Penelope (NHB Modern Plays)

Enda Walsh

• Publisher: Nick Hern Books
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781780013213
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Drama
• Index: Literature

A riveting and savage take on the classic Greek myth of Penelope, wife of Odysseus.

It's 11.30 a.m. and already it's thirty-three degrees Celsius. At the bottom of a drained swimming pool, four ridiculous men face their inevitable deaths, and play for an unwinnable love.

Fringe First Award, Edinburgh 2010

'Grandiose Penelope...mixes classical myth with a bit of Beckett, as interpreted by Father Ted after watching an episode of Lost ' - Sunday Times

'extraordinary theatre... terrifying' - Sunday Independent, Ireland

'among the finest plays Walsh has written' - Sunday Times, Ireland

'a wild, crazy, word-drunk piece that is destined to lodge in the memory... Walsh possesses a truly original theatrical voice' - Guardian

After a little time we realise that we’re looking at a dilapidated swimming pool drained of water. There are two ladders at the back of the pool where the actors enter.

At the back and above the swimming pool we can see a large sliding glass door that leads into a villa. There’s a scrim which allows us to see inside, when appropriate.

The pool’s been turned into a living space and it seems to have operated as such for years.

There are five battered pool loungers of different makes and sizes (some inflatable), a miniature snooker table, a trestle table stacked with beer, wine, spirits and snacks. There’s a portable CD stereo. There’s also a large helium-filled heart-shaped balloon bobbing above the table. Under the table there’s a mass of junk.

There’s a standing screen, at the back in the corner, large enough for someone to change behind it unseen.

There’s a large gleaming Taunton Deluxe Barbecue raised on a wooden pallet in the very centre of the pool.

Most importantly there’s a CCTV camera in the pool looking down at the men.

When the lights come up we have time to take all this in as the two men on stage are very still. We could be looking at a picture.

One of the men is standing beside one of the ladders holding a sponge full of pink suds. He’s been cleaning a long streak of blood off the tiled wall by the ladder and stands there staring at the drips coming down the wall.

This is BURNS.

A man in his mid-thirties, he wears a short Terrycloth swimming-pool robe, scruffy trainers and battered spectacles. He looks strong and able but carries himself subserviently.

The other man is standing looking intensely at the Taunton Deluxe Barbecue.

This is QUINN.

He’s a powerfully built, mid-forties man. His dyed black hair perfectly set, he’s immediately a man of some vanity. He’s wearing tight red Speedos and a pair of smart brown moccasins.

The stillness is broken when QUINN quickly walks to the barbecue. BURNS turns to look at him.

QUINN reaches out his hand and holds it above the grill to test its temperature. As usual it’s cold. There’s an uncooked sausage on the grill. He picks it up and looks at it. He drops it back down.

He walks quickly back to the trestle table, stops and throws a look at BURNS.

BURNS hesitates. He was about to say something but decides not to. QUINN wants to hear it.

QUINN. What do you have to say? (Slight pause.) What is it?

A pause. BURNS gathers the courage.

BURNS. I need to talk about Murray.

QUINN puts on the stereo and Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass play ‘Spanish Flea’.

QUINN finds a blowtorch amongst the snacks. He turns back and looks at the defunct barbecue like he means business. The blowtorch fires in his hand. He walks back over to the barbecue and begins blasting the sausage. He’s cooking it for breakfast.

BURNS drops the sponge into his metal bucket. He can’t get rid of the last of the blood on the wall. He returns the bucket to under the trestle table. He starts to look for something on top of the table. He finds it and puts it on. It’s a cardboard cone-shaped party hat that elasticates under his chin.

At the same time two other men appear and climb down the two ladders at the back. They’re also dressed in Terrycloth swimming-pool robes.

As they turn to us we see DUNNE.

A man of about fifty. He carries himself like an old theatrical troubadour (in flip-flops). He goes straight to the table to fix himself a cocktail, ignoring BURNS completely. He dances a little to the music for his own entertainment. He can move.

The other man is FITZ.

