The Books: “For Whom the Southern Belle Tolls” (Christopher Durang)

Next in my Daily Book Excerpt:

We now must leave Chekhov behind on the script shelf, and go to the next playwright: Christopher Durang!!

Christopher Durang Volume I: 27 Short Plays: some are obviously just glorified skits (not that there’s anything wrong with that) and others are meant to be full-on productions. Christopher Durang is a lunatic. He wrote a play called Laughing Wild (a 2-person play – that actually is being done on off-Broadway right now – starring Deborah Monk and Durang himself) which is so NUTS. At one climactic fantasy moment, the guy character emerges from backstage dressed as the Infant of Prague, and the female character suddenly transforms into Sally Jessy Raphael … and Raphael sets about to interview the Infant of Prague. It’s so RIDICULOUS, and so funny. Sally saying, “So, Infant of Prague, tell me …”

The first play of Durang’s I’ll excerpt is called For Whom the Southern Belle Tolls – and it is a parody of The Glass Menagerie.

In his introduction to the play, Durang writes:

Though I as a child always felt sympathy for Laura, as an adult I started to find Laura’s sensitivity frustrating. I mean, how hard was typing class really?

And though in my youth I found Laura’s interest in her glass animals to be sweet and otherwordly (with the appropriately perfect symbolism of her loving her glass unicorn best because it was different), now as an adult, I felt restless with her hobby. Did she actually spend hours and hours staring at them? Couldn’t she try to function in the world just a little bit? Why didn’t she go out bowling or make prank phone calls or get drunk on a good bottle of bourbon?

Anyway, I started to find Laura annoying and frustrating.

It’s out of this irritation with Laura’s sensitivity — a feeling greatly at odds with the Williams’ original — that I seem to have written this parody, For Whom the Southern Belle Tolls. (I say “seem” because I often say “seem” and because I approached writing this parody on impulse, unaware consciously of how my feelings toward the play had changed. Writing the parody was a way of playing with, and releasing, some of what I felt after seeing the play for what seemed like the 100th time.)

I’ll excerpt the opening scene.

EXCERPT FROM For Whom the Southern Belle Tolls, by Christopher Durang:

Enter Amanda, the Southern belle mother.

AMANDA. Rise and shine! Rise and shine! (calls off) Lawrence, honey, come on out here and let me have a look at you!

(Enter Lawrence, who limps across the room. In his 20s, he is very sensitive and is wearing what are clearly his dress clothes. Amanda fiddles with his bow tie and stands back to admire him.

AMANDA. Lawrence, honey, you look lovely.

LAWRENCE. No, I don’t, mama. I have a pimple on the back of my neck.

AMANDA. Don’t say the word “pimple”, honey, it’s common. Now your brother Tom is bringing home a girl from the warehouse for you to meet, and I want you to make a good impression, honey.

LAWRENCE. It upsets my stomach to meet people, mama.

AMANDA. Oh, Lawrence, honey, you’re so sensitive it makes me want to hit you.

LAWRENCE. I don’t need to meet people, mama. I’m happy just by myself, playing with my collection of glass cocktail stirrers. (Lawrence smiles wanly and limps over to a table on top of which sits a glass jar filled with glass swizzle sticks)

AMANDA. Lawrence, you are a caution. Only retarded people and alcoholics are interested in glass cocktail stirrers.

LAWRENCE. (with proud wonderment) Each one of them has a special name, mama. This one is called Stringbean because it’s long and thin. And this one is also called Stringbean because it’s long and thin. And this one is called Blue because it’s blue.

AMANDA. All my children have such imagination, why was I so blessed? Oh, Lawrence, honey, how are you going to get on in the world if you just stay home all day, year after year, playing with your collection of glass cocktail stirrers?

LAWRENCE. I don’t like the world, mama. I like it here in this room.

AMANDA. I know you do, honey, that’s part of your charm. Some days. But, honey, what about making a living?

LAWRENCE. I can’t work, mama. I’m crippled. (He limps over to the couch and sits)

AMANDA. (firmly) There is nothing wrong wtih your leg, Lawrence honey, all the doctors here have told you that. This limping thing is an affectation.

LAWRENCE. (perhaps a little steely) I only know how I feel, mama.

AMANDA. Oh if only I had connections in the Mafia, I’d have someone come and break both your legs.

