Fool for Love, by Sam Shepard

FOOL FOR LOVE

By Sam Shepard

This play is to be performed relentlessly without a break.

Brace yourself for Sam Shepard.  His plays are crazy, physical, slightly confusing bundles of emotion.  From “Buried Child” which just finished an Off-Broadway run, to “Fool for Love,” which was recently on Broadway, and which we will be looking at today.

Like all Sam Shepard plays, physicality is one of the most, if not most important element of storytelling.  Do not cross out or ignore the stage directions.  You will be completely lost.

In the introduction to the Seven Plays collection by Batnam Books, Ross Wetzsteon gives “four ways in which his theatre has transformed the rigid categories of naturalism in order to achieve a kind of hyperrealism.”

1. Space is emotional rather than physical.
2. Tim is immediate rather than sequential.
3. Narrative is a matter of consciousness rather than behavior.
4. Character is spontaneous rather than coherent.

To me, it is easiest to think of a Sam Shepard play as a nightmare- stakes are incredibly high, everything seems incredibly read and immediate, and none of it quite makes sense.  But, it’s terrifying nonetheless.

Today we are looking at

MAY

When we first see May we see her on the bed “feet on floor, legs apart, elbows on knees, hands hanging limp and crossed between her knees, head hanging forward, face staring at floor.  She is absolutely still and maintains this attitude until she speaks.”

Her half-brother, her love, is back.  Again.  Her half-brother, who she didn’t know was her half-brother until they were way  too deeply in love.  Their dad fell in love with two women and split his life in half to have a life with both- he’d spend months with one, then leave without a trace to spend months with the other.  

Eddie,, the half-brother, takes after their dad.  He’s in love with May, he can’t help himself, but he leaves for months with other women, but always comes back to May.  This time he was off with “The Countess.”  He comes back to try to get May to run away with him.

But this time, she doesn’t fall for him.  She’s done.  Except it’s never that easy.  She can’t quite say no.  She says no multiple times, but the more he insists, the more she waivers.  She has an out this time though- a man, a date, named Marty, who’s coming over to take her to the movies.  When he shows up, and May leaves them alone together, Eddie insists on telling him a story- the story of their dad and his mom.  May overhears this, and finishes the story- telling how she and her mom tracked down the dad, and finally found him- it broke her mom’s heart.  But May didn’t even care- she was in love with Eddie.

This monologue comes from various points in the play, all before Martin enters.  May and Eddie play a constant game of cat and mouse, and we are never quite sure which one is which.

I don't understand my feelings. I really don't. I don't understand how I can hate you so much after so much time. How, no matter how much I'd like not to hate you, I hate you even more. It grows. I can't even see you now. All I see is a picture of you. You and her. I don't even know if the picture's real anymore. I don't even care. It's a made up picture. It invades my head. The two of you. And this picture stings even more than if I'd actually seen you with her. It cuts me. It cuts me so deep I'll never get over it. And I can't get rid of this picture either. It just comes. Uninvited. Kinda' like a little torture. And I blame you more for this little torture than I do for what you did.

You can't keep messing around like this. It's been going on too long. I can't take it anymore. I get sick every time you come around. Then I get sick when you leave. You're like a disease to me. Besides, you got no right being jealous of me after all the bullshit I've been through with you.

Okay. Look. I don't understand what you've got in your head anymore. I really don't. I don't get it. Now you desperately need me. Now you can't live without me. NOW you'll do anything for me. Why should I believe it this time?

It was supposed to have been true every time before. Every other time. Now it's true again. You've been jerking me off like this for fifteen years. Fifteen years I've been a yo-yo for you. I've never been split. I've never been two ways about you. I've either loved you or not loved you. And now I just plain don't love you. Understand? Do you understand that? I don't love you. I don't need you. I don't want you. Do you get that? Now if you can still stay, then you're either crazy or pathetic.

The Whale by Samuel D. Hunter

I’ve done something VERY unconventional here- I’ve created a monologue from lines in different parts of the play.  I’m talking different scenes, different acts, dozens of pages apart.  So, if you think that’s a terrible idea, feel free to skip on over to the next post.  But, if you’re going to stick around, I bring you

THE WHALE

By Samuel D. Hunter

The play takes place over the course of five days.  It follows Charlie, a morbidly obese (we’re talking 600 lbs), very close to death, gay man.  He’s a teacher- when we meet him on Monday, he finishes the class, turns on some gay porn, and begins to masterbate.  He begins to have trouble breathing- he’s panicking and he can’t stand up.  The porn won’t stop playing.

Enter Elder Thomas, a Mormon missionary.  He immediately wants to call an ambulance.  Instead, Charlie makes him read aloud an essay.  We learn later that the essay was written by his daughter, Ellie, when she was in 8th grade.  Charlie hasn’t seen his daughter in fifteen years.  His marriage ended in divorce- his wife, Mary, fought hard for custody and won..

