"HAPPY DAYS"

Samuel Beckett

German Drama, Hamburg

Production - Cathy Mitchell

Katie Mitchell and Water. Part 1.

Very atmospheric show. Warm. Light. And happy at heart. Mitchell's constant companion - the unique tragic actress Julia Vininger will play the role of a characteristic heroine who will take the audience from light, almost operetta circumstances to a gloomy utopia. And a whole life will fly before our eyes. But water will play a decisive role!

From the theater announcement:

"Happy Days? Apocalyptic landscape, woman, below the belt is not visible, unable to move deeper and deeper. Near her husband, not a homo erectus, but a hard of hearing, drowsy, silent quadruped, able to move exclusively by crawling.

Other people who could help are only in the memory of a woman who does not stop talking. But in sharp contrast to catastrophic external situation, the woman actually looks like a typical example of a happy man whotrades in all kinds of goods from the bag of time, rarely expressing anger or depression.

She is content with the smallestevents and laughs from the optimism earned by unshakable fate. Paradoxically, and typical of Beckett, the discoursehappiness continuously worsens the situation - towards the ironic - and, in the end, the woman is sucked in by the swamp so thatcan only move with the eyes. A woman and a man, Winnie and Willie, partners in their fate. They do not require participationstruggle with the situation, and perfectly adapt to the lifestyle.

This is their tragedy, in which there is absolutely nothing funny, and,Beckett reveals the political potential of his plays: an audience of witnesses to the last hour. The cause of the disaster remains hiddenbut free to interpret. There is no doubt that the man admitted his defeat and announced his death.

« Happy Days» - one of the most prophetic texts of the twentieth century, staged for the first time in 1961, in New York. play dramatized by British director Cathy Mitchell, who directed the play in German Drama « The rest you will learn from the movie » Andwas a great success.

The epigraph of the performance is a replica of Samuel Beckett himself " There is nothing funnier than misfortune».

VIDEO

"HAPPY DAYS"
German Drama, Hamburg

Text - Samuel Beckett
staging- Cathy Mitchell
Translation into German- Erika and Elmar Tofoven
Director's assistant- Lily McLeish
Scenography and costumes- Alexey Ils
Sound- Donato Warton
Light— Jack Knowles
Dramaturgy- Rita Thiele

Performers: Julia Wininger and Pavel Herwig

Premiere- February 12, 2015
Duration- 2 hours 10 minutes with intermission

	Photo by Alexander Kurov / ITAR-TASS
	Alexander Sokolyansky. . "Happy Days" by Beckett became the best premiere of the Moscow season ( News time, 12/26/2005). Olga Egoshina. . Vera Alentova played the heroine of the play of the absurd ( Novye Izvestiya, 12/26/2005). Roman Dolzhansky. . Vera Alentova in Happy Days ( Kommersant, 12/27/2005). Alena Karas. . Vera Alentova played Beckett's "Happy Days" ( RG, 27.12.2005). Marina Davydova. . At the Theatre. Pushkin staged Samuel Beckett's famous play "Happy Days" ( Izvestia, 12/26/2005). Gleb Sitkovsky. . "Happy Days" by Beckett at the branch of the Pushkin Theater ( Newspaper, 12/27/2005). Marina Zayonts. . Vera Alentova played "Happy Days" by Samuel Beckett at the Theater. Pushkin ( Results, 10.01.2006). Olga Galakhova. . Vera Alentova boldly threw herself into the abyss of absurdity ( NG, 01/13/2006). Oleg Zintsov. . Vera Alentova found that Beckett is not hopeless ( Vedomosti, 01/13/2006). Alla Shenderova. . Vera Alentova played in the play by Samuel Beckett ( Theatrical, 02.2006).

Happy Days. Pushkin Theatre. Press about the play

News Time, December 26, 2005

Alexander Sokolyansky

proof by contradiction

"Happy Days" by Beckett became the best premiere of the Moscow season

The phrase "It doesn't matter if you believe in God, it's important that He believes in you" was worn out enough to acquire a taste of generally available sedation: that's how we are and that and it's hard to distinguish the right hand from the left, but God is in us, for lack of a better , believes and, therefore, in the end will save, otherwise how. It is very frightening to suppose that the world has not left God a single chance; it is even more terrible to switch attention from the “world” in general - you never know what is being done in it - to yourself and say: “What I still believe is no longer important. God stopped paying attention to me.”

It would be better if He died, thought Nietzsche. The idea was accepted with enthusiasm.

The state of absolute God-forsakenness was also experienced by the saints - as a prick of wild, last pain, as a "metaphysical swoon"; it was experienced by Christ himself. The horror is that people of the 20th century have learned to take this state for granted, to reflect in it. This horror - He no longer believes in me! - it is not given to understand the most intelligent of atheists, but also to most believers. A person well and correctly brought up in a religious tradition will agree to anything, just not to live in constant despair: to go crazy is even better. The great playwright Samuel Beckett (1906-1990) built his theatrical system on the experience of despair, and in the play Happy Days (1961) debugged it to impeccable, musical perfection.

Becket's poetics is no less rational than Aristotle's; the main difference is that Beckett completely lacks the concept of "tragic error" (hamartia). The point is not in the transition from happiness to unhappiness, but in the transition from a hopeless existence to non-existence, and what mistakes can there be. In Happy Days, the metaphor of hopelessness is extremely clear: at the beginning of the first act, we have before us “a low hillock covered with scorched grass”, a woman, Vinnie, about fifty years old, is dug into the ground up to her chest; at the beginning of the second, the earth had already reached her chin, and she still wanted to enjoy life: "After all, this is a miracle, what is it." If you turn off the ability to compassion, then it is very funny. As Vinnie herself says (or rather, as Beckett says) in the middle of the play: "There is no better way to magnify the Lord than to laugh heartily at his petty jokes, especially flat ones."

The St. Petersburg artist Emil Kapelyush, who created the set design for the Small Stage of the Pushkin Theatre, turned the “low hillock” into a sloping slope rising to the right and planted some completely lifeless tubular stems instead of grass. The heroine, played by Vera Alentova, is placed strictly in the center of the stage, but not in the center of the composition. For natural reasons, the viewer's gaze tends to shift to the side, Vinnie-Alentova has to take the audience's attention to herself, resisting the landscape: this is an excellent staging solution, and the actress uses its unobvious advantage very wisely. Staying in a predetermined center is not such an exciting task; confirming over and over again that the center will be where you are is much more interesting.

The behavior of the heroine is painted by Beckett with exceptional, unquestionable detail: every look, every smile, every stop of the voice. The score of the pauses in Happy Days is no less important for the author than the sequence of lines. Such urgency, as a rule, arouses in actors and directors a burning desire to oppose: what is it you, dear classic, so dictated where we want, there we will pause and make a pause. It is extremely important that Vera Alentova and director Mikhail Bychkov, well-known to Moscow theater-goers (his performances, staged at the Voronezh Chamber Theater, came to the Golden Mask three times), did not begin to express themselves across the text, that they wanted to hear the inner music of the play and believed in her self-worth. Obediently fulfilling the author's instructions, they entered a new space, where Alentova's truly acting nature began to play.

Winnie is a great tragic role, written for a non-tragic and not-great actress: that's the devil's trick. It is hardly possible to play it in such a way that, according to the usual expression, there was nowhere to stick a needle between the performer and the role; it would be even more hopeless to try to play Winnie in the technique of estrangement. Probably the most fruitful situation will be when there is a “zone of misunderstanding” between the heroine and the actress, a space of unexpressed meaning - which, according to Beckett, is always the main one. As the leader of the light forces says in Clive S. Lewis's Abominable Might, it "requires a good, but not too good, weapon."

Alentova's natural property is to be somewhat smarter than her heroines. Even at her Katya Tikhomirova (“Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears”, 1979), the actress, according to my feelings, looked down a little - sympathetically, still not, but still down. At the same time, the pure eccentric remains outside its range, which was convincingly demonstrated by Shirley Myrli (1995). Beckett's Winnie is just a character that you can't help but sympathize with, but from whom you want to move a little away: in the end, she's just a miserable fool. With all the reservations about the fact that Beckett does not have any “simply” and that simplifications in his tragic world are fraught with crushing semantic flaws.

At certain moments, Alentova plays almost like a clockwork doll, at others (the beginning of the second act) she is almost a martyr: it is important that “almost”, that with all the brightness of the acting work, something indefinite, underdeveloped is preserved in the heroine. If such a game was the conscious goal of the actress, she can only be congratulated on the brilliant performance of a fundamentally new creative task. It is more likely, however, to assume that the director Bychkov saw perspectives in the role that it was simply impossible to see from the inside, like an actor. Such things happen in the theater, that's why it is a theater.

Alentova's partner Yuri Rumyantsev plays the small role of Wily correctly and effectively. When something starts to succeed for real, it succeeds to the end. An excellent performance turned out: smart, lively, proportionate. For my taste - so far the best of the season.

As for the horrors that were discussed at the beginning of the conversation, they do not disappear anywhere, but are brilliantly removed by the very harmony of Beckett's thinking, the very power of talent. Remembering the famous words of Fr. Pavel Florensky: “There is Rublev’s Trinity, therefore, there is God,” let’s build a proof by contradiction: if one can talk about the gloomy nightmare of God-forsakenness with such perfection, then He has not left us yet.

Novye Izvestia, December 26, 2005

Olga Egoshina

Steadfast Soldier

Vera Alentova played the heroine of the play of the absurd

The Pushkin Theater hosted the premiere of Samuel Beckett's play Happy Days, a classic of the absurd. The well-known Voronezh director Mikhail Bychkov and St. Petersburg artist Emil Kapelyush were invited to the production. And the main female role was played by the theater prima Vera Alentova.

Samuel Beckett, a classic of absurd plays, is a rare guest on our stages (of the significant productions in five years, one can only name Krapp's Last Recording by Robert Sturua). And his classic play "Happy Days", written in 1961, was not staged in Moscow. And this is understandable. Direction, accustomed to arrogance in relations with the author, with Beckett has absolutely nothing to do. The author's remarks-comments accompanying literally every replica of the play are woven into the fabric of the text, merged with it, like notes and words in a song. Lowering and raising the voice, breaking intonation, eye movements, hand gestures - everything is taken into account and painted.

