James Graham Plays 2

by James Graham

  John Yeah.

  Hilary I don’t think we’re getting our deposit back.

  John He was a cunt anyway.

  Anna Who was?

  Hilary (as estate agent) ‘359 Amhurst Road. Is this your first rental together?’

  Anna (arm through Jim’s perhaps; ‘a couple’) ‘Yes.’

  Hilary ‘Awwh. High ceilings. Lots of light.’

  Anna ‘Lots of light, yes.’

  Jim ‘Yeah, very high, yeah.’

  Hilary ‘I’m sorry, your names again?’

  Anna ‘Mr and Mrs Buchanan – I’m Michael, he’s Jane, I mean, ha, I’m Jane and he’s Michael – sorry I’m just giddy at the thought of it all.’

  Hilary ‘You’re so sweet. Where have I heard those names before, Michael and Jane, where have I heard that?’

  (Singing.) ‘A robin feathering his nest

  Has very little time, to rest.

  While gathering his

  Bits of twine and twig’

  Hilary/Anna (singing) ‘Though quite intent in his pursuit’

  Hilary/Anna/Jim (singing) ‘He has a merry tune to toot

  He knows a song

  Will move the job along!’

  Hilary ‘You’re so sweet.’

  Anna ‘It all feels so new still, only married two weeks.’

  Hilary ‘Two weeks?!’

  Jim ‘Yeah.’

  Hilary ‘Oh that is so sweet. Your first home. Something that says “look how well we’re doing”. A place of our own, tick. Married, tick. Jobs – you do have jobs, don’t you?’

  Anna ‘Teachers. We’re both teachers.’

  Hilary ‘We’ll need references.’

  Anna ‘Of course!’

  Hilary ‘And a security deposit of £34.’

  Anna ‘I think we can manage that, right sweetheart?’

  Jim ‘Yes, we can manage that.’

  Hilary ‘Lots of potential in this room. A great social space, host dinner parties, invite round friends, work colleagues, imagine some lovely new modern furniture, knick-knacks, little trinkets, odds and ends, bits and bobs, brighten the place up, really sell it. A space that can just say to people “look how well we’re doing”.’

  Jim ‘What’s the area like, this part of London?’

  Hilary ‘Up and coming, so this is the right time to move, prices are going up and up, which is bad in one sense, although it prices – this is insensitive, I know – but it prices out a lot of undesirables, if you know what I mean, because there have been problems – not any more.’

  Jim ‘Problems?’

  Hilary ‘Some homelessness, destitution, it’s the east, you know, the east has always had problems – has always had problems, but it’s on the up and up, so.’

  Anna ‘Homelessness and destitution. And yet big properties like this just sat here completely empty.’

  Hilary ‘Yes.’

  Anna ‘Completely empty when people could be in them.’

  Hilary ‘Way of the world, I suppose.’

  Anna ‘Yes, I suppose it is.’

  Hilary ‘Good for you, though.’

  Anna ‘Yes.’

  Hilary ‘So?’

  Anna/ Jim ‘We’ll take it!’

  John What a cunt.

  Hilary Strange being east.

  John Important.

  Hilary I know. Miss ’em though, some of them, Chris, Angela, Stuart –

  Anna They can still come round –

  John No, they cannot ‘come round’.

  Anna No I know I just mean –

  John No ‘just’ or anything, this is why we’re here. This is why we left the rest of them, behind, this isn’t a game anymore. This isn’t a hobby, it’s not a party, ten, twenty, thirty people crashing on the floor together at any one time. Yes solidarity is important, people around you, working together, living breathing playing fucking but if you’re together then you’re vulnerable and if you’re vulnerable you get caught – them lot, I love ’em, but they get caught, we’ve got to go the extra mile. You can’t bring down the structure of something you’re inside of; we’ve gotta step out of it. Out of the system, and underground, we’re doing this. Properly.

  Jim Professional.

  John What?

  Jim ’Bout being professional.

  John That’s right, Jim’s right, it’s about being professional. From amateur to professional. Which means breaking all ties – I’m sorry. We’ll run this place with the same philosophies, this will be a house of freedom and thinking but it’s just us. Just the four of us.

