THE 4 AND 1/2 STEPS (Helios Corporation).

 

 

THE 4 AND 1/2 STEPS

(Helios Corporation)

 

A Cruel and Comic Farce in One Act

by Benjamin Gavarre

THE 4 AND 1/2 STEPS (Helios Corporation). © 2026 by BENJAMIN GAVARRE is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 

SYNOPSIS

 

HARVEY, a brilliant, tender-hearted, and chronically absent-minded man, steps into his new role as Regional Manager at Helios, a funereal, ultra-conservative corporation obsessed with uniformity. To survive the boredom, Harvey takes refuge in a dreamlike universe scored by jazz blasting through his oversized headphones. However, his first day spirals into a delirious whirlwind when the office space transforms into a theatrical farce: an official company car made of cardboard that refuses to start, a treacherous half-step on the boardroom staircase, and two grotesque majority partners who operate like praying mantises hungry for grey clones. Backed by NOAH, the magnetic head of maintenance and his secret partner in crime, along with the twins IGGY and IZZY—two young employees who mirror the vulnerability and bright wonder of his own childhood—Harvey must cast off his headphones, stand up to the tyranny of the custodial staff, and seize the reins of his own destiny with deliciously comic cruelty in a company that is about to literally lose its head.

 

CAST AND CHARACTERIZATION

• HARVEY HILL (35) – The Manager of Chaos

• Characterization: Brilliant, sweet-natured, scatterbrained, and unintentionally hilarious. He wears a corporate grey suit that is slightly too big for him, though his true trademark is a pair of oversized headphones slung around his neck—his shield against reality. His arc is that of a daydreamer who learns to rule the waking world without turning grey.

 

• NOAH, "NEO" (38) – The Grounding Wire

• Characterization: Head of Technical Maintenance, Harvey's counterpart and secret domestic partner. A mechanic with natural magnetism, a generous soul, and unshakeable calm. He wears an unbuttoned dark work trench coat over a fitted t-shirt, dark safety glasses, and a crooked smile capable of disarming anyone. He is Harvey's sanctuary against the hostility of the firm.

 

• IGGY / Ignatius (22) – The Mirror of Dignity

• Characterization: Harvey's direct assistant and Izzy's fraternal twin. A scrappy, slightly disheveled, sharp-tongued young man who is fiercely loyal. He wears a tough-guy armor to protect a raw sensitivity that echoes Harvey's own lonely childhood.

 

• IZZY / Ignatia (22) – The Inner Child's Light

• Characterization: In charge of Dead Files and minor office supplies. She wears pocket-heavy overalls and keeps her hair gloriously messy. She preserves the luminous, playful, and fantastical charm of a ten-year-old girl. Her ability to turn office trash into magic (and mini piñatas) brings Harvey's soul back to life.

 

• LORD ERNEST and LADY CLARA – The Executive Gargoyles

• Characterization: Majority partners at Helios. Performed in the key of outrageous, ridiculous farce. Two caricatured, paranoid, and absurdly affected "corporate mummies." They wear identical grey suits and move in rigid synchronization behind frosted glass, devouring each other with the lethal rapture of two praying mantises.

 

• MADAME MARGE – The Cerberus of the Linoleum

• Characterization: The legendary Head of Custodial Services and Keys. An operatic tyrant who swings between terrifying and uproariously ridiculous. She wears a heavily starched cap like a papal tiara and cleaning rags tied to her shoes so she can skate across the freshly waxed hallway, defending her empire with a pine-scented spray bottle holstered at her hip.

 

THE CHARACTERS AND THE STAGE SPACE

 

The story is inhabited by two camps clearly contrasted in their acting style and visual plasticity. On the endearing, three-dimensional, human side is HARVEY (thirty-five), the new regional manager: a brilliant, tender, absent-minded, and effortlessly funny man dressed in a formal grey suit with loud headphones around his neck to survive the corporate drudgery from which, after surrendering to chaos, he will ultimately seize control of his destiny. His counterpart and secret accomplice is NOAH, whom everyone calls NEO (thirty-eight), the head of technical maintenance: a mechanic with natural magnetism and a generous spirit, wearing an unbuttoned dark trench coat—hence the nickname Neo—over his shop clothes, a full beard, dark safety glasses, and a half-smile capable of melting steel. Alongside them are the twenty-two-year-old twins who function as an emotional mirror of Harvey's childhood: IGGY (Ignatius), his direct assistant, a snappy, somewhat scruffy, loyal kid with raw vulnerability; and his twin sister IZZY (Ignatia), keeper of the dead files, who retains the radiant, playful wonder of a ten-year-old girl. At the opposite extreme, played in the register of unhinged, cruel, and delirious farce, are the company villains: LORD ERNEST and LADY CLARA, the majority partners, two grotesque executive mummies who dwell behind a frosted glass window as gigantic shadow-puppet silhouettes; and MADAME MARGE, the legendary keeper of the keys and mops, a flesh-and-blood operatic tyrant who oscillates between dread and high comedy before revealing an unexpected heart of gold.

