Three Plays of Tennessee Williams

by Tennessee Williams

  [She applauds.]

  BIG MAMA: Other people drink and have drunk an' will drink, as long as they make that stuff an' put it in bottles.

  MARGARET: That's the truth. I never trusted a man that didn't drink.

  MAE: Gooper never drinks. Don't you trust Gooper?

  MARGARET: Why, Gooper, don't you drink? If I'd known you didn't drink, I wouldn't of made that remark—

  BIG MAMA: Brick?

  MARGARET: —at least, not in your presence.

  [She laughs sweetly.]

  BIG MAMA: Brick!

  MARGARET: He's still on the gall'ry. I'll go bring him in so we can talk.

  BIG MAMA [worriedly]: I don't know what this mysterious family conference is about.

  [Awkward silence. Big Mama looks from face to face, then belches slightly and mutters, 'Excuse me....' She opens an ornamental fan suspended about her throat, a black lace fan to go with her black lace gown and fans her wilting corsage, sniffing nervously and looking from face to face in the uncomfortable silence as Margaret calls 'Brick?' and Brick sings to the moon on the gallery.]

  I don't know what's wrong here, you all have such long faces! Open that door on the hall and let some air circulate through here, will you please, Gooper?

  MAE: I think we'd better leave that door closed, Big Mama, till after the talk.

  BIG MAMA: Reveren' Tooker, will you please open that door?!

  REVEREND TOOKER: I sure will, Big Mama.

  MAE: I just didn't think we ought t' take any chance of Big Daddy hearin' a word of this discussion.

  BIG MAMA: I swan! Nothing's going to be said in Big Daddy's house that he cain't hear if he wants to!

  GOOPER: Well, Big Mama, it's—

  [Mae gives him a quick, hard poke to shut him up. He glares at her fiercely as she circles before him like a burlesque ballerina, raising her skinny bare arms over her head, jangling her bracelets, exclaiming:]

  MAE: A breeze! A breeze!

  REVEREND TOOKER: I think this house is the coolest house in the Delta.—Did you all know that Halsey Banks' widow put air-conditioning units in the church and rectory at Friar's Point in memory of Halsey?

  [General conversation has resumed; everybody is chatting so that the stage sounds like a big bird-cage.]

  GOOPER: Too bad nobody cools your church off for you. I bet you sweat in that pulpit these hot Sundays, Reverend Tooker.

  REVEREND TOOKER: Yes, my vestments are drenched.

  MAE [at the same time to Dr Baugh]: You think those vitamin B12 injections are what they're cracked up t' be, Doc Baugh?

  DOCTOR BAUGH: Well, if you want to be stuck with something I guess they're as good to be stuck with as anything else.

  BIG MAMA [at gallery door]: Maggie, Maggie, aren't you comin' with Brick?

  MAE [suddenly and loudly, creating a silence]: I have a strange feeling, I have a peculiar feeling!

  BIG MAMA [turning from gallery]: What feeling?

  MAE: That Brick said somethin' he shouldn't of said t' Big Daddy.

  BIG MAMA: Now what on earth could Brick of said t' Big Daddy that he shouldn't say?

  GOOPER: Big Mama, there's somethin'—

  MAE: NOW, WAIT!

  [She rushes up to Big Mama and gives her a quick hug and kiss. Big Mama pushes her impatiently off as the Reverend Tooker's voice rises serenely in a little pocket of silence:]

  REVEREND TOOKER: Yes, last Sunday the gold in my chasuble faded into th' purple....

  GOOPER: Reveren', you must of been preachin' hell's fire last Sunday!

  [He guffaws at this witticism but the Reverend is not sincerely amused. At the same time Big Mama has crossed over to Dr Baugh and is saying to him:]

  BIG MAMA [her breathless voice rising high-pitched above the others]: In my day they had what they call the Keeley cure for heavy drinkers. But now I understand they just take some kind of tablets, they call them 'Annie Bust' tablets. But Brick don't need to take nothin'.

  [Brick appears in gallery doors with Margaret behind him.]

