Three Somebodies

by Kat Georges

  DOROTHY becomes suddenly exhausted and stumbles back to her couch. She sits just as VIVIAN finishes speaking previous speech. VIVIAN sits near DOROTHY.

  DOROTHY: Is he still the same? This . . . Andy Warhol?

  VIVIAN: Andy’s changed. Since Valerie shot him he put a lock on his front door, everyone’s got to be scrutinized before they come in. All those crazy people who used to just wander in and hang out . . . those disillusioned lunatics flashing weird eyes and nowhere minds were his sole source of inspiration. Now, he’s just a ghost, a walking ghost.

  VIVIAN sits up sharply, with a sudden burst of energy, with a flash of anger from a drug-magnified thought.

  VIVIAN: Somebody should have rammed an icepick up his ass a long time ago . . .

  But . . .

  Suddenly calm again. Who’s got the time?

  VIVIAN digs around through her purse. Pulls out a mirror and begins applying mascara to her false eyelashes.

  VIVIAN: Yesterday, I needed a few cosmetics, so Jasmine and I went shopping. Ha! Shopping! They’ve got our pictures on all the registers, like, people to watch, for taking stuff.

  We walk into Macy’s, and Jasmine starts talking to the clerk, but it’s too much of a hassle: I feel like I’m in the Academy Awards or something, with everybody watching me. I couldn’t grab anything!

  So we go over to Gimbel’s and—wow!—it’s the same scene. We are known in these places.

  This time I start talking to the clerk about–I don’t know—fucking Christmas sales being up or something . . .

  Enter GOLEM with a tray of salami. Sets it on table near couch that DOROTHY sits on. Turns on three TVs, which all play different 1960s era black-and-white underground movies.

  VIVIAN: And, I figure, Jasmine doesn’t stand a chance of not being caught—we are known here—and then I see her walk out the door and so I leave saying, “Merry Christmas” or some bullshit to the chick behind the counter—she’s Jewish—I don’t give a shit—and then I’m out the front door, I walk down the block, and there is Jasmine—big grin all over her face, and—check this out—she has mascara, three kinds of lipstick, Chanel No. 5, two sets of leotards, four sets of false eyelashes, and a gift set of eye shadow. The girl is incredible!

  A couple of security guards near the front door see her showing me all the stuff and start getting weird, but we just give them a look of radiance . . . and they leave us alone!

  VIVIAN looks up, sees GOLEM, then looks away quickly back at DOROTHY.

  VIVIAN: Hey, look! It’s Golem.

  GOLEM: What are you doing here, Vivian? Thought you split for some commune in Vermont.

  VIVIAN: I came back to meet Valerie. She’s late.

  GOLEM: Valerie Solanas? She’s in jail.

  VIVIAN: Some rich man no one knows bailed her out this morning.

  GOLEM: Unbelievable! Valerie’s back on the streets? Does Andy know?

  DOROTHY: Don’t worry, young man. She won’t do it again.

  GOLEM: How do you know?

  DOROTHY: She told me.

  GOLEM: And who are you?

  VIVIAN: Oh, this is Val’s mom.

  GOLEM: Hmmmmm . . . The beautiful is that which we cannot wish to change. Unlike your daughter, you are beautiful.

  She has taken a trip beyond the streets of this city. Elapsed into the turbulence. Good bye.

  VIVIAN: You don’t understand.

  GOLEM and DOROTHY start talking to each other as VIVIAN continues.

  VIVIAN: Talk about turbulence. Last night, the wind was not blowing anywhere. We all go out to eat, then hit up a couple parties, a couple clubs. The whole town is dead.

  Someone says—it’s the change of season? From what to what? I want to know. I mean, please . . . change of season? What does that mean? You wear a coat, you go out, you tip the limo driver an extra buck.

  People just never want to inhabit the inside of themselves.

  The inside . . .

  . . . it’s not something seasonal . . .

  GOLEM: What I understand is love and beauty and life and death.

  DOROTHY: I think that’s exactly what we’re talking about.

  GOLEM looks at DOROTHY, circles her. Takes a photo with a small inexpensive camera from the era. Moves in close.

  DOROTHY: I wish you wouldn’t do that.

  GOLEM: I’ll ask next time.

  Without asking, GOLEM takes another photo. DOROTHY does not object.

  DOROTHY: Valerie said to meet her at the party. I’ve never been to this kind of party before. When I was young, parties were much different. We had structure. We played games. We invited people who liked each other and were good guests.

