Dead Room Farce (18 page)

‘
One
cannot, or
you
cannot?'

‘All right,
I
cannot.'

‘Like?'

‘Well, OK – sex. I mean, I cannot imagine going to bed with a woman without having had a few drinks first.'

‘Why, are women that terrible?'

‘No, no!' he said hastily, before noticing the twinkle in Lisa Wilson's eye. ‘No, I suppose I mean it's just . . . I don't know, a matter of relaxation. A couple of drinks, a bit of . . . I guess for me drink has always been a part of foreplay.'

‘The trouble is, that kind of foreplay can so easily mean there's no afterplay. As I found with Mark.'

‘Yes, OK. I don't mean too much. I just mean a couple of drinks, to calm the atmosphere . . .'

‘There are other forms of foreplay.'

‘I know that.'

‘And all those sex manuals and how-to-keep-your-man's-interest articles in women's magazines are always recommending that couples should try new forms of foreplay . . .'

‘I know that too. There's a whole sequence in Bill Blunden's
not on your wife!
on that very subject.'

Charles Paris found himself transfixed by the steady gaze of Lisa Wilson's grey eyes, as she asked, ‘Are you actually telling me, Charles, that you have never been to bed with a woman when you weren't drunk?'

‘No, by no means. What I'm saying is that I can't recall having gone to bed with a woman without having had a couple of drinks beforehand.'

‘Well, maybe you should try it one day. It'd be a new experience for you.'

He chuckled, shrugging the idea off. ‘Yes, maybe I should.'

‘How about today?'

For a moment he thought he'd misheard, but he hadn't. The even beam of her grey eyes was still focused on his face.

‘Erm . . . well . . . nice idea,' he said lamely.

‘Why not, Charles? We fancy each other, don't we?'

‘Well, I fancy you, but I wasn't sure that –'

Take it as read.'

‘Good. Um . . . Thank you.'

‘My pleasure.' She reached out and took his hand. ‘At least I hope it will be.'

‘I'll do my best,' said Charles. Then a sudden panic hit him. Suppose his best wasn't good enough? He'd managed all right with Cookie, but then Cookie was in love with him. Lisa Wilson was a younger woman, in her sexual prime, a woman of a different generation too, who probably had strong views on her sexual rights. He kept reading things in newspapers – even in
The Times
, for heaven's sake – about how assertive modern women had become in the bedroom. God, he needed a drink! That was why he needed a few drinks before sex, to take away performance anxieties.

One of Lisa's fingers was stroking the back of his hand. The action itself wasn't erotic, but the potential it implied was. He felt the reassurance of a stirring in his scrotum. Maybe she was right. Maybe it would be rather interesting to experience sex that hadn't been well marinated in alcohol.

‘One thing . . .' said Lisa.

Oh dear, thought Charles. He had grown up in a generation for whom women saying ‘One thing . . .' before sex usually presaged some mini-lecture on men not taking advantage, and women not being cheap, and commitment being terribly important, and other antaphrodisiac caveats.

‘Yes?' he responded with foreboding.

‘I don't want any commitment involved here. We're talking about physical pleasure, two people who fancy each other giving and receiving pleasure. No emotional entanglement – OK?'

What man had ever heard more heart-warming words? It was the ultimate masculine fantasy come true. ‘OK,' Charles Paris agreed enthusiastically.

They went back to her flat. It was wonderful. Perhaps – heretical though the concept might be – it really was better without the booze.

When he left for the station early on the Monday morning, Charles Paris was more than a little in love with Lisa Wilson.

AS LOUISE goes through to the bedroom to change, the lights go down on Louise and Ted's flat, and up on Gilly and Bob's flat. Ted is sitting on the sofa with Nicky. He is embarrassed; she is all over him
.

NICKY: And I just think you're such a good man, Ted.

TED: Oh, really, it's nothing.

NICKY: No, but to agree to pretend to your friend's wife that your friend's mistress is your mistress . . . I don't know what you call a man who does that kind of thing.

TED: An idiot?

NICKY
(vindictively)
: Mind you, it doesn't reflect very well on the friend, does it? So Bob's ashamed of me, is he?