And the director's pressure here can only break the fragile fabric of a philosophical parable about a woman buried first up to her chest, then up to her neck somewhere in an unknown and hot place, and about her companion, who circles around crawling and publishes some kind of interjection.

Mikhail Bychkov is, above all, a clever director who knows how to find the resultant between his interpretation and the author's will, and, testing the strength of a dramatic structure, stop when it threatens to break. Actually, the interpretation of "Happy Days" largely depends on the choice of the actress for the role of the main character Winnie. Vera Alentova, with her train of roles of women who can endure, love and ultimately win, determined the tone of the production.

There are uneven gray elevations on the stage, in which some kind of twigs are stuck and trembling - either thorns, or antennas. On the ropes stretched over Vinnie's head, silvery umbrellas-airplanes move down. But she is not up to them. A gray-haired curly head, a pink doll face, lips tinted with a bow, a gentle cooing voice. Only in the second act it suddenly turns out that this cooing is just a habit, and the real timbre of the voice is a low soprano, harsh and hoarse (but how many women do not speak with their own voices, softening them to the requirements of good tone).

Winnie takes care of his toilet earnestly and not without pleasure: he brushes his teeth, looks at himself in the mirror, chats flirtatiously with the invisible Willy (Yuri Rumyantsev). Nadezhda Teffi once wrote about edelweiss ladies who run under the bombs to the hairdresser's (you can't do without a haircut!), dye gauze with iodine and compose new blouses, and among the most necessary things for emigration, they grab a nail file. Their "butterfly" frivolity only at first glance seems ridiculous. Already on the second and third, you understand that with the same success you can laugh at the same edelweiss flower, stubbornly blooming in an area that is definitely not suitable for flowers.

Vera Alentova endows Becket's heroine with a bit of feminine frivolity and attractive carelessness, in which the iron core of character is so often hidden. In a situation where the actor is given a close-up, and any movement of the eyes becomes a change in mise-en-scene, Vera Alentova plays with pinpoint precision: whether she folds her lips, rolls her eyes, or catches a reflection of what Willy is doing behind her back in the mirror.

She curses the heavens and immediately takes back her curse, she speaks harshly to Willie and immediately apologizes, she once again understands that everything is moving towards an inevitable finale, and is glad that she is still alive.

But the strongest melody of the image is the feeling of gratitude that Winnie overflows: for the fact that while you breathe, your eyes see. Vera Alentova gives her heroine the ability to be grateful for a doll given in childhood (not some naked, but a real doll with gloves and a hat). And to the evening, when all the guests had left, and they were drinking pink champagne, and Willy proposed a toast to her golden hair. And for the fact that now he can sometimes, in response to the flow of her phrases, mutter some kind of interjection or sing something in a false voice. Alentova plays a woman who knows how to be happy, even when neither her legs nor her arms are active anymore, and the pressing mass has come right up to her neck.

As a matter of fact, Vera Alentova played women who live, fight and win in an absurd and inhuman world more than once, including the famous Katerina in the cult film Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears. And now, having entered the water of the dramaturgy of the absurd for the first time, the actress suddenly found herself in her native element. If this Winnie is told that she is a tenacious fighter, she will not understand. But it is unlikely that you have seen a braver fighter on our stage than this fragile lady, armed only with a toothbrush, hairbrush, umbrella, sunblock, tenderness for her Willy and the ability to thank heaven for everything, everything, everything they send. .

Kommersant, December 27, 2005

Circus of convenience

Vera Alentova in Happy Days

The Pushkin Theater showed the premiere of the play directed by Mikhail Bychkov based on the play by Nobel Prize winner and classic of absurdist drama by Samuel Beckett "Happy Days". ROMAN DOLZHANSKY respectfully observed the attempts to turn the people's artist Vera Alentova from a social heroine into a clowness.

Famous actresses, especially those who have grown out of the roles of young heroines, are always looking for new roles for themselves. However, the famous work of Samuel Beckett's "Happy Days" only at first glance may seem like a gift to famous actresses. Only two circumstances can attract hungry performers: you can play "Happy Days", firstly, at any age - the heroine named Winnie hardly moves; secondly, having an arbitrarily complex character, the play is a female monologue, the second, male, role can be considered a service one, so that the one for which everything is started reigns supreme on the stage.

Nevertheless, one should not be surprised that theater posters do not dazzle with "Happy Days". It’s scary to play them: after all, Vinnie starts the performance, sitting waist-deep in the sand, and ends up being covered up to her chin. It is simply stupid not to follow Beckett's remarks, because by "happy days" he means, with gloomy irony, of course, "the last days." Winnie's inconsistent monologue, molded from household trifles, memories, appeals to Willy's husband and simply meaningless words, is a dying monologue. You can play it darker, you can play it more cheerfully, but the essence of the matter does not change much: in 1961, Beckett wrote a play about the fact that every person clings ridiculously, absurdly and hopelessly to a small life that has absolutely no meaning. According to Beckett, no consolation or salvation is supposed to be given to a person at all.

Mikhail Bychkov sweetened the absurd pill a little. In general, Mr. Bychkov is a very thorough and skillful director, one of the most accurate Russian masters (do I need to explain that this quality is very rare in our country and in its theater). I don’t know if he can stage a multi-figure Shakespearean blockbuster, but his needlework on a small stage always comes out thoughtful, reasonable and convincingly executed. To begin with, he, together with the artist Emil Kapelyush, hints to us that circumstances do matter. Winnie is not sitting in the sand, she seems to have fallen into a crack on the slope of the dehydrated earth, where the prickly, sparse stubble dries out. The eerie steel birds that fly over the ground in the prologue and finale resemble airplanes, and the rumble before the start of the action cannot but evoke associations with some kind of hostilities. However, during the performance the director has a more important and difficult task than to prove the hopelessness of the play by historical cataclysms. This task is to change the role of Vera Alentova.

It is not necessary to explain for a long time that even if the director who took on "Happy Days" is a genius, the success of the performance does not depend on him, but on the choice of the actress for the role of Vinnie. It's not about her personal charisma or scale of talent (although "Happy Days", of course, is one of those plays in which the actress cannot play everything "on the spot", a lot needs to be brought along with her name and image, so to speak, with a train roles), but in its type. Mikhail Bychkov, in full accordance with his inner attitude, at first apparently discerned an eccentric beginning in Beckett's heroine, and then recognized the same beginning in actress Vera Alentova. You know, it really happens like this: for many years some actress of social heroines plays, and plays very well, and then a person comes, shines through her with a director's X-ray - and at the premiere everyone just gasps: what a clowness almost disappeared! It also happens like this: an actor has been busy all his life over characteristic characters, and suddenly you have such a tragic power! And all because the director saw, called, convinced, opened.

The cooperation between Mikhail Bychkov and Vera Alentova is based on an agreement between smart professionals, each of whom trusted each other not recklessly, not out of frivolity or out of desperation, but with their own internal calculation. That is why you watch the performance "Happy Days" with respect. But without inspiration: there is no sense of involvement in the theatrical discovery. Vera Alentova's face has an unusually large amount of make-up, it's almost like a mask. She skillfully changes intonations - she almost wheezes, then almost squeaks in falsetto, she paints her lips with crimson lipstick and puts on a funny hat with violets, she either fogs or sharpens her eyes, she sticks out her tongue in time ... The director and actress consistently work on proof the justice of their common purpose. And only at the very end they give up: Winnie calls Willy, he hardly squeezes into her crevice, they happily hug each other in a melodramatic impulse and close themselves with an umbrella, the golden color of which suggests that in this place it would be possible to turn on something at full volume something like "autumn leaves rustle and rustle in the garden."

RG, December 27, 2005

Alena Karas

cut reed

Vera Alentova played Beckett's "Happy Days"

It was a great idea to stage "Happy Days" for Alentova - the most virtuoso and, perhaps, the most difficult role for the actress. Whether the director of the performance Mikhail Bychkov, the head of the Pushkin Theater Roman Kozak or the actress Vera Alentova became its authors - now it does not matter.

It is important that it perfectly coincided with the theatrical moment. The moment when it was time for Alentova to show her restrained virtuosity in order for the public to hear one of the most courageous and desperate texts born in the 20th century.

The play by Samuel Beckett is a complex textual, almost musical score. In order for one actress, speaking not the most melodramatic text in the world, to hold the attention of the audience for an hour and a half, she needs to have virtuoso skills. Alentova possesses it. She walked along the razor's edge almost perfectly.

Emil Kapelush built two hills on the stage, covered with long-dried cuttings of cut grass, against the background of a dazzling blue sky of eternity - a landscape too similar to that which Chekhov saw in the third act of The Cherry Orchard. Il and on the landscape of "Thoughts" by Blaise Pascal, who once called a person "a thinking reed." Isn't it from here that Kapelyush took the cut reeds with which his hills are studded?

Behind the first hill, like a puppet in a puppet theater, hidden to the very chest, sits Vinnie-Alentova. Because of the second, the humble, silent Willy (Yuri Rumyantsev) appears from time to time. Exactly like Beckett: "In the middle of the stage there is a low hillock covered with scorched grass. Simplicity and symmetry. Blinding light. In the very middle of the hillock up to the chest in the ground is Winnie. To her right, Willie is sleeping, stretched out on the ground, he is not visible from - for the hillock."

The stricter the canon, the freer creativity. The philosophy of despair turns into the strongest religious statement in "Happy Days". The similarity of Winnie, as Alentova plays her, with a doll, a puppet, is deeply connected with religious culture. After all, it is in it that a person - a creation, a creation of God - is often likened to a doll. Francis of Assisi liked to compare a person with an acrobat or a puppet, hanging upside down and completely dependent on the will of the one who hung him.

In Beckett's play, so obviously written after Nietzsche, Kierkegaard and Chekhov, inspired by Pascal's skeptical and desperate argumentation, Winnie's "puppetry" can be overlooked. Mikhail Bychkov and Alentova saw it and turned it into an exquisite and strict dance of the most diverse meanings. Here Winnie takes lipstick from his famous handbag filled with belongings: one stroke - half lips are marked with paint. And we watch in amazement as the smile drifted towards a mournful smile. But here is one more touch - and the whole lip turns red with an innocent Malvina on a white face. Thus, gesture after gesture, stroke after stroke, Alentov turns his face into a porcelain mask, into a mask of carnival, into a mask of Columbine and death, into a mask of commedia dell'arte. She has a whole wardrobe of them, and the actress uses them with such skill, as if she has been trying on a variety of theatrical traditions all her life.

