The Books: “Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune” (Terrence McNally)

Next script on my script shelf:

Next play in my little unalphabetized pile of Samuel French plays is Frankie and Johnny in the Claire de Lune, by Terrence McNally. A beautiful play by one of my favorite playwrights.

First done in New York with Kathy Bates and F. Murray Abraham. A huge sensation. An acting triumph for both of them. Kathy Bates had already become kind of a sensation with her performance in Marsha Norman’s ‘Night Mother in 1983. She was nominated for a Tony. Frankie and Johnny was a massive success for her. How I would have LOVED to see her in this part. Then, of course, Hollywood made the movie of it – and suddenly Frankie looked like Michelle Pfeiffer. What? Can you imagine how much more moving that film would have been if that character looked like Kathy Bates??? That’s one of the POINTS of the play. That’s who Frankie is. She looks like Kathy Bates. Hollywood lost its nerve – as it so often does – and I’m sorry – Michelle Pfeiffer is a good actress and all, but just putting dark circles under her eyes does not convince me, or anyone, that she is not beautiful. Sorry. Nice try, Michelle, but no cigar. Johnny falls absolutely head over heels in love with Frankie – and she, because of her issues, because of being abused in the past, because of her distrust of men, cannot accept it. She finds Johnny too “intense”. She doesn’t like how much he loves her, she can’t bear it when he goes on and on raving about her beauty. I just think it’s so much more moving, and human, and RIGHT that Frankie not be a conventionally beautiful woman. Because love is not reserved for those who are, empirically, beautiful. All kinds of people fall in love with each other. And when you’re madly in love with someone – they seem to be the most beautiful person in the world. This is one of those cases when I understand why the powers-that-be decided to put Michelle Pfeiffer in that part – but I truly believe the movie suffered because of it.

Also, it became kind of a joke – to Kathy Bates: she would create these roles on Broadway – it happened to her, I think, 3 or 4 times – and not only would she create the roles, but she would get critical acclaim like you would not believe (if you go back and read some of the original reviews of these shows – it’s breathtaking – she was one of THOSE actresses – a Broadway heavy-hitter) – but anyway, she would create these amazing parts, and then Hollywood would buy the script – they’d “let her” audition for it – just to throw her a bone – and then give the part to someone already established. Sissy Spacek in Night Mother, Michelle in Frankie and Johnny – I understand the reality. I understand that Broadway success doesn’t mean CRAP to people in Hollywood. But I love it that Kathy Bates has the last laugh now. Look at her career. Look at what happened with her first major role. Uhm – SHE WON A FECKIN’ OSCAR, OKAY??? I think she is one of the great examples, one of the great examples of do not give up, do not let it get to you, do not let the set-backs destroy you. Just keep going. Keep going.

The standards of physical beauty are insanely high in California – and Kathy Bates just could not be put into a romantic film like Frankie and Johnny – even though THAT’S WHAT MCNALLY WROTE. Sigh. Again, I understand why this happened, but I still think it stinks. Especially in this case. Frankie and Johnny the movie was not a huge success and most of the reviews made mention of the fact that Pfeiffer was miscast. The fact that she’s not skinny is referenced in the text. The fact that she is not beautiful is referenced in the text. Michelle Pfeiffer is generally regarded as one of the most beautiful women in the world. Come on. It was ridiculous. It HURT the movie, that casting choice. Okay – I’ll let it go.

Kathy Bates definintely had an uphill road with all of this – she probably had moments of despair about it – to put so much heart and effort into stuff and then not to be able to do the film?? argh! – but still, she had a highly successful New York career – but then along came Misery and her entire life changed. I guess I just really admire her. Always have. Her career, to me, is one of those triumphs, something that I really respect.

So. Back to Frankie and Johnny.

