Stefano Fortin
GEORGE II
Nomination Italian Playwrights Project 3th edition (2020/22)
excerpt translated by Thomas Simpson
Places and Times
Act III. Christmas Dinner. Scene one. West Oaks, Texas.
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Act I. The Justice of God. Huntsville, Texas. 02/02/1998.
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Act III. Christmas Dinner. Scene two. West Oaks, Texas.
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Act II. 2 + 2 = 5. Tallahassee, Florida. 11/07/2000.
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Act III. Christmas Dinner. Scene three. West Oaks, Texas.
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Act IV. Terrore Air Force One. Skies over the USA. 09/11/2001.
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Act III. Christmas Dinner. Scene four. West Oaks, Texas.
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Act V. Furor. West Point. New York State. 06/01/2002.
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Act III. Christmas Dinner. Scene five. West Oaks, Texas.
Characters
George Walker Herbert Bush, 41º President of the United States of America , father of G.W. Bush
Barbara Bush, mother of G.W. Bush
George Walker Bush, Governor of Texas; then 43º President of the United States of America
Laura Welch, wife of G.W. Bush
John Ellis “Jeb” Bush, younger brother of G.W. Bush, Governor of Florida
George Prescott Bush, son of “Jeb” Bush
Dick Cheney, Vice President of the USA
Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense
Condoleezza Rice, National Security Chief
Katherine Harris, Florida Secretary of State
Karl, Press Secretary, later campaign advisor and Chief of Staff to G.W. Bush
Al Gore, democratic candidate for President of the United States
Robert, campaign advisor to Al Gore
Claire Percy, television reporter
William Franklin “Billy” Graham, Baptist preacher and pastor
Earl, pro-Republican blogger
Ghost of an inhabitant of Florida
Flight Assistant
West Point cadets (John and Ethan)
Reporters (4)
Prologue
I.
Sixteen centuries. Sixteen.
That’s how long it took for Europeans to clarify their ideas about democracy.
And it took us to first put it into practice, like guinea pigs.
When it comes down to it, the New World was invented for three reasons:
to make money, a mountain of money;
to find new people to fill up Hell or increase God’s mercy;
to try out democracy (the real democracy, the right one).
Anyway, it’s best to carry out experiments at a distance, to protect against possible pandemics, and an ocean is perfect for that:
and endless expanse of salty water on both sides, practically an isolated laboratory, unreachable.
“Go”
They said to a mass of disinherited people without hope, the unwanted, with no reason for staying in Europe
“Go there, a Genoese navigator discovered a pile of dirt beyond the ocean a few centuries ago”
Those weren’t the exact words but that was more or less the message
“There’s all the space you could want over there. Go!”
After a while, though, we were the ones to put you on ships, to send you to the other side of the ocean.
“Call your Genovese gentleman again”
We said
“It’s time for you to go home.”
II.
The lands, the mountains, the sea
weren’t enough for us
we needed something more to keep us together, to turn us from many into one big thing. And so
-- why not give it a try?— we took your democracy and put it black on white.
Where you are it’ll never work, because you think of so many absurdities
You don’t see that among those absurdities you have a few good ideas.
Plus you don’t have the space, you’re all crowded together and end up hating each other to death, like in a condominium.
But democracy needs space more than people
It needs space to nourish itself, incessantly, indefatigably, devouring everything it can because it rots when it stands still, it grows old, so it has to move, find new climes, heal itself.
First from North to South
then from East to West
we gave to democracy
Upper Lake
The Rocky Mountains
Lake Michigan
The Grand Canyon and the one in Palo Duro
the Mississippi
The Black Hills
and lots and lots of flesh.
With all that eating it because a gigantic mass of tissues, muscles, wants, immorality
You can see it from your side of the ocean, just squint your eyes to see that lard-covered neck,
the head, the dangling arms.
Finally it got so fat it couldn’t fit in the laboratory anymore
And it was always, always hungry.
So we kept giving it things to eat: other lands, other space, other flesh
We had to cut it to pieces and cram it into other places before it suffocated everyone.
