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Authors: Tennessee Williams

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BRICK:

Maggie, shut up about Skipper. I mean it, Maggie; you got to shut up about
Skipper.

MARGARET:

You ought to understand that Skipper and I—

BRICK:

You don't think I'm serious, Maggie? You're fooled by the
faet that I am saying this quiet? Look, Maggie. What you're doing is a
dangerous thing to do.
You're—you're—you're—foolin’ with
something that—nobody ought to fool with.

MARGARET:

This time I'm going to finish what I have to say to you. Skipper and I made
love, if love you could call it, because it made both of us feel a little bit closer
to you. You see, you
son of a bitch, you asked too much of
people, of me, of him, of all the unlucky poor damned sons of bitches that happen to
love you, and there was a whole pack of them, yes, there was a pack of them besides
me and Skipper, you asked too goddam much of people that loved you,
you-superior creature!—you godlike being! And so we made
love to each other to dream it was you, both of us! Yes, yes, yes!
Truth, truth! What's so awful about it? I like it, I think the
truth is—yeah! I shouldn't have told you. . . .

BRICK
[
holding
his head unnaturally still and uptilted a bit
]:

It was Skipper that told me about it. Not you, Maggie.

MARGARET:

I told you!

BRICK:

After he told me!

MARGARET:

What does it matter who—?

[
Brick turns suddenly out upon the gallery
and calls:
]

BRICK:

Little girl! Hey, little girl!

LITTLE GIRL
[
at
a distance
]:

What, Uncle Brick?

BRICK:

Tell the folks to come up!—Bring everybody upstairs!

MARGARET:

I can't stop myself! I'd go on telling you this in front of them
all, if I had to!

BRICK:

Little girl! Go on, go on, will you? Do what I told you, call
them!

MARGARET:

Because it's got to be told and you, you!—you never let
me!

[
She sobs, then controls herself, and
continues almost calmly
.]

It was one of those beautiful, ideal things they tell about in the Greek
legends, it couldn't be anything else, you being you, and that's what
made it so sad, that's what made it so awful, because it was love that never
could be carried through to anything satisfying or even talked about plainly. Brick,
I tell you, you got to believe me, Brick, I
do
understand all about it! I—I think it
was—noble!
Can't you tell I'm sincere when I
say I respect it? My only point, the only point that I'm making, is
life has got to be allowed to continue even after the
dream
of life is—all—over . . . .

[
Brick is without his crutch. Leaning on
furniture, he crosses to pick it up as she continues as if possessed by a will
outside herself:
]

Why I remember when we double-dated at college, Gladys Fitzgerald
and I and you and Skipper, it was more like a date between you and Skipper. Gladys
and I were just sort of tagging along as if it was necessary to chaperone
you! —to make a good public impression—

BRICK
[
turns to
face her, half lifting his crutch
]:

Maggie, you want me to hit you with this crutch? Don't you know I could
kill you with this crutch?

MARGARET:

Good Lord, man, d’ you think I'd care if you did?

BRICK:

One man has one great good true thing in his life. One great good thing which is
true!—I had friendship with Skipper.—You are naming it
dirty!

MARGARET:

I'm not naming it dirty! I am naming it clean.

BRICK:

Not love with you, Maggie, but friendship with Skipper was that one great true thing,
and you are naming it dirty!

MARGARET:

Then you haven't been listenin’, not understood what I'm
saying! I'm naming it so damn clean that it killed poor
Skipper!—You two had something that had to be kept on ice, yes,
incorruptible, yes!—and death was the only icebox where you could keep
it . . . .

BRICK:

I married you, Maggie. Why would I marry you, Maggie, if I was—?

