by Raz Shaw
And if that ain’t just a little bit spiritual, fuck knows what is!
APPENDIX 1
Below is a short play that was commissioned by Paines Plough – a touring theatre company specialising in new writing and new work – for a show that was known as Directors’ Perform. The premise was that they would pair up a director and a writer who’d worked together a number of times, and the writer would write a short monologue for the director to perform. Presumably so the writer could get their own back for the number of times that director has asked the writer to butcher/delete/rewrite some of their precious script. I have worked a lot with the brilliant Naomi Wallace, and she wanted to write something about my cancer, my gambling addiction and my love for Bruce Springsteen. Naomi has kindly agreed for it to be shared with you here. I did indeed perform it, for one night only, at the Soho Theatre some years ago. No live record of it exists. Thankfully!
WORD’S A SLAVE BY NAOMI WALLACE
(DEVISED FROM CONVERSATIONS WITH RAZ SHAW)
(The stage is bare. After some moments a man in his late thirties/early forties appears on stage, dressed casually. He eyes the public.)
I did three things when I got ill. Gamble. Chemo. And listen to Bruce. And not necessarily in that order.
Shakespeare knew exactly what I’m talking about:
‘I have seen a medicine
That’s able to breathe life into stone,
Quicken a rock, and make you dance canary.’
And baby, once you dance the canary, no other dance will do.
Our second Bard, Bruce Springsteen, knew this too.
(He sings a couple of lines from the Bruce Springsteen song ‘Growing Up’.)
So here I am, holding my breath and dancing the canary, dealing the medicine of the blackjack God to my right and to my left, and turning my skin over and over and inside out again and again and I’m losing and I’m losing and I’m losing but then I’m winning and I’m winning and I’m losing again, I’m losing again, I will not get up from this table, I will not get up from this cunting table because it feels too good and I can win again and it feels too good and I will win again...
And then it’s silent. The canary stops singing.
Sure it can kill you. The gambling. The cancer too. But then there’s almost nothing in this world that won’t. Kill you. But before it does, it’ll flash your blood and send a sting of heat ’cross your gums, down your throat and into your gut. It’s a kind of sustenance.
I’ve always maintained that I don’t gamble, I pray. And I practise this form of prayer sitting down, standing up, or crawling on all fours. And once I get to praying, there is a continuous flow of time ’cause time changes its dimension when you twist and stick. Time no longer passes, it just quits. And because it quits, it can’t take you with it so you just stay. Still: pure focus. I sat in Atlantic City for twenty-three hours straight at a blackjack table, taking only a few, quick shifts to piss, shit, drink water from the bathroom sink and eat handfuls of salted peanuts. I didn’t wash. Didn’t brush my teeth. But in those hours I felt more pristine, more vigorous, more perfected than I had in my entire life.
(He sings a line from the Bruce Springsteen song ‘Born to Run’.)
Ace. An Ace from God: right here.
(Thumps his chest once to show location.)
Top of my chest between my lungs.
Yeah, folks don’t say it but I see it in their flat little faces: I was at the height of my gambling when I got sick. Was God punishing me? Was cancer my private message from God? My answer: Would it matter? Would it really fucking matter?
What mattered was that one day I went T.F.B. Street tag: Totally Fucking Bald. Six months chemo and I mean no hair anywhere. Neither sprout nor sprig to be found in crack or fold. And then I began to swell. From all the steroids. And it was like taking an air pump on full power to a garden variety worm. The contours of my body just stopped guarding their borders. Then came the side effects, 350 of them to be exact, and all at one time: mouth ulcers. So for a while there I couldn’t speak and I couldn’t eat. Let’s say I was not at my most devilishly attractive.
But that didn’t stop me from attending my personal synagogue. I kept going back, with my hairless head, to that place of smack-against-the-table, ‘Card, Please.’ Blackjack.
’Course it’s a form of escape. A kid could tell you that, but for all the places I’ve sat down in my life, it’s the only one that truly feels like home.
It was the same with Bruce. You see, The Boss might not be the greatest musician that ever lived and his voice, well, between him and me, sometimes I think my croak is more muscular than his. But the package that is Springsteen is a heat-seeking device that won’t rest till it tracks you down, locks on hard and slaps you spinning till:
(He sings a line from the Bruce Springsteen song ‘Badlands’.)
Whenever you’re fucked in your head or your gut or your groin, Bruce is like your own personal toolbox. Trite, sure. But that doesn’t make it less real. As were the needs of my system when I sat down at that table and was repeatedly flushed, irrigated with a liquid God: epinephrine.
Street tag: Adrenaline. Nectar from the adrenal glands when danger threatens, hence the rush. Yeah, the rush. It’s a cliché that we gamble for the rush. But a rush is not just a hit or a high. It’s total body dominance: hard, sharp and thorough.