It wasn’t generosity, it was necessity.
III.
So what do you want to know about democracy?
Your little democratic ladies all made up and bewigged just right, can barely stay on their feet with their good manners, there’s nothing for them to eat and they’re famished, they can’t stand up
They usually end up devouring one another
Or tearing themselves apart
But ours is always growing, it doesn’t bother them and adapts itself everywhere.
Maybe that’s why we’re always hungry here.
Seething hunger.
And we’re not ashamed to eat with our mouths open
as open as possible.
ACT III
Christmas Dinner
West Oaks, Texas
III.i.
BARBARA BUSH enters.
BARBARA BUSH No, not like that. The candlabra goes in the center, the center of the table
Not on the left, in the center. Every table has a center, isn’t that right? So that’s where the candelabra goes. Exactly there. I’m not kidding, no, I don’t ever kid about my mother’s candelabra, you should know that. Also Poppy finally agreed to let me put the candelabra at the center of the table. Isn’t that right, Poppy? Poppy? Jeb? Where are you? You know I hate it when you do that.
JEB BUSH enters.
BARBARA BUSH That’s enough, next year you do it. You collect all them all the notes from your president friends, governors, popes and oil executives, collect them yourselves. And answer them yourselves too. Enough. Done. I know ,every year you do it on purpose moving my mother’s candelabra, you do it on purpose. But next year you organize the dinner. I…
JEB BUSH Merry Christmas!
BARBARA BUSH Jeb! You’re crazy. You’ll give me a heart attack.
JEB BUSH I’m dreaming of a white Christmas
Just like the ones I used to know
Where the tree tops glisten
And children listen
To hear sleigh bells in the snow, oh, the snow.
BARBARA BUSH Come on, George, stop it.
JEB BUSH I’m Jeb, mamma.
BARBARA BUSH Sorry Jeb. I’ve always said you resemble your father. Look at yourself: the hair, the eyes…
JEB BUSH … the same hands, the same shoulders. Too bad about the name.
BARBARA BUSH By the way, Jeb, where’d your father go?
JEB BUSH I still haven’t seen him yet. He must be hiding somewhere, as usual.
BARBARA BUSH We have to find him. Junior and Laura will be arriving soon. Help me find him.
JEB BUSH Right. I’ll go. (Exits)
BARBARA BUSH (as though conducting a ritual) George Walker Hebert Bush, come forth. Come out of your jiding place reveal yourself It’s Christmas and dinner is about to begin. And you must join us. Come out. Right now.
G. W. H. BUSH appears.
G. W.H.BUSH Here I am.
BARBARA BUSH Jeb, I found him.
JEB BUSH (off) I’m coming.
JEBBUSH enters.
JEBBUSH Poppy.
G. W.H.BUSH Jeb.
JEB BUSH Mamma was looking for you, but you’re always hiding somewhere. Columba and I, as soon as we got here we hoped to find you, but we were out of luck. Why are you always hiding?
G. W.H.BUSH I come downstairs only at night, Jeb, by now the sunlight bothers my eyes and my skin. So I’m condemned to wander only at night, during the day I stay in the shadows.
JEB BUSH But you could have come down. We haven’t seen each other for a long time.
G. W.H.BUSH Since November.
JEB BUSH Right. Since November.
BARBARA BUSH Jeb, could you go into the living room? I left this year’s Christmas cards on the little table.
JEB BUSH Sure. On the little table, did you say?
BARBARA BUSH Yes. Make sure not to mix them up, it took me an hour to put them in alphabetical order.
JEB BUSH exits.
BARBARA BUSH Poppy, don’t try it: let November go, let Florida and everything else go. Not today.
G. W.H.BUSH If you want I’ll disappear, Bar, just like I came I can disappear.
BARBARA BUSH No, sta here. Just don’t start with “November”, neither with Jeb nor with Junior. Understood? No elections, no governorships, no Florida, no Texas. Nothing.
G. W.H.BUSH So what will we talk about?
BARBARA BUSH About everything else. (Silence)
(doorbell rings).