LAWRENCE. Don’t try to make me laugh, mama. You know I have asthma.

AMANDA. Your asthma, your leg, your excema. You’re just a mess, Lawrence!

LAWRENCE. I have scabs from the itching, mama.

AMANDA. That’s lovely, Lawrence. You must tell us more over dinner.

LAWRENCE. Alright.

AMANDA. That was a joke, Lawrence.

LAWRENCE. Don’t try to make me laugh, mama. My asthma.

AMANDA. Now, Lawrence. I don’t want you talking about your ailments to the feminine caller your brother Tom is bringing home from the warehouse, honey. No nice-bred young lady likes to hear a young man discussing his excema, Lawrence.

LAWRENCE. What else can I talk about, mama?

AMANDA. Talk about the weather. Or Red China.

LAWRENCE. Or my collection of glass cocktail stirrers?

AMANDA. I suppose so, honey, if the conversation’s comes to some godawful standstill. Otherwise, I’d shut up about it. (Becomes coquettish, happy memories) Conversation is an art, Lawrence. Back at Blue Mountain, when I had seventeen gentlemen callers, I was able to converse with charm and vivacity for six hours without stop and never once mention eczema or bone cancer or vivisection. Try to emulate me, Lawrence, honey. Charm and vivacity. And charm. And vivacity. And charm.

LAWRENCE. Well, I’ll try, but I doubt it.

AMANDA. Me too, honey. But we’ll go through the motions anyway, won’t we?

LAWRENCE. I don’t know if i want to meet some girl who works in a warehouse, mama.

AMANDA. Your brother Tom says she’s a lovely girl with a nice personality. And where else does he meet girls except the few who work at the warehouse? He only seems to meet men at the movies. Your brother goes to the movies entirely too much. I must speak to him about it.

LAWRENCE. It’s unfeminine for a girl to work at a warehouse.

AMANDA. Now Lawrence — if you can’t go out the door without getting an upset stomach or an attack of vertigo, then we have got to find some nice girl who’s willing to support you. Otherwise, how am I ever going to get you out of this house and off my hands?

LAWRENCE. Why do you want to be rid of me, mama?

AMANDA. I suppose it’s unmotherly of me, dear, but you really get on my nerves. Limping around the apartment, pretending to have asthma. If only some nice girl would marry you and I knew you were taken care of, then I’d feel free to start to live again. I’d join Parents Without Partners, I’d go to dinner dances, I’d have a life again. Rather than just watch you mope about this stupid apartment. I’m not bitter, dear, it’s just that I hate my life.

LAWRENCE. I understand, mama.

AMANDA. Do you, dear? Oh, you’re cute. Oh, listen, I think I hear them.

TOM. (from offstage) Mother, I forgot my key.

LAWRENCE. I’ll be in the other room. (starts to limp away)

AMANDA. I want you to let them in, Lawrence.

LAWRENCE. I couldn’t, mama. She’d see I limp.

AMANDA. Then don’t limp, damn it.

TOM. (from off) Mother, are you there?

AMANDA. Just a minute, Tom, honey. Now, Lawrence, you march over to that door or I’m going to break all your swizzle sticks.

LAWRENCE. Mama, I can’t!

AMANDA. Lawrence, you are a grown boy. Now you answer that door like any normal person.

LAWRENCE. I can’t.

TOM. (from off) Mother, I’m going to break the door down in a minute.

AMANDA. Just be patience, Tom. Now you’re causing a scene, Lawrence. I want you to answer that door.

LAWRENCE. My eczema itches.

AMANDA. I’ll itch it for you in a second, Lawrence.

TOM. (from off) Alright, I’m breaking it down.

(Sound of door breaking down. Enter Tom and Ginny Bennett, a vivacious friendly girl dressed in either factory clothes, or else a simple, not-too-frilly blouse and slacks)

AMANDA. Oh Tom, you got in.

TOM. Why must we go through this every night??? You know the stupid fuck won’t open the door, so why don’t you let him alone about it? (to Ginny) My kid brother has a thing about answering doors. He thinks people will notice his limp and his asthma and his eczema.

LAWRENCE. Excuse me. I think I hear someone calling me in the other room. (Limps off, calls to imaginary person:) Coming! (Exits)