Next in my Daily Book Excerpt:
Next on my script shelf:
I’m in Tennessee Williams land now, and will be there for quite some time! I am having such a great time re-acquainting myself with all of his plays.
Next Tennessee Williams play on the shelf is Camino Real
Camino Real opened on Broadway in 1953 and completely baffled critics and audiences. Nothing Williams had done up to that point prepared anyone for this departure. It was not a success. Camino Real pre-dates the experimental theatre of the 1960s by over 10 years. His fantastical psychedelic poetic-repetition non-literary play would become all the rage in a mere decade. But in the 1950s, at the height of kitchen-sink realism, it did not find its audience.
However Williams has had the last laugh. Camino Real has ended up withstanding the test of time. The world was ready for such theatrical experiments 10 years later, and now – we’re all pretty much used to seeing non-linear deconstructed theatre pieces. It might not be everyone’s cup of tea – but at least we know WHAT IT IS.
Camino Real is actually one of my favorites of his (I know I keep saying that, but so be it) – I like to read it not as a play, but as a long poem. It has that feeling to it.
It also contains what is my favorite Tennessee Williams line in all of his plays. I’ve had dark times when literally this line was a shining candle in the darkness. I held onto it. I have it written on a piece of paper and it’s stuck up on my closet door. It means that much to me.
In the play it is said by Byron (yes – THAT Byron):
“Make voyages. Attempt them. There’s nothing else.”
My relationship to those simple words has changed over the years … sometimes I cling to the “make voyages” part – and all the wisdom seems to be in THAT part of the line – sometimes all I can do is cling to the “attempt them” part … and then there are other times when all I can really relate to is the “there’s nothing else” part. Taken all together, it is as simple and deep a truth as you can get. It’s the meaning of life. To me, anyway. That’s IT. That’s what it is all about.
It’s not about a feeling, or an emotion, or a philosophy. It’s about taking action.
Make voyages. Attempt them. There’s nothing else.
Still has the power to stop my breath in my throat.
So – briefly – here is the “plot” of Camino Real. In this play, the “Camino Real” is the “end of the road”. Literally, and metaphorically. It’s the end of the actual road … and also, it’s where people go to die. Many of them fight this knowledge. Surrounding the small outpost is forbidding desert. There is no escape. There is definitely the feel of a powerful STATE in the play … vaguely totalitarian … human beings ground to dust in the wheels of the state …
And gathered at this end of the road is a motley crew of characters – some you would recognize – others are brand-new. For example: Don Quixote arrives. Dazed, raggedy, still journeying … Casanova is held up there – he is known as Jacques – and he has now pretty much gone to seed – the sad lover growing old … Byron is there, flamboyant, bombastic, filled with yearning … All of these kind of iconic characters are hanging out at this dusty frontier town – waiting to either die or escape.
Into this hopeless mix comes an American, named Kilroy.
He was played by Eli Wallach. It’s a tremendous part – any actor would be lucky to have such a part. He doesn’t “get” what Camino Real is – he doesn’t accept the “rules” of the place – that it is “the end” …
By the end of the play – miraculously – there is some hope. The fountain in the square starts gushing water again – a symbol of plenty, nourishment, life … people start to wake out of their haze … start to be able to connect again.
That’s what it’s all about for Tennessee Williams: loneliness. And the possibility, the heart-breaking possibility of human connection. Like Blanche DuBois’ most famous line: “I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.” That’s it. In a nutshell.
So. The scene I will excerpt here is between Casanova (known as Jacques) and Marguerite (who was once known as Camille). They are two aging courtesans … they are two people who trafficked in sex when they were young and were able to … but now? It’s not so easy. It’s a desperate connection they make, grasping, frightened – Marguerite is on the edge – she has become a faded ghost of herself –
At one point, a plane arrives. It is called “Fugitivo”. It is reminiscent of the one plane out of Casablanca in the movie. The plane lands, and chaos explodes, everyone trying to get on it at once. No one has money. People are desperate. It is a mob scene. People run about, flinging coins at the soldiers, who say: “Only this kind of currency – not that kind …” People flinging their jewelry at the guards … “Please! I beg you! Take my jewels and let me on that plane!”
Marguerite tries desperately to get on that plane – she begs, she screams – it’s a very difficult scene to read … They will not take her jewels – and then – with her screaming at the edge of the stage, screaming in agony – you can hear the plane take off.
There will not be another plane for years to come. It was her last chance.
She is near collapse. Casanova comes to her aid, helping her cross the street – she can barely stand.
Marguerite then has what is, arguably, the most important monologue in the entire show. It’s the theme. All in one place.
Anyway. Just go with it. The play is really meant to be seen and experienced – not read. Tennessee Williams never really wrote anything in this vein again. He was WAY ahead of his time.
