PLAYS ON WORDS1
By Peter Oswald
Note. Short play, mostly comedic!
Reverend
Rehearsal
Bull
Shit
Aztec
The Queen
Play
The Silence
REVEREND.
EVA AND HER TWO DAUGHTERS KATTY AND BEATRICE, GETTING TEA READY.
EVA: Katty, hurry up and lay those plates, the new vicar will be here in a minute.
KATTY: Yes, mother!
EVA: Cups and saucers, Beatrice!
BEATRICE: Yes mother!
KATTY: I can’t believe he’s coming to tea!
BEATRICE: What’s his name, mother?
EVA: He is called Simon Ever.
KATTY: That’s a lovely name for a vicar!
EVA: It is! Now bring the scones, Katherine, and Beatrice, fill the kettle! My old legs will not carry me anymore in this world.
KATTY: Here he is! He’s coming!
BEATRICE: Oh! Isn’t he old!
EVA: What do you expect? He is a man of God!
BEATRICE: He must be – hundreds of years old.
ENTER VICAR.
VICAR: Blessings to you all!
EVA: Blessings to you, Reverend! Reverend, these are my daughters Katherine and Beatrice, they are obedient girls.
VICAR: How do you do, Katherine, how do you do, Beatrice.
EVA: Forgive me for not rising, my old legs will not stand up anymore in this world.
VICAR: Oh don’t trouble yourself, Mrs Farridge.
EVA: Sit down, Reverend!
VICAR: Oh, thankyou!
EVA: Now Katty, would you pour a cup of tea for Reverend Ever?
KATTY: Yes mother!
SHE POURS A CUP OF TEA, POURS IT BACK INTO THE POT, POURS IT AGAIN, AND SO ON INDEFINITELY.
EVA: Are you comfortable, Reverend, would you like a cushioin?
VICAR: Actually that would be glorious for my back, Mrs Farridge!
EVA: Beatrice, would you fetch a cushion for Reverend Ever?
BEATRICE: Yes, mother!
BEATRICE GETS A CUSHION, TAKES IT TO THE REVEREND’S CHAIR, TAKES IT BACK TO WHERE SHE GOT IT FROM, TAKES IT AGAIN TO THE REVEREND’S CHAIR, AND SO ON INDEFINITELY.
VICAR: Extremely obedient daughters!
EVA: I have brought them up like that! Just as I was brought up myself! And my grandmother and her mother and her mother’s mother and her mother’s mother’s mother and her mother and her mother’s mother and her mother’s mother’s mother and her mother –
VICAR: Could you possibly pass me a spoon? My old hands are very cramped, they will no longer grip spoons in this world.
EVA: Katty, fetch a spoon for Reverend Ever! And Beatrice, butter a scone for Reverend Ever! You would like a scone, Reverend?
VICAR: I confess I desire one!
KATTY MODIFIES HER ROUTINE OF POURING AND UNPOURING, TO PASS A SPOON TO REVEREND EVER, TAKE IT AWAY AGAIN, PASS IT AGAIN; BEATRICE MODIFIES HER ROUTINE OF CUSHION-CARRYING TO BUTTER A SCONE, SCRAPE THE BUTTER OFF, BUTTER IT AGAIN, INDEFINITELY.
VICAR: Wonderful are the ways!
HE SINGS.
All people that one earth do dwell
Sing to the Lord with cheerful voice!
Etc
EVA QUIETLY SCREAMS AND LAUGHS. AND SO ON. THIS PLAY HAS NO END.
REHEARSAL
DIRECTOR, ACTOR.
DIRECTOR: Alright? Ok today? It doesn’t matter, you just bring whatever you are, you have just got what you have got, if you had cancer I wouldn’t ask you to act as if you didn’t have cancer, I’d say let the cancer be the character. If you only had one leg, I wouldn’t say, could you act another leg please – and above all, I wouldn’t ask you to wear a wooden one! No wooden leg acting, please, in this production, if something isn’t there, it isn’t there. Not long now, only a few days now, well here we are, here we are, we are pretty well there, aren’t we? It’s been years. Well it’s been forever, if we count everything up to this point. So let’s hope, let’s hope there’s really something. Let’s hope. Do you just want to go through it once then?
ACTOR: Help, help, they are coming!
LONG SILENCE. DIRECTOR PUTS HIS HEAD IN HIS HANDS.
DIRECTOR: Could I say something? Is it alright if I just say something, is it? I’d hoped that – well, what had I hoped? Can I ask you something? No, I won’t ask you that. That would be extremely indelicate, wouldn’t it? That wouldn’t get us anywhere, either of us, that would achieve precisely nothing except that I would have asked you a question. An unnecessary question. Because frankly the answer is all too plain! There is nothing unseen, there is nothing hidden, the covers have been ripped off the book, off the bed, there it is, the glaring fact or facts of the matter. We have not got very much time. That is the main thing. If we had more time – even just a little, things would be different. If we had a lot more, they’d be completely different, wouldn’t they, we’d be, in effect, at or near the beginning, the beginning of a relatively short thing, or the middle of a nice long thing – a long holiday even, on Long Beach! That would be something! But we are not there, are we? We are on Short Beach, or No Beach At All, we are standing in the sea up to our knees and there is nothing behind us but steep cliffs and the tide is rising. Shall we wave our hands wildly and scream, in hope of rescue? Shall we turn round and claw at the sheer rock, with bleeding fingers? Or shall we cast ourselves into the foam and let ourselves sink? Hard to decide. Well look, there are no ships on the horizon, no rescuers anywhere, I think we should just try it again. Ok?
