BOB ABERNETHY, anchor: In Washington, currently playing at the Pope John Paul II Cultural Center -- a play by none other than the late pope himself. The play, called "The Jeweler's Shop," was written by the future pope, Karol Wojtyla,when he was still a young man and seriously considering acting as a career. The play wasn't published until 1960, after Wojtyla had accepted his priestly vocation and was the bishop of Krakow. "The Jeweler's Shop" is the best known of the six plays written by John Paul.

JOHN-PAUL PIZZICA (Director): He was a playwright, and he was an actor and a director and a producer. He was involved in all aspects of theater.

(Dialogue from Play): JEWELER: What road does love take to travel from here to here?

THERESA: I must have already loved him. That was all.

Mr. PIZZICA: Essentially there are seven characters, three pairs of couples and then the jeweler. And some of the stories that the couples tell are really from actual people that Karol Wojtyla knew.

(Dialogue from Play): ANDREW: The day that she said yes …

THERESA: Andrew, do you believe in signals?

Mr. PIZZICA: It's about what happens after the romance is over, what happens after the honeymoon period, you know, when you're just talking with someone and getting to know someone and the work that is put forth in that.

(Dialogue from Play): CHRISTOPHER: There'll be pain. The pain of love and the pain of a new birth. And we shall be so intensely joyful. And we shall stand on the border of what in human language must be called happiness.