He’s a short-order cook. He’s also an ex-con. She’s a waitress. They’re both in their 40s. They both have problems. They go on a date. They end up in bed. It is implied that they have the best sex either of them ever had. But immediately afterwards (which is the start of the play) – when they actually have to deal with each other, things get complicated. Frankie recoils. She revealed too much in her lovemaking, too much tenderness, whatever. She puts the walls back up. Johnny – who is very emotional – a big tough-guy but actually very emotional – wants more from her, feels like he’s in love with her – She basically tries to kick him out of the apartment. He keeps pushing. He wants intimacy. She can’t deal with intimacy. He is “too much” for her. He keeps telling her how beautiful she is, no matter what she says he thinks it’s great (“I love meatloaf” she says and he says, “You do??? I do too! See, this is perfect!”) He drives her crazy. She drives him crazy too – but in a different way. Of course the beauty of this play is that you know, deep down, under her scarred exterior – she has fallen for him as well. It’s one of the most romantic plays ever written. The entire play takes place over the course of one night. A life-changing night. A night where the barriers between people eventually disappear. But it’s a wrenching change – Intimacy is not easy for some people. Intimacy (another word for love, I guess) actually hurts some people. Frankie is one of those people. She is DESPERATE for him to leave. And he will NOT leave. At one point, Johnny spontaneously calls the radio station they have been listening to all night and tells the DJ their story – that their names are Frankie and Johnny – that they are making love in the moonlight – and would he please play “the most beautiful music in the world” so that this thing between them will not “self-destruct”. The DJ eventually does come on the radio – and kind of laughs because of the names “Frankie and Johnny” – and then plays “Clair de Lune” for them. The radio, and the music, are a huge part of the play.

I’ll excerpt the end of the play. They have tried to make love a second time but Johnny couldn’t perform. He’s touchy about it. She tries to reassure him. He is devastated. He goes to make her an omelette – she’s very hungry – but he keeps talking, raving about how much they are connected, yadda yadda – it makes her more and more uncomfortable. Eventually, they have a bit of a scuffle, he backs into the stove, and gets burned by the skillet. Mayhem ensues – with Frankie trying to put butter on his back, or ice cubes … They are getting closer and closer to actually being able to talk to each other, actually being able to connect.

Here’s the end of the play.

EXCERPT FROM Frankie and Johnny in the Claire de Lune, by Terrence McNally.

[Frankie has stopped working on Johnny’s back. Instead she just stares at it. Johnny looks straight ahead. The music has changed to the Shostakovich Second String Quartet]

JOHNNY. What are you doing back there?

FRANKIE. Nothing. You want more butter or ice or something? [Johnny shakes his head]

JOHNNY. It’s funny how you can talk to people better sometimes when you’re not looking at them. You’re right there. [He points straight ahead] Clear as day.

FRANKIE. I bet no one ever said this was the most beautiful music ever written.

JOHNNY. I don’t mind.

FRANKIE. I don’t know what the radio was doing on that station in the first place. That’s not my kind of music. But I could tell you were enjoying it and I guess I wanted you to think I had higher taste than I really do.

JOHNNY. So did I.

FRANKIE. I liked what he played for us though, but he didn’t say its name.

JOHNNY. Maybe it doesn’t need one. You just walk into a fancy record shop and ask for the most beautiful music ever written and that’s what they hand you.

FRANKIE. Not if I was the salesperson. You’d get “Michelle” or “Eleanor Rigby” or “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”. Something by the Beatles. I sort of lost interest in pop music when they stopped singing.

JOHNNY. The last record I bought was the Simon and Garfunkel Reunion in Central Park. It wasn’t the same. You could tell they’d been separated.

FRANKIE. Sometimes I feel like it’s still the Sixties. Or that they were ten or fifteen years ago, not twenty or twenty-five. I lost ten years of my life somewhere. I went to Bruce Springsteen last year and I was the oldest one there.

JOHNNY. Put your arms around me. [Frankie puts her arms over Johnny’s shoulders] Tighter. [Frankie’s hands begin to stroke Johnny’s chest and stomach] Do you like doing that?

FRANKIE. I don’t mind.

JOHNNY. We touch our own bodies there and nothing happens. Something to do with electrons. We short-circuit ourselves. Stroke my tits. There! [He tilts his head back until he is looking up at her] Give me your moth. [Frankie bends over and kisses him. It is a long one.] That tongue. Those lips. [He pulls her down towards him for another long kiss] I want to die like this. Drown.

