A Prisoner’s Dilemma
by Boho
Michael Bailey, David Finnigan, Jack Lloyd and David Shaw
PageScene title
2.MODULE 1 – DICTATOR
3.FIRST ITERATION
8.MODULE 2
9.SECOND ITERATION
14.MODULE 3
15.THIRD ITERATION
18.MODULE 4
19.FOURTH ITERATION
25.MODULE 5 – CHICKEN
26.FIFTH ITERATION
A Prisoner’s Dilemma is written for two performers, who each play a range of characters. Iterations 1 – 5 are narrative scenes and the script is laid out in a traditional format. The five modules, however, are interactive sequences in which the audience direct the performers in different games.
Modules one and five are set. This script is intended to be a teaching script in interactive theatre, and modules two, three and four are to be written by the presenting company. A list of techniques which may be of use are on our website:
MODULE ONE: DICTATOR
The audience enters the theatre. As they enter, they are taken aside in groups of two and presented with stacks of ten ten cent pieces or five twenty cent pieces. The dialogue repeats for each iteration.
A and B approach audience members.
AHold out your hand. This is one dollar. It is yours. Now, you can give all, some, or none of it to your partner here. How much do you give them? Five, four, three, two, one. Take a seat.
Bis recording the results on a clipboard.
For the last participant, the game may be played with ten or more dollars as below.
AHold out your hand. This is ten dollars. It is yours. Now, you can give all, some, or none of it back to me. How much do you give back? Five, four, three, two one. Thankyou.
FIRST ITERATION
Tom and Sam are in a cell with no door. Each is sitting on a small mattress filled with straw.
TomYou have 6 pieces of straw. You can give me some of them, none of them or all of them. How many are you going to give me?
SamWhat’s this called?
TomIt’s called Dictator.
SamI’m not going to give you any.
TomVery good. Keeping all the straw is clearly the winning strategy. But this time we’re going to play a game called Ultimatum. This time I have 6 pieces of straw. I can give you some of them, none of them or all of them. But if you don’t think I’m giving you enough straw then you can refuse my offer – then neither of us get any straw. You understand?
SamYou offer me some of your straw-
TomOr none of it. Or all of it.
SamAnd if I don’t agree to your offer then we both get nothing.
TomWhich is why it’s called Ultimatum. So, I’m going to offer you 3 pieces of straw.
SamI accept.
TomGood. Okay, now you have six pieces of straw. How many are you going to give me?
SamI will give you one piece.
TomOne? I just gave you 50% of my bundle - and you’re going to offer me one?
SamYes.
TomI accept.
SamI thought you might. Okay, you’ve got six pieces. How many are you offering?
TomNone.
SamI don’t accept that.
TomI don’t care. I swear they’ve taken some of the straw out of my mattress.
SamThen you should stop wasting it.
Pause.
SamWhy did they leave me my watch?
TomWhat?
SamWhen they took all our things. Why did they leave me my watch?
TomWhat time is it?
SamSeven twenty.
TomMorning or night?
SamI don’t know.
TomOh.
SamHang on, we can figure this out. If I wind it forward five hours and the date changes, then it’s seven twenty at night. ...It’s seven twenty in the morning.
TomUnless they tampered with your watch.
SamThen why would they leave me with it?
TomWell let’s figure it out. The train stopped. It was... what time was it?
SamI can’t remember.
TomThe sun was in my eyes. It was late afternoon.
SamOr early morning.
TomRight. And they came through the carriages and they picked us up. They took all our stuff off us-
SamNo, no. They made us take it.
TomYou’re right. We had to pick up our briefcases and suitcases.
SamThey must have taken it off us afterwards.
TomIf that’s what they wanted, why haven’t they asked about it? They just took it all.
SamThey didn’t take my watch.
pause
SamYou’re right, I can hear it too. I think it’s a TV picking up static.
TomNo.
SamOr a radio.
TomWhy would they leave a radio tuned to static? Anyway, it’d be impossible for us to hear it here, unless it was turned all the way up, and why would they do that? It’s a generator.
SamIf it was a generator it’d be turned on the whole time. It keeps coming on and off.
TomMaybe it's only for backup. It’s a generator, I guarantee you.
Pause.
TomHow much straw have you got in your mattress?
SamWhat?
TomHave you got more than you had before?
SamHave I got more than you?
TomWhen they brought us back I saw your mattress and I thought it was different. They’ve put more straw in your bed.
SamDo you want some?
TomWhy did they do that? What did you say?
pause
Tom Sorry.
SamIt’s all right.
TomIt can’t be a generator. It keeps turning on and off.
SamThat’s what I said.
TomI know.
Silence.
Sam twists a piece of straw into a knot.
SamAll right, imagine it’s 25,000 years ago in Greece. You’re a hunter in a tribe that hunts stag. This is your stag, here.
TomOkay.
Sam gets 10 pieces of straw, arranges them in a circle around the straw knot.