  BIG MAMA [unaware of his presence behind her]: That boy is just broken up over Skipper's death. You know how poor Skipper died. They gave him a big, big dose of that sodium amytal stuff at his home and then they called the ambulance and give him another big, big dose of it at the hospital and that and all of the alcohol in his system fo' months an months an' months just proved too much for his heart.... I'm scared of needles! I'm more scared of a needle than the knife.... I think more people have been needled out of this world than-

  [She stops short and wheels about.]

  OH!—here's Brick! My precious baby—

  [She turns upon Brick with short, fat arms extended, at the same time uttering a loud, short sob, which is both comic and touching. | Brick smiles and bows slightly, making a burlesque gesture of gallantry for Maggie to pass before him into the room. Then he hobbles on his crutch directly to the liquor cabinet and there is absolute silence, with everybody looking at Brick as everybody has always looked at Brick when he spoke or moved or appeared. One by one he drops ice cubes in his glass, then suddenly, but not quickly, looks back over his shoulder with a wry, charming smile, and says:]

  BRICK: I'm sorry! Anyone else?

  BIG MAMA [sadly]: No, son. I wish you wouldn't!

  BRICK: I wish I didn't have to, Big Mama, but I'm still waiting for that click in my head which makes it all smooth out!

  BIG MAMA: Aw, Brick, you—BREAK MY HEART!

  MARGARET [at the same time]: Brick, go sit with Big Mama!

  BIG MAMA: I just cain't staiiiiiiiii-nnnnnd—it....

  [She sobs.]

  MAE: Now that we're all assembled—

  GOOPER: We kin talk....

  BIG MAMA: Breaks my heart....

  MARGARET: Sit with Big Mama, Brick, and hold her hand.

  [Big Mama sniffs very loudly three times, almost like three drum beats in the pocket of silence.]

  BRICK: You do that, Maggie. I'm a restless cripple. I got to stay on my crutch.

  [Brick hobbles to the gallery door; leans there as if waiting. | Mae sits beside Big Mama, while Gooper moves in front and sits on the end of the couch, facing her. Reverend Tooker moves nervously into the space between them; on the other side, Dr Baugh stands looking at nothing in particular and lights a cigar. Margaret turns away.]

  BIG MAMA: Why're you all surroundin' me—like this? Why're you all starin' at me like this an' makin' signs at each other?

  [Reverend Tooker steps back startled.]

  MAE: Calm yourself, Big Mama.

  BIG MAMA: Calm you'self, you'self, Sister Woman. How could I calm myself with everyone starin' at me as if big drops of blood had broken out on m'face? What's this all about, Annh! What?

  [Gooper coughs and takes a center position.]

  GOOPER: Now, Doc Baugh.

  MAE: Doc Baugh?

  BRICK [suddenly]: SHHH-!

  [Then he grins and chuckles and shakes his head regretfully.]

  —Naw!—that wasn't th' click.

  GOOPER: Brick, shut up or stay out there on the gallery with your liquor! We got to talk about a serious matter. Big Mama wants to know the complete truth about the report we got today from the Ochsner Clinic.

  MAE [eagerly]: —on Big Daddy's condition!

  GOOPER: Yais, on Big Daddy's condition, we got to face it.

  DOCTOR BAUGH: Well...

  BIG MAMA [terrified, rising]: Is there? Something? Something that I? Don't—Know?

  [In these few words, this startled, very soft, question, Big Mama reviews the history of her forty-five years with Big Daddy, her great, almost embarrassingly true-hearted and simple-minded devotion to Big Daddy, who must have had something Brick has, who made himself loved so much by the 'simple expedient' of not loving enough to disturb his charming detachment, also once coupled, like Brick's, with virile beauty. Big Mama has a dignity at this moment | she almost stops being fat.]

  DOCTOR BAUGH [after a pause, uncomfortably]: Yes?—Well—

  BI
G MAMA: I!!!—want to—knowwwwwww....