 

The stage is divided into two levels joined by a deliberately absurd geometry over a floor of irregular stone tiles. Downstage left is the dead-files corner—with grey metal filing cabinets and stacked folders—which blends into the maintenance basement, where Harvey's small combustion car sits prominently in the foreground. It is a compact little vehicle built visibly and charmingly out of painted white wood and stiff cardboard with sketched-in edges, sporting the company's classic logo on its door: «Helios: At Your Service Since 1962». Center stage, directly beneath the upper structure, glows the doorframe leading to the private managerial office—Harvey's coveted "own room"—preceded by a wide, slippery hallway guarded by the impossible Madame Marge.

 

On the right rises an open wooden staircase with a handrail leading up to the second level. Although any audience member in their right mind can count nine physical steps on the structure, according to official blueprints and company bureaucracy it is strictly a staircase of «4 and 1/2 steps», causing every employee who climbs or descends it to suffer a spectacular stumble right in the middle of the flight over that invisible, treacherous half-step. Above stretches the Executive Mezzanine: a narrow front catwalk with a white door on the right—serving as access to the «Executives Only Elevator»—and, dominating the upper center, a large enclosure sealed by vertical panels of frosted glass lit from within by intense fuchsia, violet, and amber spotlights. Behind this translucent screen, Lord Ernest and Lady Clara hold court, projecting their gigantic black silhouettes in backlight and gesticulating from on high like two gargoyles trapped in a glowing aquarium.

 

PROLOGUE

 

(Total darkness. The metallic, maddening tick-tock of an office clock accelerates until it sounds like a blender blades spinning out of control. BAM! A stark white overhead spotlight hits HARVEY dead center, stiff in his grey suit. Addressing the audience at breakneck speed, as if jolted from a nightmare, he warns): «Office concrete is hungry. It feeds on minutes. On lives traded in for a biweekly paycheck. They ask you to check your heart at the front desk and become a grey clone.» (The ticking explodes. HARVEY slams his oversized headphones over his ears and, instantly, the noise cuts out y giving way to bright, playful jazz as the lighting shifts to electric purple. HARVEY smiles, loosening up into a light groove as he continues): «My headphones are my spacesuit...» (Right at that moment, IZZY zooms across the stage on a kick scooter, blowing confetti and vanishing into the shadows) «...for walking across this dead planet. They say I'm scatterbrained...» (Now IGGY comes running backward, trips in mid-air over an invisible step, recovers his cool with a fraternal nod, and disappears) «...always lost in the clouds.» (Suddenly, upstage on the translucent screen of the Mezzanine, the gigantic, caricatured shadows of LORD ERNEST and LADY CLARA loom into view, jerking rigidly and pecking at the air with oversized dinner knives, while the silhouette of MADAME MARGE swings her mop like a medieval battle-axe. HARVEY points at them without looking, amused): «...while the corporate gargoyles lurk in the dark.» (Amber light flickers below and NOAH strolls across the stage at a slow, unhurried pace, his trench coat open, twirling a wrench; he pauses for a microsecond in front of HARVEY and gives him a slow raise of the eyebrows charged with secret, seductive complicity, causing the background shadows to vanish on the spot. HARVEY follows him with his eyes, grinning like a fool, and turns back to the audience with a wink): «Because down here... it's terrifying to be different. This morning, chaos set an ambush for me. I don't know if I'm going to run this company or drive it straight into the madhouse... but if we go down, we're making a glorious racket!» (HARVEY pulls the headphones down around his neck; the jazz cuts out abruptly and morphs into the pathetic, grinding sound of a car starter failing to turn over as the spotlight dies. In a swift visual transition, the basement area comes up in bluish half-light where NOAH is already leaning over the open hood of the little white cardboard car, and HARVEY walks toward the staircase, watching him in fascination).

 

SCENE ONE

 

(The useless metallic whine of a busted car starter—a dry click followed by a choked mechanical groan—breaks the silence with comic persistence. The lights snap up full on the basement parking area. NOAH is leaning over thelittle white wood-and-cardboard car. He wears an unbuttoned dark trench coat, a smudge of grease on his forearm, and the effortless magnetism of a man who masters machinery even when the sky is falling. A few feet away, standing near the staircase with his big headphones around his neck, HARVEY gazes at him, completely smitten, having forgotten entirely that today is his first day as boss).