So, minute by minute, the hours of her and our life are running out - in endless trifles, in ridiculous entres and somersaults on the very threshold of death. The fact that this sad carnival of dying is played out almost motionless, only with hands, eyes, lips, makes it magically attractive. Alentova-Vinny chirps merrily, brushes her teeth, swaggers and worries about Willy, and we can definitely hear the sand rustling, gradually burying her in the hill.

When the curtain opens for the second act, her chin is almost hidden in the hill. She grows into him, her voice creaks, prone to entropy, and we can definitely hear how her whole ridiculous, comical being is crying out to the blinding bright sky. Is it possible to live if there is nothing? The sadness and despair of Ecclesiastes - that's what this Winnie is. At the very end, tears begin to quietly choke Alentov, and perhaps this is the only deviation from the author's will. After all, for Winnie - every day lived in this world is a meaningless and petty day, full of humble joy. And thoughts of suicide (like smart, gloomy Willy) will never come to her flirtatious, stupid bourgeois mind. So the tears that choke Alentova are the tears of the author, forever shocked by the fact that no knowledge of the world saves from the horror of non-existence.

Izvestia, December 26, 2005

Marina Davydova

Misfortune helped Vera Alentova

At the Theatre. Pushkin staged the famous play by Samuel Beckett "Happy Days". The main role in this almost solo performance was played by Vera Alentova.

It is hard to imagine things more incompatible than actress Vera Alentova and playwright Samuel Beckett. Their obvious incompatibility, however, contains Mikhail Bychkov's main move. The well-known director, registered in Voronezh, but increasingly making forays into both Russian capitals, loves elegant concepts and genre shifts. And most importantly - he knows how to shift. This time the absurdist play of the great Irishman has been turned into a pastoral comedy. Beckett's stoicism is interpreted as worldly optimism. Or maybe not interpreted, but certainly declared by the very choice of the actress for this role.

After all, no matter where and whoever Vera Alentova plays, she still remains Katya Tikhomirova for the audience. The Oscar-winning Cinderella of Russian cinema, whose tears were believed not only by Moscow, but by all of America. This Cinderella knows for sure that patience and work will grind everything. She will suffer her feminine happiness. Paving the way to social heights. Will sort out the lentils. Overflight of the beds. Knows himself. And even without a fairy, he will be killed. Well, why do we need a fairy when the thaw is in the yard. Worldly optimism happily coincided with social optimism here. Yes, in essence, and was dictated by him.

Here is the heroine of Beckett Winnie, performed by Alentova, also does not lose heart. Life does not spoil her. She pulled it into the ground in the first act up to her chest. In the second - to the very head. But Vinnie is holding on. Rejoicing in the sun. Touched by a meeting with a bug. Induces (as long as there is something to induce) marafet. As in a well-known anecdote, slowly getting used to the earth. Nothing. Peremeletsya - flour will be. Let's put the stress on the second syllable in the word "flour"!

Alentova very well conveys the optimism of an aging woman, but still feeling like a woman. She pretends, paints her lips with a bright red bow and, waking up, pronounces praise to the Creator, doing healthy morning exercises. But this Winnie obviously does not look into that metaphysical abyss of despair that opened up before Beckett. She simply does not notice her. No sense of stopped time and darkness in which no light shines. The absurdity of life is equal to everyday difficulties that are subject to resolution and are healed by consolation. In the finale, another character of the play (Willy), almost invisible to the audience, groaning, in a plastunsky way (also, you know, life patted) will crawl and fall to his wife, who is up to her ears in the ground. And they will freeze with a blissful smile of happiness (family quiet happiness) on their lips.

Beckett should have seen how easily and elegantly his insoluble questions were resolved at the Theater. Pushkin! He is a skeptical mystic, not sure of the reality of the other world, but stubbornly desiring to make direct contact with it. A Catholic by his roots, he once said: "In times of crisis, she is no more useful than an old school tie." It's about the Bible.

"Sorrowful insensitivity", which is full of all his work, side by side with the belief in a salutary meeting with the beyond. Is it for nothing that moments so stubbornly appear in Beckett's plays that refer us to Pascal's famous "amulet" (after the death of the great philosopher and scientist, a short note on parchment was found in his clothes, in which Pascal recorded the experience of his meeting with the living God, experienced as a vision flame). Winnie now and then suddenly lights up an umbrella, which she opens over her head. Old man Krapp ("Krapp's Last Tape"), who saw a certain light a long time ago (read: experienced illumination?), tries in vain to find traces of this vision on the tapes he once recorded and cannot find it in himself. The flame flared up for a moment and died out, and everything again plunged into hopeless darkness. The flickering existence of God. The shimmering existence of the meaning of life. "Someone is looking at me," Vinnie says. And a second later: "And now he's not looking." Who could it really be? There is no need to look for an answer to this question in Mikhail Bychkov's statement. It is not about existence at all. She's about life.

If the scary world of Beckett found its embodiment in anything, it is the set design of the play. The earth's firmament squinted. There is not a single green leaf on it. Only grainless ears tremble from any breath, and the iron birds of the Apocalypse fly overhead every now and then. However, even this eschatological landscape, skillfully recreated on stage by Emil Kapelush, will not confuse our heroine. In her passionate desire for happiness - not only the optimism of Katya Tikhomirova. It still has a little bit of the optimism of another Winnie. The one who does not understand very clearly "where Piglet and I are going," but has no doubt that he will definitely reach the goal.

Newspaper, December 27, 2005

Gleb Sitkovsky

like rooted to the spot

"Happy Days" by Beckett at the branch of the Pushkin Theater

Whether the performance you are watching today is good or bad - you sometimes understand this in the very first minutes, as soon as the lights go out in the hall. "Happy Days" by Mikhail Bychkov based on the play by Beckett gives rise to a distinct premonition of good luck almost immediately, with just a glance at Vera Alentova in the role of Winnie awakened from a dream.

A well-groomed gray-haired old woman, buried in the ground to her waist, reads the morning prayer, combining it with morning exercises. Exercising the free part of the body, he moves his shoulders, rotates his head and at the same time conducts a barely noticeable, but aimed shooting with his eyes around the hall. “Our Father... Thy name... Thy kingdom... give us this day... forever and ever. Amen". Separate words of the prayer are drowned in unintelligible mutterings, while others are articulated clearly and distinctly in time with the old woman's shrug of the shoulder. This rhythmic dotted line, outlined by the director, immediately sets the pattern for the role, and the voids in Vinnie's speech turn out to be perhaps more important than all her endless verbiage. The further the performance moves, the more words the old woman forgets, naturally replacing them with all sorts of “tra-ta-ta-tam” and “tara-ra-ra”. The earth rises higher and higher to her neck, threatening to devour her whole, but the happy "tra-ta-ta-tam" will be heard from Winnie's throat until her mouth is completely clogged with clay.

Vera Alentova plays Winnie as an intelligent squeaky grandmother with two obligatory attributes that no old lady can do without - a stupid hat and a bottomless bag. Somewhere out there, beyond the hillock in which she is so thoroughly dug, is her silent and almost useless Willie (Yuri Rumyantsev), slowly cutting circles on all fours around the hill. The artist Emil Kapelyush depicted on the stage, however, not so much a hillock as the edge of some unknown abyss in the rye. Over this abyss, cereals of a frightening appearance unknown to science are earing, obscuring Winnie's head, and mechanical birds sometimes fly along an inclined trajectory. Before the beginning of the second picture, director Bychkov rhetorically inquires from the land, which is the main character of Beckett's play: “AND THEN, WHAT?” (this question will be written in block letters right on the curtain), - and she will rear up in response. Winnie is now buried up to her throat, and she can’t even reach her bag, but she can’t even shrug her shoulders, reading “Our Father”.

By whom and for what reason this woman was dug into the ground, the great Irish playwright Samuel Beckett, of course, does not give an answer. Winnie herself does not think of asking the author of "Happy Days" about this unknown reason - she is too reasonable a woman for this. In the end, we do not ask the Creator every day about the reasons for our stay on the surface of the Earth, although this, if you think about it, is no less strange than being in its depths.

All that remains for Alentova in the role of Winnie is to be happy, clutching at the days she has been given. Whether she squeaks coquettishly or wheezes when the earth grabs her throat especially hard, she looks unfailingly happy. After all, in order for your days to be happy, sometimes it’s enough just to say “tra-ta-ta-tam”, not too much hoping for an answer. Especially if you know that there, behind a hillock, your Willy lurked

Results, January 10, 2006

Marina Zayonts

Moscow believed in tears

Vera Alentova played "Happy Days" by Samuel Beckett at the Theater. Pushkin

The play of the Nobel Prize winner Irishman Samuel Beckett "Happy Days" has never been shown in Moscow. They brought them on tour, yes, but Moscow directors, even those who, after perestroika changes, showed a steady interest in Western dramaturgy of the absurd, did not dare to embody this gloomy play. At the Theatre. Pushkin it was staged by Mikhail Bychkov, a director from Voronezh, who, however, is well known to Muscovites. In recent years, his performances have been regularly participating in the Golden Mask competition, receiving prizes and approving reviews from captious metropolitan critics. In St. Petersburg, he has already released more than one performance, and in Moscow - the first. Actually, no one really doubted that this, so to speak, debut would be successful, Bychkov is one of those rare now skilled directors who are able to understand the author, reveal the actor, and clearly express their thoughts.

However, Beckett in "Happy Days" took care of everything himself, his remarks are painted strictly and in the utmost detail - a turn of the head, a smile, a gesture, a pause. The playwright wrote this incredibly powerful play about the relationship of a person (it’s tempting to write this word with a capital letter) with life, which seemed to the author to be absolutely hopeless. He placed his heroine named Winnie in scorched earth - in the first act she is in a hole up to her chest and is still able to gesticulate, in the second she is pulled inside up to her neck - and invited her to enjoy every minute bestowed from above: "After all, this is a miracle, what is it." It is on such an impossible combination of hopelessness and horror with ridiculous comedy that everything is built. There is another character in the play - Willy's husband (Yuri Rumyantsev), for the time being he hides behind another hillock and occasionally enters into a dialogue. But, of course, everything in the performance depends on the choice of the actress. Bychkov chose Vera Alentova and did not miscalculate. Moreover, in "Happy Days" the actress, whom the viewer is accustomed to seeing in the roles of victorious, optimistic, hardworking Soviet heroines, discovered a completely new quality of her talent.

