"Lucky One Day"

What happens when you go from a happy, hard-working couple to multi-millionaires overnight? In "Lucky One Day," we follow Sherman and Kelly through a series of wild windfalls that turn their world upside down. From a sweepstakes win to a multi-million dollar lottery jackpot, their lives change in an instant.

But a year later, the dream has turned into a nightmare. Their new life of luxury in a Chicago high-rise is filled with bitterness and regret. Join us as we explore what happens when the money runs out and the love disappears.

Action and Plot
"Lucky One Day," tells the story of Kelly and Sherman, a couple who unexpectedly become wealthy. The play is divided into three scenes that trace their relationship's dramatic shift over the course of a year.

In the first scene, the couple celebrates a series of incredible windfalls: Sherman gets a promotion at his engineering job, his debut novel is accepted for publication, a movie studio offers to buy the film rights, and he wins $10 million in a sweepstakes. To cap it all off, he wins a $35 million lottery jackpot with a last-minute ticket. Kelly and Sherman are ecstatic, their joy culminating in a wild celebration that ends with them running off to the bedroom.

Scene two takes place one year later in their new high-rise apartment in downtown Chicago. The couple is now estranged and hostile toward one another, constantly bickering and insulting each other. Sherman spends his days playing video games and "day-trading crypto-currencies," which he seems to be losing money on. Kelly, meanwhile, is living a frivolous life of luxury, going to the casino with her sister Connie, and their dates, dressed in designer "cheerleader ensembles". The scene escalates into a heated argument where they insult each other's lifestyle choices and question the foundation of their marriage.

In the final scene, a devastated Sherman reveals that his book and movie deal are on hold due to a plagiarism claim. He confesses to Kelly that he is unhappy with his life and offers her half of the remaining money, stating he wants her to be happy and find someone better than him. Kelly initially refuses the money and professes her love for him, but he transfers $15 million to her account anyway and decides to leave, taking only his laptop and the Rolls Royce. The play concludes with an enraged Kelly destroying Sherman's video game console with a baseball bat, cursing his name, and then declaring her happiness without him.

Themes

• The Corrupting Influence of Wealth: The most prominent theme is how sudden, immense wealth destroys the lives of the main characters. Instead of bringing them happiness, the money makes them miserable, turning their initial love into resentment and hostility. It strips away their purpose, leading Sherman to abandon his passion for writing and his engineering career for video games and day trading. Similarly, Kelly's life becomes one of leisure and superficiality.
• Loss of Identity and Purpose: Both Sherman and Kelly lose their sense of self after winning the lottery. Sherman, a former engineer and aspiring author, becomes a day-trader and video game player. Kelly, once a hard worker, now fills her days with empty pursuits like tennis and gambling. The money frees them from their old lives but leaves them with nothing meaningful to replace them with.
• Failed Dreams and Reality: The play presents a stark contrast between the couple's initial dreams and their eventual reality. In the beginning, they have tangible successes—a promotion, a book deal—but these are eventually revealed to be fragile and fleeting. The lottery win, which seemed like the ultimate dream come true, ultimately unravels their lives.
• The Breakdown of Communication: The couple's relationship deteriorates into a series of sarcastic remarks, crude insults, and misunderstandings. They are unable to connect on a deeper level, and their conversations are filled with thinly veiled accusations and bitterness.

In this episode, we present Rick Regan's one-act audio drama, "I want to taste the melons of the women who sell fruit by the sea" .

Set in a quiet California restaurant, the play captures the first night out for a married couple after months of pandemic lockdown . Pauline, an academic, and Maurice, a travel writer, meet for what seems like a celebratory dinner, but the evening quickly unravels into a bitter confrontation. Maurice reveals he wants a divorce to take a job in London—a plan that Pauline suspects involves another woman .

What follows is a raw and scathing dissection of their marriage, filled with accusations of infidelity, professional resentment, and the deep pain of feeling unseen. It’s an intimate and unflinching look at the moment a long love affair finally comes to its breaking point.

