She runs off. ANTROBUS starts after her.
ANTROBUS:
I . . . I have to go and see what I can do about this.
SABINA:
You stay right here. Don’t you go now while you’re excited. Gracious sakes, all these things will be forgotten in a hundred years. Come, now, you’re on the air. Just say anything,—it doesn’t matter what. Just a lot of birds and fishes and things.
BROADCAST OFFICIAL:
Thank you, Miss Fairweather. Thank you very much. Ready, Mr. Antrobus.
ANTROBUS:
Touching the microphone.
What is it, what is it? Who am I talking to?
BROADCAST OFFICIAL:
Why, Mr. Antrobus! To our order and to all the other orders.
ANTROBUS:
Raising his head.
What are all those birds doing?
BROADCAST OFFICIAL:
Those are just a few of the birds. Those are the delegates to our convention,—two of a kind.
ANTROBUS:
Pointing into the audience.
Look at the water. Look at them all. Those fishes jumping. The children should see this!—There’s Maggie’s whales!! Here are your whales, Maggie!!
BROADCAST OFFICIAL:
I hope you’re ready, Mr. Antrobus.
ANTROBUS:
And look on the beach! You didn’t tell me these would be here!
SABINA:
Yes, George. Those are the animals.
BROADCAST OFFICIAL:
Busy with the apparatus.
Yes, Mr. Antrobus, those are the vertebrates. We hope the lion will have a word to say when you’re through. Step right up, Mr. Antrobus, we’re ready. We’ll just have time before the storm.
Pause. In a hoarse whisper:
They’re wait-ing.
It has grown dark. Soon after he speaks a high whistling noise begins. Strange veering lights start whirling about the stage. The other characters disappear from the stage.
ANTROBUS:
Friends. Cousins. Four score and ten billion years ago our forefather brought forth upon this planet the spark of life,—
He is drowned out by thunder. When the thunder stops the FORTUNE TELLER is seen standing beside him.
FORTUNE TELLER:
Antrobus, there’s not a minute to be lost. Don’t you see the four disks on the weather signal? Take your family into that boat at the end of the pier.
ANTROBUS:
My family? I have no family. Maggie! Maggie! They won’t come.
FORTUNE TELLER:
They’ll come.—Antrobus! Take these animals into that boat with you. All of them,—two of each kind.
SABINA:
George, what’s the matter with you? This is just a storm like any other storm.
ANTROBUS:
Maggie!
SABINA:
Stay with me, we’ll go . . .
Losing conviction.
This is just another thunderstorm,—isn’t it? Isn’t it?
ANTROBUS:
Maggie!!!
MRS. ANTROBUS appears beside him with GLADYS.
MRS. ANTROBUS:
Matter-of-fact.
Here I am and here’s Gladys.
ANTROBUS:
Where’ve you been? Where have you been? Quick, we’re going into that boat out there.
MRS. ANTROBUS:
I know we are. But I haven’t found Henry.
She wanders off into the darkness calling “Henry!”
SABINA:
Low urgent babbling, only occasionally raising her voice.
I don’t believe it. I don’t believe it’s anything at all. I’ve seen hundreds of storms like this.
FORTUNE TELLER:
There’s no time to lose. Go. Push the animals along before you. Start a new world. Begin again.
SABINA:
Esmeralda! George! Tell me,—is it really serious?
ANTROBUS:
Suddenly very busy.
Elephants first. Gently, gently.—Look where you’re going.
GLADYS:
Leaning over the ramp and striking an animal on the back.
Stop it or you’ll be left behind!
ANTROBUS:
Is the Kangaroo there? There you are! Take those turtles in your pouch, will you?
To some other animals, pointing to his shoulder.
Here! You jump up here. You’ll be trampled on.
GLADYS:
To her father, pointing below.
Papa, look,—the snakes!
MRS. ANTROBUS:
I can’t find Henry. Hen-ry!
ANTROBUS:
Go along. Go along. Climb on their backs.—Wolves! Jackals,—whatever you are,—tend to your own business!
GLADYS:
Pointing, tenderly.
Papa,—look.
