Four Plays Read online

  CHAP: (Sings.) ‘I’m a Yankee Doodle Dandy…’

  GIRL: There he goes again.

  CHAP: ‘A Yankee Doodle do or die…’

  (ALL join in.)

  ‘A real live nephew of my Uncle Sam,

  Born on the fourth of July!’

  (During this, the Stars and Stripes flutter on the projection screen.)

  INTERRUPTER: Cheap!

  BOX MAN: Mocking the poor bloody American flag now.

  CHAP: We can mock the British one if you prefer.

  CHAIRMAN: No, I don’t think we do, do we?

  INTERRUPTER: No, we don’t.

  BOX MAN: What about a SONG?

  (The stage lights dim, a frozen waste appears on the projection

  screen to the lone soprano sound from Vaughan Williams’

  ‘Symphonia Antarctica’.)

  I don’t mean that sort of highbrow stuff.

  INTERRUPTER: You don’t call that highbrow, do you?

  CHAIRMAN: No. Very middlebrow I’m afraid. (To the CHAP.) Ask the Stage Management, will you?

  (Projection and music stops)

  CHAIRMAN: Right, let’s sing him a song then.

  (They all line up and sing the following to the tune of ‘Widdicombe Fair’.)

  ALL: Harold Pinter, Harold Pinter,

  Lend me your grey mare,

  All along, down along, out along lea,

  For I want to go to

  Printing House Square,

  With Arnold Wesker,

  David Storey,

  Edward Albee,

  Must get in an American,

  Charles Wood,

  Charlie Farnsbarns,

  Christopher Hampton,

  Sammy Beckett,

  Sammy Someone,

  Edna O’Brien,

  Because she’s a Woman,

  And we’re in enough trouble already,

  Old Uncle Sammy Beckett and all,

  And old Sammy Beckett and all.

  (Repeat verse to a dance.)

  CHAP: Well, now I’m going for a slash.

  CHAIRMAN: And I’m going for a drink.

  OLDER LADY: Is this the interval?

  GIRL: The interval? You must be joking!

  GRANDFATHER: Oh, can we go now?

  CHAIRMAN: Everyone’s free to do as they wish.

  (On the projection screen, there is a picture of the Trooping of the Colour. The men all stand up. Very brief, this.)

  (To the audience) That wasn’t actually meant to be disrespectful.

  BOX MAN: Ha ha di-bloody ha ha! Where’s the bar?

  GIRL: By the men’s loo, you drunken oaf.

  INTERRUPTER: Take it off!

  CAST: (To the INTERRUPTER) You take yourself off. (They all turn and dance off to the tune of ‘The Laughing Samba’. As the auditorium lights come up, the CHAIRMAN returns and starts to turn the handle of the barrel organ which plays Roll out the Barrel’. He then signals to the prompt corner. The STAGE MANAGER appears to take over the handle, the CHAIRMAN looks at his watch and saunters off After a few moments, the STAGE MANGER, clearly bored by the barrel organ, stops turning it, and goes off as well)

  End of Act One.

  ACT TWO

  As the audience returns, if indeed it does return, the house lights are up and an extremely loud Pop Group is blaring out over the hudspeakers, against the Pop Group’s still photograph on the projection screen. On stage, the STAGE MANAGEMENT and STAGE HANDS and so on are dancing, some in an offhand and some in a rather demented manner. After a while, and the STAGEMANAGER will have to decide on this, when what is left of the house has got back in, some of them will look at their watches and start to wander off the stage.

  The BOX MAN does his usual entrance, clutching a crate of brown ale, one bottle of which he is tippling. He smiles cheerily round at the audience, standing up and waving at them.

  BOX MAN: This sounds a bit more like it! I came here to be entertained, I don’t know about you.

  INTERRUPTER: (Settling into his seat.) So did I. Doesn’t seem very likely now. That Box Office Manager was quite insulting.

  BOX MAN: Dead right, sonny boy! So he was to me. Right gaffer’s man you’ve got in there. Boss’s man. (Shouting at the stage.) Well, get on with it! (Down to the INTERRUPTER.)

  I complained about the toilet.

  INTERRUPTER: Good… I’ve got a tube to catch.

  BOX MAN: Never you mind, sonny boy. If it doesn’t buck up a bit, we’ll all have a few jars and a general piss up. (He smiles broadly around him.) Okay? (He starts to sing.)

  Why are we waiting,

  Why are we waiting…

  INTERRUPTER: (Joining in.) Why are we waiting,

  Oh why, oh why…

  (The STA GEMANA GER appears.)