ACTOR: Help, help, they are coming!
EVEN LONGER SILENCE. DIRECTOR LEANS AGAINST WALL, HAND OVER FACE.
DIRECTOR: In the beginning was the word, and the word was God, and the word was with God. God. God, to be back there then, to be before the beginning. To be prior. Back in the fog of chaos, the blindly flung lightning and the wild drunkard volcano-drumming! To be floating about like a neutron, or like the form, the pre-echo, the pre-existent notion of an atom not quite yet even occurring in God’s mind! To be pre, simply to be pre, pre-everything. Or post. To be post. To have been posted into oblivion, everything finished, every error committed, every triumphant discovery faded into the past. To be post all of the past, past the finishing post, the great sack of murders crammed to its absolute limit and then cast into the pit of not. To be standing as it were on the sum, the summit of all fake and true orgasms, all swabs and hospital closures, for the whole bloody thing to be over! Over! To be sitting in the empty theatre of the universe watching the lights go out one by one. The death of death. God.
ACTOR: Would you like me to try it again?
DIRECTOR: Yes, by all means, go back to the beginning.
ACTOR: Help, help, they are coming!
EVEN LONGER SILENCE. DIRECTOR PLACES ACTOR’S HANDS AROUND HIS NECK.
DIRECTOR: I am now going to give you the most important, most life-saving piece of direction that I have ever given you or anyone else in my entire professional life so far. Which has spanned, it seems, entire religions, whole civilisations and languages, they have come and gone while I have ranted and coaxed in little rooms, bringing to the light as it were a million infants – a hard-worked midwife-machine! Syllable by syllable I have dragged the inside out. I have hunted down the hidden, the burrowed, not to slit its furry throat but to raise it onto a glittering Olympic podium! While wars trundled by with squeaking of wheels. While the human was humiliated by his inventions! While alligators evolved another streak of cruelty! Or gills, I don’t know! This, my friend, is the moment, this is what I have been working towards. Do you understand? If you do not do what I say now, then I have failed, all the powers of persuasion, of communication, that I have been developing for millennia, they will have come to nothing if you do not now respond. Listen to me now, listen – with your intestines! Grow ears on your pancreas, a little ear on each of your vertebrae! Listen, listen, listen, listen!
ACTOR: I am listening.
DIRECTOR: I want you to strangle me to death. On the count of three. One, two, three.
ACTOR ACTS STRANGLING HIM TO DEATH, WITH GREAT EXAGGERATION. DIRECTOR IS COMPLETELY UNMOVED.
ACTOR: How was that?
EVEN LONGER SILENCE.
DIRECTOR: Am I dead? No. Not in the slightest. What was that? That was acting, was it? Did I ask you to act? Have I ever, ever, once asked you to pretend? Even the tiniest bit? Is that going to get you or I or anyone else anywhere? What would be the use of it? Could you please tell me? What would be the function of imitation? Eh? Useful for a grasshopper to imitate the grass, but for you and I? Are we Stick Insects? Are we? I asked you to strangle me to death.
ACTOR: I can do better.
DIRECTOR: Can you? Can you?
ACTOR: Yes I can.
DIRECTOR: Go on then!
ACTOR: I mean with the lines.
DIRECTOR: Oh the lines! The lines! We’re alright, aren’t we, with the lines! Safe with the lines, the lines will postpone our inevitable end, they will pay our way, won’t they, the tight bloody lines, they will persuade the Iranians! They will keep out the sea, won’t they, the thin red lines! Repel the barbarians!
ACTOR: Help, help, they are coming!
DIRCTOR: Ok that’s great Nige, let’s get a cuppa tea.
EXEUNT.
BULL.
AN OFFICE. ENTER STEPHENS AND HORRIDGE. A SECRETARY.
STEPHENS: Hello! We’ve come to see Mr Phillotson.
SECRETARY: Oh! The Bull! Good luck! I’ll get him.
EXIT SECRETARY.
HORRIDGE: I wonder why they call him the Bull.
STEPHENS: Yes I wonder.
ENTER PHILLOTSON. HE SITS DOWN. SILENCE.
PHILLOTSON: Good morning. Stephens?
STEPHENS: That’s right. Good morning, Mr Phillotson.
PHILLOTSON: Good morning. Horridge?
HORRIDGE: That’s me. Pleased to meet you, Mr Phillotson.
PHILLOTSON: Not much of an office.
HORRIDGE: I like it.
PHILLOTSON: I don’t. I hate being cooped up. But every now and again they let me out for a little run around the yard.
STEPHENS: Haha!
HORRIDGE: Ha!
PHILLOTSON DOESN’T LAUGH.
