Block Not a Game for Boys

1. Auflage 2015
ISBN: 978-1-78001-633-7
Verlag: Nick Hern Books
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 104 Seiten

Reihe: NHB Modern Plays

A razor-sharp comedy about three cabbies competing in a local table tennis league. Once a week, three cabbies seek respite from their lives in a local table tennis league, and tonight they must win - or face the unthinkable oblivion of relegation. Deeper rivalries and competitive obsessions emerge as the team try to survive the pressure, but the real game takes place anywhere but at the table. Not a Game for Boys was originally performed at the Royal Court Theatre, London, in 1995. It was revived at the King's Head Theatre, London, in 2015.

Simon Block is a playwright and screenwriter. His work for theatre includes: Not a Game for Boys (Royal Court); Chimps, Hand in Hand and Everything is Illuminated (Hampstead Theatre); A Place at the Table (Bush Theatre); and 1/25th of the National Theatre Chain Play (National Theatre). His work for television includes: North Square (Channel 4); Trust (BBC1); The Shooting of Thomas Hurndall (Channel 4); Casualty 1909 (BBC1); The Eichmann Show (BBC 2); Home Fires (ITV). Work for radio includes: Breathe In Breathe Out and The Pool (BBC Radio 4).

Autoren/Hrsg.

Block, Simon

Leseproben

ACT ONE

Centre stage stands a small, round pub table with an ashtray, surrounded by three wooden chairs.

Two of the chairs face the audience, in one of which is seated OSCAR, a cabbie in his early fifties. Under a still-wet, black raincoat he wears a dark suit, dark tie, dark socks, and his best black shoes. On the floor beside his chair is a sports bag, zipped. He is slightly slouched in the chair, and ponders a point above and beyond him, smoking a thin panatela cigar. On the floor beside another chair sits an old-style holdall.

ERIC plays with the pool cue ball. He is around fifty and wears a nylon tracksuit circa 1976 – sky blue with white piping, white zips at the ankle. He wears an old pair of tennis shoes.

ERIC. So… this afternoon. It was a good turnout?

OSCAR. Bearing in mind your workday funeral typically draws a smaller crowd…

ERIC. So making the adjustment for a working day.

OSCAR. And another for rain.

ERIC. Rain. Yeah.

OSCAR. And that Fat Derek was reviled by everyone in the league.

ERIC. True.

OSCAR. Everyone he ever worked with.

ERIC. True again.

OSCAR. And by extrapolation a substantial percentage of his extended family.

ERIC. Very possible.

OSCAR. And possibly several members of his immediate family.

ERIC. To cut a long story short…

OSCAR. It wasn’t Pavarotti in the park.

ERIC. Anyone from the league committee?

OSCAR. What do you think?

ERIC. Lousy bastards. His teammates?

OSCAR. They sent the wife a message of condolence.

ERIC. Nice?

OSCAR. Impossible to judge whether they were sorry he’d gone, or sorry he hadn’t gone sooner.

Pause.

ERIC. Only two years older than me, Oz. Which by today’s standard is not a dying age.

OSCAR. Unless you’re Fat Derek, Eric.

OSCAR loosens his tie and slowly removes it.

ERIC. So how come you went to the funeral? You couldn’t stick the fat bastard any more than the rest of us.

OSCAR. Couldn’t say precisely. A sick fascination for the size of the coffin perhaps? (Pause.) Though more likely I suspect it had something to do with being present at his moment of deceasement.

Pause.

ERIC. You were present at his moment of deceasement?

OSCAR. Uh-uh.

ERIC. You were here last Tuesday?

OSCAR. I dropped by to meet Tony for a few frames down the Archway.

ERIC. You were at the actual match where Fat Derek…?

OSCAR. I was closer to him than I am now to you. The breeze as he went down rustled my Evening Standard.

ERIC. Halfway through his second game, I heard.

OSCAR. Third.

ERIC. I heard second.

OSCAR. Then you’ve been misinformed.

ERIC. Yeah?

OSCAR. Four two down. Game seven. Unlucky for some.

OSCAR undoes the top button of his shirt, and unbuttons the remainder. ERIC watches.

ERIC. So come on, Oz. What happened?

OSCAR. What would you like to know?

ERIC. The whole story. From table to grave.

OSCAR. Well. (Pause.) We’re here. We’re at the club. As usual the windows are locked. Heating’s on full despite the fact it’s a warm evening. I’m on the other side of the glass to be sociable. Out on the court. So… as usual Fat Derek’s playing his usual game.

ERIC. Twiddling. Fat bastard.

OSCAR. So he’s twiddling away, but it’s having little visible effect. In fact, the opponent’s on top. Playing Fat Derek all over the show.

ERIC. Fat Derek’s sweating by now?

OSCAR. It’s Fat Derek. Naturally he’s sweating by now. Like a pig on a stick. It’s oozing out of his face like hot treacle. Everything’s bloodshot. Chest’s heaving like a ruptured bellows, steam rising from every orifice. Repulsive. Anyway. (Pause.) Middle of the game he lays his bat down on the table.

ERIC. Mid-rally?

OSCAR. Fat Derek’s about to serve.

ERIC. I heard from Mickey Michaels he laid it down middle of a rally.

OSCAR. Mickey Michaels? Mickey Michaels… who claimed an extraterrestrial hailed his cab and made him reverse over the Chiswick flyover?

