Resurrection Blues

by Arthur Miller

  FELIX, in a flare of anger-alarm: How the hell could you antagonize me! I love you, you bastard. . . . Tell me, you still living in New York?

  HENRI: Mostly Munich. Lecturing on Tragedy.

  FELIX: Tragedy is my life, Henri—when I was training in Georgia those Army dentists were the best, but I didn’t have a cavity then. Now, when I’m paying the bills I’m full of holes. —How do you lecture on Tragedy?

  HENRI, inhales, exhales: Let me tell you what’s on my . . .

  FELIX, now a certain anxiety begins to seep out more openly: Yes! Go ahead, what is it? . . . Isn’t that cap too hot?

  HENRI: It helps my arthritis.

  FELIX: Oh, right! And how does that work again?—Oh yes!—it’s that most of the body heat escapes through the skull . . .

  HENRI: Exactly . . .

  FELIX, suddenly recalling: . . . So it keeps your joints warm!—this is why I always loved talking to you, Henri!—you make my mind wander. . . . Wait! My god, I haven’t congratulated you; your new wife.

  HENRI: Thank you.

  FELIX: I read that she’s a concert pianist?

  HENRI, a strained smile: . . . You’re going to have to hear this, Felix.

  FELIX: I’m listening!—But seeing you again always . . . moves me. Reaches over to touch Henri’s knee. I am moved. Collects himself. How long will you be staying this time?

  HENRI: A month or two; depends on how Jeanine progresses . . .

  FELIX: Doctor Herman tells me she’ll need another operation.

  HENRI: Two more, possibly three. The whole thing is devastating.

  FELIX: . . . I have to say, I never thought you were this close . . .

  HENRI: No one can be close to a drug addict; but she’s absolutely finished with that now. I was never much of a father but I’m going to see her back to health if it’s the last thing I ever do.

  FELIX: Bravo, I’m glad to hear that.—How a woman of her caliber could go for drugs is beyond me. What happened, do you know?

  HENRI, sudden surge: What happened!—she lost a revolution, Felix.

  FELIX: All right, but she has to know all that is finished, revolution is out . . . I’m talking everywhere.

  HENRI: . . . Listen, don’t make me drag it out—I haven’t the strength.

  FELIX: Yes. Please.—But I must tell you, it always amazes me how you gave up everything to just read books and think. Frankly, I have never understood it. But go ahead . . .

  HENRI: Day before yesterday I drove with my wife up toward Santa Felice to show her the country.

  FELIX: According to this Vanity Fair magazine that is one of the finest views in the world, you know.

  HENRI: As we were passing through the villages . . .

  FELIX: . . . Also the National Geographic.

  HENRI: When we got up there, Felix . . . it all came back to me . . . remember when we were students and hiked up there together? Remember our shock and disgust that so many of the children had orange hair . . .

  FELIX, a happy memory; laughs indulgently: Ah yes! The blood fluke . . . it’s in the water. But it’s practically harmless, you know.

  HENRI: Not for children. It can destroy a child’s liver . . .

  FELIX: Well now, that’s a bit . . .

  HENRI, sudden sharpness: It is true, Felix! And the symptom of course is orange hair.

  FELIX: What’s your point?

  HENRI: What’s my point! Felix, blood fluke in the water supply in the twenty-first century is. . . . My god, you are the head of this country, don’t you feel a . . . ?

  FELIX: They won’t boil the water, what can I do about it!—What is all this about the fluke suddenly? The British are definitely going to build a gigantic warehouse on the harbor, for god’s sake!

  HENRI, distressed: A warehouse! What’s that got to do with . . .

  FELIX: Because this country’s starting to move and you’re still talking blood fluke! I assure you, Henri, nobody in this country has the slightest interest in blood fluke!—Is this what you wanted to talk to me about?

  HENRI: You probably won’t remember, but on my last visit I brought home an eighteenth-century painting from Paris, cost me twenty-six thousand dollars. The pollution in our air has since peeled off about a third of the paint.

  FELIX: That couldn’t happen in Paris?

  HENRI: It’s been sitting in Paris for two hundred and fifty years! . . . I had a grand piano shipped from New York for my wife . . .

  FELIX: The varnish cracked?

  HENRI: The varnish did not crack but my architect is afraid the floor may collapse because of the underground leakage of water from the aqueduct, which has undermined the foundations of that whole lovely neighborhood. And brought in termites!

  FELIX: I’m to chase termites?

  HENRI:—My wife has to practice in the garage, Felix! When she plays for me I have to sit listening in the Mercedes!

