Cover

Title Page

Copyright

A VINTAGE BOOKS ORIGINAL, SEPTEMBER 2013

Copyright © 2013 by Sam Shepard

All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York, and distributed in Canada by Random House of Canada, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited, Toronto.

Vintage and colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

Caution: These plays are fully protected, in whole, in part, or in any form under the copyright laws of the United States of America, the British Empire including the dominion of Canada, and all other countries of the copyright union, and are subject to royalty. All rights, including professional, amateur, motion picture, radio, television, recitation, and public reading, are strictly reserved. All inquiries for performance rights should be addressed to the author’s agent, Berman, Boals and Flynn, 225 Lafayette Street, Suite 1207, New York, NY 10012.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:
Shepard, Sam.
[Plays. Selections]
Heartless : a play / By Sam Shepard.
pages   cm
ISBN 978-0-345-80680-2
eBook ISBN 978-0-345-80682-6
1. Ghost plays   I. Title.
PS3569.H394 H47 2013
812′.54—dc23

Cover design by Megan Wilson
Cover photograph © Eky Studio/Shutterstock

v3.1_r2

Acknowledgements

Many thanks to:

Santa Fe Institute
Sylvia Plath
César Aira
Matthew Warchus
Jim Houghton
and
Peter Brook

The world premiere of Heartless was produced by Signature Theatre, New York City (James Houghton, Founding Artistic Director; Erika Mallin, Executive Director; Beth Whitaker, Associate Artistic Director), and opened on August 27, 2012. It was directed by Daniel Aukin; the set design was by Eugene Lee; the costume design was by Kaye Voyce; the lighting design was by Tyler Micoleau; the sound design was by Eric Shimelonis; and the production stage manager was Donald Fried. The original cast was as follows:

Epigraph

What moment in the gradual decay

Does resurrection choose? What year? What day?

— VLADIMIR NABOKOV

Everything does indeed seem to me to be shadow and evanescence. My head spins with anguish. Really, that is the world: a desert of fading shadows.

— EUGENE IONESCO

Act One

All stage directions are from the actor’s POV toward audience. Simple set—black surround—bare-stage feel except for some stark furniture: single bed mid-stage left, placed horizontal; foot of bed facing stage left. Another single bed mid-stage right, placed vertically to audience; head of bed facing upstage. Between the beds, downstage center, is a round glass-topped table with two white metal patio chairs placed opposite each other, on either side of the table, left and right. The sense of the set is that it’s essentially an outdoor patio with the two beds receding into nebulous interior territory. The whole visual arrangement is framed by tall palm trees. Extreme downstage left, looming out into the audience like a ship’s prow, is a raised “lookout point” that drops off clifflike into a black void. The upstage area sweeps slightly uphill, then drops off radically into another black void. The extreme upstage edge is raised high enough so that actors can leap off it and disappear into some sort of unseen netting or, conversely, make sudden appearances into the playing area.

As lights go to black, a woman’s (MABLE’s) piercing voice is heard screaming someone’s name.

MABLE’S VOICE: (Screaming, offstage right.) ELIZABETH!!!

(Lights snap up bright. Two figures appear. ROSCOE, a man, mid-sixties, sits up fast in the stage right bed, facing the audience. At the same time, in stage left bed, SALLY, a woman in her early thirties, rolls over so her back is to audience, wrapping herself tightly in a sheet, mummy style. Pause. ROSCOE gets out of his bed quickly and stands, facing SALLY’s bed. He wears green boxer shorts, a plain white T-shirt, and white socks.)

ROSCOE: (Disoriented.) Sally?

(ROSCOE moves slightly toward her bed, then stops.)

SALLY: (Keeping her back to audience.) I’m sleeping.

ROSCOE: Did you scream?

SALLY: No.

ROSCOE: I thought I heard a scream.

SALLY: Go walk your dog.

(ROSCOE turns, moves toward stage right—stops—turns back toward SALLY, confused.)

