WHITE STONE a Tragic Commedia by JB Saavedra (c) 1991 John J Baca-Saavedra 3212 SE Morrison St #9 Portland, OR 97214 Phone/Fax: 503-736-9928 Greek Tragedy, Commedia Dell'Arte with elements of Clown are the theatrical styles used in the play. All characters are Masked in the Commedia style. Like clowns, with props, Adolph carries Heinrich, his club; Hermann has Hans, the gun, and Frans, the dagger, strapped around him; and Lucifer has Beelzebub, the marching snare drum, slung around him. Lucifer uses the drum to highlight each fall and hit of the clowns as well as drum rolls for introductions. Adolph is birdlike and menacing. Hermann is extremely obese. Jeremiah and Saul can be double cast. For a limited production the Chorus may consist only of Gabriel. The play is open to multi- ethnic and mixed gender casting. I would prefer live music for the two songs that begin and end the piece. WHITE STONE a Tragic Commedia Stage lights fade up very slowly in time to music, "Yome Yome", a tender Yiddish lullaby about the dreams of a young girl. Upstage center is illuminated revealing CHORUS on a raised platform. Gabriel is the leader, one step in front of, the Wretch, stage right, and the SOLDAT, stage left. They move forward a few steps in a dirge beat. GABRIEL There is a Nightmare in the soul. CHORUS There were over 90,000 bodies buried in the quiet Lithuanian field. We had to dig them up without tools. WRETCH & SOLDAT Hands raw from clawing frozen earth. GABRIEL When we broke through the first graves all the men -- CHORUS Sobbed! Incline heads. GABRIEL It must all be destroyed ... WRETCH & SOLDAT They screamed at us! And beat us! We would vomit at the stench. GABRIEL There is a Nightmare in the soul. CHORUS Nightmare. Whispers -- Echoes. Drum roll - Lucifer enters with Beelzebub, his drum. LUCIFER Alllllrrrrriiiiiight!!!! Let's get going! Whoo! Haah! Yesiree!! CHORUS Lucifer, have you any souls for judgement? LUCIFER Have I any .... whaddaya think I'm here for!? Lemme innerduce, with the assistance of Beelzebub, the incomparable, Adolph and Hermann! A & H enter. They circle the stage and bump into each other in front of Lucifer. They position themselves on either side of Lucifer. You Guys! ADOLPH Welkommen to our show! HERMANN Our show! LUCIFER & ADOLPH & HERMANN Our show! They bow. CHORUS The sea gives up all the dead who are in it; Death and Hades are emptied of the dead that are in them; and every one is judged as his deeds deserve. Then Death and Hades are hurled into the burning lake. The burning lake is the second death. LUCIFER Aaahhh, yesss, the second DEATH. HERMANN Furher, what does he mean? ADOLPH Imbecile. Merely poetic license. HERMANN Poetic .... ADOLPH License. Metaphors. HERMANN Metaphors? LUCIFER I mean the end. The place you're bound. No metaphors. We ... Motioning to A & H - L moves in opposite direction of A & H. ADOLPH & HERMANN .... really must be going. CHORUS Judgement?!! The Clowns are frozen. LUCIFER Judgement ? For these two? Come--oonn! Really? No No No No NO! They're mine mine mine!! You always do this. HERMANN Judgement? Really? ADOLPH What's this all about? The problem? LUCIFER Problem? Whaaat problem? ADOLPH Those that would pollute. HERMANN Pollute! ADOLPH The vermin. HERMANN Vermin! ADOLPH The plague of the planet. HERMANN Plague! LUCIFER The end my friends. Staarrt packing. Judgement time's over!! ADOLPH We demand a fair, open, unbiased hearing. Preferably in a venue not inflamed by rethoric or common sense. HERMANN Marching. Hear .. ing! Hear .. ing! Hear .. ing! Hear .. CHORUS Of course. Open. Fair. Unbiased. LUCIFER Of course?!! CHORUS Evidence. Arguments. Witnesses. LUCIFER Evidence? ADOLPH Arguments? HERMANN Witnesses? LUCIFER EVIDENCE!! A skull is tossed onstage to sound of slide whistle. Alas, poor Moishe I knew him well. CHORUS Clowns hand Moishe to each other like "hot potato" at the