The Books: “The Night of the Iguana” (Tennessee Williams)

Next in my Daily Book Excerpt:
Next on the script shelf:

NightOfIguana.jpgNext Tennessee Williams play on the shelf is The Night of the Iguana, included in The Theatre of Tennessee Williams, Vol. 4: Sweet Bird of Youth / Period of Adjustment / The Night of the Iguana, by Tennessee Williams.

With Night of the Iguana, produced on Broadway in 1961, Williams is back in familiar territory – after his strange departure TO THE SUBURBS the year before.

Night of the Iguana is a powerful feckin’ play, and, I believe, one of Williams’ best. It has a hallucinatory quality – everyone is on the edge – everyone is at the end of their ropes … and, like all of his great plays, the setting is a character in the play. You can’t imagine Streetcar in any other city but New Orleans – because Williams makes New Orleans part of the entire ambience. Night of the Iguana was Williams’ last commercial and critical success. He kept writing until the end of his life – he died in 1981 – but he never was as embraced again. Many critics see this as one of his most important plays, as well as one of his most personal. A lot of critics, though, didn’t like it, and still don’t – they argue over what the iguana symbolizes – they dislike the play’s lack of form. One critic for Time wrote (and I happen to agree with this statement, which is why I post it): ”Purists of the craft may object that, strictly speaking, The Night of the Iguana does not go anywhere. In the deepest sense, it does not need to. It is already there, at the moving, tormented heart of the human condition.”

Absolutely. It is THERE.

I think this is one of his best. It’s hypnotic. I’ve read it a gazillion times, and am always discovering new things.

I would imagine that this play is nearly impossible to do well. I’ve actually never seen a production of it, and I would like to – because there are so many elements in it which MUST occur – and which, to put it mildly, could drive any production designer to distraction.

A couple of the things that have to happen:

— there needs to be a heavy rainfall, on stage. The rain has to be lit up by the moonlight so it looks like a sheer silver curtain. Good luck, production designer.

— there has to be a live iguana on stage. It has to break free of its captors and run around the stage … and then it has to be caught and tied up.

Not to mention the acting challenges. I think the lead male – the Reverend Shannon – has to be one of Williams’ most difficult parts. I cannot imagine an actor pulling it off. There is so much going on, so many layers – and he has to be riiiiiiight on the verge of a mental crackup – on the verge but not there yet … and he’s weaning himself from alcohol, and he also is haunted by a spooky mask of death (that he calls “the spook”) – he climbs into bed and it’s there, he lies on the hammock and it’s above him – There are so many more layers, too – and all of them have to be going on simultaneously. You can’t just play “oooh, I’m haunted by the spook” on the lines where you say, “The spook is with me again”. Or, you can, but that’s bad acting. Shannon is haunted by the spook AT ALL TIMES … whether he references it or not. He is shaking from withdrawal from alcohol AT ALL TIMES … whether he discusses his “thirst” or not. It’s a lot of balls to keep in the air. The Reverend Shannon is a great great character – one of Williams’ best.

One of the lead females, Maxine Faulk, was played by Bette Davis in the original production – and it sounds like it was almost written for her, tailored to her natural tendencies. She has a habit of barking out a laugh at random moments: “Hah!” And listen to Tennessee’s description of her: “She is a stout swarthy woman in her middle forties — affable and rapaciously lusty … Maxine always laughs with a harsh, loud bark, opening her mouth like a seal expecting a fish to be thrown to it”. It’s an amazing role for her. Would love to have seen it.

Plot:

It takes place on top of a jungle-covered mountain in Mexico. It’s 1940. So World War II is going on. Maxine Faulk runs an inn on top of this mountain – with the jungle pretty much encroaching onto her property on a daily basis. Her husband died a week before the play begins. She had a deep respect for him, but they did not have a sexual relationship – and she’s a lusty woman, and that didn’t work for her. She goes skinny-dipping with the young Mexican boys who are her kitchen staff.

The only people staying at her inn are a group of Germans – who constantly listen to the radio, listen to the accounts of London in flames, and then cheer happily for their Fuhrer. They are meant to be psychedelic presences – they are not realistic. They troop behind in the background of other scenes, singing marching songs, all wearing bathing suits, and holding huge rubber horses – on their way down to the beach. Bizarre. Nazis on the run. They speak solely in German and occasionally you hear the words “Goering” or “Fuhrer” – Everyone else pretty much ignores them.