 

NOAH: (Wiping his forehead with the back of his hand, speaking in a warm, gravelly voice as he tightens a spark plug with his wrench) Three fly-by-night contractors designed this little tin can, and not a single engineer figured out that a toy suspension won't survive a city built out of speed bumps, potholes, more speed bumps, and craters. I mean, not every street is paved like Paris... or wherever it is people have decent asphalt. (He glances up over the rim of his dark glasses, catches Harvey staring at him in silence, and flashes a crooked, seductive smile). And you better stop staring at me without saying a word, Harv, because if anyone in this basement finds out you hog all the blankets at three in the morning, my reputation as the tough guy in maintenance is toast.

 

HARVEY: (Whispering, playing innocent, though a half-smile gives him away) I'm not staring at you, Neo; I'm supervising your work ethic as the ruthless micromanager I intend to become starting today... You're doing a passable job, I suppose. Though that trench coat ought to be illegal before noon. Remember, Helios is a serious firm with rock-solid, ancient values.

 

(NOAH gives a carefree shrug and blows a kiss into the air, which HARVEY snatches on the fly with quick discretion, tucking it into his grey suit pocket right as IGGY hurries in from the wing, looking slightly rumpled and clutching a thick dossier stamped URGENT. IGGY plants himself in front of the distracted HARVEY and thrusts the folders and a pen at him, forcing him to step away from Noah toward the wooden stairs to sign his first official papers).

 

SCENE TWO

 

(While HARVEY signs documents using the folders IGGY holds up as a desk near the wooden staircase, IZZY bursts in from the grey filing cabinets on the left, skipping happily. She wears oversized archive overalls bursting with pockets, wild loose hair, and eyes blazing with childlike excitement. Clutched to her chest is a dusty jug filled with a thick, pitch-black liquid).

 

IZZY: (Beaming with radiant enthusiasm as she drops the jug with a heavy thud in front of Noah beside the white car) The most famous pirate of the basement is here, Neo! Since Madame Marge put three padlocks on the supply closet because she claims we breathe too loud near her brooms, I crawled through the gap behind the dead-file cabinets and found this magic potion. Look! Motor oil from the year the dinosaurs hatched!

 

NOAH: (Taking the jug with patient affection, sniffing the spout, and making an amused face) Ignatia, sweetheart, this oil is so ancient that if I pour it into the carburetor of this little crate, the pistons willfuse together for eternity. It looks like lumpy tar. No good.

 

IZZY: (Widening her eyes with fascination rather than disappointment) Oh, that was just the warm-up treasure! Close your eyes and no peeking! (She dashes behind the filing cabinets, spins on her heels, and returns shaking two dented cans of spray paint like maracas). Ta-da! So you can pimp out the boss's ride! Since it's so white it looks like a hospital refrigerator, spray some super cool flames on the doors so—

 

NOAH: (Chuckling softly as he leans against the fender, looking at her fondly) If I spray-paint graffiti over the Helios logo on the manager's official car, I'm pretty sure he'll throw me out on the street... and not just out of this office. What do you say, Mr. Hill?

 

IZZY: (Spotting Harvey and her brother by the stairs, she plunges both hands into her giant overall pockets and pulls out a dazzling tangle of fake pearl necklaces, plastic carnival beads, and tiny foil party piñatas, showering them over the white hood and Noah's arms) Harvey! I mean... Boss, Big Boss! Why are you hiding back there? And look, my little brother is here too! The whole gang's together! Look, look at these magic necklaces to dress up the boss's boring rearview mirror! Even if the engine won't start, it'll sparkle so hard the car will feel happy inside!

 

NOAH: (Letting a strand of fake pearls hang naturally around his neck with effortless charm as he surveys the loot on the white hood) Would you look at this, «Chief»... Look, Ignatius, at what your sister dragged in: rancid motor oil, clogged spray cans, costume jewelry, and miniature toy piñatas. None of this fixes an engine, Ignatia. Besides, look at the boss: he's hiding his face behind those folders looking very stern. Uh-oh, I think he's mad... Alright, fine, we'll hang one tiny piñata from the mirror. Just one!

 

IZZY: (Jumping with both arms in the air) Hooray!

 

(HARVEY lowers the folder hiding his mouth and can't hold it in any longer. He lets out a clean, booming, luminous laugh that echoes across the entire ground floor).

 

HARVEY: (Pointing toward the car between laughs) Hey, Neo, Ignatia acts more like an eight-year-old girl than a seasoned purchasing assistant! Ask her for a spark plug and she brings you a unicorn on wheels! It's marvelous! I don't know how that childlike soul survives in a mausoleum like Helios, but I love it.

 

(Hearing Harvey's laughter and words, IGGY—who doesn't yet know his new boss's heart—feels the remark as a dart aimed at his sister and their lowly station. His face hardens instantly with the wounded pride of someone who has had to fight his whole life; he slams the folders shut, plants himself in front of Harvey, and raises his chin with contained fury).