SamTo catch a stag, you need ten hunters. You find a stag trail, you follow it until you know that it’s in that little patch of forest or down by the river or wherever. Then you split up and you spread out into a huge circle around the stag. Once you’ve surrounded it you all start to close in together. The idea is, when the stag finally detects you, he’s going to bolt, but if all of you are where you’re supposed to be, he’s going to run straight into one of you and you should be able to kill him.
TomShould be able to?
SamWell it’s not perfect. Maybe the stag zigs and you zag, but the point is if everyone co-operates you have a pretty good chance. And it’s worth it. One stag can feed ten families for three days, minus what the hyenas take. The problem is, when you’re all split up and forming this circle, what happens if you spot a hare?
Another piece of straw is the hare.
TomWhat happens if I spot a hare?
SamWell a hare’s pretty good. A hare will feed your family for a night, and even better, it’s a guaranteed catch.
TomHow is it guaranteed?
SamI don’t know. You sneak up on it and club its brains out. The point is, if you go after this hare, the stag is guaranteed to get away. There’s a hole in the circle of hunters, that’s all it needs. If you’ve got a hare, you’ve got enough food for your family, but not enough to share. You catch the stag, everyone eats for three days.
TomBut I’m not guaranteed to catch the stag.
SamThat’s right.
TomI’m guaranteed to catch the hare.
SamYes. Now there’s nine other hunters out there forming a circle around this stag. Are you going to help or are you going to screw them over?
TomI just keep wondering what would happen if one of them saw a hare.
SamYes.
TomI played a version of that once when I was in college. They rounded up ten volunteers and put us all in separate rooms. We had to stay in the room for ten minutes. All that was in the room was a button. All we had to do is not press that button. At the end of ten minutes, if no-one in any of the rooms pressed their button, every single person got a thousand dollars. If anyone did press their button, the game was over, that person got a hundred dollars and everyone else got nothing. So it’s simple: everyone does nothing, everyone gets the thousand. But imagine you’re sitting in that room, looking at that button, thinking about that thousand dollars. Which is all yours, as long as everyone else behaves. But what if someone else presses their button? Then you get nothing. Do you really want to risk getting nothing when you could guarantee yourself a hundred dollars by pressing the button? That thought alone might be enough to make you push it. But even if not, if everyone else is thinking the same thing, it might be enough to make them push theirs. So you’d better get there first.
SamSo, you went for the hare, took the hundred dollars?
TomNo, I was third to push the button. I thought about it too much.
SamWell there must be a way to make it work.
TomWhy?
SamBecause these people lived on stag.
Pause.
SamHey, how thick do you reckon these walls are?
TomConcrete. I don’t know.
SamCan you see any kind of ventilation shaft up there?
TomI can see a lightbulb. Why?
SamI was thinking – I can use the battery in my watch to make a spark. What if, when they come to get us, we’re...
Sam and Tom become aware of someone coming. They prepare themselves.
MODULE 2
Create an interactive sequence that utilises the Prisoners’ Dilemma, resulting in mutual defection.
SECOND ITERATION
Sam and Tom are still in their cell. Sam is slow doing things with his hands. Sam and Tom are playing paper rock scissors.
SamWhy/
TomWhat was that?
SamRock.
TomOkay.
They keep playing.
SamCan we stop soon?
TomSee, what’s that supposed to be?
SamScissors.
TomHow hard is it to show a pair of scissors?
SamMy hands are tired.
TomAll right, where are we at? I got 152. What have you got?
Sam108.
TomThat’s 44 pieces.
Sam carefully takes a handful of straw from his mattress, Tom stuffs it in his.
SamHow do you get 44 ahead?
TomDo whatever you did last turn.
SamWhat do you mean?
TomYou played rock last time, I play rock this time. You play scissors this time, I play scissors next time.
SamHow does that work?
TomIt doesn’t. Just saves having to think about it.
pause
SamWhy did they sit us next to each other?
TomWhat?
SamOn the train. We didn’t buy our tickets together.
TomWe weren’t sitting together.
SamI was two seats back, near enough. I bought my ticket before the conference started - when did you buy yours?
TomWhen I arrived at the station.
SamYou and I were the only two people from the conference catching that train, far as I know. We bought our tickets more than a week apart – there are fifteen carriages, fifty seats a carriage - what are the odds we’d end up sitting almost next to each other?
TomI don’t know, figure it out. Listen, all it was was some thug cops doing a sweep of the train, looking for anything suspicious. They see us – maybe we said something - they pick us up just as a matter of course. Coincidence. If it wasn’t us it would have been two other unlucky...
SamNo. They had photographs of us.
TomThey had photographs of us?
SamThe train stopped.
TomThe train stopped.
SamThey came into the carriage.
TomThey came into the carriage.
SamThey looked at us.
TomThey looked at the photos.
SamTheylooked at us.
TomYou said to them-
SamI didn’t say anything.
TomDidn't you… I remember you telling them-
SamI wouldn’t say anything.
TomRight.
SamYou asked them why the train was stopped.
TomI asked them why the train was stopped?
SamAnd that was when they arrested us.
