Brian Friel Plays 1

by Brian Friel

  (The PRESSMEN ask their questions with great rapidity:)

  O’KELLY: What portion of the Guildhall is occupied?

  OFFICER: The entire first floor.

  PRESSMAN 1: Is it true that there are women in there, too?

  OFFICER: Our information is that women are involved.

  PRESSMAN 2: Are they armed?

  OFFICER: Our information is that they have access to arms.

  PRESSMAN 2: They brought the arms with them or the arms are in there?

  OFFICER: We understand that arms are accessible to them.

  O’KELLY: What troops and equipment have you brought up?

  OFFICER: I cannot answer that.

  PRESSMAN 1: Have you been in touch with them?

  OFFICER: No.

  PRESSMAN 2: Are you going to get in touch with them?

  OFFICER: Perhaps.

  O’KELLY: Are you going to negotiate with them or are you going to go in after them?

  OFFICER: Sorry. That’s all I can say.

  O’KELLY: When are you going in after them?

  PRESSMAN 1: Is it a police or an army operation?

  OFFICER: Sorry.

  PRESSMAN 2: Why wasn’t the Guildhall guarded?

  O’KELLY: Who’s in charge of ground forces?

  PRESSMAN 1: Do you expect a reaction from the Bogside?

  OFFICER: Sorry, gentlemen.

  (He disappears. The PRESSMEN hurry off. MICHAEL gets to his feet.)

  MICHAEL: It was a big turn-out, wasn’t it?

  LILY: Terrible big.

  MICHAEL: And the speeches were good, too.

  LILY: I don’t care much for speeches. Isn’t that a shocking thing to say? I can’t concentrate – you know?

  MICHAEL: They’ll never learn, you know; never. All they had to do was sit back nice and quiet; let the speeches be made; let the crowd go home. There wouldn’t be no trouble of any kind. But they have to bull in. And d’you know what they’re doing? As a matter of fact they’re doing two things: they’re bringing more and more people out on the streets – that’s fine; but they’re also giving the hooligan element an excuse to retaliate – and that’s where the danger lies.

  LILY: (To SKINNER) It’s a hot whiskey you should be drinking.

  MICHAEL: I’ve been on every civil rights march from the very beginning – right from October 5th. And I can tell you there wasn’t the thousands then that there was the day. I’ve even went on civil rights marches that I was far from satisfied about the people that was running them; for as you know as well as me there’s a lot of strange characters knuckled in on the act that didn’t give a shite about real civil rights – if you’ll excuse me, Missus.

  LILY: Port wine’s gorgeous.

  MICHAEL: But as I say to Norah, the main thing is to keep a united front. The ultimate objectives we’re all striving for is more important than the personalities or the politics of the individuals concerned.

  SKINNER: At this point in time.

  MICHAEL: What’s that?

  SKINNER: And taking full cognizance of all relative facts.

  MICHAEL: What d’you mean?

  LILY: Who’s Norah, young fella?

  MICHAEL: The girl I’m engaged to.

  LILY: (To SKINNER) Ah! He’s engaged.

  (SKINNER raises his glass.)

  LILY: Congratulations.

  MICHAEL: Thanks.

  LILY: I wish you health, wealth and every happiness, young fella, and may no burden come your way that you’re not fit to carry.

  MICHAEL: Thank you.

  LILY: When are you getting married?

  MICHAEL: Easter.

  LILY: (To SKINNER) Easter! I was married at Easter – April 3rd – my seventeenth birthday. And we spent our honeymoon with the chairman’s Auntie Maggie and Uncle Ned in Preston, Lancashire, England, and we seen the docks and everything.

  MICHAEL: We’re getting married on Easter Tuesday.

  LILY: And where will you live?

  MICHAEL: We’ll live with my people till we get a place of our own.

  LILY: (To SKINNER) A place of their own!

  SKINNER: Leely, the language I speak a leetle too – yes?

  LILY: Norah’s a nice name. If the chairman had have had his way, we’d have had a Norah. But I always favoured a Noelle. She’s fourteen now. Between Tom and the twins. Born on a roasting August bank holiday Monday at 3.20 in the afternoon but I called her Noelle all the same.

  MICHAEL: (To SKINNER) How many would you say was there today?