MARGARET:

Brick, don't brain me yet, let me finish!—I know, believe me I
know, that it was only Skipper that harbored even any
unconscious
desire for anything not perfectly pure between you
two! —Now let me skip a little. You married me early that summer we
graduated out of Ole Miss, and we were happy, weren't we, we were blissful,
yes, hit heaven together ev'ry time that we loved! But that fall you
an’ Skipper turned down wonderful offers of jobs in order to keep on
bein’ football heroes—pro-football heroes. You organized the
Dixie Stars that fall, so you could keep on bein’ teammates forever!
But somethin’ was not right with it!
—Me
included!—between
you. Skipper began hittin’ the
bottle . . . you got a spinal
injury—couldn't play
the Thanksgivin’ game in Chicago, watched it on TV from a traction bed in
Toledo. I joined Skipper. The Dixie Stars lost because poor Skipper was drunk. We
drank together that night all night in the bar of the Blackstone and when cold day
was comin’ up over the Lake an’ we were comin’ out drunk to
take a dizzy look at it, I said, “SKIPPER! STOP LOVIN’ MY
HUSBAND OR TELL HIM HE'S GOT TO LET YOU ADMIT IT TO HIM! —one
way or another!

HE SLAPPED ME HARD ON THE MOUTH!—then turned and ran
without stopping once, I am sure, all the way back into his room at the Blackstone .
. . .

—When I came to his room that night, with a little scratch like a
shy little mouse at his door, he made that pitiful, ineffectual little attempt to
prove that what I had said wasn't true . . . .

[
Brick strikes at her with crutch, a blow
that shatters the gemlike lamp on the table.
]

—In this way, I destroyed him, by telling him truth that he and
his world which he was born and raised in, yours and his world, had told him could
not be told?

—From then on Skipper was nothing at all but a receptacle for
liquor and drugs . . . .

—Who shot cock robin? I with
my—

[
She throws back her head with tight shut
eyes.
]


merciful arrow!

[
Brick strikes at her;
misses.
]

Missed me!—Sorry, I'm not tryin’ to
whitewash my behavior, Christ, no! Brick, I'm not good. I don't
know why
people have to pretend to be good, nobody's good.
The rich or the well-to-do can afford to respect moral patterns,
conventional moral patterns, but I could never afford to, yeah, but —
I'm honest! Give me credit for just that, will you
please? —
Born poor, raised poor, expect to
die poor unless I manage to get us something out of what Big Daddy leaves when he
dies of cancer! But
Brick?!—-Skipper is dead! I'm
alive!
Maggie the cat is—

[
Brick hops awkwardly forward and strikes at
her again with his crutch.
]


alive! I am alive, alive! I
am
. . .

[
He hurls the crutch at her, across the bed
she took refuge behind, and pitches forward on the floor as she completes her
speech.
]


alive!

[
A little girl, Dixie, bursts into the room,
wearing an Indian war bonnet and firing a cap pistol at Margaret and shouting:
“Bang, bang, bang!"

[
Laughter downstairs floats through the open
hall door. Margaret had crouched gasping to bed at child's entrance. She
now rises and says with cool fury:
]

Little girl, your mother or someone should teach
you—[
gasping
]

to knock at a door before you come into a room.
Otherwise people might think that you lack good breeding . . . .

DIXIE:

Yanh, yanh, yanh, what is Uncle Brick doin’ on th’ floor?

BRICK:

I tried to kill your Aunt Maggie, but I failed and I fell. Little girl, give me my
crutch so I can get up off th’ floor.

MARGARET:

Yes, give your uncle his crutch, he's a cripple, honey, he broke his ankle
last night jumping hurdles on the high school athletic field!

DIXIE:

What were you jumping hurdles for, Uncle Brick?

BRICK:

Because I used to jump them, and people like to do what they used to do, even after
they've stopped being able to do it . . . .

MARGARET:

That's right, that's your answer, now go away, little girl.

[
Dixie fires cap pistol at Margaret three
times.
]

Stop, you stop that, monster! You little
no-neck monster!

[
She seizes the cap pistol and hurls it
through gallery doors.
]

DIXIE
[
with a
precocious instinct for the cruelest thing
]:

You're
jealous!
—You're just
jealous because you can't have babies!

[
She sticks out her tongue at Margaret as
she sashays past her with her stomach stuck out, to the gallery. Margaret slams
the gallery doors and leans panting against them. There is a pause. Brick has
replaced his spilt drink and sits, faraway, on the great four-poster
bed.
]

MARGARET:

You see?—they gloat over us being childless, even in front of their
five little no-neck monsters!

