The
Next-Door Neighbor
(or
The Domestic Serial Killer Monologue)
Genre: Dark Comedy, Absurdism, Dark Stand-Up.
Author: Benjamín Gavarre
The Next-Door Neighbor (or The Domestic Serial Killer Monologue). © 2026 by BENJAMIN GAVARRE is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0
GAVARREUNAM@GMAIL.COM
Dramatis Personae (English)
THE
COMEDIAN (35 years old)
An
impeccable man of magnetic charm, with a billboard smile and a natural,
disarming poise. He possesses overwhelming confidence and an almost surgical
devotion to order, neatness, and silence. Standing before the audience armed
only with a steaming cup of coffee and a microphone, he sets out to dissect the
absurdities of life in a gentrified apartment complex. Yet, beneath his
polished front and friendly next-door persona lies a disturbing fascination
with the habits, the secrets... and the sudden disappearances of everyone
around him.
THE
NEIGHBORHOOD FAUNA (Invisible Voices of the Building)
- The Performance
Artist (3rd Floor):
Eccentric, nocturnal, and circus-trained. She fills the elevator with the
scent of violets and rotates nightly guests as casually as she mistakes
apartment doors at 3 AM.
- The Airshaft
Stoner: A culinary
mystery living across the narrow air vent; an unwitting spectator who made
the mistake of looking a little too closely.
- The Nosy
Neighbor: The building's
hawk-eyed inspector; an expert in scanning clothes, trash schedules, and
heavy plastic bags.
- The Cellist in
201: A lover of
late-night rehearsals and endless utility complaints, whose loud presence
eventually evaporated into thin air.
- The Fleeting
Roommates: Transient souls
who arrive with grand promises, stack up unpaid bills, and vanish into the
night, leaving only fossilized remains behind.
(STAGE LIGHTS TURN ON. Blaring background
music—a sultry, mournful jazz that suddenly cuts out. The comedian—a young,
impeccable 35-year-old man, magnetic, with a billboard smile and overwhelming
confidence—steps onto the stage with a firm stride and stops at the microphone.
He holds a steaming cup of coffee and stares fixedly at the front row for a few
uncomfortably long seconds.)
THE COMEDIAN:
Good evening. Or terrible evening. Depending
on the case…
(Smirks, with a disarming, ironic charm)
I live in a 30-unit apartment building… 30.
They’re all pretty much tiny—around 400 square feet. Back in the day, they sold
them as "luxury suites," then rented them out as studios… and since
it’s in a heavily gentrified neighborhood, rents have gone straight through the
roof, like we’re talking Soho prices… And it’s not Soho, it’s Bushwick. But
hey, because I’m very prudent, by the time I was 20 I already had enough cash
saved up to buy mine outright… Paid in full, cold hard cash… Don’t ask me how I
did it. It’s a wonderful place for human coexistence, as long as you consider
"coexistence" a synonym for listening to the neighbor in 3B at three
in the morning. Anyone here live in an apartment building? Raise your hands.
(Points to a young man in the front row)
You. The guy in the leather jacket. Don’t
give me that look like your building is a sanctuary of spiritual peace. What do
you hear at night? Footsteps? Screams? Milk boiling over because nobody’s
watching it? The washing machine Mr. Manriquez turns on at midnight because he
won't have time tomorrow to wash his… dress shirts? Don’t answer, it’s a
rhetorical question… I don’t want to make you uncomfortable with overly
personal questions. But tell me… Do you also dream that an intruder walks into
your place and tries to slit your throat? Don’t answer… I’m joking, haha.
The truth is, apartment buildings have a
certain charm… especially those where neighbors are six feet away, separated by
paper-thin drywall. It’s absolute heaven for anyone who loves knowing when the
woman next door is blending an oat smoothie… or when the guy in 407 got his
zipper stuck…
(Takes a few steps toward center stage,
gesturing with elegance)
Let’s be honest. Starting with those
charismatic, attractive, delightful neighbors you’d actually want to
meet, but who are never home… They’re never home because those charismatic,
attractive neighbors… don’t exist. Let's face it: all we have nearby—about two
feet away behind a sheet of cardboard—is that mysterious individual who forces
us to peek discreetly from window to window, barely five feet across the narrow
airshaft. An airshaft that, luckily, has windows so gossipy you can tell if
your neighbor’s sandwich is boiled egg again, or if he switched it up to egg…
and sausage.
Now, peeking through that tiny air vent
holding your breath is a nasty habit that isn't right—it’s definitely not
right. It’s not ethical to monitor when his "supplies" arrive—supplies
that barely last him two hours, whatever they are—nor is it good to find out
that when the effect wears off, filling the entire 3rd, 4th, and 5th floors
with a very distinct aroma of weed… the starving neighbor proceeds to devour
three pizzas, two packs of instant ramen, a gallon of milk, and an entire jar
of Nutella… Mmh. I don’t crave those binges myself… Just watching him eat fills
me right up… Oh, and no, I wasn't spying on him. But when he realized it and
caught me watching him watch me… well, he got spooked. A few days later, that
place was back on the market… Who knows what happened to our little stoner
neighbor… He knew too much, though… Boy, could he eat.
