-
Camarilla
- PAJ: A Journal of Performance and Art
- The MIT Press
- PAJ 81 (Volume 27, Number 3), September 2005
- pp. 101-130
- Article
- Additional Information
PAJ: A Journal of Performance and Art 27.3 (2005) 101-130
[Access article in PDF]
Camarilla
Van Badham
Characters
PROFESSOR MARGARET-ANN TANNER, an Australian-born senior lecturer in Political Science at a London university, and a well-known public intellectual. Fifties.
JOHN ALLTHORPE, Maggy's husband. A northern teacher/trade unionist, now a labor historian. Fifties.
REBEKAH TANNER-BURTON, Maggy's daughter from her first marriage. A twenty-three year-old recent university graduate, now working as an admin assistant for a small PR company.
DAVID CRYSTAL, John's estranged son from his first marriage. American-raised. A lawyer working in the legal department of a media company. Twenty-eight.
CHARLES ASHE: A member of the G8 London Summit Secretariat.
DAVID and CHARLES are to be played by the same actor.
Scene
London, the Tanner/Allthorpe home in Fulham. Present day.
For Damien Cahill, my hero.
Prologue
London. A shopping street. A massive explosion—a bomb—ripping glass. Panic, Sirens. An aftermath. MAGGY cradles REBEKAH in her arms. They are in a circle of shattered glass, covered in it. They are bleeding, both riddled with cuts—REBEKAH the worse. MAGGY is hysterical, Rebekah almost unconscious, with blood running down her face.
MAGGY: (Screaming.) Somebody! Somebody help my daughter!
REBEKAH: Mum . . . It's all right, Mum; it's all right . . .
MAGGY: Help me! They've hurt my daughter! [End Page 101]
Scene 1
The Tanner/Allthorpe house, the next day.JOHN ALLTHORPE enters the living room with a mobile phone, searching for a television remote control.
JOHN: (On the phone.) I just wish people would leave her alone—Which channel? I can't hear—All day! Place is like a madhouse—! (He switches on the television.) No—
TELEVISION: . . . the Australian-born academic who has been a vocal critic of the government's response to the global terrorist threat. In an interview with Newsnight last year, the Professor—
JOHN: Played this on the radio as well— (He turns off the television.) Everywhere—I don't—Yes, I will. When she's—
MAGGY: (Offstage.) John!
JOHN: The kraken wakes—nevermind; I'll have to call you later—
(Enter MAGGY, in a dressing gown, brandishing a newspaper.)
MAGGY: Have you seen this?!
JOHN: (To phone.) Of course—bye—
MAGGY: John—?!
JOHN: Brad Somers just called to see how you were faring. Marie sends her regards as—(A landline telephone begins to ring.)
MAGGY: That sound! That's the fiftieth bloody time!
JOHN: Quite a fanclub of well-wishers—
MAGGY: (With the newspaper.) Sending poisoned roses and—are you answering that?!
JOHN: No, I'm not. (JOHN goes over to the telephone and rips it out of its socket.) Peace in our time.
MAGGY: Tell me you're going to plug that back in.
JOHN: They can live without us (turning off his mobile), if we can live without them. I don't want you disturbed. Come now, back to bed. The doctor said—
MAGGY: Bugger the doctor—(with the paper) what's this doing in our house?
JOHN: You should be resting, love.
MAGGY: I just got up to go to the bathroom and this greets me. "Red professor," "Terrorist friend Tanner," "Marxist aca—" here!—"maybe her daughter needs more than a few more cuts and scratches for Prof. Tanner to grasp what the British public has known all along—" They've got a picture—of her!—What was this doing in the bathroom?
JOHN: I did intend to wipe my arse on it. (JOHN comforts her.) You know it's drivel. When you're rested you'll remember—and they'll already be driveling at somebody else.
MAGGY: Where's Rebekah?
JOHN: She's sleeping.
MAGGY: She should be—!
JOHN: The doctor wants you both to rest. The concussion's lifted—there's no reason for Rebekah to— [End Page 102]
MAGGY: Page five, right-hand side, covered in blood—In this bloody—I'm going to call Harold West and I'm going to have them in court—they've got a—
JOHN: Why don't you rest and think about it?
MAGGY: I don...