 

IGGY: (His voice cracking with anger and pride) That's out of line, boss! Don't you make fun of my sister! If you laugh at her, you're laughing at me too. We know you're the big shot now and we're just the help down here, but you don't get to mock us!

 

(HARVEY cuts his laughter short. His playful expression vanishes, and he looks at IGGY deeply moved, like a man suddenly recognizing an old photograph of his own childhood. He takes a step toward Ignatius, closing the hierarchical distance, and gently takes him by both shoulders).

 

HARVEY: (With disarming gentleness and honesty) Hey, Iggy... look at me. I swear on my life I'm not making fun of you. If I were mocking you, it would be to hurt you, kid, and I would never do that. Especially not to the two of you. I'm just laughing... I'm laughing because this building feels like a graveyard of stiff ties and mothballs, and watching your sister play just brought my soul back to life.

 

(IGGY blinks, thrown off balance. All his tough-guy armor crumbles before Harvey's transparency. He rubs the back of his neck, embarrassed but deeply relieved, and gives a shy half-smile).

 

IGGY: (Lowering his guard, in a complicit tone) Fair enough, boss... Sorry. Guess I keep my shield up out of habit. Better head up to the boardroom, though—the head vultures are about to light up... I'll bring your coffee up in a second.

 

(The four share a brief, warm, empathetic pause. HARVEY winks at them and starts climbing the wooden staircase on the right; right in the middle of the flight, on the fateful 4 and 1/2 step, he takes an inevitable, comical stumble before reaching the upper catwalk).

 

SCENE THREE

 

(The ground floor dims into shadow while the frosted glass panels of the upper Mezzanine blaze to life with fuchsia, purple, and amber backlighting. Behind the translucent glass emerge the gigantic, razor-sharp black silhouettes of LORD ERNEST and LADY CLARA facing each other in profile, hands on hips and index fingers raised in grotesque, inquisitorial judgment. HARVEY stands on the narrow outer ledge in front of the glass, like a mortal answering to the Olympus of shadows, as the projected silhouettes begin snapping their jaws open and shut in unison).

 

LORD ERNEST: (Amplified, pompous voice of cheap opera, as his massive shadow wags its index finger behind the glass) Remember the sacred dogma of this corporation, my dear Mr. Hill! At Helios we abhor singularity, spontaneous blinking, and free will!

 

LADY CLARA: (Her silhouette stretches its neck like a scandalized ostrich across the glowing panel) We expect you to be an exact clone of the previous manager, your illustrious uncle—may he rest in peace and may his accounting spirit guide us! You shall undoubtedly be just like him: a man so wonderfully grey that whenever he stood against a wall, houseflies landed on his nose mistaking it for reinforced concrete! Are you lending us your ears, Mr. Hill?

 

HARVEY: (His back to the glass, discreetly sliding his loud headphones over his ears while facing the audience in a state of mystical trance) Why, of course I am, my enthusiastic and never-sufficiently-praised partners! You see, these are quantum hyper-focus headphones... They mute the noise of the universe so your wise words reverberate directly inside my cerebellum. (He sighs happily in his bubble as smooth jazz plays and the giant background shadows point and bicker on mute against the pink and amber glass). Blessed be the padded silence; I'm watching two gargoyles in a shadow show.

 

(Up the wooden staircase on the right climbs IGGY, panting with his tongue hanging out, carrying a coffee pot and the signature book. Halfway up the stairs, he trips spectacularly once again on the 4 and 1/2 step; he juggles the pot in mid-air to keep from spilling the coffee and scrambles up the last few steps on his knees until he reaches the upper walkway beside Harvey).

 

IGGY: (Wheezing loudly, leaning against the wooden railing) What a workout, folks... Since your little white elevator door up here is reserved exclusively for executive blue-bloods, the rest of us lose a lung and both kneecaps on these stairs... Which, by the way, even though any sane human with eyeballs can count nine wooden steps, the accounting blueprints claim there are strictly «4 and 1/2 steps» so the company can pay half the property tax—and that phantom half-step trips you every single time!

 

LORD ERNEST: (His silhouette leaps indignantly behind the frosted panel) Intolerable mathematical insubordination! If the board of directors decreed there are four and a half steps, then there are four and a half even if you count twenty! Leave the coffee outside the glass and roll back downstairs!

 

IGGY: (Bristling instantly in front of the glowing window) I'd love to see you walk down that tax-deductible death trap, Lord Ernest! Did you know a millimeter discrepancy between the blueprint and the lumber makes the human brain lose all spatial calculation? You'd shatter into a thousand pieces on the first stumble, like a plaster lawn gnome or an Egyptian mummy at the Met! Now that's a show I'd buy front-row tickets to see!

 

LORD ERNEST: (Choking with outrage) How dare—how dare—how dare you!

