Lodestar Quarterly

Issue 8 • Winter 2003 • Featured Lodestar Writer • Drama

Now She Dances!

Doric Wilson

Finding the Deviant

SIR HEROD enters from the wings dressed as a dandy of the period.

HEROD
(To LANE, as he enters) Everything is -- ?

GLADYS
(Peeved) Hunky dory.

HEROD
Unfortunately, I must go out.

LANE
(Crossing to the costume rack) Before dinner, milord?

HEROD
A deranged sodomist is running amuck, pillaging the womenfolk.

GLADYS
(Gleefully) A sodomist?

LANE
(Doubtful) The womenfolk?

HEROD
This deviant undid the dignity of my sister. He also sold her some bum goods.

LANE
(Gathering HEROD's cape, cap, and cane) Shouldn't your usual womanizer want to have -- if only as a point of departure -- some interest in women?

HEROD
Who can say with certainty just where sexual misdirection will ultimately lead a chap?

BILL enters with a ladder and begins hanging the lanterns.

GLADYS
(Out for revenge) Suppose, Lane, you were the pervert in question.

HEROD
(Reconstructing the crime) Yes, there you are, loitering in the twilight of the street of no return --

LANE
I stay off the streets.

GLADYS
(Joining in) -- genetically you're unbalanced.

LANE
(Conscious of BILL) Still waiting for the lab report on that.

HEROD
A product of improper toilet training.

LANE
Leave my sainted mother out of this.

GLADYS
A paucity of adequate role models.

LANE
Pseudopsychological hogwash foisted on the gullible public by a Viennese quack with a marked tendency toward misogyny.

HEROD
The moon is full.

LANE
(A throwaway) No moon.

HEROD
(A throwaway) No moon?

GLADYS
(A throwaway) Ain't it a cheat?

HEROD
(To LANE, resuming the reconstruction) You are transfigured by lust.

LANE
Not in recent memory.

GLADYS
Possessed of unbridled passion.

LANE
Perhaps in the privacy of my pantry.

HEROD
In short, you're horny.

LANE
Mildly aroused.

GLADYS
(An evangelist) Moloch has entered unto you.

HEROD
He walks with you --

GLADYS
-- and he talks with you --

HEROD
-- urging you ever onward to your moral martyrdom.

GLADYS
Your carnal comeuppance.

HEROD
Your auto-da-fé.

LADY H
(Suddenly appearing from the wings) Me!

GLADYS
Lady Herodias.

HEROD
Innocently coming the back way through the streets.

LADY H
A vessel of consternation.

GLADYS
(To LANE) Your cup runneth over.

LANE
(Helping HEROD into his cape) Poppycock.

HEROD
It only remains for me to catch the culprit.

LADY H
I'll identify him.

LANE
You didn't see him.

GLADYS
When you've seen one, you've seen 'em all.

LADY H
He'll be charged with perversity! With playing footsy with the wrong feet. With... with mimeography!

LADY H exits stage left.

HEROD
I pity the poor chap his punishment.

LANE
Will it be severe?

HEROD
(With foreboding) Civilized.

GLADYS and LANE shudder at the thought.

HEROD
(Instructing LANE for later, a complete change of tone) Devotions first, I think. Here in the garden --

LANE
The Holy Perch is in place.

HEROD
-- then inside for dinner and (Suggestively) out again for the... er... the...

LANE
(Hopefully) A nice rubber of bridge?

HEROD
Don't be preposterous.

LANE
(Resigned) Ravel.

GLADYS
Digitally remastered.

HEROD
The phonograph record... I want to hold it... feel it... fondle its grooves.

LANE
(Handing HEROD his deerstalkers cap) First things first, milord.

HEROD
(To GLADYS) When my niece does begin to... er...

GLADYS
Trip the light fantastic?

HEROD
You might slip out to the lobby and lock the doors. We wouldn't want the guardians of public morality --

LANE
(Handing HEROD his walking stick) The Vice Squad's been taken care off.

HEROD
(Starting up the aisle through the audience) Should I not return --

GLADYS
-- your understudy's in the bar across the way --

LANE
-- standing by.

