JUDGE: Did he understand the extent of his activity?
SONG: He didn’t ask. He knew that I needed those documents, and that was enough.
JUDGE: But he must’ve known he was passing classified information.
SONG: I can’t say.
JUDGE: He never asked what you were going to do with them?
SONG: Nope.
Pause.
JUDGE: There is one thing that the court—indeed, that all of France—would like to know.
SONG: Fire away.
JUDGE: Did Monsieur Gallimard know you were a man?
SONG: Well, he never saw me completely naked. Ever.
JUDGE: But surely, he must’ve ... how can I put this?
SONG: Put it however you like. I’m not shy. He must’ve felt around?
JUDGE: Mmmmm.
SONG: Not really. I did all the work. He just laid back. Of course we did enjoy more ... complete union, and I suppose he might have wondered why I was always on my stomach, but.... But what you’re thinking is. “Of course a wrist must’ve brushed ... a hand hit ... over twenty years!” Yeah. Well, Your Honor, it was my job to make him think I was a woman. And chew on this: it wasn’t all that hard. See, my mother was a prostitute along the Bundt before the Revolution. And, uh, I think it’s fair to say she learned a few things about Western men. So I borrowed her knowledge. In service to my country.
JUDGE: Would you care to enlighten the court with this secret knowledge? I’m sure we’re all very curious.
SONG: I’m sure you are. (Pause) Okay, Rule One is: Men always believe what they want to hear. So a girl can tell the most obnoxious lies and the guys will believe them every time—“This is my first time”—“That’s the biggest I’ve ever seen”—or both, which, if you really think about it, is not possible in a single lifetime. You’ve maybe heard those phrases a few times in your own life, yes, Your Honor?
JUDGE: It’s not my life, Monsieur Song, which is on trial today.
SONG: Okay, okay, just trying to lighten up the proceedings. Tough room.
JUDGE: Go on.
SONG: Rule Two: As soon as a Western man comes into contact with the East—he’s already confused. The West has sort of an international rape mentality towards the East. Do you know rape mentality?
JUDGE: Give us your definition, please.
SONG: Basically, “Her mouth says no, but her eyes say yes.”
The West thinks of itself as masculine—big guns, big industry, big money—so the East is feminine—weak, delicate, poor ... but good at art, and full of inscrutable wisdom—the feminine mystique.
Her mouth says no, but her eyes say yes. The West believes the East, deep down, wants to be dominated—because a woman can’t think for herself.
JUDGE: What does this have to do with my question?
SONG: You expect Oriental countries to submit to your guns, and you expect Oriental women to be submissive to your men. That’s why you say they make the best wives.
JUDGE: But why would that make it possible for you to fool Monsieur Gallimard? Please—get to the point.
SONG: One, because when he finally met his fantasy woman, he wanted more than anything to believe that she was, in fact, a woman. And second, I am an Oriental. And being an Oriental, I could never be completely a man.
Pause.
JUDGE: Your armchair political theory is tenuous, Monsieur Song.
SONG: You think so? That’s why you’ll lose in all your dealings with the East.
JUDGE: Just answer my question: did he know you were a man?
Pause.
SONG: You know, Your Honor, I never asked.
scene 2
Same.
Music from the “Death Scene” from Butterfly blares over the house speakers. It is the loudest thing we’ve heard in this play.
Gallimard enters, crawling towards Song’s wig and kimono.
GALLIMARD: Butterfly? Butterfly?
Song remains a man, in the witness box, delivering a testimony we do not hear.
GALLIMARD (To us): In my moment of greatest shame, here, in this courtroom—with that ... person up there, telling the world.... What strikes me especially is how shallow he is, how glib and obsequious ... completely .. without substance! The type that prowls around discos with a gold medallion stinking of garlic. So little like my Butterfly.
Yet even in this moment my mind remains agile, flip-flopping like a man on a trampoline. Even now, my picture dissolves, and I see that ... witness ... talking to me.
Song suddenly stands straight up in his witness box, and looks at Gallimard.
SONG: Yes. You. White man.