 

LADY CLARA: (Her shadow clutches both hands to her chest in vintage soap-opera melodrama) I'm having a two-dimensional ventricular episode! Harvey, reprimand and flog that plebeian at once!

 

HARVEY: (Pulling one earcup off his ear and stepping in with charming clumsiness) Easy, easy, nobody have a coronary or a conniption fit! The thing is... I asked Iggy to stage this little dramatic presentation! Yes, an immersive demonstration so you'd notice a few urgent tweaks we need around the office, starting with evening out the stairs... (He turns to Iggy, placing a warm hand on his shoulder and lowering his voice). Don't mind them, Iggy. You're one of the good guys.

 

LADY CLARA: (Her silhouette leans in suspiciously behind the glass) Performance art? I hardly think that is appropriate, Mr. Hill. Allowing underlings to cavort like avant-garde buffoons is the first step toward union anarchy.

 

LORD ERNEST: (His shadow brandishes a massive projected salad knife on the glass) I accidentally wandered into performance art once... in Japan. It was ghastly. Spectral beings surrounded me with white-painted faces and legendary makeup in blue, red, and black... They glared at me with bulging eyes, shoved me aside with fans, and whacked my shins with sticks.

 

LADY CLARA: (With lofty academic smugness) Oh, Ernest, I have zero patience for that; you committed a textbook tourist blunder. You obviously wandered onto the stage in the middle of a Kabuki theater performance, and you know samurai have no mercy for hecklers: one wrong move and—swish!—off goes your head with a katana!

 

LORD ERNEST: (Marveling at the revelation) That makes tremendous sense! Everything falls into place... No wonder they looked at me as if I were a Komodo dragon invading their pagoda. I could have lost my head! My word, Lady Clara... what a brilliant silhouette you have.

 

LADY CLARA: (Her shadow flutters its hands with cadaverous coquetry) I only attend the Opera, never Kabuki or Noh theater, no, no, no... And I always book a private box with frosted glass because I grow bored within five minutes; that way I can slip out to count my stock dividends. I am so terribly clever.

 

LORD ERNEST: (His shadow leans closer to hers in a cavernous, seductive purr) Indeed you are, Lady Clara... and so disturbingly Ravishing.

 

(IGGY watches with a shudder as the two giant black silhouettes behind the lit glass press their profiles together and sharpen their dinner knives in the air, identical to two giant praying mantises in the middle of a lethal mating ritual. The kid turns to HARVEY with deep empathy, convinced his new boss is completely alone in the world against these ghouls).

 

IGGY: (In a very low, sincere voice, leaning toward Harvey) Hey, boss... seeing how you have to deal all by yourself with these two shadow monsters... didn't you ever wish you had a twin? Someone who was your other half since you were a kid, so you wouldn't feel like the only weirdo in the room.

 

(HARVEY is deeply moved by the question. He looks at IGGY with immense tenderness, seeing in the kid's eyes the lonely boy he once was. He wants to answer from the heart, but LORD ERNEST's shadow presses a gargantuan ear against the glass to eavesdrop. To protect their secret, HARVEY pulls an old liquid-ink fountain pen from his inner pocket, takes a heavy card from the folder, and writes against the railing in long, sweeping, passionate strokes).

 

HARVEY: (Murmuring to himself as his hand dances across the paper) I'll put it in writing so these backlit vampires don't hear us... «Dear Iggy: It was very hard being different... but believe me, that's the very thing that gave me strength.»

 

(HARVEY folds the card and slips it into IGGY's hand. The kid squeezes his shoulder in silent gratitude and, to avoid tripping down the stairs again, sneaks out through the upper white door on the right—the Executives Only Elevator; a metallic bell dings and IGGY slips into the interior of the building toward the archives. HARVEY stares at the nib of his fountain pen and, suddenly, sheer panic washes over his face. Forgetting he still has one headphone on, he yells at the top of his lungs on the upper walkway).

 

HARVEY: (Clutching his head with both hands) Oh, what an idiot I am! I wrote it in cursive handwriting! And in my rush I made the loops so tight he's going to think I drew him an electrocardiogram! He won't understand a single word!

 

(Behind the fuchsia and amber window, the silhouettes of LORD ERNEST and LADY CLARA jolt violently with a gasped shriek of puritanical horror).

 

LADY CLARA: (Her shadow flails its arms like a windmill) Merciful Saint of Corporate Stationery! Did you say... in cursive handwriting?! That is carnal calligraphy! Those voluptuous curves, those intertwined loops, that wet ink running shamelessly across the cardstock! What indecency!

 

LORD ERNEST: (His silhouette points at Harvey with a gigantic stalk of celery) Confess, you depraved manager! What did you write to that boy in cursive script, eh?! At Helios we only permit square, emotionless block letters!

