She’s stubbing her cigarette out on the table. It was my mother’s.
STANLEY
It’s the Arts, Lillian. Shut up.
PLAYER 1 (BLANCHE)
You will find them in the heart-shaped box I keep my accessories in.
LILLIAN
Some of us manage to combine a love of the theatre with a respect for other people’s property. The blighters.
STANLEY
It’s Alternative Theatre.
PLAYER 1 (BLANCHE)
And Stella … Try and locate a bunch of artificial violets in that box, too, to pin with the seahorse on the lapel of the jacket.
PLAYER 2 (STELLA)
I don’t know if I did the right thing.
LILLIAN
Yes, and we’re going to have to get an alternative carpet.
PLAYER 1
(aside)
Another satisfied customer.
SCENE 29: STANLEY AND LILLIAN’S LIVING ROOM
NARRATOR
The play is over and the cast are getting changed. Stanley and Lillian are still arguing while Charles talks to the actor who played Blanche, who is the leader of the group.
PLAYER 1
Does it run to a garden? We like to do the battlements stuff alfresco.
CHARLES
(eagerly)
Oh yes. Big garden.
PLAYER 1
What kind of access?
CHARLES
French windows.
PLAYER 1
French windows. Heaven! I’ve always wanted to be in a play with French windows.
PLAYER 2
What play?
PLAYER 1
Hamlet, at this gentleman’s house. Next Wednesday.
Player 2 groans.
LILLIAN
(to Charles)
You must be mad. They’ve ruined a lovely candlewick bedspread.
STANLEY
This is Art, Lillian. I never liked that bedspread anyway.
CHARLES
You do do the play scene?
PLAYER 1
Look, dear. It’s not ‘Great Moments from Shakespeare’. Of course we do the play scene.
LILLIAN
You’ll never do it here again.
CHARLES
And the scene in the play within the play when the wicked uncle pours the poison into the king’s ear.
PLAYER 1
Dans l’oreille.
CHARLES
I want you to change it.
PLAYER 1
Tamper with the text? Moi?
CHARLES
Don’t put the poison in his ear. Give him it in a glass. Like a drink.
PLAYER 1
Cost you another five quid.
SCENE 30: SITTING ROOM
Music under, slowly fades out.
NARRATOR
At home, a few days later, Harriet is arranging the sitting room, as for a play, with the stage by the fireplace.
HARRIET
… So in the play Hamlet asks the players to adapt the play within the play to fit the circumstances of his father’s murder. All right so far. Now Charles is asking these players to adapt the play within the play to fit the circumstances of Dad’s death. Which, if this were a play would make this Hamlet. Only the play the players are putting on is Hamlet. I think a cigarette is called for.
She lights cigarette ineptly.
Because where do I fit in? I must ask Miss McArthur if anybody’s ever suggested Hamlet had a sister.
SCENE 31: INT. VAN/STREET
A van drives up and stops, engine switches off, doors open. Footsteps, Banging on back door of van.
PLAYER 1 (BARNARDO)
(from inside the van)
Who’s there?
PLAYER 2 (FRANCISCO)
Nay, answer me. Stand and unfold yourself.
Back van doors open and Player gets out.
PLAYER 1 (BARNARDO)
Long live the King.
PLAYER 2 (FRANCISCO)
Barnardo?
PLAYER 1 (BARNARDO)
He.
PLAYER 2 (FRANCISCO)
You come most carefully upon your hour.
Van doors slamming shut.
SCENE 32: SITTING ROOM
GEORGE
They’re late.
NIGHTINGALE
They’re young.
ROGERS
They’re coming from Croydon.
GWEN
Are they students?
GEORGE
Are they students?
CHARLES
Gwen imagines everyone under the age of twenty-five is a student.
GEORGE
Pretty safe bet if you ask me.
CHARLES
They’re actors, George.
GEORGE
What time do they call this? Time for another, Mrs Davenport?
Drink being poured.
GILLIATT
I feel responsible, Mrs Davenport.
CHARLES
Gwen, Gwen, George. George, Gwen.
Rustling of chocolate-box paper.
NICOLA
I’m eating these chocolates.
GEORGE
Why not telephone?
ROGERS
I hope they haven’t had an accident.
GEORGE
Hope followed a muck-cart and thought it was a wedding.
HARRIET
There’s somebody in the garden.
The French windows burst open.
NARRATOR
The door of the sitting room is thrown open and the players rush in.
PLAYER 2 (HAMLET)
O, that this too too solid flesh would melt,
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew!
NARRATOR
The stage Hamlet perches on a chair next to Charles, in a parody of Charles’s earlier gloom.
SCENE 33
PLAYER 2 (HAMLET)
… Or that the Everlasting had not fix’d
His canon ’gainst self-slaughter! Oh God! God!
How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable
Seem to me all the uses of this world!
NIGHTINGALE
I often wonder if I should have been an actor. I did have the chance, only I thought banking offered more …
PLAYER 2 (HAMLET)
Fie on’t! ah fie! ’tis an unweeded garden,
That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature
Possess it merely.