Charlie and Alan, his lover, were both Mormon, and began seeing each other against their parents wishes.  Alan was so troubled by this that he would hyperventilate every time they drove past the church.  One day, his dad asked him to please come to the church that day- he had written a sermon just for him.  Alan came out of the church a broken man.  He stopped eating completely.  He was taken care of only by Charlie, and his sister Liz, who discovered his body.

Liz has been Charlie’s nurse.  Throughout the play she yells at him, fusses at him, nags at him- she’s the first to tell him he has to go to the hospital. He refuses.  It’s not until the end that Liz completely loses it, because Charlie is doing the same thing Alan did, and there is nothing she can do about it.

At the end of the play, we finally learn about the sermon that caused Alan to break down and literally starve himself to death.  The sermon was about Jonah and the whale- a story about a man who turned his back on God.

If you want to see how this is all revealed- please check out the play.  For now, I’m going to switch gears and focus on Charlie’s daughter-

ELLIE

She shows up at the beginning of the week to see her father for the first time since she was two.  She is cruel… at best.

Charlie wants to know why she isn’t at school.  Turns out, she’s suspended- “I blogged about my stupid bitch lab partner.  She told her stupid bitch mom and the vice principal said it was “vaguely threatening.”  Ellie has a blog, a “trash site” where she posts pictures of her friends and her mom and insults them.  It’s like a blog, but the only thing she ever talks about is how much she doesn’t like people.  She’s failing.  Personally, socially and academically.  

Charlie wants to help.  First, he offers to help her pass her classes.  Then he offers to pay her to spend time with him.  One hundred and twenty thousand dollars to be exact.  Everything he has.  She quickly agrees.

Later on, Ellie meets Elder Thomas.  She’s horrible to him (like she is to everyone), but he sticks around.  Whether he feels a genuine connection, is intrigued by her cruelty, or thinks he can help her is anyone’s guess.  She hates him,, but she sticks around because “everyone else I know is even less attractive, interesting, and intelligent than you.”

She gets him to smoke pot.   He takes a hit, she takes a picture.

Later on, there’s a huge confrontation between Charlie, Liz, Ellie, and her mom (Mary.)  Mary knows immediately that Charlie’s promised Ellie all of his money.  It turns out, Charlie has put almost all of his earnings from teaching into a savings account for Ellie.  Liz had no idea.  She’s been doing his shopping from a bank account which holds less than seven hundred dollars.  She’s furious- they could have afforded all the medical care he needed, but he still refuses to even go to the hospital.  As the fight concludes, everyone exits, leaving Charlie and Mary alone for the first time in fifteen years.  They talk about Ellie- Mary says that she’s an evil girl.  Charlie thinks that getting to know her has been amazing.  She has a “strong personality” he says.  In this scene we learn why Charlie is so intent on helping Ellie in some way- “I need to know I did one thing right in my life.”

Next, we learn that Ellie posted the pictures she took of Elder Thomas smoking pot- she told his parents where he was.  “And my parents saw the pictures, and they called the church here in town, and they told them where I was staying, and I can’t figure out whether she was trying to help me or hurt me… I thought my parents were going to disown me, and you know what they said?  They said they loved me, they cared about me,and they wanted me to come home.”  Charlie believes that Ellie was trying to help him.  He has to believe it.  “Do you ever get that feeling? He says to Liz, “that people are incapable of not caring?”  I believe that is the key to Ellie.

THE AMBULANCE IS COMING THEY’LL TAKE YOU TO THE HOSPITAL  YOU SHOULD HAVE GONE AWHILE AGO

I FAILED  ARE YOU JUST TRYING TO SCREW ME OVER ONE LAST TIME BEFORE YOU DIE  I DON’T CARE THAT YOU’RE DYING  I DON’T CARE ABOUT YOU  DO YOU WANT ME TO FAIL OUT OF HIGH SCHOOL  IS THAT WHY YOU DID THIS

YOU’RE JUST LIKE MY IDIOT TEACHERS YOU THINK BECAUSE I DON’T GO NUTS OVER SOME STUPID LITTLE POEM IT’S BECAUSE I’M TOO STUPID TO UNDERSTAND IT  MAYBE I DO UNDERSTAND IT  MAYBE I UNDERSTAND EXACTLY WHAT THIS POEM IS ABOUT  BUT I JUST DON’T CARE BECAUSE IT WAS WRITTEN BY SOME SELF-INVOLVED MORON AND EVEN THOUGH HE THINKS THAT HIS “METAPHOR FOR THE SELF” IS DEEP AND SHIT IT’S ACTUALLY JUST SOME STUPID LITTLE POEM AND IT DOESN’T MEAN ANYTHING  HOW ABOUT THAT

I’M A SMART PERSON  I NEVER FORGET ANYTHING  IN THE LIVING ROOM WITH THAT OLD RED COUCH AND THE TV WITH THE WOOD FRAME  AND YOU WERE ON THE FLOOR AND MOM WAS SCREAMING AT YOU AND YOU WERE JUST APOLOGIZING OVER AND OVER YOU WERE SO PATHETIC  I REMEMBER THAT