 

LADY CLARA: (At the height of farcical delirium) You be exceedingly careful with those epistolary relationships, Harvey! Epistolary relationships are the gateway to administrative debauchery! They will land you in scandalous trouble with the Decency Union!

 

LORD ERNEST: Furthermore, the lad is shockingly young! Tender as a broccoli floret! Today you slip him notes with nineteenth-century flourishes, and tomorrow they'll demand Christmas bonuses in iambic pentameter! I demand to confiscate that sinful missive!

 

HARVEY: (Backing toward the wooden staircase on the right in a fit of nervous laughter and stage fright) What epistolary relationship, you pair of lunatics, this isn't a French novel! It was paternal penmanship advice! I have to catch him downstairs before he calls a cryptographer! (Bowing absurdly at the top of the wooden steps). See you later, huh! Yes, of course, goodbye forever! I mean, see you soon, you miserable gargoyles! I mean, my dearest friends, partners, partner, uhhh... I hope you choke on your kale—I mean, enjoy the banquet!

 

(HARVEY bolts down the stairs at breakneck speed; as he hits the fateful 4 and 1/2 step, he launches into an acrobatic mid-air leap accompanied by a cartoon slide whistle—«Pöuiiiiiiiiiii!»—and lands safe and sound on the tiles of the ground floor. Upstairs, behind the glowing glass panels, the shadows of LORD ERNEST and LADY CLARA spiral into a convulsive ecstasy of cardiac arrest, conniption fit, vapor lock, and praying-mantis mating ritual crossed with Kabuki theater: in a crimson flash of shadow puppetry, they cross their porcelain dinner knives and neatly slice off each other's heads in silhouette before collapsing behind the glass. The Mezzanine lights snap off).

 

SCENE FOUR

 

(As if no tragedy whatsoever had occurred upstairs, the lights blaze brilliantly on the ground floor in front of the central door beneath the Mezzanine that leads to Harvey's private room. There reigns MADAME MARGE, the Cerberus of custodial services, in all her terrifying, farcical glory: she wears a starched white cap shaped like a papal tiara, two floor rags tied to the soles of her shoes on which she skates across the freshly waxed tiles like a possessed Soviet figure skater, a pine-scented spray bottle holstered at her hip like a six-shooter, and a gargantuan mop wielded like a royal halberd).

 

(From the filing-cabinet corner on the left emerges IGGY, holding a massive red-velvet photo album under one arm while reading the handwritten card intently in his other hand. HARVEY, having just landed from the right-hand staircase, rushes toward him at center stage).

 

HARVEY: (Catching his breath) Iggy, wait! Don't try to read that without a helmet—what with the nerves from those dinosaurs collapsing upstairs, I scribbled in handwriting so atrocious even a pharmacist couldn't decode it!

 

IGGY: (Looking up from the card with shining eyes, devoid of irony, deeply moved) It's crystal clear, Harvey. It almost looks like it was written by my ten-year-old self when I wished somebody would tell me this exact thing. (He reads aloud softly before tucking it into his breast pocket): «It was very hard being different, but that's what gave me strength.» Thanks, boss. Really. And look, Izzy dug the Great Historical Album of Helios out from behind the cabinets so we can get you into your room.

 

(Just then, a cheerful toy horn honks and NOAH and IZZY push the little white wood-and-cardboard car a few feet toward center stage—now sporting a comically obscene piece of graffiti spray-painted on the side, a mini piñata dangling from the mirror, and fake pearl necklaces draped over the handles. Reaching the edge of Marge's waxed hallway, the car stops. NOAH steps right up beside HARVEY, slipping an arm across his back with a familiarity so natural, protective, and unmistakable that no doubt remains).

 

NOAH: (Looking at Harvey with a warm, complicit smile) Told you the little white car would make it to the door, Harv. Everything okay with the shadows upstairs, or should we just head back to the apartment for breakfast?

 

(IGGY and IZZY widen their eyes upon seeing the undeniable chemistry between the manager and the mechanic, putting two and two together instantly with radiant delight).

 

IGGY: (Letting out a playful, endearing laugh and giving Harvey a gentle nudge with his elbow) Well, well, well! I see now why you don't need a twin brother, boss... You already have your other half, don't you? Even if he's definitely not your brother...

 

IZZY: (Clapping happily as she pulls another shiny necklace from her overalls and drapes it over the white car's mirror) No wonder! Look, Neo, put this one on your boyfriend's little car—the little ornament is gonna look so cute! Well, the ornament... and Harvey too!

 

HARVEY: (Turning bright red, but laughing, freed from the secret) You are pushing your luck, Ignatia!

 

IZZY: (Putting on a face of total innocence, tilting her head like a curious child) Who, me? I'm just stating the facts! And by the way, who drives the car when you two go out for a spin, huh? Is it always you, Neo, or do you sometimes let Harvey hold the wheel?

