The Tale of the Allergist's Wife and Other Plays
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My plays up to this point had been strictly comic melodramas. As a student of nineteenth-century boulevard theatre and Hollywood film, I was intrigued that a contemporary audience could be swayed by the same melodramatic plot conventions that had slayed ‘em in the balcony in days gone by—if they were leavened by parody and knowing laughter. In Red Scare on Sunset, I thought it would be interesting if the two leading characters we were led to root for—the lovable heroine and her wacky best friend—spouted ideologies reprehensible to our modern sensibility. I thought that would be a fascinating moral challenge to the audience. In writing a play about Hollywood during the McCarthy era, it seemed to me, the obvious story would be about a sympathetic leftist who is hounded out of his career. I thought it would be more outrageous to write the play as a mad right-wing nightmare. A very conservative movie actress discovers to her dismay that everyone in her circle is involved in a communist conspiracy to destroy the Hollywood star system. In this reversal of melodramatic convention, it is the lovely heroine who sanctimoniously “names names,” who is revealed at the end to be the true horror.
The play dealt with the American fear of self-reflection, the fact that anyone who challenges the clichés of our Hollywood-inspired white-picket-fence fantasies is considered foreign, subversive, and dangerous. However liberal my own sympathies were, I thought it was important to show that radical extremists of both sides share ideological similarities—i.e., a fear of homosexuality, and the desire to deny the other side its freedom of speech. It required a well-developed sense of irony to traverse the morally askew territory of the play. I was taken by surprise at the number of critics and audience members who jumped to the odd conclusion that if I, the playwright, was playing a woman who “names names,” somehow that implied that I was personally advocating blacklisting. It amazed me that anyone would take at face value what was, to me, clearly a satiric attack on radical conservatism.
By 1991, I felt that in writing play after play for myself in drag and for the same ensemble of actors, I was imposing too many limitations on myself as both writer and actor. I embarked on a decade of experimentation. I tried my hand at the novel, cabaret, musical revues, journalism, acting in other writers’ plays, writing myself a noncomedic drag role, and, my God, even writing myself a male role. Some of these experiments were more successful than others, but it was all a journey to discover what I did best and what I enjoyed most. It wasn’t difficult for me to see that my search for an artistic identity mirrored the quests for reinvention pursued by the heroines I played on the stage.
The protagonists of all of my plays are women who, in their struggle to find a place in the world, create a new persona that enables them to navigate life’s rough waters. Eventually, they feel a terrible conflict between the false self and the girl they once were, and out of that conflict they emerge a stronger person. I never intend to tell that story, but it’s always there: whether it’s a virgin who evolves into a glamorous vampire, a teenage girl who requires a virago-like alter ego to feel complete, a honky-tonk piano player who streamlines herself into an elegant concert virtuoso, or an Indiana farm girl who becomes a popular movie star. I am my heroines. The Limbo Lounge transformed a skinny, confused performance artist into a parody grande dame of the theatre.
One of my projects in the nineties was writing the libretto to a musical entitled The Green Heart. The show, produced by Manhattan Theatre Club, wasn’t terribly well received, but I established a wonderful rapport with Lynne Meadow, the artistic director of MTC. On opening night, when the reviews were less than stellar, she told me that she’d love Manhattan Theatre Club to be my artistic home and that she would produce and direct my next play. I was extremely touched by her gesture of faith.
Well, here we go again, I thought. I had no play to hand to her. Just as I had written Vampire Lesbians of Sodom for the Limbo Lounge, I set about writing a play for Manhattan Theatre Club. I wasn’t starting from scratch. A few years before, I had performed a solo show called Flipping My Wig. One of the pieces in it was a six-minute monologue of a woman named Miriam Passman. Mrs. Passman was an emotionally intense Upper West Side matron who releases her long-pent-up creativity by performing a musical tribute to Edith Piaf at a Greenwich Village cabaret. That monologue was one of the few times I had tapped into the satirically-rich Suburban New York Jewish milieu that I’d grown up in. That lady was as much in my bones as my most arch movie-inspired heroines. For a long time, I’d wanted to write a play built around that bitterly raging character, but it was difficult coming up with a plot that didn’t read like a TV sitcom episode. Spurred by Lynne Meadow’s offer, I wondered what would happen if I placed Miriam (renamed Marjorie Taub) in a theatrical genre at odds with her manic New York attitudes. What if I flung her and her allergist husband into the middle of a very cryptic, enigmatic Pinter or Albee play? That concept forced me to take these comic urban characters onto foreign turf, which liberated my imagination and formed the essence of The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife.