ROSCOE: When I woke up I couldn’t figure out where the windows were. I thought I was still in some motel somewhere—

SALLY: (Without turning.) You were mistaken.

(ROSCOE turns again and exits stage right. SALLY immediately rolls toward audience on ROSCOE’s exit. She sits up in her bed, naked from waist up. A long surgical scar snakes down from between her collarbones to her navel—bright pink and very prominent. She looks around the space and toward stage right, then stands, wearing white underwear, grabs a gray linen blouse, throws it on, buttons it partially while crossing downstage to stage left chair at table. She sits in chair, facing audience directly, pulls her legs up, wrapping her arms around her shins, and stares out across audience, as though seeing something in distance. Pause. Then the voice of ROSCOE offstage right, speaking to his dog in high-pitched falsetto. No sounds of dog whatever. SALLY just listens—looks out over audience.)

ROSCOE’S VOICE: (To dog—off right.) Shall we take a walk? What do you think? A little walk? Piss and poop? Tinkle, tinkle. Yes? Shall we go? Oh—happy dog! Happy, happy, happy dog! Here we go! Poop and piss! Jumping, jumping! Happy, happy, happy, happy dog! Let’s go—here we go! Yes—happy, happy, happy, happy—

(ROSCOE’s voice fades away off right. Pause. SALLY just sits and stares out in the same posture. She speaks calmly to some invisible partner in same direction as audience.)

SALLY: You should’ve told me it was going to be like this. You could’ve warned me. ’Course, how would you know? You were the same as me. Right? Young. Babies, really. What were we then—ten? Eleven? I forget. How could we know what was up ahead? (Pause.) I’m glad you’re still around, though—some part of you. I’m glad—(Stops.) You have to stop visiting me, though, in the middle of the night. I can’t—I have to get some sleep. You understand? Some peace. I can’t be dealing with—

(LUCY, SALLY’s older sister, enters from stage left. LUCY is dressed very drably in a dark cardigan sweater, a knee-length skirt, and flat shoes. She carries a metal tray in both hands with syringes, bottles, cotton balls, alcohol, etc. LUCY stops when she sees SALLY sitting there. SALLY ignores her, keeps staring out.)

LUCY: You’re up early.

(SALLY holds posture, ignores her.)

Have you taken your pills, “Sunshine”?

(No response from SALLY.)

Did you have your orange juice? Vitamin D?

(No response from SALLY.)

Sally, what are we going to do with you?

SALLY: (Holding posture.) Who’s “we”?

(LUCY exhales, crosses to table, sets down medicine tray, and sits in opposite chair, stage right. SALLY remains standing still, staring straight ahead. LUCY goes about her daily routine of filling syringes with various serums, medicines—flicking the bottles expertly as she speaks to SALLY.)

LUCY: (As she works.) Did you do anything domestic this morning—like make coffee, flip an egg—?

(SALLY shakes her head.)

How ’bout your new friend—what’s his name?

SALLY: Roscoe.

LUCY: How ’bout Roscoe. He looks like the “rise and shine” type. Did Roscoe put any coffee on?

(SALLY hunches her shoulders.)

I can smell something warm and nutty—

SALLY: Must’ve, then.

LUCY: We’re just sociable as hell this morning, aren’t we?

SALLY: Oh—sorry.

LUCY: Don’t apologize.

(Long pause. SALLY remains in her posture, LUCY continues her work.)

Did you happen to hear a scream, earlier?

(SALLY slowly turns her head toward LUCY and stares at her.)

SALLY: What?

LUCY: A scream. High-pitched—piercing. Nightmarish.

(SALLY turns away from her, back to original posture.)

SALLY: Must’ve been Mable.

LUCY: Mom doesn’t scream. She moans.

SALLY: She used to scream.

LUCY: That was way back.

SALLY: Yeah—she’s been screaming for decades.

LUCY: I wouldn’t say that, exactly.

