It is late on a Sunday morning, early June, in St. Louis
.
The interior is what was called an efficiency apartment in the period of this play, the middle or late thirties. It is in the West End of St. Louis. Attempts to give the apartment brightness and cheer have gone brilliantly and disastrously wrong, and this wrongness is emphasized by the fiercely yellow glare of light through the oversize windows which look out upon vistas of surrounding apartment buildings, vistas that suggest the paintings of Ben Shahn: the dried-blood horror of lower middle-class American urban neighborhoods. The second thing which assails our senses is a combination of counting and panting from the bedroom, to the left, where a marginally youthful but attractive woman, Dorothea, is taking “ setting-up exercises” with fearful effort
.
SOUND: Ninety-one , ha!
—ninety-two , ha!
—ninety-three , ha!
—ninety-four ,
ha!
This breathless counting continues till one hundred is achieved with a great gasp of deliverance. At some point during the counting, a rather short, plumpish woman, early middle-aged , has entered from the opposite doorway with a copy of the big Sunday
St. Louis Post-Dispatch .
The phone rings just as Bodey, who is hard-of-hearing , sits down on a sofa in the middle of the room. Bodey, absorbed in the paper, ignores the ringing phone, but it has caused Dorothea to gasp with emotion so strong that she is physically frozen except for her voice. She catches hold of something for a moment, as if reeling in a storm, then plunges to the bedroom door and rushes out into the living room with a dramatic door-bang
.
DOROTHEA: WHY DIDN’T YOU GET THAT PHONE?
BODEY [
rising and going to the kitchenette at the right
]: Where, where, what, what phone?
DOROTHEA: Is there more than one phone here? Are there several other phones I haven’t discovered as yet?
BODEY: —Dotty , I think these setting-up exercises get you overexcited, emotional, I mean.
DOROTHEA [
continuing
]: That phone was ringing and I told you when I woke up that I was expecting a phone call from Ralph Ellis who told me he had something very important to tell me and would phone me today before noon.
BODEY: Sure, he had something to tell you but he didn’t.
DOROTHEA: Bodey, you are not hearing, or comprehending, what I’m saying at all. Your face is a dead giveaway. I said Ralph Ellis—you’ve heard me speak of Ralph?
BODEY: Oh, yes, Ralph, you speak continuously of him, that name Ralph Ellis is one I got fixed in my head so I could never forget it.
DOROTHEA: Oh, you mean I’m not permitted to mention the name Ralph Ellis to you?
BODEY [
preparing fried chicken in the kitchenette
]: Dotty, when two girls are sharing a small apartment, naturally each of the girls should feel perfectly free to speak of whatever concerns her. I don’t think it’s possible for two girls sharing a small apartment
not
to speak of whatever concerns her whenever—whatever
—concerns her, but, Dotty, I know that I’m not your older sister. However, if I was, I would have a suspicion that you have got a crush on this Ralph Ellis, and as an older sister, I’d feel obliged to advise you to, well, look before youleap in that direction. I mean just don’t put all your eggs in one basket till you are one hundred percent convinced that the basket is the right one, that’s all I mean. . . . Well, this is a lovely Sunday for a picnic at Creve Coeur. . . . Didn’t you notice out at Creve Coeur last Sunday how Buddy’s slimmed down round the middle?
DOROTHEA: No, I didn’t.
BODEY: Huh?
DOROTHEA: Notice.
BODEY: Well, it was noticeable, Dotty.
DOROTHEA: Bodey, why should I be interested in whatever fractional—fluctuations—occur in your twin brother’s waistline—as if it was the Wall Street market and I was a heavy investor?
BODEY: You mean you don’t care if Buddy shapes up or not?
DOROTHEA: Shapes up for what?
BODEY: Nacherly for you, Dotty.
DOROTHEA: Does he
.
The interior is what was called an efficiency apartment in the period of this play, the middle or late thirties. It is in the West End of St. Louis. Attempts to give the apartment brightness and cheer have gone brilliantly and disastrously wrong, and this wrongness is emphasized by the fiercely yellow glare of light through the oversize windows which look out upon vistas of surrounding apartment buildings, vistas that suggest the paintings of Ben Shahn: the dried-blood horror of lower middle-class American urban neighborhoods. The second thing which assails our senses is a combination of counting and panting from the bedroom, to the left, where a marginally youthful but attractive woman, Dorothea, is taking “ setting-up exercises” with fearful effort
.
SOUND: Ninety-one , ha!
—ninety-two , ha!
—ninety-three , ha!
—ninety-four ,
ha!
This breathless counting continues till one hundred is achieved with a great gasp of deliverance. At some point during the counting, a rather short, plumpish woman, early middle-aged , has entered from the opposite doorway with a copy of the big Sunday
St. Louis Post-Dispatch .
The phone rings just as Bodey, who is hard-of-hearing , sits down on a sofa in the middle of the room. Bodey, absorbed in the paper, ignores the ringing phone, but it has caused Dorothea to gasp with emotion so strong that she is physically frozen except for her voice. She catches hold of something for a moment, as if reeling in a storm, then plunges to the bedroom door and rushes out into the living room with a dramatic door-bang
.
DOROTHEA: WHY DIDN’T YOU GET THAT PHONE?
BODEY [
rising and going to the kitchenette at the right
]: Where, where, what, what phone?
DOROTHEA: Is there more than one phone here? Are there several other phones I haven’t discovered as yet?
BODEY: —Dotty , I think these setting-up exercises get you overexcited, emotional, I mean.
DOROTHEA [
continuing
]: That phone was ringing and I told you when I woke up that I was expecting a phone call from Ralph Ellis who told me he had something very important to tell me and would phone me today before noon.
BODEY: Sure, he had something to tell you but he didn’t.
DOROTHEA: Bodey, you are not hearing, or comprehending, what I’m saying at all. Your face is a dead giveaway. I said Ralph Ellis—you’ve heard me speak of Ralph?
BODEY: Oh, yes, Ralph, you speak continuously of him, that name Ralph Ellis is one I got fixed in my head so I could never forget it.
DOROTHEA: Oh, you mean I’m not permitted to mention the name Ralph Ellis to you?
BODEY [
preparing fried chicken in the kitchenette
]: Dotty, when two girls are sharing a small apartment, naturally each of the girls should feel perfectly free to speak of whatever concerns her. I don’t think it’s possible for two girls sharing a small apartment
not
to speak of whatever concerns her whenever—whatever
—concerns her, but, Dotty, I know that I’m not your older sister. However, if I was, I would have a suspicion that you have got a crush on this Ralph Ellis, and as an older sister, I’d feel obliged to advise you to, well, look before youleap in that direction. I mean just don’t put all your eggs in one basket till you are one hundred percent convinced that the basket is the right one, that’s all I mean. . . . Well, this is a lovely Sunday for a picnic at Creve Coeur. . . . Didn’t you notice out at Creve Coeur last Sunday how Buddy’s slimmed down round the middle?
DOROTHEA: No, I didn’t.
BODEY: Huh?
DOROTHEA: Notice.
BODEY: Well, it was noticeable, Dotty.
DOROTHEA: Bodey, why should I be interested in whatever fractional—fluctuations—occur in your twin brother’s waistline—as if it was the Wall Street market and I was a heavy investor?
BODEY: You mean you don’t care if Buddy shapes up or not?
DOROTHEA: Shapes up for what?
BODEY: Nacherly for you, Dotty.
DOROTHEA: Does he
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