The Designated Mourner
Page 1
Table of Contents
OTHER WORKS BY WALLACE SHAWN
Title Page
Dedication
PRODUCTION HISTORY
CHARACTERS
PART ONE
PART TWO
Copyright Page
OTHER WORKS BY WALLACE SHAWN
SCREENPLAYS:
My Dinner with André
by Wallace Shawn and André Gregory
Marie and Bruce
by Wallace Shawn and Tom Cairns
TRANSLATIONS:
The Mandrake by Niccolò Machiavelli
The Master Builder by Henrik Ibsen
The Threepenny Opera by Bertolt Brecht
OPERA LIBRETTI:
In the Dark, music by Allen Shawn
The Music Teacher, music by Allen Shawn
PLAYS:
The Hotel Play
Our Late Night
A Thought in Three Parts
Marie and Bruce
Aunt Dan and Lemon
The Fever
The Designated Mourner
Grasses of a Thousand Colors
To my darling, D. E.,
and all the other poets and writers
PRODUCTION HISTORY
The Designated Mourner was first presented at the Royal National Theatre in the Cottesloe auditorium in London, England, on April 18, 1996. It was directed by David Hare, with scenic design by Bob Crowley, lighting design by Rick Fisher and sound design by Freya Edwards. The cast was as follows:
JACK Mike Nichols
JUDY Miranda Richardson
HOWARD David de Keyser
The Designated Mourner was first presented in the United States at the Steppenwolf Theatre Company (Martha Lavey, Artistic Director; Michael Gennaro, Managing Director) in Chicago, Illinois, on March 23, 1997. It was directed by Les Waters, with scenic design by Dan Ostling, costume design by Janice Pytel and lighting design by Christine Solger; Michele Volansky was the dramaturg and the production stage manager was Christi-Anne Sokolewicz. The cast was as follows:
JACK David Shapiro
JUDY Martha Lavey
HOWARD Nicholas Rudall
The Designated Mourner was first presented in New York City by Celeste Bartos and Scott Rudin at 21 South William Street on May 1, 2000. It was directed by André Gregory and co-created by Jennifer Tipton; with scenic design by Eugene Lee (with N. Joseph DeTullio); costume design by Dona Granata (with Ivan Ingerman); hair design by Antonio Soddu, Marion Geist and Linda Rice; lighting design by Jennifer Tipton (with Les Dickert) and sound design by Bruce Odland (with Shane Rettig); the sous-chef was Larry Pine and the stage managers were Renée Lutz and Tammy Scozzafava. The cast was as follows:
JACK Wallace Shawn
JUDY Deborah Eisenberg
HOWARD Larry Pine
Special thanks to Bob Norden, Roger Morgan, Trinity Repertory, Hugh Hardy, Nick Gregory, Robert Linton, Liz Sherman, Carol Rizzo, Lisa Stump, Lynda Rodolitz, Stiegelbauer Associates, Randi Savoy, David Rotundo, Georgina Marr, Ariel Ashe, Gus Vavasis.
The production was dedicated “. . . For Jerzy.”
Profound thanks and a big hug to the D.A.A.D., Berlin, and Joachim Sartorius.
CHARACTERS
JACK
JUDY
HOWARD
Jack is older than Judy. Howard is older than Jack.
PART ONE
JACK
(To the audience) The designated mourner. I am the designated mourner. I have to tell you that a very special little world has died, and I am the designated mourner. Oh yes, you see, it’s an important custom in many groups and tribes. Someone is assigned to grieve, to wail, and light the public ritual fire. Someone is assigned when there’s no one else.
Christ, you know, I remember so clearly the moment—when was that?—years ago—when someone was saying, “If God didn’t like assholes, He wouldn’t have made so many of them,” and the person who was saying it looked right at me as he said it—ha ha ha—
I think someone asked me, “Say, are you all right?” And I said, you know, “Oh, it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t bother me. I mean, I’m fine, really.” By the way, do you remember when people used to say that all the time? “I’m fine, really,” “I’m fine, really” . . . Ha ha ha—I must admit, it was an expression I always absolutely hated, but anyway, you know, we all used it—aha ha ha—
I remember saying to Judy, “I don’t sort of understand this need you have to look for beauty in subtler things. Look at your own hand—look at your hand, the plate, the cake, the table . . .”
JUDY
(To the audience) I guess the search for more refined forms of punishment never comes to an end. After all, there are so many ways that life can be squeezed out of a human body. “Can a method be found that is more in keeping with the essential sweetness of our human nature?” a rather cruel queen once plaintively asked, or so it’s said.
I loved him so much, it was a kind of torture. Every morning, waiting, watching his face, in those squirming long moments of sleep and half-sleep as he turned and stretched—I sat there beside him, my hand beside him, not touching him, and pain would fill up my body inch by inch, as if someone were pouring it out of a pitcher.
