Next on the script shelf:
Next Tennessee Williams play on the shelf is Lifeboat Drill
This very short one-act takes place in a first-class stateroom on the Queen Elizabeth II. Mr. and Mrs. Taske, an ancient couple riddled with physical issues, are staying in the stateroom. They are cantankerous and it appears that they cannot stand one another, and have NEVER been able to stand each other. They bicker. They fumble with dentures, glasses … They can barely move without falling over and breaking their hips. Mrs. Taske is very very prudish and makes a big stink about having had a male steward help her get dressed the other day. She wants a female steward because she felt the male steward got a bit too familiar. Meanwhile – on the ship, a lifeboat drill is going on. The male and female stewards come into the room and tell them not to worry – they don’t need to participate in the drill. Mr. and Mrs. Taske are horrified at this … they will be left behind in case of an emergency …. so once the stewards leave, they try to read the lifeboat drill instructions and figure out what they should do if they need to evacuate the ship. A comedy of errors ensue, as they try to put on the life jackets, as they try to understand the instructions – all of this is punctuated by one or the other of them falling down. They are on their last legs. It becomes a battle of survival – between the two of them. Who is MORE healthy, who is the LEAST infirm …
From Lifeboat Drill in The Theatre of Tennessee Williams, Vol. 7: In the Bar of a Tokyo Hotel, and Other Plays
MR. TASKE. [reading the instructions slowly and loudly] The signals for attendance are a succession of seven or more short blasts followed by one long blast on the ship’s whistle, supplemented by electrically operated gongs.
MRS. TASKE. Department of useless. Who cares what operates them?
MR. TASKE. If I were you, Ella, I would give this drill more serious attention. Of course, if you feel it doesn’t apply to you and that you’re not concerned in it, laugh it off, ignore it. After all, it’s up to you. Nobody’s forcing you to.
MRS. TASKE. I reserve the right.
MR. TASKE. I’m not arguing with you.
MRS. TASKE. How about the life jacket? It seems to me you’re supposed to wear a life jacket. — Well? — Where is it? You’d better locate it first before you follow those red arrows to the lifeboat station.
MR. TASKE. Life jacket, huh? Life jacket?
MRS. TASKE. Yes, exactly, life jacket, necessary for boat drill. [Mr. Taske scrambles awkwardly about the bed, panting and wheezing] Are you having convulsions?
MR. TASKE. Looking for printed instructions. You have the printed instructions? Give me the printed instructions.
MRS. TASKE. [angrily] I don’t have the printed instructions. [She raises her hands] Do I appear to have the printed instructions? I was not permitted to look at the printed instructions.
MR. TASKE. Not permitted, did you say not permitted?
MRS. TASKE. I reached for them, you held them back.
MR. TASKE. [panting] Ludicrous — accusation! Why would I hold back the printed instructions?
MRS. TASKE. The reason was obvious to me if not to you. Survival, your own, is all that has ever concerned you. However, be that as it may, it is I, not you, who will participate in the lifeboat drill. You will remain in stateroom, wallowing like a walrus beached on your bed, but I will get into my life preserving, the jacket, and proceed as instructed. Now will you hand over the printed instructions? That is not a request, that is a demand to which I suggest you comply unless you wish to explain your refusal to do so in court. And if you think for one moment I don’t intend to call Shawl, Shawl, Shawl, SAUL, shit to, SHIP to — SHORE! — immediately after this lifeboat drill is over, you have a surprise coming to you, oh, do you ever, I tell you! So now hand over to me that sheet of printed instructions or else!
MR. TASKE. Hell and damnation, Ella, take the printed instructions if you can find them!
MRS. TASKE. You had the printed instructions in your hand!
MR. TASKE. Did, yes, but now don’t!
MRS. TASKE. Lost, are they? Where are they lost?
MR. TASKE. If I knew where they were lost, they would not be lost. HAH! WHAT’S THIS? [He holds up a crumpled piece of paper]
MRS. TASKE. Well?
MR. TASKE. Found! Found! [He holds the sheet at various distances from his face] And now, by God, the print’s invisible to me!
MRS. TASKE. The fact you’ve removed your glasses could explain that, you know.
MR. TASKE. Not removed, dropped off.
MRS. TASKE. Off where?
MR. TASKE. Look between beds, Ella! — LOOK BETWEEN THE BEDS!
MRS. TASKE. How DARE, don’t you DARE, shout me orders like to a domestic.
MR. TASKE. You can see, have on glasses.
MRS. TASKE. Have on my own, not yours! What would I do with your glasses? My lenses not cataract lenses, thick as plate glass! [He falls with a crash between the beds. There is a pause.] –Now what? — Did you take a spill? [Pause. He clambers slowly onto her bed] OFF! — Senile lechers — disgust me!
MR. TASKE. Presence on — your bed — accidental, assure you.
MRS. TASKE. Not assured. Hope to resume relations? Of what nature impossible to conceive. I SAID OFF! MEANING OFF! [She shoves him off the bed. Pause. Slowly, he sits up, putting on his glasses]
MR. TASKE. One — lens — only. Broke other.
MRS. TASKE. One’s better than none. Read instructions out loud, since both concerning.
MR. TASKE. [reading hoarsely] Life jacket — will be found in — accessible position in — the stateroom.
MRS. TASKE. Very illuminating, that piece of information. Stateroom’s full of accessible positions. Which accessible position is referred to, if any? Floors, walls, ceiling?
MR. TASKE. Inquire of steward, it says. Says — “usually under bed”.
MRS. TASKE. Is it?
MR. TASKE. See it!
MRS. TASKE. Get it!
[Mr. Taske attempts to crawl beneath the bed but can’t make it]
MR. TASKE. HELP!
MRS. TASKE. What?
MR. TASKE. Stuck! Ring! Steward!
MRS. TASKE. Never, never!
MR. TASKE. Hahhhh — GOT IT!
