On to the sixth play, The Academy by an Italian, Mario Fratti. I don’t understand what the deal is with the plays in this book, but, with one exception, they all have unpleasant sexist tones built into their premises, or creeping about their edges. And three of the sixth deal with “American women” as tourists in Europe in a very negative light. While the other two deal with women from a sort of American perspective, this time we are looking at them from a European angle.
The Academy is a school room of sorts, in which a group of young Italian men are assembling. All are named after Mussolini’s campaigns, which, according to a note in the text, was common in that time. I assume this was to set the period of the play. There seems to be no reason for it other than that. All the boys go to the Academy and Afro, has brought his friend, Fortunato, to take the test for entry. This test is in part administered by The Professor and includes an off-stage interview with his wife. He succeeds in his interview. Then Fortumato is questioned on aspects of American culture and the English language. He passes and gets to join the Academy.
There is a slow reveal that many of the students have “crushes” on the Professor’s wife. It becomes further clear that the Academy is a place for young Italian men to learn how to become unofficial gigolos, how to take advantage of American tourist women, divorcee’s, widows, young heiresses, by seducing them, winning their love and them getting them to give money. The Professor explains, or gets students to recite, the formula for proper exploitation of these women, about the Academy’s network of hotel workers, florists and gondoliers and how to use them to gain the confidence, of these women and also, their money. The Academy is paid ten percent from the earnings of each “student.”
All the students leave, each having been assigned their marks. It is revealed that the professor’s “wife” is actually a prostitute, who has been hired to asses the sexual finesse of each young man. Some of them have fallen for her and it is implied that she has for them, or at least feels some guilt for her part in getting them into this sordid profession. The professor exults in his power over her and the play ends.
What is it with this book and its weird fascination with American women in Europe behaving badly and being treated badly in return? The editor, Stanley Richards, seems to have an unhealthy fixation on this topic. Perhaps that is the only thing people wrote about at the time, although one suspects otherwise. There must have been other topics during the nine year period that encompasses this volume.
I didn’t really like this play. I found it’s premise annoying. It was written by an Italian so perhaps he is mocking an American stereotype of his young countrymen as libertines, dead set on taking money from tourists. The tone is unclear, though. The young men are presented as poor, unable to find more reputable work, and therefore sympathetic. The Professor is clearly a bad guy, and his wife is treated as his victim. I hope there’s an end to this trend.

The next play on offer in Best Short Plays of the World Theatre 1958-1967 is our first from an America writer, although it found it’s way to the stage in London, by way of Italy, in 1961. Crawling Arnold by Jules Feiffer is a short comedy very reminiscent of Charles Durang, although is pre-dates him by a good ten years or so. This play is also of interest to me in that I played Arnold, when I was 15 or so during my sophomore year in high school. It feels as though it must have been edited. I have very slight memory of it, only that I was crawling around in a suit, and that I had a longish scene with Ariel.

The play concerns the Enterprise family, a caricature of the “All America Family”: Grace, the mother, worried, submissive, concerned with propriety; Barry, the father, blustery, anxious, concerned with masculinity; and their two sons, the infant Will and the eponymous Arnold. Will is payed by a baby carriage. The family has a black maid, Millie, who bristles with hostility at every entrance, causing Barry and Grace to freeze uncomfortably.  It begins with Grace and Barry showing a young woman slides of Will. This is Miss Sympathy, a social worker who has been brought in to help Arnold who’s behavior has been erratic of late.

With the arrival of Will, Arnold has regressed and has begun crawling again. The main issue is that Arnold is an adult man with a job. His crawling happens only around the house and it is driving his parents nuts. The play takes place on the day of the big air raid drill that the elder Enterprises have spent months anticipating and preparing for. They have a very elaborate fallout shelter they've been practicing in. When the siren sounds everyone except Arnold runs to the fallout shelter in the basement. Millie manages to secure herself in the shelter, leaving Arnold’s parents and Will outside of it, demanding that  Millie will let them in.

Arnold and Miss Sympathy are left alone together. This gives her a chance to delve into Arnold's psychosis. The two chat about Arnold’s need to flout societal norms. He confesses to doing something ‘naughty’ on his way home. The conversation turns to seduction, and as Arnold unbuttons Miss Sympathy’s blouse, she worries the all clear will sound. He informs her that the naughty thing he has done was to disable the all clear siren.