Strictly speaking, Roman Kozak was the first to see her tendency to eccentricity in the play "Delusion" based on the play by Alexander Galin. Already there it was clear that Alentova was able to change roles, and the role of Winnie brilliantly confirmed this. The actress plays brilliantly. An absurd hat, crookedly painted lips with a red bow, a thin, almost shrill falsetto - all this makes her look like a clockwork doll. With learned movements, he takes out a toothbrush, an umbrella, a mirror from the bag and rejoices in all this. Then the curtain falls, on which the director wrote, as they say, the main question of life: "And then what?" And then here's what. Winnie is sitting in a hole up to his neck, there is no time for joy learned by heart. In the voice - hoarse hysterical notes, almost rebellion, protest. Death is on the doorstep. Bychkov, in essence, put everything in its place, unlike Beckett, he gave a clear answer to all questions. For happiness, after all, a person needs nothing at all, well, at least for loved ones to be alive. And the unfortunate Willy suddenly crawled out of his crevice, opened an umbrella over Vinnie's head, and tears of happiness on her face completed the job. Beckett would not approve of these tears, but our public, of course, is always ready for compassion.

NG, January 13, 2006

Olga Galakhova

Happy day

Vera Alentova boldly threw herself into the abyss of absurdity

In the Theater named after A.S. Pushkin, on the stage of the branch, the premiere of the play "Happy Days" based on the play by Samuel Beckett took place. Mikhail Bychkov, director from Voronezh, was invited to the production. The main role of Winnie in the absurdist play was brilliantly played by Vera Alentova.

In the performance of the Pushkin Theater, everything more than successfully grew together: director Mikhail Bychkov and the theater's leading actress Vera Alentova were able to understand and trust each other. And here we pay tribute to the acting courage with which the famous, eminent actress threw herself into the abyss of absurdity, parting with her image of a social heroine, so beloved in our cinema. Forget about the skills of everyday theater, in which the actress also reached heights, the detailed and thorough psychology, which, as a rule, was expressed in the performance of this actress in specific realities! Forget all previous experience, something, and not to occupy the last Alentova, and start from scratch. This, if you like, is Becketian, since there is no past in his plays, but there is a myth about the past.

Mikhail Bychkov, who has a taste for literature, little mastered by the stage, treats Beckett as the author of modern theater. And here, first of all, you need to be able to see, feel how the space will breathe in the performance. The director, together with St. Petersburg stage designer Emil Kapelyush and lighting designer Sergei Martynov, seems to increase in volume a fragment of a steep ravine or descent to a lake with reeds, which Vinnie recalls. On this mass of land, either the yellowed grass has not been cut, or the lake has dried up long ago, and the stalks scorched by the sun remained from the reeds. Suddenly, this soil will begin to move, it will suddenly be flooded with the rich blue color of a clear night, then it will be replaced by an equally intense color of moonlight, snatching out the fragile figure of Winnie, or rather, half of it, because Winnie Vera Alentova, so similar to porcelain, has grown into this soil. 50s doll. A sweet lady from a good family, with no less good upbringing and education, an exemplary and respectable wife. The performance begins with her prayer, the words of which she charmingly omits, but retains her holy mood. She performs the daily ritual of one of the happy days: she squeezes out the remnants of toothpaste, brushes her teeth, takes out glasses and a mirror from a straw bag, paints her lips with a bow, which makes her face even more defenseless. A magnifying glass appears, through which she examines with joy a living ant, rejoicing in him as a third living creature, not counting her and Willy. He dug into a hole in a ravine. It is difficult for her to see him, but she carries on her endless conversation with him, regardless of whether Vinnie hears the answer or not. Sometimes Willy can hardly get out of the den and with great difficulty overcomes the space of five meters. The role of Willy is nobly played by Yuri Rumyantsev. Beckett is a lover of couples in dramaturgy - she gives the floor, and he - the movement.

Mikhail Bychkov does not stop or change a word in the play, but the art of directing lies in the fact that Beckett's play, which was interpreted as a story about the end of the world, about two who survived after a nuclear war in order to stay to die, about the death and disappearance of a classical culture in the Pushkin performance became a love story. Winnie and Willy here became a kind of Irish Pulcheria Ivanovna and Afanasy Ivanovich. Love in Beckett, like faith, does not require proof, love arises in spite of, contrary to, across all calculated logical combinations. It is difficult for two to realize that loss awaits them ahead. Winnie talks about death, which awaits Willie, but she herself sinks deeper into the ground. In the second act, she will turn into a talking head, which will look with longing and despair at the abandoned bag, from which she cannot get a single little thing. And when Winnie is completely taken away by the earth, her things will live without her.

The happy days that go on so similarly one after another may not be so happy, but one day will be especially happy, because Vinnie, wearing his formal white suit and white bowler hat, will crawl to Willy. Together they will sing a simple song, now and then forgetting the words. God knows when was the last time Willie and Winnie sang like that. Perhaps at their wedding or at a party when they were twenty? Then, of course, they did not suspect that they would sing it again after many, many years, but only before their death. And who knows what their last hour will be like. They will leave, embracing, with a smile of deliverance from a mortal and devastating existence, they will leave together and will be happier in this than Pulcheria Ivanovna and Afanasy Ivanovich

Vedomosti, January 13, 2006

Oleg Zintsov

in the trench

Vera Alentova found that Beckett is not hopeless

Voronezh director Mikhail Bychkov managed the almost impossible. At his performance "Happy Days" in the branch of the Moscow Theater. Pushkin, you can go for art, or you can go for a cultural rest. Actress Vera Alentova, popularly loved for the film "Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears", settled down in the tragic universe of Samuel Beckett as in a hairdresser's.

Becket's Winnie is dug into the ground up to her waist in the first act, up to her neck in the second, but she does not forget to say a prayer in gratitude for each new day - “after all, what a miracle it is.” Whether this is stoicism or stupidity is not a question of interpretation; Beckett's dramaturgy does not tolerate interpretations in the usual sense at all, except perhaps in the musical one: slightly changing the score of the pauses is the maximum that a smart director can encroach on. Apart from, of course, the main and decisive factor - the choice of the heroine.

However, Mikhail Bychkov and the artist Emil Kapelyush allowed themselves something else - to emphasize Beckett's metaphor more boldly. And now Winnie stands, as if in a trench, on an oblique hillock studded with iron stems, some metal insects fly over her, and echoes of distant explosions are heard on the soundtrack. Mikhail Bychkov, of course, is far from the first to see the echo of war behind Beckett's philosophical despair, but the emphasis is characteristic: the director is more interested in the worldly side of the matter than metaphysics, and in this sense, the choice of the actress, somewhat discouraging at first glance, turned out to be accurate.

It is clear that in "Happy Days" Vera Alentova was invited to play in a completely different register, which is remembered throughout the country for her main film role - a simple woman of a difficult, but still happy fate. However, it is also clear that a new role arises from this opposition: if the public did not know how Alentova played in the film “Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears”, the effect would not be the same.

But since we remember her Katya Tikhomirov, now we simply have to be amazed - after all, what a miracle it is! A kilogram of make-up, deliberately theatrical, on the verge of eccentricity, intonations: either an almost puppet voice, or a strangled “tragic” wheezing, and the share of coquetry always carefully measured for the heroine - this Winnie wandered into the Becket story not from life, but not from the puppet theater, but more like a soap opera. In other words, from the reality where, as most of the public believes, almost all famous actors live.

Some strange and hardly conceived by the director sense dawns in this, re-illuminating the metaphysics of the play, it would seem, completely cleaned out of the performance. And Vinnie's remarks about how useful it is to laugh at God's petty jokes, especially flat ones, and remarks after a pause: "Someone is looking at me ... but now they are not looking" begin to seem like a variation on the question that was no longer asked by Samuel Beckett, but by writers next era.

I wonder if he watches TV?

Theatergoer, February 2006

Alla Shenderova

woman in the sand

Vera Alentova played in the play by Samuel Beckett. There is already a spark of absurdity in the combination of names: the actress of the Russian realistic school, whose tears Moscow and Russia have long and recklessly believed, plays the heroine of the great absurdist, who avoided realism like hell incense.

The role of Winnie in Beckett's play "Happy Days" was offered to Alentova by Mikhail Bychkov, a director from Voronezh, whose performances are boring, but sound, for which they are nominated for the Golden Mask almost every year. It could be expected that in Moscow Bychkov would stage a performance that did not aspire to transcendental heights, but stood firmly on its feet. All this would have been so if the director had not chosen Beckett's play for the capital's debut. She has practically no Russian stage history. Somewhere in the 80s, Anatoly Vasilyev was going to stage “Oh, wonderful days” (the title is translated differently), and the role of Winnie was supposed to be played by the most European of our stars - Alla Demidova, but the project did not take place. In 1996, Moscow saw this play staged by Peter Brook - a performance that amazed not so much with the performance of Natasha Parry, but with the perfect accuracy of every detail, every gesture, color, light ...

For his performance on the Small Stage of the Pushkin Theatre, Bychkov borrowed this attention to detail from Brook, and the artist Emil Kapelyush borrowed some of the design. On a brightly lit sloping stage, a mound is poured in which a woman is buried up to her chest. Vera Alentova diligently plays out every movement prescribed by the playwright - waking up, Winnie thanks the Lord for a new happy day, and then does countless things: brushes his teeth, tints his lips, puts on his hat, rummages in his bag, opens his umbrella, never ceasing to chirp coquettishly with her husband. Resembling a huge insect, Willy (Yuri Rumyantsev) crawls behind a nearby hillock. "Answer me, dear! How are you, honey? Look, do not burn, dear! .. ”- Winnie does not let up. Disguised as an elderly clowness (a gray shaggy wig, heart-shaped lips, a puppet voice), Alentova at first very accurately, rhythmically and in detail, does everything necessary. The danger lies precisely in this detail: her actions are too specific and are not strung by the director on any rod other than everyday life. This Winnie doesn't fuss to distract herself from terrible thoughts, and she doesn't chirp because she's afraid of being alone. She just fusses and chirps.

