Pinball
Page 7
THEENIE: No, please no.
AXIS: [calling] Vandelope, help, ho!
CROWD: [off, singing] We own our own bodies
We shall not be moved.
VANDELOPE enters as a doctor of laws, disguised as a man. Change of lights, puff of smoke to indicate fantasy.
VANDELOPE: [shakes hands with SOLOMON] Dr Vandel Hope, QC. Give me leave to emulate your peroration.
SOLOMON: At last, a man after my own heart.
They sing and dance.
VANDELOPE & SOLOMON: You put your right hand in,
You pull your right hand out,
You put your right hand in,
And you shake it all about.
You do the hokey pokey
And you turn around
And that’s what it’s all about.
SOLOMON: [offering his flask] Brandy?
VANDELOPE: Your Honour!
She drinks. Sound of the crowd, off, shouting.
SOLOMON: Attention those nincompoops attempting illegal entry by climbing through the skylight. You are endangering your own lives and you are endangering the lives of policemen.
He calls.
Constable! [To VANDELOPE] Lunch, as soon as the police clear through to the gate.
VANDELOPE: I have startling new evidence.
SOLOMON: [checks his fob watch] This is most irregular.
VANDELOPE: I would speak so the scroungers and riff-raff out there listen and learn.
SOLOMON: Order. The court will come to order.
Noise of the crowd lessens.
VANDELOPE: Your Honour, it is the concern of this court that the boy grow up responsible, is it not?
SOLOMON: Let the rabble listen and be ashamed.
VANDELOPE: You would agree that every man is the maker of his own fortune?
SOLOMON: You put it neatly.
VANDELOPE: Then the boy must be able to make his own decisions.
SOLOMON: What? The boy?
VANDELOPE: All of us. Take control of our own lives. We could do it, in time, if there was no prejudice between us, and no power above us.
SOLOMON: Abandon the rule of the law?
VANDELOPE: You can retire, Your Honour.
SOLOMON: Puppy! People come to Solomon begging for wisdom.
VANDELOPE takes a Bible off SOLOMON’s table and opens it.
VANDELOPE: You would uphold the judgement of King Solomon?
SOLOMON: You mock me.
He pulls the Bible from VANDELOPE.
How can you, a doctor of laws, make a plaything of our finest precedent? You invite the jungle to take over and blood to flow in the streets.
VANDELOPE: You would stand by Solomon’s ruling, no matter what?
SOLOMON: I have sworn it.
VANDELOPE: Have it your own way.
SOLOMON: Bring me a sword.
SYLVESTER hands him the sword.
VANDELOPE: ‘And they stood in awe of the King
Because they perceived
That the wisdom of God was in him
To render justice.’
SOLOMON: Have the women stand before me.
LOUISE and THEENIE come forward.
SOLOMON: ‘Divide the living child in two
And give half to the one
And half to the other.’
THEENIE: You can’t cut Albie in half.
SOLOMON: [indicating THEENIE] The woman whose son was alive said to the king:
‘Oh, my lord, give her the living child
And by no means slay it.’
THEENIE: At least let me go and hug him goodbye. I’ll tell him. He’s going to live with his dad for a while.
LOUISE: Alabastar will be very happy with us.
SOLOMON: [indicating LOUISE] The other said,
‘It shall be neither mine nor yours:
Divide it.’
LOUISE: We’ve moved the Space Invaders into his room. Theenie can come and see him if she wants to. Sylvester?
SOLOMON: ‘Then the king said,
Give the living child to the first woman
And by no means slay it;
She is its mother.’
The law allows it and the court awards it.
THEENIE: Did he say?
AXIS: Yes.
THEENIE: Hooray!
She hugs AXIS.
SOLOMON: What? The law awards the child to the natural mother, but this natural mother is unnatural. The law allows the ruin of the law?
VANDELOPE: [removing disguise] You swore it, Sol, old pal.
SOLOMON: [his authority severely shaken] You! You have spent hours obfuscating me. It has to be the other way round. There is too much at stake.
VANDELOPE: There’s been fifty-eight people arrested; are you dropping the charges?
SOLOMON: Harlots! The law has to be cherished or you wreck the civilisation of centuries.
Pause.
[Aside] The words are coming out, why aren’t they rousing … ?
He looks at VANDELOPE, AXIS and THEENIE.
Why aren’t you frightened of the damage you will cause? Don’t turn away from me. For my children’s sakes I had an empire to hold onto and I cannot have you telling me it’s gone. And yet, you remind me of my wife, of Miriam, when she used to get up in the morning and sing.
He leaves, defeated.
VANDELOPE: In real life it could be a bit more difficult.
LOUISE: Well, do we talk about it, or what?
THEENIE: I’ve never talked to you. I’m going to need some coffee.
SYLVESTER: He says he doesn’t want to play pinball any more. He won thirteen free games in a row and after that there’s nothing else to do. I love him, don’t you see? I love him too.
AXIS: I could do with some champagne.
THEENIE: I want to paint, a circus.
VANDELOPE: The law keeps itself strong
Rewards those who make it,
Invents endless reasons
Why people should take it.
But you never know what
We could change
If we risk it.
Join hands friends
And we can go home
Optimistic.
THE END
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CURRENCY PLAYS
First published in 1996
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Copyright © Alison Lyssa, Pinball
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