And here is my next excerpt of the day from my library, the Script section
The next Lanford Wilson play on my shelf – is his first full-length – a play that, in its original off-off-off-OFF Broadway production caused a sensation in 1965 – is Balm in Gilead – Acting Edition
Here – unlike most of his early one-acts – he crams the stage with characters – There have to be 30 characters in this play, although I haven’t counted. It takes place in an all-night coffee shop on Upper Broadway. The characters are low lifes: hustlers, prostitutes, pimps, heroin addicts …
The script is fascinating and difficult to read because Wilson doesn’t have just one scene going on at one time – there are multiple scenes happening simultaneously – but if it’s done correctly, with proper overlapping and pauses – you would hear every word. Scenes across the stage from each other inform one another – they comment on one another – It must have been an amazing experience to see it for the first time.
Basically, the overriding theme of Balm in Gilead is loss of innocence. If there are “leads” in this play – it would be Darlene and Joe. Darlene is a girl who just arrived in NYC from the Midwest, and she has started hooking. It is clear that she is dumb as a box of rocks. Wilson makes that clear from the beginning – while she is new to town, and naive – it should be clear that she is DUMB, and not a sweet-faced ingenue. And Joe – an amateur hustler. He’s young, mid-20s, middle class, good-looking … again – he still has one foot in the civilized world – while the majority of the characters you see in the play have let go of civilization completely.
This is the story of how easy it is to fall off the face of the earth.
I’ll post a random excerpt of one of the massive group scenes – there are a couple of reaaaallly good monologues in this play – but I thought I’d post the mish-mash symphonic chaos of the group stuff so you could get a feel for what it looks like on the page.
So in this scene we’ve got John (the guy who works the grill in the coffee shop), Darlene (the new prostitue), Joe (the new fresh-faced hustler), Kay (the waitress), Ann (a prostitue – an old pro), Terry and Rust (a couple of lesbian prostitutes – tough girls who have boy’s nicknames), Al (a bum), Bonnie (a prostitute), Dopey (a male prostitute and heroin addict), Judy (another lesbian hooker), Bob (a general hood), Tig (a male prostitute), and Ernesto (another male prostitute – from Colombia).
Watch how the dialogue overlaps.
From Balm in Gilead – Acting Edition
[Dopey enters cafe, takes a seat]
JOHN. Come on, Dopey, you’re going to fall asleep.
TIG. Don’t bother to speak. [Goes to the back of cafe]
BOB. Screw it.
DOPEY. What do you mean, I’m awake. Look! I want a cup of coffee.
JOHN. I know, but I’ll give it to you and you’ll be asleep on the damn table. You do it every time, Dopey.
[John turns to get him coffee]
KAY. [to Bob who has stopped in the doorway] Come on, you’re holdin’ the door open!
TERRY. [much louder] I don’t give a good goddam if she sleeps with Margaret Truman!
[Bob exits]
DOPEY. [to prove he’s awake] Kay? Could you hand me the cream, please?
[At the back of the cafe Terry falls against a booth. Much commotion. She has spilled coffee on Bonnie. They sit her down again.]
RUST, BONNIE, TERRY [variously]
Come on.
God, look at that all over me!
Where the hell.
For Christ’s sake, where the hell are you going?
Watch it, fellow.
Sit down, take it easy.
All over me. Goddam.
Do you have a rag?
Miss? Now just take it easy.
Why don’t you sober up?
[Lights dim for aonly a second, during the above exchange, with a spot on Darlene]
AL. [to John] They every one of them steal. They all steal, you know?
TIG. [to Ernesto] Spices and things, you know.
[Anne re-enters]
JOHN. Yeah. Well.
[Darline and Joe exchange several glances]
AL. Every girl you see; they all steal. You take them up to your room and they’ll steal something every time. You fall asleep and they’ll sneak out and steal something.
TERRY. [over, from the back] I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I am.
[Dopey is falling asleep on the table]
AL. And then they tell you they left the door open.
JOHN. I know. No, I don’t, but I know.
AL. They all steal.
[Momentary lull. The quartette begins a soft blues from the back]
JOHN. When it gets quiet in here you almost think something’s gonna happen.
KAY. Quiet all of a sudden, ain’t it?