SALLY: What would you say?

LUCY: Well—of course she screamed back when she fell out of that tree.

SALLY: Yeah.

LUCY: But that was a long time ago when Whitmore left her. You weren’t even around.

SALLY: I was here. Right here. When you brought her back in pieces. She was screaming then.

LUCY: Well—she was in terrible pain.

SALLY: The police came to the door.

LUCY: I don’t remember that.

SALLY: Of course you don’t.

(Long pause where the two of them just sit there in silence.)

What?

LUCY: Screaming, I mean.

SALLY: Screaming neighbors.

LUCY: Domestic dispute or something.

SALLY: I’ve never seen the neighbors, have you?

LUCY: Once.

SALLY: I’ve seen their cars. Their gardeners.

LUCY: Who could’ve been screaming, then?

SALLY: This is L.A. People scream all the time.

(Long pause.)

LUCY: What happened to your friend? “Boscoe,” was it?

SALLY: Roscoe.

LUCY: Whatever.

SALLY: No. Not “whatever.” That’s his name—Roscoe. How would you like it if somebody called you “Juicy” instead of Lucy?

LUCY: Sally, for Christ’s sake! It’s so much fun trying to have a conversation with you!

SALLY: Fun?

LUCY: (Short pause.) Where is your friend—Roscoe? (Exaggerating name.)

SALLY: Walking his dog. (Exaggerating “dog.”)

LUCY: (Pause.) Oh—he’s got a dog? That changes my opinion of him.

SALLY: Why’s that?

LUCY: He’s the one who just recently left his wife and children, isn’t he? Ran off?

SALLY: So?

LUCY: Well, he must be looking for a replacement, then.

SALLY: With the dog?

LUCY: Yes. Well—

SALLY: The dog replaces the children?

LUCY: I’m not—

SALLY: That’s deep, Lucy. That’s really deep. Did you just come up with that on your own?

(SALLY gets up suddenly, crosses upstage, gets into her bed, and wraps herself up tightly in sheet, as before, then turns her back on LUCY. LUCY stands, gathering her tray together.)

LUCY: Well—maybe you just need more rest, Sally. Maybe that’s it. Lack of sleep can make a person crabby and irritable. Studies show— (She begins to cross stage right, then stops.) You really ought to take your medicine, though. You want to stay alive, don’t you?

(LUCY exits stage right. SALLY just lies there with her back to audience for a short while, then suddenly starts singing, a capella—in full voice, while remaining in posture, her back to audience.)

SALLY: (Singing.)

I want to stay alive

I want to stay alive

How many times I catch myself

I want to stay alive

I’m slipping all the time

Falling in my mind

Ten times a day I catch myself

I want to stay alive.

(She stops. ROSCOE’S VOICE dovetails in from off right.)

ROSCOE’S VOICE: (Calling from off right.) Sally! Oh, Sally! You didn’t go back to sleep, did you, because I’ve got something for you! Big gooey surprise!

(SALLY rolls over, facing audience.)

SALLY: What could that be?

ROSCOE’S VOICE: Jelly do-nuts!

SALLY: (Sitting up in bed.) Jelly do-nuts?

ROSCOE’S VOICE: Deep-fried!

SALLY: What flavor?

ROSCOE’S VOICE: Raspberry. Mango.

SALLY: Mango? In a do-nut?

ROSCOE’S VOICE: “California Exotic,” they call it. Golden! Oozing!

SALLY: They must inject it or something. How do they get mango in there?

(ROSCOE enters from down right, heading toward table, a coffee cup in each hand and a white bakery bag containing do-nuts dangling between his teeth. He crosses slowly to table, careful not to spill coffee; sets cups down and then bag of do-nuts. Sally watches closely from bed.)

You would’ve made a great husband. Maybe.

ROSCOE: Ooops! Forgot the half-and-half.

