Copyright held by the Manhattan Experimental Theater Workshop
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Written by Megh Chakrabarti, Chad Hodge, Rachel Waterhouse, and Ellen Welti
Directed by Blake E. Bolan
Under the influence of Antonin Artaud
‘wot pray he bring’
‘hot wax and ripened string’
snivel down, lost some
dirty bastard, how come
a tad of breeze to tag to please the gods (nods) (pause)
Darkness. A radiant glow begins very dim, but brightens to a blinding light. The rapidity of wings beating is heard as flashing displays of thunderstorms are seen in the sky.
A shrill cry envelops the space starting at one corner, then the other, till the entire space acts as one complex multi-projectional voice.
Flames as if it were paper, slowly crinkling and crumbling until all falls to ash. A sort of not black darkness envelops every area. Anticipation lingers much like the resounding thumps of an ending echoing heartbeat.
Bull: Pale white skin reflects the moonlight in the evening.
Pasiphae: I am encased in wood and waiting. Warm flesh and broken bones! Delicious!
Bull: Are you not thankful for the sea?
Pasiphae: Moo moo moo.
Bull: Inflamed thighs and retribution come here and be satisfied!
Pasiphae: What definition! The discomfort!
Bull: How could I not know? I saw the straps and the skins, I heard the not so familiar tongue calling for more! Oh! What have I done? Tonight I came for the taking.
A broom is heard, a long steady sweep and click of the handle on wood. Another broom joins the first. It sweeps during the handle tap and vice versa continuing. A breath is taken by many, held, and released. Taken and released. Immediately the brooms pick up pace, the breath falling into rhythm. The lights raise on a mass of dancing workers. Some are acrobatic, turning a cartwheel to dust the floor, others shuffle with a broom as football players at a high school dance. The workers fall into a rushed frenzy running around in confused circles trying to catch forgotten identities. Some do, and begin calling out wares and prices. the calls beckon to those still turning wildly and all fall into vocational activity.
“Eggs! Goat cheese! Flour! For sale!”
“The lepers are coming soon, clear the streets!”
“Off the shoulder, says I, off the shoulder. She took off the whole dress. Then one had the nerve to demand half my pay.”
“The lepers are coming.”
“That’s not worth 10. I’ll give you 4.”
“Sure, I can have your hobby horse done by this weekend.”
“15.”
“They’ll rob me blind and then I’ll burn!”
A great, rushing wind can be heard in a variety of voices at several different pitches. The wind voices dance with each other through octaves feeding off each other, always changing, partnered with a flare of white light that washes over the stage in a flood. A crackling sound joins in , like flames, as the buzy winds build to a crescendo and silences.
anomalous assortment of fixations
man’s motivation for self-preservation
bloody dreamers, how come
murderous man loves his son
Voices begin quietly and build in horrible wonder.
“Fool! It’s a good omen!”
“What does it matter? The world is ending.”
“What’s going on?”
“We’re all going to burn!”
“Shh, you’ll frighten the children.”
“Flying? Perhaps he’s going to take a vacation?”
“Wings? Men can’t fly?”
“Perhaps if the sun is gone, I shall always be pale and beautiful?”
Pandemonium ensues. The peasants trample atop one another. Limbs are obviously broken, but all persist in scrambling to get somewhere else. Some drag their paralyzed legs behind them like dead game in the mouth of a hound. Others try to lift their broken arms that flop like lead down to the ground. A gulping sound. Silence, even cackles.
But the ploughmen does not stop his work. The shepard remains leaning on his staff. A moment, the blind smell, odors of singed feather and boiling skin. The dumb do not utter a sound, but still a salty sinewy taste bathes their tongues. Even the deaf hear screaming. Birds burst in flames and children cry all struggle and with this were some lucid nightmare where wrong could be right again, and fathers could save their sons, and children would not fall to hell for merely dreaming of seeing the glories of the the heavens.
Oracle: Truth? Loud voices do not speak the truth. This is THE TRUTH!