Marjorie suffers from the same feelings of dissatisfaction as my other heroines. However, this being a more naturalistic play, she doesn’t abandon her family to become the world’s most glamorous philosopher. She remains in her Riverside Drive apartment, raging in impotent frustration. Her only transformations lie in her frustrated fantasies. The character of her childhood friend Lee Green, née Lillian Greenblatt, bears a resemblance to my earlier ladies. A refugee from Bronx River Road, Lee has reinvented herself as a globe-trotting free spirit. I can’t escape it.
The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife was the first play of mine that wasn’t a vehicle for me to perform in. That was never an option. One of my strengths as a performer is to play a female character with, one hopes, a psychological truth, but at the same time to add a layer that comments on the history of star acting. I find it an easy balancing act to play an emotionally honest scene while throwing in a dash of Susan Hayward’s Brooklyn-inflected standard stage speech for satiric spice. The role of Marjorie Taub required none of that theatrical distancing. Though outrageously self-dramatizing, Marjorie has to be played for total reality. Early in the play’s gestation, I went to see the play Death Defying Acts. I had long admired its star, Linda Lavin, but seeing her once more, I realized that she was the perfect actress to play Marjorie. I couldn’t get her voice out of my head, and began to write every line for her. An important part of my life has been the worship of actresses, and I wanted the challenge of writing a very rich role for a great actress. It’s difficult for me to express the thrill of hearing Linda read the role of Marjorie for the first time. Everything I hoped she’d be was there. I’ve relived that excitement at every performance of The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife that I’ve seen her play.
Lynne Meadow’s beautiful production of The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife received glowing notices and prompted a Broadway transfer. Though it was pouring rain the first day the marquee went up at the Barrymore Theatre, nothing could have stopped me from gazing at it from every angle. The honky-tonk drag queen was now reinvented as a Broadway playwright. My overnight legitimacy was exciting, but like my self-created heroines, this new identity left me confused. It disturbed me when so many people kept telling me, “You must be so thrilled to finally be mainstream.” I became very defensive and quipped, ad nauseam, “I always thought I was mainstream. I haven’t performed in a bar for fifteen years. I don’t think my audience has been composed of pinheads and carny folk.” It bugged me that I was so prickly. Why couldn’t I just shut up and be grateful? Was embracing the importance of being “mainstream” tantamount to a put-down of the work I’d done for the past twenty years? In truth, I didn’t think my other plays were so on-the-fringe. Most of them had been commissioned by respected nonprofit theatres and transferred to commercial runs. They’ve been performed in theatres and colleges coast to coast. Is it that drag and plays deemed camp parody are never considered “mainstream,” no matter how genteel their pedigree? Please forgive the chip on my shoulder. The first four
plays in this volume have great emotional resonance for me and they represent collaborations that I found extraordinarily fruitful.
In my ongoing artistic trek, I envision a career where I can continue to grow as a writer and actor. To expand my horizons as a playwright will necessitate my writing plays that won’t have to take into account the limitations of a very demanding drag actress. However, I’m still as hopelessly stagestruck as ever, and that means that the “actress” will continue to prosper.
Whenever she feels the great ache for a comeback, no doubt she will be provided with a vehicle perfectly suited to her peculiar charms. After all, she’s sleeping with the playwright.
Charles Busch
New York City
September 2000
VAMPIRE LESBIANS OF SODOM
Charles Busch in Vampire Lesbians of Sodom, Tokyo, 1990. Photo Credit: T. L. Boston.