(ROSCOE turns and darts back off right. SALLY leaps out of bed, goes to table, and peeks into bag, sniffing do-nuts, then crumples it back up again. She sits in stage left chair again, picks up coffee and slurps it. ROSCOE reenters from down right with half-and-half, plates, and napkins, talking as he enters.)

I myself am a huge fan of the jelly do-nut. Going way back to my junkie days. Avenue D, Fourteenth Street, Dunkin’ Donuts, cops, transvestite fistfights, hookers, and faggots—the strung out and hopeless.

SALLY: What a list.

(ROSCOE sits at table, puts do-nuts on plates, distributes napkins, etc., while SALLY slurps coffee and listens.)

ROSCOE: Everyone had an appetite for the juicy jelly do-nut. It was a religion.

SALLY: It gave them hope.

ROSCOE: It did.

SALLY: They began to believe in themselves.

ROSCOE: Renewed faith.

(Pause.)

SALLY: You were a junkie?

ROSCOE: Weren’t we all?

SALLY: Well—it’s hard to picture.

ROSCOE: Sixties—you know.

SALLY: I wasn’t born until ’82.

ROSCOE: Poor you.

SALLY: Why? What’d I miss?

ROSCOE: All the assassinations. (About do-nuts.) I think I’ll cut these in half. They’re huge.

SALLY: Busy, busy, busy.

(ROSCOE gets up and exits—again stage right. SALLY immediately picks up a do-nut, smells it, then licks a gob of the filling off it. When ROSCOE reenters with a butter knife she quickly puts do-nut back on plate. ROSCOE sits and starts cutting do-nuts in half.)

Don’t you think I should be taping this? Seems like an opportunity.

ROSCOE: (Cutting do-nuts.) What?

SALLY: All this—activity. This—spontaneous life. For the documentary.

ROSCOE: I hate documentaries.

SALLY: No, I mean—the film—what we’ve been working on—whatever you want to call it.

ROSCOE: Pretending to be real life.

SALLY: There’s no pretending.

ROSCOE: Suit yourself.

(SALLY rushes upstage to her bed and hauls a video camera and equipment out from underneath it. She puts on earphones, fastens the battery pack around her waist, adjusts focus, etc. She returns to table hoisting camera on her shoulder, starts shooting ROSCOE eating do-nut, drinking coffee.)

(Directly to camera.) This is me in the act of devouring a lemon-filled jelly do-nut. “Jelly” is a bit of a misnomer in this case since it seems to be actually a kind of custard—meringue, maybe.

SALLY: (Still shooting.) Professor Hubbard—uh, could you give us any insight into the comparisons between Cervantes and say, oh, a contemporary Latin American writer such as—César Aira?

ROSCOE: An Episode in the Life of a Landscape Painter?

SALLY: That’s the one.

ROSCOE: Well, the only valid comparison I could make is the adventure itself—two men, horseback, trekking out into the vast unknown, in search of romance.

SALLY: (Still shooting.) Romance?

ROSCOE: Meaning.

SALLY: Meaning?

ROSCOE: Stop repeating everything I say!

SALLY (Eye to camera.) We’re shooting, you know. We’re taping this.

ROSCOE: I know, I know. But it’s boring when you do that.

SALLY: What’s boring?

ROSCOE: Repeating everything! It’s boring.

SALLY: (Still shooting.) Isn’t repetition part of primitive ritual?

ROSCOE: (Throws down do-nut.) Oh my God.

SALLY: Well—isn’t it? Poetry—song—dance—the drum—

ROSCOE: Can we move on to something—

SALLY: All right, all right. So touchy all of a sudden.

ROSCOE: I’m not touchy!

SALLY: You are.

(SALLY moves in circles around ROSCOE, in and out, getting different angles with the camera.)

ROSCOE: I’m not touchy! I just don’t know if this film idea is—

SALLY: Let’s change the subject, then.

ROSCOE: Let’s.

SALLY: What’s all this “junkie” business, for instance? First I’ve heard about it. Shocking, actually. From heroin to scholarship?