Song steps out of the witness box, and moves downstage towards Gallimard. Light change.
GALLIMARD (To Song): Who? Me?
SONG: Do you see any other white men?
GALLIMARD: Yes. There’re white men all around. This is a French courtroom.
SONG: So you are an adventurous imperialist. Tell me, why did it take you so long? To come back to this place?
GALLIMARD: What place?
SONG: This theatre in China. Where we met many years ago.
GALLIMARD (To us): And once again, against my will, I am transported.
Chinese opera music comes up on the speakers. Song begins to do opera moves, as he did the night they met.
SONG: Do you remember? The night you gave your heart?
GALLIMARD: It was a long time ago.
SONG: Not long enough. A night that turned your world upside down.
GALLIMARD: Perhaps.
SONG: Oh, be honest with me. What’s another bit of flattery when you’ve already given me twenty years’ worth? It’s a wonder my head hasn’t swollen to the size of China.
GALLIMARD: Who’s to say it hasn’t?
SONG: Who’s to say? And what’s the shame? In pride? You think I could’ve pulled this off if I wasn’t already full of pride when we met? No, not just pride. Arrogance. It takes arrogance, really—to believe you can will, with your eyes and your lips, the destiny of another. (He dances) C‘mon. Admit it. You still want me. Even in slacks and a button-down collar.
GALLIMARD: I don’t see what the point of—
SONG: You don’t? Well maybe, Rene, just maybe—I want you.
GALLIMARD: You do?
SONG: Then again, maybe I’m just playing with you. How can you tell? (Reprising his feminine character, he sidles up to Gallimard) “How I wish there were even a small cafe to sit in. With men in tuxedos, and cappuccinos, and bad expa triate jazz.” Now you want to kiss me, don’t you?
GALLIMARD (Pulling away): What makes you—?
SONG:—so sure? See? I take the words from your mouth. Then I wait for you to come and retrieve them. (He reclines on the floor)
GALLIMARD: Why?! Why do you treat me so cruelly?
SONG: Perhaps I was treating you cruelly. But now—I’m being nice. Come here, my little one.
GALLIMARD: I’m not your little one!
SONG: My mistake. It’s I who am your little one, right?
GALLIMARD: Yes, I—
SONG: So come get your little one. If you like. I may even let you strip me.
GALLIMARD: I mean, you were! Before ... but not like this!
SONG: I was? Then perhaps I still am. If you look hard enough. (He starts to remove his clothes)
GALLIMARD: What—what are you doing?
SONG: Helping you to see through my act.
GALLIMARD: Stop that! I don’t want to! I don‘t—
SONG: Oh, but you asked me to strip, remember?
GALLIMARD: What? That was years ago! And I took it back!
SONG: No. You postponed it. Postponed the inevitable. Today, the inevitable has come calling.
From the speakers, cacophony: Butterfly mixed in with Chinese gongs.
GALLIMARD: No! Stop! I don’t want to see!
SONG: Then look away.
GALLIMARD: You’re only in my mind! All this is in my mind! I order you! To stop!
SONG: To what? To str
ip? That’s just what I‘m—
GALLIMARD: No! Stop! I want you—!
SONG: You want me?
GALLIMARD: To stop!
SONG: You know something, Rene? Your mouth says no, but your eyes say yes. Turn them away. I dare you.
GALLIMARD: I don’t have to! Every night, you say you’re going to strip, but then I beg you and you stop!
SONG: I guess tonight is different.
GALLIMARD: Why? Why should that be?
SONG: Maybe I’ve become frustrated. Maybe I’m saying “Look at me, you fool!” Or maybe I’m just feeling ... sexy. (He is down to his briefs)
GALLIMARD: Please. This is unnecessary. I know what you are.
SONG: Do you? What am I?
GALLIMARD : A—a man.
SONG: You don’t really believe that.
GALLIMARD: Yes I do! I knew all the time somewhere that my happiness was temporary, my love a deception. But my mind kept the knowledge at bay. To make the wait bearable.
SONG: Monsieur Gallimard—the wait is over.