ANN. [to John] You want somebody should scream or something?
JOHN. Oh, go back out on the street!
ANN. It’s dirty out there. I think I’m going to write to the Department of Sanitation. I made sixty tonight.
JOHN. Sixty scores or sixty bills?
ANN. Four scores — ha! — and thirty-eight cents. I always end up with odd change; never can figure out where the hell it came from.
JOHN. You’re so rich, so buy me a drink, teacher.
ANN. Sammy would slug me, I spend my money on you.
TERRY. She can just kiss it.
JOHN. Why do you keep him anyway?
ANN. God, you’d better gp back to school.
RUST. Miss, could we have another coffee? Two more.
[Darlene moves her cup now to the seat by Joe. Takes the seat next to him]
DARLENE. Do you mind?
JOE. How should I mind?
DARLENE. Well, look, if you’re thinking or waiting for someone …
JOE. No, I’m not waiting for someone.
DARLENE. I saw you looking at the clock.
JOE. I’m waiting for ten o’clock. [He drinks. She takes a cigarette out, he lights hers and his own]
DARLENE. Thanks.
TIG. [to Ernesto] You know in Egypt they had salves and things that could cure anything.
DARLENE. That’s better than those other two creeps were acting. Did you see them?
JOE. They’re just high. They’re okay usually.
TIG. Cancer even! It says so.
ERNESTO. Show me where, you can’t.
TIG. It does.
DARLENE. Why are you waiting for ten o’clock?
TIG. Hey, John, you ever read the Bible?
JOE. I’m meeting someone.
JOHN. What?
TIG. The Bible, stupid.
JOE. Like a business deal. A transaction.
JOHN. Sure. When I was about twelve.
ERNESTO. Yeah?
JOHN. I didn’t understand it.
TIG. Hell, you wouldn’t anyway. You know they had embalming fluid back then?
ANN. What’d they do, drink it?
ERNESTO. Show me where.
TIG. Go away.
DARLENE. What were they high on?
JOE. Huh? How should I know?
[Ernesto pays check and exits to corner]
DARLENE. On dope, or just drinking?
JOE. You don’t get high on ginger. Bombinos, deedees; you don’t scream it out — you know, you don’t yell it out like that.
DARLENE. Do you like that?
JOE. Are you kidding?
DARLENE. Me either — eye-ther.
JOE. Not on your life. Once is enough.
DARLENE. Oh. What was it like?
JOE. Are you kidding? Like getting sick as a bitch. Depends on what you’re talking though. New, are you?
DARLENE. Well, have you seen me before?
JOE. No.
DARLENE. Are you sure?
JOE. Yeah.
DARLENE. How do you know?
JOE. I’d know.
DARLENE. [complimented] Thanks.
JOE. I remember faces. You see me standing around, you’d think I was just as stupid as the next guy, but I look – and I watch people, you know? And I study them when they don’t know. You learn a lot. Where you from?
DARLENE. I’m from Chicago.
TIG. [comes from the booth to John at the cash register] Could I have change fior cigarettes?
DARLENE. [pausing] My sister used to come around here, though. She’s living off somewhere right now.
JOE. Who’s your sister?
DARLENE. Oh, you wouldn’t know her. It must have been four years ago. She used to write me.
TIG. [hits the machine] This damn thing!
DARLENE. Sometimes.
JOE. What’d she do?
DARLENE. Oh, I don’t know. [Affected] We used to exchange letters. She’d write and I’d think, God — New York! [Pause] She was … like her. [Nods to Ann] Of course, she was very pretty, you know.
JOE. Ann? A hooker. She sold it?
DARLENE. Well, you needn’t be high and mighty about it.
JOE. Who is?
DARLENE. She used to make — sometimes a hundred dollars a night … twice that sometimes.
JOE. So does Ann, but she loves it. [Yelling out] Don’t you, Ann?
ANN. Don’t I what?
JOE. Just say yes.
ANN. No. Hell, no; it’s a lie if he’s saying it. [Turns away]
JOE. She goes for free as much as she charges.
DARLENE. She didn’t come here for that, of course. She came here to do something else. I forget what; you know. But you look and you don’t get anything and you — resort, you know? To something else.