TED: No, no, I think he just doesn't want Gilly to find out about you.

NICKY: But he told me he did want Gilly to find out about me. He said he wanted to have me out in the open . . .

TED: Really? Be a bit cold this time of the year.

NICKY
(not hearing what Ted said)
: . . . but instead he actually wants to have me under wraps.

TED: Probably be warmer, wouldn't it?

NICKY
(furious)
: Huh. Bob's a two-faced rotter. Still, two can play at that game.
(reaching for Ted's tie and drawing him towards her)
If he wants to tell people I'm your mistress, then I'd better become your mistress, hadn't I?

TED
(appalled)
: What!

NICKY
(giving him a kiss on the lips and rising from the sofa)
: Yes, you just give me a couple of minutes, Ted, and then come through to the bedroom – and I'll really have my revenge on Bob.
She sets off towards the bedroom
.

TED
(weakly)
: But, Nicky, wouldn't that just be using me as a sex-object?

NICKY
(as she goes through into the bedroom)
: Yes! Any objections?
As she goes off, Ted rises to his feet and stands irresolute
.

TED: Ooh-er.
He decides his best defence is going to be escape, and hurries off towards the door to the hall. Just as he gets there, however, Gilly comes in from the hall, furiously angry. Ted backs away as she advances on him
.

GILLY: Do you know what I've found out about that slug of a husband of mine?

TED
(falling backwards on to the sofa)
: No, no, I don't.

GILLY: That chit of a girl who he said was your mistress . . .

TED: Oh, no.

GILLY: . . . is actually his mistress.

TED
(weakly)
: Really? Are you sure?

GILLY: What do you mean – am I sure? Surely you'd have noticed whether or not you had a mistress?

TED: Oh, I don't know. It's the kind of thing one could easily forget.

GILLY: If you think that, then you've clearly never had the right sort of mistress.

TED: I've never had any sort of mistress.

GILLY
(intrigued)
: No? Goodness, Ted, your life must've been very dull.

TED
(miserably)
: Yes – and I liked it that way!

GILLY
(furiously)
: Ooh, Bob's made me so furious.
(She sits beside him on the sofa)
Do you know, I've half a mind . . .

TED: That's about all I seem to have at the moment.

GILLY
(thoughtfully)
: I've half a mind to get my own back on Bob – in the appropriate way.

TED
(with foreboding)
: ‘In the appropriate way'?

GILLY: Huh. Bob's a two-faced rotter. Still, two can play at that game.
(reaching for Ted's tie and drawing him towards her)
If he's saying you've got a mistress, then you'd better have a mistress, hadn't you?

TED
(appalled)
: What!

GILLY
(giving him a kiss on the lips and rising from the sofa)
: I'll just get us some champagne, Ted, and then we'll go through to the bedroom – and I'll really have my revenge on Bob.

As she goes off into the kitchen, undoing her blouse, Ted rises to his feet and stands irresolute.

TED: Ooh-er. Back home, I think.
He turns to go out through the French windows. But as he opens them, Louise appears on the balcony in front of him, dressed in a sexy negligee. She comes into the room, closing the doors behind her.

LOUISE: I knew you'd be here, Ted darling.

TED
(backing away and falling back on to the sofa)
: What?

LOUISE: Ted, I've been reading this magazine article about putting the excitement back into your sex-life . . .

TED: Really? I'm not sure that my sex-life can cope with any more excitement.

LOUISE
(coming to sit lasciviously beside him on the sofa)
: . . . and it says that couples who've been together a long time should liven things up by making love at unexpected times in exciting new places . . .

TED: I'm quite happy with the boring old places, Louise darling.

LOUISE
(taking hold of his tie and pulling him towards her)
: I'd have thought a neighbour's flat was definitely an exciting new place.
She suddenly reaches for the buckle of his belt, and starts to undo it. Ted struggles to get free.

TED: Louise! Darling! I don't want to make a big thing of this.

LOUISE: I do – and, what's more, I seem to be succeeding.
Ted manages to break free from her and stands in the middle of the room, clutching at his trouser-belt. Louise stands up, and throws off her negligee to reveal that she is dressed in sexy bra and pants.

LOUISE: Ted, you don't always have to have a boring sex-life, you know.

