Authors: Garson Kanin
B00AZRHQKA EBOK (10 page)
M
ILLIE
: I could set up a special somewhere behind her and give you some great peep stuff even with the clothes on.
L
ARRY
: Great. So She comes out—
R
USS
: Dripping.
L
ARRY
: She moves around—we know She’s naked. She gets her underclothes—from where?
A
LICIA
: The bed?
I
VAN
: Yes, good. I can have there a good chair.
L
ARRY
: Corset on—and then we’re all right. Damn. If we can convince her to just flash one for a split second—or her behind—a glance only—
A
RT
: What’s the point? These days they see everything. Frontal. The works.
L
ARRY
: Yes, but not the star’s. And not in a high-class twenty-two-dollar-ticket Broadway musical—and anyway—it’s unexpected.
A
RT
: Go ahead and do it. I’m not stopping you.
L
ARRY
: Wait a second. Just so we all understand. I’m not after titillation for the sake of titillation.
A
RT
: Watch your language.
L
ARRY
: The point is to dramatize the aloneness of Nora at this point. And a girl, by herself in a room—dressing—doing all the small, personal things a girl does when alone—damn!—this can be
sensational!
And what’s more, she can do it. Midge, find out what women did then—I mean kinds of perfume and atomizers, there must be some period kinds. And what did they do about armpits, and so on…
A
LICIA
: You see? Here are the basic stages.
L
ARRY
: Excellent, Alicia. Many thanks.
(
All return to their places
)
A
LICIA
: This can work.
L
ARRY
: Why is it stuff like this is always more erotic in period dress?
A
LICIA
: I don’t know—but it is.
L
ARRY
: Silk stockings, right?
A
LICIA
: Oh, yes!
L
ARRY
: Nothing sexier. And putting them on—I mean watching them being put on. God Almighty! In silent movies, they’d do it sometimes. Clara Bow. Vilma Banky. It was electrifying.
A
RT
: Oh, I don’t know. Panythose aren’t bad.
L
ARRY
: No contest.
A
RT
: Let’s try it. Alicia, you put on the silk stockings—and Midge, you do pantyhose and we’ll all vote.
L
ARRY
: Where were we?
ME: Scene Two. Over.
L
ARRY
: Scene Three. Tough one. Rector’s. Main dining room. Midnight supper. The big waltz number. We don’t see them right away, but as the waltz goes on—we discover Jack and Nora waltzing. Lovely, this. They’re part of the crowd, part of life, lost in it. And it’s romantic and the tune is a winner. “Midnight Waltz.”
H
Y
: A sure standard.
F
RED
: If the waltz comes back.
L
ARRY
: Digression. Alicia—I’ve been thinking. That towel thing of yours is superlative—a real inspiration. Thank you.
A
RT
: What do you mean, “Thank you”? That’s what she gets paid for, isn’t it? An arm and a leg…I’m only kiddin’, Alicia. I think your towel thing is superlative.
(I begin to notice something about
AC
—a habit. He kicks someone in the groin and immediately does what he can to soothe the pain. Like those nutty mothers who sock their kids in the head and then kiss it to make it well. Is he getting it both ways? Why does he do it? It keeps everyone so on edge. Is that the reason?
L
ARRY
has been looking at
A
RT
for some time. I wonder if there is going to be another blowup. No.
L
ARRY
stands up, begins pacing around, and talks:)
L
ARRY
: A few years ago, Art, I took five weeks off and went down to Sarasota, Florida. Just a whim. I wanted to see how a circus is put together.
A
RT
: With money!
L
ARRY
: (
Ignoring him
) I’ve been a circus buff from the age of—I don’t know—maybe five, when I saw my first one in Seattle. And for the next ten years or more I had one driving ambition—to be a clown.
A
RT
: You’ve
made
it!
L
ARRY
: I’ve seen circuses everywhere in the world—the Russians are the best—and I’ve watched the American ones deteriorate—just slick commercialism now. Too bad.
A
RT
: What
is
all this?
L
ARRY
: In Sarasota, everything was enthralling. I learned plenty. About precision and training. And patience—God, it can take seven or eight years—
years
—to train an animal. And about discipline.
A
RT
: (
To the group
) Anybody here know what he’s talking about? Hands, please.
L
ARRY
: And the single greatest lesson I learned down there was one called The Pat on the Head. Just that. In caps: THE PAT ON THE HEAD. These extraordinary trainers working with the animals—people think they beat them or force them. Not at all. The animals are shown how to do something. They try. If they do it
right
, they get a pat on the head. Oh, sure—sometimes a chunk of fish or meat or dog biscuit—but I watched that process for five long weeks and I’m convinced that The Pat on the Head was more important. That was the lesson. Think about it, Art.
A
RT
: Listen, I once patted a guy on the head so hard—an actor—it took seventeen stitches.
L
ARRY
: So. We’re on the Roof Garden. Number over. Jack and Nora to their table with two friends. Orchestra off. Trio continues. Sonofabitch—Claude—comes in with a party of six. Will there be room, Ivan?
I
VAN
: We make room.
L
ARRY
: Jack sees them. Nora doesn’t. Her back is to them. S.O.B. spots Jack and Nora. His party—heads together—they look over at Nora’s table—then back together and big laughter. Jack stands. Sits. Trio off. Orchestra on. They play the one-step. How’s that coming, Hy?
H
Y
: Bloodcurdling. Trouble is, I never danced the one-step in my life. But don’t worry.
L
ARRY
: All right.
H
Y
: No sense the
two
of us worrying.
