Lodestar Quarterly

Issue 7 • Fall 2003 • Featured Writer • Drama

My Unknown Son

Daniel Curzon

Scene 2

Scene 2

SON enters, now dressed like one of the stupid, gawky, goofy characters in Shakespeare -- Dogberry, Sir Andrew Aguecheek, Bottom, etc. -- who always misuse words and clunk about.

SON
(to FATHER) Hold there, thou varlet!

FATHER
What?

SON
I arrest thee in the name of Good Queen Bess, ruler of all England, Wales, Ireland, the top part of France, and other domains that thou canst find out if thou just ask! Run not away, sirrah!

FATHER
Run away? I've been calling for you!

SON
(Grabs FATHER's ear) And now I have thee most prodigiously by the ear! Away to prison with thee, villain most cuckolded! (Tries to take FATHER off)

FATHER
Wait! For what?

SON
I am the watch and thou has loitered most impeccably, and so thou hast plotted most indifferently against the good queen!

FATHER
No, I haven't.

SON
Sneck up! (snaps fingers in his face) I give thee the lie in the thorax, sirrah. I pluck thy beard!

FATHER
I don't have a beard. See! (touches his own face)

SON
(looking at the face, a beat) Then I give thee a big pun in thy face, thou cuckold! Thou wouldst o'erthrow the Tudor line, and thus art a most scurvy fellow, a one-suited jackanapes, a birdbolt, a lackpurse, and a stockfish, and, moreover, a bull's pizzle.

FATHER
... Where's the big pun?

SON
I couldst not think of one! (to offstage help) Help ho there!

FATHER
You're a little confused. You've been sent here not to arrest me, but to meet your father.

SON
(stuttering) F-F-F-F (FATHER slaps him, to make him get the word out) Father?

FATHER
I'm (hedging)... I'm a friend of his. He sent me to find you.

SON
O no, sir! My father is dead. My mother told me so. O no, no, no, sir!

FATHER
I think she lied.

SON
(in a huff) Dost call my mother a whore, a baggage, an uncleanly trollop, a trull, a drab, a minx, a jade, a slut?

FATHER
Hold on! Hold on! Didn't your mother live with another woman, and your father was never around?

SON
'Tis true, but no man calleth me good mother such names! 'Twould make me a whoreson bastard! A baseborn, spurious, unchaste, dishonored, misbegotten coxcomb, and a stealer of blackberries!... And a cuckold.

FATHER
(to see if SON really knows) By the way, what is a cuckold?

SON
(with giggles) Oh, sir, thou dost talk most naughty! A man's wife may not put the cuckoo's egg into her jolly apron, or see what haps to a man's good repute! (falls on the floor at his bawdy humor)

FATHER
Simmer down. You're not a bastard.

SON
By my troth and all my gilliflowers, thou art most certain?

FATHER
If you're born, you're legitimate. People used to care so much about all that paternity and maternity stuff. Now it's ceased to be such a big issue -- you should pardon the pun.

SON
(sadly) By Our Lady's virginity, if only such had been true when I were a boy.

FATHER
Did you go through a lot of trouble?

SON
Aye, sir. My mother was an outcast, for she had no husband, and yet she had me.

FATHER
If you'd been born in the twentieth century -- like my son was -- then you wouldn't have had to worry.

SON
(not too sure, his pain showing through a bit) You think not, sir?

FATHER
(doubtful) Nobody today is going to suffer the way they would have in the old days! Not my son... not mine. (Takes out a coin) Here's a little something -- some support from your father.

SON
From my father? (looks at the coin, bites it, giggles) I shall use my wealth well! I have many ideas by which to improve this world. First I shall... (Thinks hard. Smiles goofily.) Ooo! Ooo! That's it!

FATHER
(curious) What?

SON
(pompously, sitting on a raised chair) I'll make every man jack stand on their heads. And when they are all there, with their big butts up -- (laughs goofily) I shall -- I shall think of the rest later! I have lots of good ideas about butts like that! I have written a paragraph about butts. So there!

FATHER
(thinking of his book) I have need of writing a few paragraphs myself.

Enter MIDWIFE as an Elizabethan Fool, with a cap and bells, motley, and a bauble -- the Fool's scepter.)