 

NOAH: (Laughing charmingly as he ruffles Izzy's hair) I let him drive on the straightaways, Ignatia, but on the curves I close my eyes because he steers like he's in a bumper car.

 

MADAME MARGE: (Skating out on her floor rags from the back door with the battle cry of a municipal Valkyrie and braking hard with her mop held crosswise) Halt right there, you love-struck bacteria! Nobody utters the word "enter" in the face of my imperial domain! I have just applied three coats of mirror-shine wax imported straight from the Vatican, and anyone who puts half a toenail on my tiles will slide straight down into the city sewer!

 

HARVEY: (Stepping toward the central door, still trying to negotiate nicely) Madame Marge, Empress of Suds, look—I just want to step into my room... I mean, my private office. If you want, I'll roll horizontally along the wall so my shoes don't touch the floor!

 

MADAME MARGE: (Spraying the air with her pine atomizer as if exorcising demons, making outlandish comic faces) Sacrilege! He wants to smear his managerial humanity across my disinfected drywall! Back, I say! Around here, me, my bucket, and my fifty keys are the law! Go set up your desk inside a filing cabinet!

 

IGGY: (Slamming open the giant velvet album right in front of Marge's nose) Dial down the pine spray, Madame Marge, because right here in the nineteen-seventy-eight album is your photo dressed as a Broom Showgirl next to the founding bylaws! And the secret clause states in black and white that if the old senior partners ever drop dead of a conniption fit on the manager's first day, you are required to let anyone pass who asks, provided they promise not to scuff the floor and roll through barely noticed! So hand over the master key without a peep, or your supplies of bleach, paste wax, and lavender-pine spray will be confiscated forever, and you'll be condemned to scrub for all eternity using only unscented tallow laundry bars and stubby little corn-husk brooms!

 

MADAME MARGE: (Cackling like a storybook witch until it turns into a ridiculous coughing fit) Ha, ha, ha, and triple-ha! Fools! The partners never actually die! They always fake a heart attack behind that glass, but it's just part of their mating ritual; they woo each other in the dark like insects and always resurrect in nastier forms. I control the master key, and I warn you that you're all in danger of vanishing from this company no matter how hard the new little boss tries to protect you!

 

(HARVEY looks at NOAH, looks at IGGY holding the open album, and sees IZZY smiling beside the white car. Something clicks inside him. For the first time, HARVEY yanks the oversized headphones completely off his neck, tosses them onto the car seat, squares his shoulders, and takes command of the room with a luminous, relentless, and deliciously cruel confidence).

 

HARVEY: (With the firm voice of an orchestra conductor seizing the baton) I am done asking for permission in my own management! You say the partners are like praying mantises in the middle of a mating ritual, Madame Marge? Well, what a shame you never studied biology or Japanese theater, because when mantises and samurai get too passionate, they literally lose their heads! Twins: open the trunk where the Mezzanine laundry chute lets out and bring forth the proof that this time the partners truly passed on to a better tax bracket!

 

(With grand ceremony, IZZY and IGGY pop open the cardboard trunk of the little white car and triumphantly pull out two farcical prop heads, identical to LORD ERNEST and LADY CLARA, complete with bulging eyes, expressions of romantic ecstasy, and lettuce leaves still stuck to their cheeks. MADAME MARGE gives a comical shriek of fright, clapping both hands to her starched cap).

 

IZZY: (Hopping gleefully on one foot as she holds up Lord Ernest's head by the ears) Here's the senior partner's head! The boss was right: in their romantic conniption they sliced their own necks right off! (She drapes one of her fake pearl necklaces across his forehead and shakes the head like a maraca). Look, Madame Marge, he still has his lovestruck expression! Do you think the old witch ate him before dessert?

 

NOAH: (Stepping up to inspect Lord Ernest's severed neck through his mechanic's magnifying glass with deadpan professional gravity) Clean cut right along the necktie, not a single drop of oil or blood. Looks like they've been stuffed with pure shadow and financial sawdust since nineteen-eighty. Total write-off, boss.

 

IGGY: (Squinting with tender mischief as he holds Lady Clara's head high by her stiff bun) And here we have the head of Anne Boleyn... I mean, what am I saying, of the old praying mantis! (He works her jaw like a ventriloquist's dummy, speaking in a squeaky falsetto). «Oh, forgive me for making you climb four and a half steps that look like nine, young Ignatius! Take my private box at the Opera, since I no longer have a neck to peer over the railing!»

 

HARVEY: (Crossing his arms with executive satisfaction) How nicely the partners talk once they finally lose their heads. But let's not be heartless toward corporate romance, kids... If they died mid-courtship, we shouldn't leave them hanging. Give them their severance kiss!

