A sensuous undertaking
by temi (brodkey) rose
Scene One: Morning cont’d
In the kitchen, in the morning. Hope is sitting at the table holding a mug of coffee with both hands. Stephen and Michael argue as they fix themselves first drinks then food.
Stephen: You can’t.
Michael: I think I can.
Stephen: She won’t let you.
Michael: It’s my life.
Stephen: That’s not how she sees it.
Hope: What are you arguing about?
Stephen: Nothing, Mom, it’s ok. Did you sleep there all night?
Michael: You shouldn’t have drunk so much.
Hope: I don’t think it was the liquor that did me in, I think it was the pills.
Michael and Stephen speak at the same time.
Michael: Too much information. Stephen: That’s not funny.
Hope: What’s the matter? You don’t like the vision of your mother as a pill popping, sleeping in her clothes on the floor kind of person? How about your dad being the fight for his country and die a slow, torturous death because of his country’s indifference to biology?
Stephen: Mom. Michael: Mom. Don’t.
Hope: Military men.
Stephen: And their wives.
Michael: You never minded until now.
Hope: That’s not true.
Stephen: Yes. It is.
Michael: You like to win. You never want to lose anything.
Hope: He was my husband.
Michael: Mom stop.
Michael: Don’t be mad at Stephen; you’re really mad at Dad.
Hope: Aren’t you mad at Dad?
Michael: No. I don’t know. Not really. I’m proud. I’m proud of them both.
Hope: Soldier dignity is nice, isn’t it? (she sighs)
Connie enters newly showered, in her robe and is shocked by her mother’s disheveled appearance.
Connie: What’s going on? Mom, what happened to you?
Hope: A little the worse for wear is all.
Hope kisses each of her children and exits.
Lights alter for Ballet #1 : Siblings
The siblings move without speaking, perhaps there is music playing. This is the opportunity to develop the audience’s understanding of their relationships. The lights are pastels, early morning pale oranges, pinks and yellows. When the siblings are done eating, the sun is higher than it was and they exit, leaving the kitchen empty.
Scene Two: Afternoon
Gina is unpacking bags of groceries. Connie is dressed up, about to go out.
Gina: Looks make a difference.
Connie: Not anymore.
Gina: Never changes.
Connie: Yes, it does. There is a rift in the body female, Gina. One part dives deeply into patriarchal forms of repressive objectified-body-manipulating dystopia; the other part rides the waves of social reform: women distinguishing themselves through their honesty, their wisdom and their devotion.
Gina: Are you kidding?
Connie: No. I don’t think so.
Gina: You think you can have a happy life as a woman without trading on your physical beauty?
Connie: I’d go further. I’d say that physical beauty in a woman (or a man) is a handicap in the pursuit of happiness.
Gina: Because?
Connie: Because beauty is harder not to objectify.
Gina: And what’s wrong with being appreciated as a beautiful object?
Connie: I have no idea who I am but I know I’m not an object. I flow, I change, I grow, I abandon, I encourage.
Gina: Oh courage.
Connie: En-courage.
Gina: Yes, to embolden courage in another. There are two types of courage.
Connie (teasing): The mother and the whore. The devil and Miss Jones.
Gina (not amused): Bravado and patience. Endurance and transformation.
Lights shift to indicate a later part of the afternoon. Stephen, Michael, Gina and Connie are in the midst of a card game (a real game please - ad libs related to the game are fine) at the kitchen table.
Stephen: Remember that? God, I hated that play
Gina: Why?
Michael: It’s depressing. First there’s this woman who doesn’t give a shit about her children and – surprise! They all end up dead. That’s what happens when mothers don’t take care of their children. Duh.
Gina: That’s not what the play was about.
Connie: It was about survival.
Michael: That makes it ok to commit endless crimes?
Connie: No. And what crimes does Mother Courage commit? She’s a businesswoman.
Gina: Looking out for her family.
Stephen: During a war.
