CHARACTERS:

AN AMERICAN FAMILY: DAD, MOM, BILL [eldest son], JERRY [middle son], DAN [youngest son], ANN [oldest daughter], SARA [middle daughter], KATIE [youngest daughter] The age range of the kids should be: no older than the late twenties, and no younger than thirteen.

A FOREIGN FAMILY, preferably similarly structured, perhaps Middle-Eastern or Indian.

OTHER VISITORS: Other couples, individuals, and/or families may periodically drift by. There are no formal speaking parts, and it would just be for ambiance, and to provide the possibility of observing some outside reactions to the family (mainly when they do "the march").

SETTING:

The family is on a family trip to some touristic site - perhaps a nature site - hoping to increase family unity, and have a good time.

DAD: Well, here we are! Now look, before we begin to check out the sights, let’s all get into a family huddle here. Come on! Remember how we used to? That’s right. Remember how we all used to be so close? [Looks meaningfully at Bill, and Katie] Well, it’s never too late. I know that we have our differences. We don’t always see things eye to eye. It’s normal. There’s so many pressures and influences in society, and so many crazy ideas floating around.

KATIE: O Dad, come on!

DAD: Well, but what I want to say is - when all is said and done - we’re a family. A FAMILY! Years ago, I took your mother to be my wife, "till death do us part." And over the years, she bore me three wonderful sons - yes, even you! [looking at Bill] - and three beautiful daughters. Beautiful! [He hugs Katie] And we shared many Christmases together, picked out many trees together, and you all believed in Santa once, and the big ones [looking at older kids] didn’t spoil it. And remember all the birthdays, with their candles? "I’ll huff and I’ll puff, and I’ll blow your house down!" [They all laugh, recognizing who it was]

BROTHERS AND SISTERS: [in unison] Jerry!

DAD: And the Easter baskets…

SARA: Chocolate bunnies!

DAD: And trick-or-treating on Halloween. What a great witch Little Katie was, even then!

KATIE: Dad!

DAD: I know that sometimes we’ve had problems. Someone here even called me a tyrant once. What was it - you said the padre familiarus was a thing of the past?

BILL: Pater familias.

DAD: Well, my father always told me, "Spare the rod and spoil the child." And I saw him get his way, no matter what, and thought, "That’s how it’s done." But I know I overdid it sometimes. I didn’t always handle the pressure coming from the outside world very well.

MOM: But your Dad kept a roof above your heads. No matter how unhappy his work made him. No matter how much he wanted to quit, or just get into his car, and drive off down the highway, he just kept taking it, for you. [Looking at kids] For you.

DAD: Not that that was an excuse. I just want to say, that when you think of me - please try not to only think about the punishments. Think about the good things. [Looking at Jerry] Like the day I carried you home, when I didn’t have the car, and they called from school to say you’d been injured on the playground. All the way up the hill. [Looking at Sara] And the big party I threw for your "sweet sixteen." I put off buying a new car for a whole year, so you could live in a fairy tale, for that one day.

SARA: Thanks Dad [hugs him]

DAD: [To Dan] And the way I went to the coach, and made him put you in the starting lineup. My son wasn’t going to be a bench-warmer!

ANN: It’s true Dad, you have always stood up for us.

DAD: And that’s what a family is all about. We have our disagreements. We have our quarrels. We make mistakes. But we share things nobody else will ever know. We have our secret life. Our secret history. Parts of it dark, but parts of it, indescribably beautiful. I cleaned every one of your little, shit-filled butts when you were a baby…

KATIE: That was beautiful?! [They laugh, but he is serious]

DAD: Thinking on the death that we come from, and go back to, it was. Beautiful, like being in a church, when the organ’s playing. You were alive and helpless and crying, and looking back on it all, now, I know that you were all worth it, and that even changing your diapers was a blessing. That’s what a family is. What it’s all about. Living under one roof. Knowing each other like nobody else.

KATIE: Thanks to my diary.

DAD: It was a mistake.

MOM: My mistake! I thought you were smoking pot.

DAD: What we read hurt us, but the fact that we read it hurt you even more. We were wrong. Wrong.

MOM: It was my fault. I’m the one.

ANN: It’s over with, it’s OK. Forget about it. You were trying to do good.

DAD: You know, girls, one day you’ll all have a man of your own. But let me tell you something. Even lying with him naked in your bed -

SARA: [Shocked] Daddy!

