by David Ives
WILLIAMSON: Uh-huh.
LEVENE: Now I wanna win that Cadillac as top salesman of the month, I need some leads.
WILLIAMSON: You can’t have any leads, Shelley.
LEVENE: Oh please, John, please?
(Bell.)
M.C.: Scene Two. Another booth at the restaurant, (MOSS and AARONOW in the booth.)
MOSS: We’re gonna win that fuckin’ Cadillac, Aaronow.
AARONOW: Duhhh.
MOSS: You and me. Know how?
AARONOW: Duhhh.
MOSS: We’re gonna steal the leads from the office.
AARONOW: Duhhh.
MOSS: I mean you and me, Aaronow. Tonight.
AARONOW: Wouldn’t that be illegal?
(Bell.)
M.C.: Scene Three. Another booth at the restaurant, (ROMA and a POTENTIAL CUSTOMER.)
ROMA: What is the meaning of life?
POTENTIAL CUSTOMER: I don’t know.
ROMA: Me either. Would you like to buy some real estate?
(Bell)
M.C.: Act Two. The real-estate office, the next morning. (WILLIAMSON, MOSS, AARONOW and ROMA with a POLICEMAN.)
WILLIAMSON: Somebody broke into the office last night and stole the leads. Was it you, Moss?
MOSS: I ain’t talkin’.
WILLIAMSON: Was it you, Roma?
ROMA: Suck my dick.
WILLIAMSON: Was it you, Aaronow?
AARONOW: Duhhh. (LEVENE enters.)
LEVENE: Hand over the Cadillac! I just made a sale!
WILLIAMSON: Sorry, Levene. You were the one who stole the leads last night. (To POLICEMAN.) Take Levene away.
LEVENE: You can’t take me away! I made the calls! I hit the board! I won the car! You can’t do this!
WILLIAMSON: Yes I can. We’re illustrating the nature of American capitalism.
LEVENE: Oh. Okay, (POLICEMAN takes him away.)
AARONOW: Can I have a Cadillac?
WILLIAMSON: No.
ROMA: Is there anybody here who hasn’t said “fuck”? (Small pause.) I’ll be at the restaurant.
BLACKOUT
ANCIENT HISTORY
Ancient History was originally presented by Primary Stages (Casey Childs, artistic director) in New York City in May 1989. It was directed by Jason McConnell Buzas; the set design was by Philipp Jung; costume design was by Claudia Stephens; lighting design was by Deborah Constantine; sound design was by David Ferdinand. The cast was as follows:
RUTH Beth McDonald
JACK Christopher Wells
ACT ONE
Dark stage. Silence.
RUTH’S VOICE: Paradise.
JACK’S VOICE: Absolutely.
(We hear the duet “Au fond du temple saint” from Bizet’s The Pearl Fishers in the distance, as the lights come up on RUTH’S bedroom: a bed, a mirror, a clock, a telephone, a door to the outside, and a door to a bathroom. Some clothing scattered around the room, RUTH and JACK are lying together on the rumpled bed. They are in their mid-thirties. She is wearing a brightly figured robe. He, a plain white robe.)
RUTH: Paradise.
JACK: Absolutely.
RUTH: Paradise.
JACK: Absolutely. (Sighs contentedly.)
RUTH: This is what I call shayn [i.e., beautiful].
JACK: This is what I call molto shayn.
RUTH: They ought to put us on TV.
JACK: Or bottle us.
RUTH: The world would be littered with empties.
JACK: Can you imagine what the world would be like if everybody lived like this?
RUTH: It’d be Utopia.
JACK: Earthly paradise.
RUTH: Absolutely.
JACK: There’d be no more war. No strife.
RUTH: No hunger.
JACK: No hatred.
RUTH: No Pekingeses.
JACK: All dogs would die of hunger because their owners would be in bed all the time.
RUTH: No cats, either.
JACK: No Siamese cats, anyway.
RUTH: No cats of any stripe.
JACK: No toupées.
RUTH: No German novels.
JACK: No chewing gum.
RUTH: No Sunday-afternoon football on TV.
JACK: Hey. Don’t knock football.
RUTH: All right. We’ll keep football.
JACK: You don’t understand its subtleties.
RUTH: No cigars.