Thus the play ends. Its’ a pretty good play. I didn’t remember it that well. There is a vaguely sexist element in it when Arnold admits to seducing the last four social workers the his parents have brought to the house. This lends a kind “gamesmanship” to his seduction which makes it a little less fun and spontaneous. Otherwise Miss Sympathy is a nicely realized character. Millie has two lines. The parents are very broad. Arnold remains a cipher. His rebellion feels random and one wishes there were something heroic or subversive about it, but it just kind of hangs there, half formed. Perhaps it is just a ploy to seduce random social workers.

There’s a lot of funny Durang-ish dialogue: when Miss Sympathy hears Arnold began crawling after his brother’s birth, she writes a note, “Sibling rivalry,” then, when told that Arnold is thirty-five, she amends her note with, “Advanced sibling rivalry.” That sort of tone. It’s pretty good.

Ah! Finally! The first truly good short play in the Best Short Plays of the World Theatre. That’s nice. There were seventeen more to go and it wasn’t looking good. Of course, good old Noel Coward is here with a little gem of a play. Come into the Garden Maud is a sweet one act, two scene play that is part of Coward’s Suite in 3 Keys. There’s also a nice part for me. Strangely, it shares a similar theme as the last play in that is concerns Americans in Europe, but much less bizarrely.
The play takes place in the sitting room of a suite in an expensive Swiss Hotel. Anna-Mary Conklin, an American tourist in her 50’s still stylish and obviously wealthy, is berating a hotel waiter, Felix, to correct the failings in his service. He leaves, promising to do better. She makes a couple of phone calls, one to a stylist to complain about her recent visit, and one to a friend to get etiquette advice regarding the Prince she has invited to the dinner party she is holding that evening. Her husband, Verner Conklin enters from a golfing expedition. The two have a little argument about the coming party.
Verner is not at all interested in high society pretension his wife is so concerned about. Anna-Mary receives an message that Maud Caragnini, an acquaintance with whom she had made a forgotten cocktail date, has arrived. Verner is pleased. He likes Maud more than most of his wife’s mooching, social climber friends. Anna-Mary is dismissive of Maud as a bit gauche. Anna-Mary is half dressed and runs to the bedroom to make herself presentable. Maud enters with Felix who bringing ice. The two know each other from when Felix worked in Rome, where Maud lives.
Verner and Maude share friendly small talk. Anna-Mary enters and, in case there was doubt, shows herself to be two-faced, fawning over Maud and complimenting her for things she had previously mocked. Maud is not impressed by the Prince who has been invited to the dinner party. Verner finds this very amusing to Anna-May’s annoyance, so she sends him to the bar on an errand.
Anna-Mary receives a call from one of her dinner guests, who is canceling due to illness. She pleads, but he won’t be coming. She begs Maud to come but Maud has other plans that can’t be broken. Anna-Mary is indignant. Her solution, to avoid having thirteen at the table, is for Verner to excuse himself from the party and have his dinner alone in the hotel room. She excuses herself to straighten out the place cards leaving Maud and Verner alone. Maud expresses mystification at Verner’s ability to cope with his wife. She confesses a certain affection for him and kisses him on the cheek as she leaves.
Scene two begins later that night. Verner is alone, clearly sitting out the dinner. Felix enters and they chat briefly about Maud. Felix leaves and Verner gets a call from Maud. She is driving back to Rome that night, but she wants to see Verner before she goes. They meet, confess their love, and haggle over the where and what-for of their situations. Verner decides to join her on her trip to Rome. They agree to meet in the lobby twenty minutes. She leaves to get her suitcase from her hotel. Anna-Mary returns, proves she is really unpleasant, and Vernor leaves.
That is a rough outline. It is so well structured and written. The characters are complex and interesting. The dialogue is snappy and funny. There is a clear development, growth, and journey for the characters. I really liked this one.