  Jim Like the Musketeers.

  John I’m not joking, Jim.

  Jim I’m not joking, the Musketeers were incredible. The Musketeers had commitment and nobility. They had a code of honour.

  John This is what we committed to. Say goodbye. Now – here in this room. In this room with no walls and a toilet in it. Say goodbye to your friends, to your family. And to the old you. We burn our past.

  Go on, everything you have, we’re flushing it.

  Jim Might block it.

  John I don’t care, Jim.

  Jim Victorian, this plumbing.

  John Everything’s Victorian – the attitudes, the mindset, the prejudices fuck it. We’re flushing it. All of it. Bye, John.

  Anna Bye, Anna!

  Hilary Bye, Hil.

  Jim Er yeah bye. Jim.

  John Blow it up, or burn it down.

  John/Hilary Blow it up, or burn it down.

  John/Hilary/Anna Blow it up, or burn it down.

  John/Hilary/Anna/Jim Blow it up, or burn it down.

  Anna Was fun though.

  Jim What?

  Anna Being the Buchanans, for just a moment.

  Jim I hated the Buchanans.

  Anna I know.

  Jim I hated the Buchanans, Anna, they were smug and they were completely blind.

  Anna Not their personalities, which we invented anyway –

  Jim They’re real, those types of people, those types of young people, painfully real.

  Anna I meant pretending to be real, you know. . .

  Jim What?

  Anna Item.

  Jim . . .

  Anna With a future together –

  Jim Their future together was shit. Their future together was monotomy and monogamy and just convincing themselves they were happy while they wait to die.

  Anna I know, but still.

  Jim I’m just fucking around.

  Anna Wanker.

  Jim I mean I’m not, it’s all true, but I mean I know what you mean, it was – there was something about that. In their world, if we still lived in their world, you’d be my . . . ‘that’.

  Anna And you mine.

  Jim I thought that when I first saw you, actually.

  Anna No you didn’t – really?

  Jim Yes.

  Anna I did you, actually.

  Jim But that’s – it’s not real, it’s fantasy.

  Anna It’s romanticism, the corruption of real moments by projecting clichés onto them, ones we’ve all seen in films or read in books, star-crossed lovers, love at first sight, all the nonsense.

  Jim Rain falling.

  Anna The crowds part.

  Jim Music.

  Anna Exactly. When the moment itself, pure, should be enough, without projecting someone else’s branded version of romance onto it.

  ‘Hello.’

  Jim I said it to you first.

  Anna You did. Even though you’re shy.

  Jim ‘Hello.’

  Anna ‘Hello.’

  ‘What book’s that?’

  Jim ‘Kropotkin.’

  Anna ‘It is often said that anarchists live in a world of dreams to come, and do not see the things which happen today. We do see them. And only too well. And in their true colours. And that is
what makes us carry the hatchet into the forest of prejudice that besets us.’

  Jim ‘That’s very good.

  Who have you got, there?’

  Anna ‘Goldman.’

  Jim ‘I can’t quote him cause I don’t know him.’

  Anna ‘It’s a she.’

  Jim ‘Well, now I feel like a cunt.’

  Anna ‘Don’t, I don’t want you to.’

  Jim ‘I’m still learning.’

  Anna ‘We’re all still learning.’

  Jim ‘First time in this place, I like it.’

  Anna ‘Yeah it’s a good selection. Til the pigs come and raid it.’

  Jim ‘Do the pigs raid it?’

  Anna ‘Course they do. A censorship of ideas.’

  Jim ‘Would you like to have a drink with me?’

  Anna ‘I don’t drink. Alcohol pacifies. It stops you being proportionately angry at the big stuff and makes you disproportionately angry at the little stuff.’

  Jim ‘Would you like to smoke a joint with me?’

  Anna ‘Yes please.’

  Jim And then I could have taken you –

  Anna Spun me around in your arms –

  Jim (clipped, 1940s accent) ‘Oh my darling Anna.’

  Anna (same) ‘James.’

  Jim ‘I’ll never let you out of my sight again, dammit. These eyes will never leave you, these arms will never let you go.’

  Anna ‘And those lips.’

  Jim ‘Do you hear that?’