Michael: Life during wartime?
Stephen & Gina: Yeah.
Gina: Haven’t you ever felt that way?
Michael: What way?
Stephen: Like you’d do anything to survive?
Michael: Not really. I don’t think I’ve ever been anywhere near that close to not being able to survive.
Connie: The characters weren’t criminals.
Michael: They weren’t very admirable.
Connie: I think they were very admirable. Hard-working ordinary people, doing what ordinary people do but in extraordinary circumstances.
Gina: Not so extraordinary.
Connie: Compared to what? Here?
Gina: No, compared to the world.
Michael: What do you think Mother Courage does when all her children are gone?
Gina: She keeps going, that’s the point.
Pause.
Connie: I heard this Buddhist thing. Like we’re each a leaf and it’s sad when we die, and in the fall when leaves die, it’s sad but even then, leaves themselves aren’t dead.
Michael: Just those particular leaves.
Stephen: So that’s why we shouldn’t grieve?
Connie: I guess.
Stephen: Because life persists. But it’s precisely the individuality of the person that IS missed. We don’t love humanity: we love specific people. I think it’s hard to like Mother Courage because she’s like Mother Nature, she can experience the total annihilation of her self-extensions and just keep going. But that vision is so hopeless. Endless warfare. Endless loss.
Pause.
Michael: Does the daughter commit suicide at the end?
Gina & Stephen: ?
Connie: She commits the ultimate act of Christian courage, compassion makes her brave.
Michael: But is it suicide?
Stephen: Not if she’s a warrior.
Michael: But she’s not a warrior, she’s just a mute girl.
Stephen: Hang on a minute. Anyone can be a warrior.
Michael: Like anyone can be an artist?
Stephen: Yeah, exactly like that. I’m starting to like this play better in retrospect (laughs at himself).
Connie: Kattrin risks her life so that others may live. She can’t even hear the drum she beats to save the town in the end.
Michael: She could feel the vibrations.
Connie hits or kicks him.
Michael: Ouch.
Stephen: Mother Courage is the mother of courage. It’s her kids who have courage.
Michael: Eilif has military hero courage,
Stephen: Which is also self sacrificing. So that’s two kids who do that.
Michael: How is Swiss Cheese brave? What does he sacrifice?
Stephen: He has bureaucratic courage.
General laughter.
Stephen: He tries to conserve, keep the money safe.
Michael: What?
Stephen: It’s not just that it’s money. He knows he’s responsible for the liquidity of his unit.
Connie: The liquidity of his unit?
Stephen: Their ability to negotiate. We’re trying to understand how a bureaucrat can have courage. So you have to see it from his point of view, not yours.
Michael: I thought bureaucrats were the epitome of cowards?
Connie: That’s in Russian Literature. This is German.
Gina: He obeys rules and tries to do the right thing but the authority structures keep changing on him. So right and wrong keeps changing and he can’t keep up.
Michael: He’s sliced up by those whirling metal blades.
Michael illustrates with his arms, enormous whirling metal blades.
Connie: Scylla and Charybdis.
Gina: Rock and a hard place.
Stephen: The devil and the deep blue sea.
Connie: You think the play’s called Mother Courage just because Mother Courage is the mother of courageous children? Don’t you think she’s brave herself at all?
Stephen: Sure. Why not? Writers love puns. Why can’t she be both? The army did a study decades ago that correlated courage in males to their mothers’ courage.
Gina: Not their fathers?
Stephen: Nope.
Gina: That’s interesting. I didn’t know that.
Stephen: Hundreds of years of non-stop war. That’s got to be crazy-making.
Gina: It explains a lot about that part of the world.
Stephen: And any other strategic crossroads.
Michael: Mother Courage has courage. Elemental courage. Because she’s a survivor.
Connie: The mother takes care of herself. She tries to take care of her family but she can’t. That’s her tragedy. The daughter might succeed in caring for others. If the people understand the meaning of the beating of the drum. We don’t know. But, either way, for her life, it’s a tragedy.