In the second picture, Vinnie appears before the audience, immersed in the ground up to his neck. There is no appraisal in Beckett's text - the heroine does not talk about her situation and does not talk about what awaits her next. Bychkov, on the other hand, writes the words “And then what?” on the curtain and leaves the actress to play the physiology of a woman buried alive in the ground. That is, Alentova abruptly changes her flirtatious voice to a tragic moan. We call this moan a song. Winnie wheezes, wheezes and no longer resembles Beckett's character, but the criminal buried in the pit from Alexei Tolstoy's novel Peter the Great. The zealousness of the noblewoman Morozova appears in the intonations, and a tear glistens in her eyes. The absurdist text begins to play according to the school of experience - with the need to suffer and squeeze a tear out of the viewer. The actress Alentova is highly professional, so in the finale, when Willy crawls up to Winnie and tries in vain to lower her head to where her chest was recently, the audience rustles together with paper handkerchiefs. But this performance gives rise to the same feeling as the questions of meticulous schoolchildren, who find out why the three sisters cannot get on the train and come to Moscow, and Ranevskaya - to hand over the Cherry Orchard to dachas.

Probably Beckett himself would have had fun with such an approach - it is not for nothing that a passer-by is mentioned in his play asking why Willie does not take a shovel and dig up his wife. Winnie laughs heartily at him. She knows that she is not sinking in sand or in a swamp. It sinks in that you can’t feel it with your hands and try it on the tooth. From whose captivity one cannot be freed, one can only thank God for each new day. Life is not called, but existence.

Oh les beaux jours / Happy Days by Samuel Beckett (1961)

Translation from English by L. Bespalov

Characters

Winnie- a woman in her fifties

Willy- a man in his sixties

Act one

In the middle of the stage is a low hill covered with scorched grass. Smooth slopes to the hall, to the right and to the left. Behind a steep cliff to the platform. Ultimate simplicity and symmetry. Blinding light. The extremely pompous realistic backdrop depicts the uncultivated plain and the sky converging on the horizon. In the very middle of the mound up to the chest in the ground is Winnie. Nearly fifty, well-preserved, preferably blonde, in body, arms and shoulders bare, low neckline, full breasts, string of pearls. She sleeps with her hands on the ground in front of her, her head in her hands. To her left on the ground is a roomy black utility bag, to the right is a folding umbrella, a handle bent by a beak protrudes from its folds. To the right of her, Willy is sleeping, stretched out on the ground, he is not visible because of the hillock. Long pause. The bell rings piercingly, for, say, ten seconds, and stops. She doesn't move. Pause. The bell rings even more piercingly, for, say, five seconds. She wakes up. The call is silent. She raises her head, looks into the room. Long pause. He stretches, rests his hands on the ground, throws back his head, looks at the sky. Long pause.

Winnie (looks at the sky). And again the day will be outstanding. (Pause. She lowers her head, looks out into the audience, pause. She folds her arms, raises her to her chest, closes her eyes. Her lips move in inaudible prayer for, say, ten seconds. They stop moving. Her hands are still at her chest. In a whisper.) In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, amen! (Opens her eyes, lowers her hands, puts them on the hillock. Pause. Brings her hands to her chest again, closes her eyes, and again her lips move in inaudible prayer for, say, five seconds. In a whisper.) Forever and ever amen! (Opens his eyes, puts his hands on the hillock again. Pause.) Go ahead Vinnie. (Pause.) Start your day, Vinnie. (Pause. Turns to the bag without moving it, rummages in it, takes out a toothbrush, rummages again, takes out a flat tube of toothpaste, turns his head to the audience again, unscrews the cap, puts the cap on the ground, with difficulty squeezes a drop of toothpaste onto brush, holding a tube in one hand, brushing her teeth with the other. Shamefully turns away, spits back over a hillock. Her gaze lingers on Willy. She spits. She leans back even more. Loudly.) Hey! (Pause. Even louder.) Hey! (With a gentle smile, he turns back to the audience, puts down the brush.) Poor Willy - (looks at the tube, smiles gone)- ends - (looks for a cap)- anyway - (finds a cap)- do not write anything - (screw cap on)- things grow old, they come to an end - (puts tube down)- here she came - (turns to bag)- nothing to do about - (digging in bag)- can't help you - (takes out a mirror, turns to the audience)- well, yes - (looks at teeth in mirror)- poor Willy - (feels upper teeth with finger, unintelligible)- God! - (pulls up upper lip, looks at gums, also unintelligible)- My God! - (turns lip away to one side, mouth open, exactly the same)- anyway - (on the other hand, exactly the same)- no worse - (releases his lip, in a normal voice)- no worse and no better - (puts down the mirror)- no change - (wipes fingers on grass)- without pain - (looks for a brush)- you can say almost without - (takes a brush)- what a miracle - (looks at brush handle)- what could be better - - Real… what? - (pause)- what? - (puts down brush)- well, yes - (turns to bag)- poor Willy - (digging in bag)- it has no taste - (digs)- to nothing - (pulls out glasses in case)- no interest - (turns back to the room)- to life - (takes glasses out of case)- my poor Willy - (puts down case)- sleeps forever - (pulls back temples)- amazing ability - (puts on glasses)- nothing could be better - (looks for a brush)- in my opinion - (takes a brush)- always thought so - (looks at brush handle)- I would like that - (looks at pen, reads)- real ... no fake ... what? - (puts down brush)- and there you go completely blind - (takes off glasses)- anyway - (sets aside points)- and so many - (climbs into the cutout for a scarf)- saw - (takes out a folded handkerchief)- in my time - (shakes handkerchief)- marvelous lines, how is it there? - (wipes one eye). When my time has passed (wipes another)- and that one - my rolled up there ... - (looking for glasses)- that's it - (takes glasses)- what happened, it happened, I wouldn’t refuse anything - (wipes glasses, breathes on glasses)- maybe she refused? - (wipes)- pure light - (wipes)- emerge from the darkness - (wipes)- underground baked light. (Stops wiping his glasses, raises his face to the sky, pause, lowers his head, starts wiping his glasses again, stops wiping, bends back and to the right.) Hey! (Pause. With a gentle smile, he turns to the audience and again begins to wipe his glasses. The smile is gone.) Amazing ability - (stops wiping, puts glasses away)- I would like that - (folds handkerchief)- anyway - (puts handkerchief in neckline)- a sin to complain - (looking for glasses)- that's not, - (takes glasses)- no need to complain (brings glasses to his eyes, looks into one glass)- you have to be grateful: so many good things - (looks into another glass)- without pain - (puts on glasses)- one might say, almost without - (looks for a toothbrush)- what a miracle - (takes a brush)- what could be better - (looks at brush handle)- except that the head sometimes aches - (looks at pen, reads)- real ... no fake, natural ... what? - (brings brush closer to eyes)- real, not fake - (Pulls out a handkerchief from behind the neckline.)- well, yes - (shakes handkerchief)- sometimes, a mild migraine pesters - (wipes brush handle)- grab - (wipes)- let go - (wipes automatically)- well, yes - (wipes)- great mercy to me - (wipes)- truly great - (stops rubbing, stopped, distant look, in a dead voice)- and prayers may not be in vain - (pause, exactly the same)- in the morning - (pause, same)- for the coming dream - (lowers his head, starts wiping his spectacles again, stops wiping, raises his head, calms down, wipes his eyes, folds his handkerchief, puts it back behind the neckline, peers into the handle of the brush, reads)- real, not fake ... natural - (brings closer to eyes)- natural... (takes off glasses, puts away glasses and brush, looks straight ahead). Things get old. (Pause.) Eyes age. (Long pause.) Come on Vinnie. (She looks around, her eyes fall on the umbrella, she examines it for a long time, picks it up, pulls out a handle from the folds of incredible length. Holding the tip of the umbrella with her right hand, bends back and to the right, leans over Willie.) Hey! (Pause.) Willy! (Pause.) Remarkable ability. (Strikes him with the handle of an umbrella.) I would like that. (Strikes again.)

The umbrella slips from her hand, falls behind a hillock. Willy's invisible hand immediately brings him back.

Thank you, little one. (She shifts the umbrella to her left hand, turns to the audience, examines her right palm.) Wet. (He takes the umbrella again in his right hand, examines his left palm.) Well, okay, well, at least not worse. (Throws her head, joyfully.) No worse, no better, no change. (Pause. Exactly the same.) Without pain. (He leans back to look at Willy, as before, holding the tip of the umbrella.) Please don't fall asleep, honey, I might need you. (Pause.) Nothing in a hurry, just don't curl up like you have in the factory. (Turns towards the hall, puts down the umbrella, examines both palms at once, wipes them on the grass.) And yet the view is not the same. (He turns to the bag, rummages in it, takes out a revolver, raises it to his lips, kisses it briefly, puts it back in the bag, rummages, takes out an almost empty bottle of red potion, turns to the audience, looks for glasses, lifts, reads the label.) Loss of spirit... loss of interest in life... loss of appetite... newborns... children... adults... six tablespoons... daily - (throws head, smile)- if you approach with old standards - (smile as if never happened, lowers his head, reads.)“Daily…before and after…meals…gives instant… (brings closer to eyes)… improvement". (Takes off, puts glasses away, moves hand with bottle to see how much is left, unscrews the cork, tilting his head back, empties, throws the cork and bottle away over the hill towards Willy.)

Samuel Beckett

Happy Days

Translation by Natalia Sannikova

Characters:

Winnie, about fifty years old

Willy, about sixty

Act one

In the middle of a space covered with scorched grass, a small round hill rises. The slopes of the hill are gentle in front and on the sides. Behind the slope steeply descends to the stage. Maximum simplicity and symmetry.

Blinding light.

A banal, realistically painted backdrop depicts a cloudless sky and a bare plain, which merge somewhere in the distance.

In the center of the hill, buried in it just above the waist - Winnie. Fifty years old, well preserved, preferably blonde, plump, arms and shoulders bare, open bodice, large breasts, string of pearls. She sleeps with her head resting on her hands, which are resting on a hill. On the left next to her is a large black bag, like a shopping bag, on the right is a folding (and folded) sun umbrella with a protruding curved handle.