MIDWIFE
(as Fool) Hey, nonny! Hey, nonny! And a nonny, nonny hey! (bowing to FATHER) At your service, sir!

FATHER
What are you doing here?

MIDWIFE
(striking poses) Just fooling around.

FATHER
Well, I don't want you here. I'm doing just fine.

MIDWIFE
In truth, sir? (bopping him on the head with the bauble) Dost thou not admire thy child? (MIDWIFE bops SON on his head, stays by his side as he sits in chair.)

SON
(giddy, overly pleased) Oh, a Fool! They're fun! (to FATHER) Look! It's a Fool!

FATHER
(with a double meaning about his child) I noticed.

SON
(to FOOL) Quibble with thy words! Come on, quibble!

MIDWIFE
(to FATHER) Has thou no quibbles? What shouldst I say to thy child?

FATHER
Nothing.

MIDWIFE
(alluding to the line in King Lear) Nothing will come of nothing.

SON
Oh, 'tis most witty! "Nothing will come of nothing."

MIDWIFE
(to FATHER, meaning SON, but slyly) How like you this Fool, fool? Art glad thou hast such a fine offspring?

FATHER
You can't control those things.

MIDWIFE
Ashamed?

FATHER
No, I'm not ashamed.

MIDWIFE
Maybe you should be. Maybe your sperm wasn't good enough. And such good stock too! Maybe it was the way you did it!

FATHER
I gave the best I had! Accidents happen! Even when people do it the "normal" way. It's biology!

SON
(impatiently) Prithee, where are thy quibbles? Please, more quibbles -- right into mine nose! (points to nose) Or into my butt! (points to it) See! (to FATHER) Hast thou quibbles for my butt, good sir?

MIDWIFE
(to SON) Oh, he has no quibbles about anything. (knocks on SON'S head) Knock, knock!

SON
(going along) Who's there?

MIDWIFE
Nobody.

SON
Nobody who?

FATHER
(to MIDWIFE) Stop this. Stop it!

MIDWIFE
But I'm a licensed Fool. Wouldst revoke my license, sir? (going on, to SON, knocking again) I hear there be a vacancy in this lodging! 'Tis true?

SON
Yay, we have an attic vacant. Right here. (Points to his head, laughs)

MIDWIFE
(with a sly look at FATHER) Does thy worthy father live in here?

SON
(giggling) He's gone a-riding!

MIDWIFE
A-writing? A veritable paragraph? A whole page?

FATHER
(to MIDWIFE) Stop it!

MIDWIFE
What's wrong, nuncle? 'Tis just a little fooling. Hast no meaning. Whoop, Jug! I love thee!

FATHER
(more quietly, turning away) Thou dost gall my heart.

MIDWIFE
(to audience) He's nobody's fool!

SON
God's wounds, this is the finest merry-making I've had since St. Athol's Day!

FATHER
(with a double take) Whose day?

SON
Athol. (spelling it out, but having some trouble) A-T-H-O-L. Athol! (It sounds like "asshole.") Didsst I tell you St. Athol's Day is my name day?

FATHER
Somebody gave you that name?

SON
Most truly. All do call me Athol!

FATHER
Please don't say it so much, or so loudly.

SON
Prithee, if I be an Athol, fain would I declare it, and gladly too!

MIDWIFE
(as Fool) How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have an Athol for a son!

FATHER
He's not really hurting anyone.

SON
(interrupting, to FATHER) Dost thou not know...

FATHER and MIDWIFE ignore SON, keep on talking right across his body.

MIDWIFE
(to FATHER) No doubt he'll save the day. Just like in all the Shakespeare plays. The dumb jerks always manage to capture the bad guys. Just like in real life! You writers! Suck up! Suck up!

FATHER
I'm just trying to have a decent son.

SON
(to FATHER, about more quibbles) Dost thou, huh? Dost thou?

SON waves his arms, tries to get their attention.

MIDWIFE
(to FATHER) But this is the one you got. Hey, nonny! Hey, nonny! And my sonny is a nonny, nonny new! (to FATHER) Shall I tell him the truth, who you are?

FATHER
No. (looking at his SON) What good will it do?

MIDWIFE
Oh, a hug or something. I thought you were into hugs. Or is that only when they're little babies and dribbling all over themselves doesn't mean that much?

FATHER
What do you want me to say?