A few days later, a female performance artist
moved in. These places get snapped up in a heartbeat, even with rents orbiting
the International Space Station. Yep, a performance artist. She does
"living art." She sets an egg in front of an audience, then brings a
different guy home every night—not the egg… one of those guys with two… eggs.
This girl, Barbara, comes home insanely late, past four in the morning,
stumbling without ever falling because she’s a circus performer, always
accompanied by a new recruit. She captures them, I think; seduces them with her
fantastic egg-laying act… And then, six feet away from me, she proceeds to
hatch it with the help of whichever guy is on shift… A different set of eggs
every night… Sometimes three… Though come to think of it, the one laying the
egg is always her; she must have spares, I suppose… I’ve bumped into her in the
elevator several times; she always smells like violets, and her date is always
someone new. But she picks them so similar: they always stare up at the ceiling
like it’s crawling with spiders… Me? I can’t stop looking at their pants—you
know, right at the fly, checking if their two eggs are still hanging in there.
(Laughs naturally; completely unfiltered and
unabashed)
Yes, I admit I’ve waited in the hallway
pretending to fumble for my keys just to greet her with a daytime soap opera
smile: "Good evening, neighbor. How’s contemporary art treating you?
The performances? I’ve heard you have quite the creative capacity—as if
organic, sensitive material were emerging from your innermost self."
And she just looks at me with glassy eyes, smiles, and says: "Art
hurts, neighbor." And I think: "Yeah, but I bet continuous
performance art in your bed with a different guy every night must hurt too."
Apparently, I’m not her type… I think she
suspects I don’t share her passion for the new frontiers of theater,
performance art, and installations of broken chairs climbing toward the
Universe… She knows I do monologues and other things… Well, she doesn’t know
that… Well… You try to be a polite, tolerant neighbor who doesn't complain
about her noisy night life… and what do I get in return? Egg-laying Barbara
mistakes my front door for her suite at three in the morning, pounding and
demanding I get out of HER apartment… So I had to whisper in her ear: "Listen,
I knew you were crazy, but this isn't your apartment. And don't you dare raise
your voice at me, because you have no idea what I’m capable of." Barbara
never laid another egg. I mean, she stopped living… in the apartment next door…
Well, let’s see if my next neighbor isn’t a weirdo, or a toxic flutist, or a
drummer obsessed with twelve-tone serialism… Ugh.
(Pausa, takes a sip of coffee, and smiles at
the audience with complicity)
Look, I’ll be frank: I spy on my neighbors…
Almost all of them… But I cannot stand being spied on… Let me tell you…
(Walks to the far right, pointing at someone
in the third row)
You, in the third row. Yes, you, don’t look
down… You. If you ran into me in the building lobby, you’d say "Good
morning" politely like a civilized human being… Wouldn’t you?… No? You
wouldn’t greet me because I scare you, and you’d give me an instant head-to-toe
scan trying to guess the weight… of my trash bag, which contains something
reasonably heavy—anything, a perfectly reasonable weight, nothing out of the
ordinary, don't exaggerate—and you’d stand there thinking: "That
handsome, polite young man who leaves so well-groomed at eight in the
morning... what does he do for a living? He’s always wearing that same black
t-shirt with the little bones, those tight jeans, and that weird habit of
taking out heavy trash bags at the exact same time as me… heavy bags he loads
into his trunk…"
Ma'am, discretion is a virtue. Eyes talk
louder than mouths… If you’d be so kind as to stop staring at my… pants… I know
I’m attractive, young, magnetic… What? Why are you pointing at my bag? Are you
that interested in what your neighbor throws out? Are you interested in the
thick plastic… or are you interested in me…? Don’t answer, it’s a rhetorical
question…
(To the audience member)
And of course, you look like you’re about to
leave because you feel uncomfortable and intimidated by all this exposure… You
can rest easy, but I’ll tell you this… That nosy, gossipy neighbor doesn’t
live… in the building anymore… I don’t know, she probably moved to another
borough, or moved to Europe. You never know, n’est-ce pas?
(Runs a hand through his hair, laughing at
himself)
Because at 35, you think you’ve got it all
figured out. You’ve got an apartment, an espresso maker, a mysterious cactus
that survives on sheer humidity and my daily "Good morning, Mr.