Behind her on the right behind the hill, stretched out on the ground, Willie sleeps.

Long pause. There is a sharp call; five seconds, and the call stops. Vinnie doesn't move. The bell rings again, even sharper, three seconds. Vinnie wakes up. The call is silenced. She raises her head, looks ahead. Long pause. She straightens up, rests on the hill with her hands, throws her head back and looks up. Long pause.

WINNIE (looking up). - Another divine day. (Pause. She returns her head to her normal position, looks straight ahead. Pause. Folds her arms, brings her to her chest, closes her eyes. Inaudible prayer makes her lips move for about five seconds. Then her lips stop moving, her hands remain folded. In a whisper.) Jesus Christ. Amen. (She opens her eyes, separates her hands, leans on the hill. Pause. She joins her hands again, brings them to her chest again. Silent prayer makes her lips move again, three seconds. In a whisper.) Till the end of time. Amen. (She opens her eyes, separates her hands, leans on the hill. Pause.) Go ahead Vinnie. (Pause.) Start a new day, Vinnie. (Pause. She turns to the bag, rummages in it without moving, takes out a toothbrush from it, rummages again, takes out a flattened tube of toothpaste, turns to face the audience, unscrews the cap, puts it on a hill, squeezes it onto the brush with some difficulty some toothpaste, tube in one hand, brushing her teeth with the other. Shamefully turns away, leaning back to the right to spit over the hill. So Willy is in front of her eyes. She spits, then leans a little lower.) Ay! (Pause. Louder.) Whoa! (Pause. When she turns to face the audience, there is a gentle smile on her face.) Poor Willy - (she looks at the tube, the smile disappears from her face)- will end soon - (looks for a tube cap)- eventually - (takes cap)- nothing to do about - (twist the cap)- Another - (puts tube down)- little misfortune - (turns to bag)- irreparable - (digging in bag)- at all - (takes out a mirror, turns to face the audience)- ah, well, yes - (looks at teeth in mirror)- poor dear Willy - (touches upper incisors with thumb, slurs)- Lord Almighty! - (raises upper lip to check gums, also indistinct)- Hold on! - (pulls back one corner of the mouth, mouth open, also indistinct)- eventually - (other corner of mouth, also indistinct)- didn't get any worse (stops inspection, normal voice)- neither better nor worse - (puts down a mirror)- no changes (wipes fingers on grass)- and no pain - (looks for a toothbrush)- nearly - (takes a brush)- wonderful thing - (looks at brush)- irreplaceable... absolutely - (looks at the brush, reads)- about what? - (pause)- what? - (puts down brush)- ah, well, yes - (turns to bag)- poor Willy - (digging in bag)- no interest - (digs)- to the environment - (takes out glasses case)- no purpose - (turns to face the room)- in life - (takes glasses out of case)- poor dear Willy - (puts down case)- only sleep and knows how -

CHARACTERS:

VINNIE, a woman in her fifties
WILLY, a man in his sixties

STEP 1

A field covered with burnt-out grass, the center of which rises as a low hill. The front and side slopes are gentle. Rear - cuts off abruptly to stage level. Maximum simplicity and symmetry.

Dazzling light.

A very unpretentious backdrop depicts the boundless plain and the sky, merging in the distance.

In the very center of the hill is WINNIE, who has grown into it just above the waist. She is in her fifties, well-preserved, preferably blonde, plump, arms and shoulders bare, low bodice, voluminous bust, string of pearls. She sleeps with her hands under her head. To her left on the ground is a capacious black bag, like a shopping bag, to the right is a closed folding umbrella, a hooked handle sticks out of the case.

Behind her, on the right, hidden by the hill, WILLY sleeps on the ground.

Long pause. The bell rattles piercingly - for, say, ten seconds, it stops. WINNIE doesn't move. The ringing becomes more and more piercing, for, say, five seconds. She wakes up. The call is silent. She lifts her head, looks ahead. Long pause. He straightens up, puts his hands flat on the ground, throws back his head and looks straight up.

Long pause.

WINNIE (looking up): Today is another great day. (Pause. Lowers her head, looks into the audience, pause. Folds her arms over her chest, closes her eyes. Her lips move, she prays inaudibly for, say, ten seconds. Her lips fall silent. Her hands are still clenched. In the name of Our Lord, Jesus Christ. Amen. (Opens his eyes, unclenches his hands, lowers them to the hill. Pause. Folds his arms over his chest again, closes his eyes, lips moving inaudibly again for, say, five seconds. Quietly.) Eternal peace. Amen. (Opens eyes, unclenches his hands, returns them to the ground. Pause.) Go ahead, Vinnie. (Pause) Start your day, Vinnie. (Pause. Turns to the bag, rummages without moving it, takes out a toothbrush, rummages again, takes out a flattened tube of paste, turns to the audience, unscrews the cap, puts it on the ground, squeezes some paste onto the brush with some difficulty; one one hand holds a tube, the other brushes her teeth. She slowly turns back to the right to spit. In this position, her eyes rest on WILLIE. She spits. She tries to look further away. Loudly.) Hey-hey! (Pause. Louder.) Hey! (Pause. With a gentle smile, turns to the audience, puts down the brush) Poor Willy - (examines the tube, the smile disappears) - is about to run out - (looks for the cap) - okay - (finds the cap) - there's nothing to be done - (screws the cap on ) - old rubbish - (puts down the tube) - and this is also rubbish - (turns to the bag) - no medicines will help here - (rummages in the bag) - no medicines. - (takes out a mirror, turns to the audience) - oh, yes - (examines his teeth in the mirror) - poor old Willy - (he tries his upper front teeth with his thumb, indistinctly) - My God! - (pulls back his upper lip to examine the gums, just as indistinctly) - Lord! - (pulling back the corner of the mouth, mouth open, equally indistinct) - okay - (another angle, equally indistinct) - no deterioration - (leaves examination, in normal voice) - no improvement, no deterioration - (puts down the mirror) - no change - (wipes fingers on grass) - no suffering - (looks for brush) - almost - (takes it) - excellent thing - (examines brush handle) - irreplaceable - (examines handle, reads) - clean... what? - (pause) - what? - (puts brush down) - oh, yes - (turns to bag) - poor Willy - (rummages in bag) - no taste - (rummages) - nothing - (takes out glasses in case) - no interest - (turns to audience) ) - to life - (takes glasses out of case) - poor old Willy - (puts down case) - sleeps all the time - (opens glasses) - wonderful gift - (puts on glasses) - no need to touch it - (looks for a brush) - in my opinion - (takes a brush) - she always said this - (examines the handle of the brush) - I would like this - (examines the handle, reads) - natural. .. clean... what? - (puts down the brush) - soon I’ll be completely blind - (takes off his glasses) - okay - (puts down his glasses) - enough, I’ve seen enough - (looks for a handkerchief in the neckline) - it seems - (takes out a folded handkerchief) - in his lifetime - (shakes the handkerchief) - where these wonderful lines come from - (wipes one eye) - woe to me, woe! - (wipes another) - to see what I saw - (looks for glasses) - oh, yes - (takes glasses) - and I won't even notice - (starts to wipe glasses, breathes on them) - or will I notice? - (rubs) - the light of God - (wipes) - lights in the darkness - (wipes) - terrible flashes. (Finishes wiping, raises face to sky, pause, lowers head, wiping again, stops wiping, arches back to right) Hey! (Pause. With a gentle smile, she turns into the hall and wipes again. Stops smiling) - A wonderful gift - (she finishes wiping, puts her glasses on) - that’s how I would do it - (folds the handkerchief) - okay - (removes the handkerchief in the neckline) - I can’t complain - (looking for glasses) - no, no, - (takes glasses) - it's a sin to complain - (raises glasses, looks through the lens) - there is something to say thank you for - (looks through another lens) - no suffering - (puts on glasses) - almost - (looking for a brush) - a great thing - (takes a brush) - irreplaceable - (examines the handle of the brush) - sometimes my head hurts - (examines the handle, reads) - a guarantee ... natural ... clean ... what? - (looks more carefully) - natural clean ... - (takes out a handkerchief from the neckline) - oh yes - (shakes the handkerchief) - only occasionally a slight migraine - (starts rubbing the brush handle) - hurts - (rubs) - and stops - (mechanically wiping) - oh yes - (wiping) - so much happiness - (wiping) - real happiness - (finishes wiping, with a fixed, lost look, abruptly) - maybe prayers are not in vain - (pause, equally abruptly) - so - ( pause, just as abruptly) - that's all - (lowers his head, wipes again, finishes wiping, raises his head, calmly wipes his eyes, folds his handkerchief, puts it away in the neckline, examines the handle of the brush, reads) - full guarantee ... natural pure ... - (looks more carefully) - natural pure ... (Takes off his glasses, puts them and the brush aside, looks in front of him). Old trash. (Pause) Old eyes. (Long pause) Wake up, Vinnie. (Looks around, notices an umbrella, looks at it for a long time, picks it up and pulls out a handle of incredible length from the case. Taking the umbrella in his right hand, leans back to the right and hangs over WILLY). Hey hey! (Pause) Willie! (Pause) A wonderful gift. (She pushes him with the tip of her umbrella) I wish I could. (He pushes again. The umbrella slips out of his hands and falls over the hill. WILLY's invisible hand immediately returns it) Thank you, honey. (He grabs the umbrella with his left hand, turns into the hall and examines his right palm) Wet. (He again takes the umbrella in his right hand, examines his left palm). No deterioration. (Understood head, cheerfully) No improvement, no deterioration, no change. (Pause. Just as cheerfully.) No suffering. (He leans back to look at WILLY, umbrella still holding the handle.) Kindly, honey, don't leave me, please, I might need you. (Pause). Don't rush, don't rush, don't make faces. (Turns forward, puts down umbrella, examines both palms, wipes them on the grass) The paint still seems to be fading. (Turns to the bag, rummages in it, takes out the revolver, picks it up, kisses it hastily, puts it in the bag, rummages, takes out an almost empty bottle of red medicine, turns forward, looks for glasses, puts them on, reads the label. (Lost spirit ... lethargy... lack of appetite... infants... adolescents... adults... regularly six... tablespoons a day - (raises head, smiling) - as in the old days! - (smile disappears, lowers his head, reads) - on the day ... before and after ... meals ... instant ... (looks more carefully) ... improvement. how much is in it, unscrews the cap, throws his head back, swallows in one gulp, throws the cap with the vial in the direction of WILLIE. The sound of breaking glass) That's better! (looks for glasses) Oh yes (puts on glasses, looks for a mirror) It's a sin to complain. asit lips) Where does this amazing line come from? (Paints lips) Oh, transient joy - (paints lips) - Oh, ta-ta-ta, eternal sadness. (Makes her lips. WILLY stirs to distract her. She sits up. She lowers her lipstick and mirror and arches to look at him. Pause. WILLY's bald head appears and freezes from behind the slope, bleeding in a trickle. WINNIE pushes his glasses up on his forehead. Pause (WILLY's hand appears, covers his head with a handkerchief, disappears. Pause. A hand appears and dapperly sideways puts a boater with club tape on his head, disappears. Pause. WINNIE arches even more.) Honey, pull on your underpants before you get burned. (Pause) No? (Pause) Ah, I see, you still have that ointment. (Pause) Give it a good rub, honey. (Pause) Now on the other side. (Pause. She turns forward, fixes her gaze in front of her. With a happy expression) It seems that today will again be a glorious day! (Pause. The look of happiness fades. She lowers her glasses from her forehead, and resumes painting her lips. WILLY unfolds the newspaper, his hands are not visible. Yellow edges of the newspaper appear on both sides of his head. WINNIE finishes painting his lips, examines them in the mirror, slightly pushing it back aside.) Raspberry. (WILLY turns the page. WINNIE puts down lipstick and mirror, turns to bag). Light. (WILLY turns the page. WINNIE rummages in his bag, pulls out a fussy brimless hat with a wrinkled feather, turns around, straightens the hat, smoothes the feather, raises the hat to his head, but the moment WILLY reads, he freezes.