ERIC. Mickey Michaels said middle of the rally.

OSCAR. Which do you believe? What comes out of the horse’s mouth? Or its arse?

ERIC. Mouth.

OSCAR. Right. Which is me. The eyewitness.

ERIC. I’m sorry, Oz.

Pause.

OSCAR. So Fat Derek lays his bat down without a word. He looks to his left. He looks to his right.

ERIC. Why’d he do that?

OSCAR. Some things we’ll never know. Some things we’ll never want to know. (Pause.) Without a peep… Fat Derek drops like a stone.

ERIC. I heard to the floor.

OSCAR. From Mickey Michaels?

ERIC. Yeah.

Pause.

OSCAR. Lucky guess.

OSCAR starts to remove his shoes and trousers.

ERIC. So was he winning when he…?

OSCAR. Twenty-one twenty down in the third.

ERIC. You’re winding me up.

OSCAR. As the Mohawk later remarked: if you’ve got to go, go twenty-one twenty down in the third.

ERIC. Perfect timing was always a hallmark of Fat Derek’s game.

OSCAR. Not to mention surprise.

ERIC. Describe Fat Derek to a third party you’d say perfect timing plus the element of surprise.

OSCAR. Plus, now, dead.

Pause.

ERIC. So a doctor was called?

OSCAR. The Mohawk’s a doctor.

ERIC. Yeah, but of criminology.

OSCAR. So he knows a stiff when he sees one.

ERIC. I suppose he would.

OSCAR. When you think about it, Fat Derek had it coming.

OSCAR takes off his jacket.

Well… it came, so he must’ve had it coming.

OSCAR takes off his unbuttoned shirt.

ERIC. What about resuscitation?

OSCAR. Well…

ERIC. Reassure me here, Oz. If I start karking it during a game, give me some indication you’d at least try.

OSCAR. An attempt was made.

ERIC. Successful?

OSCAR. Not in any meaningful way.

ERIC. The Mohawk did it?

OSCAR. He was too busy noting the time and location of death, including any suspicious circumstances.

ERIC. Then who? You?

OSCAR. You must be joking. (Pause.) Tony did it.

ERIC. Tone? Our Tone?

OSCAR. Leapt on the body without a moment’s hesitation. Course, when he leapt he thought it was a viable person. That it was merely a body only became apparent afterwards.

ERIC. Nevertheless, Oz. It’s a bit unexpected. Tone leaping to the rescue so to speak. Not like him.

OSCAR. I told him later I thought he acted very maturely.

ERIC. What did he say?

OSCAR. He said he didn’t know what came over him.

The telephone rings. ERIC answers it. Pause.

ERIC. I said I can’t come home. It’s out of my hands, isn’t it? (Pause.) No, Elaine. You see what you’re doing here: you are beginning to work yourself into a state. And my advice to you on this is: don’t. (Pause.) Believe me… Mum’s laughing muscles soon fatigue. She’s never been a great enthusiast. She’ll stop. Trust me, Elaine. (Pause.) Course you can, Lainey. Any time.

He switches off the telephone and replaces it on the table.

OSCAR. Elaine’s phoning more.

ERIC. Everything’s worse these days. The kids. Her migraines.

OSCAR. Couldn’t Martin sit with her for a bit?

ERIC. Martin? Don’t be stupid, Oz. So. Fat Derek collapses.

Pause.

OSCAR. It was a tremendous shock.

ERIC. You don’t turn out for an evening’s ping-pong expecting fatalities.

OSCAR. They were in two minds what to do.

ERIC. Course they were.

OSCAR. So they settled it with a vote.

ERIC. I heard that…

OSCAR. And they voted ‘yes’, they should finish the match.

ERIC. That’s what I heard. I heard they voted while Derek lay on the floor.

OSCAR. By now he was sitting.

ERIC. Sitting? He made it to a chair before his final…? He staggered to…?

OSCAR. Once it was suggested the match should continue, Derek’s carcass became an immediate obstacle to unimpeded play. He was removed to the nearest chair.

OSCAR unzips his bag and removes a pair of modern, new table-tennis shoes; a freshly pressed pair of table-tennis shorts and matching, pressed, table-tennis shirt, and a modern deep-blue TSB tracksuit, which he places on the table.

ERIC. Ugh.

OSCAR. What?

ERIC. Fat Derek… slumped.

OSCAR. Not exactly a pretty sight alive. But now… Head dangling. Arms. He looked…

ERIC. Like shit.

OSCAR. More kind of…

ERIC. Dead?

OSCAR. Not absolutely. Not stone.

ERIC. Asleep?

OSCAR. Bored. You know sometimes you watch when you want to be playing and you get so bored you drop off.

ERIC. Fat Derek looked bored?

OSCAR. Intensely.

OSCAR puts on his T-shirt.

ERIC. Well… worse ways to pop than slap in the middle of the game you love, Oz.

OSCAR. You think so? (Steps into his shorts.) At the funeral this afternoon I learned but this one thing: I am not going to die in shorts.

ERIC. It must appear ridiculous.

OSCAR. It appears ridiculous because it is ridiculous. No one will be giggling at my funeral.

ERIC. There was giggling?

OSCAR. If they’d giggled openly I could have taken it as a mark of affection. A measure of warmth. But they tried swallowing it, which made Fat Derek a fat figure of...