SABINA:
Mr. Antrobus—take me with you. Don’t leave me here. I’ll work. I’ll help. I’ll do anything.
THREE CONVEENERS cross the stage, marching with a banner.
CONVEENERS:
George! What are you scared of?—George! Fellas, it looks like rain.—“Maggie, where’s my umbrella?”—George, setting up for Barnum and Bailey.
ANTROBUS:
Again catching his wife’s hand.
Come on now, Maggie,—the pier’s going to break any minute.
MRS. ANTROBUS:
I’m not going a step without Henry. Henry!
GLADYS:
On the ramp.
Mama! Papa! Hurry. The pier’s cracking, Mama. It’s going to break.
MRS. ANTROBUS:
Henry! Cain! CAIN!
HENRY dashes into the stage and joins his mother.
HENRY:
Here I am, Mama.
MRS. ANTROBUS:
Thank God!—now come quick.
HENRY:
I didn’t think you wanted me.
MRS. ANTROBUS:
Quick!
She pushes him down before her into the aisle.
SABINA:
All the ANTROBUSES are now in the theater aisle. SABINA stands at the top of the ramp.
Mrs. Antrobus, take me. Don’t you remember me? I’ll work. I’ll help. Don’t leave me here!
MRS. ANTROBUS:
Impatiently, but as though it were of no importance.
Yes, yes. There’s a lot of work to be done. Only hurry.
FORTUNE TELLER:
Now dominating the stage. To SABINA with a grim smile.
Yes, go—back to the kitchen with you.
SABINA:
Half-down the ramp. To FORTUNE TELLER.
I don’t know why my life’s always being interrupted—just when everything’s going fine!!
She dashes up the aisle.
Now the CONVENEERS emerge doing a serpentine dance on the stage. They jeer at the FORTUNE TELLER.
CONVEENERS:
Get a canoe—there’s not a minute to be lost! Tell me my future, Mrs. Croaker.
FORTUNE TELLER:
Paddle in the water, boys—enjoy yourselves.
VOICE FROM THE BINGO PARLOR:
A-nine; A-nine. C-Twenty-four. C-Twenty-four.
CONVEENERS:
Rags, bottles, and sacks.
FORTUNE TELLER:
Go back and climb on your roofs. Put rags in the cracks under your doors.—Nothing will keep out the flood. You’ve had your chance. You’ve had your day. You’ve failed. You’ve lost.
VOICE FROM THE BINGO PARLOR:
B-fifteen. B-Fifteen.
FORTUNE TELLER:
Shading her eyes and looking out to sea.
They’re safe. George Antrobus! Think it over! A new world to make—think it over!
CURTAIN
Act III
Just before the curtain rises, two sounds are heard from the stage: a cracked bugle call.
The curtain rises on almost total darkness. Almost all the flats composing the walls of MR. ANTROBUS’ house, as of Act I, are
up, but they lean helter-skelter against one another, leaving irregular gaps. Among the flats missing are two in the back wall, leaving the frames of the window and door crazily out of line. Off stage, back right, some red Roman fire is burning. The bugle call is repeated. Enter SABINA through the tilted door. She is dressed as a Napoleonic camp follower, “la fille du regiment,” in begrimed reds and blues.
SABINA:
Mrs. Antrobus! Gladys! Where are you?
The war’s over. The war’s over. You can come out. The peace treaty’s been signed.
Where are they?—Hmpf! Are they dead, too? Mrs. Annnntrobus! Glaaaadus! Mr. Antrobus’ll be here this afternoon. I just saw him downtown. Huuuurry and put things in order. He says that now that the war’s over we’ll all have to settle down and be perfect.
Enter MR. FITZPATRICK, the stage manager, followed by the whole company, who stand waiting at the edges of the stage. MR. FITZPATRICK tries to interrupt SABINA.
MR. FITZPATRICK:
Miss Somerset, we have to stop a moment.
SABINA:
They may be hiding out in the back—
MR. FITZPATRICK:
Miss Somerset! We have to stop a moment.
SABINA:
What’s the matter?
MR. FITZPATRICK:
There’s an explanation we have to make to the audience.—Lights, please.
To the actor who plays MR. ANTROBUS,
Will you explain the matter to the audience?
