Rock 'n' Roll (12 page)

NIGEL
(Oh, yeah.)

JAN
I was present at this concert, tell her, at Havel's house in the country.

NIGEL
(
interested
) At Havel's? Recently?

JAN
No—before he was in prison.

NIGEL
(Shit.)

JAN
The band had nowhere safe to play, even rehearse, except for a few friends willing to take the risk. After their last concert the police burned down the building.

NIGEL
(
interested
) When was that?

JAN
Oh … six years.

NIGEL
Bollocks.

JAN
After that it was more difficult. Emigration, prison …

NIGEL
(
losing interest
) Yeah, shame.

JAN
With the police, it was personal against the band. For other bands now we have Rockfest.

NIGEL
Rock Fest …?

JAN
Sure. Even a Communist government wants to be popular. Rock ‘n' Roll costs nothing so we have rock festival at the Palace of Culture.

NIGEL
This is better. (
He takes out a notebook.
)

JAN
The organisers invited the Plastics to play if they changed their name to PPU. There was argument in the band. Well, it's a question. If you play your music and hide your name, are you making fools of the government or is the government making fools of you? Finally they agreed PPU was not exactly changing their name. They got a girl singer, like Nico, and rehearsed. But the police found out and cut off the electricity.

Nigel has tautened.

NIGEL
When was this?

JAN
Then they were offered to play in a club in Brno if they agreed to be on the poster as ‘A Band from Prague'. It was a crisis. Some said yes, some said no. Bad things were said between the band. Terrible things. It finished the Plastics. There is no Plastics now, after twenty years, it's over.

NIGEL
(
pause
) When was this?

JAN
Yesterday.

NIGEL
(
points his finger at Jan
) I knew you had a dissident story if you tried.

JAN
Actually, the Plastic People is not about dissidents.

NIGEL
It's about dissidents. Trust me.

JAN
(
bemused
) Okay.

NIGEL
Where would I find a Plastic Person?

JAN
At Klamovka—it's a pub, in Kosire in the park.

NIGEL
Can you take me?

JAN
(
nods
) I'll call someone. I'll leave you a message.

NIGEL
Thanks. Which way are you going now?

JAN
(
points
) But you can get a taxi on the bridge.

NIGEL
Fine.

JAN
How is Max?

NIGEL
The old bastard's going to be seventy this year.

JAN
Oh … yes, October.

NIGEL
I don't see him. Esme and I aren't together, you know.

JAN
Oh. No.

NIGEL
Yeah. I'll see you later, then.

Nigel walks.

JAN
Listen. Maybe you can write about the album. Foreign journalists never mention the music … only about being symbols of resistance.

NIGEL
Yeah … that's the story, I'm afraid.

Nigel goes.

Blackout and ‘Bring It on Home' by John Lennon from the
Anthology
box set.

Smash cut to silence and sunshine. Summer 1990.

At the garden table, Esme is working on something with a notebook and textbook. Her summer jacket is on the back of her chair.

The phone starts ringing in the house. The phone is answered.

ALICE
(
off
) Grandpa! Phone!

Alice enters the dining room. Her long blonde hair has been cropped. She is nineteen now, and grown up by more than the three years.

The necessary items for six place-settings are collected randomly on the table. There is a drawer in the table. Alice takes out six place-mats and starts laying the table.

Esme completely loses her rag—she jumps up, she throws her pen down, she tries to tear the book in two, she throws the book at the table.

ESME
Fuck shit sodding buggering bastard
bitch!

She picks up her chair and is about to hurl it to the ground when Alice reaches her, smothering her.

ESME
(
cont.
) Sodding stupid sodding—

ALICE
It's all right, it's all right! Mum …!

ESME
Sod the whole thing—and
don't laugh!

ALICE
(
lying
) I'm not, I'm not.

Esme sits down, steaming and sulking. Alice looks through the stuff on the table.

ALICE
(
cont.
) So what have we got here? Hm. Part One. ‘Read the poem carefully—' Oh, not carelessly, then? Right … ‘Read the poem carefully. One. What metre is Catullus using? Clue, exclamation mark! The poem is Catullus's version of a lyric by the Greek poet Sappho.' Christ, are they giving clues in ‘A' level now?

ESME
(
snarls
) Just watch it.

ALICE
Anyway, there's the clue. I wonder if the metre could possibly be …?

Esme makes a small sound. Alice cups an ear.

ALICE
(
cont.
) Sorry?

ESME
(
mutters
) Sapphic.

ALICE
Sapphic! So we've done that. ‘Two. Scan the poem, clearly marking the feet and the length of each syllable.' As opposed to scanning the poem and not letting on. Okay. Well …

She flips through Esme's textbook.