GWEN
I am enjoying this. It’s so real.
PLAYER 2 (HAMLET)
That it should come to this!
But two months dead: nay, not so much, not two:
So excellent a king; that was, to this,
Hyperion to a satyr.
GWEN
It’s so real.
GEORGE
First-rate.
SCENE 34: BEDROOM
Music.
PLAYER 1 (PLAYER KING)
Full thirty times hath Phoebus’ cart gone round Neptune’s salt wash and Tellus’ orbèd ground, And thirty dozen moons with borrowed sheen About the world have times twelve thirties been, Since love our hearts and Hymen did our hands Unite comutual in most sacred bands.
NARRATOR
The play within the play takes place upstairs in the bedroom where Charles’s father died.
PLAYER 2 (PLAYER QUEEN)
So many journeys may the sun and moon
Make us again count o’er ere love be done!
But, woe is me, you are so sick of late,
So far from cheer and from your former state.
NARRATOR
We see the King in the play asking the villain for a drink. The villain at first refuses, then gives him one. The King collapses. The villain comforts his widow and kisses her. During this Charles is intently watching George’s reactions.
PLAYER 1 (PLAYER KING)
Lights, lights, lights.
GEORGE
Yes, come on, somebody, switch it
on. Let the dog see the rabbit.
CHARLES
Well?
GEORGE
Well what?
CHARLES
Don’t you see? (To Gwen.) Don’t you see?
GWEN
See what, dear?
CHARLES
He killed him, then took his wife.
GEORGE
Of course he did. Give us credit for a little intelligence. And now he’s wrestling with his conscience, right? We’re not stupid. (To Gwen.) Your son is pathetic.
SCENE 35: SITTING ROOM
NARRATOR
In the sitting room the King is slumped in an armchair staring at a blank television screen, wrestling with his conscience. Hamlet appears behind him and picks up an ornament as if about to smash it over the King’s head.
GEORGE
Go on. Go on. Give him what for.
PLAYER 2 (HAMLET)
Now might I do it pat, now ’a is a-praying;
And now I’ll do’t – and so ’a goes to heaven,
And so am I reveng’d. That would be scann’d:
A villain kills my father; and for that,
I, his sole son, do this same villain send
To heaven.
Oh, this is hire and salary, not revenge….
GEORGE
He’s such a wet, this boy.
SCENE 36: BEDROOM
Music under.
NARRATOR
The Players followed by the audience move upstairs to Gwen’s bedroom, where the scene between Hamlet and Gertrude takes place. Around the bedroom door George and the others crane to see what is happening in the bedroom.
PLAYER 2 (HAMLET)
Nay, but to live
In the rank sweat of an enseamèd bed,
Stew’d in corruption, honeying and making love Over the nasty sty!
GEORGE
That’s it. Now you’re talking. You tell her, the bitch! The dirty cow!
GERTRUDE
Oh speak to me no more,
These words like daggers enter in my ears.
No more, sweet Hamlet.
HAMLET
A murderer and a villain;
A slave that is not twentieth part the tithe
Of your precedent lord; a vice of kings;
A cutpurse of the empire and the rule,
That from a shelf the precious diadem stole,
And put it in his pocket!
SCENE 37: KITCHEN
NARRATOR
Detached as ever, Harriet sits in the kitchen, smoking and with a drink.
Door opens, Charles comes in.
HARRIET
Congratulations. They’re loving it.
CHARLES
Why? Why?
HARRIET
Why what?
CHARLES
Why can’t they see themselves?
HARRIET
It’s a play.
CHARLES
It was a play in Shakespeare. They saw themselves there. The King saw the play and recognised himself and was conscience-stricken.
HARRIET
But that was a play too. The whole thing was a play. This isn’t a play.
CHARLES
Look at Queen Elizabeth. She was always seeing plays and kicking up because she thought they had a message for her.
HARRIET
That’s allegory. I haven’t done that yet. Miss McArthur says –
CHARLES
Oh, sod Miss McArthur.
Door bursts open and Players rush in.
CHARLES
Oh Christ.
NARRATOR
The King falls dead at George’s feet. The Queen also dying, holding up a glass.
GERTRUDE
No, no, the drink, the drink – O my dear Hamlet – The drink, the drink – I am poisoned.
NARRATOR
Hamlet is dying. George is very moved.
GEORGE
Poor sod.
Doorbell.
NIGHTINGALE
(knowledgeably)
Fortinbras.
SCENE 38: FRONT DOOR
Front door being opened.
LABOUR CANVASSER
I’m canvassing on behalf of the Labour Party but I don’t know who this other gentleman is.
GEORGE
Fortinbras, you twerp.
FORTINBRAS
For me, with sorrow I embrace my fortune.
I have some rights of memory in this kingdom
Which now to claim my vantage doth invite me.
SCENE 39: STREET
The Players’ van driving off.
GWEN
Thank you, thank you.
GEORGE
(calling)
Come again! Goodbye.
Front door closing.
