Three Plays of Tennessee Williams

by Tennessee Williams

LAURA: Please—please!

  AMANDA [calling from kitchenette]: Laura, are you going to do what I asked you to do, or do I have to get dressed and go out myself?

  LAURA: Going, going—soon as I get on my coat! [She pulls on a shapeless felt hat with nervous, jerky movement, pleadingly glancing at Tom. Rushes awkwardly for coat. The coat is one of Amanda’s, inaccurately made-over the sleeves too short for Laura.] Butter and what else?

  AMANDA [entering upstage]: Just butter. Tell them to charge it.

  LAURA: Mother, they make such faces when I do that

  AMANDA: Sticks and stones can break our bones, but the expression on Mr. Garfinkel's face won't harm us! Tell him your coffee is getting cold.

  LAURA [at door]: Do what I asked you, will you, will you, Tom?

  [He looks sullenly away.]

  AMANDA: Laura, go now or just don't go at all!

  LAURA [rushing out]: Going—going! [A second later she cries out. Tom springs up and crosses to door. Amanda rushes anxiously in. Tom opens the door.]

  TOM: Laura?

  LAURA: I'm all right. I slipped, but I'm all right.

  AMANDA [peering anxiously after her]: If anyone breaks a leg on those fire-escape steps, the landlord ought to be sued for every cent he possesses! [She shuts door. Remembers she isn't speaking and returns to other room.]

  [As Tom enters listlessly for his coffee she turns her back to him and stands rigidly facing the window on the gloomy gray vault of the areaway. Its light on her face with its aged but childish features is cruelly sharp, satirical as a Daumier print.

  MUSIC UNDER: 'AVE MARIA'.

  Tom glances sheepishly but sullenly at her averted figure and slumps at the table. The coffee is scalding hot; he sips it and gasps and spits it back in the cup. At his gasp, Amanda catches her breath and half turns. Then catches herself and turns back to window.

  Tom blows on his coffee, glancing sidewise at his mother. She clears her throat. Tom clears his. He starts to rise. Sinks back down again, scratches his head, clears his throat again. Amanda coughs. Tom raises his cup in both hands to blow on it, his eyes staring over the rim of it at his mother for several moments. Then he slowly sets the cup down and awkwardly and hesitantly rises from the chair.]

  TOM [hoarsely]: Mother! I—I apologize, Mother. [Amanda draws a quick, shuddering breath. Her face works grotesquely. She breaks into childlike tears.] I'm sorry for what I said, for everything that I said; I didn't mean it.

  AMANDA [sobbingly]: My devotion has made me a witch and so I make myself hateful to my children!

  TOM: No, you don't.

  AMANDA: I worry so much, don't sleep, it makes me nervous!

  TOM [gently]: I understand that.

  AMANDA: I've had to put up a solitary battle all these years. But you're my right-hand bower! Don't fall down, don't fail!

  TOM [gently]: I try, Mother.

  AMANDA [with great enthusiasm]: Try and you will SUCCEED! [The notion makes her breathless] Why, you—you're just full of natural endowments! Both of my children—they're unusual children! Don't you think I know it? I'm so—proud! Happy and—feel I've—so much to be thankful for but—Promise me one thing, Son!

  TOM: What, Mother?

  AMANDA: Promise, Son, you'll—never be a drunkard!

  TOM [turns to her grinning]: I will never be a drunkard, Mother.

  AMANDA: That's what frightened me so, that you'd be drinking! Eat a bowl of Purina!

  TOM: Just coffee, Mother.

  AMANDA: Shredded wheat biscuit?

  TOM: No. No, Mother, just coffee.

  AMANDA: You can't put in a day's work on an empty stomach. You've got ten minutes—don't gulp! Drinking too hot liquids makes cancer of the stomach… Put cream in.

  TOM: No, thank you.

  AMANDA: To cool it.

  TOM: No! No, thank you, I want it black.

  AMANDA: I know, but it's not good for you. We have to do all that we can to build ourselves up. In these trying times we live in, all that we have to cling to is—each other.... That's why it's so important to—Tom, I—I sent out your sister so I could discuss something with you. If you hadn't spoken I would have spoken to you. [Sits down.]

  TOM [gently]: What is it, Mother, that you want to discuss?

  AMANDA: Laura!

  [Tom puts his cup down slowly.

  MUSIC: 'THE GLASS MENAGERIE']

  TOM: —Oh.—Laura...

  AMANDA [touching his sleeve]: You know how Laura is. So quiet but—still water runs deep! She notices things and I think she—broods about them. [Tom looks up.] A few days ago I came in and she was crying.

  TOM: What about?

  AMANDA: You.

  TOM: Me?

  AMANDA: She has an idea that you're not happy here.

  TOM: What gave her that idea?

  AMANDA: What gives her any idea? However, you do act strangely. I—I'm not criticizing, understand that! I know your ambitions do not lie in the warehouse, that like everybody in the whole wide world—you've had to—make sacrifices, but—Tom—Tom—life's not easy, it calls for—Spartan endurance! There's so many things in my heart that I cannot describe to you! I've never told you but I—loved your father....