FRANKIE. What do you want from me?

JOHNNY. Everything. Your heart. Your soul. Your tits. Your mouth. Your fucking guts. I want it all. I want to be inside you. Don’t hold back.

FRANKIE. I’m not holding back.

JOHNNY. Let go. I’ll catch you.

FRANKIE. I’m right here.

JOHNNY. I want more. I need more.

FRANKIE. If I’d known what playing with your tit was gonna turn into —

JOHNNY. Quit screwing with me, Frankie.

FRANKIE. You got a pretty weird notion of who’s screwing with who. I said I liked you. I told you that. I’m perfectly ready to make love to you. Why do you have to start a big discussion about it. It’s not like I’m saying “no”.

JOHNNY. I want you to do something.

FRANKIE. What?

JOHNNY. I want you to go down on me.

FRANKIE. No.

JOHNNY. I went down on you.

FRANKIE. That was different.

JOHNNY. How?

FRANKIE. That was then.

JOHNNY. Please.

FRANKIE. I’m not good at it.

JOHNNY. Hey, this isn’t a contest. We’re talking about making love.

FRANKIE. I don’t want to right now.

JOHNNY. You want me to go down on you again?

FRANKIE. If I do it will you shut up about all this other stuff?

JOHNNY. You know I won’t.

FRANKIE. Then go down on yourself.

JOHNNY. What happened? You were gonna do it.

FRANKIE. Anything to get you to quit picking at me. Go on, get out of here. Get somebody else to go down on you.

JOHNNY. I don’t want somebody else to go down on me.

FRANKIE. Jesus! I just had a vision of what it’s going to be like at work Monday after this! I’m quitting my job. I was there first.

JOHNNY. What are you talking about?

FRANKIE. I don’t think we’re looking for the same thing.

JOHNNY. We are. Only I’ve found it and you’ve given up.

FRANKIE. Yes! Long before the sun ever rose on your ugly face.

JOHNNY. What scares you more? Marriage or kids?

FRANKIE. I’m not scared. And I told you: I can’t have any.

JOHNNY. I told you: we can adopt.

FRANKIE. I don’t love you.

JOHNNY. That wasn’t the question.

FRANKIE. You hear what you want to hear.

JOHNNY. Do you know anybody who doesn’t?

FRANKIE. Not all the time.

JOHNNY. You’re only telling me you don’t love me so you don’t have to find out if you could. Just because you’ve given up on the possibility, I’m not going to let you drag me down with you. You’re coming up to my level if I have to pull you by the hair.

FRANKIE. I’m not going anywhere with a man who for all his bullshit about marriage and kids and Shakespeare …

JOHNNY. It’s not bullshit!

FRANKIE. …Just wants me to go down on him.

JOHNNY. Pretend it’s a metaphor.

FRANKIE. Fuck you it was a metaphor! It was a blowjob. What’s a metaphor?

JOHNNY. Something that stands for something else.

FRANKIE. I was right the first time. A blowjob.

JOHNNY. A sensual metaphor for mutual acceptance.

FRANKIE. Fuck you. Besides, what’s mutual about a blowjob?

JOHNNY. I made that up. I’m sorry. It wasn’t a metaphor. It was just something I wanted us to do.

FRANKIE. And I didn’t.

JOHNNY. Let go, will you! One lousy little peccadillo and it’s off with his head!

FRANKIE. Stop using words I don’t know. What’s a peccadillo?

JOHNNY. A blowjob! Notice I haven’t died you didn’t do it!

FRANKIE. I noticed.

JOHNNY. And let me notice something for you: you wouldn’t have died if you had. Thanks for making me feel about this big. [He gets up and starts gathering and putting on his clothes] I’m sorry, I mistook you for a kindred spirit. Kindred: two of a kind, sharing a great affinity.

FRANKIE. I know what kindred means!

JOHNNY. Shall we go for affinity?

FRANKIE. That’s the first really rotten thing you’ve said all night. Somebody who would make fun of somebody else’s intelligence, not worse, their education or lack of — that is somebody I would be very glad not to know. I thought you were weird, Johnny. I thought you were sad. I didn’t think you were cruel.