  GOLEM: Nothing’s changed. Don’t worry. We’ll have a good time.

  GOLEM moves to DOROTHY’s side, blows gently on her neck and whispers.

  GOLEM: On windy evenings there’s a smell of moisture in the air. The smell her body had when it was young. Under all those clothes.

  DOROTHY: That feels lovely. Like a warm island breeze.

  GOLEM: Tonight, Dorothy, is a very special night. This is not just any party . . . but a very special party. A chance to remember what we strive to forget. A chance to hold onto a dream of happiness for moments at a time and to escape the petty world in which we live.

  DOROTHY: You make me feel so young.

  GOLEM: You are young. A young girl. Naïve in her beauty. Legs that move without knowledge.

  GOLEM kisses DOROTHY’s neck.

  GOLEM: Beautiful woman-girl. Let’s dance.

  GOLEM helps DOROTHY stand without her walker.

  SOUND Music rises, “Coconut Grove” by Loving Spoonful.

  GOLEM and DOROTHY dance. VIVIAN paces. Bored and angry. Sits on couch. Fidgets. VIVIAN starts speaking to get GOLEM’s attention (unsuccessfully) as DOROTHY and GOLEM talk and dance.

  VIVIAN: Last night, everyone was so boring. I got bored. Okay, so what? I should have stayed home. Okay, right. But I had this urge, from the I Ching that I was needed out in the world last night.

  So, okay. I go.

  Jasmine and I and those guys are just cruising from party to party, thinking about having a good time, but no such luck. All the parties are full of a bunch of rich PR snobs.

  They take one look at Jasmine and me, and they just want to throw us out. But they want the guys to stay, of course. Whatever. I’ll never hang around with those gay boys again.

  So we just tripped around, then finally ended up running into Randy. (Looks around, expecting a reaction. Disappointed to find no one is listening to her.)

  DOROTHY: You know I used to dance so much with Val’s father. To all the old songs. We were in love.

  We met at a dance hall. Sam worked at a bank and he would always buy me jewelry. Then he’d say, “Okay, baby cakes, now that you look so pretty, let’s go out, so I can show the world my girl—she’s all mine!”

  I loved to hear him say things like that. It made me feel special . . . to be desired by someone . . . to be wanted. I was sure that feeling was love.

  GOLEM: To be in love . . . is to love the beloved . . . just as he is . . .

  DOROTHY: That’s beautiful.

  GOLEM: Someday, I’ll write a poem about it.

  GOLEM and DOROTHY dance some more, like two people in love. VIVIAN watches with growing antagonism, takes a different pill, then starts dancing herself as it kicks in.

  DOROTHY: Oh, I have to sit down for a bit.

  GOLEM leads DOROTHY to the couch, where, breathless, she sits.

  VIVIAN moves in toward GOLEM.

  VIVIAN: Oh, Randy told me the funniest joke last night at Bob’s opening . . . but I can only remember the punch line . . . what was it? . . . something like, “Oh, sorry . . . wrong number! . . .

  VIVIAN laughs loudly and uncontrollably.

  GOLEM and DOROTHY ignore her, still talking to each other.

  GOLEM: I must leave . . .

  DOROTHY: Where are you going?

  GOLEM: Away! . . . Then . . . Bac
k again!

  GOLEM exits, twirling.

  VIVIAN dances.

  DOROTHY taps her fingers and reminisces.

  DOROTHY: One night after we were married, Sam and I went out to the dance hall . . . the nightclub where we had met. This fellow there was looking at me. Sam had just bought me a new bracelet and I was wearing a very well-tailored satin dress that fit me to a T. This fellow just kept staring.

  Well, after a while, I looked at him and smiled. And he smiled back.

  Sam was just coming from the men’s room and he saw us smiling at each other and he just went crazy.

  He grabbed the man and threw him on the ground and started kicking his face, until a few of the other guys in the place pulled him off and threw him out.

  I ran out to meet him, and as soon as I was out the door, he grabbed me and started shaking me and pulling my hair and slapping my face and screaming, “You slut, I can’t trust you by yourself for a minute!”

  We never went to that club again.

  As DOROTHY speaks, VIVIAN grows suddenly startled as if hearing a strange noise.

  VIVIAN: Wait, who’s that?

  VIVIAN crosses to entry, looks out, comes back, bored.

  VIVIAN: Oh, it’s no one. . .