Michael: Damned if you, damned if you don’t, give a shit.
Stephen: Now I remember what I hated -- the bleakness, like Godot. I prefer musicals.
Connie: Something with a punch line.
Gina: Wait a second, I totally disagree with you, Connie. Mother Courage does take care of a lot of people. She provides supplies to people on the war front.
Connie: But she gets money for it.
Gina: Do I do nothing necessary for your sustenance?
Connie: Point taken.
Michael: Did anyone ever notice that Buddha looks like those ancient fertility sculptures? (ad libs of concurrence) And Jesus totally looks like a girl. (hoots of delighted agreement) What’s with that?
Connie: Images of kindness – maybe they have to have a feminine cast. Christ, the young maiden, pleading for mercy and love. And Buddha, the matron spreading joy and good will, the nurturer.
Gina: And the crone?
Connie: I don’t think the crone has ever inspired idolatry.
Lights shift.
The brothers are in simultaneous monologues.
Michael: I like rules.
Stephen: There once was a boy with a gun.
Michael: I just don’t like someone else’s rules.
Stephen: I’ve always loved guns.
Michael: I’m allowed to have my own rules. That’s what freedom is.
Stephen: My first gun was a rifle.
Michael: I can’t exist without structure. I crave it. Not like an aphrodisiac, like sleep.
Stephen: I like hand guns.
Michael: I feel weak when I have to operate without structure.
Stephen: I like to shoot.
Michael: But the idea of living and working inside of military culture.
Stephen: Shooting a person is different.
Michael: I don’t know how they do it.
Stephen: I can’t say I ever like that.
Michael: I think it brings them peace.
Stephen: There is a sense of relief, pressure release, problem alleviated -that lasts for a few moments and then an anvil falls on your chest.
Michael: War preparedness creates peace. I don’t think that’s ironic. I think it’s like bringing an umbrella so it won’t rain. I think it’s superstitious.
Stephen: When they pin medals on your chest, the weight lifts a little. To your shoulders.
Michael: I don’t see the attraction.
Stephen: We carry the weight of the lives we take. A kill takes patience, trust, accuracy, focused intention. Living with the kill takes courage.
Lights shift back to the card game.
No time lapse.
Gina: Tell us a story about laughter.
Michael: Then it can’t be about girls.
Connie: Why not?
Stephen: Girls aren’t funny.
Connie: Why not?
Stephen: I wish I knew.
Connie: Maybe you don’t get our jokes.
Michael: What jokes?
Connie: Innuendo is not a joke.
Gina: Why do I never know what’s going on?
Stephen (affectionately): You’re slow. It’s not your fault.
Gina: I like slow.
Connie: Me too.
Gina: Nothing wrong with slow. It’s those speedy motherfuckers you have to watch out for.
Blackout.
Scene Three: Dinner
3a. Drinks
It’s evening now. Appetizers and drinks are being served by Gina in the livingroom, hence her absence. Raj is alone in the kitchen.
Raj: There’s something about secrets. Something seductive. It seems so easy; just say the expected thing regardless whether it has any similarity to your inner reality. Or pretend you did or said something you wish you had done or said, making the world more aesthetically pleasing in retrospect. Or insist that someone else is the cause of your problems. Suddenly you have to keep up the lie that protects your secret. And the lies multiply like stage four cancer, splatter all over your insides then aggregate themselves into unbreachable stone walls and you, the small soul immersed, standing in the center of the courtyard of a deserted a castle alone.
The first boy I kissed died of a heroin overdose. People don’t thrive in isolation. Take the stones down. It doesn’t matter how long it takes. My heart burst through the cracks. I changed.
Maybe I will tell the truth of who I am. Maybe that truth will resonate with someone else’s truth.
3b. Hors D’Oeuvre
Stephen and Connie burst into the empty kitchen to pick up more hors d’oeuvre.
