:     Are you sure?
Hamilton:     I think I’d remember being President.
Reagan:     Not if you had Alzheimer’s.

(Hamilton grimaces.)

Reagan: Say, maybe that’s why I don’t remember funneling that money to the contras.

In July 1986, Mikhail Gorbacev visited a supermarket in Texas.

(GORBACEV enters, s.l. Reagan eagerly rushes over to him.)

Gorbacev was shocked to see the mountains of fresh produce that even the poorest Americans had easy access to. While people in his own country waited in line for hours to buy a loaf of bread.
It was THIS visit that convinced Gorbacev to embark on the expanded program of reforms known as "Perestroika" which would ultimately lead to the end of the Soviet Union.

Reagan:      Mr. Gorbacev…
Gorbacev:     What?
Reagan:      Tear down this wall.
Gorbacev:     Shut up.

Alexander Hamilton was our first Secretary of the Treasury.

Hamilton: Hi.

He created much of our banking system.
But the most important thing he ever did as Secretary of Treasury, the thing that earned him his place in history, was his handling of our War Bonds from the Revolutionary War.

You see, the Founding Fathers needed money to fund the war. So they sold bonds.
Basically, they borrowed money from their supporters on the promise that they would pay it back after the war.

Hamilton: If we won the war. (depressed:) If we still had a country after the war.

But once the war was over…

Hamilton: Well, we were broke.

Everyone told Hamilton not to worry about paying off the war bonds. People would understand. Buying Revolutionary War bonds was a huge gamble in the first place. He could pay them off at 10 cents on the dollar, and they’d be thrilled. Nobody really thought we were gonna WIN the war.

Hamilton: I did.

Hamilton insisted that we honor our debt and pay off the war bonds in FULL.

Reagan: That’s nuts.

Some people thought he was crazy.
But by doing so, Hamilton did more to establish our credit as a nation than anyone in history.
Remember, we were basically a third world country, at the time. But our money suddenly became the safest investment on the planet. An American could go anywhere in the world, and they knew that our money was green.

(Reagan looks guilty. He turns to Gorbacev to change the subject:)

Reagan:      Mr. Gorbacev…
Gorbacev:      I heard you the first time.
Reagan:      Tear down this wall.

Soviet Communism was doomed from the start.
I’m sure it sounded good on paper.
But in a system where everyone receives the same rewards, no matter how hard they work — SOME people are going to decide not to work at all.
And when that happens, all the OTHER people are gonna feel like suckers for working hard for no reason. And eventually nobody bothers working, and productivity decreases and the economy collapses. End of story.

Unless you can come up with SOME other incentive for people to work hard — such as…
An evil empire which it is their patriotic duty to outplay, outsmart, outlast at every opportunity.

In short, The Cold War and the arms race probably prolonged the Soviet Union well beyond its natural lifespan.

Reagan:      Mr. Gorbacev…
Gorbacev:     What?
Reagan:      Tear down this wall.
Gorbacev:     I’m doing it.
Reagan:     Tear down this wall.
Gorbacev:     I’m doing it!!

In 1929, the US stock market collapsed.
Thousands of US Banks failed. Millions of people lost their life-savings.
In SOME countries, this turn of events would have been considered "tough luck" and the depositors would have simply been told "Sorry, looks like you screwed the pooch".
But in America, because of Alexander Hamilton, the idea that our money might not be green was considered SO un-American, that FDR created the FDIC - Federal Deposit Insurance to protect your money EVEN IF your bank is swallowed up by a crack in the earth.
This was done so that no American would ever again have to hear the words: "Sorry, looks like you screwed the pooch"

Reagan: Mr. Gorbacev---

His first year in office, Ronald Reagan signed into law the DEPOSITORY INSTITUTIONS DEREGULATION AND MONETARY CONTROL ACT OF 1980, which immediately caused the Savings & Loan crisis.

Reagan: Heh, heh. Looks like they screwed the pooch.

Alexander Hamilton was spinning in his grave.

Hamilton:     People are losing their life savings. Farmers are losing their farms.
Reagan:     Sorry, looks like they screwed the pooch.
Hamilton:     But you’re destroying the economy.
Reagan:     Pooch!

In 1982, there were 160 cases of AIDS in this country.

Reagan: Oh my.

Unfortunately, in 1982, most of those effected were homosexuals.

Reagan:     Heh heh, well, in that case, it looks like they screwed the pooch, too.
Hamilton:     But Mr. President…
Reagan:     Pooch!

By 1985, there were 20,000 cases and AIDS had spread to every region of the globe.

Reagan:      Mr. Gorbacev…
Gorbacev:     What?
Reagan:      Tear down this wall.

In 1989, David Hasselhoff believes he helped reunite Germany by singing his new hit single "Looking For Freedom" at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, the year the Berlin wall came down.
To this day, he complains that his contribution has been overlooked.

(Enter DAVID HASSELHOFF.)

Hasselhoff: I find it a bit sad that there’s no photo of me hanging on the walls
in the museum at Checkpoint Charlie.

David Hasselhoff did not bring down the Berlin Wall.
No amount of singing, or whining, or posturing in front of the Berlin Wall, brought down the Berlin Wall.

Hamilton: We really should have taken the Russians to the Piggly Wiggly years ago.

Reagan: Mr. Gorbacev…
Gorbacev: I’m tearing down this wall! Do you understand that? I’m tearing it down. But I’m very busy right now dismantling the entire Iron Curtain, dismantling the Warsaw Pact, dismantling my own country. This little tourist attraction is really not that high on my priority list. I’ll get to it, when I get to it. Okay? Is that clear? Do you understand? Are you stupid?

(Beat.)

Reagan: Tear down this wall.
Gorbacev: AGH!!

Alexander Hamilton’s face is on our money, because without him, we probably wouldn’t have money.
George Washington is on our money, because without him, we might not have a country.
Without Thomas Jefferson, we wouldn’t have the Declaration of Independence.
And without Ronald Reagan…?

(Reagan thinks about it, a minute.)

Reagan: We wouldn’t have AIDS.

Rest in peace, Ronnie.

Hamilton: Keep the 10.

BLACKOUT

THIS SCRIPT IS COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL AND MAY NOT BE DOWNLOADED, TRANSMITTED, PRINTED OR PERFORMED WITHOUT THE EXPRESS PERMISSION OF THE AUTHOR

AUTHOR'S NOTES:
I did my best to fact check on the internet as I was writing the piece on the day of the show, so the gist of this information is all accurate, but I had to fudge some of the minor details. For example, the story about Gorbacev and the supermarket is true, but I'm not certain that it was in Texas. The escalation of AIDS cases is true, but the exact figures vary, depending on the source.

June 25, 2004 - No Shame Los Angeles

Cast:
Nic de Armendi ... Reagan
Jeff Hirbour ... Hamilton
Alim Kouliev ... Gorbacev
Mike Rothschild ... Hasselhoff
Jeff Goode ... Narrator

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