Next script on the shelf:
Next Tennessee Williams play on the shelf is a full-length play (yes, another full-length!!) called The Red Devil Battery Sign, included in 27 Wagons Full of Cotton And Other One-Act Plays
This play was written in 1980, and I honestly have no idea what it’s about, how to talk about it, or … It’s such a weird weird play. I wonder about his state of mind when he wrote it – and I almost NEVER wonder that with Williams. His technique is so solid, everything just flows – but this play? Uhm ….
There’s a woman. We never know her name. She has esaped from a mental asylum. She lives in a hotel in Dallas. She also apparently has photocopied documents from some … I don’t know. The government wants to get the documents from her. It’s a dangerous situation. But because she’s loony tunes, you don’t know if it’s true or not. There’s a guy named King who used to be in a mariachi band with his daughter – and somehow that all fell apart … and he can’t get over his lost glory. There’s a place called The Hollow – just outside the city – where wild ravening Lord of the Flies type youths terrorize the population. There are explosions on the horizon – unexplained. The nameless woman and King have a romance. Or – a love affair. Whatever. She claws at his back. Somehow that is symbolic of her wild nature. She sees people walking around the hotel wearing red-devil hats – or … she sees them out the window … not sure … and she is very paranoid about what it all means. Are the red devils coming to get her?
I could go on and on but that’s about as coherent as I can get about this play.
The play ends with the nameless woman joining the Lord of the Flies group – as their goddess-mother-muse. She gives up on her humanity, on language – and stands amidst the ravening youths – howling like a wolf – as they all worship her.
Of course the writing itself is wonderful – his writing is always wonderful – I have had so much fun with these Williams excerpts – I know they’ve gone on forever, but I’m almost done!! But anyway, I have just loved re-visiting his wriitng, on a play by play basis. I don’t think I’ve ever sat down and just read his stuff, in its entirety, like I have done over the past couple of months. I have just loved doing this. And of course – there is some amazing writing in Red Devil Battery Sign – but the entire thing is just strange, and i would love to read Williams’ own thoughts on what he was attempting.
So here’s part of a scene between King and the nameless woman, who refers to herself as Woman Downtown.
From The Red Devil Battery Sign, by Tennessee Williams
[He looks up as if listening to something, a reverberation, an ominous thing, still not too close — beyond the room and the Woman Downtown — a thing that gives his words a meaning deeper than their surface: a distant warning trumpet
KING. Life is only a while. Love — longer. [The Woman Downtown smiles and caresses him] Now, now, honey, leggo, I’m supposed to go home early tonight.
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. Whose supposition is that?
KING. You heard of Perla, my wife.
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. Not as much as your daughter, La Niña.
KING. This involves La Niña.
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. [sitting up] How?
KING. I didn’t tell you? She’s comin’ home tomorrow for a visit. I won’t be downtown tomorrow …
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. Neither will I, King. Not down this town, anyhow …
KING. She’s only comin’ home for a short visit before she goes back to work.
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. [pouring herself a drink] I didn’t mean I was leaving because of her. Actually her visit is very well-timed, coincides with a trip I’m obliged to make. Your friend Juan in the kitchen, can he still be trusted?
KING. ¡Si! Amigo. Amigo fiel. ¿Por qué?
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. The Judge and I have been using him as a go-between, a messenger service. Tonight under a metal cover from room service he sent me this letter. It’s from the Judge. Read it.
KING. [reading with some difficulty] “Congress which otherwise would — would …”
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. [assisting him] “– adjourn — adjourn the weekend, will hold special session …”
KING. How do you know this is from the Judge? Not fake?
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. Juan has called him for me frequently. From a pay phone in town. Last night a manservant of the Judge got on Juan’s bus and passed him this. — It’s not fake. [She reads] “You will accompany me. Reservation made on Braniff Airlines. Flight 68, departing for Washington D.C., 5:00 p.m. My car will pass service entrance at 4:15 exactly …”
[King looks up. There is a pause]
KING. When?