  [Immediately she thrusts her fist to her mouth as if to deny that statement. Then, for some curious reason, she snatches the withered corsage from her breast and hurls it on the floor and steps on it with her short, fat feet.]

  —Somebody must be lyin'!—I want to know!

  MAE: Sit down, Big Mama, sit down on this sofa.

  MARGARET [quickly]: Brick, go sit with Big Mama.

  BIG MAMA: What is it, what is it?

  DOCTOR BAUGH: I never have seen a more thorough examination than Big Daddy Pollitt was given in all my experience with the Ochsner Clinic.

  GOOPER: It's one of the best in the country.

  MAE: It's THE best in the country—bar none!

  [For some reason she gives Gooper a violent poke as she goes past him. He slaps at her hand without removing his eyes from his mother's face.]

  DOCTOR BAUGH: Of course they were ninety-nine and nine-tenths per cent sure before they even started.

  BIG MAMA: Sure of what, sure of what, sure of—what?—what!

  [She catches her breath in a startled sob. Mae kisses her quickly. She thrusts Mae fiercely away from her, staring at the doctor.]

  MAE: Mommy, be a brave girl!

  BRICK [in the doorway, softly]: 'By the light, by the light, Of the sil-ve-ry mo-ooo-n'

  GOOPER: Shut up!—Brick.

  BRICK: —Sorry....

  [He wanders out on the gallery.]

  DOCTOR BAUGH: But now, you see, Big Mama, they cut a piece off this growth, a specimen of the tissue and—

  BIG MAMA: Growth? You told Big Daddy—

  DOCTOR BAUGH: Now wait.

  BIG MAMA [fiercely]: You told me and Big Daddy there wasn't a thing wrong with him but—

  MAE: Big Mama, they always—

  GOOPER: Let Doc Baugh talk, will yuh?

  BIG MAMA: —little spastic condition of-

  [Her breath gives out in a sob.]

  DOCTOR BAUGH: Yes, that's what we told Big Daddy. But we had this bit of tissue run through the laboratory and I'm sorry to say the test was positive on it. It's—well—malignant.... [Pause.]

  BIG MAMA: —Cancer?! Cancer?!

  [Dr Baugh nods gravely. | Big Mama gives long gasping cry.]

  MAE and GOOPER: Now, now, now, Big Mama, you had to know....

  BIG MAMA: WHY DIDN'T THEY CUT IT OUT OF HIM? HANH? HANH?

  DOCTOR BAUGH: Involved too much, Big Mama, too many organs affected.

  MAE: Big Mama, the liver's affected and so's the kidneys, both! It's gone way past what they call a—

  GOOPER: A surgical risk.

  MAE: —Uh-huh....

  [Big Mama draws a breath like a dying gasp.]

  REVEREND TOOKER: Tch, tch, tch, tch, tch!

  DOCTOR BAUGH: Yes, it's gone past the knife.

  MAE: That's why he's turned yellow, Mommy!

  BIG MAMA: Git away from me, git away from me, Mae!

  [She rises abruptly.]

  I want Brick! Where's Brick? Where is my only son?

  MAE: Mama! Did she say 'only son'?

  GOOPER: What does that make me?

  MAE: A sober responsible man with five precious children!—Six!

  BIG MAMA: I want Brick to tell me! Brick! Brick!

  MARGARET [rising from her reflections in a corner]: Brick was so upset he went back out.

  BIG MAMA: Brick!

  MARGARET: Mama, let me tell you!

  BIG MAMA: No, no, leave me alone, you're not my blood!

  GOOPER: Mama, I'm your son! Listen to me!

  MAE: Gooper's your son, Mama, he's your first-born!

  BIG MAMA: Gooper never liked Daddy.

  MAE [as if terribly shocked]: That's not TRUE!

  [There is a pause. The minister coughs and rises.]

  REVEREND TOOKER [to Mae]: I think I'd better slip away at this point.

  MAE [sweetly and sadly]: Yes, Doctor Tooker, you go.

  REVEREND TOOKER [discreetly]: Good night, good night, everybody, and God bless you all... on this place.... [He slips out.]