Reverend Shannon, someone who goes a long way back with Maxine, arrives at the top of the mountain at the very beginning of the play. He is a de-frocked priest who now runs tours through Mexico. But the company who hired him is always extremely upset with him, because instead of taking the little church groups he is in charge of to see the tourist sites – he drags them into the poverty-struck areas, makes them eat the local food, they all get dysentery … And there is also the small problem that he has a penchant for seducing the youngest girl on every tour. He likes teenage girls. Which is, of course, why he is DE-frocked priest. There’s also a little problem that he despises God. He despises God and he loves teenage girls. Not a good mix for a priest. He’s also a raging alcoholic, and has had multiple nervous breakdowns. He’s in the middle of one when he arrives at the top of the mountain. He and Maxine go way back … he comes to her place whenever he needs to “relax” – which means lie in a hammock and drink rum, and have no responsibilities. Sadly, though, he is in the middle of conducting a tour – and he forces the busload of Baptist women to sit at the bottom of the mountain while he climbs up it to go see his friend. He has kept the ignition key in his pocket. He is insisting that the entire tour stay at Maxine’s inn for the next couple of days. This causes a huge brou-haha – because Maxine’s inn is primitive. It’s not in a city. It’s bug-infested. Also; the Reverend Shannon seduced the youngest girl on the tour bus, as always – a 17 year old music prodigy traveling with her stuffy Baptist music teacher. So basically Shannon is in big BIG trouble. Add on to this the fact that he is constantly haunted by a grinning face of death … and you’ve got a man on the edge of an abyss.

Maxine, in her own way, has a thing for Shannon. She pretty much wants him to stay on at her inn, lie in her hammock, and fuck her. She needs sex. She knows that he is a sex-pot (although of course consumed with guilt about it … also, she is about 25 years too old for him – but she figures that he is a desperate man, and will take what he can get). He arrives – in a state of panic and frenzy – you can hear the shouts of the pissed-off tourists at the bottom of the mountain – he’s out of his mind … Maxine just laughs her big laugh, and keeps trying to make him drink. “Have a rum coco …” He keeps refusing.

Two other people arrive … looking for lodgings … a 40 year old spinster named Hannah and her ancient deathly-ill grandfather, called Nonno. The two of them are basically hustlers – with a genteel edge. They travel the world and hustle people out of their money. Hannah is a watercolorist. She will set herself up in some chi-chi restaurant, or square, or cafe – and paint people for money. And Nonno was once a minor poet 15 years before. He is now on the verge of death … is losing his sight, can’t see, is losing his memory … and every night he dictates lines of what he says will be “his last poem” to his granddaughter. He has been working on the same poem for 15 years.

Hannah is a professional virgin. Chaste. But not innocent. She knows how to get what she needs. She knows her grandfather will never leave Maxine’s mountaintop. He is going to die. She doesn’t have the money to pay the bill – and Maxine is less than friendly to her – mainly because from the moment they met, Hannah and Shannon felt connected to one another. They’ve never met before … but there is immediately some deep strain of sympathy between the two characters and Maxine will have NONE of that. Shannon will be HERS or NO ONE’S.

I’ll excerpt the scene where Maxine pretty much lays down the law with Hannah. See if you can hear Bette Davis saying Maxine’s lines. I know I can.


EXCERPT FROM The Night of the Iguana, included in The Theatre of Tennessee Williams, Vol. 4: Sweet Bird of Youth / Period of Adjustment / The Night of the Iguana, by Tennessee Williams

[Maxine has pushed one of those gay little brass and glass liquor carts around the corner of the verandah. It is laden with an ice bucket, coconuts and a variety of liquors. She hums gaily to herself as she pushes the cart close to the table]

MAXINE. Cocktails, anybody?

HANNAH. No, thank you, Mrs. Faulk, I don’t think we care for any.

SHANNON. People don’t drink cocktails between the fish and the entree, Maxine honey.

MAXINE. Grampa needs a toddy to wake him up. Old folks need a toddy to pick ’em up. [She shouts into the old man’s ear] Grampa! How about a toddy? [Her hips are thrust out at Shannon]

SHANNON. Maxine, your ass — excuse me, Miss Jelkes — your hips, Maxine, are too fat for this veranda.

MAXINE. Hah! Mexicans like ’em, if I can judge by the pokes and pinches I get in the busses to town. And so do the Germans. Ev’ry time I go near Herr Fahrenkopf he gives me a pinch or a goose.

SHANNON. Then go near him again for another goose.

MAXINE. Hah! I’m mixing Grampa a Manhattan with two cherries in it so he’ll live through dinner.