RUST. [to Terry] I wouldn’t worry about it.
JOE. Naw, Ann didn’t either. Ann’s a schoolteacher. Was going to be; came here to do something like that. When she got here they tell her she can work part-time or something.
TERRY. It doesn’t affect me.
JOE. She told ’em to kiss it. She got a raw deal.
DARLENE. Yeah. You know what I’d make as a waitress? Maybe sixty dollars a week. Less maybe. Tips included.
JOE. You been here long?
DARLENE. A month.
JOE. Month? You must have saved up.
DARLENE. Are you kidding? I came here with about seven dollars.
JOE. You got a room around here yet?
DARLENE. I’m across the street, in the Tower. And probably I’ll get …
JOE. And one upstairs? Everybody does.
DARLENE. My sister had a room; this same place. I didn’t ask you what your ten-o’clock business deal was.
JOE. Yeah, you did.
DARLENE. Well, I didn’t care. [Pause] It’s a filthy place upstairs. Have you seen it up there? I looked around this afternoon already. I’ve never seen cockroaches like that. I mean they should get a bravery medal or something. They play games on the floor right in front of you. They don’t even run from you.
[Dopey has awakened. He looks at his coffee and gets up to leave]
KAY. [to Dopey] Hey, you pay?
DOPEY. I don’t have anything.
KAY. Coffee.
DOPEY. I didn’t even touch it. I gotta get outside. [He leaves cafe]
JOE. You knwo I might be able to help you get a room. Save you some dough, maybe. After the first week or two they’ll get on to you and kick you out. They got fellas that hang around to spot girls who take people up. You’ll have to get one of the boys around to rent a room in his name and he’ll rent it to you. See? They don’t really care, just so long as they look legal. Most of the cats, though, would make you pay through the nose.
DARLENE. Why? I mean why should I get a room from someone else?
[Judy enters and goes to cash register]
JOE. It’s just the way you have to do it. All these guys in here – a lot of them – they rent a room out for about eight bucks a night. That’s not much when you’re making a hundred.
KAY. [to Judy] You owe for a burger and a Coke.
JUDY. I’ll get it.
DARLENE. It sounds like a lot to me. Eight dollars a day? A room’s only twelve a week. No girl’s gonna do that.
JOE. They got nothing better to do with their money. Most of the girls keep a fellow anyway. Give most of their money to some guy. Then he treats them like shit. Don’t ask me. Over half of them. So they can be seen with someone steady, you know?
JUDY. [regarding Rust and Terry in the back booth] Well, isn’t that cozy.
DARLENE. I wouldn’t believe it. [Joe shrugs] I mean I believe it, but how can they ever get any money saved up or anything? If they’re giving it away? It’s pretty sick, isn’t it? Everybody living off everybody like that?
JOE. You won’t get away from that, I don’t care where you go. You’ll either make a mint of money or go broke. But like I said, more guys would charge eight bucks. I could probably get you a room for maybe only four or five.
DARLENE. I don’t think so.
JUDY. [to Kay] How much do I owe you?
JOE. You’ll either go broke or make a pile.
KAY. Ninety-five and that guy’s two teas.
DARLENE. I made two hundred dollars one night. That’s what I’ve been living off of. One guy; man, one night.
JUDY. Just me; he can come back and pay.
JOE. Don’t expect it every time.
[Rust comes to the counter]
DARLENE. And I didn’t have to do anything.
RUST. Give me a glass of water, Kay.
JOE. Much.
KAY. Just hold it a minute!
DARLENE. Nothing. He felt sorry for me or something. He was a customer — in this cafe? And the boss fired me. I was right out on the floor and got fired on the spot. And th is guy came over to me on the floor, and said let’s go have a steak or something to eat, you don’t want to work here anyway. Let’s go have a steak. He was my first customer at the cafe. I walked right off the floor and we went to his room and he gave me two hundred dollars.
RUST. Could I have a glass of water?
JOE. What, did you roll him?
JUDY. [to Rust] First things first, honey!
DARLENE. No! I told you. He gave it to me. He felt sorry for me or something.
I was wondering if you could post some of the monologues from this play? I’m looking for a good one and this sounds like it could have potential.
Thanks much!
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