The Books: “Here” (Michael Frayn)

Next script on my script shelf:

Next play in my little unalphabetized pile of Samuel French plays is Here: A Play in Two Acts, by Michael Frayn

Author of Noises Off, Copenhagen and the list goes on and on – this playwright just dazzles me. With his range, his thematic complexity – his … just the fact of him.

This play Here is little known and has not been produced in the States. A good friend of mine, who is a wonderful director, had a dream to do this play – we did a couple of readings of it – I LOVE this play – I mean, I am HUNGRY to do this play – but Frayn won’t release the rights. Not sure why – if another theatre company has been promised it, or if he doesn’t want this play out competing with his later works – don’t know – but periodically, year after year, we try to get the rights to this damn thing.

Goldurnit, I want to do this play.

I think about it and I feel this little bruise in my heart … like I just want to do it. I wish we could do it. I would lie and steal and cheat to get to do it.

I don’t know why it turns me on so much, but it does. There’s something about the play that is a little bit like a blank slate … and when you read the dialogue, you’ll see what I mean. There’s a Pinter-esque feel to it. Most of the important stuff is NOT said. People leave things unspoken. There are worlds of subtext. The lines are, for the most part, simple and prosaic … but the truth beneath is just … fantastically rich.

Even just writing about it makes me feel all yearning and wistful. grrrrr. NOBODY can love this play like I do.

Cath and Phil are a young couple. They are going to move in together. The first scene is the two of them looking at an apartment and trying to decide whether or not they like it. But you get the sense – without either of them saying a word – what is really going on is that they’re both a little freaked out by commitment.

I’ll excerpt from Scene 2. Cath and Phil have now moved into that apartment. They’re both quietly flipping out at the closeness and intimacy.

Watch the fireworks. I’m dying to say these lines.

From Here: A Play in Two Acts, by Michael Frayn

Scene 2

A mattress now occupies the center of the room, with a small TV and an alarm clock on the floor beside it. A simple table, with two chairs. By the window stands a small pot plant. On the wall, a picture or two. There are a few objects carefully arranged on the shelves, including a dozen books and the toy dog. The curtain is drawn across the alcove. Phil and Cate are sitting on the mattress, looking at the room. She is wearing a long, shapeless jumper. He has his arms round her.

PHIL. Yes?

CATH. Yes. Yes!

PHIL. Yes … [Pause] Or … [He gets up and goes towards the shelves]

CATH. Come back!

PHIL. What?

CATH. Don’t go away!

PHIL. Just …

CATH. What?

PHIL. This. [He moves the toy dog to a new position] Better?

CATH. Better.

PHIL. Or worse?

CATH. Better. Isn’t it?

PHIL. Yes. Much better. [He returns to the mattress and puts his arms round her] Yes?

CATH. Yes!

PHIL. [looks around the room] Cath, I think … I think …

CATH. … we’ve got it.

PHIL. I think.

CATH. I think we have.

PHIL. I think we may just possibly have.

CATH. You have.

PHIL. We have.

CATH. You did it.

PHIL. We did it.

CATH. Anyway, we’re there.

PHIL. So …

CATH. So we can just … I don’t know!

PHIL. Sit back.

CATH. Yes! sit back and … what?

PHIL. Live. Or whatever.

CATH. Oh, love …

[She kisses him. He looks at the shelves]

PHIL. Hold on.

CATH. What?

[He jumps up and goes back to the shelves]

CATH. What are you doing?

PHIL. Nothing. [He moves the toy dog to the floor by the bed, and the alarm clock to the shelf where the dog was]

CATH. You’re moving him?

PHIL. No. I just wanted to see if the clock …

CATH. Leave it, leave it! [She holds out her arms to him]

PHIL. Just a moment … [He moves it again]

CATH. You had it right before!

PHIL. Yes, but I just wanted to try something … [He moves it again] How about that?

CATH. No.

PHIL. No?

CATH. I liked him where he was before.

PHIL. What — here?

CATH. Not there …

PHIL. Here?

CATH. Where he was before!