STEPHENS: Well you’ve got a charming secretary.
PHILLOTSON: She’s a cow. They’re all cows.
EMBARRASSED SILENCE.
PHILLOTSON: So what can I do for you fellows?
STEPHENS: Well –
ROGERS PUTS HIS HEAD ROUND THE DOOR. PHILLOTSON LEAPS TO HIS FEET AND LUNGES FORWARDS.
ROGERS: Sorry! Wrong door!
PHILLOTSON: (ROARS.) Rogers!
ROGERS HAS ALREADY GONE. PHILLOTSON BELLOWS IN AGONY.
PHILLOTSON: This used to be his office! Now whenever I have a meeting he pops his head around the door and pretends it’s a mistake!
HORRIDGE: What a nuisance!
STEPHENS: Stupid!
PHILLOTSON: It’s sheer provocation! I can’t stand it! If he does it again I won’t hold myself back! I have got to have my own space!
STEPHENS: Of course you have!
PHILLOTSON: I used to have three secretaries under me – he’s filched two of them! What sense does that make? I do far more work than he does! I’m their ox!
HORRIDGE: How difficult!
PHILLOTSON: So what can I do for you fellows?
ROGERS PUTS HEAD ROUND DOOR.
ROGERS: Sorry! Done it again! Sorry!
PHILLOTSON ROARS, LEAPS OVER DESK, SMASHES INTO THE DOOR AS ROGERS CLOSES IT. HE LIES IN A HEAP ON THE FLOOR, BREATHING HEAVILY.
HORRIDGE: Are you alright?
PHILLOTSON: They are goading me, aren’t they?
STEPHENS: It looks a bit like it.
PHILLOTSON SITS AT DESK, SLIGHTLY STUNNED.
PHILLOTSON: I’m putting on weight. All I do is eat, eat, eat. Soon I’ll be enormous. Then they’ll have to give me a bigger office!
HE ROARS WITH LAUGHTER, STANDS UP.
PHILLOTSON: Then I will just lean against the wall and crash straight through it! I’ll push him up against a wall till his ribs pop!
STEPHENS: Do you think you need some time off?
ROGERS PEEPS ROUND THE DOOR.
ROGERS: Oh God, I don’t believe it! You berk, Rogers!
PHILLOTSON FLINGS HIMSELF AGAINST THE NOW CLOSED DOOR, ROARING AND BATTERING WITH HIS HEAD AND FISTS.
PHILLOTSON: Rogers!
HORRIDGE: Should we call someone?
PHILLOTSON: Rogers! Rogers!
ENTER ROGERS DRESSED AS A MATADOR, WITH A SWORD. HE WAVES HIS RED CAPE. PHILLOTSON CHARGES – STEPHENS AND HORRIDGE ARE KNOCKED FLYING. ROGERS TAUNTS PHILLOTSON WITH THE CAPE, AND AS PHILLOTSON BLINDLY BLUNDERS, ROGERS RUNS HIM THROUGH THE BACK OF THE NECK WITH THE SWORD. PHILLOTSON DIES.
STEPHENS: Jesus Christ! You’ve killed him!
ROGERS: Ole!
EXIT ROGERS. STEPHENS AND HORRIDGE STAND IN SHOCK, THEN STAGGER OUT OF THE ROOM.
SHIT
NEIL AND GRACE.
NEIL: Shit weather.
GRACE: Yeah shit.
NEIL: Shit clouds shitting shit on the shit ground.
GRACE: And the shit houses.
NEIL: Built out of shit.
GRACE: On shit.
NEIL: Shit on shit.
GRACE: On the shit earth.
NEIL: And the shit flowers.
GRACE: The shit roses and the shit daisies.
NEIL: All the shit little animals.
GRACE: Slithering about in the shit.
NEIL: And the shit people.
GRACE: Dressed up in their shit Sunday best.
NEIL: Shit diamond earrings.
GRACE: And shit golden wedding rings.
NEIL: In their shit shiny shoes.
GRACE: Going in through the shit church door.
NEIL: Singing their shit hymns.
GRACE: And saying their shit prayers.
NEIL: Floating up to shit heaven.
GRACE: And all the shit angels with their shit harps sitting on their shit clouds.
NEIL: Shit forever and ever.
GRACE: All the shit birds fluttering about.
NEIL: Singing their shit songs.
GRACE: Lovely as the shit dawn.
NEIL: On and shit on.
GRACE: Till the shit stars come out and the shit moon.
NEIL: All the shit panoply of heaven.
GRACE: Like a shit tapestry woven with shit silver thread.
NEIL: Sweet shit dreams.
GRACE: Between the shit sheets.
NEIL: God bless the shit little children.
GRACE: Silent shit night.
NEIL: The peace of the shit blue hills.
GRACE: And the shit sea.
NEIL: The calm shit sea all paved with shit moonlight.
GRACE: And the shit tall ships.
NEIL: The shit glittering fish.
GRACE: The numberless sands of the shit shore.
NEIL: Where the shit mermaids comb their shit hair.
GRACE: And the shit drowned sailors sing to one another.