 

IZZY AND IGGY: (In chorus, delighted) Long live the newlyweds in the fiscal hereafter!

 

(With macabre puppet-show glee, IZZY and IGGY mash the faces of the two prop heads together, making a loud plastic kissing sound—«Mwah, mwah, clonk!»—right under the nose of MADAME MARGE, who backs away horrified, spraying pine mist left and right to no avail).

 

IGGY: (Tucking Lady Clara's head under his arm like a football and fixing the head custodian with a stare) Alright, Madame Marge... the upstairs crowd is settled. Who's next on the downsizing list? Who was it that said things were going to go very badly for us in this company?

 

IZZY: (Covering her mouth with both hands, eyes huge with excitement) Ooh, look! I bet if Neo puts a little elbow grease into the engine, he can floor the gas pedal and drive us all straight into Harvey's room!

 

NOAH: (With disarming simplicity, opening the cardboard door of the white car) Alright, kids, hop in, I think we can all squeeze aboard. Harv, get up front with me; you two stick the ex-partners on the hood as headlights, give us a little push, and sure enough, this baby will roll.

 

HARVEY: (Climbing into the car beside Noah with a full, complicit smile before turning to the twins) Ready, team! Let's go look at the photo album inside my room... I mean, my office!

 

(IZZY and IGGY wedge the two severed heads onto the white cardboard hood like figureheads, take their places flanking the car, and, with HARVEY and NOAH shoulder-to-shoulder at the wheel, aim the front bumper directly at MADAME MARGE, who stands just six feet away in front of the central door, looking ready for anything except stepping aside).

 

HARVEY: (Poking his head out the glassless window with farcical serenity) Are you serious, Madame Marge? Are you really going to stay planted in that exact spot? Perhaps you wish to die run over by a cardboard car in the line of custodial duty.

 

(A tense silence freezes the air. All at once, MADAME MARGE stops acting like a cornered beast. Her ridiculous, exaggerated posture melts away completely. She slowly lowers the mop, looks at HARVEY and NOAH holding each other's gaze in total peace, takes in the bright, fearless joy of the twins, and lets a small, wise smile cross her face. She pulls the large golden key from her apron, turns around, and flings open the central door to Harvey's room).

 

MADAME MARGE: (In a calm, surprisingly human voice, stepping aside with grace) In thirty years of mopping this building, I've watched a lot of grey people pass through who didn't love anybody, Mr. Hill. What truly shines doesn't get swept away. You are the new partners that some buried part of my bitterness has been waiting for all along. Truth be told, I admire the lot of you... and I'm actually delighted that such a lovely relationship has blossomed between Mr. Harvey and a cuarta-rate handyman.

 

NOAH: (Leaning out the window of the white car, stung but amused) Hey now... Hold on, Madame Marge, fourth-rate handyman my foot! I'm a certified specialist technician!

 

MADAME MARGE: (With maternal snark) Yes, yes, of course you are, sonny, whatever helps you sleep at night. (She motions toward the white car with her chin). And there's no need for you kids to push that car; this thing has always been able to run on its own... Just turn the ignition, boy, and you'll see it works like a charm!

 

(NOAH turns the key on the dashboard and, defying all laws of cardboard engineering, the powerful, glorious roar of a freshly tuned V8 combustion engine shakes the entire theater).

 

ALL: (In cartoon unison) OHHH!

 

HARVEY: (Staring at the car in wonder) It actually runs! Pinch me, I must be dreaming!

 

MADAME MARGE: (With an ironic little chuckle) Look who finally figured it out! Dream on, boss, dream on.

 

HARVEY: (Stopping dead in his tracks as he steps out of the white car, his face lighting up at her words as if he has just cracked the riddle of the universe; he glances out at the audience for a beat with a radiant smile) «Dream on»?... Oh, right... I'm dreaming! That explains everything! (He laughs joyously and reaches out his hand to his team). The car runs, but we don't even need to drive inside! Let's all walk into my room, and Madame Marge, you're welcome to join us too! Let's go!

 

ALL: (In radiant unison) Let's go!

 

(They all walk toward the room at center upstage. IGGY leads the way proudly with the giant velvet album tucked under his arm, stepping first into the office bathed in warm golden light, followed by IZZY skipping happily, and HARVEY and NOAH walking shoulder to shoulder. MADAME MARGE watches them enter with complicit tenderness, adjusts a pearl necklace on the prop heads resting on the white hood, and remains on the threshold barring the way with her mop held crosswise, glancing vigilantly up at the darkened Mezzanine and all around to make sure no ghost from the past interrupts their photo session, while in the distance a cheerful alarm clock rings, blending into celebratory music).

 

CURTAIN

 

THE 4 AND 1/2 STEPS (Helios Corporation). © 2026 by BENJAMIN GAVARRE is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0