Witz

by Joshua Cohen

  Shalom aleichem or something like that, says the Radio City stage manager who’s gladhanding, gelthandling to haggle around too early the next morning and this, when everything’s long been set out and signed…and how’s everything by you?

  Me, it’s like having a heart attack.

  We have an hour left to rehearse, Mada says while ignoring the mensch’s shaking all over to root around for his pocketwatch where, in his pocket—and then the press conference, an hour to rest, shower, and eat; we’re back here for soundcheck at—winding it, noon.

  Interviews throughout the afternoon, at the sponsoring hotel the Midtown One Season, demoted by three thanks to frost.

  Then to Ben, remember, let us do the talking.

  All set?

  Gelt puts a goy on the boxoffice, why not.

  A phalanx of security shall fill the frontrow tonight, retired police and fire will arise to keepsafe the wings. As for the hall without, its lobby’s been hastily whitewashed, overnight, moonlit by unions: a stretch of wall that used to host a vast verdant mural, famous for its artistry forgotten, redone into this pure snowlike swath, obliterating its representation, made to reflect virtuously above the marmoreal floors, polished and shining. The short agitable stage manager spits a mucose hock of morning chaw to the cuspidor at the side of the stagedoor, retreats from his briefing by Mada and Gelt, heading backstage to overlord the Rockettes’ lastminute refittings for long shapeless skirts, modest wigs frayed to frump, setting hems, renegotiating necklines with what he calls upper management that’s probably only his conscience. A rumbling wells, quakes the theater’s vault, diapasonic, shakes draped forms on flutes, flakes goldleaf, rattles mirrorglass foxed in smoke and framed in chrome and cracking: statuesque Eve dropping her marble apple to roll to a doorstop, let in a draft; the sounding not of His stomach, nor that of the grumbling of those waiting out in the weather for their tickets reserved, a kvetch over price, it’s the warmingup of the organ, swelling initially a pillowlike softness, then rising into a dignified pad of a devotional nature, underscoring the fumbling of a handful of His lookalikes, Ben’s bit players, A Pharisee, Sadducee #3…these understudies curtain up and stumbling through staging, which like the streets connecting crosstown and the avenues north and south has been amateurishly blocked, made safe for the public—them klutzy with smashing their irreplaceable props, and persisting, too, in mispronounciating their lines if they don’t just forget them entire.

  A night spent on bed’s edge, rawthroated on the lip of the toilet—Ben bowed to gut up what’d been ordered to be the most settling of catering—after a debut that went, He’ll admit, maybe just an encore short of wellreceived, nu, thank you very much despite; and this despite the encouragement, the kudos, kisses and hugs XO again, VSOP the cartons of cigarettes and the chocolate balloons and the flowers they’d brought Him, that bouquet of bouquets composed only of the flowers to which He’s allergic, He thinks though they’re artificial, silled in every shade known to mortification, disaster: yellow, red, pink, deathwhite, paling petals; the clutch of them Mada, Gelt, Hamm, and Him crowded into His turret atop the Great Hall to wait for the morning editions, the mediated response, the silent radio, imageless teevee, any pitch or delivery, for the earliest word of the cheaping bird; Mada calling downstairs to Garden Control every ten minutes with Gelt, too, listening in on the line from the hallway, after any indication, any news breaking late the already broken. Insecure, maybe, hungry for feedback, thirsty for praise. Under the veil, His face an open book: page Doctor Tweiss, then take cover. As wide as any newspaper spread, the next magazine feature or foldout. His ears “are marks of quotation.” His mouth an indiscretion, if still forgivably young.