THE CAST
Vampire Lesbians of Sodom was originally produced at the Limbo Lounge in New York City in 1984. It moved to the Provincetown Playhouse, New York City, on June 19, 1985, and was produced by Kenneth Elliott and Gerald A. Davis. Directed by Kenneth Elliot, with set design by B. T. Whitehill; costumes, John Glaser; lighting, Vivien Leone; production stage manager and hair design, Elizabeth Katherine Carr; and choreography, Jeff Veazey, it was performed with the following cast, in order of appearance:
THE CHARACTERS
SYNOPSIS OF SCENES
Scene 1: Sodom, in days of old. The entrance to a forbidding cave.
Scene 2: Hollywood, 1920. La Condesa’s mansion.
Scene 3: Las Vegas today. A rehearsal hall.
VAMPIRE LESBIANS OF SODOM
PROLOGUE
Sodom in days of old. Two muscular, handsome GUARDS are standing sentry before the entrance to a forbidding cave.
ALI Who goes there?
HUJAR You needn’t fear, Ali. No one ventures near this spot save for madmen and fools.
ALI Including you and me.
HUJAR Yes, but we are clever fools. For our deed today, we shall receive a kingly sum.
ALI If we live to spend it.
HUJAR The creature we guard desires nothing of the likes of you. The Succubus thrives upon the blood of young virgins.
ALI A rare delicacy, eh?
HUJAR You must be new to these parts. Where do your people hail from?
ALI I hail from Ishbar, in Asia Minor. You know, the fertile crescent.
HUJAR So what brings you to Sodom?
ALI Don’t scoff, but I’ve come to seek my fortune.
HUJAR Then my friend, you’ve made a wise move. This city has everything. It never sleeps. Have you been to the bars?
ALI No, I’m living out in Gomorrah.
HUJAR Gomorrah?
ALI Hujar, I don’t want to offend you but I’m really not into bars. I’m looking for a relationship.
HUJAR Then my man, you shouldn’t have moved to the twin cities.
A cock crows.
HUJAR The cock has crowed. It’s time to begin. The Succubus demands its breakfast.
ALI Have you ever seen the Succubus?
HUJAR No one has, except for the virgin sacrifice and obviously, they never live to tell. We had best begin. The sleeping potion will wear off; the virgin will awake and we’ll have a lot of explaining to do. You wait here, I’ll bring her in.
He exits. Hujar returns carrying in his arms the beautiful young VIRGIN.
HUJAR Quite a beauty, isn’t she? A pity she is to be sacrificed.
ALI Hujar, she stirs.
HUJAR That cannot be. The potion should last an hour more. Damn the Gods, let’s get out of here. (The girl begins to wake in his arms.)
GIRL No, Papa, I don’t want to play. Please, don’t make me. (She awakes.) Where am I? Who are you? Please sir, release me.
He puts her on her feet. The virgin is indeed beautjful but there is something about her costume and demeanor that suggests a stripper performing a burlesque sketch about vestal virgins. It could be the G-string and spike heels.
HUJAR We are soldiers under the command of the Governor.
GIRL My mind is such a jumble. I had such a strange dream. I dreamt there was a lottery to choose a sacrificial victim for the dreaded Succubus and I dreamed that I chose the black stone of death. You know, they say our dreams can be interpreted. They can tell us many things about ourselves. I wonder what this dream means.
HUJAR That was no dream, that was the truth. You are the virgin sacrifice.
GIRL (Thinks they’re joking.) You couldn’t be . . . but surely you . . . no, I . . . I couldn’t . . . It’s imposs . . . (She realizes it’s true and screams.)
HUJAR (Grabs her around the neck.) Another peep out of you and we’ll rip your tongue out.
ALI Hujar, be kind to the girl. These are her last moments on earth.
HUJAR And they shall be ours if her screams bring forth the Succubus.
Ali breaks Hujar’s arm away.
GIRL Please sir, I beg of you. If there is any shred of pity or tenderness in your heart. Please, do not deliver me to the Succubus.
HUJAR We only follow our orders.
GIRL (To Ali.) You, you have the eyes of a poet. Surely you cannot see it just to send me to this most horrible of deaths.
ALI I wish there was something I could do.
HUJAR Soldier, control yourself. You are acting weak and womanish.
GIRL If having a kind heart is womanish, be proud of your womanhood. I implore you, sir, save me. My father has money. Aid my escape and all of his gold shall be yours.