NIGHTINGALE
Come along, Nicola, time we were going.
NICOLA
(kiss)
Goodbye, George. (Kiss.) Goodbye, Gwen.
ROGERS/GILLIATT
Goodnight, Gwen. Goodnight, George.
GWEN
Goodnight.
NIGHTINGALE
Goodnight, George.
GEORGE
Goodnight.
SCENE 40: SITTING ROOM
NARRATOR
George with his arm round Gwen leads her back into the house, which is pretty much a shambles. George rights a chair or two.
GWEN
(meaningfully)
Leave it. Come on up, darling.
GEORGE
Won’t be long.
SCENE 41: BEDROOM
NARRATOR
Charles is waiting for Gwen in her bedroom.
GWEN
Allow your mother just a little share of happiness. You’re young. It was no joke being married to your father.
CHARLES
Frank, you mean.
GWEN
Your father. It’s so long since your mother was appreciated. A little kiss even.
CHARLES
It’s not just a little kiss, though, is it? It’s full-blown sexual intercourse.
GWEN
Please. You make it sound so clinical.
CHARLES
You don’t –
GWEN
CHARLES
Human beings? You’re fifty. Look at you.
GWEN
Well? I’m a fine figure of a woman. I look younger every day.
CHARLES
It’s in such bad taste. I’m trying to find some guilt here.
GWEN
Guilt? I’m all woman, Charles.
She opens door.
(Calling.) George!
CHARLES
Your husband has just died.
GWEN
Don’t exaggerate. It’s two months ago at least. I know. I wrote it down.
CHARLES
Mother!
GWEN
That word again. What?
CHARLES
George killed Father.
GWEN
Did he? I thought it was pneumonia.
CHARLES
No. It was like in the play. George gave him a drink and it killed him.
Telephone rings downstairs and stops as George answers it.
GWEN
Isn’t that George all over. He gave me this new nightdress. He just can’t say no.
GEORGE
(from downstairs)
Hello …
GWEN
(calling)
George! (To Charles.) You see, dear, Frank drank. That’s what killed him. It isn’t like the play. Life isn’t like plays. I mean if it was like the play there’d be that old man behind the curtains calling out at this point and you’d have to kill him. You aren’t going to kill anybody. People don’t do such things.
George comes into the bedroom.
GEORGE
That was Birdie. Their car’s broken down. Be a sweetie, Charles, and nip over and give them a lift home. I’m knackered.
NARRATOR
Indifferent to Charles, George unzips Gwen’s dress and kisses the back of her neck.
CHARLES
Oh God!
NARRATOR
Charles watches horrified.
GEORGE
Away you go, Charles. And take care.
Car starting and driving off.
SCENE 42: KITCHEN
Car crash.
HARRIET
Birdie and Nicola were sitting in the car, parked on the road, waiting for Charles. He drove smack into them. Birdie was killed, Nicola’s in a coma, both cars were a write-off, everybody’s heartbroken and the funeral’s this afternoon.
SCENE 43: SITTING ROOM
Music.
NARRATOR
Harriet sits at her table in the sitting room, doing her homework. Charles is on the sofa, in his funeral suit, one leg in plaster.
HARRIET
‘Is the fate of Shakespeare’s tragic heroes inevitable?’
CHARLES
Shakespeare doesn’t work. Life isn’t like Shakespeare. Right now it’s Ibsen. I feel like shooting myself. Hamlet meets Hedda Gabler. What’re they doing?
HARRIET
Not that. They’re in the kitchen.
CHARLES
I woke up at four this morning. They were at it like knives. If this were Shakespeare they’d be racked with guilt. Do you think I ought to paint my cast black?
HARRIET
What for?
CHARLES
The funeral.
SCENE 44: KITCHEN
NARRATOR
In the kitchen Gwen is peering into the fridge-freezer.
GWEN
Hello again, quiches.
NARRATOR
While Gwen gloats over her store, George’s hand caresses her bum.
GEORGE
My little gooseberry tart.
NARRATOR
He embraces her as she holds out a frozen quiche behind him, and, while he kisses her neck, reads the label.
GWEN
Leek and raspberry? That can’t be right … How’s the cup going?
GEORGE
Bit short on gin. This our total stock?
GWEN
Oh, I knew there was something I’d forgotten. But there’s that stuff in the shed still. Frank’s residue. In the cupboard.
GEORGE
Good old Frank. I’ll go and fetch it.
Music.
SCENE 45: SITTING ROOM
NARRATOR
George carries a punch bowl into the sitting room and places it down, with the glasses arranged neatly round it. It is orange and evil-looking.
SCENE 46: BEDROOM
Tennis ball on cricket bat, birdsong. Music fades out.
NARRATOR
In the garden, Charles and Harriet in their funeral clothes are playing French cricket. Gwen watches them through her bedroom window. George comes up and puts his arms around her.
GEORGE
Time for a quick one, eh?
GWEN
George. We’re going to a funeral.
GEORGE
I think that’s what does it. I’ll nip down and get a drink first.
GWEN
One for me, too.