WILLY: His Eminence The Holy Father Dr. Carolus Hunter has fallen asleep in the Bose.

Pause.

WINNIE (staring ahead, hat in hand, in a tone of ardent remembrance): Charlie Hunter! (Pause) I close my eyes - (takes off glasses and closes eyes, hat in one hand, glasses in the other, WILLY turns the page) - and I'm sitting on his lap again, in Borough Green's beech garden. (Pause. Opens his eyes, puts on his glasses, twirls his hat) Ah, wonderful memories! (Pause. She raises her hat to her head, but the moment WILLIE reads it, she freezes.)

WILLY. Graceful youth emerges.

Pause. She raises her hat to her head, but freezes, takes off her glasses, peers intently ahead, hat in one hand, glasses in the other.

WINNIE: My first ball! (Long pause) My second ball! (Long pause. Closes eyes.) My first kiss! (Pause. WILLY turns the page. WINNIE opens his eyes.) A certain Mr. Johnson, or Johnston, or perhaps it would be better to say Johnston. Lush mustache, yellow-yellow. (Respectfully) Almost red! (Pause) In the back shed, I don't know which one. We didn’t have a barn, and he probably didn’t either. (Closes eyes) I see piles of pots. (Pause) Bunches of bast. (Pause) Thick shadows under the beams.

Pause. She opens her eyes, puts on her glasses, raises her hat to her head, but at the moment when WILLY reads, she freezes.

WILLY: Quick little boy needed.

Pause. WINNIE hastily puts on his hat, looks for a mirror. WILLY turns the page. WINNIE takes a mirror, examines the hat, puts the mirror down, turns to the bag. The newspaper disappears. WINNIE rummages through his bag, takes out a magnifying glass, turns forward, looking for a toothbrush. The newspaper reappears folded and starts fanning WILLIE's face, his hand is not visible. WINNIE picks up the brush and examines its handle through a magnifying glass.

WINNIE: Full guarantee... (WILLY stops fanning)... natural pure... (Pause. WILLY starts fanning himself with newspaper again. WINNIE peers more carefully, reads). Full guarantee... (WILLY stops fanning himself) ... natural clean... (Pause. WILLY waves newspaper again, WINNIE shifts glass and brush, removes handkerchief from neckline, removes and wipes glasses, puts on glasses, looks for glass, picks up and wipes the glass, puts the glass down, looks for the brush, picks up the brush and wipes the handle, puts down the brush, puts away the handkerchief in the neckline, looks for the glass, lifts the glass, looks for the brush, picks up the brush and examines the pen through the glass) Full guarantee... (WILLY stops fanning himself) )... natural clean... (Pause. WILLY fanning himself again)... pork (WILLY stops fanning, pause)... stubble. (Pause. WINNIE puts down the glass and the brush, the newspaper disappears, WINNIE takes off his glasses, puts them down, stares ahead.) From the bristles of the boar. (Pause) This is exactly what, in my opinion, and it is wonderful that a day does not pass - (with a smile) - as they used to say in the old days - (smile away) - every day, something new is added to knowledge, let even the most trifling, if, of course, work hard. (WILLY's hand reappears with a card, which he examines, bringing it to his eyes). And if for some reason nothing can be done, then you just close your eyes - (closes your eyes) - wait until the day comes - (opens your eyes) - a joyful day, when even the body melts at such a temperature, and the moonlit night is such that you cannot count the hours . (Pause) This, in my opinion, is very comforting when you lose heart and take envy for this beast. (Turning to WILLY) I hope you understand - (sees the card, leans down). What do you have there, Willy, let me see? (She holds out her hand and WILLY passes the card to her. A hairy forearm appears over the slope, raised in a falling gesture, and remains in this position until the card returns. WINNIE turns forward and examines the card) God, what a come! (She looks for glasses, puts them on and examines the card) This is the most natural obscenity! (Looks at the card) Any decent person would be sick of this! (WILLY fingers impatiently. She looks for the glass, picks it up and examines the card through the glass. Long pause.) What, I wonder, is that creature in the background doing, in his opinion? (Looks closer) Oh, no, how can you! (Fingers show impatience. Last long breath. She lays down the glass, takes the card by the edge with the index finger and thumb of the right hand, turns her head away, pinches her nose with the index and thumb of the left hand) Fu! (Drops the card) Put it away! (WILLY's hand disappears. But then his brush appears, with a card. WINNIE takes off his glasses, puts them away, stares intently ahead. Throughout the rest, WILLY continues to enjoy the card, changing angles of view and distance). From the bristles of a boar. (With a puzzled expression). What is a hog specifically? (Pause. Still puzzled expression) I know the pig, of course, but the boar... (The puzzled expression disappears). Well, what's the difference, I always said it, you'll remember it yourself, this, in my opinion, is wonderful, everything is remembered by itself. (Pause). Is that all? (Pause) No, not all of them. (with a smile) No, no. (Smile fades) Not really. (Pause) Just a part. (BEAT) Rising out of the blue one day. (Pause) That's what I think is great. (Pause. She turns to the bag. The hand holding the card disappears. She starts rummaging through the bag, but freezes) No. (She turns forward. Smiling) No, no. (Smile fades) Take it easy, Vinnie. (She stares ahead. WILLIE's hand reappears, takes off his hat and disappears with it) What then? (A hand reappears, removes the handkerchief from his head and disappears with it. Sharply, as if he does not notice it) Winnie! (WILLY tilts his head so that it is not visible). Where is the exit? (Pause) Where are you- (WILLY blows his nose loudly and long, no head or hands visible. She turns to look at him. The head reappears. Pause. The hand reappears, covers the head with a handkerchief, disappears. Pause. The hand reappears and puts a boater on his head dapperly on one side, disappears (pause). I'd rather not wake you up. (She turns forward. To enliven the ensuing scene, she continually nibbles grass and jerks her head up and down.) Yes, if only I could bear the loneliness, that is, when you talk and talk and no one hears. (Pause). No, I do not flatter myself with the hope that you, Willy, hear a lot, no, God forbid. (Pause) There are days when you don't hear a thing. (Pause) But there are days when you answer. (Pause). So, I can always say, even when you don’t answer, and maybe you don’t even hear anything: someone still hears something, I don’t talk to myself, that is, into the void - I couldn’t bear it - even a little bit. (Pause) That, in my opinion, is what gives me the strength to continue, to continue talking, of course. (Pause) And if you died - (smile) - as they used to say - (smile fades) - left me forever, then what would I do, what would I be able to do, all day, I mean, from the morning call before evening? (Pause) I would just stare ahead with pursed lips. (Long pause while she does this. Leaves the grass alone.) And while I breathe, not a single word, nothing will break the local silence. (Pause) Maybe you'll just die from time to time on the mirror. (Pause) Or a short... burst of laughter if you happen to remember some old joke. (Pause. A smile appears, it widens and seems about to turn into laughter, when suddenly it is replaced by an expression of alarm). Hair! (Pause) Did I comb my hair today? (Pause) Quite possibly. (Pause). After all, I usually comb my hair. (Pause) There's so little you can do. (Pause) You do everything. (Pause) Whatever you can. (Pause. That's the whole man. (Pause) Human nature. (She starts looking at the hill, looks up.) Human weakness. (She resumes looking at the hill, looks up.) Natural weakness. (She resumes looking at the hill). combs. (Looks around) No hairbrush. (Looks up. Concern on her face. She turns to her bag, rummages in it.) Ah, here's the comb. and a brush. (Looks ahead, with a worried face) I must have put them in place after using them. (Pause. With the same concern.) But I usually don’t put things in their place, no, at the end of the day I clean everything together. (Smiling) Like they used to say in the old days. (Pause) Good old time. (Smile fades) And yet... I kind of... remember... (With sudden nonchalance) Okay, what's the difference, I always said, I'll just comb them later, simple and neat, I have a whole ... (Pause. Puzzled) Comb? (Pause) Or comb it? (Pause) Comb it? (Pause) Sounds weird. (Pause. Turning slightly to WILLY.) What do you say, Willy? (Pause. Turning around a little more) What do you say about your hair, Willy, comb it or comb it? (Pause) Head hair, of course. (Pause. Still turning around.) Head hair, Willie, what do you say about the hair on your head, comb it or comb it?

long pause

WILLY: Comb it.