[
Pause. Voices approach on the
stairs.
]

Brick?—I've been to a doctor in Memphis, a—a gynecologist
. . . .

I've been completely examined, and there is no reason why we can't have
a child whenever we want one. And this is my time by the calendar to conceive. Are
you listening to me? Are you? Are you LISTENING TO ME!

BRICK:

Yes. I hear you, Maggie.

[
His attention returns to her inflamed
face.
]

—But how in hell on earth do you imagine—that
you're going to have a child by a man that can't stand you?

MARGARET:

That's a problem that I will have to work out.

[
She wheels about to face the hall
door.
]

Here they come!

[
The lights dim.
]

CURTAIN

ACT TWO

There is no lapse of time. Margaret and Brick are in the same
positions they held at the end of Act I.

MARGARET
[
at
door
]:

Here they come!

[
Big Daddy
appears first, a tall man with a fierce, anxious look, moving carefully not to
betray his weakness even, or especially, to himself.
]

BIG DADDY:

Well, Brick.

BRICK:

Hello, Big Daddy.—Congratulations!

BIG DADDY:

—Crap . . . .

[
Some of the people are approaching through
the hall, others along the gallery: voices from both directions. Gooper and
Reverend Tooker become visible outside gallery doors, and their voices come in
clearly.

[
They pause outside as Gooper lights a
cigar.
]

REVEREND TOOKER
[
vivaciously
]:

Oh, but St. Paul's in Grenada has three memorial windows, and the latest one
is a Tiffany stained-glass window that cost twenty-five hundred
dollars, a picture of Christ the Good Shepherd with a Lamb in His arms.

GOOPER:

Who give that window, Preach?

REVEREND TOOKER:

Clyde Fletcher's widow. Also presented St. Paul's with a baptismal
font.

GOOPER:

Y'know what somebody ought t’ give your church is a
coolin’
system, Preach.

REVEREND TOOKER:

Yes, siree, Bob! And y'know what Gus Hamma's family gave in his
memory to the church at Two Rivers? A complete new stone parish-house
with a basketball court in the basement and a—

BIG DADDY
[
uttering a loud harking laugh which is far from truly
mirthful
]:

Hey, Preach! What's all this talk about memorials,
Preach? Y’ think somebody's about t’ kick off around
here? ‘S that it?

[
Startled by this interjection, Reverend
Tooker decides to laugh at the question almost as loud as he can.

[
How he would answer the question
we'll never know, as he's spared that embarrassment by the voice
of Gooper's wife, Mae, rising high and dear as she appears with
“Doc” Baugh, the family doctor, through the hail
door.]

MAE
[
almost
religiously
]:

—Let's see now, they've had their
tyyy-phoid
shots, and their tetanus shots, their diphtheria shots
and their hepatitis shots and their polio shots, they got
those
shots every month from May through September,
and—Gooper? Hey! Gooper!—What all have the
kiddies been shot faw?

MARGARET
[
overlapping a bit
];

Turn on the hi-fi, Brick! Let's have some music t’ start
off th’ party with!

[
The talk becomes so general that the room
sounds like a great aviary of chattering birds. Only Brick remains unengaged,
leaning upon the liquor cabinet with his faraway smile, an ice cube in a paper
napkin with which he now and then rubs his forehead. He doesn't respond
to Margaret's command. She bounds forward and stoops over the instrument
panel of the console.
]

GOOPER:

We gave ‘em that thing for a third anniversary present, got three speakers in
it.

[
The room is suddenly blasted by the climax
of a Wagnerian opera or a Beethoven symphony.
]

BIG DADDY:

Turn that dam thing off!

[
Almost instant silence, almost instantly
broken by the shouting charge of Big Mama, entering through hall door like a
charging rhino.
]

BIG MAMA:

Wha's my Brick, wha's mah precious
baby!!

BIG DADDY:

Sorry! Turn it back on!