Ace: Stage 4 sclerosing mediastinal non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma of the large cell type.
Street tag: Cancer of the lymph you’re-fucking-dying glands. And you Can’t Walk Away. Under. Any Circumstances.
(He sings a line from the Bruce Springsteen song ‘I’m on Fire’.)
Some say there’s a bigger rush in losing than there is in winning: Stick ’em up. Your money or your life. Sure. And yet there were times when I was so scared my teeth hurt.
There is a kind of kick-ass arrogance about being a part of the cancer club. You no longer say to women, ‘Haven’t I seen you somewhere before?’ A simple ‘I got cancer’, occasionally followed by ‘baby’, gives you more mileage than a wallet full of cash. It’s a status thing. I mean, whatever your natural standing might have been before you got sick, cancer shoots you to the front of the line. People who made you feel small now seem tiny to your bigness. Therefore, I developed T.C.S. Street tag: The Cancer Swagger. Translated simply as ‘I don’t roll the dice, I AM the dice.’ So during my illness I actually got quite a lot of what I saw as freakish sympathy sex and I’d be lying on my back, in all my bald glory, with some shit hot chick shaking roulette on top of me and thinking: ‘Baby, are you mad!? I look like a fucking alien.’
But I’d wipe myself off and head back to my church where I’m losing and I’m still fucking losing and...
(He sings a line from the Bruce Springsteen song ‘Backstreets’.)
... and I’m losing and I’m losing but then I’m winning and I’m winning and I’m winning and I’m winning and I’m losing, I’m losing, I will not get up from this table, (he hums), I will not get up from this table, (he hums), I will not get up from this table, (he hums), because it feels too good and I can win again, it feels too good, (he hums), I will win again.
And then on a day like any other day it goes silent. The canary stops singing.
And God sits down at my table and smiles at me.
I’m not that surprised; I’ve been praying to him for months now, days, hours, and I never let up.
(He sings a line from the Bruce Springsteen song ‘Brilliant Disguise’.)
So God shows me his teeth ’cause he’s proud of me. And suddenly I’m no longer alone. I stink and I’m hungry and I’m tired and I’m broke but I’m ready to deal again. Always ready to deal again. But when God smiles at me I see he’s got something stuck in his teeth. It’s small and green and nasty. But I’m fascinated. I’m hooked.
I put down my cards, just for a second, and move in close ’cause I got to see what God’s got trapped in this one spot between his canines, and as I get closer I smel
l God’s breath and it’s so sweet, so dark that I want to crawl inside and stay there.
But then I see what it is, caught like a piece of last night’s dinner.
It’s me. That piece of flotsam between God’s teeth is me. And before I can even let out a whimper, God shoots me a card. All right, I say. Let’s play. I turn the card over. Bingo. Alleluia. Oy-fucking-vey.
And while I can’t read the card, which reads like a smear down a window, I know what it means: I am not going to die. Jackpot. Pretty penny. Windfall. The cancer in my lymphs will soon be packing its bags, heading on down the road to torment some other loser.
So for now, I’ve been given the green light to fuck the hell out of gambling as I’m about to wave goodbye to both the cancer and cards and the madness forever. Soon, yeah, real soon.
(He sings three or four lines from the Bruce Springsteen song ‘Badlands’.)
The first time I entered the casino in remission, I missed my sidekick, my non-hodge-lymph. Sure, I was glad it was walking away, though I was colder somehow.
But hey, today it’s still an ace. Deal it. Fuckin’ deal it. Over and over and over till I’m emptied and so absolutely still inside I can’t remember what fruit tastes like, what water feels like on my arms, how quiet and thick the night can be when you just fall easily asleep.
Soon, yeah, real soon.
But no matter how hard I play and stay and pray, God’s never sat down at my table again.
(He looks for a moment at the public, and then exits.)
The end.
APPENDIX 2
Excerpt from Gambling by Tom Holloway, a play devised by me and co-directed by me and Georgina Lamb about my gambling addiction.
It was produced by Eleanor Lloyd and performed at the Soho Theatre in 2010.
I walk along the row of machines until I find the one that feels right.
That’s my ritual.
To find the machine that’s talking to me.
Calling me.
I walk along and then I find it.
It looks like all the others.
It sits there just like all the others.
But this is the one for me today.
Today we will go on a journey together.
Today it is my partner.
I sit down in front of it on the little black stool.
It swivels just right.
Everything feels just right.
I put my money down.
My little cup of money.
I keep my handbag in my lap as I sit down and put my little cup of money down in front of me.
I love the cup of money.
The cup of coins.
Heavy.
I love how heavy it is.
Waiting for me.
A whole cup there just waiting for me.
The machine.
The stool.
The cup.