On to the third of the Best Short Plays of the World Theatre 1958-1967. From England we have Brigid Brophy’s The Waste Disposal Unit. This, like The New House, was originally conceived as a radio play and converted to the stage. I was hopeful when I began this, as it was one of the two plays by women in this collection. It was bumbling along quite amusingly before suddenly going awry, ending rather disconcertingly.
It begins in a sitting room in an Italian palazzo, empty, save for a wooden crate of Coca Cola, and Virgil Knockerbicker, a youngish American, sitting in a window seat. He is dressed in black and reads a black notebook. He is soon joined by his older brother, Homer, who is overweight and suffering in the heat of the Italian summer. He complains to Virgil who replies despondently, if wittily. They are awaiting the arrival of Merry, Homer’s wife, who, according to her custom is alone in their bedroom. She does not allow her husband to see her in the morning until she has face on.
There is the vague insinuation that Homer is henpecked. He is called away to answer the door. Merry comes out and chats with Virgil then leaves to find Homer. The maid has beaten Homer to the door and brings in Angelo Lumaca, an Italian. He talks to Virgil and it is revealed that Virgil is a homosexual and is writing a poem in his book. Homer and Merry return and make small talk with Angelo, about how they are modernizing the palazzo to make it more comfortable for Merry. Angelo turns out to be the waste disposal unit repairman, come to repair the fancy American waste disposal unit Homer has imported. Homer takes him to the kitchen.
Merry watches the chickens in the yard and is offended by the behavior of one of the roosters, whom she calls degenerate. To distract her, Homer brings her to the kitchen to watch Angelo at work. Homer returns and Virgil reads his unfinished poem to him. It is an ode to The American Woman. It is at this point the play starts to turn in its unexpected direction. The poem is an assessment of “The American Woman” partially based on Merry and contains lines like “The American Woman would rather be a lovely person/ Than be herself.”
The reading of the poem is interrupted by the sudden arrival of Angelo. He reports that Merry has been disposed of by the disposal unit when she was somehow drawn into it while inspecting his work. Before any can quite respond, Merry’s mother (meant to be played by the same actress) enters looking for Merry. She talks in long monologue about surprising Merry. She surmises that Merry must be in the kitchen and while searching for Merry, she too is disposed of by the disposal. Angelo is shocked, but Virgil and Homer cheer and dance and sing, joined, after a bit, by Angelo who sings, “La donna á mobile” and Virgil ends the play by calling the disposal unit “the ultimate triumph of American technology.”
Well. All of this caught me quite by surprise. The tone is very light, sort of Noel Cowardish with a certain wit. Although Homer is somewhat fawning in his behavior towards Merry, there is nothing of the harridan or shrew about her. In fact, she seems quite charming, if a little peculiar. All the characters are interesting. Virgil doesn’t seem to bear her any animosity. His poem is strangely, suddenly anti-female, but it does not start that way. There is also an implication that his homosexuality might motivate this, but how or why I do not know. I think it was meant to be comedic. Perhaps the audience is not meant to sympathize with Virgil, Homer and Angelo at the end, but that is not sense that pervades. I honestly don’t know what to make of it. Very odd. Brigid, you let us down.

Back again with the second play in Best Short Plays of the World Theatre. This time we're off to Ireland for Brendan Behan’s family comedy The New House. Adapted into play form from a radio drama of the same name from early in Behan’s career, it is a light hearted, almost sit-com like story of a family in the poor tenement houses of 1950’s Dublin. It is probably semi-autobiographical and brims with wit and affection for all of it’s characters.
The play concerns the Hannigan family, father Jim, mother Chris, eldest son Noel, middle daughter Eileen, and youngest son Seamus. We meet the family at breakfast time. Jim, Noel and Eileen are preparing to leave for their jobs, and Seamus for school. Noel has a new job working construction on the new housing project, near the one that has just opened. The kids petition their father to apply for one of the new houses as their current apartment is old, dirty, in poor repair, and too small for the needs of the family as currently constituted.
Jim is steadfast in his commitment to his current situation. He has no love for the apartment, but the new development is too far from work, besides, good men were reared in these houses, leaving would be no way to honor them. The family banters charmingly. They are joined the half senile neighbor, Mrs. Camody, for whom Mrs. Hanningan cares. Jim and Eileen leave. A letter arrives from the Dublin Corporation. Behind her husband's back, Chris has applied for a new house and has been approved.
She and the kids move to the new house while Jim is at work, leaving a note for him to meet them there when he gets done. Jim finds the note and is understandably miffed. He has some drinks at the pub before making his way to the new house. On the way, he meets his new neighbor, Gabble Gibbons, an effusive braggart. Gabble has been similarly tricked by his spouse. Jim finds his family and begins his new life in the new house. Thus ends part one.
In part two the family, or more specifically Jim and Noel, have to deal with Chris’s plan to start a garden. She wants them spread out a shipment of manure into the yard, a task to which they are both apposed. They are interrupted by the arrival of Gabble Gibbons, who has come to avenge his son for the fight that Seamus had with him. The argument that erupts between Jim and Gabble causes Mrs. Carmody, newly arrived next door, to come over and faint. Jim and Gabble are sent to the pub to get her some brandy, where they drink healths and loose track of their animosity. It is here that Gabble reveals his wife’s own garden plans and concocts a plan to trick the police into spreading the manure and preparing both his and Jim’s gardens.
The play is slight but amusing. Very amusing actually. It reminds me of Hobson’s Choice, in the way it mocks patriarchal pretensions. Despite Jim’s protestations, Chris is the true authority in the household.