Themes

• Marital Disintegration and Infidelity: The central theme is the complete breakdown of a long-term marriage. Maurice’s serial infidelity is the primary catalyst for the conflict. His desire for a divorce is driven by a new affair disguised as a career opportunity. The dialogue explores the deep wounds and cynicism that years of cheating have inflicted on Pauline.
• Aging, Desire, and Longing: The play's title is echoed in Francesca's metaphor of Maurice wanting a "ripe melon" while describing Pauline as a "dry" fence-post. This highlights Maurice's mid-life crisis and his longing for the passion and adoration of youth, which he seeks in other women because his marriage has grown stale . Francesca points out the bitterness of an aging man who can no longer easily attract the youth he craves .
• The Need for Recognition: Beyond the issue of infidelity, Pauline’s deepest hurt comes from feeling unseen and unvalued by her husband. She explicitly states, "It's not about sex, Mo! It's about recognition. You don't even see me. You don't know what I do" . Her final attack on the intellectual merit of his writing is a desperate attempt to assert her own value and be recognized as his equal .
• Authenticity vs. Artifice: The conflict pits two different ways of life against each other. Maurice is a travel writer whose life is an adventure, but Pauline frames his work as inauthentic, "overheated, purple prose of made-up middle-aged adventures". Conversely, Maurice attacks Pauline’s academic life as sterile and detached, accusing her of being a "dilettante busybody" for studying Arctic peoples from the comfort of Fresno .
• The Aftermath of a Shared Crisis: The story is explicitly set as the couple emerges from the COVID-19 pandemic. The lockdown forced Maurice, the world traveler, to be "chained to your wife," removing his usual escape. This forced proximity did not create their problems but exacerbated them, bringing years of resentment to a breaking point.

"George, the Gold, and The Gun"

This episode is a tense, character-driven thriller set in a "Sam Spade-type" office in downtown Cincinnati. It follows two partners in a non-profit foundation whose long-standing relationship unravels over two days, exposing a web of financial deception, personal desperation, and moral compromise.

Characters

• George: A man in his late forties with an athletic build, George is the financial mastermind of the operation. He is disillusioned with the "shell game" he has created and is determined to cash out and disappear. He views his actions as a high-stakes gamble that he won, and he feels entitled to the rewards.
• Bill: George's partner, who believes for fifteen years that their foundation is a modest charity genuinely helping blind orphans. He is married to George's sister, Linda. Bill is unaware of the foundation's immense wealth until the final confrontation. The script reveals he suffers from severe depression and feels the foundation is his only purpose in life.
• Carol: The "saucy" and pragmatic bookkeeper who is complicit in George's scheme. She is not an official employee and receives her payment once a year in one hundred gold coins to avoid taxes. She is tough and unafraid, even threatening Bill when he points the gun at her.

Themes

• Deception and Betrayal: The central theme is the profound deception George has maintained for fifteen years. He has hidden the true nature of their business from his partner and brother-in-law, Bill. When the truth is revealed, Bill feels utterly betrayed, stating, "You're making a monkey out of me!"
• Wealth and Moral Corruption: The original, noble mission of helping blind orphans becomes corrupted by the immense wealth George generates. The foundation transforms into a tax shelter and a "shell game" involving lobbying politicians and covering for doctors. This is symbolized by Carol's off-the-books payment in gold coins.
• Purpose and Despair: While George feels trapped and seeks escape, Bill clings to the foundation as his sole source of purpose and identity. The dissolution of the charity pushes him to reveal his deep depression and suicidal thoughts, as he tells George, "Without you, I'm just some washed up nobody" and "I'd rather be dead".
• Escape: A driving motivation for George is the desire to escape his life, which he feels is empty despite his financial success. His intricate plan to convert his assets to gold and flee to Canada in a "George's Screw and Bolt" truck is his ultimate escape plan.