  TOM [gently]: I know that, Mother.

  AMANDA: And you—when I see you taking after his ways! Staying out late—and—well, you had been drinking the night you were in that—terrifying condition! Laura says that you hate the apartment and that you go out nights to get away from it! Is that true, Tom?

  TOM: No. You say there's so much in your heart that you can't describe to me. That's true of me, too. There's so much in my heart that I can't describe to you! So let's respect each other's—

  AMANDA: But, why—why, Tom—are you always so restless? Where do you go to, nights?

  TOM: I—go to the movies.

  AMANDA: Why do you go to the movies so much, Tom?

  TOM: I go to the movies because—I like adventure. Adventure is something I don't have much of at work, so I go to the movies.

  AMANDA: But, Tom, you go to the movies entirely too much!

  TOM: I like a lot of adventure.

  [AMANDA looks baffled, then hurt. As the familiar inquisition resumes he becomes hard and impatient again. Amanda slips back into her querulous attitude towards him.]

  AMANDA: Most young men find adventure in their careers.

  TOM: Then most young men are not employed in a warehouse.

  AMANDA: The world is full of young men employed in warehouses and offices and factories.

  TOM: Do all of them find adventure in their careers?

  AMANDA: They do or they do without it! Not everybody has a craze for adventure.

  TOM: Man is by instinct a lover, a hunter, a fighter, and none of those instincts are given much play at the warehouse!

  AMANDA: Man is by instinct! Don't quote instinct to me! Instinct is something that people have got away from! It belongs to animals! Christian adults don't want it!

  TOM: What do Christian adults want, then, Mother?

  AMANDA: Superior things! Things of the mind and the spirit! Only animals have to satisfy instincts! Surely your aims are somewhat higher than theirs! Than monkeys—pigs.

  TOM: I reckon they're not.

  AMANDA: You're joking. However, that isn't what I wanted to discuss.

  TOM [rising]: I haven't much time.

  AMANDA [pushing his shoulders]: Sit down.

  TOM: You want me to punch in red at the warehouse, Mother?

  AMANDA: You have five minutes. I want to talk about Laura.

  TOM: All right! What about Laura?

  AMANDA: We have to be making some plans and provisions for her. She's older than you, two years, and nothing has happened. She just drifts along doing nothing. It frightens me terribly how she just drifts along.

  TOM: I guess she's the type that people call home girls.

  AMANDA: There's no such type, and if there is, it's a pity! That is unless the home is hers, with a husband!

  T
OM: What?

  AMANDA: Oh, I can see the handwriting on the wall as plain as I see the nose in front of my face! It's terrifying! More and more you remind me of your father! He was out all hours without explanation!—Then left! Good-bye! And me with the bag to hold. I saw that letter you got from the Merchant Marine. I know what you're dreaming of. I'm not standing here blindfolded.

  [She pauses.]

  Very well, then. Then, do it! But not till there's somebody to take your place.

  TOM: What do you mean?

  AMANDA: I mean that as soon as Laura has got somebody to take care of her, married, a home of her own, independent—why, then you'll be free to go wherever you please, on land, on sea, whichever way the wind blows you! But until that time you've got to look out for your sister. I don't say me because I'm old and don't matter - I say for your sister because she's young and dependent.

  I put her in business college—a dismal failure! Frightened her so it made her sick at the stomach. I took her over to the Young Peoples League at the church. Another fiasco. She spoke to nobody, nobody spoke to her. Now all she does is fool with those pieces of glass and play those worn-out records. What kind of a life is that for a girl to lead?

  TOM: What can I do about it?

  AMANDA: Overcome selfishness! Self, self, self is all that you ever think of!

  [Tom springs up and crosses to get his coat. It is ugly and bulky. He pulls on a cap with earmuffs.]

  Where is your muffler? Put your wool muffler on! [He snatches it angrily from the closet and tosses it around his neck and pulls both ends tight.] Tom! I haven't said what I had in mind to ask you.

  TOM: I'm too late to—

  AMANDA [catching his arm—very importunately. Then shyly]: Down at the warehouse, aren't there some—nice young men?

  TOM: No!

  AMANDA: There must be—some…

  TOM: Mother— [Gesture.]

  AMANDA: Find out one that's clean-living—doesn't drink and—ask him out for sister!

  TOM: What?

  AMANDA: For sister! To meet! Get acquainted!

  TOM [stamping to door]: Oh, my go-osh!

  AMANDA: Will you? [He opens door. Imploringly.] Will you? [He starts down.] Will you? Will you, dear?

  TOM [calling back]: YES!

  [Amanda closes the door hesitantly and with a troubled but faintly hopeful expression.

  Spotlight on Amanda at phone.]

  AMANDA: Ella Cartwright? This is Amanda Wingfield! How are you, honey?

  How is that kidney condition?

  [Count Five]

  Horrors!

  [Count five.]

  You're a Christian martyr, yes, honey, that's what you are, a Christian martyr!