TomYou think they stopped the train for us? Why stop a train in the middle of nowhere to pick us up?
SamI don’t know. But they had our photos.
The noise begins.
SamAnd if they had our photos…
The noise continues.
SamListen. I think it’s the sea. It’s the sound of the sea.
TomThe sea?
SamListen.
TomIt doesn’t sound like the sea.
The noise ends.
Pause.
SamNo, not at all.
Pause.
SamDo you know what stickleback do when they’re threatened?
TomStickleback?
SamIt’s a little fish, like a minnow. When a school of stickleback is feeding in the shallows of a river and they detect a predator, like a pike, they don’t automatically panic and flee. The school will stay where it is, but a couple of stickleback will start moving slowly towards the pike.
TomLike a sacrificial offering?
SamLike a scout party. If the pike’s asleep, or if it’s not hungry, the stickleback can get back to feeding themselves. If it’s hunting for prey, they can raise the alarm so the whole school can escape. So two stickleback will sneak towards the pike in little spurts – the first creeps forward an inch, the other catches up. The second creeps forward, the first follows. They each take a little risk, and they trust the other one will back them up.
TomIs it worth endangering their lives getting that close to it?
SamIf there’s a predator in your river and your life depends on how hungry it is, that information’s worth taking a risk for.
TomIf there’s a dangerous predator nearby, what you do is keep your stickleback head down and stay out of the way. If the fish next to you wants to play secret agents and risk his life, you let him make the first move and you wait and watch.
SamWhat if he’s relying on you to back him up?
TomThen he’s going to be disappointed. Or eaten.
Silence.
SamHow long since we last ate?
TomI don’t know.
SamI haven’t had a meal I could taste since the conference final dinner, at that hotel.
TomYou're right, I never got even my dinner on the train. I ordered a chicken casserole from the dining car woman, I paid for it, and then they stopped the train and I never even saw it.
SamAre you sure?
TomYes. I paid the woman, she went off to the dining car to get it, and then they stopped the train. I didn’t even get to see it.
SamI got mine.
TomYour casserole?
SamYeah. There were onions in it. I told her no onions, she mustn't have heard me over the noise.
TomDid I get mine?
SamI thought so.
The noise begins.
TomOh. Well it can’t have been early morning, in any case.
The noise gets louder.
TomIt’s the lightbulb in the next room. Someone’s walked in and switched it on. You can hear it buzzing.
SamOur lightbulb doesn’t buzz.
TomIt’s not the sea.
The noise ends. Pause.
TomWhat’s the time?
SamHalf past four.
TomIn the morning?
SamI don’t know.
TomCan’t you wind it forward and see if the date changes?
Sam tries.
TomWhat’s the matter? What’s wrong with your fingers?
Tom examines Sam’s hands.
TomWhat did you say to them?
SamNothing I said.
Sam and Tom become aware of someone coming. They prepare themselves.
MODULE THREE
Create an interactive sequence that utilises the game of Pigs, where one character wins and one loses.
THIRD ITERATION
VARIABLE SEQUENCE: characters reverse depending on Module 2 results. The winner is eating a slice of watermelon – reverse the dialogue if necessary.
Tom eats watermelon, Sam watches him.
SamWhat did you tell them?
silence
SamSee, you don’t have to say. I know what you told them. I know, because they ask you the same question they ask me. You know I didn’t open my mouth out there and I know you did.
Sam looks around, realises what he’s saying.
SamSorry.
End variable sequence.
Silence.
Sam is 3. Tom is 2.
TomFive.
SamWho’s evens?
TomYou are. Odds, I win.
SamYou know they’re putting us at each other’s throats.
Sam is 3. Tom is 2.
TomFive. Odds, I win.
SamThat’s why they question us separately. They’ve pit us against each other.
Tom is 2. Sam is not playing.
TomTwo. Evens, you win. I know.
SamWe don’t want to hurt each other. We have a choice.
Tom is 1. Sam is not playing.
TomOne. Odds, I win. No we don’t. If you’re finished, that’s three/one to me.
SamWe don’t have to fight if we don’t want to. There’s a choice.
TomWhat choice do you think we have? Let me ask you something: do you think when the Germans and the Japanese surrendered the USA and Russia wanted to go right into stockpiling weapons for the next war? They didn’t have the choice. Even now - imagine you’re a military strategist for the Soviets, and you receive a proposal from Washington: the US is offering to destroy their entire nuclear arsenal if Russia does the same. Perfect – neither America nor the Soviet Union wants to actually fire those missiles. But before you order your entire atomic arsenal scrapped: are you sure the US is actually destroying its weapons? What if you obey the terms of the proposal and disarm the USSR, but America defects and keeps its weapons active? You’ve left your country completely exposed and unable to retaliate if the Americans ever do decide to strike. Even if they don’t, the Russians are now helpless to prevent the US from making whatever demands and threats she like. It’s the Prisoner’s Dilemma. No matter what promises they make, no matter how much you want to, you cannot afford to co-operate.