DAD: you’ll be strangers, compared to how you are with your family. The ones who saw you from day one - your first struggling steps to walk - the things we talked about at dinner - the TV shows we watched together - the way we all cried when Laddy was run over - our jokes - the things that made us laugh and cry. From babies who couldn’t speak, slowly changing, into young women and young men: the metamorphosis, the journey. Nobody will ever know you like your father, your mother, your sisters, and your brothers.

MOM: It’s true.

DAD: Nobody. [Pause] Do you know how many couples get divorced these days? Use each other? Pillage each other? Take what they can get, and run? And friends? Where are they when you need them? Sure, it’s fun to share a drink, to hang out and do whatever kids do these days. But what happens when it’s your moment of need? Will they be there? [Looks at them all, meaningfully] Your family will. Whether you want it or not, family’s something you can’t lose. Sometimes, it may be the shadow that you want to get away from, that haunts you everywhere you go, but that’s a fair price to pay, because it will also be there, to cover you like a shield, when you’re outnumbered, and alone. When all your so-called friends have vanished in a puff of smoke. Poof! [Singing lines from the Minstrel Boy] "One sword at least thy right shall guard, one faithful harp shall praise thee." [Mom, and the two older girls cheer] Blood is thicker than water. And I guess that’s what I’m trying to say. That as time goes on, the preciousness of it all becomes more and more clear. Kids, I’m not going to last forever, and I want to feel close to you, now, more than ever, as the years catch up with me. Kids - in all this big, empty, cold, cruel world, the only thing you can really count on is your family. Let’s stick together. Let’s stand by each other. Let’s be the family we always wanted to be, the family we could have been. It’s not too late!

ANN: You’re right, Dad! We’re a family, and this is where love begins!

SARA: I love you Dad! I love you Mom! [They are all exchanging hugs and expressions of love, though Bill and Katie hang back slightly]

DAD: Katie? Little Katie? My little moon worshipper, or whatever you do - I respect it, I just don’t know! Come on, honey. Please, give your daddy a break. Let’s make up for lost time. [Katie hugs him] What’s that song you always sing?

SARA: [Sings it for her] "In our family portrait we look pretty happy, We look pretty normal, let’s go back to that…"

DAD: Let’s. We can. [Katie hugs him again. Then Dad steps over to Bill] Well, big boy. What about it? You were the first one out of Mom. The pioneer. Daniel Boone out of the womb. You made a path for the whole family. [Pause] I know we’ve had our differences, Billy. Politics. But what are politics in the end? Billy, we live and die, politics is just bullcrap, meaningless. How could we let it divide us? If we were immortal, maybe, but we’re not. You know how much I love you. Remember those long walks we used to take together? The pieces of broken branches that were sometimes hidden under the autumn leaves? The spots of ice on the sidewalk, after a storm? All the things we talked about? Planets. Rockets. Friendship. Baseball. Remember the way we used to watch lightning storms from the porch, see the whole sky lit up with gigantic bolts, like some kind of battle going on among the Gods? And we could feel the mist of the rain on our faces? [Bill nods] I want that back, Billy. Screw politics! I want that back!

SARA: [Softly, to Bill] Go on, hug him. [DAD extends his arms to Billy. Slowly, Bill let him hug him]

DAD: That’s my boy. My beautiful boy. Before politics. Before all that stuff that didn’t matter.

MOM: Peace between the two elephants. No one gets driven out of the herd.

DAD: That’s right. It’s a family.

ANN & SARA: A family!

EVERYONE [except Bill; and Katie just mouths the words, though she wants to feel it] A family!

DAD: Remember how we used to do "the march"?

KATIE: O no! Not that!

ANN & SARA [jumping up and down with glee]: O yes! O yes! Let’s do it! The march!

DAD: The family march!

KATIE: O great, the one that made us look like the Adam’s Family!

DAD: Who cares what people think of our togetherness?

MOM: They ought to think it’s beautiful.

ANN: Oh, the people who put it down are just jealous. They just wish they could be so close.

DAD: Come on, let’s go!