  DOCTOR BAUGH: That man is a good man but lacking in tact. Talking about people giving memorial windows—if he mentioned one memorial window, he must have spoke of a dozen, and saying how awful it was when somebody died intestate, the legal wrangles, and so forth. [Mae coughs, and points at Big Mama.]

  DOCTOR BAUGH: Well, Big Mama.... [He sighs.]

  BIG MAMA: It's all a mistake. I know it's just a bad dream.

  DOCTOR BAUGH: We're gonna keep Big Daddy as comfortable as we can.

  BIG MAMA: Yes, it's just a bad dream, that's all it is, it's just an awful dream.

  GOOPER: In my opinion Big Daddy is having some pain but won't admit that he has it.

  BIG MAMA: Just a dream, a bad dream.

  DOCTOR BAUGH: That's what lots of them do, they think if they don't admit they're having the pain they can sort of escape the fact of it.

  GOOPER [with relish]: Yes, they get sly about it, they get real sly about it.

  MAE: Gooper and I think—

  GOOPER: Shut up, Mae!—Big Daddy ought to be started on morphine.

  BIG MAMA: Nobody's going to give Big Daddy morphine.

  DOCTOR BAUGH: Now, Big Mama, when that pain strikes it's going to strike mighty hard and Big Daddy's going to need the needle to bear it.

  BIG MAMA: I tell you, nobody's going to give him morphine.

  MAE: Big Mama, you don't want to see Big Daddy suffer, you know you—

  [Gooper standing beside her gives her a savage poke.]

  DOCTOR BAUGH [placing a package on the table]: I'm leaving this stuff here, so if there's a sudden attack you all won't have to send out for it.

  MAE: I know how to give a hypo.

  GOOPER: Mae took a course in nursing during the war.

  MARGARET: Somehow I don't think Big Daddy would want Mae to give him a hypo.

  MAE: You think he'd want you to do it?

  [Dr Baugh rises.]

  GOOPER: Doctor Baugh is goin'.

  DOCTOR BAUGH: Yes, I got to be goin'. Well, keep your chin up, Big Mama.

  GOOPER [with jocularity]: She's gonna keep both chins up, aren't you, Big Mama?

  [Big Mama sobs.]

  Now stop that, Big Mama.

  MAE: Sit down with me, Big Mama.

  GOOPER [at door with Dr Baugh]: Well, Doc, we sure do appreciate all you done. I'm telling you, we're surely obligated to you for—

  [Dr Baugh has gone out without a glance at him.]

  GOOPER: —I guess that doctor has got a lot on his mind but it wouldn't hurt him to act a little more human....

  [Big Mama sobs.]

  Now be a brave girl, Mommy.

  BIG MAMA: It's not true, I know that it's just not true!

  GOOPER: Mama, those tests are infallible!

  BIG MAMA: Why are you so determined to see your father daid?

  MAE: Big Mama!

  MARGARET [gently]: I know what Big Mama means.

  MAE [fiercely]: Oh, do you?

  MARGARET [quietly and very sadly]: Yes, I think I do.

  MAE: For a newcomer in the family you sure do show a lot of understanding.

  MARGARET: Understanding is needed on this place.

  MAE: I guess you must have needed a lot of it in your family Maggie, with your father's liquor problem and now you've got Brick with his!

  MARGARET: Brick does not have a liquor problem at all. Brick is devoted to Big Daddy. This thing is a terrible strain on him.

  BIG MAMA: Brick is Big Daddy's boy, but he drinks too much and it worries me and Big Daddy, and, Margaret, you've got to cooperate with us, you've got to cooperate with Big Daddy and me in getting Brick straightened out. Because it will break Big Daddy's heart if Brick don't pull himself together and take hold of things.

  MAE: Take hold of what things, Big Mama?

  BIG MAMA: The place.

  [There is a quick violent look between Mae and Gooper.]

  GOOPER: Big Mama, you've had a shock.

/>   MAE: Yais, we've all had a shock, but...