JOHNNY. I’m sorry.

FRANKIE. It’s a cruelty just waiting to happen again and I don’t want to be there when it does.

JOHNNY. Please! [There is an urgency in his voice that startles Frankie] I’m not good with people. But I want to be. I can get away with it for long stretches but I always hang myself in the end.

FRANKIE. Hey, c’mon, don’t cry. Please, don’t cry.

JOHNNY. It’s not cruelty. It’s a feeling I don’t matter. That nobody hears me. I’m drowning. I’m trying to swim back to shore but there’s this tremendous undertow and I’m not getting anywhere. My arms and legs are going a mile a minute but they aren’t taking me any closer to where I want to be.

FRANKIE. Where’s that?

JOHNNY. With you.

FRANKIE. You don’t know me.

JOHNNY. Yes, I do. It scares people how much we really know one another, so we pretend we don’t. You know me. You’ve known me all your life. Only now I’m here. Take me. Use me. Try me. There’s a reason we’re called Frankie and Johnny.

FRANKIE. There’s a million other Frankies out there and a billion other Johnnys. The world is filled with Frankies and Johnnys and Jacks and Jills.

JOHNNY. But only one this Johnny, one this Frankie.

FRANKIE. We’re too different.

JOHNNY. You say po-tah-toes? All right, I’ll say po-tah-toes! I don’t care. I love you. I want to marry you.

FRANKIE. I don’t say po-tah-toes. Who the hell says po-tah-toes?

JOHNNY. Are you listening to me?

FRANKIE. I’m trying very hard not to!

JOHNNY. That’s your trouble. You don’t want to hear anything you don’t think you already know. Well I’ll tell you something, Cinderella: your Prince Charming has come. Wake up before another thousand years go by! Don’t throw me away like a gum wrapper because you think there’s something about me you may not like. I have what it takes to give you anything and everything you want. Maybe not up here … [he taps his head] … or here … [he slaps his hip where he wears his wallet] … but here. And that would please me enormously. All I ask back is that you use your capacity to be everyone and everything for me. It’s within you. If we could do that for each other we’d give our kids the universe. They’d be Shakespeare and the most beautiful music ever written and a saint maybe or a champion athlete or a president all rolled into one. Terrific kids! How could they not be? We have a chance to make everything turn out all right again. Turn our back on everything that went wrong. We can begin right now and all over again but only if we begin right now, this minute, this room and us. I know this thing, Frankie.

FRANKIE. I want to show you something, Johnny. [She pushes her hair back] He did that. The man I told you about. With a belt buckle. [Johnny kisses the scar]

JOHNNY. It’s gone now.

FRANKIE. It’ll never go.

JOHNNY. It’s gone. I made it go.

FRANKIE. What are you? My guardian angel?

JOHNNY. It seems to me the right people are our guardian angels.

FRANKIE. I wanted things too, you know.

JOHNNY. I know.

FRANKIE. A man, a family, kids … He’s the reason I can’t have any.

JOHNNY. He’s gone. Choose me. Hurry up. It’s getting light out. I turn into a pumpkin.

FRANKIE. [Looking towards the window] It is getting light out! [Frankie goes to the window]

JOHNNY. You are so beautiful standing there.

FRANKIE. The only time I saw the sun come up with a guy was my senior prom. [Johnny has joined her at the window. As they stand there looking out, we will be aware of the rising sun] His name was Johnny Di Corso but everyone called him Skunk. [She takes Johnny’s hand and clasps it to her but her eyes stay looking out the window at the dawn] He was a head shorter than me and wasn’t much to look at but nobody else had asked me. It was him or else. I was dreading it. But guess what? That boy could dance! You should have seen us. We were the stars of the prom. We did Lindys, the mambo, the Twist. The Monkey, the Frug. All the fast dances. Everybody’s mouth was down to here. Afterwards we went out to the lake to watch the sun come up. He told me he was going to be on American Bandstand one day. I wonder if he ever made it. [Johnny puts his arm around her and begins to move her in a slow dance step]

JOHNNY. There must be something about you and sunrises and men called Johnny.