SHANNON. Go on back to your Nazis, I’ll mix the Manhattan for him. [He goes to the liquor cart]

MAXINE. [to Hannah] How about you, honey, a little soda with lime juice?

HANNAH. Nothing for me, thank you.

SHANNON. Don’t make nervous people more nervous, Maxine.

MAXINE. You better let me mix that toddy for Grampa, you’re making a mess of it, Shannon.

[With a snort of fury, he thrusts the liquor cart like a battering ram at her belly. Some of the bottles fall off it; she thrusts it right back at him]

HANNAH. Mrs. Faulk, Mr. Shannon, this is childish, please stop it!

[The Germans are attracted by the disturbance. They cluster around, laughing delightedly. Shannon and Maxine seize opposite ends of the rolling liquor cart and thrust it toward each other, both grinning fiercely as gladiators in mortal combat. The GHermans shriek with laughter and chatter in German]

HANNAH. Mr. Shannon, stop it! [She appeals to the Germans] Bitte! Nehmen Sie die Spirtuosen weg. Bitte, nehmen Sie die weg.

[Shannon has wrested the cart from Maxine and pushed it at the Germans. They scream delightedly. The cart crashes into the wall of the verandah. Shannon leaps down the steps and runs into the foliage. Birds scream in the rain forest. Then sudden quiet returns to the verandah as the Germans go back to their own table]

MAXINE. Crazy, black Irish Protestant son of a … Protestant!

HANNAH. Mrs. Faulk, he’s putting up a struggle not to drink.

MAXINE. Don’t interfere. You’re an interfering woman.

HANNAH. Mr. Shannon is dangerously … disturbed.

MAXINE. I know how to handle him, honey — you just met him today. Here’s Grampa’s Manhattan cocktail with two cherries in it.

HANNAH. Please don’t call him Grampa.

MAXINE. Shannon calls him Grampa.

HANNAH. [taking the drink] He doesn’t make it sound so condescending, but you do. My grandfather is a gentleman in the true sense of the word, he is a gentle man.

MAXINE. What are you?

HANNAH. I am his granddaughter.

MAXINE. Is that all you are?

HANNAH. I think it’s enough to be.

MAXINE. Yeah, but you’re also a deadbeat, using that dying old man for a front to get in places without the cash to pay even one day in advance. Why, you’re dragging him around with you like Mexican beggars carry around a sick baby to put the touch on the tourists.

HANNAH. I told you I had no money.

MAXINE. Yes, and I told you that I was a widow — recent. In such a financial hole they might as well have buried me with my husband.

[Shannon reappears from the jungle foliage but remains unnoticed by Hannah and Maxine]

HANNAH. [with forced calm] Tomorrow morning, at daybreak, I will go in town. I will set up my easel in the plaza and peddle my water colors and sketch tourists. I am not a weak person, my failure here isn’t typical of me.

MAXINE. I’m not a weak person either.

HANNAH. No. By no means, no. Your strength is awe-inspiring.

MAXINE. You’re goddam right about that, but how do you think you’ll get to Acapulco without the cabfare or even the busfare there?

HANNAH. I will go on shanks’ mare, Mrs. Faulk — islanders are good walkers. And if you doubt my word for it, if you really think I came here as a deadbeat, then I will put my grandfather back in his wheelchair and push him back down this hill to the road and all the way back into town.

MAXINE. Ten miles, with a storm coming up?

HANNAH. Yes, I would — I will. [She is dominating Maxine in this exchange. Both stand beside the table. Nonno’s head is drooping back into sleep]

MAXINE. I wouldn’t let you.

HANNAH. But you’ve made it clear that you don’t want us to stay here for one night even.

MAXINE. The storm would blow that old man out of his wheelchair like a dead leaf.

HANNAH. He would prefer that to staying where he’s not welcome, and I would prefer it for him, and for myself, Mrs. Faulk. [She turns to the Mexican boys] Where is his wheelchair? Where is my grandfather’s wheelchair?

[This exchange has roused the old man. He struggles up from his chair, confused, strikes the floor with his cane and starts declaiming a poem]

NONNO:
Love’s an old remembered son
A drunken fiddler plays,
Stumbling crazily along
Crooked sideways.
When his heart is mad with music
He will play the —

HANNAH. Nonno, not now, Nonno! He thought someone asked for a poem. [She gets him back into the chair. Hannah and Maxine are still unaware of Shannon]

MAXINE. Calm down, honey.

HANNAH. I’m perfectly calm, Mrs. Faulk.

MAXINE. I’m not. That’s the trouble.

