Happy Birthday, Wanda June Page #5

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PENELOPE:

I know.

SHUTTLE:

If you want to wrestle, you got

Lehigh. If you want to play

tennis, you go to Vanderbilt.

PENELOPE:

I don't want to go to Vanderbilt.

SHUTTLE:

You don't wrestle if you don't have

supreme confidence, and I wrestled.

But when I get with you, and I say

to myself, "My God--here I am with

the wife of Harold Ryan, one of the

great heroes of all time--"

Pause.

PENELOPE:

Yes?

SHUTTLE:

Something happens to my confidence.

PENELOPE:

(to the audience)

This conversation took place,

incidentally, about three months

before Harold was declared legally

dead.

SHUTTLE:

When Harold is definitely out of

the picture, Penelope, when I don't

have to worry about doing him wrong

or you wrong or Paul wrong. I'm

going to ask you to be my wife.

PENELOPE:

I'm touched.

SHUTTLE:

That's when I'll get my confidence

back.

PENELOPE:

I see.

SHUTTLE:

If you'll pardon the expression,

that's when you'll see the fur and

feathers fly. Good night.

PENELOPE:

Good night.

Blackout.

SCENE TWO:

SHUTTLE and WOODLY argue in pitch darkness, with PAUL

listening, and lights come up gradually to full on the

living room the same evening.

SHUTTLE:

You've got to fight from time to time.

WOODLY:

Not true.

SHUTTLE:

Or get eaten alive.

WOODLY:

That's not true either--or needn't

be, unless we make it true.

SHUTTLE:

Phooey.

WOODLY:

Which we do. But we can stop doing

that.

The lights are full. SHUTTLE and WOODLY are bored with each

other, WOODLY looks out the window, speaks to an imaginary

listener who has more brains than SHUTTLE. PAUL hates them

both, but prefers SHUTTLE's noisy manliness.

WOODLY:

We simply stop doing that--dropping

things on each other, eating each

other alive.

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