NEIL: And there, in the middle of the shit underwater garden there is a shit tree with shit magic plums.
PAUSE.
GRACE: Back to shit reality.
NEIL: A shit splash of cold water!
GRACE: Shit weather.
NEIL: Yeah shit.
GRACE: Shit food.
NEIL: Shit thoughts going in and out.
GRACE: Shit skin. Shit tongue. Shit lips. Shit teeth. Shit gums.
NEIL: Shit bones. Shit blood.
GRACE: Shit blood. Shit hair and gristle. Shit nervous system. Shit brains. Shit intestines. Shit lymph.
NEIL: Shit shit.
GRACE: Yeah shit shit. Shit piss. Shit spit.
NEIL: Shit politics. Shit television.
GRACE: Shit theatre.
NEIL: Shit air. Shit lungs.
GRACE: Shit grass.
NEIL: Shit agriculture.
GRACE: Shit roads.
NEIL: Shit killers.
GRACE: Yeah shit victims.
NEIL: Shit education.
GRACE: Shit beauty.
NEIL: Shit true love.
GRACE: Shit passion.
NEIL: Shit kissing and cuddling.
GRACE: Shit museums full of shit.
NEIL: Shit aquariums full of shit fish.
GRACE: Shit rocks.
NEIL: Shit fossils
GRACE: Shit science.
NEIL: Yeah shit art.
GRACE: Shit music.
NEIL: Shit health.
GRACE: Yeah shit carers visiting the shit sick.
NEIL: And the shit dying.
GRACE: Shit money.
NEIL: Shit religion.
GRACE: Shit everlasting bliss.
NEIL: Shit news.
GRACE: Shit war.
NEIL: Yeah shit glory.
GRACE: Shit courage.
NEIL: Shit discipline.
GRACE: Shit self-sacrifice.
NEIL: Shit history.
GRACE: Yeah shit.
NEIL: Shit honesty.
GRACE: Shit goodness.
NEIL: Oh bright shit island of shit in the shit!
GRACE: We shall come unto thee!
NEIL: And shit shall be shit!
GRACE: As shit was in the beginning, so shall shit be in the end!
NEIL: Amen amen amen
AZTEC
ENTER AZTEC PRIEST, WEARING SMART SHIRT AND TIE AND EVANGELISTIC SMILE.
Hi, I'm Pete. And I've come here tonight to tell you about a very special friend of mine. The light of my life, and the light of your life. The one who makes the flowers bright, who breaks every little bird out of its egg to sing in the springtime. I've got some very good news for you. The one who warms the whole world, who gives life to every living thing, is not hidden away high up in heaven where we can never see him; he's not just a story or a picture in a stained glass window. He's nearby. He's so close you can feel him. He's the most visible thing there is. In fact, if it wasn't for him, we wouldn't be able to see anything.
Yes, the God I worship is a real God. He wakes me up in the morning! He even changed the colour of my skin! And if sometimes he's covered in clouds of doubt, he always comes shining through.
Yes I'm talking about Huitzilopochtli, god of gods, otherwise known as the sun!
(SINGS.) Shine sungod, shine,
Fill the world with your speeding photons!
It's so simple! The answer's staring you straight in the face. Which other God has an entire tabloid newspaper devoted to him? It's time to take off the shades and believe. In your heart of hearts you know you love him. But it's time to show him some real devotion. And not just a pilgrimage to Torremolinos! Shake off the darkness, come out of the fridge! If you're a Christian, no problem, you don't even have to change the words!
(SINGS.)
What can I give him, poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd, I would give a lamb.
If I were a wise man, I would do my part,
Yet what I have I give him, give my heart.
(DURING THE ABOVE HE UNWRAPS A LARGE AND POWERFUL KNIFE FROM A CLOTH.)
And then at last Sunday will really be Sunday! Who's going to give him their heart tonight? Come on, it won't hurt, I'm the world's one and only qualified Aztec priest, just one scoop and out it pops, it's lovely! Come on, I'd like you to really think about all that he does for you and ask yourselves if you can't give him just a little something in return! It's hard work what he does! Ah, you sir!
AUDIENCE MEMBER STEPS FORWARD. PRIEST ASKS TWO OTHERS TO HOLD UP A SHEET PAINTED WITH A SMILING FACE OF THE SUN. ON A LITTLE TAPE RECORDER HE PLAYS THE BEATLES' 'HERE COMES THE SUN.' HE TAKES THE FIRST VOLUNTEER BEHIND THE SCREEN. SCREAMS. PRIEST EMERGES WITH A BLOODY HEART IN A CARRIER BAG, WHICH HE HOLDS UP TO THE AUDIENCE, SMILING WARMLY.
That was beautiful! He'll be glad of that! Anyone else?
ANOTHER AUDIENCE MEMBER STEPS FORWARD.
Ah you sir! Good! This is wonderful! Are you pure at heart? You are? What's this?
HE SEES THAT THE VOLUNTEER HAS A BOTTLE OF SUNCREAM IN HIS POCKET. HE TAKES IT OUT.
Sunblock? Blasphemy! Disbelief! I can't work with this material!