HEROD
(From the aisle) I have my sword stick.

SIR HEROD exits through the lobby in pursuit of the sodomist as GLADYS and LANE wave him on his way.

GLADYS
Tallyho.

LANE
(To GLADYS, through gritted teeth) "Suppose, Lane, you were the pervert in question"?

GLADYS
I'll in and finish the dusting.

GLADYS makes a hasty exit stage right.

LANE
(Muttering to himself as he crosses to the costume rack) The wrong music... no summerhouse... a dubious gramophone... fractious fairies making spectacles of themselves on the public thoroughfares... (Reminiscing to BILL, as he puts on his butler's livery)...

BILL
Can I help?

LANE
Sweet of you, William, to offer. Perhaps during the interval. (Calling to the light booth) Gary, kill the worklights and bring up dimmers one... eight... nine... and five... (The light booth complies)... and check the gel on the decapitation special. The severed head's been looking overly lurid. (To BILL) As for us, there is naught we can do but hope. And see to the escargot.

LANE exits behind the house flat taking the costume rack as GLADYS peeks around the stage right flat.

GLADYS
(To BILL) Pssst!?

BILL
Me?

GLADYS
(Still making mischief) Lane did it.

BILL
Did what?

GLADYS
(Entering) Lane is the man with the ink stained hand.

BILL
You mean he's the sodo-whatchamacallit?

GLADYS
He used an alias.

BILL
Lane?

GLADYS
That's also an alias.

BILL
(Uncertain) Naw.

GLADYS
(Blocking him) Thanks to him the entire deus ex machina is in dire jeopardy.

BILL
Figured something was up.

GLADYS
Later tonight Sir Herod will draw Miss Salome aside. She will finger her tassels, he will clear his throat, she will tap her toe...

BILL
(So what) Yeah?

GLADYS
Absolute darkness.

BILL
So?

GLADYS
You try constructing a seduction without moonlight.

BILL
(Shocked) Touching and stuff?

GLADYS
Complete with X-rated choreography.

BILL
This Miss Salome -- ?

GLADYS
-- is being led down the garden path. Minus the atmospheric lighting.

BILL
Somebody should warn her.

GLADYS
(Hinting) Pity this play hasn't a hero.

BILL
I volunteer.

GLADYS
(Pretending surprise) You?

BILL
Why not?

GLADYS
You're only a secondary story line.

BILL
I'll pad my part.

GLADYS
They'll throw you in the summerhouse.

BILL
We didn't put up the summerhouse.

GLADYS
(Indicating the back of the auditorium) The summerhouse is there at the end of the garden where it's always been.

BILL
(Astonished) But how did it... ?

GLADYS
(Pleased with herself) Always remember, Gladys is your friend.

BILL
(Fascinated by the sudden appearance of the summerhouse) If you say so.

GLADYS
Always remember, Lane is not your friend.

BILL
(Confused) But --

GLADYS
What I just confided in you?

BILL
About the damsel in distress?

GLADYS
Mull it over, Galahad.

GLADYS starts to exit upstage right.

BILL
Miss Gladys, ma'am, wait!

BILL makes a hurried exit to the stage left wings to retrieve the moon as a satisfied GLADYS waits.

Next Page:   Act , Miss Salome Surveys   (page 9 of 14 pages)

All Pages:   See the entire play on one page

Table of Contents:   Now She Dances!

Doric Wilson was one of the first playwrights at New York City's legendary Caffé Cino and a pioneer of the Off-Off-Broadway movement, writing, directing, producing and designing over a hundred productions. He was a founding member of Circle Repertory Theater and the Barr/Wilder/Albee Playwright's Unit, a participant in all three nights of the Stonewall Riot, and was active in the early days of New York's gay liberation movement as a member of Gay Activist Alliance and as a "star" bartender and manager of the post-Stonewall gay bar scene, where he opened such landmark institutions as The Spike, TY's, and Brothers & Sisters Cabaret. His plays can also be read at www.doricwilson.com.

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