JACK: No houseplants.
RUTH: No polyester.
JACK: No parents.
RUTH: No polyester.
JACK: No parents.
RUTH: No polyester …
JACK: No parents …
(Small pause.)
RUTH: No canned spaghetti.
JACK: No men who wear fur coats.
RUTH: No fat women who wear short dresses.
JACK: No Jehovah’s Witnesses waking you up on Sunday morning for a contribution.
RUTH: No Jews on street corners saying “Are you Jewish?” only to the men.
JACK: No religion of any slant.
RUTH: No political parties.
JACK: No international boundaries.
RUTH: No extraterrestrial boundaries.
JACK: No time.
RUTH: No space.
JACK: No matter.
RUTH: No antimatter.
JACK: God, isn’t it simple?
RUTH: Yeah. Utopia’s a snap when you get right down to it.
JACK: Es ist ganz einfach. [It’s perfectly simple.]
(Pause.)
RUTH: Only what’s left? I mean, when you take all those things away.
JACK: Shtupping [i.e., fucking]. Shtupping with just the right English on it.
RUTH: No former girlfriends, either.
JACK: Or boyfriends.
RUTH: Or ex-wives.
JACK: No talking about them, anyway.
RUTH: Maybe you’d be given a drug after every relationship that’d make you forget all about them.
JACK: So you could start afresh.
RUTH: Yeah. A virgin all over again.
JACK: A version all over again.
RUTH: Aversion? As in therapy?
JACK: No, as in every man wants to marry a version. Of something.
RUTH (“I’m impressed”): Oooooooh.
JACK: I am a clever child.
RUTH: And aren’t we the most discriminating and tasteful couple you ever saw?
JACK: We’d know how to put a world together. How come they never asked us?
RUTH: Yeah, how come they never consulted the experts?
JACK: The fools.
RUTH: Now let’s never move, Pinky.
JACK: All right.
RUTH: Ever.
JACK: Pinky—it’s a deal. (Small pause.) Except you’re on my leg—
RUTH: Oh, sorry.
JACK: No, don’t move. I always wanted gangrene. As an experience.
(The phone rings and they suddenly go completely still The lights change slightly, darkening. Then the phone rings once again, the lights return to where they’d been, and the two go on exactly as they had before.)
RUTH: Aren’t we the most discriminating and tasteful couple you ever saw?
JACK: We’d know how to put a world together. How come they never asked us?
RUTH: And no varicose veins.
JACK: I beg your pardon?
RUTH: In our perfect world. No varicose veins.
JACK: Alas, varicose veins are inevitable.
RUTH: They’re disgusting.
JACK: You can get rid of Pekingeses and polyester, but varicose veins are part of the grand design.
RUTH: Would you still love me if I had varicose veins?
JACK: Of course not.
RUTH: Would it be all over?
JACK: It would be all over.
RUTH: Somehow I thought so. But you know you’re not supposed to say things like that on my birthday.
JACK (an old routine between them): What? I’m not?
RUTH AND JACK (together): Uh-oh!
&n
bsp; JACK: Anyway you’re not going to get them. Varicose veins, I mean.
RUTH: Can we get off varicose veins?
JACK: An ugly blue bulging vein ruin those gorgeous gams? No sirree, I’d never allow it. In fact—let me kiss those perfect gams right now. (He starts to kiss his way up her leg.)
RUTH: Jack! No!
JACK: Yes! I must! I pine for your kneecaps!
RUTH: Jack, stop that! Come back!
JACK: No, I must kiss your legs, I— (Stops abruptly, making a face.)
RUTH: What’s the matter?
JACK: Nothing. Just a small case of crabs.
RUTH: Oh stop.
JACK: Minor infestation of pubic lice. Nothing to worry about.
RUTH: Oh God, stop it!
JACK: Let me pick one off.
RUTH: Will you stop?
JACK: Mmm! Delicious!
RUTH: Jack—
JACK: You crack them in your teeth, like pistachios.
RUTH: You’re disgusting.
JACK: Dig out the meaty part. Yum yum.
RUTH: Get back up here. Come on. (She pulls him back by her side.)
JACK: Have I ever told you about spending my thirtieth birthday picking nits out of my girlfriend’s pubic hair?