CAN I HAVE ONE OF THOSE DONUTS

I CAN’T BE HERE RIGHT NOW  I HAVE TO GO  I CAN’T  THE AMBULANCE IS COMING THEY’LL HELP YOU  YOU’RE GOING TO THE HOSPITAL  YOU JUST NEED SURGERY OR SOMETHING  YOU ASSHOLE  YOU FAT FUCKING ASSHOLE DAD PLEASE

Heartbreak House by George Bernard Shaw

HEARTBREAK HOUSE

“A Fantasia in the Russian Manner on English Themes”

This play was written between 1916 and 1917 however it was not performed until 1920.  This was because of World War 1.  Shaw spends much of the 48-page introduction to this play discussing how the entire nature of the theatre changes during war time.  Heartbreak House would not have been welcomed on the London stage first, because of the economical changes during the war, and also because audiences who used to enjoy the serious dramas of Chekho, Ibsen, and Shakespeare now craved silly jokes, pretty girls and above all, a distraction.  The literal bomb drop in the final scene was too much for audiences filled with soldiers and civilians to whom bomb scares were too much of a reality.  For these reasons, Shaw waited until the war was done before he allowed the play to be performed.

The play revolves around Ellie Dunn, who arrives at the house (which she later dubs “Heartbreak House”) intending to marry a rich older man for money.  This man, Mangan, gave Ellie’s father money to start a business, and then gave him more money when the business fell apart.  Ellie is extremely grateful, and also believes that this generosity makes him a good man (and, in theory, a good husband.)  

The house has an air of confusion and chaos.  Ellie is not greeted when she arrives.  She is stuck on the porch with her luggage for hours.  After arriving, she quickly confesses to Mrs. Hushaby that she is in love with another man.  A man she met at a concert, and again at an art museum.  This man told her stories of the fantastic adventures he had been on.  

Then this man arrives.  It turns out, the man that Ellie is in love with is Hesione’s husband.  He enjoys telling stories and charming women.  All women fall in love with him.  This is Ellie’s first heartbreak, which she recovers from rather quickly.

After dinner, Ellie and Mangan discuss their engagement.  They are both well aware that they are no Romeo and Juliet, but they will both benefit from the marriage.  In the middle of this discussion, Mangan reveals that he ruined Ellie’s father.  This is her second heartbreak.  He gifted her father money to start a new business, knowing he was extremely passionate and equally ignorant.  “The surest way to ruin a man who doesn’t know how to handle money is to give him some.”  Knowing this, Ellie will marry him anyway- “why not?”

Why not?  Mangan is in love with another woman and Ellie is in love with another man.  A power struggle ensues.  Ellie, determined to marry him anyway threatens that if he does not agree to marry her, she will keep him from seeing the woman he loves ever again.  At the end of this conversation, Ellie hypnotizes him and puts him to sleep.  He sleeps through the following conversation during which the monologue takes place.

Ellie confronts Hesione, who doesn’t think Ellie should marry for money, and voiced that opinion to Ellie’s father.  They argue, insult each other, all while trying to maintain an air of elegance and class.  Finally, Ellie reaches her breaking point.  But she doesn’t break- she wakes up Mangan instead.  He has heard their entire argument and immediately launches into a rage.  Hesione tries to calm him down, Ellie just watches this unfold.  Hesione eventually leaves, and Ellie confirms that she still intends to marry Mangan, frustrating him even more.

Enter: a burglar.  They catch him but after getting to know him, will not turn him into the police.  He says he will turn himself in unless they pay him not to.  

The conversation returns to the subject of marrying for money- should Ellie marry Mangan or not?  At this point, the maid warns everyone that an air-raid is about to happen.  Mangan and the burglar retreat, but the rest of the crew is apathetic.  So much so that they turn all the lights on.  A bomb lands in the garden, killing Mangan and the burglar.  The bombs pass overhead, missing the house completely.  Ellie and Hesione hope that the bombs return the next day.

Today we are looking at

ELLIE

She’s determined to grow up.  She wants to marry Mangan for his money, for an easier way of life, and to repay her father. She’s made this decision before the play even begins,  and she never wavers.  Yet she has to defend her choice to all of these people who believe they are older, wiser, and know better than she does.  This is one of a few times in the play when she confronts these people, confronts her own heartbreak, and defends herself and her ideals.

Oh, don't slop and gush and be sentimental. Don't you see that unless I can be hard- as hard as nails- I shall go mad.  I don't care a damn about your calling me names: do you think a woman in my situation can feel a few hard words?

I suppose you think you're being sympathetic.  You are just foolish and stupid and selfish.  You see me getting a smasher right in the face that kills a whole part of my life: the best part that can never come again; and you think you can help me over it by a little coaxing and kissing.  When I want all the strength I can get to lean on: something iron, something stony, I don't care how cruel it is, you go all mushy and want to slobber over me.  I'm not angry; I'm not unfriendly; but for God's sake do pull yourself together; and don't think that because you're on velvet and always have been, women who are in hell can take it as easily as you.