WINNIE (turning around in the hall, joyfully). So today you will talk to me, what a glorious day it will be! (Pause. No joy) Another glorious day. (Pause) Okay, so what am I talking about, hair, yes, later, and thank you for that. (Pause) - On me - (raises his hands to the hat) - yes, the hat is on me - (lowers his hands) - now I can’t take it off. (Pause) Come to think of it, sometimes you can't take off your hat, even if your whole life is at stake. You can't put it on, you can't take it off. (Pause). How many times did she say: Put on your hat now, Vinnie, it doesn’t cost you anything, or take off your hat, Vinnie, be smart, you’ll feel better, and did nothing. (Pause) I couldn't. (Pause. She understands her hand, releases a strand of hair from under her hat, brings it to her eye, looks askance at her, lets go, her hand falls). You called them golden on the day when the last guests left - (the hand is raised, as if there is a glass in it) - for your golden ... let it never ... (voice breaks) ... let it never ... ( Hand goes down. Head too. Pause. Quietly.) On that day. (Pause. Still quiet.) What day? (Pause. Raises his head. In a normal voice) Now what? (Pause) There are no words, it happens, even they are not, words. (Slightly turning to WILLY). Isn't that right, Willie? (Pause. Turning a little more.) Isn't that right, Willie, because sometimes there aren't even words? (Pause. Facing forward) what then to do until you find them, words? Combing your hair when it's not combed yet, or you're not sure about it, cutting your nails when they need to be cut - all this helps to survive. (Pause) That's the whole point. (Pause) Just this. (Pause) That's it, in my opinion, and it's wonderful that not a day goes by - (smiling) - as they used to say in the old days - (smile disappears) - so that nothing bad happens - (WILLY breaks over the hill, his head disappears, WINNIE turns around at the noise) - no good. (Tries to see what happened.) Willy, crawl into the hole, you've shown yourself enough. (Pause) Willie, do as they say, don't lie in that devilish sun, climb into the hole. (pause) Come on, Willy. (Invisible WILLY starts crawling to the left, towards the hole) Well done. (She follows his progress). Yes, not with your head, fool, how will you turn around? (Pause) So, so... that's right... around... so... now climb. (Pause) I know, honey, it's not easy to crawl backwards, but then it will be more comfortable. (Pause) You forgot the Vaseline. (She watches him crawl for Vaseline.) Lid! (Watches how he crawls back to the hole. With irritation) Yes, not with his head, they tell you! (Pause) More to the right. (Pause) To the right, I said. (Pause. Annoyed) Put your butt down, well! (Pause) Yes. (Pause) Finally! (All these instructions loudly. Now in a normal voice, still turning towards him) Do you hear me? (Pause) Willie, I'm begging you, just yes or no, you hear, just yes or don't say anything.

Pause

WILLY. Yes.

WINNIE (turning forward, in the same voice) Now?

WILLY (annoyed): Yes.

WINNIE (a little quieter): And now?

WILLY (more annoyed): Yes.

WINNIE (even quieter): And now? (Slightly louder) And now?

WILLY (violently): Yes!

WILLY (annoyed): Yes.

WILLY (more annoyed): Don't be afraid anymore.

Pause

WILLY (violently): Don't be afraid anymore!

WINNIE (normal voice, patter). The Lord is with you, Willie, I really feel your kindness, I know what kind of work it costs you, now you rest, I will not bother you until it is necessary, that is, until my resources run out, which is unlikely to happen , and even then only to know that you are supposed to hear me, even if you really don’t - that’s all I need, just to feel that you are here and, right, you’re not sleeping - that’s all I pray; I will not say anything unpleasant, nothing that can hurt you, I will not talk about an unknown hope that torments me somewhere here. (Pauses, sighs) It seems. (He puts his index and ring fingers to his heart, rotates them, stops) Here. (Moves them a little) Somewhere. (Removes hand) Surely there will come a time when, before I say a word, I will have to make sure that you have heard the previous one, and then, of course, there will come another, another time when I will have to learn to talk to myself - such an emptiness I never could endure. (Pause) Or, pursing your lips, looking ahead. (Pushes lips together, looks ahead) All day long. (Clutches his lips again and looks ahead) No. (smile) No, no. (Smile fades) There is, of course, a bag. (Turns to her) And there will always be a bag. (Facing forward) Yes, I'm pretty sure. (Pause) Even when you, Willie, are gone. (Turns slightly towards him) Willie, you're dying, aren't you? (Pause. Louder) Willie, you're going to die soon, aren't you? (Pause. A little louder) Willie! (Pause. Tries to look at him) So, you did take off your straw, you figured it out. (Pause) Yes, you settled in perfectly, I must say: leaning your chin on your hands, blue eyes like plates from the darkness. (Pause) I wonder if you can see me from there, huh? (Pause) No? (Facing forward) I understand, it's not at all necessary when two people gather - (stammering) - in this sense - (normal voice) - simply because one sees the other, and the other sees the first, life taught me that too ... too. (Pause) Yes, I think it's life, there's no other word for it. (Turns a little towards WILLY). Do you think, Willie, you could see me from your seat if you looked in my direction? (Turns around a little more.) Raise your eyes, Willy, say you see me, well, for my sake, do it, I'll lean as low as I can. (Leans down. Pause.) No? (Pause) Well, whatever. (Slowly turns forward.) Something the earth seems to be cramped today, maybe I've gained weight, although it's unlikely. (Pause. Absently, eyes downcast) Probably because of the heat. (Patting and stroking the ground) All bodies are expanding, some are larger. (Pause. Patting and stroking) Others are smaller. (Pause. Patting and stroking) Oh, I can perfectly imagine what is going on in your head: not only did you have to listen to this old woman, it also makes you look. (Pause. Tapping and stroking) Well, I understand. (Pause. Patting and stroking) I quite understand. (Pause. Patting and stroking) It seems that you ask a little, sometimes it seems impossible - (voice breaks, mutters) - ask for less - to put it mildly - whereas in reality - when you think about it - you look into your soul - and you see someone else - what does she need? - peace - would leave her alone - and also the moon - forever - wants the moon - (Pause. Stroking suddenly stops. Cheerfully) Oh, what do we have here? (Tilting his head to the ground, skeptical) It looks like someone is alive! (Looks for glasses, puts them on, bends down. Pause) Ant! (Instantly straightens up. Shrill) Willy, ant, live ant! (grabs magnifying glass, bends down again, examines with glass) Where did he go? (Looking for) Ah! (Follows his progress on the grass) He has some kind of small white ball in his paws. (Watches. The hand is motionless. Pause) Disappeared. (Looks through the glass for a while, then slowly straightens up, puts the glass aside, takes off his glasses, looks straight ahead, holding the glasses in his hand. Finally) Some small white ball.

Long pause. Wants to put away glasses.

WILLY: Eggs.

WINNIE (shuddering): What?

Pause.

WILLY: Eggs. (Pause. He wants to put his glasses away again) Goosebumps.

WINNIE (stops hand): What?

Pause.

WILLY: Goosebumps.

Pause. She puts her glasses down, stares straight ahead. Pause.

WINNIE (whispering): God. (Pause. WILLY laughs softly. She steps in almost immediately. Both laugh softly. WILLY stops. She continues to laugh alone for a moment. WILLY enters. They both laugh. She stops. WILLY laughs alone for a moment. He stops. Pause. In a normal voice) Oh, anyway, what a joy to hear you laugh again, Willy, I was sure that I would never hear it again, that you would never laugh again. (Pause) Someone will probably think that we are sacrilegious, but I am not. (Pause) What better way to flatter the Almighty than to chuckle along with him at his jokes, especially the worse ones? (Pause) You, Willy, I think you will support me in this. (Pause) Or maybe we were amused by completely different things? (Pause) However, it doesn't matter, I always said it, while one ... you understand ... where this amazing line came from ... laughing furiously ... ta-ta ta-ta laughing furiously in the midst of cruel misfortune. (Pause) And now? (Long pause) Willy, could I have been loved? (Pause) Ever? (Pause) Don't get me wrong, I'm not asking if you loved me, we both know all about it, I'm asking if you ever found me attractive. (Pause) No? (Pause) Are you silent? (Pause) I agree, it's a difficult question. You've already done more than enough, for now, just lie back, relax, I won't bother you anymore unnecessarily: just to know that you're here, hear me and almost certainly not sleep, it's... uh. .. already happiness. (Pause) And the day did pretty well. (Smiling) As they used to say in the old days. (Smile fades) Still, it seems a bit early for my song. (Pause) In my opinion, singing too early is a serious mistake. (Turning to the bag) Of course there is a bag. (Looking at the bag) The bag. (Facing forward) Could I list its contents? (Pause) No. (Pause) And if someone came and asked: "Vinnie, what's in that huge black bag?" Would I be able to give a comprehensive answer? (Pause) No. (Pause) Who knows what treasures are there, especially in the depths. (Pause) What delights. (Turns to look at the bag.) Yes, there is a bag. (Facing forward) But something tells me: Vinnie, do not abuse the bag, use it, of course, let it be your assistant ... when it presses, by itself, but think about the future, something tells me: think about future, Winnie, when the words run out - (Closes eyes, pause, opens eyes) - and, be kind, do not abuse the bag. (Pause. Turns to look at the bag.) Here is just one quick dive at random. (She turns around into the hall, closes her eyes, throws out her left hand, puts it in her bag and takes out a revolver. Disgusted) You again! (Opens his eyes, puts the revolver in front of him and examines it appraisingly. He weighs it in his palm) It always seemed that in terms of weight this thing should be at ... the very bottom. But no. Always on top like Browning (Pause) Brownie... (turning slightly towards WILLY). Remember Brownie, Willie? (Pause) Remember how you kept making me take that thing away from you? Put it away, Vinnie, put it away before I'm done with my troubles at once. (Back into the hall) Your troubles! (to Revolver) It's nice to know you're in there, but I'm tired of you. (Pause) Leave you outside - that's what I'll do. (Puts the revolver on the ground to his right) That's it, from now on your place is here. (Smiling) Good old time! (smile fades) And now? (Long pause) Earth's gravity is the same, but I don't think so, Willy. (Pause) Yeah, it feels like if I had nothing to hold me - (points with hand) - like this, I'd just soar into the blue. (Pause) And that maybe one day the earth will move and let me go, I really want this, yes, it will crack in a circle and let me go. (Pause) Have you ever felt like you were being sucked in, Willy? (Pause) What do you have to hang on to, Willy? (Pause. She turns a little towards him) Willie.