by Sarah Ruhl
SHE
Oh, my husband.
How did you ever become a banker. You’re more like a poet.
HARRISON
I’m good with numbers.
A silence.
Harrison touches her face.
They almost kiss.
HE
Sorry to interrupt.
That was intimate. That was nice. I envy you.
I spoke with your daughter.
She misses you.
You two made a lovely thing.
I’m here to do a non-false exit.
SHE
What?
HE
A good-bye. A real one.
He goes to her. He kisses her on the hair, gently.
HE
Sorry.
SHE
Sorry.
A silence.
HE
Good-bye.
SHE
Good-bye.
He exits and does not look back.
A glorious man, a grown-up man.
They watch him go.
SHE
(To her husband) Hello.
HARRISON
Hello.
He pokes his head back in.
HE
How was that?
SHE
It was good.
HE
So: the end?
SHE
The end.
HE
The end.
They nod at each other.
He turns to go.
She and Harrison turn toward each other.
They inch toward one another, like plants to the light.
They kiss. A kiss that is as simple as it is real.
The lights go out.
The end.
Acknowledgments
“I don’t mind hiding in a bedroom but hiding in a library seems kind of dry,” on page 26, is a quote from No Time for Comedy by S. N. Behrman. Thanks to the Rodgers & Hammerstein estate for permission to use a quote from “Some Enchanted Evening.” Much gratitude to all the divine and generous actors who helped me work on this play in living rooms, rehearsal halls and theaters, in alphabetical order: Todd Almond, Clea Alsip, Jenny Bacon, David Aaron Baker, Bob Balaban, Alec Baldwin, Jeffrey Carlson, Michael Cerveris, Michael Chernuss, Michael Cyril Creighton, Erica Elam, Dominic Fumusa, Emma Galvin, Jessica Hecht, Scott Jaeck, Danny Jenkins, Patrick Kerr, Ross Lehman, Cristin Milioti, Mark Montgomery, Mary-Louise Parker, Bray Poor and Sarah Tolan-Mee. Much gratitude to Bob Falls, Tim Sanford, Stuart Thompson, Adam Greenfield, André Bishop, Daniel Swee, Alaine Alldaffer, Bruce Ostler and Tanya Palmer. Love and thanks to Jessica Thebus and Rebecca Taichman. Thanks to the McCarter Theatre for having me to the Palmer House where I wrote much of Act One. Thank you dear Tony, Anna, Hope and William. This play is a love note to actors and, as such, I must thank my mother, who took me to the theater when I was a child and made me fall in love with it. “You’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din.”
COURTESY OF THE JOHN D. AND CATHERINE T. MACARTHUR FOUNDATION
SARAH RUHL’s plays include The Oldest Boy, In the Next Room or the vibrator play (Pulitzer Prize finalist, Tony Award nominee, Best Play); The Clean House (Pulitzer Prize finalist, Susan Smith Blackburn Prize); Passion Play, a cycle (Pen American Award, The Fourth Freedom Forum Playwriting Award from The Kennedy Center); Dead Man’s Cell Phone (Helen Hayes Award); Melancholy Play; Eurydice; Orlando; Demeter in the City (NAACP nomination); Late: a cowboy song and Dear Elizabeth. Her plays have been produced on Broadway at the Lyceum Theatre by Lincoln Center; Off-Broadway at Playwrights Horizons, Second Stage and Lincoln Center’s Mitzi Newhouse Theater. They have also been produced across the country, often premiering at Yale Repertory Theatre, Berkeley Repertory Theatre and the Goodman. Originally from Chicago, Ms. Ruhl received her MFA from Brown University where she studied with Paula Vogel. In 2003, she was the recipient of the Helen Merrill Emerging Playwrights Award and the Whiting Writers’ Award. She was a member of 13P and of New Dramatists and was awarded the MacArthur Fellowship in 2006. Her book of essays 100 Essays I Don’t Have Time to Write (Faber and Faber) was published this fall. You can read more about her work on www.SarahRuhlplaywright.com. She teaches playwriting at the Yale School of Drama, and she lives in Brooklyn with her family.