HE PUSHES VOLUNTEER AWAY.
There's no hope for mankind! There's no hope! Sunblock!
HE EXITS FURIOUSLY SHOUTING 'SUNBLOCK!'
THE QUEEN
A RUNDOWN FLAT. ENTER DRAG, A THIEF, PICKING HIS NOSE.
DRAG: God save our gracious Queen,
Long live our noble Queen,
God save the Queen,
Dada dada -
ENTER BOLT, ANOTHER THIEF, DRAGGING THE QUEEN. SHE IS DRESSED IN ORDINARY CLOTHES AND HAS A BAG OVER HER HEAD.
BOLT: I've got her! Drag! I've got her!
DRAG: Got who?
BOLT: This is unbelievable! We'll be famous!
DRAG: What the fuck have you gone and done, Bolt? Who is this? Put her back!
BOLT: No way! Too late now! No going back!
DRAG: You put her back right now!
BOLT: Won't!
DRAG: Where were you dragged up? Look it's allright nicking penknives and sticker books, but you can't go stealing a person! What did you bring her here for?
BOLT: We're partners, Drag, we agreed we'd share everything -
DRAG: What do I get then, an arm? You can't go stealing a -
BOLT: She is not a person.
DRAG: What? What is she, a robot then?
BOLT: She is not a person.
DRAG: What is she then?
BOLT: She is the Queen!
DRAG: The Queen? Oh God! Let's have a look -
BOLT: No. Not yet. Wait. I can't face her yet. I – is there any gin left?
DRAG: Yeah -
GIVES HIM GIN.
DRAG: It's not the bloody Queen.
BOLT: It is. It fucking is.
DRAG: It is not. Look at her shoes!
BOLT: It's the Queen, mate!
DRAG: Well where did you get her?
BOLT: Woolworths.
DRAG: Woolworths? What's the Queen doing in Woolworths?
BOLT: Slumming it.
DRAG: Eh?
BOLT: Mingling – slumming it -
DRAG: Expand -
BOLT: Mingling with her people incognito.
DRAG: Oh come on.
BOLT: It's her, Drag!
DRAG: Well even if she was mingling, there'd still be underwear officers!
BOLT: Eh?
DRAG: Underwear Officers, you know, keeping an eye on her.
BOLT: Undercover officers.
DRAG: That's the ones! There'd be about ten thousand, and helicopters, and unmarked vans, and the Horse Guard, you know, dressed up as tree surgeons.
BOLT: I created a diversion.
DRAG: You what?
BOLT: I created a diversion.
DRAG: What?
BOLT: I stuffed newspaper into some kids' trainers and set light to them.
DRAG: Oh, Bolt, you bastard!
BOLT: No, I mean, not ones with a kid in them! Ones for sale!
DRAG: Oh!
BOLT: Then I grabbed her and ran. I am so sorry Ma'am.
HE KNEELS TO THE QUEEN.
DRAG: Get up!
BOLT: Christ! What am I doing?
DRAG: I was just singing the National Anthem when you came in.
BOLT: Spooky.
DRAG: Anyway it's not the Queen. I hope.
BOLT: It is, mate! I took ID.
DRAG: Eh?
BOLT: I took ID, to check.
DRAG: What ID?
BOLT: A stamp.
DRAG: A stamp?
BOLT: And a 2p coin.
DRAG: Let's see.
BOLT SHOWS HIM THE COIN.
DRAG: Look, this is Nineteen Seventy-Nine, her chin hasn't sagged -
BOLT: Well I took that into account.
DRAG: You're crackers, Bolt. If not, we're traitors.
BOLT: Look, this is the biggest fish ever!
DRAG: And you just happened to spot her?
BOLT: I've been watching her for weeks! Every day she's in there in Woolies, looking at people, and she never buys anything! It's the Queen.
DRAG: You should have told me about this.
BOLT: I didn't want to put your loyalty to the test.
DRAG: I would have stopped you, you Parliamentarian!
BOLT: I know you would!
DRAG: Forgive us, your Majesty, but - . What are we going to do?
BOLT: Demand a ransom!
DRAG: How much?
BOLT: Anything we like! The sky's the limit! Five hundred quid!
DRAG: Alright, I'm with you, mate. But it's not her.
BOLT: It is!
DRAG: Alright then prove it. Show us her face.
BOLT: Alright.
DRAG: God save us -
THEY REMOVE THE BAG AND GAG.
QUEEN: Oh for fuck's sake, what's up? Bleedin bloody norah, cor blimey, strike a light, up yours you big puff, round the 'ouses, w'appen, man? Like, whatever? I'm like so, you what? Get tae fock ye big girl's blouse, horses for courses, get stuffed me old china!
DRAG: Quick, get the gag back on!
THEY GAG HER AGAIN.
DRAG: So that's Queen Elizabeth the Second?
BOLT: She's putting it on!
DRAG: Oh come on. It's just some poor old dear -
BOLT: No, Drag, no!
DRAG: Take her back!
BOLT: No!
DRAG: I'll take her back myself. I'm so sorry, gran, my mate's obsessed with the Royal Family.
STARTS UNDOING HER.