JACK
(To the audience) You see, I think we ought to be precise about facts—I mean, very, very precise about historical facts. Or I mean, for God’s sake, let’s try to be. Or I mean, for God’s sake, let’s pretend to be. Or something, anyway. Well, at any rate . . . At any rate, there are those who believe that it was a columnist for a newspaper called The New York Sun who, in 1902, first coined that wonderful pair of neatly matching phrases “highbrow” and “lowbrow.”
JUDY
I watched him wake up, the squirming stilled, touched his face, his neck, his mouth, kissed him, one hand lying deep in his hair, oily and thick like a bucket full of worms. The one thing he never would say—the word he couldn’t stand: love. I love you.
JACK
A “highbrow” was a person who liked the finer things—you know, saving the Rembrandt from the burning building, rather than the baby or the fried chicken or whatever—while a “lowbrow” was someone who you might say liked to take the easy way in the cultural sphere—oh, the funny papers, pinups—you know, cheap entertainment.
JUDY
There are ideas that are almost like formalized greetings. Everyone agrees with them, but we keep repeating them anyway, all day long. Everyone keeps saying, for example, “Human motivation is very complex.” But, if you stop and think about it, you have to admit that human motivation is not complex, or it’s complex only in the same sense that the motivation of a fly is complex. In other words, if you try to swat a fly, it moves out of the way. And humans are the same. They step aside when they sense something coming, about to hit them in the face. Of course, you do see the occasional exception—the person who just stands there and waits for the blow.
I love silence, the beauty of silence. The shadows of trees. Japanese monasteries buried in snow, surrounded by forest. Loneliness, death, in the dark forest. But my life was different, a different way: A city. People. Concerts. Poetry.
Altogether, I was lucky—one of the few—because I paid a little price for the things that I thought. I paid a price, so my life was not nothing, my life had something in it.
JACK
All human beings have a need to hear stories, and a rather pretentious fraud I knew in school even used to say that stories are actually “as necessary as food.” I hated that. But, do you know, it’s true? If people don’t dream at night, they go insane, and by day, they need stories—it’s just that simple. Now, some people like to get their stories from gossip, and some people like to get them from novels or pla
ys, but personally I’ve always liked newspapers the best. The stories in newspapers are brief, they’re varied, and, every once in a while, you get to read about someone you know—a friend or an acquaintance suddenly pops up.
Incidentally, have you ever noticed the way that people are always asking, as if there would be a new answer each time, “How can this have happened?” “How can that have happened?!” “Why, it seems impossible!” et cetera. And yet, actually, the answer to those questions is always the same. You remember I was mentioning God a moment ago? Well, that reminded me of something an old acquaintance of mine always used to say when people said things like that. He always used to say, “God’s not in His heaven. And all’s not right with the world.” Aha ha ha ha—aha ha ha ha. But to me, you see—well, he always seemed to me to have the right idea. I always thought, frankly, it was a point well taken.
But shall we get off the very boring subject of me? I’m not interesting. You can sum me up in about ten words: a former student of English literature who—who—who went downhill from there! Ha ha ha ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha! Oh for God’s sake. For God’s sake—no. Now, I’m serious—honestly—let’s forget me, and let’s talk about someone who actually is interesting— let’s talk about someone we can all revere!—now that would be enjoyable. In other words—yes—let’s talk about—Howard!
But—er—ah—er-hrr—mm-hmm—er—now what can I say on such a fascinating subject? How should I begin to tell you about this remarkable man who responded so sensitively to the most obscure verses—and also to the cries of the miserable and the downtrodden, sometimes virtually at the same instant, without ever leaving his breakfast table? I mean, if I’m going to speak of Howard, what should come first? What should be the very first thing that I ought to say? I mean, I really ought to say many different things simultaneously, because, you see, he was so outstanding in so many ways. But that’s not possible. So, what can I do? Oh what the hell—let’s just calm down—I have to start somewhere—so—well—all right—I’ll start by describing one of Howard’s truly most exceptional qualities—well, let’s just call it—his capacity for—for contempt. Yes. Good. All right. So. “Howard’s Capacity for Contempt.” Now really, of course, that’s really the subject for a lengthy monograph, I can only just sketch it, you know, a superficial sketch, but it really is a good place to begin, because Howard’s capacity for contempt was so—well—incredibly vast. In fact, he really had contempt for pretty much everybody on earth. Isn’t that absolutely wonderful?
HOWARD
(To Judy) All right, my darling. Hold my hand for a moment.
JACK
An apostle, you see, of universal love, but flying through each particular day “on wings of scorn,” as some amusing wag said of someone once. Oh, it was impressive, really.
HOWARD
(To Judy and Jack) Oh God, I had to laugh when I heard what Tom was saying on the radio—ha ha ha—I really laughed.
JACK
It was wonderful, the way he could draw us all into it. Pretty soon we’d all be laughing.
(They all laugh.)
HOWARD
He was chattering, chattering, of course—to Eddie!—and all of a sudden—to Eddie’s surprise—he was giving his famous views on “morality” again—aha ha ha!—
JACK
His contempt didn’t come out of nowhere, of course. I mean, you had to understand that over the years—and a bit more each year, one could say, I suppose—poor Howard had really been frightfully mistreated in every possible way. Why, it was just outrageous! You know, a month after his very favorite little tea house in the park had been closed for good, they’d actually cut down his favorite grove of trees! And that’s just one example. So naturally this was an angry man!