HANNAH. I understand that, Mrs. Faulk. You lost your husband just lately. I think you probably miss him more than you know.

MAXINE. No, the trouble is Shannon.

HANNAH. You mean his nervous tate and his …?

MAXINE. No, I just mean Shannon. I want you to lay off him, honey. You’re not for Shannon and Shannon isn’t for you.

HANNAH. Mrs. Faulk, I’m a New England spinster who is pushing forty.

MAXINE. I got the vibrations between you — I’m very good at catching vibrations between people — and there sure was a vibration between you and Shannon the moment you got here. That, just that, believe me, nothing but that has made this … misunderstanding between us. So if you just don’t mess with Shannon, you and your Grampa can stay on here as long as you want to, honey.

HANNAH. Oh, Mrs. Faulk, do I look like a vamp?

MAXINE. They come in all types. I’ve had all types of them here.

[Shannon comes over to the table]

SHANNON. Maxine, I told you don’t make nervous people more nervous, but you wouldn’t listen.

MAXINE. What you need is a drink.

SHANNON. Let me decide about that.

HANNAH. Won’t you sit down with us, Mr. Shannon, and eat something? Please. You’ll feel better.

SHANNON. I’m not hungry right now.

HANNAH. Well, just sit down with us, won’t you?

[Shannon sits down with Hannah]

MAXINE. [warningly to Hannah] O.K. O.K. …

NONNO. [rousing a bit and mumbling] Wonderful … wonderful place here …

[Maxine retires from the table and wheels the liquor cart over to the German party]

SHANNON. Would you have gone through with it?

HANNAH. Haven’t you ever played poker, Mr. Shannon?

SHANNON. You mean you were bluffing?

HANNAH. Let’s say I was drawing to an inside straight. [The wind rises and sweeps up the hill like a great waking sigh from the ocean] It is going to storm. I hope your ladies aren’t still out in that, that … glass-bottomed boat, observing the, uh submarine … marvels.

SHANNON. That’s because you don’t know these ladies. However, they’re back from the boat trip. They’re down at the cantina, dancing together to the jukebox and hatching new plans to get me kicked out of Blake Tours.

HANNAH. What would you do if you …

SHANNON. Got the sack? Go back to the Church or take the long swim to China. [Hannah removes a crumpled pack of cigarettes from her pocket. She discovers only two left in the pack and decides to save them for later. She returns the pack to her pocket] May I have one of your cigarettes, Miss Jelkes? [She offers him the pack. He takes it from her and crumples it and throws it off the verandah] Never smoke those, they’re made out of tobacco from cigarette stubs that beggars pick up off sidewalks and out of gutters in Mexico City. [he produces a tin of English cigarettes] Have these — Benson and Hedges, imported, in an airtight tin, my luxury in my life.

HANNAH. Why — thank you, I will, since you have thrown mine away.

SHANNON. I’m going to tell you something about yourself. You are a lady, a real one and a great one.

HANNAH. What have I done to merit that compliment from you?

SHANNON. It isn’t a compliment, it’s just a report on what I’ve noticed about you at a time when it’s hard for me to notice anything outside myself. You took out those Mexican cigarettes, you found you just had two left, you can’t afford to buy a new pack of even that cheap brand, so you put them away for later. Right?

HANNAH. Mercilessly accurate, Mr. Shannon.

SHANNON. But when I asked you for one, you offered it to me without a sign of reluctance.

HANNAH. Aren’t you making a big point out of a small matter?

SHANNON. Just the opposite, honey, I’m making a small point out of a very large matter. [Shannon has put a cigarette in his lips but has no matches. Hannah has some and she lights his cigarette for him] How’d you learn how to light a match in the wind?

HANNAH. Oh, I’ve learned lots of useful little things like that. I wish I’d learned some big ones.

SHANNON. Such as what?

HANNAH. How to help you, Mr. Shannon ….

SHANNON. Now I know why I came here!

HANNAH. To meet someone who can light a match in the wind?

SHANNON. [looking down at the table, his voice choking] To meet someone who wants to help me, Miss Jelkes … [He makes a quick embarrassed turn in the chair, as if to avoid her seeing that he has tears in his eyes. She regards him steadily and tenderly, as she would her grandfather]

HANNAH. Has it been so long since anyone has wanted to help you, or have you just …

SHANNON. Have I — what?

HANNAH. Just been so much involved with a struggle in yourself that you haven’t noticed when people have wanted to help you, the little they can? I know people torture each other many times like devils, but sometimes they do see and know each other, you know, and then, if they’re decent, they do want to help eacah other all that they can. Now will you please help me? Take care of Nonno while I remove my water colors from the annex verandah because the storm is coming up by leaps and bounds now.