  FELIX: But cousin, a grand piano—you’re talking three-quarters of a ton!

  HENRI: I was getting out of a taxi yesterday on Avenue Fontana, our number-one shopping street . . .

  FELIX: Did you see the new Dunhill store . . . ?

  HENRI: . . . I nearly stepped on a dead baby lying at the curb.

  Felix throws up his hands and walks away, steaming.

  Shoppers were passing by, saw it, and walked on. As I did.

  FELIX: What is all this suddenly? None of this has ever been any different!

  HENRI: I don’t know! I suppose I never really looked at anything. It may be Jeanine; she was so utterly beautiful, Felix.

  FELIX: Oh god, yes.

  HENRI: I think I never really saw what I meant to her. Sitting with her day after day now . . . for the first time I understood my part in her suffering. I betrayed her, Felix. It’s terrible.

  FELIX: Why? You always gave her everything . . .

  HENRI: A faith in the revolution is what I gave her . . . and then walked away from it myself.

  FELIX: I hope I’m not hearing your old Marxism again . . .

  HENRI: Oh shit, Felix!—I haven’t been a Marxist for twenty-five years!

  FELIX: Because that is finished, they’re almost all in narcotics now, thanks be to god; but the Americans are here now and they’ll clean out the whole lot of them by New Years! Your guerillas are done!

  HENRI: These are not my guerillas, my guerillas were foolish, idealistic people, but the hope of the world! These people now are cynical and stupid enough to deal narcotics!

  FELIX: Listen, after thirty-eight years of civil war what did you expect to find here, Sweden? Weren’t you in analysis once?

  HENRI: Yes. I was. Twenty years ago at least. Why?

  FELIX: I’m seeing a man in Miami.

  HENRI: Well, that’s surprising. I always think of you in control of everything.

  FELIX: Not the most important thing.

  HENRI: . . . You don’t say. Maybe you have the wrong woman.

  FELIX: They can’t all be wrong. My dog just won’t hunt.

  HENRI: Imagine. And analysis helps?

  FELIX, hesitates: Semi. I’m trying to keep from letting it obsess me. But I have this vision, you know?

  HENRI: Oh? Someone you’ve met?

  FELIX: No, just imaginary—like those women you see in New York. Tall, you know? Fine teeth. Kind of . . . I don’t know . . . nasty. Or spirited . . . spirited is the word. Is your wife tall?

  HENRI: No. She’s Viennese. Rather on the short, round side.

  FELIX: I’ve tried short and round, but . . . Shakes his head. It’s torturing me, Henri. Listen, how would you like to be ambassador to Moscow again?

  HENRI, gripping his head: Do you see why I am depressed?—nothing follows!

  FELIX:—The reason you’re depressed is . . .

  HENRI, grips his head: I beg you, Felix, don’t tell me why I’m depressed!

  FELIX: . . . It’s because you’re a rich man in a poor country, that’s all . . . but we’re moving, by god!

  Intercom. Felix bends to
it.

  Thank you, my dear. To Henri:—I have a meeting. . . . What’d you want to tell me?

  HENRI, a pause to organize: On our little trip to Santa Felice—Hilda and I—we were struck by a . . . what to call it? . . . a kind of spiritual phenomenon up there. Really incredible. Wherever we went the peasants had pictures of this young man whom they . . .

  FELIX: He’s finished. We’ve captured him, Henri, he is history, all done.

  HENRI: They keep candles lit before his photograph, you know . . . like a saint.

  FELIX: This saint’s gunmen have shot up three police stations and killed two officers and wounded five more in the past two months.

  HENRI: They say he personally had nothing to do with the violence.

  FELIX: The man is a revolutionary and he is responsible!—Listen, Henri, two of my brothers died fighting shits like these and he will have no mercy from me. Is this what you wanted to talk to about?

  HENRI: There is a rumor—which I find hard to believe—that you intend to crucify this fellow?

  FELIX: I can’t comment on that.

  HENRI: Beg your pardon?

  FELIX: No comment, Henri, that’s the end of it.

  HENRI: And if this brings on a bloodbath?

  FELIX: Don’t think it will.

  HENRI: Felix, you are totally out of touch. They really think he is the Messiah, the son of god!

  FELIX: The son of god is a man named Ralph?

  HENRI: But a crucifixion! Don’t you see?—it will prove they were right! These are simple people, it could bring them roaring down out of the mountains!

