Square Go

Gary McNair, Kieran Hurley

• Publisher: Oberon Books
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781786826084
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Mezzi di comunicazione e arti performative
• Subtopic: Teatro

Max is a normal-ish kid in a normal-ish town. He spends his days daydreaming and hanging out with his weird wee pal Stevie Nimmo. But when Max is called for his first Square Go, a fight by the school gates, it's his own demons he must wrestle with first. Featuring an original soundtrack by members of Frightened Rabbit, this unmissable collaboration between Fringe First winning writers Kieran Hurley (Heads Up) and Gary McNair (A Gambler's Guide to Dying) is a raucous and hilarious new play about playground violence, myths of masculinity and the decision to step up or run.

A high school boys’ toilet. STEVIE NIMMO sits, alone. He is eating strawberry laces.

Suddenly the space is blasted full of booming wrestling-intro-style rock music. The space is filled with lights and smoke.

A voice is heard, offstage.

MAX: (Offstage.) Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, people of Hammerston put your hands together and show your appreciation for Hammerston High’s people’s champion Max Fucking Brocklehurst!

MAX appears, wearing a wrestling mask and boxing gloves. He takes big strides and works the crowd like a pro-wrestler, high-fiving the audience, climbing up on parts of the set, posing. He leads the audience in a chant.

MAX: Max! Max! Max! Max! Max!

MAX psyches himself up in the centre of the stage.

MAX: (In voiceover.) How To Give A Victory Speech. You’ve crossed the line! You’ve crossed the line before anyone else! Cameras surround you, there are microphones in your face, now is your time! You are a hero! Smile as much as possible, look happy! Congratulate your opponents! Say how hard they made you work, how much of a competition they made it for you. Look happy, remember to smile. Be gracious, be proud, thank the crowd, thank the fans thank your coach, thank your parents. You have defeated your opponent. You have proven your worth. You, alone, are victorious! Everybody loves you! Well done!

Suddenly the music cuts out, stark lights up. We’re back in a toilet again.

STEVIE: That’s shite.

MAX: What? Fuck you. You’re the one that said “imagine there’s a big mad crowd.” Well, here’s ma crowd and they fuckin love me!

STEVIE: That’s pure incandescent mate. You’re heavy rambunctious.

MAX: I’m just trying to get fucking – in the zone! Fucksake Stevie!

STEVIE: Just saying, as your hauners, maybe you should start by looking at the situation, as is. Instead of prancing about in the toilets like a fucking wank.

MAX: I don’t want to do this Stevie, I’m just trying to get myself –

STEVIE: Shouldnae have said that thing then.

MAX: I didnae mean it.

STEVIE: Tae Danny fucking Guthrie as well, I mean / that’s cosmological –

MAX: I didnae mean it.

STEVIE: How long have we got?

MAX: Bout an hour.

STEVIE: You need to get cracking then wee man.

MAX: “Wee man” aye?

STEVIE: Aye! Or you’re gonnae get pure tabernacled. Time to start taking this fucking seriously!

MAX turns to the audience.

MAX: Okay, so I’m going to have to bring you all up to speed here. See in about one hour’s time, when that clock strikes 3.35 aw this wrestling show-down stuff, will basically become, like, an actual reality. As I, Max Brocklehurst...

STEVIE: Run of the mill average naebody from class 2B.

MAX: ...step up to go toe to toe at the school gates in my very first square go. Now I understand that not all of you are from about here so yous might no really know what your square go is. Basically it’s a word for like a rammy –

STEVIE: A pagger.

MAX: A heavy swedge.

STEVIE: A mano-a-mano.

MAX: A possible do-in.

STEVIE: A guaranteed pumpin, in this case.

MAX: An act of combat.

STEVIE: A bust-up.

MAX: A… fisticuffs.

STEVIE: A stramash.

MAX: A fight, basically. Man to man. A go. No weapons. Two men, squared off against each other, toe to toe. A square go.

STEVIE: (Just properly understanding the phrase for the first time, half to himself.) Oh aye right enough –

MAX: I’ve dreaded hearing those words my whole life. It was actually my dad that invented the term “square go.”

STEVIE: Did he fuck! It goes back. Way back in time. First ever square go was when Adam battered fuck ootay that snake. Even Jesus will have had his go. It’s always been a thing. It’s just the way it is. It has to happen, comes to us all. Inevitable. A rites of passage thing.

MAX: Like your VL.

STEVIE: You’re a VL.

MAX: Naw I’m no. Right, so your VL is your virgin lips. If you’ve no had a kiss, you’re a VL. If you’re a VL, you’re a sad wee loser wi no mates. Int that right Stevie?

STEVIE: Fuck up you.

MAX: Point is, your square go is something you have to just get done. Everyone gets their square go at some point.

STEVIE: Aye but no everybody gets their square go offay King of the School, Neanderthal knuckle-dragger Danny Guthrie.

MAX: Aye, alright, cheers for the reminder Stevie. Fuck.

STEVIE: Which is why Max here is hiding out in the bogs until the clock strikes for the end of the day. Which, you have to hand it to him, is a strategically well-chosen hiding spot if you’re planning on shiting yourself.

MAX: Fuck up Stevie. You’d be shiting yourself too if Danny Guthrie was after you.

STEVIE: And just so yous all know by the way it’s Danny Guthrie, alright? Never just Danny, never just Guthrie. Always Danny Guthrie. Names stick, that’s just the way it is here. Like Morag Malone.

MAX: Round here Morags always get called Mo. But we already had a Mo Malone, and it wouldnae be right to have a Mo Malone and a Mo Malone 2. So everyone just calls her Macauley Culkin.

STEVIE: Here, Macauley Culkin’s your brother.

MAX: Stevie, shut it. What he – when he says that right, he doesnae mean he’s my brother, but… right, so, you’re at school, or you’re walking down the street and one of you sees a guy that just looks a wee bit suspect, like a bit of a weird guy, you know, just a guy who’s a bit of a riddy, a pure beamer ay a guy right and you’ve got to get your pal’s attention and then say “here mate, that’s your brother.” It sounds simple, and it is but it’s an endless game.

STEVIE: It’s brilliant banter.

MAX: Aye. Usually… Me and Stevie have worked out the best place for calling out a Your Brother is in Asda.

STEVIE: Nobody knows why but it is. It just is.

MAX: Stevie’s got hunners ay brothers in Asda. Point is, Danny Guthrie is always Danny Guthrie and if you forget he’ll break your legs.

STEVIE: Correct.

MAX: Sorry, you might no have caught our names, I’m Max...

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Half-Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Chapter 1