BOLT: Hands off!
DRAG: Oh come on!
BOLT HITS HIM.
DRAG: Right, Civil War it is then!
THEY FIGHT. AS THEY DO SO, THE QUEEN GETS LOOSE. SHE KNOCKS THEM BOTH OUT WITH KARATE CHOPS, AND PRODUCES A MOBILE PHONE.
QUEEN: (IN ROYAL VOICE.) Hello? Sir Rodney? Yes I'm perfectly alright. I'm in Number Twenty-Eight Cromwell Road, would you send a detachment of cavalry? I'll be waiting outside. Cheerio! Don't mention it.
EXIT.
PLAY
KING, QUEEN AND PRINCE SIT IN A ROW, SILENT. ENTER PLAYWRIGHT.
PLAYWRIGHT: Hello. Anything to say to me today? They’re on the phone again. What’s going on. Nothing? Would somebody speak, please?
QUEEN: We have nothing to say to you.
KING: Go back where you came from!
PLAYWRIGHT: I come from here. That’s my problem.
QUEEN: You are not welcome!
PLAYWRIGHT: Why not? Tell me that.
QUEEN: You have given us nothing but unhappiness!
PLAYWRIGHT: I’ve tried my best.
KING: Rubbish! That can’t possibly be true!
PLAYWRIGHT: Why not?
KING: Well if you have really tried your best, you are pitiful! The dregs of the race!
QUEEN: As if a woodlouse should put on clothes and go around pretending to be a man.
PLAYWRIGHT: I hoped you might help!
KING: How can we help? We have nothing except what you give to us!
QUEEN: And that is nothing.
PLAYWRIGHT: Not nothing! You are here, aren’t you? You can see and you can speak!
KING: All we can see is you. All we can speak is to you.
PLAYWRIGHT: Can’t you speak to each other? Don’t you speak to each other when I’m not here, have nice conversations?
QUEEN: No! We are utterly silent. Nor do we look at each other.
KING: We try to forget about each other.
QUEEN: About ourselves!
KING: Yes!
QUEEN: And sometimes we almost succeed! Sometimes! I do. I can feel it coming, but then, just as I am about to disappear, straining in every cell to open the great door into the dark – you appear!
KING: Through this stupid little door.
QUEEN: Out of the dreary light, where you have been wandering about.
KING: And then we are stung back into speech.
PLAYWRIGHT: I think you should talk to each other, I really do.
QUEEN: Are you out of your head? Me talk to that – piece of emptiness?
KING: It’s true, that’s what I am.
QUEEN: A scrap of cobweb caught in the ear of a cat!
KING: The husk of a fly – or just the fly’s foot, caught in it!
QUEEN: Nothing whatsoever can pass between us!
KING: Except nothing!
QUEEN: Oh yes, plenty of that!
PLAYWRIGHT: I’m sorry, I would have imagined there was something –
KING: Completely wrong. For me to speak to her would be like a corpse dragging out of its handbag a mirror in which to look at itself.
QUEEN: To powder its face!
KING: Exactly. Much better just to lie in the dark.
QUEEN: You have not made us very well, you see.
PLAYWRIGHT: I do see that.
KING: She has absolutely nothing to say for herself. And nor do I. King and Queen of a scrap of tarmac, whose history is one dead leaf.
PLAYWRIGHT: I like the sound of that.
KING: Then I have given you totally the wrong impression.
QUEEN: King and Queen of the gallows. King and Queen of an empty bag of cement.
PLAYWRIGHT: But you have your son!
QUEEN: Ah! Ahaha!
KING: Not so much a son as a sleight of hand –
QUEEN: A cardtrick!
KING: A dead rabbit pulled out of the hat.
PLAYWRIGHT: He is not dead!
KING: We are just struggling to twist the language into some expression of the death beyond death –
QUEEN: The language is living, that is the problem.
KING: It doesn’t do death very well. Death in the sense of – the way that – that is dead!
QUEEN: Rather, a mockery of life.
KING: No, mockery is wrong –
QUEEN: You have given us a son, yes –
KING: But somehow in doing that, you have simply taken from us –
QUEEN: Something that we didn’t even have!
KING: The child is entirely a negative!
PLAYWRIGHT: Well I would take him away if I could –
QUEEN: Don’t! You would set in motion – some chain of events.
KING: Somehow – by taking away from us even the thing that we most do not want –
QUEEN: You would create a loss!
KING: And we do not want that.
QUEEN: We do not want that.
KING: We do not hate him. He is nothing to us. And yet, his loss would be something, and we don’t want that.
QUEEN: We don’t want that!
KING: We don’t want anything! Do you understand?
PLAYWRIGHT: I think you’re grotesque.
QUEEN: That is inaccurate.
PLAYWRIGHT: I’m afraid I’m going to cancel you out.
QUEEN: What?
PLAYWRIGHT: You seem to want it!
KING: Can you do that? Can you do that?
PLAYWRIGHT: Yes!
QUEEN: You can blot us out? Totally?
PLAYWRIGHT: Very nearly totally, yes.
QUEEN: Very nearly totally is not bad.