  SKINNER: No idea.

  MICHAEL: Six thousand? More?

  (SKINNER shrugs indifferently. Rises and goes to the window where he looks out. LILY takes off her shoes.)

  MICHAEL: I’m getting pretty accurate at assessing a crowd and my estimate would be between six and six and a half. When the ones at the front were down at the Brandywell, the last of them were leaving the Creggan. I could see both ways ’cos I was in the middle. And the hooligan element kept well out of the way. It was a good, disciplined, responsible march. And that’s what we must show them – that we’re responsible and respectable; and they’ll come to respect what we’re campaigning for.

  LILY: D’you see them shoes? Five pounds in Woolworth’s and never a day’s content since I got them.

  MICHAEL: Do you go on all the marches, Lily?

  LILY: Most of them, It’s the only exercise I get.

  MICHAEL: Do you have the feeling they’re not as – I don’t know – as dignified as they used to be? Like, d’you remember in the early days, they wouldn’t let you carry a placard – wouldn’t even let you talk, for God’s sake. And that was really impressive – all those people marching along in silence, rich and poor, high and low, doctors, accountants, plumbers, teachers, bricklayers – all shoulder to shoulder – knowing that what they wanted was their rights and knowing that because it was their rights nothing in the world was going to stop them getting them.

  SKINNER: Shite – if you’ll excuse me, Missus. Who’s for more municipal booze?

  (He refills his own glass and LILY’s.)

  MICHAEL: What do you mean?

  LILY: That’s enough. Easy – easy.

  SKINNER: It’s coming off a fine broad back. Another whiskey, Mr Hegarty?

  MICHAEL: Are you for civil rights at all?

  SKINNER: Course I am. I’m crazy about them. A little drop?

  MICHAEL: Not for me.

  SKINNER: Just a nip?

  MICHAEL: I’m finished.

  SKINNER: Have a cigar.

  MICHAEL: No.

  SKINNER: A cigarette, then.

  MICHAEL: No.

  SKINNER: Or what about a shower under the golden fish?

  (LILY gives a great whoop of laughter.)

  LILY: Haaaaa! A shower! God but you’re a comic, young fella.

  (SKINNER lights a cigar and carries his glass to the phone.)

  MICHAEL: I see nothing funny in that.

  LILY: D’you see if it was a Sunday I’d take a shower myself. Sunday’s my day. We all have our days for bathing over at the granny’s – that’s the chairman’s mother. She has us all up on a time-table on the kitchen wall, and if you miss your night you lose your turn.

  SKINNER: (Phone) Hello? Could you tell me what won the 3.30?

  LILY: (To MICHAEL) D’you see the granny, young fella? Seventy-seven years of age. Lives alone. Supple as an aul cat. Her own teeth, her own eyes. And she still does twenty houses a week – you know – cleaning them down; and me that could be her daughter, I can never manage more nor fifteen.

  (SKINNER hangs up.)

  SKINNER: Bingo Mistress at eights. Which leaves me slightly ahead of the millionaire bookie.

  LILY: I’d know by the look of you.

  (SKINNER dials again. LILY continues to MICHAEL.)

  LILY: Most of them she’s been doing for years, and they think the world of her; you know – dentists and solicitors and doctors and all. Very swanky. And the wanes in them houses – they visit her and
all – they have a sort of pet name on her – they call her Auntie Dodie. Wouldn’t it make you puke? I’ll tell you something, young fella: them class of people’s a very poor judge of character.

  SKINNER: (Phone) Jackie? Yes, it’s me. No, as a matter of fact I’m stripped to the waist and drinking brandy in the Mayor’s parlour. (To LILY and MICHAEL) He’s killing himself laughing! (Into phone) Look, Jack, would you put half-a-note on Bunny Rabbit in the 4.30? Decent man. See you tonight. Bye.

  LILY: I’m glad you’ve a nice cushy career.

  SKINNER: It’s not all sunshine, Lily.

  LILY: D’you bet heavy?

  SKINNER: When I have it.

  LILY: That’ll be often. What do they call you, young fella?

  SKINNER: Skinner.

  LILY: Mr Skinner or Skinner what?

  SKINNER: Just Skinner.