  STAGE MANAGER: That won’t get you very far, you know.

  BOX MAN: It won’t get you any bloody far either, if you’re not careful. Just get on with it. They burn down places like this, you know.

  INTERRUPTER: Oh, I don’t believe in violence. But I don’t see why one should sit and be insulted. Quiet protest is quite sufficient.

  STAGE MANAGER: All right. Start Dim.

  (He goes off, and the house lights do indeed start to dim as the FATHER enters and sits down at the piano. He starts p faying and sings a snatch of ‘On The Isle Of Capri’. He then sings ‘In A Little Gypsy Tea-Room’ as his son, the CHAP, enters. They sing together.)

  FATHER/CHAP: ‘In a little gypsy tearoom,

  You stole my heart away,

  It was in a little gypsy tearoom,

  I fell in love one day…’

  (The GIRL enters.)

  GIRL: And he’s such a thumping cad…

  (The CHAP sings to his FATHER‘S accompaniment, addressing

  himself to the GIRL.)

  CHAP: ‘I am only a strolling vagabond,

  So good night, pretty maiden, good night,

  I am off to the hills and the valleys beyond,

  Good night…’

  INTERRUPTER: Joan Littlewood did this years ago.

  CHAP: ‘Good night…’

  GIRL: (To the INTERRUPTER.) Piss off.

  BOX MAN: Yes, give the boy a chance.

  CHAP: ‘So good night, pretty maiden, good night. I come from the hills,

  And the valleys beyond,

  So good night, pretty maiden, good night.’

  GIRL: All right. That’ll do. (To the BOX MAN) He’s no boy.

  BOX MAN: I want to see Val Doonican.

  CHAP: And the Black and White Minstrels.

  GIRL: Oh, he’ll black up for you if you like.

  INTERRUPTER: I like something entertaining, but that leaves you with something to think about afterwards.

  GIRL: Well, forget it.

  (During this exchange, the CHAIRMAN enters and starts to sing, again to the FATHER‘S accompaniment.)

  CHAIRMAN:, Oh, my love is like a red, red rose…’ (To the audience) Join in all you old folks – we still need your money while you’re here –

  GIRL: Oh, my God! His love!

  CHAIRMAN: That’s newly sprung in June…’ (To the audience) And all you youngsters too, even if you can’t remember the words. You’ll be with us a bit longer if you’re lucky.

  BOX MAN: We don’t want any of that modern rubbish.

  GRANDFATHER: ‘Everyone suddenly burst out singing…’

  CHAIRMAN: ‘Oh, my love is like the melody That’s sweetly played in tune…’

  (To the GIRL) I do hope you’re not going to be cheap and obvious about the Scots.

  GIRL: I couldn’t he bothered, actually.

  (She immediately dances to a number by the Supremes with

  the CHAP. This lasts as long as it will seem to hold.)

  (To the CHAP) You’re not very good, are you?

  CHAP: No…

  (Once again, while this has been going on, the GRANDFATHER has entered and sat down on his chair. There is a silence, or if there isn’t a silence, the actors will have to im
provise. However, when the next stage is reached, the GRANDFATHER rises slowly and also sings)

  GRANDFATHER: ‘Rock of ages cleft for me, Let me hide myself in thee,’ (etc)

  CHAP: Very good.

  GIRL: Of course he’s good.

  INTERRUPTER: ‘Ancient and Modern’ now, is it?

  BOX MAN: Sounds bloody ancient to me. Who wants a brown ale?

  CHAIRMAN: (To the BOX MAN.) I shouldn’t overplay it too much.

  BOX MAN: Don’t you get grotty with me! She’s dead right. (Pointing at the GIRL) You’re just a moaning old posh-voiced pouf.

  (The OLDER LADY enters)

  Come on, darling, sing us a song, or show us your knickers.

  OLDER LADY: I will if you like.

  CHAIRMAN: (To the OLDER LADY.) What are you going to do?

  FATHER: I know.

  (He starts to sing as he plays the piano a fair pastiche of Jack Buchanan.)

  ‘Good night, Vienna,

  You golden city of a thousand dreams…’

  (As he plays and sings, the OLDER LADY and the GRANDFATHER execute a very dashing tango together. The BOX MAN applauds at the end of it)

  INTERRUPTER: God, how sentimental!

  BOX MAN: Give the old bag a break, or I’ll come down and give you a right duffing up.