ALICE
(
cont.
) Ah, the Sapphic stanza! Four lines. Tum-ti, tum-ti, tum-ti-ti, tum-ti, tum-ti, with tum-tum as an option in the second and fifth foot—times three.

ESME
I know.

ALICE
Fourth line: tum-ti-ti, tum-ti or tum-tum.

ESME
I know!

ALICE
So the good news is, you never have to decide between a tum-ti-ti and a tum-ti or a tum-tum. It's just a matter of counting the syllables.

ESME
Ha! Go on, then. Do the last stanza—and, yes, I did see the elision.

ALICE
(
glances at the text
) The three elisions, Mum.

ESME
Three?

ALICE
Words ending in ‘m' are elided like vowels before a vowel.

ESME
Why?

ALICE
I don't know.

ESME
(
furious
) Well, how is anyone supposed to know
that!

Alice shows her the place in the book where it says so.

A young man,
STEPHEN,
a few years older than Alice, enters the interior encumbered by four bottles of wine and a tabloid newspaper. He disencumbers himself and sees Alice, who waves him back discreetly. Stephen turns his attention to his newspaper. During this—

ESME
(
cont.) (with dignity
) Right. Thank you.

ALICE
(
resuming
)‘Three. Translate the poem into English.' Marks will be deducted for translating into Norwegian. (
translating from the Latin on sight
)'He seems to me equal to a god, to exceed the gods, that man who, sitting opposite you …'

ESME
Yes,
thank you,
darling

ALICE
‘Sees and hears you sweetly laughing—'

ESME
I'm
doing it. How's it coming for the royal visit?

ALICE
Stephen's here to help.

Alice goes inside, ‘out of earshot'. Stephen closes the paper and folds it open to a different page. Alice kisses him casually on the mouth.

ALICE
You are good. What's Max doing?

STEPHEN
On the phone.

ALICE
Still?

STEPHEN
What should I …?

ALICE
Do the table. Six places. I'll find napkins.

STEPHEN
Okay. Oh—no, no, I'm not staying, I'm not family.

ALICE
Official shag is family, and anyway I want you here for Max—if he gets bored he'll start saying things.

STEPHEN
No—no—she's
your
stepmother.

ALICE
Are you scared?

STEPHEN
I'll say—have you read her column?

ALICE
Oh, did you get it?

STEPHEN
Here.

ALICE
I can't now.

STEPHEN
She's got a photograph.

Alice glances at the photo.

ALICE
(
laconic
) She looks all right.

STEPHEN
Um, there's a piece about your friend Syd, um, Roger …

ALICE
About the album?

STEPHEN
Not really. I'll keep it for you. He's all right, is he?

ALICE
Of course he's all right. He's all right when people leave him alone to do his painting and his garden so he doesn't have to talk to them …

Max enters. He uses a single stick now.

ALICE
(
to Max
) Where do you keep the napkins?

MAX
What's all this?

ALICE
All what? You haven't forgotten …?

MAX
Oh God.

ALICE
What have you done?

MAX
Don't panic. What are you cooking for your dad?

ALICE
Fish pie.

MAX
That's a blessing—will it stretch to two extra?

STEPHEN
I'll drop out.

ALICE
No.
What do you mean?

MAX
There's a man come to see me all the way from Prague, and I'm afraid I …

ALICE
But it's meet the wife!

MAX
It went clear out of my head. Actually, having two extra will stop it turning into the clash of the titans.

ALICE
(
bristling
) I hope you weren't thinking of having a go at her.

MAX
I meant you.

Alice slams down a large pepper-mill and marches out in a huff. Max notes Esme, who has remained absorbed.

MAX
(
cont.
) I said, ‘Eleanor wouldn't expect you to go that far.' She became incensed and called me a fool. Apparently it's all to do with a plan she's got to be a lecturer on Swan Hellenic cruises.

STEPHEN
Who's your Czech?

Stephen leaves the paper on the table and starts a stillborn effort to lay places.

MAX
Jan? He teaches philosophy at Charles University … ex-dissident—he was in prison briefly.

STEPHEN
So why isn't he an ambassador, or minister of something?

MAX
Now, now. Come upstairs and tell me what the comrades are doing now that history has ended.

STEPHEN
Can't, I have to lay the table. Why don't you read the journal, then you'd know.

MAX
Marxism Today?
It's not so much the Eurocommunism. In the end it was the mail order gifts thing. I couldn't take the socks with the little hammers and sickles on them.

STEPHEN
Well, read the
Morning Star
and keep up with the tankies.