I also love this because the cast list is like a who’s who of the Actors Studio. I have now met many of those people – and of course now they are, for the most part, ancient. Vivien Nathan – Mike Gazzo was in this – who a couple of years later would write Hat Full of Rain AT the Studio, through improvisation … Jo Van Fleet … Martin Balsam … In fact, I dated the son of one of the actors who was in the original production of Camino Real. Strange. Of course, the guy I dated wasn’t even born in 1953 … but the man who eventually would be his father was acting on Broadway throughout the 40s and 40s. I know his father now as an old man with a hearing aid. (Still sharp, still with it, teaching acting, etc.) But there he was back then, on Broadway in the 1950s, young, vital, surrounded by all that talent – so awesome!
EXCERPT FROM Camino Real
MARGUERITE. Lost! Lost! Lost! Lost!
[She is still clinging brokenly to the railing of the steps. Jacques descends to her and helps her back up the steps.]
JACQUES. Lean against me, cara. Breathe quietly, now.
MARGUERITE. Lost!
JACQUES. Breathe quietly, quietly, and look up at the sky.
MARGUERITE. Lost …
JACQUES. These tropical nights are so clear. There’s the Southern Cross. Do you see the Southern Cross, Marguerite? [He points through the proscenium. They are now on the bench before the fountain; she is resting in his arms] And there, over there, is Orion, like a fat, golden fish swimming north in the deep clear water, and we are together, breathing quietly together, leaning together, quietly, quietly together, completely, sweetly together, not frightened, now, not alone, but completely quietly together … [Lady Madrecita, led into the center of the plaza by her son, has begun to sing very softly; the reddish flares dim out and the smoke disappears] All of us have a desperate bird in our hearts, a memory of — some distant mother with — wings …
MARGUERITE. I would have — left — without you …
JACQUES. I know, I know!
MARGUERITE. Then how can you — still — ?
JACQUES. Hold you? [Marguerite nods slightly] Because you’ve taught me that part of love which is tender. I never knew it before. Oh, I had — mistresses that circled me like moons! I scrambled from one bed chamber to another bed chamber with shirttails always aflame, from girl to girl, like buckets of coal oil poured on a conflagration! But never loved until now with the part of love that’s tender …
MARGUERITE. — We’re used to each other. That’s what you think is love … You’d better leave me now, you’d better go and let me go because there’s a cold wind blowing out of the mountains and over the desert and into my heart, and if you stay with me now, I’ll say cruel things, I’ll wound your vanity, I’ll taunt you with the decline of your male vigor!
JACQUES. Why does disappointment make people unkind to each other?
MARGUERITE. Each of us is very much alone.
JACQUES. Only if we distrust each other.
MARGUERITE. We have to distrust each other. It is our only defense against betrayal.
JACQUES. I think our defense is love.
MARGUERITE. Oh Jacques, we’re used to each other, we’re a pair of captive hawks caught in the same cage, and so we’ve grown used to each other. That’s what passes for love at this dim, shadowy end of the Camino Real … What are we sure of? Not even of our existence, dear comforting friend! And whom can we ask the questions that torment us? “What is this place?” “Where are we?” — a fat old man who gives sly hints that only bewilder us more, a fake of a Gypsy squinting at cards and tea leaves. What else are we offered? The never-broken procession of little events that assure us that we and strangers about us are still going on! Where? Why? and the perch that we hold is unstable! We’re threatend with eviction, for this is a port of entry and departure, there are no permanent guests! And where else have we to go when we leave here? Bide-a-While? “Ritz Men Only”? Or under that ominous arch into Terra Incognita? We’re lonely. We’re frightened. We hear the Streetcleaners’ piping not far away. So now and then, although we’ve wounded each other time and again — we stretch out hands to each other in the dark that we can’t escape from — we huddle together for some dim-communal comfort — and that’s what passes for love on this terminal stretch of the road that used to be royal. What is it, this feeling between us? When you feel my exhausted weight against your shoulder — when I clasp your anxious old hawk’s head to my breast, what is it we feel in whatever is left of our hearts? Something, yes, something — delicate, unreal, bloodless! The sort of violets that could grow on the moon, or in the crevices of those far away mountains, fertilized by the droppings of carrion birds. Those birds are familiar to us. Their shadows inhabit the plaza. I’ve heard them flapping their wings like old charwomen beating worn-out carpets with grey brooms … But tenderness, the violets in the mountains — can’t break the rocks!
JACQUES. The violets in the mountains can break the rocks if you believe in them and allow them to grow!
[The plaza has resumed its usual aspect. Abdullah enters through one of the downstage arches]
ABDULLAH. Get your carnival hats and noisemakers here! Tonight the moon will restore the virginity of my sister!
MARGUERITE. [almost tenderly touching his face] Don’t you know that tonight I am going to betray you?
JACQUES. — Why would you do that?
MARGUERITE. Because I’ve outlived the tenderness of my heart.
