THEATER PLAYS

MAN: And how must it be said?

DIRECTOR: Sincerely, with feeling. Your words should come from your very heart… Remember in Faust? “Let apes and children praise your art, if their admiration’s to your taste, But you’ll never speak from heart to heart, unless it rises up from your heart’s space.” Got it? Well! Off you go!

MAN: (reading from the paper in his hand) Dear brother!..

DIRECTOR: Don’t look at the paper but at the camera, right at the camera!

MAN: But there’s no camera.

DIRECTOR: Here, in rehearsal, I’ll play the role of the camera. And tomorrow, during the show, think of it the other way, that the camera’s your director. It’s me, your best friend. Looking into the camera’s eye – directly into the lens, that is – address it as if it were a living person. Keep this in mind: that way you’ll be looking into the eyes of millions of people, and they’ll be looking at you. Clear? Off you go!

MAN: (staring intently at DIRECTOR) Dear brother!..

DIRECTOR: Stop! You’re looking at the camera, and that’s good, but you’ve forgotten to portray grief.

MAN: It’s difficult to remember everything at once – my face, and the camera, and the words, and the grief. I’m afraid of losing the thread.

DIRECTOR: To hell with the words, then! Words are the least of your worries. If you can’t remember, don’t. Words aren’t important in the modern theater. The main thing is to express emotion.

CONSULTANT: (from her corner) All the same, it seems to me that the words are important too.

DIRECTOR: (to CONSULTANT) Should I kick you out now or wait for you to pipe up again? (to MAN) Continue. Your face should be sad but at the same time serene, inspiring energy and optimism. Yes, your best friend has left you too soon, but he will always stay with you, in your heart. He will not be forgotten. His work will never die. And you will be the one to carry it on. So, start over! Sobs constrict your throat…

MAN: (in a strangled voice, while unsuccessfully trying to create a mixture of sadness, energy, and optimism on his face) Dear brother!

DIRECTOR: What are you muttering there?

MAN: This sobbing’s making my throat tight.

DIRECTOR: So it’s tight, but you still have to speak clearly.

MAN: (in his own voice) All this is very difficult. How can anybody portray sorrow and optimism at once? This isn’t going anywhere.

DIRECTOR: (furious) It isn’t going anywhere because you don’t know how to put in the work, and you don’t even want to. I’m afraid I’m only wasting my precious time with you.

MAN: (unexpectedly gruff and arrogant) You forget yourself, my dear sir. Please watch your tone. Yes, we have no acting talent. What of it? We don’t have to. We’re busy with more important things. Politicians should never be actors.

DIRECTOR: You’re wrong. It’s actors who should never be politicians. A good politician ought to be an actor, though. But so be it. If I ever find the time, I’ll give you some private lessons. Provided you make it worth my while, needless to say. In the meantime, go run your lines in front of a mirror and learn the words.

MAN: (tightly wound now) You’re being way too familiar, and it’s unacceptable – do you hear me? We’re not floozies in vaudeville or wherever you normally do your thing, but upstanding, respected people. Conduct yourself accordingly.

DIRECTOR: Theater 101: the director is all, and the rest, whoever they may be, are nobody and nothing, empty suits, clothes hangers, dolls, and puppets. Is that clear?

MAN: And I say again: we will not tolerate being taunted just because we’re having trouble with one thing or another!

DIRECTOR: (mocking) “With one thing or another”… Such modesty! “One thing or another”! (ferociously.) You’re having trouble with everything! Do you hear? Everything! (thinks for a moment) This is what I’m going to do. Tomorrow I’m going to put a sniper in the window of the building closest to the square. And if you haven’t learned your lines, as soon as you make the first mistake, the rifle will make bang-bang. I’ll have the second coffin all ready. And your partner will double up on her speech over the twin graves. (to WOMAN) Won’t you?

WOMAN: With pleasure.

DIRECTOR: That will, I assure you, be one awe-inspiring show. It’s a pity that you won’t be there to enjoy it.

MAN: Your little jokes are stupid and out of place.

DIRECTOR: But I’m not joking at all. There’s less than twenty-four hours left before we thoroughly disgrace ourselves, so stop talking and buckle down at last. Every show demands hard work and preparation, and ours especially. It involves countless hordes of people, and we’re down to the wire.

CONSULTANT: You seem nervous. Afraid you aren’t going to make it?

DIRECTOR: I’m never afraid of anything. It’ll all be ready in time. I’ve staged spectacles on streets, and on squares, and in stadiums, and in swimming pools… And everything always went like clockwork. This is my profession. I work like a horse, but I demand the same attitude to the work from everyone else.

MAN: I’m not against work, but I do require respect. I’m not some whippersnapper – I’m a big deal. A very big deal.

DIRECTOR: And I require respect too. In your free time, away from rehearsals, by all means run the government or the country, I couldn’t care less. But here I’m directing this production, and you’re only actors in it and have to do what you’re told.

MAN: So stick to your business, but don’t forget who you are and who I am.

DIRECTOR: I’m not forgetting that you’re our prime minister, our fearless leader. Although the male lead in the seediest provincial theater would play that part in tomorrow’s performance far better than you. And you, in turn, don’t forget that I’m the one who forged your image when you were being groomed for the prime minister spot. I’m the one who taught you how to walk, talk, dress, carry yourself, so that you’d look every bit like a serious, intelligent, upstanding person. But now we’re in rehearsal, not at some government meeting. And in rehearsal, everyone obeys just one person. Namely, the director. And that director is me.

MAN: Permit me to…

DIRECTOR: (cutting MAN off) And I make so bold as to observe that when a minister is removed from his post, he becomes nobody, the “former,” the “ex” whatever. But no one will take my calling from me. I was, am, and will remain a top-flight professional.

MAN: But that doesn’t give you the right…

DIRECTOR: (cutting him off again) Wait, I haven’t finished yet. If you make a mess of tomorrow’s nationwide broadcast, it’ll be your mess, of course. Unfortunately, though, it will be mine too. You’ll probably be fired, but I’ll survive it. No one’ll fire me. Still, I value my reputation as the country’s best director, and I don’t want to lose it because of you. And I won’t let either of you go until you deliver your speeches the way you should. This is, first of all, in your own interests. How come you aren’t understanding that?

MAN: (less confident) I just wanted to say that I don’t like the way you rehearse.

DIRECTOR: Directing’s part of my job description, so leave that to me. If you let all the professionals do what they do the way they want to, as they know best, our country would have changed to the good long ago. But you interfere with everything and spoil everything. (pointing to WOMAN) Take your fellow member of the government as your example. She’s sitting quietly and not trying to stretch the rehearsal out with pointless bickering. (to WOMAN) Because you’re a minister, an elected representative, or something like that too, aren’t you?

WOMAN: What of it?

DIRECTOR: Nothing. So what are you running there?

WOMAN: What ministry would they give to a woman? Only what is considered the most unimportant, third-rate – health care, education, culture…

DIRECTOR: And which of those ministries do you head up?

WOMAN: Me…? (racking her brains) It’s… You know… Education, I think… Or no – Culture. I always get them mixed up. (to MAN) Do you remember? At present I’m Minister of what – Education or Culture?

MAN: (sullenly) Agriculture.

WOMAN: Right! For some reason I was thinking Culture.

MAN: You were head of Culture last time around.

WOMAN: Why didn’t you remind me before? At yesterday’s meeting, I kept saying that our main aim is to develop culture.

MAN: No big deal. They probably thought you were pushing them to improve crop cultivation or something.