  Anna ‘Yes. Music.’

  Jim ‘What is it?’

  Anna ‘Rachmaninov, I think.’

  Jim ‘Is it real or are we only dreaming it?’

  Anna ‘You’d better kiss me before we wake up. Kiss me like there’s no tomorrow. Kiss me like they do – in the movies.’

  Hilary I was listening to that.

  John, I said I was listening to that.

  Don’t, you’ll scratch it.

  John I want to scratch it.

  Hilary It’s peaceful.

  John It’s positively comatose, that’s the problem.

  Hilary You’re hurting my ears, it sounds like it’s screaming –

  John It is screaming. This is what it actually sounds like, under the rigidly, repressed order of intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus, outro. It’s screaming. It’s the ‘illusion’ of art, for the masses, convincing them they’re experiencing some free expression – intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus, outro – like an inmate painting in prison.

  You know Bach actually used maths to write his pieces 1+1+1, equals, and don’t question.

  Hilary What about jazz? Wasn’t jazz meant to be new notes, in its own order?

  John That’s what jazz was meant to be, yes. But then they packaged it and sold it. Jazz is a fucking traitor. Not as bad as pop. Everyone, leaving the factories on a Friday night, ‘Here’s some music – don’t look out of your window, don’t question anything, here’s a song, just dance. Left foot, right foot, together. Turn and back. Turn and back. Just – dance.’

  Anna/ Hilary (sing from The Supreme’s ‘Where Did Our Love Go’)

  John That’s not dancing. That’s marching to their tune. That’s goosestepping in time.

  Hilary I’ll show you dancing.

  Anna I’ll show you dancing.

  Hilary AaaaaaaaAAAAAHHHHHHH!

  Anna AaawwwhhoooooOOOOOOW!

  John (as Edward Heath, baton, conducting) And a one, two, three, and, bring in the strings, and now the bass. Lose the strings, and now the wind. And now the shopkeepers and the miners. Now the steelworkers and office clerks, one two three, one two three, keep time, two three, play your part, two three.

  Jim ‘As Mr Heath, the builder’s son from Bexley, amateur conductor, arrives on the steps of 10 Downing Street, ousting Mr Wilson’s Labour government, to begin his first term as Prime Minister . . .’

  John ‘We used to fight our enemies, on foreign soils. But the future of this country is not one of international conflict. The real danger in the future of this country is dissent from within. The decade ahead of us presents real challenges, towards a ‘civil war’, that we must work together to prevent . . .’

  I was surrounded by them. I’ve been surrounded by them my whole life.

  Jim Who?

  John Tories.

  Jim Yeah?

  John Yeah, even before they knew they were Tories, I knew they were Tories.

  Jim Prince Charles was at Cambridge when we were.

  John Yeah.

  Jim ’Parently.

  John Here’s my theory about Tories, do you want to hear it?

  Jim Er, yo – . . . yeah.

  John Eh?

  Jim I said yeah. Yes.

  John I went to Haberdashers’ Aske’s, private school for boys, that was where I was sent by my parents, out of sight, out of mind.

  Jim/John/Hilary/Anna CHILDREN SHOULD BE SEEN AND NOT HEARD.

  Hilary SIT UP STRAIGHT.

  Anna DON’T ANSWER BACK.

  Jim/John/Hilary/Anna BECAUSE I SAID SO.

  John The sound of hard shoes on the cloisters, the sight of all that ancient, immovable stone, it cannot fail but to imprint upon them the weight of the past. It represses any notion of ‘another way’. Because the old ways feel so immovable and sturdy and strong.

  My theory is that it is possible, entirely possible, for a future Conservative Member of Parliament born today to live his or her life from cradle to dispatch box having only ever heard the sound of hard shoes on stone floors, that awful echoey, cloppity-clop of the past, the sound of reverence, of seriousness of propriety and respect, from church to private school to Oxbridge, to Parliament, just cloisters. All they know are cloisters. And that’s why they are the way they are.

  Haberdashers’ Aske’s. Its motto. ‘Serve and Obey.’

  Jim My school didn’t have a motto.