Everything is ready.
Everything is right.
This is the moment I love.
The screen glows in front of me.
One of the local girls places a complimentary glass of lemonade in front of me.
She smiles at me and gives me my drink and says it’s lovely to see me again.
She uses my first name.
Her.
The machine.
The stool.
The cup.
All of it inviting me.
All of it welcoming me.
This is the moment I love.
This is where it feels good.
I reach in to the cup.
I take out ten coins.
I slide them in to the machine and it comes to life.
Here we go.
You and me.
It talks back.
Sings its little songs.
Invites me to press its buttons.
Inviting me in to its game.
I love the first press of the button.
I feel it…
I feel it deep inside me.
I move my hand up.
Place my finger right on the glowing button and I…
I…
I…
push.
I place just one finger on it and I push and we have begun.
I get small wins.
To begin with.
Five credits.
Seven credits.
It’s teasing me.
I enjoy it.
Just when I’m almost out…
Five more credits.
Ten more credits.
I watch the shapes spin on the screen.
Each time.
Game after game.
Spinning there in front of me.
Sometimes flashing.
Sometimes it sings.
But always spinning.
Every game spinning.
I up the ante.
I’m enjoying this.
I up the bet.
It asks for more money.
I oblige.
It’s teasing me and I’m saying to it, tease me more.
Reel me in.
Do your worst to me.
Push the button.
The images spin.
Push the button.
The images spin.
I hear someone.
Suddenly I hear someone on another machine.
Lights and sounds.
A big win.
Five hundred credits.
I know it just by the sounds of the machine.
Five hundred credits.
They’re working together now, these machines.
Dancing with me.
Toying with me.
And I love it.
Bring it on.
You lead and I’ll follow.
I push the button.
I follow you around the room.
I push the button.
We move with grace and poise.
I push the button.
Lights up.
Your song plays.
One hundred credits.
Showing me I can do it too.
Giving me a little taste of the big win I just heard.
Seeing my cup is almost empty it gives me a nice win to keep my game going.
This dance.
This waltz.
To keep the music playing.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Raz Shaw has been a theatre director for over twenty years and has directed plays all over the world from the South Bank to South Sudan. In 2016 he won Best Director at the UK Theatre Awards for his production of Margaret Edson’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play WIT, about an American professor’s battle with ovarian cancer. Death and the Elephant is his first book.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
So many thanks. A mountain of gratitude.
To Brooke, whose spirit and courage (and brilliant book) inspired me to think about writing a book of my own in the first place.
To my first two readers, Naomi and Lucinda, for their wisdom, encouragement and, at times, fiercely honest notes.
To my ‘sister’ Louise, who was almost literally forced to read my first scribblings in a desperate bid for validation. Over the past three years she must have read the equivalent of a thousand pages. As ever she was wonderfully and (sometimes) painfully candid throughout. Her notes were always on the money. Thanks, Beans. A greater friend no man can have.
To all those others who were press-ganged into reading bits along the way and who gave me the confidence to keep going. You know who you are (aka I am scared to list people in case I miss somebody out!).
To Debbie, who was not only there by my side – cracking bad gags – from the cancer get-go and was (and still is) my rock, but who also gave me the two pieces of writing advice from which everything else followed:
a) Write for at least 30 minutes every day.
b) Don’t get it right, get it written.
To my last reader, Julie Hes, for her endless support, the specificity of her notes and for her never-ending generosity. She’s still annoying,
mind you.
To my developmental editor, Tamsin Shelton, whose detailed brilliance helped give order and structure to a ragbag bunch of words.
To Mathew Clayton, who saw the potential in a random scattergun first draft and urged me to make significant changes whilst at no time making me feel he had lost faith in its potential. Without his backing, his support and insightful notes, this book would never have seen the light of day.
To John Mitchinson, whose force of personality alone gave me the impetus and courage to carry on just at the point when I had begun to doubt all that I was sure of (blatant Springsteen plagiarism right there!).
To Georgia Odd and Jimmy Leach, geniuses of crowdfunding, who dragged me kicking and screaming back onto social media and forced me to discover my inner American.
To DeAndra Lupu for her support, her wisdom, her empathy, her positivity, her sense of humour and her laser-like attention to every single detail. I spotted only one flaw. A blind eye to wonky tally marks. Nobody’s perfect, I guess!
To Philip Connor and the rest of the Unbound family, most of whom I haven’t even met, who have been beavering away tirelessly to make my book become just that. A book.
To Mark Bowsher for his gentle trailer-making magic.
To those who were by my side during the cancer days and are still by my side now. Tort and Tig and Al and Jo and Paul and Gesine and Mouse and Girsha and countless others. Your unwavering friendship and support back then gave me the strength to move forward when moving seemed the least likely option.