[This is a family ritual from days gone by. They all line up, single file, Dad in the front, and begin to march. It’s just a comical and fun way of acting. Katie, second to last, joins in the march, but deliberately does weird things: veers off to the side, and does weird skips and jumps, and makes faces. Bill just walks behind, reluctantly, following them, but not about to fully join in this spectacle. Other visitors to the site look at them. Finally Dad says:]

DAD: Family, Halt! [They do so. Then he cries out again] We did it! [They cheer] Family Huddle! [They gather together, join hands, and throwing them up in the air, shout] We’re a family! Hooray! [Bill is participating, but has not given himself to this like the others] We stand by each other! Through thick and thin! What are we?

EVERYONE: A family!

DAD: I can’t hear you!

EVERYONE: A family!

ANN: [Singing Sister Sledge song, and dancing] We are fam-i-ly! We are fam-i-ly! We are fami-i-ly!

JERRY: You know, they have lyrics on the net.

ANN: [Good-naturedly] O shut up!

DAD: [Pleased with everything] All right. All right. Well. Here we are. Just like old times. They say there’s more to see here than you can manage to take in in a single day - so - I guess we better get started. It’s supposed to be really amazing. Ma, did you bring the guidebook?

MOM: [Pulling it out of her bag] Of course! [DAD takes it, and begins to look through the pages, to try to find the relevant map]

[A family of dark-skinned individuals appears, about the same size as this family]

FOR. FATHER: [Coming up to them, in a heavy accent] Excuse me. I am wondering - do you know which way it is to the restaurant? [At the same time, two young men with this family look at Sara, and say something to each other in their own language, looking at her approvingly. They are not intending for anyone else to notice this, but they are too unguarded in their gestures. When they see people have noticed them - including their own mother, who looks at them very disapprovingly - they stop.]

DAD: [Surprised to see this foreign man, then disturbed to see that man’s two sons acting in a way that he thinks may be rude about his daughter] Seems like maybe you should be asking for directions back home.

FOR. FATHER: [Doesn’t understand] Excuse me?

DAD: Or to the nearest English class.

KATIE: [Upset] Daddy! [Dad looks over that family disrespectfully, then goes back to his reading]

FOR. FATHER: [Angry now] Excuse me. You don’t have to be rude. This is my country, now, too. I have as much right to be here as you. I don’t expect this way to treat me. [His wife tries to shut him up]

MOM: [As Dad looks up from the guidebook, back at the family] Let’s go, honey.

DAD: Your country, now? You can’t even speak English, and it’s your country? You know, lately, a lot of people in my country have been killed, by people who look just like you.

KATIE: Dad!

BILL: All right, let’s go.

FOR. FATHER: But they are not me. I am me. They are they. I am here with my family.

DAD: Bla, bla, bla. Come back when you get a translator.

KATIE: Daddy, will you stop?!! Will you stop treating him like that? [The foreigner’s sons speak angrily to each other in their language, and one of the daughters also.]

DAD: Don’t tell me to stop, Katie! These people have killed lots of our people, and who knows what they’re doing here? Who knows what harm they intend!

KATIE: Dad, you can’t assume that!

DAD: Oh come on, Katie. This world is no bouquet of roses. You’re sweet, you want to see the whole world as just one big you. You see it with your loving heart. But all that love inside you is just like a fog, you can’t see through it to the beasts that are on the other side of it.

FOR. FATHER: This talk is wrong. It is not right.

FOR. DAUGHTER: We are not beasts! And we have nothing to do with anyone who has harmed this country!

DAD: [To Katie] I’m your father, Katie, and the same way I would beat the hell out of anyone who came to hurt you, who broke into the house to do you harm, well, in that same way, I’d like to see all of these types [indicating foreign family] go back to their own country, just to be safer. You can’t imagine how devastated I would be if anything ever happened to you. You think I don’t love you? We try to be so generous to the whole world, and all we do is end up setting ourselves up for the kill.

FOR. FATHER: Your words are very foolish.

FOR. DAUGHTER: Disgraceful! [Then continues speaking in her own language]

FOR. MOTHER: [In her language, pulling her husband’s arm, and trying to lead him away. The foreign boys also talk excitedly with each other]

DAD: Excuse me????

FOR. FATHER: [As his wife pulls him away] I said, your words are very foolish. You don’t understand. You think you know us? [His wife reprimands him in his own language]

FOR DAUGHTER: This is a shame! This is not in your laws and this is not the way you say that you are. You talk in one way, but what you do is the opposite.

DAD: Who’s foolish? [Mom tries to restrain him]

KATIE: Dad!