Song drops his briefs. He is naked. Sound cue out. Slowly, we and Song come to the realization that what we had thought to be Gallimard’s sobbing is actually his laughter.
GALLIMARD: Oh god! What an idiot! Of course!
SONG: Rene—what?
GALLIMARD: Look at you! You’re a man! (He bursts into laughter again)
SONG: I fail to see what’s so funny!
GALLIMARD: “You fail to see—!” I mean, you never did have much of a sense of humor, did you? I just think it’s ridiculously funny that I’ve wasted,so much time on just a man!
SONG: Wait. I’m not “just a man.”
GALLIMARD: No? Isn’t that what you’ve been trying to convince me of?
SONG: Yes, but what I mean—
GALLIMARD: And now, I finally believe you, and you tell me it’s not true? I think you must have some kind of identity problem.
SONG: Will you listen to me?
GALLIMARD: Why?! I’ve been listening to you for twenty years. Don’t I deserve a vacation?
SONG: I’m not just any man!
GALLIMARD: Then, what exactly are you?
SONG: Rene, how can you ask—? Okay, what about this?
He picks up Butterfly’s robes, starts to dance around. No music.
GALLIMARD: Yes, that’s very nice. I have to admit.
Song holds out his arm to Gallimard.
SONG: It’s the same skin you’ve worshiped for years. Touch it.
GALLIMARD: Yes, it does feel the same.
SONG: Now—close your eyes.
Song covers Gallimard’s eyes with one hand. With the other, Song draws Gallimard’s hand up to his face. Gallimard, like a blind man, lets his hands run over Song’s face.
GALLIMARD: This skin, I remember. The curve of her face, the softness of her cheek, her hair against the back of my hand ...
SONG: I’m your Butterfly. Under the robes, beneath everything, it was always me. Now, open your eyes and admit it—you adore me. (He removes his hand from Gallimard’s eyes)
GALLIMARD: You, who knew every inch of my desires—how could you, of all people, have made such a mistake?
SONG: What?
GALLIMARD: You showed me your true self. When all I loved was the lie. A perfect lie, which you let fall to the ground—and now, it’s old and soiled.
SONG: So—you never really loved me? Only when I was playing a part?
GALLIMARD: I’m a man who loved a woman created by a man. Everything else—simply falls short.
Pause.
SONG: What am I supposed to do now?
GALLIMARD: You were a fine spy, Monsieur Song, with an even finer accomplice. But now I believe you should go. Get out of my life!
SONG: Go where? Rene, you can’t live without me. Not after twenty years.
GALLIMARD: I certainly can’t live with you—not after twenty years of betrayal.
SONG: Don’t be so stubborn! Where will you go?
GALLIMARD: I have a date ... with my Butterfly.
SONG: So, throw away your pride. And come ...
GALLIMARD: Get away from me! Tonight, I’ve finally learned to tell fantasy from reality. And, knowing the difference, I choose fantasy.
SONG: I’m your fantasy!
GALLIMARD: You? You’re as real as hamburger. Now get out! I have a date with my Butterfly and I don’t want your body polluting the room! (He tosses Song’s suit at him) Look at these—you dress like a pimp.
SONG: Hey! These are Armani slacks and—! (He puts on his briefs and slacks) Let’s just say ... I’m disappointed in you, Rene. In the crush of your adoration, I thought you’d become something more. More like ... a woman.
But no. Men. You’re like the rest of them. It’s all in the way we dress, and make up our faces, and bat our eyelashes. You really have so little imagination!
GALLIMARD: You, Monsieur Song? Accuse me of too little imagination? You, if anyone, should know—I am pure imagination. And in imagination I will remain. Now get out!
Gallimard bodily removes Song from the stage, taking his kimono.
SONG: Rene! I’ll never put on those robes again! You’ll be sorry!
GALLIMARD: (To Song): I’m already sorry! (Looking at the kimono in his hands) Exactly as sorry ... as a Butterfly.
scene 3
M. Gallimard’s prison cell. Paris. Present.
GALLIMARD: I’ve played out the events of my life night after night, always searching for a new ending to my story, one where I leave this cell and return forever to my Butterfly’s arms.