  Well, I just now happened to notice in my little red book that your subscription to the Companion has just run out! I knew that you wouldn't want to miss out on the wonderful serial starting in this issue. It's by Bessie Mae Hopper, the first thing she's written since Honeymoon for Three.

  Wasn't that a strange and interesting story? Well, this one is even lovelier, I believe. It has a sophisticated, society background. It's all about the horsy set on Long Island!

  FADE OUT

  SCENE FIVE

  [It is early dusk on a spring evening. Supper has just been finished in the Wingfield apartment. Amanda and Laura in light-coloured dresses are removing dishes from the table, in the upstage area, which is shadowy, their movements formalized almost as a dance or ritual their moving forms as pale and silent as moths.

  Tom, in white shirt and trousers, rises from the table and crosses toward the fire-escape.]

  AMANDA [As he passes her]: Son, will you do me a favour?

  TOM: What?

  AMANDA: Comb your hair! You look so pretty when your hair is combed! [Tom slouches on the sofa with the evening paper. Its enormous headline reads: 'Franco Triumphs'.] There is only one respect in which I would like you to emulate your father.

  TOM: What respect is that?

  AMANDA: The care he always took of his appearance. He never allowed himself to look untidy. [He throws down the paper and crosses to fire-escape.] Where are you going?

  TOM: I'm going out to smoke.

  AMANDA: You smoke too much. A pack a day at fifteen cents a pack. How much would that amount to in a month? Thirty times fifteen is how much, Tom? Figure it out and you will be astounded at what you could save. Enough to give you a night-school course in accounting at Washington U! Just think what a wonderful thing that would be for you, Son!

  [Tom is unmoved by the thought.]

  TOM: I'd rather smoke. [He steps out on the landing letting the screen door slam.]

  AMANDA [sharply]: I know! That's the tragedy of it…. [Alone, she turns to look at her husband's picture.]

  [DANCE MUSIC: 'ALL THE WORLD IS WAITING FOR THE SUNRISE!']

  TOM [to the audience]: Across the alley from us was the Paradise Dance Hall. On evenings in spring the windows and doors were open and the music came outdoors. Sometimes the lights were turned out except for a large glass sphere that hung from the ceiling. It would turn slowly about and filter the dusk with delicate rainbow colours. Then the orchestra played a waltz or a tango, something that had a slow and sensuous rhythm. Couples would come outside, to the relative privacy of the alley. You could see them kissing behind ash-pits and telegraph poles.

  This was the compensation for lives that passed like mine, without any change or adventure.

  Adventure and change were imminent in this year. They were waiting around the corner for all these kids. Suspended in the mist over Berchtesgaden, caught in the folds of Chamberlain's umbrella—

  In Spain there was Guernica!

  But here there was only hot swing music and liquor, dance halls, ban, and movies, and sex that hung in the gloom like a chandelier and flooded the world with brief, deceptive rainbows....

  All the world was waiting for bombardments!

  [Amanda turns from the picture and comes outside.]

  AMANDA [sighing]: A fire-escape landing's a poor excuse for a porch. [She spreads a newspaper on a step and sits down, gracefully and demurely as if she were settling into a swing on a Mississippi veranda.] What are you looking at?

  TOM: The moon.

  AMANDA: Is there a moon this evening?

  TOM: It's rising over Garfinkel's Delicatessen.

  AMANDA: So it is! A little silver slipper of a moon. Have you made a wish on it yet?

  TOM: Um-hum.

  AMANDA: What did you wish for?

  TOM: That's a secret.

  AMANDA: A secret, huh? Well, I won't tell mine either. I will be just as mysterious as you.

  TOM: I bet I can guess what yours is.

  AMANDA: Is my head so transparent?

  TOM: You're not a sphinx.

  AMANDA: No, I don't have secrets. I'll tell you what I wished for on the moon. Success and happiness for my precious children! I wish for that whenever there's a moon, and when there isn't a moon, I wish for it, too.

  TOM: I thought perhaps you wished for a gentleman caller.

  AMANDA: Why do you say that?

  TOM: Don't you remember asking me to fetch one?

  AMANDA: I remember suggesting that it would be nice for your sister if you brought home some nice young man from the warehouse. I think that I've made that suggestion more than once.

  TOM: Yes, you have made it repeatedly.

  AMANDA: Well?

  TOM: We are going to have one.

  AMANDA: What?

  TOM: A gentleman caller!

  [THE ANNUNCIATION IS CELEBRATED WITH MUSIC. Amanda rises.]

  AMANDA: You mean you have asked some nice young man to come over?

  TOM: Yep. I've asked him to dinner.

  AMANDA: You really did?

  TOM: I did!

  AMANDA: You did, and did he—accept?

  TOM: He did!

  AMANDA: Well, well—well, well! That's—lovely!

  TOM: I thought that you would be pleased.

&n
bsp; AMANDA: It's definite, then?

  TOM: Very definite.

  AMANDA: Soon?

  TOM: Very soon.

  AMANDA: For heaven's sake, stop putting on and tell me some things, will you?

  TOM: What things do you want me to tell you?