FRANKIE. You got a nickname?

JOHNNY. No. You got to be really popular or really unpopular to have a nickname.

FRANKIE. I’ll give you a nickname. [They dance in silence a while. Silence, that is, except for the Shostakovich which they pay no attention to] You’re not going to like me saying this but you’re a terrible dancer.

JOHNNY. Show me.

FRANKIE. Like that.

JOHNNY. There?

FRANKIE. That’s better.

JOHNNY. You’re going to make a wonderful teacher. [He starts to hum]

FRANKIE. What’s that supposed to be?

JOHNNY. Something from Brigadoon.

FRANKIE. That isn’t from Brigadoon. That isn’t even remotely from Brigadoon. That isn’t even remotely something from anything. [They dance. Frankie begins to hum] That’s something from Brigadoon. You can’t have kids in a place this size.

JOHNNY. Who says?

FRANKIE. How big is your place?

JOHNNY. Even smaller. We’ll be a nice snug family. It’ll be wonderful.

FRANKIE. Does it always get light so fast this time of year?

JOHNNY. Unh-unh. The sun’s in a hurry to shine on us.

FRANKIE. Pardon my French but that’s bullshit.

JOHNNY. You can sleep all day today.

FRANKIE. What are you planning to do?

JOHNNY. Watch you.

FRANKIE. You’re just weird enough to do it, too. Well forget it. I can’t sleep with people watching me.

JOHNNY. How do you know?

FRANKIE. I was in the hospital for my gall bladder and I had a roommate who just stared at me all the time. I made them move me. I got a private room for the price of a semi. Is this the sort of stuff you look forward to finding out about me?

JOHNNY. Unh-hunh!

FRANKIE. You’re nuts.

JOHNNY. I’m happy.

FRANKIE. Where are you taking me?

JOHNNY. The moon.

FRANKIE. That old place again?

JOHNNY. The other side this time. [Johnny has slow-danced Frankie to the bed. The room is being quickly flooded with sunlight]

FRANKIE. If you don’t turn into a pumpkin, what do you turn into?

JOHNNY. You tell me. [He kisses her very gently]

FRANKIE. Just a minute. [She gets up and moves quickly to the bathroom. Johnny turns off all the room lights. He starts to close the blinds but instead raises them even higher. Sunlight pours across him. The Shostakovich ends. Johnny moves quickly to the radio and turns up the volume as the announcer’s voice is heard]

RADIO ANNOUNCER … that just about winds up my stint in the control room. This has been Music Till Dawn with Marlon. I’m still thinking about Frankie and Johnny. God, how I wish you two really existed. Maybe I’m crazy but I’d still like to believe in love. Why the hell do you think I work these hours? Anyway, you two moonbeams, whoever, wherever you are, here’s an encore. [Debussy’s “Clair de Lune” is heard again. Johnny sits, listening. He starts to cry he is so happy. He turns as Frankie comes out of the bathroom. She is brushing her teeth]

JOHNNY. They’re playing our song again.

FRANKIE. Did they say what it was this time?

JOHNNY. I told you! You just walk into a record shop and ask for the most beautiful music …

FRANKIE. Watch us end up with something from The Sound of Music, you’ll see! You want to brush? [She motions with her thumb to the bathroom. She steps aside as Johnny passes her to go in] Don’t worry. It’s never been used. [Still brushing her teeth she goes to the window and looks out] Did you see the robins? [She listens to the music] This I can see why people call pretty. [She sits on the bed, listens and continues to brush her teeth. A little gasp of pleasure escapes her.] Mmmmm! [Johnny comes out of the bathroom. He is brushing his teeth]

JOHNNY. I’m not going to ask whose robe that is.

FRANKIE. Sshh! [She is really listening to the music]

JOHNNY. We should get something with fluoride.

FRANKIE. Sshh!

JOHNNY. Anti-tartar build-up, too.

FRANKIE. Johnny! [Johnny sits next to her on the bed. They are both brushing their teeth and listening to the music. They continue to brush their teeth and listen to the Debussy. The lights are fading.]

END OF THE PLAY