HUJAR Child, you have been forsaken. Your father has publicly announced his pride in your selection as food for the Goddess.
GIRL I refuse to believe this.
ALI It’s true. We have his sworn testimonial of acceptance.
GIRL Then it is true. I am truly alone. A mere child of fourteen. Friendless, parentless, damned to this most vile fate. Tell me, my good executioners, how much time do I have?
HUJAR But a few minutes more.
GIRL Then permit me a moment whilst I bid farewell to my girlhood. (In a reverie.) Goodbye youth. Adieu bubbling brook of joy, rosy hope of budding romance. I bid farewell to the frothy games of catching a whippoorwill and skipping to it’s tune, lightning bugs parading their brilliance before the first evening stars. I wave goodbye to the beardless boys who breathlessly snatched a forbidden kiss and the silly girls who giggled at my follies. Goodbye dear friends. Farewell round orb.
ALI Is there nothing Ican do to ease your pain?
GIRL Yes, there is something you could do. Break my hymen. Rape me and I’ll no longer be a virgin fit for sacrifice.
ALI But, I . . .
The girl rips off Ali’s loincloth and chases him around screaming “Break my hymen, break my hymen!” Hujar pushes her to the ground.
HUJAR The child is mad. Away!
The two soldiers exit.
GIRL I beseech thee Isis, provide me with the courage to face my destruction.
The SUCCUBUS enters in the form of a beautiful and very hardboiled dame. She is by turns very grand and also a bit cheap but most importantly, she has a very big chip on her shoulder.
GIRL Run! Save yourself! The creature is about to emerge.
SUCCUBUS (Irritated.) Hey, hey, hey! Where are you going?
GIRL Woman, have you lost your senses?
SUCCUBUS Not that I’m aware of.
GIRL Who are you?
SUCCUBUS Give a guess.
GIRL An actress?
SUCCUBUS Guess again.
GIRL Are you a trollop?
SUCCUBUS I suppose you’ve never met a myth before.
GIRL (Innocently.) No. What can I do for you, myth?
SUCCUBUS Behold my magnificence, for I am the dreaded Succubus!
GIRL How can pure evil be embodied by such beauty?
SUCCUBUS How much easier to lure you into my arms. Come, child.
GIRL Vile thing, what right have you to demand my death?
GIRL What proof have you of my maidenhead? What if I told you I was the village slut, a repository for every man’s seed in Sodom?
SUCCUBUS I’d say you were a big fat liar. Now get in that cave. I’m freezing my ass off in this draft.
GIRL I’m afraid to die.
SUCCUBUS (With great self pity.) That’s nothing to be afraid of. Think how much crueler my fate, never to die, condemned to immortality. The perennial witness to the eternal passing parade. My cave is quite the lonely one.
GIRL Forgive me if I don’t weep.
SUCCUBUS A spitfire, eh. But why should you pity me? I’m a goddess. You look around and see the glamorous way I live. My slaves, my riches, my dishware. But try throwing a dinner party for two pinheads and a cyclops. True, I have caskets full of sparkling jewels but where the fuck can I wear them. My life stinks. The only enjoyment I get is a vestal virgin now and then but time goes on and I survive. And how, how you may wonder do I face the prospect of a millenium of time on my hands? What keeps me going is a sense of humor. I giggle, I chuckle, I even guffaw but inside I weep. It’s the age old story, laugh, Succubus, laugh.
GIRL (Sarcastically.) If you’re so unhappy, why don’t you leave Sodom?
SUCCUBUS And go where, pray tell, get married, have a couple of kids, turn my cave into a split level? The Gods owe me an answer. Deliver me an answer! I demand an answer!
GIRL Counseling. Seek good counsel from the High Priest and then hie thee hither, you bloodsucking old bag!
SUCCUBUS Child, I must say I am impressed by your fortitude. If you were a fellow Succubus, I might even be afraid of you. But you are not. You will look into my eyes and all thought of defiance shall vanish. Look into my eyes. Look into my eyes. Look into my eyes!
The girl is hypnotized by the Succubus.
SUCCUBUS You will come to me now. (Very imperiously and most unseductively.) Seek out my warmth. Suckle at my breast.