TED: Ooh-er.
At that moment Nicky appears from the bedroom door, dressed in sexy bra and pants. At the same time Gilly appears from the kitchen door, holding a bottle of champagne and also dressed in sexy bra and pants.

LOUISE, GILLY AND NICKY
(all at the same time)
: Come on, Ted. I'm ready for you now.

TED: Ooh-er.
He throws up his hands to his face. Unsupported, his trousers fall down around his ankles. The three women watch in amazement as he falls over backwards in a dead faint, as . . .

THE CURTAIN FALLS FOR THE END OF ACT ONE.

‘I'm still not happy about that “big thing” line,' Bernard Walton complained at the ‘rewrites call' on the second day of the Leeds run.

‘It's getting the laugh,' Bill Blunden countered.

‘Well, it isn't, actually. The laugh comes on Louise's line: “I do – and, what's more, I seem to be succeeding.”'

‘I'm sorry, Bernard. You can't have all the funny lines.' This insinuation really offended the star's professionalism. ‘I am not asking to have all the funny lines, Bill! I'm a team player, always have been. Ask anyone in the business, and they'll all tell you Bernard Walton works as part of an ensemble!'

The rest of the
not on your wife!
company, who worked on stage every night getting no eye contact or feedback from Bernard, might have questioned the accuracy of this, but none of them would have dared voice what Bill Blunden said next. ‘I haven't seen much evidence of it. Your performance as Ted seems to me entirely self-centred. You're in a hermetically sealed little world of your own.'

‘What the hell do you mean? How dare you, a mere writer, have the nerve to tell me –?'

Tony Delaunay moved quickly to stem Bernard Walton's fury. The company manager was ever-present, ever-watchful, always ready to ease over any little difficulties the current Parrott Fashion production might encounter in its circuit of the country. ‘Sorry, sorry, can we just cool it, please? Bernard, if you just say what your problem with the line is . . .'

‘My problem with the line,' the star replied in a voice of icy restraint, ‘is that it's been shoe-horned into the script with no real logic and motivation, and that all it basically is is just a knob-joke. “I don't want to make a big thing of this.” “I do – and, what's more, I seem to be succeeding.” What is that about if it's not about an erection?'

‘Of course it's about an erection,' said Bill Blunden. ‘That's why it's getting the bloody laugh!'

‘All right. Well, I suppose I'd rather be in a play that got its laughs from genuine wit and character, rather than from jokes about erections.'

This belittling of his playwriting skills was too much for Bill Blunden. ‘Are you trying to tell me I don't know how to write comedy? Shall I tell you how many productions of my plays there were, world-wide, last year? Go on, you guess how many. You just try and have a bloody guess!'

‘Look, let's not turn this into a shouting match,' Tony Delaunay eased in again, as ever smoothing the way, mollifying offended egos. ‘Is your problem with the line itself, Bernard, or the fact that it's you who says it?'

‘Well, all right. I suppose it is the fact that I'm involved in the exchange,' the star conceded. ‘My audience doesn't expect to hear Bernard Walton doing primary school smut.'

‘Sod
your
audience!' snapped Bill Blunden. ‘Let's think about the play's audience, shall we, for a change?'

‘No, no,' Tony Delaunay's conciliatory voice once again intervened. ‘Bernard has got a point. He's the star of this show, his name's above the title, and people who come to see it have certain expectations because of his name. He shouldn't be having to deliver lines which are at odds with his public image.'

‘Thank you, Tony.' Bernard Walton sat back, vindicated, but the playwright still looked unhappy, so the company manager continued his fence-mending.

‘Look, Bill, Bernard has to be doing material he's comfortable with. He's a public figure who has been bold enough to take a stand against declining standards of decency in entertainment and –'

‘Are you saying that
not on your wife!
's indecent?'

‘No, Bill, no. I am not saying that. I am saying that Bernard's position is particularly sensitive at the moment, given the current national debate about moral responsibility in the arts – not to mention the fact that Bernard is currently having a biography written about him, so we don't want any adverse publicity. You know how the tabloids love the kind of “Anti Porn Campaigner Spotted in Sex Club” type of story, and we –'