ROSCOE: It’s not a “business”—well—I guess it is.

SALLY: Quite lucrative.

ROSCOE: That’s not what I was—

SALLY: Tell us about the “time”—the era—you know—the street life.

ROSCOE: I liked it better when we were just—exchanging pleasantries. You know—the camera changes everything.

SALLY: (Still shooting.) How?

ROSCOE: I don’t know. It stops something.

SALLY: Forget about the camera.

ROSCOE: I can’t!

SALLY: What about you leaving your wife and family? There’s a subject.

ROSCOE: I don’t want to talk about that.

SALLY: (Taking camera down from her shoulder.) You’re so grouchy all of a sudden.

ROSCOE: I’m sorry—I—I just feel like—I’d just like to have some coffee and—eat a jelly do-nut and—not think about anything.

SALLY: Fine by me.

(SALLY sets camera on floor, under table, takes earphones off, sits back down opposite ROSCOE, in stage left chair, and slurps coffee. Pause.)

ROSCOE: How’s your mother?

SALLY: What?

ROSCOE: Your mother?

SALLY: Haven’t checked. That’s not my job. It’s Lucy’s. Juicy Lucy.

ROSCOE: I see.

SALLY: Lucy’s in there right now—shooting her up. Why don’t you ask her?

ROSCOE: We’re on a junkie jag here, aren’t we?

SALLY: You started it. Sedatives—vitamins—antibiotics—I don’t know. A regular chemical cocktail.

ROSCOE: Right.

SALLY: She’s got a nurse with her as well.

ROSCOE: Can’t the nurse—?

SALLY: My mother has quirky requirements.

ROSCOE: What’s the matter with her?

SALLY: Nobody seems to know.

ROSCOE: Doctors?

SALLY: “Rigors,” they’re calling it.

ROSCOE: Oh—so they have a name for it?

SALLY: Psychosomatic.

ROSCOE: Soon as they have a name they give up.

SALLY: What?

ROSCOE: Trying to figure out what it is.

SALLY: Paralysis—her hands are like claws. Feet all seized up.

ROSCOE: What happened to her? Something must’ve happened.

SALLY: Fell out of a pine tree. Way back.

ROSCOE: Pine tree?

SALLY: Middle of the night. High up.

ROSCOE: Climbing? What was she doing?

SALLY: Accident. Trauma—you know.

ROSCOE: Do you think I could meet her?

SALLY: Why?

ROSCOE: Well—I’d just like to meet her. We’re all living in the same house.

SALLY: I thought you said you were just visiting. On the mend.

ROSCOE: Well, sure—yeah.

SALLY: Just to heal up from your separation. That’s what you told me, isn’t it?

ROSCOE: That’s right. Don’t think I’m not grateful for the hospitality.

SALLY: You’re not “living” here.

ROSCOE: No.

SALLY: This isn’t your home.

ROSCOE: No, it isn’t.

SALLY: You’re a visitor.

ROSCOE: Yes!

SALLY: Good.

(Long pause. ROSCOE gazes out over the audience to the distance.)

ROSCOE: How did you find this place, anyway?

SALLY: My mother’s owned it for years. Divorce settlement.

ROSCOE: Spectacular view.

SALLY: (Looking out in same direction.) Yeah. They say James Dean used to stay here.

ROSCOE: Really?

SALLY: When he was first starting out. Yeah. Slept in that same bed you’re sleeping in. Just like George Washington.

ROSCOE: You’re kidding!

SALLY: I never “kid.”

ROSCOE: That’s unbelievable! James Dean?

SALLY: Yeah. Fresh out of Indiana. ’Course it might be just another fable in the L.A. canon of hysterical imaginings.

ROSCOE: Hysterical what?

SALLY: Never mind.

(Long pause. They both stare out over audience in the direction of the great Los Angeles Valley.)

ROSCOE: (Staring out.) I’ve never seen it from way up like this. You can see the whole valley.

