The Books: “This Is the Peaceable Kingdom or Good Luck God” (Tennessee Williams)

Next in my Daily Book Excerpt:

Next on the script shelf:
Next Tennessee Williams play on the shelf is This Is the Peaceable Kingdom or Good Luck God, included in The Theatre of Tennessee Williams, Vol. 7: In the Bar of a Tokyo Hotel, and Other Plays. Another one-act. This play takes place in 1978, so obviously it was written after that. Williams died in the early 80s. Peaceable Kingdom is about the city-wide nursing home strike that took place in NYC in 1978.

It’s set in a nursing home during the strike – where everything is on the verge of chaos. There is no staff in the nursing home. The (haha I was going to say “inmates” – but I meant “patients”) patients are dependent on family to come take care of them, feed them, etc., but many do not have family. There are a lot of racial tensions in the nursing home. The blacks against the Jews against the whites … Animosity and tensions growing. It’s a very depressing play. Everyone is in wheelchairs and everyone has just been shuffled off into the nursing home so that no one will see them. Only the Jews appear to “take care of their own” and come visit their family members on a regular basis. This causes envy among the other patients.

Oh, and there’s graffitti on the walls in the nursing home – like the kind you used to see on subway cars in New York – and the words “GOOD LUCK GOD” are clearly visible across the back wall.

Occasionally, in the middle of the action of the play, a “strange voice” will suddenly intone – as though over a loudspeaker: “This is the Peaceable Kingdom, this is the Kingdom without fear …” It is never explained what the voice is, or where it comes from … but it has an effect on the cantankerous nature of pretty much everyone on the stage. Things become gentler, more compassionate – for just a SECOND.

Eventually, the tensions become too much and the nursing home explodes into violence and rage. It’s not done in a realistic way – because realistically these people would be too infirm to riot and fight – but as the riots go on, they all seem to gain strength, and power. They become a force to be reckoned with. Charity do-gooders who come to the nursing home, bearing food as gifts, are pretty much torn to shreds, their clothes ripped off them … television crews clamor to get into the nursing home … etc. etc.

You get the picture.

Meanwhile, the strange voice warns, beckons, cajoles: “This is the Peaceable Kingdom, this is the Kingdom without fear …”

I’ll excerpt from one of the group scenes. We have Saul and Bernice Shapiro, brother and sister in their 60s, who are there to feed and take care of their drooling aged infirm toothless mother who only speaks Yiddish. We have Lucretia and Ralston – two people in wheelchairs – we’re not sure what the connection is between them, but there is a connection – Lucretia is impatient, and angry – Ralston tries to calm her – and then we have two old black men in wheelchairs (offstage) making ribald jokes. The two old black men are kind of like Waldorf and Statler, the muppets in the balcony. They provide a running commentary of bad jokes, and loud laughter that drives everyone else crazy. But they’re managing to have a great time.

There are a bunch of separate scenes going on here – but they overlap. Saul and Bernice to one side of the stage – Lucretia and Ralston to the other.

From This Is the Peaceable Kingdom or Good Luck God.

BERNICE. For God’s sake, remember Mama and don’t agitate them against us. This is not a classroom at NYU.

LUCRETIA. It’s plain to me that they are back in the saddle.

SAUL. The secret of Jewish survival over the ages —

LUCRETIA. All right, Mr. Ralston, say nothing? ‘Sthat what you mean by be careful what you say?

BERNICE. I am not a student of yours in your classes at NYU.

SAUL. No. I’d have you expelled.

BERNICE. Be careful what you say in front of Mama. I feel her shaking.

SAUL. Mama’s gone past understanding and I am grateful for that. The time of the closed cattle cars with human excrement on the floors for two and three nights and days to Auschwitz and —

BERNICE. Be careful what you say. You know perfectly well that this place is goyim, goyim.

LUCRETIA. This place is Christian, Christian!

RALSTON. Lucretia, Lucretia, be careful what you say in that powerful voice of yours with them at the door, taking notes.

LUCRETIA. I repeat it is CHRISTIAN! Hail, Mary, full of Grace, blessed art Thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of Thy womb, Jesus.

BERNICE. It’s not too late for Mama to be transferred to the B’Nai Brith Home for the Aged.

SAUL. Look at Mama, drooling, no teeth in her mouth, deaf, blind, reduced to a vegetable and then you tell me transfer her. She will not be transferred.

BERNICE. Saul, you had better be careful what you say, we are surrounded by goyim.

LUCRETIA. CHRISTIAN!

BERNICE. GOYIM!

LUCRETIA. Country admitted them freely for what? To be robbed and insulted! Christ, I wish I was — [She bangs her hand violently against the wall back of the chairs]

STRANGE VOICE. [resonant, all pervading] This is the Peaceable Kingdom, the kingdom of love without fear. The Peaceable Kingdom is without —

BERNICE. All right, I teach high school math, you teach Hebrew at NYU. However —

SAUL. I teach ancient tongues, yes, but humanities also, as you know, Bernice, if you know your faith is Judaic.

BERNICE. All I know is be careful what you say here.

SAUL. Limit of your knowledge? You admit it?

BERNICE. Imperative to face it! Be careful what you say.

LUCRETIA. SUFFERING! BE QUIET! DYING PEOPLE DON’T CARE ABOUT RELIGIONS OR DIFFERENT RACES OR NOTHING BUT DARK FALLING!

RALSTON. Oh, Lucretia! You refused to be careful of what you say …

STRANGE VOICE. [audibly but faintly] Peaceable Kingdom, kingdom of love without fear.