  FELIX: Shooting doesn’t work! People are shot on television every ten minutes; bang-bang, and they go down like dolls, it’s meaningless. But nail up a couple of these bastards, and believe me this will be the quietest country on the continent and ready for development! A crucifixion always quiets things down. Really, I am amazed—a cretin goes about preaching bloody revolution, and you . . .

  HENRI: Talk to the people! They’ll tell you he’s preaching justice.

  FELIX: Oh come off it, Henri! Two percent of our people—including you—own ninety-six percent of the land. The justice they’re demanding is your land; are you ready to give it to them?

  HENRI: . . . To tell the truth, yes, I just might be. I returned to try to help Jeanine but also . . . I’ve decided to put the business and both farms up for sale.

  FELIX: Why!—those farms are terrific!

  HENRI: They’ve been raising coca and it’s impossible to police my managers when I’m away so much; in short, I’ve decided to stop pretending to be a business man . . . Breaks off.

  FELIX: Really. And what’s stopping you?

  HENRI: Courage, probably. I lack enough conviction . . .

  FELIX: No, Henri, it’s your common sense telling you that in ten years the land you gave away will end up back in the hands of two percent of the smartest people! You can’t teach a baboon to play Chopin.—Or are you telling me this idiot is the son of god?

  HENRI: I don’t believe in god, let alone his son. I beg you, Felix, listen to what I’m saying . . . you crucify this fellow and our country is finished, ruined!

  FELIX: Henri, dear friend . . . Draws the letter out of his jacket pocket. . . . not only are we not ruined—I can tell you that with this crucifixion our country will finally begin to live!

  This fax arrived this morning.

  A gigantic fax unspurls.

  You’ve heard of Thomson, Weber, Macdean and Abramowitz of Madison Avenue?

  HENRI: Of course . . . Thomson, Weber, Macdean and Abramowitz. They’re the largest advertising agency for pharmaceutical companies.

  FELIX: So I’m told. How they got wind of it I don’t know, unless General Gonzalez contacted them for a finder’s fee—he’s our consul in New York now; anyway, they want to photograph the crucifixion for television.

  HENRI: What in god’s name are you talking about?

  FELIX, hands the letter to Henri: This is an offer of seventy-five million dollars for the exclusive worldwide rights to televise the crucifixion.

  HENRI, stunned, he reads the letter: Have you read these conditions?

  FELIX: What do you mean?

  HENRI, indicating letter: They will attach commercial announcements!

  FELIX: But they say “dignified” announcements. . . . Probably like the phone company or, I don’t know, the Red Cross.

  HENRI: They are talking underarm deodorants, Felix!

  FELIX: You don’t know that!

  HENRI, slapping the letter: Read it! They hardly expect a worldwide audience for the phone company! They’re talking athlete’s foot, Felix!

  FELIX: Oh no, I don’t think they . . .

  HENRI: They’re talking athlete’s foot, sour stomach, constipation, anal itch . . . !

  FELIX: No-no!

  HENRI: Where else does seventy-five million come from? I’m sure they figure it would take him four or five hours to die, so they could load it up—runny stool, falling hair, gum disease, crotch itch, dry skin, oily skin, nasal blockage, diapers for grownups . . . impotence . . .

  FELIX: God no, they’d never do that!

  HENRI: Why not? Is there a hole in the human anatomy we don’t make a dollar on? With a crucifixion the sky’s the limit! I forgot ear wax, red eyes, bad breath . . .

  FELIX: Please, Henri, sit down for a moment.

  HENRI, sitting: It’s a catastrophe! And for me personally it’s . . . it’s the end!

  FELIX: Why?—nobody will blame you . . .

  HENRI: My company distributes most of those products, for god’s sake!

  FELIX: I think maybe you’re exaggerating the reaction . . .

  HENRI: Am I! As your men drive nails into his hands and split the bones of his feet the camera will cut away to . . . god knows what . . . somebody squirming with a burning asshole! You must let the fellow go . . . !

  FELIX: He’s not going anywhere, he’s a revolutionary and an idiot!

  HENRI: You’re not visualizing, Felix! People are desperate for someone this side of the stars who feels their suffering himself and gives a damn! The man is hope!

  FELIX: He is hope because he gets us seventy-five million! My god, we once had an estimate to irrigate the entire eastern half of the country and that was only thirteen million! This is fantastic!

  HENRI: Felix—if you sell this man, you will join the two other most contemptible monsters in history.

  FELIX: What two others?

  HENRI: Pontius Pilate and Judas, for god’s sake! That kind of infamy is very hard to shed.

  FELIX: Except that Jesus Christ was not an impostor and this one is.