word "Holy". Adolph ends up with him. Moishe, Moishe! The place where you are is Holy. I have indeed seen the misery of my people .. heard their crying .. am well aware of their suffering. ADOLPH Adolph tosses Moishe. Just the type of inflammatory theatrics I warned against. HERMANN Theatrics! LUCIFER EVIDENCE! Soap bar is tossed onstage. Hey Joshua, whas up? Putting the fat to good use. Don't waste a drop. Hermann grabs soap bar. EVIDENCE!! Lampshade is tossed onstage. Miriam! Tight skin, lookin' good babe. Adolph grabs lampshade. These poor souls what's become of them? Interesting concept, ecologically sound, but somehow, just not .. RIGHT!! How do you explain this? ADOLPH Cheap theatrics. Tosses Miriam. HERMANN Cheap! Tosses Joshua. All three props, evidence, remain on stage. LUCIFER And those weapons? Still in their possession. ADOLPH This? This is only poor, simple Heinrich. Hardly useful. HERMANN Gleefully. Hans und Frans! ADOLPH Cretin! Put those away! Wouldn't want to hurt anyone .. nooo.. HERMANN Forgive me, mein... A knees H in groin. ...nooo.... LUCIFER To Adolph. And our bargain .. you and I? ADOLPH Hah! I've never kept a bargain in my life! LUCIFER AAAARRRRRR!! Snatches Heinrich. Adolph runs in circle. He meets Lucifer downstage center and is pummeled. ADOLPH AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!! HERMANN Startled from reverie with Frans. Fuhrer! I'll save you! He rushes Lucifer from behind. He lifts his dagger and is pummeled. AAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!! Lucifer drops club center stage and moves upstage. ADOLPH Moving center stage. Ooooooo .... you should be ashamed! Just like my father. He would beat us. Mother & I. In the basement; naked; in the basement. Cold and naked in the basement. Every day at five, precisely. He told us it was time for dessert. "Ready for dessert?" he'd say. ADOLPH(continued) At five, every day, precisely. When I was of age he forced us ... to fuck. Mother and I cold and naked, in the basement. Sometimes he would leave us there ... for days ... weeks ... without food, without water, in summer ... winter. But every day, at five ... Adolf Beats Hermann viciously to the beat of the drum - six - three - ten. .....Precisely!!!!! HERMANN AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! LUCIFER SIX MILLION Jewish victims of precisely planned, brutal extermination. Three million Poles. Tens of millions of others in TOTAL WAR, starvation, execution.Does the word GENOCIDE ring a bell? Cow bell. Ooo, sorry didn't mean to use the "G" word. CHORUS Man is born to sorrow as sparks fly upward. Who is your witness? LUCIFER Still with the witnesses? Evidence isn't enough? Skulls, soap bars, lampshades? YOU need witnesses! SOLDAT I was a Ukrainian guard for the death trains. One day a Jewess jumps out at a stop, with her mongrel son -- asks for bread -- --"for my child"-- I gave her a small white stone put my gun muzzle to the dog-boy's head. I told her to eat. CHORUS She gagged -- choked, dropped the dog-boy. SOLDAT I shot it, then her. LUCIFER Drum roll. Allow me to introduce straight from an engagement at the Sands in Jerusalem, the man with the Torah, mister excitement himself, the Prophet ... Jeremiah! Jeremiah enters. SOLDAT Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; WRETCH Before you came to birth I consecrated you; GABRIEL I appointed you as prophet to the nations. JEREMIAH Judah has gone into exile after much pain and toil. Living among the nations she finds no respite; her persecutors all overtake her where there is no way out. The roads to Zion are in mourning; no one comes to festivals now. Her gateways are all deserted; her priests groan; her young girls are grief-stricken; she suffers bitterly. her children have gone away into captivity driven in front of the oppressor. Her foes now have the upper hand, her enemies prosper, for Yahweh has made her suffer for her many, many crimes; ADOLPH Aha! Aha! Even he admits it. HERMANN Even he ... what? ADOLPH WHAT!!?? HERMANN Admits what? ADOLPH Mongoloid peabrain!! Their crimes! Their many, many crimes! HERMANN Many, many, many, crimes! ADOLPH They shouted all the louder, "Let him be crucified! ..And the people everyone of them, shouted .. 