Silence falls for a brief moment. The Oracle tries to speak, but a woman shrieks in the corner. The woman faints, while the rest of the peasants run wildly, looks of terror upon their faces. The Oracle tries to speak again, but is overshadowed by the loudspeaker voice.
Loudspeaker Voice: HELIOS IS LEAVING! DARKNESS PREVAILS! ALL IS LUST!
Everyone breathes a sigh of exhausted relief. Laughter, shy at first, then quite loud. The laughter ends and they all simultaneously breathe a sigh of relief.
“It’s quite understandable, with the state of today . . .”
“Escapism, really. The gods’ message to tell us excape is futile. And aren’t we all trying to escape, anyhow?” The crowd applauds.
“Quite a fine crop, lad.”
“I’ll name this mule Poseidon’s Triumph.”
“Old coot, why would Posiedon want an ass named after him?”
“Come, Posiedon’s Triumph.”
“The world’s never going to end.”
“A falling sun? Ha!” The crowd is relieved.
A prostitute may lead a young man in a dark corner, an old woman may interrupt them and take the willing innocent home. A shop keep with 3 eyes hands out pomegranites to chubby middle aged housewives who exit with cheeks swollen with fruit. The birds chirp and the children play in the street, as a soft breeze carries feathers through the marketplace.
A clenching that causes a heart to skip, the moment a pendulum falters. Blood-rushed ball-pivot joints jerk eyes become wide with sight-stricken astonishment. Dry creacked lips that seal a sort of secret. An eruption. The pain takes grip and mingle with wax and feathers like knives piercing cauterized flesh. Wings demon Tarterus’ gate. Melted wax, poured like rainfall. It collects momentum with each micrometer of epipermus it consumes. Fiery teeth explode, sporing and spreading, hungrily across charred skin. Like death crawling excruciatingly dull one feels the sensation of a loss the tautness of sinew, adrenal glands, the body becomes warm and drunk. Inferno attached at arms length. Drastic grasps of unsought oxygen. Dillapidated veins tend to collapse with atmospheric pressure.
Pasiphae: Your pale coat astounds my eyes and I am blinded by love.
Bull: We must remember the gravity of the situation.
Pasiphae: Perhaps he will crumble to dust. A shame.
Bull: I’ll never eat a boy like that.
Pasiphae: I’m famished.
Bull: That’s a different side.
wax and string, wax and string
certified gos sing our praise
these last few days, these last few days
intervention love invention
sondaries to long extensions
fetching flight, pilfering ideals
when shadows envelop water and wheels
The heavens of Olympus are lit up, brightly. Their faces are haughty and powerful, a glow powered by the nectar of sweet ambrosia.
Everyone speaks, people separating into groups discussing, but mostly yelling.
“I don’t believe it.”
“Of course he could swim.”
“If we lose this little one, so easy to manipulate, what will come next? Will Daedalus himself defy us?”
“Don’t try and upset the balance of things.”
“Zeus’ wrath has grown. The human race is screwed.”
“He was flying in a North-Easterly direction. That’s always chaos.”
“Irony . . .no, it’s just coincidence.”
“Really, it was the Minotaur’s indecency . . .”
“Preposterous . . .I blame the ocean currents.”
“Ah, truly, just the end of human civilization.”
Limbs no longer stretch and lips no longer part. It bubbles and cracks, smoldering under the searing heat, heat of a blue star, but a cruel star.
alone the sky can man appeal
limbs near flight bear from fine mind reels
wax and string, wax and string
humbly bring minute thinks of things
these last few days these last few days
he’ll soon be bird stop abruptly
A shadow appears before the blood red sun. A winged dancer with long limbs. A volatile situation feather’s flux and wax dissapates in debaucherous sunlight. A face in the sun. A careless shrug. Irridescent cobalt dye. Deep into waters as dark as a sunless void. When ambitions are beautiful before they are sour. Vivacity holding hands with the sun. Shrivelling, the perfect arabesque. Smoldering under the souring heat of a blue star. Thin-bodied archaic wings. I see the elongated moment of contact, crying out to deep breen infinity.