  OLDER LADY: (To the BOX MAN.) Thank you very much. (The FATHER does his introduction to ‘If You were The Only Girl In The World’and the OLDER LADY sings to the audience)

  Tf I were the only girl in the world,’

  GRANDFATHER: (Rising.) And I was the only boy,’

  CHAP: (Also rising and singing.) ‘Nothing else would matter in the world today,’

  GIRL: (Rising and singing and taking the CHAP’s hand.) ‘We would go on loving in the same old way’

  OLDER LADY/GRANDFATHER/CHAP/GIRL: (All join hands and sing the rest of the chorus)

  …’If you were the only girl in the world

  And I was the only boy.’

  INTERRUPTER: Oh God, I can’t stand any more of this.

  BOX MAN: Bloody good.

  (The CHAIRMAN lifts his eyes to heaven or at least somewhere above his usual line of vision and addresses the INTERRUPTER)

  CHAIRMAN: I think I really do have to agree with you this time.

  INTERRUPTER: And so you should. (He gets up and goes out)

  BOX MAN: Piss off!

  GIRL: (To the BOX MAN.) Thank you, sir, she said.

  BOX MAN: You know what you need.

  GIRL: Yes, you told us all that before.

  CHAIRMAN: Does anyone remember where we were?

  GIRL: You must be mad.

  (The BOX MAN rises and sings.)

  BOX MAN: Oh, he’s football crazy, He’s football mad,

  Since he joined the local football club…’

  CHAIRMAN: I know – ‘He’s lost the wee bit of sense he had.’

  GIRL: If I were a man, my balls would hurt.

  CHAP: Well, thank God you’re not.

  CHAIRMAN: Anyway, it’s ‘footba’ crazy’, not ‘football’. Anyone can see you ‘re not a Scot.

  BOXMAN: Show us your kilt! What’s your tartan, then? The Macpouves I suppose.

  CHAIRMAN: (Wearily.) I had an idea you were going to say that.

  GIRL: We all had an idea he was going to say that.

  CHAIRMAN: Yes, now this Chap was going to tell us about his life.

  GIRL: That’s what we’re all afraid of.

  CHAIRMAN: So, old um –

  GIRL: Chap.

  CHAIRMAN: I think the floor is what they call ‘yours’.

  BOXMAN: Give him a big hand! He’s only just started. You never know. You might see him on the telly one day. GIRL: Best place for him. CHAIRMAN: Hear, hear.

  (The CHAP goes over to his FATHER at the piano and puts his arm round his shoulders)

  CHAP: You needn’t sit there all the time, you know.

  FATHER: No, it’s all right, I quite like sitting here.

  GIRL: You’ve already said he’s dead anyway.

  GRANDFATHER: Missed the twentieth century. I didn’t…

  OLDER LADY: No, neither did I. I’m rather glad, aren’t you?

  CHAP: No.

  BOX MAN: We shouldn’t have missed you.

  (The INTERRUPTER appears from another part of the house)

  INTERRUPTER: Yes, I’d like to know what you’d have done without decent dentists and anaesthetics. Can’t see you biting on to a leather belt. CHAP: Nor you, either.

  BOX MAN: Let him say his piece. It’s a free country.

  CHAIRMAN: It’s not a free country.

  BOX MAN: It’s not a free country.

  CHAP: As I was about to say –

  (The GIRL goes into another Suprernes type dance, the CHAP joins her. The music finishes suddenly)

  CHAP: (To the GIRL.) Finished?

  GIRL: Yes. Do carry on.

  CHAP: As I was saying –

  BOX MAN: What was he saying? This brown ale they sold me in the bar tastes like old horse piss.

  GIRL: How would you know?

  CHAP: …I was born –

  GIRL: That’s a promising start.

  CHAP: And original too.

  CHAIRMAN: Oh, do stop it, the two of you. (To the CHAP.) Do you think you could get on with it?

  INTERRUPTER: What do you mean ‘get on with it’? He hasn’t started yet.

  BOX MAN: Give the boy a chance.

  (The CHAP advances downstage and taking his time, he surveys the audience and addresses them. – If there are still any lefl)

  CHAP: The last time that I saw the King,

  He did the most curious thing,

  With a nonchalant flick,

  He pulled out his dick,

  And said: ‘If I play, will you sing?’

  INTERRUPTER: Filth!

  GIRL: Just bloody boring.

  BOX MAN: I was in my cradle when I heard that one.

  GIRL: Cradles weren’t invented when you were born.