RUTH: About a hundred times.
JACK: Do I repeat myself? Very well then, I repeat myself.
RUTH: I tell you, when we get our perfect world …
JACK: I know. There’ll be no crabs.
RUTH: I don’t care about the crabs so much. You just couldn’t talk about them all the time.
JACK: But we’re adults. We’re twentieth-century grown-ups. We can talk about anything.
RUTH: Not for the twentieth time. Do you remember how somebody once said “Hell is other people”?
JACK: Yeah. J. P. Sartre.
RUTH: Hell isn’t other people. It’s other people telling the same story for the twentieth time.
JACK: And do you know what that is?
RUTH: What.
JACK AND RUTH (together): Marriage.
RUTH: Ah! Now we are onto marriage, and ready for blastoff.
JACK: It’s in the dictionary. “Marriage. Archaic noun. Two people telling each other the same story for the twentieth time.”
RUTH: Thank you!
JACK: Have I ever told you about spending my thirtieth birthday picking nits out of my girlfriend’s pubic hair?
RUTH: Who was she, anyway?
JACK: I thought you didn’t want to talk about it.
RUTH: I don’t think I really want to know.
JACK: Good.
RUTH: Was she as good-looking as me?
JACK: No.
RUTH: That’s all right, then. But speaking of birthdays …
JACK: Birthdays? Birthdays?
RUTH: Yeah. Do I get my presents now?
JACK: Sorry, Pinky. No presents till after the guests leave.
RUTH: Pleeeeeeeeease, Pinky?
JACK: Oh all right. One present.
RUTH: Great.
JACK: The rest you’ll get after the party. Sixteen million frisky sperms.
RUTH: So what did you get me? Huh? Whadja get me?
JACK: Well you know they’ve started issuing the complete trombone suites of Arthur Honegger. In seven volumes?
RUTH: Mm-hm … ?
JACK: And I know how much you love Honegger.
RUTH: Honegger, off-egger.
JACK: Oh, very good! Ten points!
RUTH: Sechel. (Pronounced “sayk’l.”)
JACK: What’s that, Jewish pastry?
RUTH: Jewish brains.
JACK: Oh you are such a clever people, thinking up words like sechel, and Schlegel, and bagel.
RUTH: But to tell you the honest-to-God truth, I didn’t really want the complete Honegger trombone suites.
JACK: What? You didn’t??
JACK AND RUTH: Uh-oh!
JACK: What did you want?
RUTH: What did you get me and I’ll tell you.
JACK: You have to guess.
RUTH: I don’t want to guess. Just hand over the loot, will ya?
JACK (takes a small box from under the bed): Say “antidisestablish-mentarianism.”
RUTH: Antidisestablishmentarianism.
JACK: Happy birthday. (He hands it over.)
RUTH (tearing off the gift-wrapping): Oh God I love presents. I love presents.…
JACK: A bottle of Kwell, what a perfect idea.
RUTH: I’m not even going to ask what Kwell is.
JACK: Kills pubic lice instantly.
RUTH: I should’ve known. (She sees what’s inside the box.) Oh, Pinky! A pair of Droopy Eyes! (It’s a pair of trick glasses—the kind in which the eyes hang out of the frames on long springs.) How did you know? (She puts them on.)
JACK: I thought you’d want them to go with your Norma Kamali dress.
RUTH: Gosh, thanks, Pinky.
JACK: Anything for you, Pinky. (Kiss.)
RUTH: If the rest of the presents are like this, I’m going to kill you.
JACK: Would it be all over?
RUTH: It would be all over.
JACK: All right, then, greedy bitch. Just to assuage your insatiable rapaciosity.
RUTH: Rapaciositudinousness.
JACK: Try this. (He takes a larger box from under the bed.)
RUTH: You shouldn’t have.
JACK: But I did.
RUTH: But you shouldn’t have.
JACK: But I did. Now open it.
RUTH: I thought you’d never ask. (She tears open the box.) Oh God, Jack …
JACK: Do you like it?
RUTH: Oh God …! (RUTH has taken a silk kimono out of the box.)
JACK: God? Who? No such entity. The invention of a lot of silly superstitious cave-dwellers.
RUTH: It’s incredible!
JACK: So what do you expect from tall, thin and tasteful people?