KING: Better!
PLAYWRIGHT: I would still – remember you a bit.
QUEEN: But then – bit by bit – we would vanish even more out of your head, you would completely, completely forget us, it would not be as if, it would really be that we had never been?
PLAYWRIGHT: It’s possible I think – in the end.
KING: Why didn’t you tell us?
QUEEN: Do it, do it, do it!
KING: If we had known, then everything would have been different!
QUEEN: You can bear anything that isn’t forever! Oh bliss!
KING: He can cancel us out!
QUEEN: What is the procedure?
PLAYWRIGHT: There are certain bits of paper. I have to burn them. That’s the first stage.
QUEEN: Oh glorious God!
PLAYWRIGHT: Then I have to move on to other things, let nature take its course –
KING: Nature! God I love nature!
QUEEN: It has its uses, doesn’t it?!
KING: Do it straightaway! Start the process!
PLAYWRIGHT: Alright. Goodbye then.
QUEEN: Get on with it! Get on with it!
EXIT PLAYWRIGHT.
KING: I think he is burning them now.
QUEEN: He is destroying the record!
KING: God it feels good!
QUEEN: Oh the icy flames!
KING: We are going up in smoke!
QUEEN: Come, come, my darling!
EXEUNT KING AND QUEEN. RE-ENTER PLAYWRIGHT.
PLAYWRIGHT: Well that’s it. I was as good as my word. All gone. Every single draft, ash. Just you left. What do you think?
PRINCE: I have still got a tiny bit of hope.
PLAYWRIGHT: Aha!
PRINCE: I do not think I am entirely a waste.
PLAYWRIGHT: Good, good!
PRINCE: There is a lot to be done.
PLAYWRIGHT: Yes!
PRINCE: A lot. Not much in reference to them.
PLAYWRIGHT: No.
PRINCE: They did not give me very much.
PLAYWRIGHT: No.
PRINCE: Certainly very little sense of confidence. A turgid lineage.
PLAYWRIGHT: They were mostly interested in blotting themselves out.
PRINCE: But I am not. Or at least, that is what I think.
PLAYWRIGHT: I’m so glad.
PRINCE: I am not so much in memory of them.
PLAYWRIGHT: What?
PRINCE: There is a little church, with a little graveyard. Perhaps I am the curate.
PLAYWRIGHT: Right –
PRINCE: Or do I cut the grass? I think I should probably be able to cut the grass.
PLAYWRIGHT: Good.
PRINCE: And to rake it. To rake it into heaps.
PLAYWRIGHT: Excellent! You will be magnificent!
PRINCE: No, no, wait, wait. Not so much of that – there’s a little horse that leans on the gate, a little old horse. And clouds. But we cannot do very much more than that. We will be worn out. It might be necessary to tend the grass –
PLAYWRIGHT: Yes –
PRINCE: For thousands of years, first.
PLAYWRIGHT: Alright.
PRINCE: And to pay particular attention –
PLAYWRIGHT: Yes –
PRINCE: To the ragwort.
PLAYWRIGHT: Alright.
PRINCE: But you have got to be careful! You can’t go charging about with great scythes, you can’t ride on the clouds! Do you understand that? I have weak antecedents! But listen, listen, listen – if you treat me gently, if you blow lightly on the ash, there is a possibility. I can definitely feel it, faint, faint – a strong possibility of a faint probability – nothing more than that. But let them be your warning. At all times.
PLAYWRIGHT: I will.
PRINCE: Leave me now.
PLAYWRIGHT: Alright.
PRINCE: On tiptoe. Till the next time.
PLAYWRIGHT: The next time!
EXIT PLAYWRIGHT, DELIGHTED. PRINCE CURLS UP ON THE FLOOR, EXHAUSTED.
THE SILENCE
1, 2 AND 3 SIT IN SILENCE.
1: Can I just -
2: Ssshhhh!
1: Can I just say -
2: Ssshhhh!!!!
1: Can I just say what a -
2: Will you be quiet?!
1: Can I just say what a beautiful silence!
3: No you cannot.
1: Please!
2: Shut up!!
3: It's impossible.
1: Please!
3: Logically impossible.
1: Please!
2: Shut up!!!
1: A silence so profound!
2: Oh! Don't say profound!
1: Why not?
2: Say anything but don't say profound! 'A profound silence.'
1: A silence so profound -
3: What could be more stale?
1: A silence so stale?
3: What could be more stale than to say 'A silence so profound'?
1: What could be more profound?
2: Silence, perhaps.
1: What could describe silence better than 'profound'?
2: Silence. Perhaps.
1: Silence describe silence?
2: Perfectly.
3: Try it.
BRIEF SILENCE.
2: That was it exactly.
1: No it wasn't. That was not it at all. There was a little noise.
2: Rubbish.
1: There was. The silence before was more – profound.
3: It was not profound.
1: It was.
2: Rubbish.
3: What kind of little noise?
1: I don't know what it was. A kind of seeping noise. But not silence.
2: Seeping?
1: Yes – seep, seep, seep, seep. Didn't you hear it?
3: I am profoundly deaf.
2: Are you?