The lights go up. We now see that a balcony or elevated runway has been erected at the back of the stage, back of the wall of the Antrobus house. From its extreme right and left ends ladder-like steps descend to the floor of the stage.
ANTROBUS:
Ladies and gentlemen, an unfortunate accident has taken place back stage. Perhaps I should say another unfortunate accident.
SABINA:
I’m sorry. I’m sorry.
ANTROBUS:
The management feels, in fact, we all feel that you are due an apology. And now we have to ask your indulgence for the most serious mishap of all. Seven of our actors have . . . have been taken ill. Apparently, it was something they ate. I’m not exactly clear what happened.
All the ACTORS start to talk at once. ANTROBUS raises his hand.
Now, now—not all at once. Fitz, do you know what it was?
MR. FITZPATRICK:
Why, it’s perfectly clear. These seven actors had dinner together, and they ate something that disagreed with them.
SABINA:
Disagreed with them!!! They have ptomaine poisoning. They’re in Bellevue Hospital this very minute in agony. They’re having their stomachs pumped out this very minute, in perfect agony.
ANTROBUS:
Fortunately, we’ve just heard they’ll all recover.
SABINA:
It’ll be a miracle if they do, a downright miracle. It was the lemon meringue pie.
ACTORS:
It was the fish . . . it was the canned tomatoes . . . it was the fish.
SABINA:
It was the lemon meringue pie. I saw it with my own eyes; it had blue mould all over the bottom of it.
ANTROBUS:
Whatever it was, they’re in no condition to take part in this performance. Naturally, we haven’t enough understudies to fill all those roles; but we do have a number of splendid volunteers who have kindly consented to help us out. These friends have watched our rehearsals, and they assure me that they know the lines and the business very well. Let me introduce them to you—my dresser, Mr. Tremayne,—himself a distinguished Shakespearean actor for many years; our wardrobe mistress, Hester; Miss Somerset’s maid, Ivy; and Fred Bailey, captain of the ushers in this theatre.
These persons bow modestly. IVY and HESTER are colored girls.
Now this scene takes place near the end of the act. And I’m sorry to say we’ll need a short rehearsal, just a short run-through. And as some of it takes place in the auditorium, we’ll have to keep the curtain up. Those of you who wish can go out in the lobby and smoke some more. The rest of you can listen to us, or . . . or just talk quietly among yourselves, as you choose. Thank you. Now will you take it over, Mr. Fitzpatrick?
MR. FITZPATRICK:
Thank you.—Now for those of you who are listening perhaps I should explain that at the end of this act, the men have come back from the War and the family’s settled down in the house. And the author wants to show the hours of the night passing by over their heads, and the planets crossing the sky . . . uh . . . over their heads. And he says—this is hard to explain—that each of the hours of the night is a philosopher, or a great thinker. Eleven o’clock, for instance, is Aristotle. And nine o’clock is Spinoza. Like that. I don’t suppose it means anything. It’s just a kind of poetic effect.
SABINA:
Not mean anything! Why, it certainly does. Twelve o’clock goes by saying those wonderful things. I think it means that when people are asleep they have all those lovely thoughts, much better than when they’re awake.
IVY:
Excuse me, I think it means,—excuse me, Mr. Fitzpatrick—
SABINA:
What were you going to say, Ivy?
IVY:
Mr. Fitzpatrick, you let my father come to a rehearsal; and my father’s a Baptist minister, and he said that the author meant that—just like the hours and stars go by over our heads at night, in the same way the ideas and thoughts of the great men are in the air around us all the time and they’re working on us, even when we don’t know it.
MR. FITZPATRICK:
Well, well, maybe that’s it. Thank you, Ivy. Anyway,—the hours of the night are philosophers. My friends, are you ready? Ivy, can you be eleven o’clock? “This good estate of the mind possessing its object in energy we call divine.” Aristotle.
IVY:
Yes, sir. I know that and I know twelve o’clock and I know nine o’clock.
MR. FITZPATRICK:
Twelve o’clock? Mr. Tremayne, the Bible.
TREMAYNE:
Yes.