  LILY: Would you be anything to Paddy Skinner that used to keep the goats behind the Mormon chapel?

  SKINNER: Both my parents died when I was a baby. I was reared by an aunt. Next question?

  LILY: Lord, I’m sorry, son. (To MICHAEL) Both his parents! Shocking. ‘Life is not a bed of roses. Sorrow is our daily lot.’ (Suddenly bright) But I’ll bet you’re musical like all the others.

  SKINNER: Who?

  LILY: Sure it’s well known that all wee orphans is always musical. Orphans can play instruments before they can talk. There was the poor wee Mulherns opposite us – the father and mother both submitted to TB within three days of other – and when you’d pass that house at night – the music coming out of it – honest to God you’d think it was the Palais de Danse. And sure look at the Nazareth House Ceilidhe Band – thumping away at concerts all over the world – trained armies couldn’t stop them. Sure the poor nuns can’t get quiet to say their prayers.

  (SKINNER turns on the radio.)

  SKINNER: I can play the radio, Lily.

  (Waltz music on the radio.)

  LILY: What’s that?

  SKINNER: Four ways – loud and soft and off and on. Can you?

  LILY: Oh, you’re great.

  SKINNER: And I play the horses and the dogs.

  LILY: You’re brilliant.

  SKINNER: Thanks.

  LILY: Are you working?

  SKINNER: No.

  LILY: Did you ever work?

  SKINNER: For a while when I was at grammar school – before they kicked me out.

  LILY: What did you ever do since?

  SKINNER: Three years ago I did some potato picking.

  LILY: (To MICHAEL) He has a long memory.

  SKINNER: And last August I was a conductor on the buses.

  LILY: But travel didn’t agree with you.

  SKINNER: Listen, Lily – isn’t that the BBC Orphans’ Orchestra?

  LILY: I’ll tell you something – you never had to study glibness. Oh, nothing sharpens the wits like idleness. (To MICHAEL.) You stick to your books, son. That’s what I say to our boys.

  SKINNER: I’ll bet you the chairman’s glib, Lily.

  LILY: The chairman never worked on account of his health.

  (SKINNER sings with the radio and does a parody-waltz off and into the dressing-room.)

  SKINNER: 1 – 2 – 3; 1 – 2 – 3; 1 – 2 – 3; 1 – 2 – 3.

  LILY: (Calls) And he has more brains than you and a dozen like you put together! Brat! Put that thing out!

  (MICHAEL switches radio off.)

  LILY: Cheeky young brat, that Skinner! Easy seen he never had no mother to tan his backside.

  MICHAEL: Was he on the march at all?

  LILY: Who?

  MICHAEL: Skinner.

  LILY: How would I know?

  MICHAEL: My suspicion is he just turned up for the meeting.

  LILY: The chairman worked for a full year after we married. In Thompson’s foundry. But the fumes destroyed the tissues of his lungs. D’you think he likes sitting at the fire all day, reading the wanes’ comics?

  MICHAEL: That Skinner’s a trouble-maker.

  LILY: But for all he got no education he’s a damn-sight smarter nor that buck.

  MICHAEL: That’s what I was talking about earlier, Lily. Characters like that need watching.

  LILY: Who?

  MICHAEL: Him.

  LILY: What about him?

  MICHAEL: I have a feeling about him. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was a revolutionary.

  LILY: What do they call you again, young fella?

  MICHAEL: Michael.

  LILY: Michael’s a nice name. I have a Michael. He’ll be eight next October. You stick to your books, son.

  MICHAEL: We’ll watch him, Lily. I’m uneasy about that fella.

  (DODDS enters.)

  DODDS: If you are born into the subculture of poverty, what do you inherit? Well, you inherit an economic condition, and you inherit a social and psychological condition. The economic characteristics include wretched housing, a constant struggle for survival, a chronic shortage of cash, persistent unemployment and very often real hunger or at least malnutrition. And of course the economic environment conditions the psychological and social man so that he constantly feels inferior, marginal, helpless, dependent. Another inheritance is his inability to control impulse: he is present-time orientated and seldom defers gratification, never plans for the future, and endures his here and now with resignation and frustration. The reason for this sense of defeat is the existence of a set of values in the dominant class which stresses the accumulation of wealth and property, the desirability of ‘improvement’ and explains the low economic status of the poor as a result of their personal shiftlessness and inadequacy.