PHIL. This is where he was before.

CATH. Anyway, it doesn’t matter.

PHIL. Doesn’t matter?

CATH. It’s not going to start a world war if you put the dog there instead of there!

PHIL. It might! We don’t know!

CATH. Don’t be silly, love.

PHIL. Cath, we can’t foresee what the consequences will be! We’re standing at a crossroads …

CATH. What — putting it there or putting it there?

PHIL. Putting it there or putting it there — and there’s no signpost, and we can’t possibly see where the two different paths lead. All we know is that whichever one we take, that’s the one we’ll have taken.

CATH. We can always move it.

PHIL. That won’t alter the fact that it was here to start with. It will always have been here. We’ll have that with us forever. Forever and ever. It’s like looking up at the sky at night. We’re staring into infinity.

CATH. Yes, well, I don’t want to think about it.

PHIL. All right, then we won’t think about it.

CATH. Do you mind?

PHIL. Then on and on the effects of not thinking about it will go …

CATH. Yes, but let’s not even talk about it.

PHIL. And if we don’t even talk about it …

CATH. I know.

PHIL. If we don’t talk about not even talking about it …

CATH. I know. I know!

PHIL. But, Cath …

CATH. Don’t. Don’t. Sorry. But just don’t.

[Pause]

PHIL. Cath, all I’m saying is — we’ve got to take control.

CATH. Yes.

PHIL. Because here we are.

CATH. Here we are.

PHIL. Now.

CATH. Yes.

PHIL. As it happens.

[Pause]

CATH. As it happens?

PHIL. We might not be.

CATH. What do you mean?

PHIL. We might be in some other room altogether. If we hadn’t seen the board that day.

CATH. Phil, don’t start all this again! We did see the board that day, and that’s that.

PHIL. But we wouldn’t have seen the board that day if we hadn’t been walking down this particular street.

CATH. But we were walking down this particular street.

PHIL. But why were we walking down this particular street?

CATH. Why were we walking down this particular street?

PHIL. We didn’t usually.

CATH. No.

PHIL. So why did we, on that particular day?

CATH. I don’t know.

PHIL. No. I don’t know!

CATH. We just did.

PHIL. We just did. Yes. We just did.

CATH. But since we did …

PHIL. Oh, sure. But isn’t it a tiny bit …?

CATH. What?

PHIL. I don’t know. A tiny bit … well …

CATH. No!

PHIL. No? I mean, look. [He gets up and walks about the room] We wouldn’t have been walking down this particular street or any other particular street if … well … if we’d never met.

CATH. Never met? What are you talking about? What is all this? We did meet, we did meet!

PHIL. Yes, but we shouldn’t have met if I hadn’t gone to that place where you were that day.

CATH. No …

PHIL. And I shouldn’t have gone to that place if I hadn’t known that man.

CATH. All right.

PHIL. And I shouldn’t have known that man if I hadn’t walked up that mountain, and I shouldn’t have walked up that mountain if there hadn’t been a mountain to walk up, and there wouldn’t have been a mountain to walk up if the rock strata hadn’t been tilted the way they are, and the rock strata wouldn’t have been tilted the way they are if the earth had cooled down differently five thousand million years ago, and if it had, Cath, if it had, if the earth had cooled down slightly differently five thousand million years ago, then I wouldn’t be here now — you wouldn’t be here now — you’d be sitting in some completely different room with some completely different man.

CATH. No, I shouldn’t.

PHIL. Yes, you would. If you’d met someone else instead of me.

CATH. If I’d met someone else instead of you?

PHIL. Yes.

CATH. I shouldn’t have fallen in love with them!

PHIL. Yes, you would. Of course you would. If I hadn’t been there. You’d have fallen in love with someone.

CATH. You mean, you would?

PHIL. All right.

CATH. You’d be sitting here with some completely different woman?

PHIL. Yes! No … [He goes back to the mattress and puts his arms around her]

CATH. You would, wouldn’t you.

PHIL. No. As it happens.

CATH. Yes, you would. I know you would.