  GOLEM and BERNARD enter. Begin talking from offstage.

  BERNARD: Where were you? When I tell you to be someplace at 9:30, I expect you to be there at 9:25! Got it?

  GOLEM begins trying to sell BERNARD on his movie idea. BERNARD listens with lack of obvious interest, crosses immediately to the salami table, picks up a piece of salami and delicately eats it, a nibble at a time.

  GOLEM: Okay—the first shot is an extreme close-up of . . . well, no one can tell exactly what it is, except that there are darks and lights and they are moving. Could be flesh. Could be water reflecting. Could be a petri dish experiment. No one knows . . .

  We pull back, little by little, extremely slowly . . . slowly . . . slowly . . . and at some point . . . boom!—the screen goes to bright white and “America the Beautiful” begins to play, and we see that the bright white is the sky on a sunny day on the beach.

  The camera pans down to a long shot of people on the beach, all happy and laying around, kids with pails and shovels and teenage girls laughing and looking at teenage boys. What could be more beautiful in America, right? Of course . . .

  GOLEM continues speaking as VIVIAN and DOROTHY start to converse.

  DOROTHY can’t stop staring at BERNARD’s conservative appearance.

  BERNARD focuses only on his own actions.

  VIVIAN is bored by every glance at BERNARD and tries her best to rile him with sardonic remarks.

  VIVIAN: Valerie had a play. I liked the title. Up Your Ass.

  DOROTHY: I think it sounds filthy.

  VIVIAN: Andy said he was going to make a movie out of it. But he deceived her. He never gave her back the script.

  DOROTHY: Maybe it wasn’t very good.

  VIVIAN: It doesn’t matter.

  DOROTHY: Of course it matters.

  VIVIAN: No, what matters is—he went back on his word.

  DOROTHY: Maybe he just changed his mind.

  VIVIAN: He manipulates people!

  DOROTHY: He didn’t force her to give him the script.

  VIVIAN: He’s a goddamned liar! He said I was his next Superstar! And now he’s got the transvestite instead of me! He lied!

  DOROTHY: Lots of people lie. You don’t try to kill them.

  VIVIAN: You don’t try. If someone fucks you over, then Valerie’s right. . . . Just stick a gun in the asshole’s face and boom!—one less asshole.

  DOROTHY: Aren’t you against killing? People are dying in Vietnam, on the streets, killing themselves. . . . You don’t really think you could ever kill someone . . . do you?

  VIVIAN: No one who fucks up my world deserves one single more breath.

  DOROTHY: Have you ever killed?

  VIVIAN: No. That’s why Valerie is important. She tried . . . —

  DOROTHY: She failed . . .

  VIVIAN: She did not fail. We fail. Everyday. We just sit and dance and make these movies and art that are unconnected. Valerie at least connected.

  DOROTHY: Attempted murder is not connecting.

  VIVIAN: Sex and violence are the only connection we’ve got. Language is a thing of the past.

  DOROTHY: You only say what you think I should hear.

  VIVIAN: Nobody listens to words anymore.

  DOROTHY: I’m listening.

  VIVIAN: But not to me.

  GOLEM speaks this over DOROTHY and VIVIAN’s previous conversation.

  GOLEM: So the song continues to play, and the camera zooms in on a group of young girls—the future of America, right? Suntanned, blond, pre-pubescent, wearing those cute little bathing suits. Skin exposed. They get up and walk over to the hamburger stand and buy hamburgers and one of them buys a milkshake.

  The camera closes in on her, as though buying a milkshake is the most significant event in the world.

  And as the camera holds on her, sucking up that thick, creamy milkshake, struggling to get it to come up through the straw, little cheeks straining and sucking—boom!—there’s a flash to a scene of a man in leather with a whip. Flash! Back to the girl.

  And then there’s a series of these flashes between these leather scenes, and always back to the innocent young girl sucking on that little straw. And all the while “America the Beautiful” is playing, because this really is a beautiful country.

  And then the music changes to some kind of carnival music. And the man who was in leather is now at the beach sucking on a milkshake and girl is in leather swinging the whip around.

  And this is interspersed with pictures of a roller coaster, a skyscraper, a train, an airplane. Close-ups of twisted faces rushing off to work from the crowded subway. An empty easy chair. A mirror. A clock.

  Then—flash!—a scene of a crowd of happy children running out of the front door of their school. So many happy children, they just keep coming and coming, we’ll talk to central casting, get thousands. Never have so many happy children been seen anywhere in film history.