[
Everyone laughs very loud. Big Daddy is
famous for his jokes at Big Mama's expense, and nobody laughs louder at
these jokes than Big Mama herself, though sometimes they're pretty cruel
and Big Mama has to pick up or fuss with something to cover the hurt that the
loud laugh doesn't quite cover.

[
On this occasion, a happy occasion because
the dread in her heart has also been lifted by the false report on Big
Daddy's condition, she giggles, grotesquely, coyly, in Big
Daddy's direction and bears down upon
Brick, all very quick and alive.
]

BIG MAMA:

Here he is, here's my precious baby! What's that you've
got in your hand? You put that liquor down, son, your hand was made
fo’ holdin’ somethin’ better than that!

GOOPER:

Look at Brick put it down!

[
Brick has obeyed Big Mama by draining the
glass and handing it to her. Again everyone laughs, some high, some
low.
]

BIG MAMA:

Oh, you bad boy, you, you're my bad little boy. Give Big Mama a kiss, you bad
boy, you! Look at him shy away, will you? Brick never liked
bein’ kissed or made a fuss over, I guess because he's always had too
much of it!

Son, you turn that thing off!

[
Brick has switched on the TV
set.
]

I can't stand TV, radio was bad enough but TV has gone it one
better, I
mean—
[
plops
wheezing in chair
]

one worse,
ha ha! Now what'm I sittin’ down here faw? I want
t’ sit next to my sweetheart on the sofa, hold hands with him and love him up
a little!

[
Big Mama has on a black and white figured
chiffon. The large irregular patterns, like the markings of some massive animal,
the luster of her great diamonds and many pearls, the brilliants set in the
silver frames of her glasses, her riotous voice, booming laugh, have dominated
the room since she entered. Big Daddy has been regarding her with a steady
grimace of chronic annoyance.
]

BIG MAMA
[
still
louder
]:

Preacher, Preacher, hey, Preach! Give me you’ hand an’ help me
up from this chair!

REVEREND TOOKER:

None of your tricks, Big Mama!

BIG MAMA:

What tricks? You give me you’ hand so I can get up
an'—

[
Reverend Tooker extends her his hand. She
grabs it and pulls him into her lap with a shrill laugh that spans an octave in
two notes.
]

Ever seen a preacher in a fat lady's lap? Hey, hey,
folks! Ever seen a preacher in a fat lady's lap?

[
Big Mama is notorious throughout the Delta
for this sort of inelegant horseplay. Margaret looks on with indulgent humor,
sipping Dubonnet “on the rocks” and watching Brick, but Mae and
Gooper exchange signs of humorless anxiety over these antics, the sort of
behavior which Mae thinks may account for their failure to quite get in with the
smartest young married set in Memphis, despite all. One of the Negroes, Lacy or
Sookey, peeks in, cackling. They are wailing for a sign to bring in the cake and
champagne. But Big Daddy's not amused. He doesn't understand why,
in spite of the infinite mental relief he's received from the do
doctor's report, he still has these same old fox teeth in his guts.
"This spastic thing sure is something,” he says to himself, but
aloud he roars at Big Mama:
]

BIG DADDY:

BIG MAMA, WILL YOU QUIT
HORSIN‘
?—You're too old an’ too fat
fo’ that sort of crazy kid stuff an’ besides a woman with your blood
pressure—she had two hundred last spring! —is riskin’ a
stroke when you mess around like that. . . .

BIG MAMA:

Here comes Big Daddy's birthday!

[
Negroes in white jackets enter with an
enormous birthday cake ablaze with candles and carrying buckets of champagne
with satin ribbons about the bottle necks.

[
Mae and Gooper strike up song, and
everybody, including the Negroes and Children, joins in. Only Brick remains
aloof.
]

EVERYONE:

Happy birthday to you.

Happy birthday to you.

Happy birthday, Big Daddy—

[
Some sing: “Dear, Big
Daddy!"
]

Happy birthday to you.

[
Some sing: “How old are
you?"
]

[
Mae has come down center and is organizing
her children like a chorus. She gives them a barely audible: “One, two,
three!” and they are off in the new tune.
]

CHILDREN:

Skinamarinka—dinka—dink

Skinamarinka—do

We love you.