DAD: No, let me go! Who’s foolish?!

BILL: Let him go, Dad! He’s walking away! He’s going away!

JERRY: [Supporting his father] Bastard! He’s the one who’s a fool!

DAD: [To Mom and Katie] No, get off me! Nobody makes me look bad in front of my daughters! And did you see the way those punks were looking at Sara? Who’s foolish? [He begins to pursue the departing foreigners]

KATIE: Dad, stop!

BILL: Let it go! They’re leaving!

DAD: Who’s foolish?

[The foreign man turns to face them, and his two sons come up to flank him, but his wife tugs at him again, and pulls him away, and one of the daughters grabs and twists the ear of one of the sons, pulling him away also. Then the other son begins to go, after a final glare.]

DAD: No, wait a minute. Don’t go! Do you have something to say? Come on back. I think we don’t need a dictionary to understand each other, after all.

BILL: Let it go! For Christ’s sakes! They’re going!

DAD: [To the foreigners] Come back! Cowards! [To Bill] Bill, don’t you remember, just a minute ago, how we all said we were a family? And how families stick together, through thick and thin? Have you forgotten so soon?

BILL: Dad, if you start a fight now, you’ll be wrong. Why the hell should I punch some innocent guy in the face, just because you’ve lost your head, and picked a god-damned fight with him, when you didn’t need to?

JERRY: Don’t worry, Dad, I’m here, I’ll back you up. We don’t need Bill.

DAN: I’m with you, Dad.

DAD: I’m disappointed in you, Bill. You still don’t get it, do you? What a family is all about.

BILL: What, ganging up on strangers? Treating people like shit, and starting fights?

DAD: Those people are dangerous, Bill. Like chameleons. All nice and friendly, till they get their orders. Blend in, smile, then BOOM!

KATIE: Daddy, it’s a family!

DAD: The perfect cover. The kids are like fruits in the basket, hiding the serpent on the bottom.

KATIE: Dad!

DAD: Oh, don’t get me wrong. There may be some good ones. I’m not prejudiced. But how can you tell? And then, the way they come into our country, as though they own it, and just want you to roll a red carpet underneath their feet. How dare they be rude to us! In two generations they can be rude! But for now…

BILL: It’s [Imitating black slaves from old movies] Yass Sir. Any mo cotton fo me t’pick?

DAD: Don’t be fresh with me, son!

MOM: That’s your father you’re speaking to, Bill!

BILL: God damn it, this is what the whole f***g problem is! Family! Family! You think I don’t want it?! You think I don’t miss it?! You think I don’t cry, sometimes, in the night, when no one can see, wishing things could be like they used to be? Before I grew up, and became the "bad son"? Before I began to see the world in my own way, and you stopped loving me?

DAD: I never stopped loving you!

MOM: Bill, we never stopped loving you!

BILL: You think I don’t wish I could cram myself back into the womb, and start all over again, and never have an idea of my own, just so I could keep you forever? Or that I could freeze myself, in time, and be that little boy on Christmas morning, for the rest of eternity? My own version of Keats’ Grecian Urn? Sometimes I even thought - if only I’d been hit by a car when I was a child, in the days when you still loved me -

MOM: We do love you, Bill!

BILL: And could spend the rest of my days lying in a bed, in a coma, without ever having developed the mind that separated us - preserved as the child you loved; and adored, because I had never ceased being the person you wanted me to be.

KATIE: [Crying] Oh please, Bill, don’t say that. You’re beautiful, just the way you are! You’re my hero!

DAD: [To Katie] Your bad influence.

SARA: Dad’s my hero.

JERRY: When a family’s threatened, it’s got to stand together, no matter what.

DAD: [Walking away, disappointed] I’m disappointed in you, Bill.

MOM: [To Dad] Please, shhh!

DAD: A family sticks together. Especially when there’s trouble.

JERRY: That’s right. You don’t let family down.

DAD: I’m disappointed in you. It’s like, you’re not even my son.

BILL: [Breaking free of Katie. Yelling offstage, in the direction the foreign family has gone, but they are now bound to be out of range. Of course, he is being brutally ironical.] Come back! Come back, you cowards, and fight! Come back so I can punch the hell out of your brown faces, and be loved! Come back, so I can punch the hell out of your brown faces, and be a part of my family again!

MOM: Billy!