  What are they saying, Ben’s asking, like tell me, what Are they saying, as if they’re saying nothing at all…what are They saying, as if to say who are they to say anything to me, what are they Saying, as if to ask they’re saying That and why—you want they should stick to the script, repeat after me…and the answer Mada gives to Him’s what, don’t worry, no cause for alarm, the baseless threat of your fret—always a hundred different if equally ridiculous things, Ben, listen up, what they’re saying, it’s still much too early to tell…then, with efficient, neat hands Hamm straightens His false hair, elasticized, once pasted, bearded over His bite: Ben’s never changed out of costume. They’ve got a thousand different agendas, is what Mada’s saying, all demanding the same thing in a million different ways, Ben, bear with us; the door opens and Gelt comes in cloudy in the face and says, though he doesn’t quite seem to believe it, what it really is, Ben, is an issue of popular response, we’re talking appeal. Wide, cutting across like a knife disemboweling. To hell with the critics, the role of the public’s to criticize them…their responsibility, that’s what they do: our polling, our surveys, demographics, you name it—there are methods, there are ways, Ben, take it from me, we’ve got it under control.

  It’s all in the packaging (Hamm): we’re poring over the research, the data (Mada), samples, testmarkets (Gelt)…that’s what this tour’s about, after all—the Messiah opening in selected wherevers this summer, or this season passing for…but, goes the Garden’s latest questionaire, how do they want their salvation, with hot beverage, maybe, and their choice of dessert; and so there’s optimization, specialization, brandjobs supercustom. A question, another, half of what’d been asked to last session: should Ben conform to them, or them conform to Ben—asked to eighteen different groups of eighteen different adolescents selected at the holy and holying random, railroaded at Times Square, pennedin ten floors up—a focusgroup, with attention operating at deficit. Them giddy excitement and performance anxiety at the prospect of giving any right answer at their individual rolltop desks in this space luxurious with panes formerly used as a screen studio lit over the foot traffic and growing pools of manure; quills in hand, ink welling, the surveyed stare at parchment scraps; asked their names, ages, purchasing habits, the usual blah and then

  Q. A Messiah should be ____:

  A.) Male

  B.) Female

  C.) All of the Above

  D.) None of the Above

  E.) All & None of the Above

  (Circle One)

  Q. A Messiah should look ____:

  A.) Good

  B.) Eh

  C.) Feh

  D.) Down upon us all

  (Circle One)

  Q. Match the following words with their definitions, and then use one in a sentence:

  1. Kvetch

  A. To take pride in pathy.

  2. Kvell

  B. Me

  3. Mitzvah

  C. To bitch, complain, or whine

  4. Goy

  D. A good deed, or, better—commandment

  Sentence:

  I am a goy.

  Fun Fillins:

  My mother is a

  ______.

  Your mother is a

  ______ ______.

  I hope you

  ______ ______ ______.

  On a scale of one to five, one to a thousand and a millionfigured unto innominate more please rate your satisfaction with the salvation of your soul in the fields preparest the green pastures provided, then list in the space designated nowhere what your Savior’s name should be, ideally: Benjamin Israelien, how does that sound, strike you closefisted, the beaten goat drum of the ear; those seven sialogogic syllables—the tongue to the roof of the mouth on the assenting Ja of the vorname, how’s that feel, a good tolling roll: Benjamin—or so they’re informed, who to confirm or deny—from the Hebrew Binyamin, meaning A son of the right, or Of the tribal south, alternately, wandering, the kingdom of them and of Judah, there’s no time to get into that now; though others hold it to be a corruption of A son of days, born to His father Jacob’s old age, Israel’s, Him like the first Benjamin, a Ben-oni, A son born of sorrow, of pain, or according to such an authority as the Rambam Of mourning—no relation to the tour’s opener, shortlived, the Amazing Benoni, a fleacircus
veteran who had to pull out of his contract when the union impounded his wand for you don’t want to know what; his opening patter: Ram-bam, thank-you-ma’am, I’m just saying…

  How about “Ben,” then, they ask the daily assembled: or is that too familiar, sounds too much like a kid, a household pet that died once? Whatever comes to your mind, first thought best, no thought at all. How about Benny, or is that much too familiar? Or Bennie? Schlemielsounding, maybe, loserish—like a goy who’s owed you money for moons, who’d trust in a Savior named that, all wrong.