RUTH: But how could you afford this?
JACK: Oh, I sold a couple more quarts down at the blood bank, (RUTH puts it on and looks in the mirror.) You should put the Droopy Eyes on with that. It was meant as an ensemble.
RUTH: Is it gorgeous?
JACK: It’s very gorgeous.
RUTH: Can I attack you?
JACK: Attack me. Make my body your bombing target. (He opens his arms wide and she jumps into them. They fall onto the bed together.) Yes! Yes! More sex, you lusty wench! (RUTH lies back blissfully and sighs.)
RUTH: Oh God I’m happy!
JACK: I thought you were attacking me. What happened?
RUTH: I don’t think I’ve ever been as happy as I am right now.
JACK: Actually you’ve been exactly this happy in the arms of half a dozen men. You’ve just forgotten.
RUTH: Oh shut up.
JACK: Just as you’ll forget me some day.
RUTH: Don’t spoil it. Cynic.
JACK: Pollyanna.
RUTH: Fatalist.
JACK: Running dog of bourgeois optimism.
RUTH: You’re wonderful.
JACK: Speak for yourself. (Long kiss. They lie back on the pillows.)
RUTH: Paradise.
JACK: Absolutely.
RUTH: This is what I call shayn.
JACK: “Shayn! Come back!”
RUTH: God, it’s crazy.
JACK: Everything’s crazy.
RUTH: I mean it’s ironic.
JACK: Everything’s ironic, if you look at it the right way. Anyway, what’s crazy and ironic today?
RUTH: I was just thinking how this guy pursued me for months and months and I never went to bed with him, and then I saw you twice and I paid for both of the movies, and bang! Ten days that shook the bed.
JACK: Who was this?
RUTH: Just a guy.
JACK: Right before you started going out with me?
RUTH: Uh-huh.
JACK: And he pursued you for months and you never went to bed with him?
RUTH: Two months, three months, something like that.
JACK: Three months without sex? Who carries on a platonic relationship for three months anymore, even in these days of the great viruses?
RUTH: Hey. It wasn’t entirely platonic.
JACK: Oh. (Pause.) How far’d he get?
RUTH: What?
JACK: How far did he get? I mean, if he didn’t get to bed with you.
RUTH: What do you want, sixteen-millimeter films?
JACK: I’m just curious. First base? Second base? Shortstop?
RUTH: Shortstop?
JACK: Yeah.
RUTH: What’s shortstop?
JACK: You know what shortstop is.
RUTH: I never went to an all-boys Catholic school.
JACK: That’s when she lets you work her through her panties but won’t let you put your hand inside.
RUTH: Where have I been all these years?
JACK: I guess you were educated wrong.
RUTH: I guess I was.
JACK: Then after you round third you come sliding into home, and—
RUTH: I think I understand the system, thank you.
JACK: Good. (Slight pause.) So did he get to third base?
RUTH: Jack, he wasn’t even interesting!
JACK: But did he get to third base?
RUTH: No. We got called on account of rain. Is there anything but sex for you?
JACK: Nope. Freud was right. Everything is sex.
RUTH: Yeah? What about love?
JACK: Love? Love?
RUTH: Yeah, remember love?
JACK: That hormonal scam? The greatest con-job since Christianity.
RUTH: Rather an important factor in the world, bub.
JACK: No. I’ll tell you what’s important in the world.
RUTH: Tell me what’s important.
JACK: Like. And likeness. People who like the same things and are alike. Two people in a bed who really like each other. Forget all your prophets preaching love. In an ideal world, there’d be like songs, and volumes of like poetry.
RUTH: So even in Utopia there’d be no love?
JACK: I’d have it confiscated at the border.
RUTH: You don’t really mean that.
JACK: I absolutely mean that.
RUTH: Well I’m sorry but I beg to differ.
JACK: You really think there’d be love in Utopia? After all the damage it’s done to the world?
RUTH: Especially in Utopia there’d be love.
JACK: Why. State your case succinctly and give examples.
RUTH: Well…
JACK: Yes?
RUTH: Give me a second here.
JACK: I’d love to hear the case for love.
RUTH: Well in Utopia you’re supposed to be safe, right? I mean, you’re supposed to be protected in Utopia.