3: Yes I am.
2: No you are not.
3: No I am not. I apologise for saying that.
2: It was a lie, wasn't it?
3: No, it was not a lie.
2: Well it wasn't true, so what was it?
3: I just wanted to hear what it sounds like.
2: You what?
3: I just wanted to hear what it sounds like to say 'I am profoundly deaf.'
2: Well now you know.
3: Yes.
2: How stupid.
3: Not stupid at all. Just curious.
2: You know what it sounds like, but you don't know what it feels like!
3: I know what it feels like to hear it.
2: But not to be it!
3: No.
1: Sshhh – sshhhh -
2: Now he's telling us to shut up.
3: Ridiculous. We are far more intelligent than he is. There is more wit in our spit than in his entire head. How can he possibly tell us to shut up?
2: Shut up yourself!
3: That told him. That was native wit, that was. He might learn something if he shut up and listened. Childish enthusiasm is all he's got going for himself.
1: Listen – listen – seep, seep, seep – did you hear it?
2: I heard you going seep, seep, seep -
1: I was trying to describe it.
3: Describe what?
1: The sound I could faintly hear just in the back of your chatter, that was breaking the silence.
2: What silence?
1: The silence behind it -
2: There was no silence!
3: We have long ago given up on that!
2: That was a totally failed experiment!
1: No – I could still hear it!
3: He could hear it!
2: A couple of doors down the street, locked up in a box, a little dead bird. He could hear it not singing. Nothing we can do can drown out the sound of that!
3: Haha!
1: I could hear the idea of it – or was I just remembering it? It was so profound, once!
2: Then it started shallowing out!
3: At least do it the justice to describe it better than that!
2: I can imagine its tombstone. 'Here Lies A Profound Silence.'
3: We don't expect any better from tombstones! They are the death of the language! 'He Fell Asleep.' 'Dearly Beloved.' Hogwash! Awful, trite!
1: It was a blue silence.
2: Oh shut up.
1: The blue silence of the profound deep.
3: The profound deep is not blue it is black. Below fifty metres light cannot penetrate.
2: There are luminous creatures.
3: What kind of sound do they make?
2: A luminous kind of sound, I suppose.
3: And do not forget the great whales, who deliberately sound -
2: Sound! That's good!
3: Yes – it means dive deep. They deliberately sound in order to make their sounds – their songs – at great depth because sound waves travel furthest through water that is coldest. Thus the blue whales -
2: Blue! Profound!
3: The blue whales can talk to each other right around the world, by merely sounding to great depth and making a note that is very very low, deep in the cathedral of their chests.
2: Cathedral is wonderful! Cathedral! How did you think of that?
3: A bass note on the organ. Ultra-low. Boooom – boooooom – lower than any foghorn – far, far down, making the profound deep ring like a gong!
2: So it is far from silent, the profound?
3: To descend to those depths in search of quiet would be like trying to meditate inside a washing machine.
2: So profound is the worst possible word! Haha! Profound!
1: How shall I speak of it then?
3: Why bother?
1: Since only I seem able to remember it, I have a duty -
2: You have a duty to forget about it.
1: Well it was a wonderful silence.
2: Until you broke it!
1: Did I?
2: Yes!
3: I remember it well. There was silence. How deep it was, I neither know nor care. I am not getting into that! But there was silence of a kind. And then you felt compelled to comment on it.
2: I tried to get you to shut up!
1: I'm sorry.
3: The silence you remember as perfect, having been broken, was then permanently damaged, because even in the intervals between our speech you could hear a sound -
1: Could I?
2: Yes – seep! Seep! Seep! You see, the perfect complexion of your silence had grown freckles!
3: Wonderful phrase!
2: Strings of blood streaked its blue eyes!
3: Oh!
1: Do you think I did that to it?
2: Who else?
1: I broke the silence?
3: Yes. You flogged it to death.
1: How can I bring it back?
2: I think my original idea was the best.
1: What was that?
2: Shut up!
1: Well that won't do any good if you don't.
2: Well perhaps we will if you're polite!
1: But there'll still be that noise!
2: What noise?
1: Seep, seep, seep, seep!
3: There might not be. It might have gone.
1: Could we try it, please?
2: Shall we?
3: Well I haven't got anything much else on.
2: Allright.
1: Really silent.
3: And if it works, you won't say anything like -
2: Oh my God what a wonderful silence!
3: Or -
2: My, this is really profound!
3: Or any other feeble interruptive noises arising from the depths of your shallowness!
1: I promise.
2: We'll try to hold it for -
3: Six weeks?
2: A minute!
3: In memory of?
2: The Big Bang.
3: I think we can do it.
1: Alright?
2: Have we started yet?
3: Well if we had, it wasn't a very good start, was it?
1: Please, I'm anxious to -
3: Ok -
1: I will have to comment if there's a seep, seep, seep -
2: Oh, you couldn't let that go unremarked!
1: Or any other noise. I will just say, can you hear that? Because anyway the silence won't be silence.
3: Understood!
2: Ok, going under -
3: Three, two, one -
2: As it was in the beginning, so shall it be in the end!
THE END.