All I Want For Christmas Is Melania’s Non-Fungible Token: A One-Act Play
Melania Trump is speaking on her cell phone from her bedroom at Mar-a-Lago.
MELANIA: I love it, Marc-Antoine. Love is the only word. You are the master, the artist. Your work, your oeuvre, should have its own room at the Louvre. Your Elizabeth Taylor, your Ava Gardner, and this—perfection!
MARC-ANTOINE COULON: Ma chère. Melania, but one has only to paint a few strokes—suddenly, it is your cobalt blue eyes, your eyelashes, your mascara, your eyebrows. It is only you. What do they say? The eyes are the windows to the soul. C’est vrai, ma chère Melania.
MELANIA: What are we charging? One SOL, one Solana blockchain for the non-fungible token, which comes to $182.54.
MARC-ANTOINE: I am honored to collaborate with you in this operation, ma chère Melania. You are—what is the word?—a philanthropist!
MELANIA: For the foster children, to train them in the computers when the fostering is finished. My Be Best initiative. Think of all the people who will contribute and be on my list.
MARC-ANTOINE: It is your vision.
MELANIA: You were so brilliant to add the audio to the NFT.
MARC-ANTOINE: It is the vision complete. Your beautiful words in your own beautiful voice.
MELANIA: “My vision is…look forward with inspiration, strength, and courage.”
MARC-ANTOINE: Ideal words. The pause is ideal. Then the inspiration.
MELANIA: My vision is… And on the website, “an amulet to inspire.”
MARC-ANTOINE: You evoke Cleopatra. And now we will paint the next. Like Cleopatra. We have made the eyes famous. Now le nez, your nose, in profile, like an Egyptian queen. Immortelle!
MELANIA: One SOL or two?
MARC-ANTOINE: Let us see how we do on the eyes.
MELANIA: I would love to see you do your watercolor of Ivanka’s nose. Two watercolors. Before and after.
MARC-ANTOINE: For that we could charge four SOLs.
MELANIA: And the breasts, before and after?
MARC-ANTOINE: Je pense, cinq SOLs. So naughty, ma chère.
MELANIA: Have you been watching the new series of Sex in the City?
MARC-ANTOINE: Je sais il est votre favori.
MELANIA: So sad. The husband, he is “Big,” he dies.
MARC-ANTOINE: Quelle surprise!
MELANIA: This Carrie goes to a party instead of to the Hamptons with her husband. This “Big” stays home. He rides a Peloton. She returns home, he is lying on the floor, holding his chest. Il est mort. He is dead from the bicycle.MARC-ANTOINE: Quel dommage! Tragique!
MELANIA: That is not the tragedy. His will leaves one million dollars to his first wife. She did not know.
MARC-ANTOINE: Impossible!
MELANIA: No prenup.
MARC-ANTOINE: Incroyable!
MELANIA: Can you imagine that? And this “Big,” the actor who plays this “Big,” he is now accused of the sexual harassments. Can you imagine that?
MARC-ANTOINE: Scandale!
Donald Trump enters the room.
TRUMP: Can you get off the phone with your girlfriend? We have an event to do.
MELANIA: Another?
TRUMP: We’ve brought in $463,000 already for just nine of these. Republican candidates lined up around the block, can’t wait to give us their money hand over fist. Sliding scale. More for the personal appearance, more for the photo-op. And more for you, sweetheart. So, get off, put on those stilettos and do a runway walk for us.
MELANIA: Who is it tonight?
TRUMP: Can’t remember. Mo Brooks, Marco Rubio, Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
MELANIA: I’ll be right there, Donald.
TRUMP: I’m going out to mingle and I’ll give you a big hand when you come in like a million dollars and you give us the big smile.
Trump exits.
MELANIA: I must go, Marc-Antoine, to another of the so dull fundraisers. I will be thinking the whole time of your next portrait of me.
MARC-ANTOINE: Le profil, pour la reine. Notre queen! Je t’aime. Au revoir.
MELANIA: Sarah Huckabee Sanders…
MARC-ANTOINE: What is a Huckabee Sanders?
MELANIA: Carrie should have had the prenup. Love you. Bye.
Sidney Blumenthal, former senior adviser to President Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton, has published three books of a projected five-volume political life of Abraham Lincoln:A Self-Made Man,Wrestling With His Angel ,andAll the Powers of Earth. His play This Town, about a scandalous White House dog, was produced in 1995 by LA TheatreWorks. This is the twelfth in his "Trump Cycle" series of one-act plays published in The National Memo, including The Pardon, Epstein's Ghost, Ivanka's Choice, Sunset Boulevard, The Exclusive, The Role Model, A Modest Proposal, The Exit Interview, The Hitler Gospel, Father Knows Best, and The Gold Medal Winner.