HOWARD
(To Judy and Jack) So immediately Eddie got very very serious. Oh yes, very serious—you know the way he gets. His lips get sort of—stuck in place—like this—you know?—so his voice is sort of “er er er”—hee hee hee—
(They all laugh.)
JACK
(To the audience) Now, one of Judy’s problems, I’m sorry to say, was that she refused to wear clothes in front of her father, which I, as her husband, found somehow always vaguely unnerving. I mean, her usual outfit around the house was this rather well-worn pair of ratty old trousers, some bright-red lipstick, and a rather frilly brassiere. The trousers and lipstick never varied, but the brassiere would be forgotten on certain occasions. In other words, she was sometimes topless. All right, all right, you think I’m a prude, but one of the main reasons it bothered me, honestly, was that as Howard, of course, always went around in his bedclothes and dressing gown, it meant that usually I was the only one dressed. I mean, that was a little unfair—don’t you think so? I was the one who felt out of place. I felt out of place because I was dressed! Ha ha ha—
JUDY
(To the audience) Shall I tell you about the first time I met the very amusing and extraordinarily long-lived President of our country? I was about six years old, and I was strolling happily through the park with my nurse, running off the pathway every few moments to chase a squirrel or a bird, and all of a sudden we passed the President, also strolling, with a huge entourage. He was heavily guarded in those days, obviously. Well, as soon as we passed he ran back towards me, with his whole group following confusedly behind him, and he came right up to me, and he was sort of pretending to be a cat, with his hands held up by his ears like paws, and he was sort of purring and meowing, and then he laughed loudly and instructed me, “Now give your father my very best regards! Don’t forget—my best regards!” And then he laughed again, and they were all gone.
So, who here can say what the difference is between poetry and prose? Can anyone tell me? Well—er—poetry comes in those short little lines! Isn’t that the difference? Well, all right—all right, let’s say it is. But can you tell me, then, how the length of the lines could possibly affect the way the words convey meaning? Do the words care what size of line they’re on? But all the same, this indefinable difference has had some very definable results in my life over the years, in my opinion. You know, I always think of this drunken friend of Father’s leaning over me sickeningly at some party or other when I was ten or eleven, saying, “Yes, it’s a miracle, really, that he’s allowed to exist, it’s just remarkable that your father is allowed to exist!” Well, do you think that he would have been “allowed to exist” past the age of thirty if he hadn’t completely given up writing prose and devoted himself entirely to the writing of verse? It was just the way his talent developed, but it meant that the charming little gang who led our country never read what he wrote, as the only members of the gang who could understand poetry at all were undoubtedly Father’s own father and our playful President himself, who, out of respect for his old comrade-in-arms, my appalling grandfather, undoubtedly made the decision just to look the other way.
JACK
In those early days, when we all were getting to know each other, the three of us used to talk for hours over cups of tea, sometimes long into the night, and of course I was dazzled. I’d never met anyone like Howard in my life. He would talk about all these people and events, and he would tell us his ideas, and I’d sit there amazed.
HOWARD
Oh, I turned the volume on the radio to loud. I didn’t want to miss a single word! Hee hee—did you know that morality was Eddie’s favorite subject? Oh yes, he loves to talk about it. He finds it so enjoyable. You know, morality for Eddie is like—what?—like—what?—you know—it’s like some terribly worthy old urn, some terribly worthy old urn that’s wrapped up in some towels in his back closet. Well, it’s got a few chips in it, one has to admit, and it is rather ugly, really, if you bother to look at it, and it’s too heavy to lift, and in its style of course it’s totally out of keeping with everything else in the house. So, well, you know, it can’t be used, it has no function in his life at all—but ten times a day he has to exclaim, “Oh yes, that urn, it’s my great poss
ession, my greatest treasure.”
JACK
Oh, now, Howard, really, that’s—
HOWARD
Now for Tom, of course, it’s all just a wonderful way of being able to say at every opportunity, “Well, I was superior.” You know, Tom is really indifferent to other human beings. You could be dying in agony in front of his eyes, and it wouldn’t bother Tom the slightest bit. But he loves morality because it means he can say, These other people were terrible, you know, what they did was wrong, they were inferior, contemptible. I, on the other hand, did what was right, you see, and I’m quite superior.
JUDY
(To the audience) Father’s best piece of prose, I’ve always thought, was his essay called “The Enemy.” You know, no one actually can write like that if they’re over twenty-five, for whatever reason, and he most certainly never could have—it was all so bluntly personal: the way he wrote about his parents, the house, the corridors, the statues—the sheer lustfulness with which he described the young woman, whom he’d met in the park—the rather wild humor in his description of the process of bringing her over to the house . . . and then the power of that passage in which he slowly realizes who and what that young woman actually was. In the end, well, the hours he spent with her that night would change his life.