McPherson The Brightening Air

1. Auflage 2025
ISBN: 978-1-78850-860-5
Verlag: Nick Hern Books
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 104 Seiten

Reihe: NHB Modern Plays

'You'll remember how much of living is really just forgetting.' The family home is more than a building. It's a destination of pilgrimage, an inherited investment, a repository of memory or magic. But, for brother and sister Stephen and Billie, home is all they've got. Mucking along in their decaying farmhouse, they're doing just fine. That is, until the arrival of an ex-clergyman uncle with an unscrupulous plan, a sister-in-law seeking a miracle, and a prodigal brother hell-bent on trouble... An entrancing tale of fate, family and unseen forces in 1980s Ireland, Conor McPherson's play The Brightening Air was the winner of the Edgerton Foundation New Play Award. It was first performed at The Old Vic, London, in 2025, directed by the playwright.

Conor McPherson is a playwright, screenwriter and director, born in Dublin in 1971. His plays include: Rum and Vodka (Fly by Night Theatre Co., Dublin); The Good Thief (Dublin Theatre Festival; Stewart Parker Award); This Lime Tree Bower (Fly by Night Theatre Co. and Bush Theatre, London; Meyer-Whitworth Award); St Nicholas (Bush Theatre and Primary Stages, New York); The Weir (Royal Court, London, Duke of York's, West End and Walter Kerr Theatre, New York; Laurence Olivier, Evening Standard, Critics' Circle, George Devine Awards); Dublin Carol (Royal Court and Atlantic Theater, New York); Port Authority (Ambassadors Theatre, West End, Gate Theatre, Dublin and Atlantic Theater, New York); Shining City (Royal Court, Gate Theatre, Dublin and Manhattan Theatre Club, New York; Tony Award nomination for Best Play); The Seafarer (National Theatre, London, Abbey Theatre, Dublin and Booth Theater, New York; Laurence Olivier, Evening Standard, Tony Award nominations for Best Play); The Veil (National Theatre); The Night Alive (Donmar Warehouse, London and Atlantic Theater, New York); Girl from the North Country (Old Vic, London) and The Brightening Air (Old Vic, London, 2025). Theatre adaptations include Daphne du Maurier's The Birds (Gate Theatre, Dublin and Guthrie Theater, Minneapolis), August Strindberg's The Dance of Death (Donmar at Trafalgar Studios), Franz Xaver Kroetz's The Nest (Young Vic, London), Chekhov's Uncle Vanya (West End, 2020) and Pawe? Pawlikowski's Cold War (Almeida Theatre, 2023). Work for the cinema includes I Went Down, Saltwater, Samuel Beckett's Endgame, The Actors, The Eclipse and Strangers. His work for television includes an adaptation of John Banville's Elegy for April for the BBC, and the original television drama Paula for BBC2. Awards for his screenwriting include three Best Screenplay Awards from the Irish Film and Television Academy; Spanish Cinema Writers Circle Best Screenplay Award; the CICAE Award for Best Film Berlin Film festival; Jury Prize San Sebastian Film Festival; and the Méliès d'Argent Award for Best European Film.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Mcpherson, Conor

Leseproben

ACT ONE

LYDIA BILLIE

LYDIA. Put these up the far end.

BILLIE. Can we talk?

LYDIA. Set the table and you can talk about whatever you want.

BILLIE. You start.

LYDIA. Okay. Stations.

BILLIE. Yeah – go.

LYDIA. Limerick Junction.

BILLIE. Yeah.

LYDIA. Talk to me.

BILLIE. There’s no town there. Just a station. No one lives there. No one stays there. You just transfer.

LYDIA. You come and go.

BILLIE. Yeah, go anywhere. Like to a real place.

LYDIA. Escape anywhere.

BILLIE. Yeah, no one would know which way you went.

LYDIA (). There’s no town there?

BILLIE. There’s nothing there. It’s the middle of Tipperary. It’s like a magic door. Get yourself a ticket to Limerick Junction, change platforms, and poof – you’re gone!

LYDIA. Boom.

BILLIE. Shoot across to Rosslare Harbour. Ferry to Le Havre. SNCF to Paris, Orient Express to Istanbul – if you don’t mind changing at Bucharest.

LYDIA. No, I don’t mind.

BILLIE. Okay – well, once a week I think it is – there’s a service to Tehran. Get yourself down there – through Iran, across Pakistan, bang, down into New Delhi, on to Varanasi. You know what’s there, of course?

LYDIA. No.

BILLIE. In Varanasi? The Manikarnika Ghat. Where the steps lead down to the River Ganges. They cremate the bodies of the dead there twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. You wanna be cremated there, Lydia, you know why?

LYDIA. Why?

BILLIE. ’Cause if you’re burned there and your bones are thrown in the River Ganges – you won’t be reincarnated any more, you’re free. Your soul is washed clean, and you finally return to nothingness. With none of this life stuck on you any more.

LYDIA. I must do that then.

BILLIE. Yup – just get a ticket for Limerick Junction and off you go. Where will I put the cake?

LYDIA. In the middle.

BILLIE. Pride of place. Should we test it? Do a taste test.

LYDIA. You will not! You’ll have your lunch with everyone else.

BILLIE. Lunch? It’s five o’clock.

LYDIA. Late lunch.

BILLIE. Dinner.

LYDIA. Early dinner.

BILLIE. Linner. Lunner.

LYDIA. Dinch.

BILLIE. Dunch.

STEPHEN. What are you doing?

LYDIA. Setting the table.

STEPHEN. For what?

LYDIA. What do you mean, for what?