Tonight I realize my search is over. That I’ve looked all along in the wrong place. And now, to you, I will prove that my love was not in vain—by returning to the world of fantasy where I first met her.
He picks up the kimono; dancers enter.
GALLIMARD: There is a vision of the Orient that I have. Of slender women in chong sams and kimonos who die for the love of unworthy foreign devils. Who are born and raised to be the perfect women. Who take whatever punishment we give them, and bounce back, strengthened by love, unconditionally. It is a vision that has become my life.
Dancers bring the wash basin to him and help him make up his face.
GALLIMARD: In public, I have continued to deny that Song Liling is a man. This brings me headlines, and is a source of great embarrassment to my French colleagues, who can now be sent into a coughing fit by the mere mention of Chinese food. But alone, in my cell, I have long since faced the truth.
And the truth demands a sacrifice. For mistakes made over the course of a lifetime. My mistakes were simple and absolute—the man I loved was a cad, a bounder. He deserved nothing but a kick in the behind, and instead I gave him ... all my love.
Yes—love. Why not admit it all? That was my undoing, wasn’t it? Love warped my judgment, blinded my eyes, rearranged the very lines on my face ... until I could look in the mirror and see nothing but ... a woman.
Dancers help him put on the Butterfly wig.
GALLIMARD: I have a vision. Of the Orient. That, deep within its almond eyes, there are still women. Women willing to sacrifice themselves for the love of a man. Even a man whose love is completely without worth.
Dancers assist Gallimard in donning the kimono. They hand him a knife.
GALLIMARD: Death with honor is better than life ... life with dishonor. (He sets himself center stage, in a seppuku position) The love of a Butterfly can withstand many things—unfaithfulness, loss, even abandonment. But how can it face the one sin that implies all others? The devastating knowledge that, underneath it all, the object of her love was nothing more, nothing less than ... a man. (He sets the tip of the knife against his body) It is 19__. And I have found her at last. In a prison on the outskirts of Paris. My name is Rene Gallimard—also known as Madame Butterfly.
Gallimard turns upstage and plunges the knife into his body, as music from the “Love Duet” blares over the speakers. He collapses into the arms of the dancers, who lay him
reverently on the floor. The image holds for several beats. Then a tight special up on Song, who stands as a man, staring at the dead Gallimard. He smokes a cigarette; the smoke filters up through the lights. Two words leave his lips.
SONG: Butterfly? Butterfly?
Smoke rises as lights fade slowly to black.
END OF PLAY
afterword
It all started in May of 1986, over casual dinner conversation. A friend asked, had I heard about the French diplomat who’d fallen in love with a Chinese actress, who subsequently turned out to be not only a spy, but a man? I later found a two-paragraph story in The New York Times. The diplomat, Bernard Bouriscot, attempting to account for the fact that he had never seen his “girlfriend” naked, was quoted as saying, “I thought she was very modest. I thought it was a Chinese custom.”
Now, I am aware that this is not a Chinese custom, that Asian women are no more shy with their lovers than are women of the West. I am also aware, however, that Bouriscot’s assumption was consistent with a certain stereotyped view of Asians as bowing, blushing flowers. I therefore concluded that the diplomat must have fallen in love, not with a person, but with a fantasy stereotype. I also inferred that, to the extent the Chinese spy encouraged these misperceptions, he must have played up to and exploited this image of the Oriental woman as demure and submissive. (In general, by the way, we prefer the term “Asian” to “Oriental,” in the same way “Black” is superior to “Negro.” I use the term “Oriental” specifically to denote an exotic or imperialistic view of the East.)
I suspected there was a play here. I purposely refrained from further research, for I was not interested in writing docudrama. Frankly, I didn’t want the “truth” to interfere with my own speculations. I told Stuart Ostrow, a producer with whom I’d worked before, that I envisioned the story as a musical. I remember going so far as to speculate that it could be some “great Madame Butterfly-like tragedy.” Stuart was very intrigued, and encouraged me with some early funding.
M. Butterfly Page 7