A trim and fidgety mid-sixties man. He carefully organises his pool lounger and towel. Everything has to be in its place. He’s brought an old book to read and takes real care that his bookmark is doing its job. He has a small container of tablets. He empties the contents out. There’s only three tablets in there. That will do. He throws them into his mouth and knocks back a bottle of tomato juice. He blesses himself. That was the wrong direction. He tries it again and again but has forgotten how to bless himself. He gives up. His manner’s a little fey.

DUNNE meanwhile has fixed his cocktail. It’s a very flamboyant margarita topped with fruit and tiny paper umbrellas. He walks over to watch QUINN pulverising the sausage.

BURNS remains at the table where he’s placed various snacks into various bowls. He acts as a reluctant servant throughout.

FITZ acknowledges him with a little nod. FITZ turns and looks at the blood on the wall. BURNS does the same.

The two men then look over at QUINN.

QUINN turns off the blowtorch and hands it to DUNNE.

He reaches into the barbecue and grabs the sausage but burns his hand.

QUINN. Shit!

BURNS doesn’t have to be asked. He comes to the barbecue, grabs the ferociously hot sausage and starts to blow on it for

QUINN.

A perfect temperature now and QUINN finally takes the sausage in his hand as ‘Spanish Flea’ comes to an end.

The men speak with considerable erudition. They may be of different classes (QUINN is certainly a rougher diamond) but they all like the sound of their own voice. Their accents are provincial (each one from a different area of the country) though sound soft… as these are men of distinction.

QUINN bites into the sausage.

DUNNE. How is it?

A pause as QUINN carefully chooses his word.

QUINN. ‘Sausagey.’

DUNNE. That’s good.

FITZ (to DUNNE). Most are often not. Some are. Some have got a sausageness but more often than not they taste of nothing but heat.

DUNNE. And heat isn’t even a taste.

FITZ. Isn’t it?

DUNNE. People would say that heat was a sensation, you know… generally…

QUINN. As a rule.

DUNNE. As you say, Quinn… as a rule… the word having its meanings… having its related characteristics, Fitz. ‘What does heat have?’ ‘Taste’ is not the first thing that springs to mind.

QUINN. ‘This tastes hot.’ I would say that before I would say this tastes of sausage.

DUNNE. But I said, ‘How is it?’ and you said, ‘Sausagey.’ Why didn’t you say that it tastes hot if hot was your first sensation?

QUINN. Hot was my first sensation but I said ‘sausagey’ out of badness.

DUNNE. Right.

QUINN. This is the very last sausage, men, and I wanted you all to know that it’s a superior sausage. Not some dust-filled, cigar-shaped, hunk of pigshit… but an actual sausage! The sausage of our youth. Had I just said, ‘This is a hot sausage’… well, that has negative connotations…

FITZ. Not if we were cold, it doesn’t. A hot sausage would be quite nice in the cold!

QUINN. Obviously not if we were cold, Fitz. Had we been sitting in a yurt in Mongolia shivering into a herd of yaks and I was clutching this sausage… I would look you each in the eye and smile… ‘Gentlemen, this is a hot sausage! The last hot sausage! The final sausage, heated! What do you feel about that then, lads?’

FITZ. Jealous. And cold.

DUNNE. Leaning in trying to get a modicum of heat off that delicious-looking banger, no doubt.

QUINN. But this is not Mongolia…

FITZ and DUNNE. God, no…!

QUINN. …this is… Burns!

BURNS. What?

QUINN. What is this?

BURNS. A sausage?

QUINN. Yes, it’s a sausage! What are we here?

BURNS. 11.30 a.m.

QUINN. More importantly!

BURNS. Thirty-three degrees Celsius.

FITZ. That’s hot.

DUNNE. That’s hot and early.

BURNS. It’s always hot.

DUNNE. And invariably early…! (Trails off.) …when it isn’t late…

QUINN. And this… my fellow competitors… this is sausagey.

QUINN starts to eat the sausage as the o...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Contents
• Original Production
• Characters
• Penelope
• About the Author
• Copyright and Performing Rights Information