So, since we’re all trapped inside, I gonna start this again. So I picked up my copy of Best Short Plays of the World Theatre: 1958-1967, edited by Stanley Richards. I’ll go through these plays, read and write about them. There are twenty plays with authors as diverse as Noel Coward and Leroi Jones. It should be interesting.
Oh my! This is a distressing beginning. The first play is The Orchestra by Jean Anouilh, a french playwright who cut his teeth in the avante-garde of the 1930’s. This play was written in the early 1960’s and produced in 1962. It’s not a fun read. I know the Bechtel test didn’t exist at the time but, this play might have benefited from it.
The Orchestra would be extremely difficult to produce as it has as it’s characters an orchestra who is playing in a brasserie somewhere in France after World War II. The orchestra is comprised of seven people; two violinists, a double bassist, a cellist, a violist, a flutist, and a pianist; all are women, except the pianist. The dialogue takes place mostly between numbers, but some of it takes place during them. Ideally, one would need actresses who could play the instruments, or find some theatrical way of having them pretend. Of course, there would be no reason to produce it because it’s a terrible play.
The Play is built around three conversations between two duos of women and a trio comprising two women and the pianist. Pamela and Patricia, the violinists, trade insults about their appearance and Patricia’s virginity and Pamela’s promiscuity. Emmeline, the violist, rants about her lover or husband, and their arguments to flutist Leona’s sycophantic replies. Madame Hortense, the bassist and leader of the orchestra flits about, handing out sheet music and maternally flirting with the pianist under the jealous eyes of his lover, Suzanne the cellist.
Despite a cast of nearly all older women, the talk almost all about men. The lone man is weak, trapped in a loveless marriage with an invalid wife. He is sleeping with the cellist, who exhibits all the cliches of the “psycho-girlfriend.” The only part of the play that does not exhibit an unpleasant fascination with sexual politics happens when Patricia complains of her need to “care” for her senile mother whom she lives with. Basically, she talks about how she must abuse her mother to make her behave in a long monologue. Simultaneously, Pamela rationalizes abandoning her daughter for her various lover as the two talk across each other.
Things come to a head when Suzanne confronts the pianist about his lackluster loving in probably the only remotely interesting writing in the play as she laments their love being restricted by their watches. She causes a scene which gets the orchestra in trouble with the unseen manager of the brasserie. Overcome and upset, she runs to the bathroom giving Madam Hortense a chance to press her advantage with the pianist. He breaks into the longest monologue in the play, a disturbing tirade about how he lusts helplessly after all the women he sees, and goes to the beach to imagine having sex with all the bikini clad women there, some of it consensual and some not.
Suzanne shoots herself in the bathroom. The Manager comes angrily to the stage and fires the orchestra, demanding that they play one last song to distract the unseen customers from the suicide. The play ends.
I just don’t get it. Perhaps in the original french there was something poetic about the writing. Apart from the watch monologue, this translation conveys none. If there is some analogy in the story I don’t see it. Perhaps I’m too removed from 1960’s France to understand. This play left a very unpleasant taste in my mouth. I’ve read very few play that I wish I hadn’t. This was one.