[He gives a quick jerky nod, dropping his face briefly into the cup of his hands. She murmurs “Thank you” and springs up, starting along the verandah. Halfway across, as the storm closes in upon the hilltop with a thunderclap and a sound of rain coming, Hannah turns to look back at the table. Shannon has risen and gone around the table to Nonno]

SHANNON. Grampa? Nonno? Let’s get up before the rain hits us, Grampa.

NONNO. What? What?

[Shannon gets the old man out of his chair and shepherds him to the back of the verandah as Hannah rushes toward the annex. The Mexican boys hastily clear the table, fold it up and lean it against the wall. Shannon and Nonno turn and face toward the storm, like brave men facing a firing squad. Maxine is excitedly giving orders to the boys]

MAXINE. Pronto, pronto, muchachos! Pronto, pronto! Llevaros todas las cosas! Pronto, pronto! Recoje los platos! Apurate con elmantel!

PEDRO. Nos estamos dando prisa!

PANCHO. Que el chubasco lave los platos!

[The German party look on the storm as a Wagnerian climax. They rise from their table as the boys come to clear it, and start singing exultantly. The storm, with its white convulsions of light, is like a giant white bird attacking the hilltop of the Costa Verde. Hannah reappears with her water colors clutched at her chest]

SHANNON. Got them?

HANNAH. Yes, just in time. Here is your God, Mr. Shannon.

SHANNON. [quietly] Yes, I see him, I hear him, I know him. And if he doesn’t know that I know him, let him strike me dead with a bolt of his lightning.

[He moves away from the wall to the edge of the verandah as a fine silver sheet of rain descends off the sloping roof, catching the light and dimming the figures behind it. Now everything is silver, delicately lustrous. Shannon extetnds his hands under the rainfall, turning them in it as if to cool them. Then he cups them to catch the water in his palms and bathes his forehead with it. The rainfall increases. The sound of the marimba band at the beach cantina is brought up the hill by the wind. Shannon lowers his hands from his burning forehead and stretches them out through the rain’s silver sheet as if he were reaching for something outside and beyond himself. Then nothing is visible but those reaching-out hands. A pure white flash of lightning reveals Hannah and Nonno against the wall, behind Shannon, and the electric globe suspended from the roof goes out, the power extinguished by the storm. A clear shaft of light stays on Shannon’s reaching out hands till the stage curtain has fallen, slowly.]

This entry was posted in Books, Theatre and tagged , . Bookmark the permalink.

4 Responses to The Books: “The Night of the Iguana” (Tennessee Williams)

  1. You know, it usually irritates me when I want to talk about a book and people start talking about the movie.

    But I LOVE that movie, with Richard Burton and Ava Gardner and Deborah Kerr.

  2. Stevie says:

    Here’s a fun link about the making of the movie – evidently, Puerto Vallarta has never been the same.

    http://www.hypermex.com/html/hist_ign.htm

    I would love to see this play performed. It’s so damned complicated! Might make an amazing opera.

    Another great Tennessee post, Sheila! Thanks :)

  3. Bill Reid says:

    Shelia….
    I saw the original production starring Bette Davis and Margaret Leighton. I was on a college break in New York City. My college basketball team was playing in a tournament. I slippped away from the game crowd and went to see “The Night of the Iguana” (standing room). After more than 50 years it is the memory of Davis’ Maxine that has stayed with me. She was a terrific presence. After two young beach boys jumped out of the cabana window, she appeared with brazen red hair. From that moment to the poetic ending you couldn’t take your eyes off her. When Maxine wanted to swim with Shannon in the liquid moonlight she told him she’d help him back up the hill. It was a tender, very beautiful momemt. When Davis was on stage she was magnetic…great with physical action like the tug-a-war with Shannon over the liquor cart and she had a wonderful delivery of the comic lines. I missed her during that second act very long row boat scene with Shannon and Hannah. Several of the crtics wondered if Davis had read the play because she had the third lead role. I think Williams should have built up Maxine’s role. She was a much fresher character than Hannah. The audience loved Bette Davis and cheered as she took her final bows. I remember a young man running up and giving her a beauquet of yellow roses.

    • sheila says:

      Bill – WOW! Words can’t express how much I appreciate your comment. I love how clearly you remember it – down to the blocking. That is a powerful performance. I almost feel like I saw the production myself after reading your words – and I thank you so much for providing that glimpse.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.