BILL: A family sticks together! Through thick and thin! Blood is thicker than water! Blood is thicker than justice! Love! [Starts to break down. Sobbing, to the foreign family that is long gone] I need your blood, so I can be loved!

KATIE: Billy!

DAD: [Walking away, with a disgusted wave of his hand] It’s like he’s not my son! I try! Lord do I try! But he just doesn’t get it! [Most other family members begin to follow him. Mom is torn between following him and watching her tormented son. Katie stays with Bill]

BILL: [In his own world, now, his parody is unraveling with the intensity of his emotions] I want to be loved. What do you want me to do? I’ll do anything! [Screams like a torture victim] Stop it!

KATIE: Billy! [Mother starts to run towards him, but Dad calls]

DAD: Veronica! [She freezes in her tracks]

BILL: Stop it! I’ll talk! I’ll talk! I’ll tell you everything! I’m with al Qaeda. I’m with the FARC. I’m with the IRA. I’m with the Basques. I’m with the Tamil guerrillas. [Softly] I disagree with Dad. [Exhausted] I love Big Brother.

KATIE: Billy!

BILL: [To Katie] I just want to be loved.

KATIE: I love you, Billy.

DAD: [off stage now] Veronica! [She starts to go]

BILL: What does your love mean to me? You’re a Wiccan. You love me, only because you love [hisses, and makes a sign with his hands] the Devil!

KATIE: Stop it, Billy!

BILL: No, I know, little sis. Wicca is holy. No Devil. You’re Woodstock. That’s the problem. Woodstock type. Too late. But you would have been there.

KATIE: Billy, it’s OK. We’re OK. We’re going to be OK.

BILL: Katie, I just wanted to be loved! Why did my mind have to get in the way - why did I have to commit the sin of thinking? I wanted a better world, Katie.

KATIE: We all do.

BILL: A better world. To solve the riddle of the Sphinx. To save Thebes. And so I became Oedipus - killer of his father, raper of his mother - [Imitating the horrified citizens] Banish him from the city! - No wonder he gouged his eyes out, no wonder he didn’t want to see! Seeing is losing. Seeing is losing everything. What do we gain, Katie, from our sight, but pain, solitude, banishment?

KATIE: Billy! I love you!

BILL: [Imitating Hamlet, manipulating his hands as though he held Yorick’s skull] Alas, poor Bill. I knew him, Horatio!

KATIE: Billy, I love you! I love you! [Hugging him fiercely. Then looking into his eyes, holding his face] I love you, Billy. We can’t give up. We can’t give up being who we are. We can’t close our eyes. We can’t close our hearts to the world, just to be loved by our family.

BILL: They’re in us, Katie. For all our brilliant No’s, for all our pretenses of independence and rebellion, and our anger, they’re in us, like soldiers in a conquered city. Someone said that. Like a garrison. We try to be ourselves, and they’re there with their spears. Their spears of not loving us anymore. Their spears of being hurt by us. Controlling us. Always controlling us. With the love they gave us, before we knew what it could do to us. Before we knew what it expected of us.

KATIE: That’s not love, Billy.

BILL: And any time we strike back - a blow for our freedom - it’s like the bee that dies when it stings. The guilt. The misery. The loneliness. You’re Gandhi, and they make you feel like Hitler. You’re Mandela, and they make you feel like AIDs.

KATIE: That’s not love, Billy.

BILL: [Looks at her] You mean - we were never loved?

KATIE: God loves us, Billy. And we love each other. You and I love each other.

BILL: All those childhood presents, under the Christmas tree, and its glowing lights? And those games we played? And the walks, and the lightning storms? It wasn’t love? Just the puppet maker, standing with his wood? The potter, shaping his clay?

KATIE: It was what he could give. He thought it was love. [Crying] I’m sorry, Billy.

BILL: He wanted me to jump that guy, with him. That poor guy who didn’t do a thing, except to accidentally bump into his ignorance.

KATIE: His love wasn’t worth it, Billy.

BILL: Not worth it? He’s Dad.

KATIE: His love wasn’t worth it, Billy.

BILL: An innocent man, spared. A family, lost. Justice served. An outcast born.

KATIE: We’re right, Billy. We’re right. He’s wrong.

BILL: He’s Dad.

KATIE: He’s wrong.

BILL: Our family?

KATIE: You and me, Billy. Until they learn. You and me. Until they learn.

THE END

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