  (The JUDGE appears in the battlements and BRIGADIER JOHNSON-HANSBURY enters right, DODDS does not move.)

  JUDGE: Brigadier Johnson-Hansbury, you were in charge of security on that day.

  BRIGADIER: That is correct, my lord.

  JUDGE: Could you tell us what strength was at your disposal?

  BRIGADIER: The 8th Infantry Brigade, 1st Battalion Parachute Regiment, 1st Battalion King’s Own Border Regiment, two companies of the 3rd Battalion Royal Regiment of Fusiliers.

  JUDGE: And equipment?

  BRIGADIER: Twelve Saracens, ten Saladins, two dozen Ferrets and four water-cannons, and a modicum of air-cover.

  JUDGE: And the Royal Ulster Constabulary and the Ulster Defence Regiment?

  BRIGADIER: They were present, my lord.

  JUDGE: Under your command?

  BRIGADIER: As a civilian authority.

  JUDGE: Under your command?

  BRIGADIER: Under my command.

  JUDGE: I’m an old army man myself, Brigadier, and it does seem a rather formidable array to line up against three terrorists, however well armed they could have been.

  BRIGADIER: At that point we had no idea how many gunmen were inside the Guildhall. Our first reports indicated forty.

  JUDGE: But those reports were inaccurate.

  BRIGADIER: They were, my lord. But I would like to point out that we were in an exposed position between the terrorists inside the Guildhall and the no-go Bogside areas at our flank and back.

  JUDGE: I see. And you, personally, gave the command over the loudhailer to the terrorists inside to surrender?

  BRIGADIER: I did, my lord. On two occasions.

  JUDGE: And approximately ten minutes after the second occasion, they emerged?

  BRIGADIER: That is correct.

  JUDGE: Brigadier, a persistent suggestion keeps cropping up in the various reports about the events of that day and indeed it was voiced strenuously by counsel for the deceased within these very walls, and I would like to have your reaction to it. The suggestion is that no attempt was made to arrest these people as they emerged, but that they were dealt with ‘punitively’, as it has been phrased, ‘to teach the ghettos a lesson’.

  BRIGADIER: My lord, they emerged firing from the Guildhall. There was no possibility whatever of effecting an arrest operation. And at that point we understood they were the advance group of a
much larger force.

  JUDGE: So you dismiss the suggestion?

  BRIGADIER: Completely, my lord.

  JUDGE: And an arrest was not attempted?

  BRIGADIER: Because it wasn’t possible in the circumstances.

  JUDGE: And had you known, as you learned later, Brigadier, that there were only three terrorists involved, would you have acted differently?

  BRIGADIER: My orders would have been the same, my lord.

  JUDGE: Thank you, Brigadier.

  (The JUDGE disappears. BRIGADIER JOHNSON-HANSBURY goes off right.)

  DODDS: Middle-class people – with deference, people like you and me – we tend to concentrate on the negative aspects of the culture of poverty. We tend to associate negative values to such traits as present-time orientation, and concrete versus abstract orientation. Now, I don’t want to idealize or romanticize the culture of poverty; as someone has said, ‘It’s easier to praise poverty than to live in it.’ But there are some positive aspects which we cannot overlook completely. Present-orientated living, for example, may sharpen one’s attitude for spontaneity and for excitement, for the appreciation of the sensual, for the indulgence of impulse; and these aptitudes are often blunted or muted in people like us who are middle-class and future-orientated. So that to live in the culture of poverty is, in a sense, to live with the reality of the moment – in other words to practise a sort of existentialism. The result is that people with a culture of poverty suffer much less from repression than we of the middle-class suffer and indeed, if I may make the suggestion with due qualification, they often have a hell of a lot more fun than we have.

  (DODDS goes off left. The dressing-room door is flung open. SKINNER is dressed in splendid mayoral robe and chain and wears an enormous ceremonial hat jauntily on his head. At the door:)

  SKINNER: ‘You’re much deceived; in nothing am I changed/But in my garments!’

  (He comes into the parlour carrying robes and head-gear for the other two. LILY gives one of her whoops.)

  LILY: O Jesus, Mary and Joseph!