'Let his blood be on us and on our children!'" HERMANN On their children!! ADOLPH I AM the vengeance of God. The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. HERMANN With awe. Yahweh. JEREMIAH Nooooo!!!! Exits. ADOLPH & HERMANN Sore loser. HERMANN I never imagined I could be the Holy Instrument of God's grand design. I thought I was just having fun. Remember, Fuhrer, the outrageous jokes we .. ADOLPH Enough .. enough idiot! LUCIFER Enough is right! They would have you believe it is God not they who is responsible for their own precisely thought out plan of genocide and world domination. Their Final Solution. Annihilation. SHOAH. WRETCH They made me empty the gas vans. In the third van I found ... ... my wife and my children. I asked them to shoot me after I laid her on the ground. "No", they said, "you are strong; you will work". CHORUS We would crush the charred remains into a powder ... ... fill hundreds of sacks.. WRETCH take them to the river to dump them. The current took it away. Took the powder away. GABRIEL I was the Polish engineer of the trains. I could hear the screams from the cars closest to the engines. The Germans gave us vodka as payment -- CHORUS -- a bonus. GABRIEL We drank constantly. ADOLPH We have a witness. If you would be so kind? I present Saul, or Paul, if you prefer, Apostle to the Gentiles. HERMANN Our witness? Saul enters to drum roll. CHORUS Saul, Saul why are you persecuting us? SAUL Those under the Law who have sinned will be judged by the Law, But those who have sinned outside the Law will perish outside the Law. So when gentiles, not having the Law, still through their own innate sense behave as the Law commands, then, even though they have no Law, they are a law for themselves. Adolph & Hermann applaud. SAUL(continued) They can demonstrate the effect of the Law engraved on their hearts, to which their own conscience bears witness; since they are aware of, various considerations, some of which accuse them, while others provide them with a defense ... ADOLPH Enough Juden! SAUL ... How dare you ... ADOLPH I dare! I will always DARE!! Adolph & Hermann beat Saul and toss him offstage. ADOLPH As I was about to say, before I was so rudely interrupted. HERMANN Rudely! ADOLPH We are a "Law unto ourselves". HERMANN A law unto ourselves????? ADOLPH Lackey! Toad! Of course. HERMANN Of course! ADOLPH We never once believed Jews, or for that matter, anyone we exterminated to be human beings. HERMANN Never once! ADOLPH We followed the "Law in our hearts". HERMANN Our hearts! ADOLPH We are true to our "Consciences". HERMANN Our consciences! ADOLPH We are not guilty of murder! Only of cleansing the planet of vermin. HERMANN Vermin!! LUCIFER You mean to say that you are innocent because you don't believe you committed any crimes, in fact, were doing good? ADOLPH Precisely! We never intended to kill any people. HERMANN People! ADOLPH Reasonably. I understand there are those who hold a ... differing opinion ... radical fringe ... but can they, in honesty, to their own ideals, can they, condemn me, my companion, for a simple difference of opinion? Surely not. HERMANN Surely. LUCIFER OOO...uuu...ttt ... standing! Two totally corrupt, unrepentant souls gain entry to Heaven through loopholes in the LAW. Father .... ADOLPH ... forgive us Adolph & Hermann kneel & cross themselves. ADOLPH & HERMANN ..... we know not what we do. All three laugh hysterically. "Der Rebbe Elimelech", a klezmer tune, fades up. Chorus points to audience as lights fade