MIDWIFE
Why, that you love your son. You do love him, don't you? Whoop, Jug, I love thee!

FATHER
(looking at SON) Love him?

SON
I want that Fool's bauble! (He grabs it from MIDWIFE, runs off, jabbering) By my troth, I got it! I got the bauble! I got it in mine hand!

FATHER
(disciplining) Here, give that back to her! (Goes after SON)

SON
(playing keep-away) No! I've got it forever!

FATHER
Come here!

SON
No!

FATHER
Athol!

SON
(singsong) It's mine!

FATHER
(echoing SON) It's not yours!

MIDWIFE
(watching him unable to control the child, sarcastically) Nice work. The male influence, no doubt.

FATHER
You want some kind of mawkish declaration that I have the socially approved response to my "slow" child! Well, I won't give it! I can't love just any child that's given to me! That's ridiculous! You love the individual!

MIDWIFE
I think the Elizabethans had a word for it -- "unnatural." Nothing will come of nothing!

SON
I've got the bauble! Prithee, look at me! (He sticks the bauble between his legs like a penis, giggles.)

FATHER
I'm supposed to say I love that? That's not love. It's pity.

MIDWIFE
Is that all, nuncle?

FATHER
All right, it's shame then. It's pity and shame and disappointment, if that's my child. How do I know his mother didn't stick somebody else's sperm in her at the last moment?

MIDWIFE
You are something else!

FATHER
Well, the world can use something else! I'm not going to make you or me feel good by saying I love my son. (almost breaking down with the pain of the thought and not being able to say it) I love my... I love my...

MIDWIFE
And here I thought you two might live together. A little cottage on the heath.

FATHER
I want to write my book! I wouldn't have time --

MIDWIFE
-- If he were on your hands -- and for his whole life too? He's never going to grow up, of course.

FATHER
Nobody should have to go through that.

MIDWIFE
People do. Mothers mostly. But then they're so used to it. Not you! You've got your career to think about!

FATHER
That's right! I'm not going to squander my talent on that... thing.

MIDWIFE
Don't be so sure there's so much talent here! (looking at his typewriter) I've read some of this history. I think you'd be better off taking care of him. (points to SON)

FATHER
I won't be pulled down this way! I want another son!

SON
My bauble! My bauble! My bauble is a bubble! There is some trouble with my bubble, for my bauble is a bubble! My bauble makes me babble. Babble! I like to dabble in my babble! I like to dabble with my babble 'cause my babble is a bubble, and my bubble is a bauble -- and a butt!

MIDWIFE
(to SON) Come along, Athol. He wants another son.

FATHER
(to MIDWIFE) Shhhh!

SON
Must go now?

MIDWIFE
I'm afraid so.

SON
(about FATHER) Is yonder gentleman to come with us?

MIDWIFE
Are you to come with us?

FATHER shakes his head no, but reluctantly.

MIDWIFE
Come along. He can't make this journey.

SON
(a little disappointed) Thou canst not go, noble sir?

FATHER
No.

SON
Well, I thank thee most portentously. Wilt I see thee more?

FATHER
I don't think so.

SON
No?

FATHER
I want --

MIDWIFE
(to SON) Tarry not! He is a-weary of thee, fool.

SON
(hurt) Oh.

FATHER
That's not the way to say it!

MIDWIFE
A rose by any other name would stink as sweet. (to SON) Say bye-bye.

SON
(to FATHER) God rest ye!

FATHER
God rest ye.

MIDWIFE
(to SON, who is going out the wrong exit) No, this way, Athol.

SON
(somewhat melancholy, somewhat silly) My bauble! My bauble! My bauble is a bubble! My bubble! My bubble! My bubble is a trouble!

SON and MIDWIFE disappear, MIDWIFE leading him as he sings his rhyme sadly.

FATHER
Who would want that? It's not right! It's not fair!

Next Page:   Scene 3   (page 4 of 6 pages)

All Pages:   See the entire play on one page

Table of Contents:   My Unknown Son

Daniel Curzon's works include the landmark gay protest novel Something You Do in the Dark (1971), The World Can Break Your Heart (1984), Superfag (1996), Only the Good Parts (1998), and Not Necessarily Nice: Stories (1999) as well as the play Godot Arrives (winner of the 1999 National New Play Contest). He has also written and published non-gay fiction and plays.

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