  End of movie.

  I call it . . . “Tan Lines.”

  Pause by all ONSTAGE.

  Then VIVIAN turns to DOROTHY.

  VIVIAN: So, what do you think . . . of Valerie’s writing?

  DOROTHY: I never read any of it.

  MUSIC continues, Velvet Underground’s “Sunday Morning.”

  BERNARD looks at his watch,

  DOROTHY looks at GOLEM.

  GOLEM turns on projector, with weird psychedelia.

  VIVIAN looks through her purse, finds another pill, eats it, then begins dancing in the beam of the projector.

  BERNARD turns to DOROTHY.

  BERNARD: Do try the salami. It’s exquisite.

  DOROTHY: I’m not very hungry. I’m waiting for my daughter.

  BERNARD: Yes, Golem mentioned you were Valerie’s mother. She’s a frightening creature.

  DOROTHY: She wasn’t always that way. She was so sweet, once . . .

  BERNARD and DOROTHY speak at the same time under the pretense of holding a true conversation. Exit GOLEM. VIVIAN continues to dance in projector’s beam.

  BERNARD: . . . truly frightening. Not unlike the coyote, in many respects. No one understands such creatures.

  Have you heard of Beuys? Joseph Beuys? His coyote piece was quite remarkable. Such vision! Here is a man, who knows the American esprit better than most Americans themselves. He saw the persecution of the coyote as an example of the American tendency to project his own sense of inferiority onto an object of hate or a minority. So he created a living art piece that focused entirely on the coyote. In fact, he wanted to see nothing of America during his trip other than the coyote.

  DOROTHY: I don’t think Valerie ever understood her father. He worked so hard. When the Depression hit Sam lost his job at the bank, and I started working here and there where I could . . . ironing shirt
s, selling cosmetics door to door . . . Sam finally got part-time work as a janitor . . . it killed him. Our dreams of buying a house fell to pieces. Valerie was born in the middle of this nightmare . . . I even thought about giving myself an abortion . . . But Sam would have killed me. We vowed that our child would never have to face the kind of hardships we faced. From the time she was born we taught important values like kindness, responsibility, and hard work. She was a strong-willed child. We tried.

  BERNARD and DOROTHY continue to speak at the same time. VIVIAN continues to dance.

  BERNARD: Here’s what Beuys did: He arrived at JFK and was wrapped in felt, laid on a stretcher, and driven by ambulance to the gallery. There, he went into a cage with his coyote for two weeks. Each day, he stacked the latest issue of the Wall Street Journal in two piles of twenty-five copies each. He wore brown gloves, had a flashlight with him, and leaned on a walking stick. Gradually, he set out to get close to the coyote.

  DOROTHY: Divorce is never easy, especially for a child. Sam started drinking . . . the yelling lasted till dawn . . . things broke . . . he left. I thought I could raise Valerie by myself. I had a little savings. I worked part time. For years, we were best friends. And suddenly . . . I don’t know . . . hormones, drugs, sex, something happened to her. One day she was my daughter . . . the next day, I didn’t want anyone to know we had ever been close.

  While DOROTHY and BERNARD are “conversing,” enter GOLEM.

  VIVIAN dances over to him and erotically attempts to turn him on.

  VIVIAN: Aren’t you going to dance tonight?

  GOLEM: Later.

  VIVIAN: You’re so beautiful . . .

  GOLEM: The beauty in you is apples is grapes is desperate in its attempt to be visible as you hide your face behind hands with outstretched fingers and wade in water too shallow to swim in.

  VIVIAN: What do you mean?

  GOLEM: We’ll have a reason to remember each other . . . but not now.

  VIVIAN stops dancing, disappointed, pouts.

  GOLEM crosses away from VIVIAN and starts snapping flash pictures of everything but her on the stage.

  VIVIAN: Where’s Valerie?

  GOLEM: I see things from behind the camera lens. Just aim and shoot. I edit vision. I focus on one tiny part of the big blur to give it the importance lost in the whirl of society.

  A poet is like a cameraman. Aim and shoot. Enter the world of voyeurism and risk. Reality is, after all, just that which is seen, just as long as it is, or can be, seen. Reality is a movie, the iris of our eye focusing onto the film of our mind, as we record moments to be edited and replayed to an ever-changing audience whose only constant member is . . . ourself.