  CHAP: I am going to make a sort of shortish speech about my life and women.

  GIRL: Wouldn’t you guess?

  BOX MAN: Why, I’ve had more –

  CHAP: Yes, than hot dinners. Except my dinners were probably a bit hotter and slightly more interesting.

  BOX MAN: I’ll come down and sort you out too!

  CHAP: No, you won’t.

  CHAIRMAN: Yes, he’s quite right. You’re just an underpaid –

  GIRL: Overworked –

  CHAIRMAN: Exactly. What was it?

  GIRL: ‘Device’ is what you keep saying.

  CHAP: Now the first girl I really remember lusting after –

  GIRL: Wake me up when he’s finished.

  CHAP: Was actually a woman.

  (They all change places and take up TV chat show poses.) I don’t know what age she was really. She could have been twenty-one or thirty-one. All I remember is that she had a small boy called Malcolm about three years old, I should imagine, and a bit younger than me. (The CHAIRMAN clears his throat and becomes the interviewer to all the others)

  CHAIRMAN: Now, J. Waddington Smith, you’ve just come from this play tonight – Did you think it came off at all? Or would you call it a total disaster?

  GRANDFATHER: Not a total disaster, no. On the other hand –

  GIRL: On the other hand –

  GRANDFATHER: I must confess it did have some enjoyable moments.

  CHAP: Oh, say that would you?

  OLDER LADY: I quite enjoyed it. But then I suppose I’m easily pleased.

  GIRL: Oh no, you’re not. You’re the worst audience in the world.

  CHAP: Usual easy obligatory cracks about critics.

  OLDER LADY: Well, naturally.

  GIRL: (Fiddling with her hair) But he really has got a bit too predictable now, hasn’t he? (To the CHAIRMAN) They are getting me fiddling with my hair in the intellectual winsome bit, aren’t they?

  CHAIRMAN: Yes, but I shouldn’t worry about it too much. I’ve already told them t
hat –

  GIRL: Device –

  CHAIRMAN: Up in the Box not to overdo it too much.

  OLDER LADY: Quite right.

  CHAIRMAN: (To the CHAP) It struck me that there was a certain amount of strident waffle. What would you say to that?

  CHAP: Oh, I agree. After all, there ought to be a bit more to it than that?

  GIRL: Oughtn’t there?

  CHAIRMAN: I agree. Didn’t there? What did you think about the devices?

  CHAP: The theatrical ones, you mean?

  GIRL: Well, we did go to the theatre, didn’t we?

  FATHER: What is all this?

  CHAP: They call it television.

  GIRL: Yes, you really died before all that.

  CHAP: Lucky old bugger.

  CHAIRMAN: We’re having a ‘lively intellectual confrontation’.

  CHAP: ‘Making the news’.

  CHAIRMAN: Do you mind? ‘The first with the news’. (Rising.) I think we’ve done this for the moment, anyway, don’t you?

  CHAP: Oh, yes.

  (They all change around seats with the CHAP now in the middle.)

  Oh, yes… The lady with the three year old boy.

  GIRL: Malcolm.

  INTERRUPTER: Why don’t you give the young people a chance?

  CHAP: Why don’t you give us a chance?

  BOX MAN: You take a chance, darling.

  GIRL: Don’t be disgusting.

  CHAIRMAN: Why shouldn’t he be? He’s paid his money. As he says.

  GIRL: I doubt it.

  BOX MAN: And I want it back!

  INTERRUPTER: So do I.

  (All sing the Stoke City football song ‘We’ll Be With You’, which also plays over the loud speakers, led by the BOXMAN, who twirls his scarf, etc., bawling, while some of the cast stand up to the Wembley type stadium sound)

  CHAP: Well, to continue if that’s possible –

  CHAIRMAN: If anything’s possible…

  CHAP: There were the twins. One was called Gloria, I know. And I think the other was Pat. But Pat was the nice one, Gloria was the dirty one.

  GIRL: Oh, yes.

  CHAP: Then there was a younger, blonde fat one, but I don’t remember her name. But I do think she was more sort of humiliating than the rest. Then there was my Auntie Viv. She had very dark, curly hair.

  FATHER: I used to call her the Gypsy Queen.

  CHAP: That’s right. But she had a funny way with handling the children. And I remember she said to me, ‘Don’t lift your trousers’ – we used to wear what were called ‘short trousers’ then – ‘when you go to the toilet’.

  GIRL: Are you going to go on much longer?

  CHAP: Then there was Arabella.