Celebrating WitSlings
Taken from a script composed of WitSlings written during LSW Sessions and performed in a three minute segment at the:-
Westminster Arts Gala
London Palladium
Sunday, 11th October 1998
with LSW Members: Bruce Wall, Sarah Rice, Max Bonamy, Toby Mace, Philip
Dinsdale, Adele Lynch, Rupert Mason with Special Guests, longstanding RSC Veterans both,
Bill Homewood and Estelle Kohler
All lines spoken by VOICE GUEST are those of Shakespeare;
All other VOICES are from WitSlings written by LSW Members themselves.
All material presented herein is under the direct copyright of LSW.
For permission to perform please e-mail: Londonswo@hotmail.com
VOICE GUEST
You are a monument without a tomb;
VOICE ONE
A matching saucer without its spoon;
VOICE TWO
A dining table without its legs;
VOICE THREE
An empty glass far past its dregs;
VOICE FOUR
A nightmare had when still awake;
VOICE FIVE
The real thing, darling?;
VOICE SIX
Yes, but still a fake
VOICE SEVEN
And everything you did;
VOICE EIGHT
You did un-make.
VOICE GUEST
And then she clipped Adonis in her arms;
VOICE SEVEN
(as a West Country Adonis)
‘By Heck’
VOICE ONE
Thought he
VOICE SEVEN (Adonis)
She’s got a vice-like grip
VOICE ONE
She drew him closer still and pressed him to her
I think I’ll faint from the pain of it.
VOICE ONE
Struggling free he pushed her to one side
VOICE SEVEN (Adonis)
Else in those arms I might have died.
VOICE GUEST
This beauteous combat, wilful and unwilling;
VOICE THREE
This fight with softness and unwanted hurts;
VOICE SEVEN (Adonis)
This hot desire to do my own undoing
VOICE FIVE/FOUR
This vision; feeling burns; and dreams, and hurts.
VOICE SEVEN (Adonis)
This wanting, but not having in my heart; (SMALL PAUSE)
VOICE ONE
Not having and not wanting is the art.
VOICE GUEST
Crabbed Age and youth cannot live together
VOICE FIVE
The first like lead progesses; youth’s a feather
VOICE SEVEN
The lad’s carousing oftimes makes him ill
VOICE FIVE
The elder’s sun sets gently o’er the hill.
VOICE GUEST
My parts had pow’r to charm a sacred nun
VOICE TWO (as old woman)
And I was lovely once, when I was young
Oh, men back then did but fall at my feet
Or maybe they were short the men I’d meet.
VOICE GUEST
Thou art as wise as thou art beautiful
VOICE TWO (as old woman)
Oh, how I wish this was but truly so.
VOICE GUEST
He sat beside her on the grassy verge.
VOICE THREE
(an elderly Indian Army Officer)
I know your looks are fair; your body firm
But, oh my dear, you have but half a wit
And yet I love you, need you, want you sore
For wisdom comes when beauty is no more.
VOICE GUEST
No more be grieved at that which thou hast done.
VOICE THREE
(an elderly Indian Army Officer)
All I was really after was a little fun.
When I said ‘Why don’t you come out for a little country run?’
You must have known my intention was to see you undone.
VOICE GUEST
Farewell. Thou art too dear for my posessing.
VOICE TWO (as old woman)
And I’m not sure I can be bothered with all that undressing.
By the time one has undone all those buttons and bows
The moment’s lost and my nipples are froze.
VOICE GUEST
How all occasions do inform against me
VOICE SIX
The very floor impeds me in my quest
The lift is stuck, my shoes are tied together,
My nose is running, hanky have I not
The toilet that I seek is twelve floors up;
I broke my glasses falling out of bed,
The person to my left I think is dead.
VOICE GUEST
More is thy due, than more than all can pay
VOICE FIVE
Nothing is what your soul will have today.
The world will catch up with us someday soon
for flying is like walking on the moon
If harmony is drama left undone.
VOICE FOUR
I watched in horror as it sped close by.
VOICE GUEST
She flashed forth fire as lightning from the sky
VOICE FOUR
The twisted metal engines all aflame.
The carnage left as wreckage of the plane.
Innocent people killed (pause) and what’s the gain.
VOICE EIGHT
My mind is blunt and hard it is to think
of something fresh to say about an actor’s lot.
So much unsung talent, it makes me sad.
VOICE GUEST
Why art thou paitent, man? Thou should’st be mad.
VOICE THREE
Does she love me, or do I merely surmise?
VOICE GUEST
I do believe her, though I know she lies.
VOICE THREE
In infinite stupidity I fall,
Though my heart is the culprit of them all.
VOICE GUEST
When I am sometimes absent from thy heart
VOICE THREE
And coursing like a river through thy veins,
In head, in lungs, in kidney and hot spleen;
and rising like a fever in your cheek
I am the essence of your precious life
A ruby reservoir of joy and pain.
VOICE GUEST
The thoughts that come are wild and young,
VOICE SIX
The ones that leave
VOICE ONE
No longer please
VOICE SEVEN
There are the hidden places
VOICE FIVE
but a million faces,
VOICE FOUR
And thoughts that leave their traces.
VOICE GUEST
We are a monument with its tomb;
VOICE ONE
A pregnant woman blessed in her womb;
VOICE EIGHT
A dining table standing proudly on its legs;
VOICE THREE
An empty glass enjoyed down to its dregs;
VOICE FOUR/VOICE SIX
The nightmare passed, (pause) our joy is all awake;
ALL VOICES (soto voce/echo)
Awake;
VOICE GUEST
The real thing, darlings?
ALL VOICES
(CLOSING BOOKS)
Yes. But STILL a fake. (Bow – PICK THEM UP -- and exit)