F
RED
: We’ll get it, we’ll get it.
L
ARRY
: One-step. Everybody on, dancing. Except Jack and Nora. Claude and partner. When we’ve got the number—the dance—really riding—S.O.B. and his partner sit there and stare at Jack and Nora. They’re trying to cool it—all at once, Claude points. That’s the moment! That’s the signal—Jack makes a running lunge for him—he shoves the girl in front of him and dashes onto the dance floor—we lose him—meanwhile Jack piles into the girl—knocks her ass over tip—gets up and piles into the crowd—looking for Claude.
A
RT
: Jesus! How’re you going to do
that
?
L
ARRY
: Do what?
A
RT
: Knock the girl over. Eight times a week. Can we get insurance on a thing like that?
L
ARRY
: As in all things, Art, we get experts, professionals. It’s a tough trick I grant you, but important. It’s action. And audiences these days are action-oriented, you know that. And they’re going to get their share from us, believe me.
A
RT
: Yeah, but
how
?
L
ARRY
: Stand up, Nick. (
N
ICK
gets out of his chair and takes a step forward. He is a short, elderly, chunky, scarred, tough-looking trainer type. He wears glasses
) Ladies and gentlemen—Nick Pappas, our stunt man. He’s here to help us with falls, trips, fights, and so on. Anything physical—we’ll refer to Nick.
A
RT
: (
To
N
ICK
) O.K.
You
tell me how we’re gonna do it.
N
ICK:
The knockin’ the girl out of the chair bit you mean?
A
RT
: That’s it.
N
ICK:
Well, first off—it’s not gonna be no girl.
A
RT
: What?!
L
ARRY
: Hold it. Listen, everybody. This is classified information. Keep it dark. No leaks. It’ll hurt us. After a while, I suppose—it’ll come out, but by then it won’t matter, now it will. So this is—for the present—Top Secret, right? Go ahead, Nick.
N
ICK
: No girl. I got a good man. A tumbler. He’ll look an O.K. girl all right.
H
Y
: If he remembers to shave.
N
ICK
: Don’t worry about the guy. The way we’ll routine it, see—there’ll be no physical contact whatsoever. Way shape or form. I figure the jumper to dive right
past
my tumbler—right into the wings offstage where I got a foam-rubber mat. My tumbler takes his own fall. Also, he’s gonna be wearing this dress and nothing underneath—I mean not pants no nothing—
A
RT
: But if he’s a—
N
ICK
: Wait. No pants no nothing—only a false twat.
A
RT
: (
To
L
ARRY
) Is this guy putting me on?
L
ARRY
: Why would he?
N
ICK
: No! See, the idea is that on the jump, she—I mean
he
—goes over in his chair and the skirt goes up and everybody’s attention naturally goes to the one spot and whatever they see or don’t see or think they see it takes off their mind from the action and we got it made. Y’unnerstan’ this whole bit is a split second.
A
RT
: So if it’s such a great trick—why can’t you do it with a
real
girl, and a
real
twat? After all, there’s got to be girl tumblers.
N
ICK
: No. No, sir. Not for this. This is gonna be a rough fall—also, there’s always the chance of an accident. I would not handle this stunt unless with a man doubling woman.
L
ARRY
: Can I keep going, please? Now comes the top of the act to this point. The fight. Nick’s going to work on it with Jenny and me. Part One: we see Jack grab him. They disappear in the crowd. People are still dancing. Now the couples begin to stop—one by one—women scream—men try to break up the fight—the dance stops—but the music goes on—louder and faster. Part Two: they’re squared off now and it’s a real blood battle. Blood. Torn clothes. Rough-and-tumble. Not like a boxing match—it’s anything goes—wrestling, rolling, punching. Part Three is the surprise ending to it. Jack is the
loser
. Knocked cold. Nora breaks away, jumps on Claude and he flattens her, too. Part Four: police arrive. Two of them start working over the out Jack and Nora. Curtain.
I
VAN
: A fine scene.
A
RT
: If it works.
L
ARRY
: That’s our job. To make it work.
C
LAY
: It can work.
L
ARRY
: It’s the toughest I can remember, physically, I mean. But what the hell. That’s the game. Next. Hospital scene. Jack in bed. Nora visiting, her arm in a sling.
A
LICIA
: This is it, Larry. What I asked you about. The place I worry about the change. Can you get me a crossover or
something
? I’ll need two minutes at least—well, all right,
one
minute with breakaways.
L
ARRY
: And the cops who kneel down to look at them can be dressers. Crowd gathers around—masking—hell, we could probably make the whole change onstage in the dim. A slow dim.
A
LICIA
: I doubt it.
R
USS
: Would you want to use the projection again? With another newspaper? I mean, if they’re celebrities and there’s a brawl, wouldn’t it?…
L
ARRY
: That’s damn good, Russ.
A
LICIA
: Certainly helps
me
.
C
LAY
:
And
the players.
L
ARRY
: You know what? We ought to carry this forward and back. Use at least
six
projections. Three in each act. No. Wait. Seven is better. Four in Act One. Three in Act Two.
I
VAN
: Better if only one place. Style.
L
ARRY
: Thanks, Russ. Real good. Right. So we’re in the hospital scene. And we find out Claude has really let loose now. The lawyer in. Discussion of what to do. A suit for slander—otherwise the manager is worried about the consequences. Decided. Jack says, “Well, if you can’t lick 'em, sue 'em.” Lawyer leaves. Jack and Nora. Number. But now we’re stuck. Number. But what? Who?