MR. FITZPATRICK:
Ten o’clock? Hester,—Plato?
She nods eagerly.
Nine o’clock, Spinoza,—Fred?
BAILEY:
Yes, sir.
FRED BAILEY picks up a great gilded cardboard numeral IX and starts up the steps to the platform. MR. FITZPATRICK strikes his forehead.
MR. FITZPATRICK:
The planets!! We forgot all about the planets.
SABINA:
O my God! The planets! Are they sick too?
ACTORS nod.
MR. FITZPATRICK:
Ladies and gentlemen, the planets are singers. Of course, we can’t replace them, so you’ll have to imagine them singing in this scene. Saturn sings from the orchestra pit down here. The Moon is way up there. And Mars with a red lantern in his hand, stands in the aisle over there—Tz-tz-tz. It’s too bad; it all makes a very fine effect. However! Ready—nine o’clock: Spinoza.
BAILEY:
Walking slowly across the balcony, left to right.
“After experience had taught me that the common occurrences of daily life are vain and futile—”
FITZPATRICK:
Louder, Fred. “And I saw that all the objects of my desire and fear—”
BAILEY:
“And I saw that all the objects of my desire and fear were in themselves nothing good nor bad save insofar as the mind was affected by them—”
FITZPATRICK:
Do you know the rest? All right. Ten o’clock. Hester. Plato.
HESTER:
“Then tell me, O Critias, how will a man choose the ruler that shall rule over him? Will he not—”
FITZPATRICK:
Thank you. Skip to the end, Hester.
HESTER:
“. . . can be multiplied a thousand fold in its effects among the citizens.”
FITZPATRICK:
Thank you.—Aristotle, Ivy?
IVY:
“This good estate of the mind possessing its object in energy we call divine. This we mortals have occasionally and it is this energy which is pleasantest and best. But God has it always. It is wonderful in us; but in Him how much more wonderful.”
FITZPATRICK:
Midnight. Midnight, Mr. Tremayne. That’s right,—you’ve done it before.—All right, everybody. You know what you have to do.—Lower the curtain. Houselights up. Act Three of THE SKIN OF OUR TEETH.
As the curtain descends he is heard saying:
You volunteers, just wear what you have on. Don’t try to put on the costumes today.
Houselights go down. The Act begins again. The Bugle call. Curtain rises. Enter SABINA.
SABINA:
Mrs. Antrobus! Gladys! Where are you? The war’s over.—You’ve heard all this—
She gabbles the main points.
Where—are—they? Are—they—dead, too, et cetera. I—just—saw—Mr.—Antrobus—down town, et cetera.
Slowing up:
He says that now that the war’s over we’ll all have to settle down and be perfect. They may be hiding out in the back somewhere. Mrs. An-tro-bus.
She wanders off. It has grown lighter.
A trapdoor is cautiously raised and MRS. ANTROBUS emerges waist-high and listens. She is disheveled and worn; she wears a tattered dress and a shawl half covers her head. She talks down through the trapdoor.
MRS. ANTROBUS:
It’s getting light. There’s still something burning over there—Newark, or Jersey City. What? Yes, I could swear I heard someone moving about up here. But I can’t see anybody. I say: I can’t see anybody.
She starts to move about the stage. GLADYS’ head appears at the trapdoor. She is holding a BABY.
GLADYS:
Oh, Mama. Be careful.
MRS. ANTROBUS:
Now, Gladys, you stay out of sight.
GLADYS:
Well, let me stay here just a minute. I want the baby to get some of this fresh air.
MRS. ANTROBUS:
All right, but keep your eyes open. I’ll see what I can find. I’ll have a good hot plate of soup for you before you can say Jack Robinson. Gladys Antrobus! Do you know what I think I see? There’s old Mr. Hawkins sweeping the sidewalk in front of his A. and P. store. Sweeping it with a broom. Why, he must have gone crazy, like the others! I see some other people moving about, too.
GLADYS:
Mama, come back, come back.
MRS. ANTROBUS returns to the trapdoor and listens.
MRS. ANTROBUS:
Gladys, there’s something in the air. Everybody’s movement’s sort of different. I see some women walking right out in the middle of the street.