SALLY: Yeah. The whole nasty panorama in one gasping breath. When it’s clear, you can see the Pacific.

ROSCOE: (Pointing) Is that it?

SALLY: What?

ROSCOE: That bluish band way out there.

SALLY: (Looking where he’s pointing.) No, that’s smog. It’s over there—when you can see it. The ocean. (Pointing in different direction.)

ROSCOE: Blue smog? I thought smog was yellow.

SALLY: Changes color with the seasons. Like leaves back East.

ROSCOE: (Staring out.) You know, the Spanish recorded smog in their journals as far back as the 1500s.

SALLY: What color was it then, Professor?

(LUCY enters from stage right with metal tray, empty bottles, etc. She stops when she sees ROSCOE.)

LUCY: Oh—looks like you’re back.

(ROSCOE, very gentlemanly, stands, extends his hand.)

ROSCOE: Yes—Roscoe Hubbard, and—you must be Lucy?

LUCY: (Setting down tray and shaking ROSCOE’s hand.) The sister, that’s right. Lucy, the sister.

SALLY: I’m glad we all know each other now.

LUCY: How was the dog walk?

ROSCOE: Fine. Just fine. Lovely roads up here. Smell of eucalyptus. Mockingbirds—mocking.

SALLY: Pit bulls. Razor wire.

(Pause.)

ROSCOE: (To LUCY.) Well—would you like some coffee? We’re just—

LUCY: Love some. Thank you.

(ROSCOE exits stage right. LUCY sits in ROSCOE’s chair. She and SALLY sit in silence. SALLY slurps her coffee. LUCY stares out over L.A. Long pause.)

SALLY: That’s his chair, you know.

LUCY: Oh— (She stands abruptly, looks at chair.) I didn’t realize they were designated.

SALLY: He was sitting there.

LUCY: (Looking around for another chair.) Right. Well, there must be another one.

SALLY: Must be.

(Long pause. SALLY slurps coffee. LUCY remains standing.)

How’s the matriarch this morning?

LUCY: (Stays standing.) Same.

SALLY: Talking?

LUCY: Some.

SALLY: Coherent?

LUCY: In and out.

SALLY: Awake, though?

LUCY: Apparently.

SALLY: (Short pause.) What’s she talk about these days?

LUCY: She told me she heard a scream. Same time as me.

SALLY: In her dream.

LUCY: Somebody’s name.

(ROSCOE enters from right with a cup of coffee and a light folding chair.)

ROSCOE: Here we go! Had to find a chair.

LUCY: Oh—you brought a chair. How nice.

ROSCOE: Yes. You sit in mine and I’ll use this one.

LUCY: Oh, that’s all right.

ROSCOE: I insist.

(ROSCOE sets coffee down for LUCY, then unfolds chair and places it upstage center of table and sits between women.)

SALLY: This is kinda like an old black-and-white movie. Everybody’s so polite.

LUCY: (Sitting; leaning toward do-nuts.) Are these—? (She picks one up.)

ROSCOE: Jelly do-nuts? Yes, they are.

SALLY: The real deal.

ROSCOE: You’re more than welcome to have one. Your sister doesn’t seem to—

(SALLY grabs a do-nut and shoves the whole thing in her mouth. LUCY and ROSCOE watch as she munches away.)

LUCY: (To SALLY.) Good?

SALLY: (Mouth full.) Delicious.

(Pause as SALLY chews.)

ROSCOE: (To LUCY.) I was hoping to meet your mother but Sally doesn’t—

SALLY: (Chewing.) What?

ROSCOE: Well—didn’t you say that—

SALLY: (Chewing.) I don’t care if you meet her. Why should I care?

ROSCOE: I thought you said—

LUCY: I don’t think it’s a good idea.

SALLY: Why not?

LUCY: Because she’s—

SALLY: What?

LUCY: Compromised. (To ROSCOE.) You understand—

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