  Because the whole packaging thing’s about as dead as dead, and Gelt knows from what he’s talking—or only acts the part—done with his pacing around Ben’s towered room he’s just standing by a window like sitting down’s bad for his image. Nowadays, he says, it’s interface we’re dealing with, no options save those supplied by dream, information so instant it becomes knowledge, raw access, then faith, the here and now, am I making sense: give them what They want, They suddenly want it. BetaBen. Abrasurprise. Instantly transferable, remoldable, no, forget the mold, authenticity’s what it’s about, verisimilitude…and then the magic, the ability to fashion from pure idea, or from nothing at all, golem, am I right, Ben, am I right—anyone want to pucker on a moustache, I’ll get the boss. At any rate, and they’re so high lately (you know what I’m paying in property taxes alone? scrawls one of the respondents in the space left wilderness wasted, labeled Comments & Complaints—on what my wife calls our beach house and it’s not even on the beach, it’s in Gainesville?), adaptability’s the thing, evolution. To be protean. Choice. Any change. The mundane scratched out in itch, a rash erasure copied from the person desked one over, to either side, a bubble snub of the unsharpened tip. On a scale of one to infinity, rate how much you’d fork over to be saved in the space provided by your nonexistence, the void. All spoonfed, except exactly what to copy, what to write if not just to crumple, snowball let it rip—to tear out the eyes with the tongue; to tap the temple with pencils, which are sidelocks dipped in ink—what to answer, then, having an inkling or lead that the best answer’s only a question in return. Most correct.

  The tagline’s BEN: BELIEVE (they’ve spent a hundred grand on that alone, in cigartongued copywriters, tricolor billboards, airwave campaigns on the hour), and it flits through the mind, in one ear never out the other, stuck in the middle as if a malignant lump, to further dull the gray to submission. Why, because one day the world will end, and you’ll need Him, says taskmaster of ceremonies John Johannine, a tall, straight, imperturbable corpse or undertakermaterial he’s bald with strong jaws, whom you might remember from such programming as—announcing an overly processed approximation of divinity into the microphone, his chazzano profundo echoing specially effected with much reverb superadded to age the voice deep into the gaping mouth of the miraculous past, to fill with its bass and one true faith conviction Madison Square Garden, at capacity crowded two to a seat then ten across the aisles soldout. He’s introducing Ben cued off the cards a nubile intern holds aloft in the interest of career advancement. There’ll be others, Johannine stalling, stretching, raising the pitch as Ben Himself rises: slowly up from below the stage on a horned altartype platform pistoned amid the hiss of whitedry ice, flashpot pop, and the dazzle of strobes…others upon others, smothers schmothering forever, Johannine contorted breathless to a grimace as if he’s had one too many whiffs of the sour breath of his own business, but know this: they’re only pretenders to thrones, intoning impostors, the fakiry fake; don’t be fooled, don’t be led astray sheepish, there’s only one, there’s only one Him…who else are you going to turn to when the going gets tough, he gets the nod from Mada in the wings:

  Abas & Imas, applause, allages kinder, I give you—Benjamin Israelien. Violins verklempt in unison. Just lunaticker as His head peeks over the stage then above the audience as if a heavenly what, not a sun, not a moonstar, just a—thing, outlined round and piffpuffily inflated, even if only shadowed from behind an illuminated screen, an exteriorized veil, this stark antependium. Good evening, New York. God Bless You, New York, and God Bless the United States of Affiliation, gevalt. And throughout all this intro—a drumroll, please, the house lights dimming down; brass roaring up, a throb of late German Romanticism; its seven trumpet fanfare executed by a snatch of Local 802 Satchmos, uniformed in smoky tuxes and tented satin yarmulkes kinked to hold, numblipped, shakyfingered on the valves. A screen, it’s smoked over our eyes…it’s been said: the screen is the eye of God and we are all looking upon Him and seeing only us, then soon listening and hearing us, too, our last reassuring murmur, roundly smattered applause—it’s a movie, a moving walkie talkie. An explosion, and can’t you almost feel it how loud and how huge. Rapidly cut scenes of the holy insaned, sootrobed forms in mad escape from the falling height of skyscrapers, flame and ash and the swandive of window glass, the whirr of sirens surmounting the whiz of fighter aeroplanes above; firefighters below, cradling newborns suckling thumbs, swaddled saved in the folds of the new twotone flag (black & white or blue & white, it’s both the same without color; He can’t be sure of anything; it’s dark, it’s the veil), a standard being raised everywhere lately, in this stadium, above this lesser Garden. Hatikvah’s sounded in a new arrangement, solemnly heavy on the schmaltz. An anthem without a country to call its tune, saccharine and slow. That’s the Q. for the pan out. It all pans out in the end, nu—to shatter the fourth wall, which is the brick blindfold tied over the eyes and ears of the audience, the veil of our own disbelief…as a knighted actor, Sir what’s his face, was also in what’s its name, with her you know the one I’m talking the redhead and, between me and you now doing hackwork, nude mostly and with outlandish accents for free money the whore the prostitutka, her exhusband’s exboyfriend playing Israel Israelien doneup in a doublebreasted beige suit with undone silk tie patterned with the two stripes and a star straight off the rack of the last casualwear warehouse left in the Empire State, he’s staring hard summoning his method, descending into the depths of his own loss, divorce, disappointment, addictions Rx, why, and zee to gaze forlornly into the void of his son’s, his only son’s bedroom and

  Take 1…ACTION!

  I am your father.

  Cut.

  Take 2

  I am your—

  Cut.

  Take 3

  I am—

  Cut.

  Take 4

  I am your fat—almost had it that time…

  Cut.

  Take 5

  I—

  Cut.

  Take 6

  Cut.

  Take 7

  And cut! megaphones Schlomo “Slo-Mo” Spielgrob, a director touted as The Next Schlomo Spielgrob, even though he’s the one and only—recently rehabilitated enough to be making movies under such an assumed name—he sits down in his foldup chair, strokes his oneday, halfmooned beard, pokes his fingers anxiously through his glasses without lens, then takes from his head that bent brim Yankels or maybe it’s the Metz cap a popular model with the sidelocks attached, stuffs it on the bell of the megaphone he sets atop a cooler between seated Ben and Johannine—His hired and handgreased mouthpiece, His spokesperson recontextualized to spokesmensch, a misrepresentation of public face this graceless humbly mumbly, alldenying interpreter and press secretary, this shuffler of jobs, positions, titles and sheafs of chaff, former Chief of Staff to President Shade, whom you might remember as Ben’s future father-inlaw, here played by a respectably graying, growlingly jowled paunch of an actor whose name might’ve been Oscar itself, who’d done the president in ten previous projects. Ben desultory in His own chair foldedout, its sixpointed star decal peeling from the backing, He’s gnawing at the lip of His foamcup, complimentary with its water or what He’s shvitzed under the studiolights; His script wilting on Johannine’s knees as the latter with quickdraw of the wrist passes highlighter through the lines, for any they want to censor, delete. Security twitchy at their holsters, which are empty when not loaded down with
props. A cast of hundreds shivering, coming down with a light fever’s headcold, incipient flu, from yesterday’s hours spent in summery shorts and themed tshirts out on a forlorn frozen stretch of Brooklyn beach, Seagate, was it, the board-walk’s breakdown that’s standing in for Joysey. He walks on water, He steps in dreck. He turns water to spoiled wine, fish into moldy loaves. Around, a mustering of extras for the next scene set earlier, thousands of them and their years bundledup in garb, into centurial gabardine, silken caftans topped with pointy turbans trimmed brilliantly in fur as if in the religious return of the sumptuary and its lex as yellow as fear; others who only look and sound and dress and act like them, or as they were, or as they’re being cast and played, except they’re not getting paid (though neither were the dead)…