Cactus" greetings… You think you’re on top of the world mid-way through
average human life expectancy… You know you’re doing way better than fine, way
above the satisfying, happy lives of regular city dwellers… You’re thriving,
you’re happy, until… those infernal noises ruin the few hours of sleep you
wanted all to yourself again…
(Lowers his voice, adopting a mischievous
tone)
Because if there’s one thing I’m sure of,
it’s that a community sharing their joyous or miserable lives in a building
shouldn’t get used to neighbor noise… You tolerate it, like I do; nobody
complains, nobody wants trouble, everyone wants peace and quiet… Of course,
there’s always that one guy who loses his mind and goes to knock on the door of
the idiot playing the saxophone, or the woman hammering her kitchen floor at 3
AM with zero mercy. But it never ends well…
And I don’t know why, but suddenly the
problem—the problems—seem to solve themselves… Voilà, something happens
and those noisy, annoying neighbors just stop living… here… in this lawless
land… And the noise vanishes… Ha.
(Playful, mischievous smile)
It’s funny. The guy in 201, for instance.
That polite gentleman who played the cello at absurd hours and argued heatedly
over complaints about dogs, cats, passionate nights, loud music… claiming they
wouldn't let him rehearse his "artistic, silent cello
interpretations." Well, that whiny, chubby, hairless gentleman… One day he
just… vanished. Absolute silence. Days passed, weeks passed, and not a single
note. Did he move to the beach for inspiration? Did he win the lottery and fly
to the Bahamas? Or maybe, who knows… he got sick of high HOA fees and decided
to evaporate entirely. Poor guy. You never know when neighbors will embark on
an unannounced trip and forget to turn off their bathroom shower. How rude.
(Shrugs with mock innocence and
self-deprecation)
And well… same thing happens with roommates.
Oh, roommates. Those lovely creatures who arrive with a suitcase full of
dreams, filling your life with pleasant banter and promises to stock the fridge
with prosciutto and Greek yogurt… After all that joy, they owe three months of
utilities, and suddenly disappear in the dead of night, leaving behind nothing
but fossilized underwear on the drying rack and an existential void in the
fridge. What a mystery life is!
I actually miss them a little… especially
when I have to clean the place by myself, because my level of neurosis
regarding cleanliness is directly proportional to my single status. My college
buddies used to tell me: "Benny, you should get a steady partner, or at
least a cool roommate… someone to split expenses and those quiet evenings
with." Oh yeah? And risk them discovering I don't even know how to
boil an egg, and that my interior design style is non-existent—no unnecessary
furniture beyond a table, a chair, an armchair… and my cactus?
No, thank you. I prefer living alone in the
image and likeness of God Almighty. Has anyone ever seen God share His
apartment with a woman, a roommate, a cactus…? Nah, God is just a beautiful
allegory reminding us that we should live alone, in silence, and enjoy our
solitude without anyone disturbing our peace… Nobody.
(Pauses for comic effect, grinning ear to
ear, interacting with the audience)
Raise your hands if you live alone. (Waits
for hands and points to someone) See, buddy? You get it. You come home at
midnight, open the door, and the first thing you do is talk to yourself just to
make sure your vocal cords still work. "Do I still have leftover
Chinese?" And you answer yourself in a late-night radio host voice: "Nope,
you forgot again… Looks like warm oatmeal stirred in water with no sugar for
you, buddy." That, my dear friend of enjoyable solitude, is true
intimacy. Zero drama.
(Steps forward, dropping his voice to a
darker, playful register)
God, but out on the street… hasn't it
happened to you?… I’m convinced people look at me with a mix of fascination and
suspicion. Maybe because at 35 I have this exceptional confidence, this massive
self-assurance. I walk freely down the street, not staring at anyone weirdly,
not following anyone too closely unless they deserve it… I walk silently,
stealthily… I don't know why people always think I'm following them—especially
women. I assure you I don't want anything from them, and even less from men, I
swear… nothing serious with them, nothing.
Once I’m home, I’m extremely quiet… When I
get back from the street—supposedly stalking people, right, can you believe it…
Ha—I’m very careful not to let out a single disturbing sound… I respect
peaceful community life.
I’m weird, yes, I admit it—I'm a fanatic for
cleanliness, for eliminating harsh smells, for keeping everything immaculate,
for working meticulously, silently, almost surgically in all my… nighttime
activities… Ha, ha. I’ll tell you about my
nighttime activities another day. Nothing bad, I swear. Nothing unusual.
Nothing involving kids, pets… or nosy neighbors staring at me in the elevator
or the lobby. Nothing… nothing at all.
(Smiles flirtatiously)
I promise to be a better host next time
someone knocks on my door looking for a place to stay… Because clearly, they
got the wrong door.
(LIGHTS DIM, leaving a blue spotlight
centered on his posture. Sultry, mournful jazz returns in the background).
Good night. And please… make sure you lock
your door, and leave at least one light on so you don't trip—and so everyone
knows someone lives in that apartment, that it’s not empty, and that you’re not
in there alone, helpless to defend yourself, helpless to call for help. Calling
for help… Ha!
(Impeccable bow, mischievous smile, wink at
the audience.
TOTAL BLACKOUT).