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. Tomorrow. [He looks at her darkly] — Originals of those photostate papers I mentioned once — remember? — have been decoded. Judge Collister and I are taking them to the capital and I — if I shouldn’t be able, after I testify, to return to here, or anywhere near here — would it mean I’d never see you again?
[She sits down very gravely and searches his face with her eyes]
KING. This trip you’re taking is — peligroso — muy peligroso.
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. Dangerous, yes, very yes, very — [She continues to stare at him gravely. He takes the drink from her hand and drains it. He pours another and returns the tumbler to her. She drinks, he drinks again. Sounds are heard: fireworks crackling and horns blowing below] — Once you said, “Time has no limit for us.”
KING. Madre de Cristo, forget it. The Judge is old, let him go! You? No.
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. No I’m going, it’s an obligation, a, a, — my God, it sounds like all hell’s broken out down there! [She crosses abruptly to the window, raises the shade, then cries out repeatedly and wildly.] His sign, his sign, the Red Devil Battery sign, grinning at me through the window!
[A red glare pulses in]
KING. [holding her] It’s just an electric sign, honey. The building is being opened tonight by the Mayor. That’s all, that’s —
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. All? All? Battery Empire’s devil-face grinning in at me?!
KING. Lie down, I’ll —
[He rushes to lower the shade]
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. I can still see it; it pulses like blood through the shade!
[The red glare is extinguished. She crouches sobbing on the bed. He crosses to her. She plunges to him and starts tearing his clothes off.]
KING. Now, now, love, you’re — acting like a —
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. She-wolf? — Make love! Make love!
[Pause]
KING. — After — all that? [She is undressing him. After a while she lets go of him and lies back on the pillows. He finally speaks huskily, shamed] I’m sorry about that, but you k now sometimes in a man it just don’t work … [He sits on the edge of the bed] — I want a cigarette.
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. I want a drink.
KING. Forget it. You don’t need a drink.
[They are both frustrated and angry]
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. I’ve got to have something tonight.
[She reaches for the bottle]
KING. Put down the bottle. [She doesn’t] I don’t like what you’re doing; there’s no future in it.
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. Just to wash down a pill, can’t swallow it dry.
KING. You’re going to wind up not young anymore, not beautiful, not elegant, but —
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. Yes, yes, puta!
KING. The kind that’s picked up by any stranger and banged in alleys and back of trucks — I am — going to go home. How do I know what a wolf-howling woman might do or not do ’cause a — invalid man couldn’t satisfy her one night out of a month.
[Abruptly tender, she sits up, breasts exposed in the dim, aqueous light]
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. That was awful, forgive me! It made me vicious because I needed you so terribly this time that could be the last time.
KING. I guess a little of him was bound to rub off on you, love.
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. Moments, only moments. I turn to an animal. [Pause. He seems away] — Am I with you or alone in space?
KING. — I think this Washington trip is —
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. I know what you think. You’re right. Maybe just a gesture, and maybe — fatal. But doesn’t it make a sort of dignified monument to mark where I was, a woman without a name, inclined to wolf-howls at night? Are you still on the bed? [He nods] Just seated beside me, not touching? [He slowly turns to look at her, then throws himself into her arms. The room is dimmed out. Music. When the room is lighted again, he is beside the bed, nearly dressed. She is watching him from the bed] You know, there’s somewhere beyond, and that time I think we went there.
KING. — Sleep, now?
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. Yes, now, quickly. This kind of exhaustion’s a comfort, all the truth and then love. [He crosses to the window and opens the drapes] Don’t!
KING. I think it’s daybreak. [He raises the shade to the pulsing red glare. She stares at it unblinking. He raises his right forearm and strikes it with his left palm] Battery Man, here is to you, my salute!
WOMAN DOWNTOWN. Again, for me!
KING. Yeah, again, for us both!
THE SCENE DIMS OUT AND FAST CURTAIN