Stephen: Why are you being such a bitch?
Connie: Why are you?
Stephen: It’s my gay personality, don’t-cha know?
Connie: I can tell the difference between my own brothers, thank you very much.
Stephen: Can you? I thought the only person who’s real to you is you.
Stephen exits with a tray. Connie is immobile. Enter Julie. Connie starts moving around agitated.
Connie: I need to keep busy.
Julie (laughs): That’s the story of my life.
Connie (angry): So I don’t fall apart.
Julie: I get it, Connie, I do.
Connie: Nobody gets it.
Connie grabs some hors d’oeuvre and exits hurriedly, Julie follows more thoughtfully.
3c. Soup and Salad
Bruce and Julie bring in stacks of soup bowls and salad plates. As if with one impulse they collapse into the kitchen chairs, there is a huge release of tension. Julie stands, gives Bruce a hug and exits with a bottle of something for the guests. After a moment Hope enters.
Bruce: Hey, kid.
Hope laughs.
Hope: I don’t feel much like a kid.
Bruce: You’ll always be a kid to me.
Hope (suddenly angry): I don’t want you to see me as a kid. I’m a woman. I lost my husband. I’m a grown woman, Bruce. I’m not a kid.
Bruce (embracing her): I know, kid. I know.
Blackout.
3d. Salmon
Lights come up on Brenda and Julie washing, drying and putting away pans, dishes and such.
Julie: Maybe I don’t want another man.
Brenda: Are you gay, dear?
Julie: No.
Brenda: Divorce always feels like failure.
Julie: And freedom.
Brenda: That’s good. And now you want to declare your freedom from the entire male race?
Julie: Do I?
Brenda: I don’t know. Do you?
Julie: I don’t know.
Brenda: You know, sometimes when you don’t know, it’s exactly the right thing to be. Knowing isn’t a state of grace, it’s only knowing. Maybe there’s no answer now. Maybe not knowing is exactly right. You’ll know when you know. And you’ll know what you want to do. You know?
Brenda exits as Hope enters. Hope joins Julie in cleaning up.
Julie: How you doin?
Hope tries to lie but can’t.
Hope: Not so good. I slept in the hall.
Julie: Anything I can do?
Hope: Honestly, Julie, I don’t have a clue.
Julie hugs Hope for as long as necessary.
Julie: I love you.
Hope: I love you too.
3e. Dessert
Raj and Stephen hiding from the group, having their coffee in the kitchen, are mid-chat. Lights dim amber.
Raj: I read about Gandhi. At first I disliked him. His asceticism turned me off.
Stephen: Did you read about that?
Raj: That’s what I’m telling you. When I read about him and what he did, I didn’t respect it at first but then as I found the world to be filled with incorrigible corruption, I began to value his insights more and more. His idea of working with our hands, the dignity of it. Not hands themselves necessarily, you understand, though hands are part of it. Hands stand for the knowledge and skill contained in prowess, in correct and creative relationship to the world, to the stuff of the world.
Stephen: I meant did you read that they found out he was gay.
Raj: No. No, I hadn’t read that. Thank you. That’s wonderful news. Fantastic. I’m happy to know that. Exceedingly happy. You bring light to a dark day, Stephen, light to a dark day.
Enter Bruce.
Bruce (frustrated): Women
Raj (jolly): I like women.
Bruce: Me too.
Raj (smiles): No, I meant I like what they bring to the world.
Bruce (cheering up): Me too.
Ballet #2 : Clean up the Kitchen (part one). Deep blues and romantic lighting. Gina is in charge. All the actor/esses (except Arthur) clear the mess from dinner, leaving the kitchen quiet and clean for the
End of Act Two
act one ~ In the Theatre pdf / html act two ~ In the Kitchen pdf / html act three ~ In the Kitchen cont'd pdf / html act four ~ In the Hall pdf / html 3/1/13 |
john leo, temi rose (elena sapora hidden), sophie nimmannit