  John There’s only two types of group in society, Jim. Those whose school had a motto, and those whose didn’t. ‘Serve and obey.’ Walking on the left, chapel at 7 a.m., breakfast at 8, dinner at 7, sing the national anthem, pray to God.

  Jim Labour aren’t much better.

  John Democracy in this country is a fucking illusion – here’s a piece of paper, every five years. Red, or blue, or yellow, not a blind bit of difference between them. Cosmetics. Nothing more.

  Jim ‘Voted Labour all me life, me.’ It’s its own kind of fascism, I’ve seen it.

  John I know.

  Jim ‘Who d’you think you are lad?’

  . . .

  ‘I said, yer listening? Oh ay gone deaf all of a sudden have yer, can’t hear yer old man, now, ey, I shouldn’t wonder.’

  ‘Don’t listen to him, I’m proud of you, love.’

  ‘Poncing off, to fucking, Cam-ber-idge.’

  ‘Not poncing off anywhere. Worked hard. What’s wrong with him wanting to leave, nothing wrong, you leave him be.’

  ‘Think’s he’s better.’

  ‘I said LEAVE HIM BE, or so much as help me, I’ll knock you six ways from Sunday. Don’t think I’m scared o’ yer, you sack of worthless shite.’

  ‘YOU! KEEP THAT SHUT, RIGHT? SICK O’ YER. SICK O’ THE BLEEDING LOT OF YOU, GOD SPARE ME, WHY HE GAVE ME HER FOR A WIFE, AND HIM FOR A SON. CAMBRIDGE!’

  Anna Jim?

  Jim . . .

  Anna Jim –

  Jim What?

  Hilary But they are the lesser of two evils, Labour – if you had to choose.

  John We don’t have to choose, why compromise? Hilary Abortion legalised, homosexuality legalised – John In Place of Strife. Tax and spends.

  Hilary But socialism, though. Bakunin, states, ‘Freedom without socialism is privilege and injustice. But socialism without freedom is slavery and brutality.’

  John Let me tell you something. The history of the mo
dern United Kingdom isn’t one of Labour, then Tories, then Liberals, then Tories, then Labour – it’s just of the Tories. They’re the constant. They will always get back in. They don’t even have to fight for it. They just have to sit back and let the passage of time roll by until it is handed to them again, wherefrom their sole principle and reason for getting up every morning will be to wherever and however possible Keep Things The Same.

  Haberdashers’ Aske’s. Serve and obey. What did we do, Jim, our last exam, Cambridge?

  Jim Medicine, I started with.

  John Jim?

  Jim But I realised. Medicine is just sticking plasters over wounds. It’s stitching up and cleaning up and sending on your way, nothing more.

  So I switched to economics instead. Which is proper medicine.

  Anna See, Jim.

  Jim What?

  Anna That, then. That was good.

  Jim?

  Jim I heard yer.

  John What did we do, Jim? Last exam – this close, this close to getting a DEGREE. ‘You have copied down what we told you! You have repeated it back to us well! Now you are ready to go out into the world.’

  Jim We stood up.

  John Both of us.

  Jim Middle of the hall.

  John Most prestigious learning institute in the world.

  Jim Three years’ work.

  John More – our entire, youthful lives.

  Jim We held up our exam papers.

  John All our written answers. This close.

  Jim And we burnt them.

  John . . . we burnt them.

  Jim Because fuck them.

  Anna ‘Can I have a drink now please, Mummy?’

  Hilary ‘Here, I’ll wash it up for you.’

  Anna ‘Fairy?’

  Hilary ‘That means it’s special for me. It’s especially mild to keep my hands soft.’

  All (singing) ‘Now hands that do dishes can feel soft as your face. With mild green – Fairy Liquid.’

  John ‘This is the complexion Ann gets, with Knights Castille. And as long as she does, he won’t be looking at anyone else.’

  Jim ‘A 9mm Parabellum Carbine Beretta M1938/42. Slim and lightweight, it’s the gun your friends want you to have and your enemies don’t want to see. Beretta – for all your killing needs.’

  BANG!

  Anna Don’t!

  Jim Just joking.

  Anna Don’t point it in my face.

  Jim Not loaded.

  Hilary Where’d it come from?

  John Down the line.

  Hilary How far down the line?