Skinamarinka—dinka—dink

Skinamarinka—do.

[
All together, they turn to Big
Daddy.
]

Big Daddy, you!

[
They turn back front, like a musical comedy
chorus.
]

We love you in the morning;

We love you in the night.

We love you when we're with you,

And we love you out of sight.

Skinamarinka—dinka—dink

Skinamarinka—do.

[
Mae turns to Big Mama.
]

Big Mama, roo!

[
Big Mama bursts into tears. The Negroes
leave
.]

BIG DADDY:

Now Ida, what the hell is the matter with you?

MAE:

She's just so happy.

BIG MAMA:

I'm just so happy, Big Daddy, I have to cry or something.

[
Sudden and loud in the
hush:
]

Brick, do you know the wonderful news that Doc Baugh got from the clinic
about Big Daddy? Big Daddy's one hundred percent!

MARGARET:

Isn't that wonderful?

BIG MAMA:

He's just one hundred per cent. Passed the examination with flying colors. Now
that we know there's nothing wrong with Big Daddy but a spastic colon, I can
tell you something. I was worried sick, half out of my mind, for fear that Big Daddy
might have a thing like—

[
Margaret cuts through this speech, jumping
up and exclaiming shrilly:
]

MARGARET:

Brick, honey, aren't you going to give Big Daddy his birthday
present?

[
Passing by him, she snatches his liquor
glass from him.

[
She picks up a fancily wrapped
package.
]

Here it is, Big Daddy, this is from
Brick!

BIG MAMA:

This is the biggest birthday Big Daddy's ever had, a hundred presents and
bushels of telegrams from—

MAE
[
at same
time
]:

What is it, Brick?

GOOPER:

I bet 500 to 50 that Brick don't
know
what it
is.

BIG MAMA:

The fun of presents is not knowing what they are till you open the package. Open your
present, Big Daddy.

BIG DADDY:

Open it you'self. I want to ask Brick somethin! Come here,

Brick.

MARGARET:

Big Daddy's callin’ you, Brick.

[
She is opening the
package.
]

BRICK:

Tell Big Daddy I'm crippled.

BIG DADDY:

I see you're crippled. I want to know how you got crippled.

MARGARET
[
making
diversionary tactics
]:

Oh, look, oh, look, why, it's a cashmere
robe!

[
She holds the robe up for all to
see.
]

MAE:

You sound surprised, Maggie.

MARGARET:

I never saw one before.

MAE:

That's funny
.—Hah!

MARGARET
[
turning
on her fiercely, with a brilliant smile
]:

Why is it funny? All my family ever had was family—and luxuries such as
cashmere robes still surprise me!

BIG DADDY
[
ominously
]:

Quiet!

MAE
[
heedless in
her fury
]:

I don't see how you could be so surprised when you bought it yourself at
Loewenstein's in Memphis last Saturday. You know how I know?

BIG DADDY:

I said, Quiet!

MAE:

—I know because the salesgirl that sold it to you waited on me and said, Oh,
Mrs. Pollitt, your sister-in-law just bought a cashmere robe for your
husband's father!

MARGARET:

Sister Woman! Your talents are wasted as a housewife and mother, you really
ought to be with the FBI or—

BIG DADDY:

QUIET!

[
Reverend Tooker's reflexes are
slower than the others. He finishes a sentence after the
bellow.
]

REVEREND TOOKER
(to Doc Baugh):

—the Stork and the Reaper are running neck and neck!

[
He starts to laugh gaily when he notices
the silence and Big Daddy's glare. His laugh dies
falsely.
]

BIG DADDY:

Preacher, I hope I'm not butting in on more talk about memorial
stained-glass windows, am I, Preacher?

[
Reverend Tooker laughs feebly, then coughs
dryly in the embarrassed silence.
]

Preacher?

BIG MAMA:

Now, Big Daddy, don't you pick on Preacher!

BIG DADDY
[
raising his voice
]:

You ever hear that expression all hawk and no spit? You bring that expression
to mind with that little dry cough of yours, all hawk an’ no spit . . . .

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