SYNOPSIS

It’s morning in Bellini’s cafe, a charming busy cafe in the middle of the city owned and run by the lovable Enzo Bellini. Enzo is nervous his daughter Sophia is returning home heartbroken after nine years away to work at Bellini’s. Enzo spills the beans and tells the whole cafe how she fell disastrously in love with her former boss “the weasel” Maxwell Roberts.
“Bellini’s Cafe” (watch recording on YouTube)

In the opening song  “Bellini’s cafe”, we meet Enzo, Sophia, and the two other Bellini waitresses Madeleine and Carmella. We also meet Bellini regulars Curtis, Sydney and Snort; three stockbrokers who have come to see the cafe as their spiritual home. Curtis is in love with Madeleine, Snort loves Carmella and when Sophia returns, Sydney is captivated with her.  ​
​After work, Sophia crumbles when asked about “the weasel’ Maxwell Roberts, she can’t stop crying. The girls resolve to go to a bar, get drunk together and to hear it all. Sophia vows she’ll never ever talk about him.
After three strong drinks, Sophia blurts out the whole story in a cathartic purging that eventually has the whole of the bar huddled around the table, hearing every detail of her disastrous infatuation for her former boss.

“I Don’t Want To Talk About Him” (watch on YouTube)

​Scene 3 and we are at home with Enzo. He is watching home movies on his old film projector of his beloved wife Angela, who died ten years before.

“Ever After”

It’s late, Enzo is on his third sambucca and he imagines the super 8 image of Angela leaving the home movie to dance with him around the lounge room.
He  knows his own health is failing fast,  he is worried about his daughter so he hatches a plan.
He pays for the biggest Billboard in the city- the huge one opposite Bellini’s cafe. The billboard is covered with a glorious photo of his daughter with the inscription;
“Sophia Bellini- the jewel of the city, interested suitors call Enzo Bellini or come into Bellini’s cafe and see for yourself. A lifetime of love and fulfilment with a brave beautiful woman awaits”.
Sophia is speechless, she is a massive billboard in the city. Enzo loves it, the regulars at the cafe love it. Over the coming weeks they feel like the girl on the billboard is looking out for them.

“Billboard Girl” (watch on YouTube)

​Sophia, Carmella and Madeleine are now firm friends. Sophia claims she has “shared” more than the others. She convinces Madeleine to tell her story. In the music store across the road, Carmella leaps on a speaker and gets the varied bunch of noodling musicians to play together for the good of Madeleine’s moment.
Madeleine leaps up and shares with the girls and the rest of the music store, her search for Mister Right.

"Mister Right Where The Hell Are You?”

Meantime, Michael the barista at Bellini’s cafe is learning to dance at “Latin Larry’s Latin Dance hall”. The girls decide to attend. Michael and Sophia have known each other since they were kids, but there has never been anything between them. Latin Larry is not very Latin, he chain smokes and reads magazines during the uninspired lessons, looking up occasionally to bark tepid instructions.

A second billboard!! On the adjacent billboard opposite Bellini’s cafe a new photo of Sophia appears with the following inscription:
“you are my most precious thought, you are the blood in my veins, you are my treasured secret, God blessed this world with you, you are grace and allure. My secret will out. Love, the one true suitor”
There’s a buzz at Bellini’s- it’s a love mystery! Who wrote the second billboard? Whoever did it, Sophia loves- totally and instantly- the impassioned second billboard has captured her. Madeleine and Carmella thinks it’s a bit ‘OTT”.
Enzo thinks it’s suitably gushing.  A TV reporter called Julia Miles makes it the human interest story on the news.

‘This is Julia Miles Reporting” (watch on YouTube)

​​A month passes with no sign of the impassioned billboard writer, Sophia grows impatient, reading his words over and over again, she wants the mystery man to show.

“Let’s Begin”
​
Meanwhile the girls and Michael continue with lessons at Latin Larry’s Latin Dance Hall. One night they arrive to learn Latin Larry passed away during the week and he has been replaced by Monica of “Monica’s Mambo Academy”. Miss Monica is spellbinding, a beautiful sensuous  Latin dancer who demands and deserves the rapt attention of her transfixed students. Suddenly the room is intense,  sex is in the air but Miss Monica wants it in their bodies. She pairs Michael with Carmella but Miss M says there’s nothing there just friends...then Michael with Madeleine but same result...she then pairs Michael with Sophia and lingers with them....Sophia and Michael have lock on, their eyes meet, their bodies meet...they are totally unaware of anyone else in the room....Miss Monica asks “you two are lovers?.....well you should be”, the room descends into a wild heated dance, ending with Sophia and Michael locked together... she asks Michael “did you write the second billboard” but he says no.

"Monica's Mambo Academy" (watch on YouTube)

​End of Act 1

Act 2 opens with Michael and Sophia in a simultaneous soliloquoy “Awkward”, things changed between them after the dance at Miss Monica’s. Sophia tries to block out her attraction for Michael and concentrate on the elegiac words of the billboard mystery man. Michael concentrates on his barista duties.

“Awkward”

The reporter Julia Miles does a follow up story about how the mystery man has gone underground. 6 Months on from the second billboard and he has seemingly disappeared.
The stockbroker boys are ever more in love with the 3 waitresses, with Curtis especially desperate for Madeleine.

“This is Julia Miles part 2”

 At the end of her report, Julia Miles asks Michael what he thinks of Sophia Bellini and Michael sings “Wishing You”.

“Wishing You”

It’s an internal monologue that looks like it might turn external. Whilst singing he arranges a chair in the middle of the cafe and is obviously preparing to make a speech- come clean on his feelings for Sophia.
Carmella sees him doing so, but at that very moment, the weasel Maxwell Roberts, her former boss walks into Bellini’s cafe and asks Sophia out on a date!!
Sophia is bubbling with excitement thinking that maybe Maxwell is the billboard mystery man.....the timing makes sense!
Whilst Sophia races off to prepare for the date with Maxwell, Carmella confronts Michael.
In the laundromat where they both are doing their respective washing loads, she gets him to confess his feelings for Sophia Bellini. However with the re- emergence of Maxwell Roberts, Michael reasons he has lost her.
Carmella enlists the help of other sundry laundromat washers and soon the whole laundromat has spilled onto the street urging Michael to “make his move”, by the last verse Michael has resolved to do so.

“Michael Make Your Move” (watch on YouTube)


Meanwhile Sophia is on her dream date! The alleged weasel Maxwell Roberts takes Sophia out but pretty soon Sophia realises Maxwell is
1. Still handsome and still loves the gym.
2. Not a weasel
3. Unbelievably self obsessed and ...a little boring.
At the end of the night, she feels wonderful- she is free of the Maxwell Roberts curse.
On returning home the girls are waiting for Sophia; Enzo has had a heart attack and been taken to hospital. That night the great Enzo Bellini dies and Sophia is devastated.
The regulars at the cafe miss the beautiful old man, he was the spirit of Bellini’s, but Sophia is a ghost of herself, she is utterly gutted. On the day Enzo’s original billboard is being taken down, Sophia resolves to leave Bellini’s, travel and maybe never return....
This finally brings the mystery writer of the second billboard out of his hiding place, the last scene is a mess of revelations, fireworks, sprinkler hoses, mambo dancing and surprise pairings.


Can I stage Who Loves Me? We’d love you to!

Watch video recordings                                                          
Read a sample of the script
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