STEPHEN. For who?

LYDIA. For your uncle. For when everyone is here. What do you think?

STEPHEN. Billie, you left the gate open, your chickens are all over the shop.

BILLIE. What?!

STEPHEN. I told you a million times.

BILLIE (). And you can tell me a billion times and I still won’t do it. So, understand that.

STEPHEN. Stupidity’s beyond understanding.

BILLIE. That’s why you’re so thick.

LYDIA. This was my idea. Don’t take it out on her.

STEPHEN. Take what out?

LYDIA

LYDIA. Billie seems good.

STEPHEN. Her fingers are all bent.

LYDIA. Yes, I saw.

STEPHEN. She won’t go to physiotherapy unless I let her go on the train.

LYDIA. You won’t let her?

STEPHEN. She can’t manage on her own. She’ll get to Sligo, walk out of the station, get hit by another car.

LYDIA. I could go with her.

STEPHEN. She won’t let anyone go with her. It’s impossible.

LYDIA. I know.

STEPHEN. Do you?

LYDIA

LYDIA. So look. Dermot’s coming.

STEPHEN. What here?

LYDIA. Mm. See your uncle. See everyone.

STEPHEN. See everyone?

LYDIA. He loves you, Stephen. He loves Billie.

STEPHEN. Yeah. He loves Billie.

LYDIA. See how you’ve been. How have you been?

STEPHEN. I’m great. How have you been?

LYDIA. Good. Yeah. I must get some of your eggs.

STEPHEN. Eggs is Billie.

LYDIA. Place looks well.

STEPHEN. It’s cold.

LYDIA. It’s a bit cold.

STEPHEN. Wind gets in everywhere. Rain gets in.

LYDIA. Has Dermot said anything?

STEPHEN. Said what?

LYDIA. Dermot. And your uncle.

STEPHEN. What?

LYDIA. I’ll let them tell you.

STEPHEN. Tell me what?

LYDIA. Nothing.

STEPHEN. They want to sell. Get me and Billie out to sell it.

LYDIA. No, I don’t think so.

STEPHEN. Then what?

LYDIA (). I said I’ll let them tell you!

STEPHEN. That’s why everyone’s coming. I wouldn’t mind but I’ve tried to get him to sell it to me. Buy them out. They won’t sell it.

LYDIA. What if he wants to sell it to someone else?

STEPHEN. Is that what they said?

LYDIA. No, I don’t – No.

STEPHEN. Then what?

LYDIA. Something. I don’t know. But not selling it.

STEPHEN. Yeah, something. Then fuck him. I’ll find us somewhere.

LYDIA. You’ll always keep Billie with you, of course.

STEPHEN. What choice do I have?

LYDIA. She could stay with us.

STEPHEN (). Yeah, right. If they try to fucking sell this… they’ll… Let them try. () So how have you been? Did I ask you that? What’s going on?

LYDIA. Nothing. The usual.

STEPHEN. All the usual.

LYDIA. Mm.

STEPHEN. Life and the whole lot.

LYDIA. Dermot’s wandering again, you probably know that. So what’s new?

STEPHEN. Yeah?

LYDIA. My own fault, of course. For giving him so many chances.

STEPHEN (). He was always like that.

LYDIA (). You might have told me!

STEPHEN. There no telling you.

LYDIA. He’s gone in the head. Girl over in Annaduff. We never see him. I’ve asked him what are we going to do. Says he doesn’t know.

STEPHEN. Kick him out.

LYDIA. We have two children! I can’t kick him out.

STEPHEN. Kids’ll still have him. He won’t be dead.

LYDIA. He’s as upset as I am.

STEPHEN. Yeah… Give me a break.

LYDIA. Maybe you could…

STEPHEN. Maybe what? He doesn’t talk to me.

LYDIA (). Do you remember when we were younger? You told me about the water from the well up there in the fox’s covert?

STEPHEN

Do you remember?

STEPHEN

You said it could make someone fall in love with you.

STEPHEN

Can you get me some?

STEPHEN. Are you serious?

LYDIA. You don’t believe in it?

STEPHEN. Believe in it? Can’t say I ever think about it.

LYDIA. Never think about love?

STEPHEN. No.

LYDIA. So this is it. You’re just gonna take care of your sister. Live on your own. Dinner for one. Dinner for two.

STEPHEN. Looks like it.

LYDIA (). It’s mad, isn’t it?

STEPHEN. What is?

LYDIA. I married the brother who can’t get enough. And here’s you, you don’t want any.

STEPHEN. Maybe there’s nothing left for anyone to have.

LYDIA. Will you get me some?

STEPHEN. Some what? Some of the water?

LYDIA. From the well.

STEPHEN. I’ll get it for five hundred pounds.

LYDIA. Five hundred pounds?!

STEPHEN. You can get it yourself if you want.

LYDIA. Okay, I will. Where is it exactly?

STEPHEN. You wouldn’t even know it even if you were looking at it. It’s just a trickle in the muck and the stones, in among the briars and the hawthorn. Little brass tap. I’d have to mow a way in. It’s two days’ work.

LYDIA. There’s a tap?

STEPHEN. Tiny little brass tap someone put there years ago. Centuries ago. I don’t know.

LYDIA. Five hundred pounds. Are you just punishing me?

STEPHEN. Why would I punish you? We were children.

LYDIA. Yeah well. Old pain lingers. Turns into arthritis.

STEPHEN. Not if you never feel anything any more. Did you put mustard on this?

LYDIA. You all love mustard.

STEPHEN. It’s good.

LYDIA. Does it work?

STEPHEN. Yeah, it’s nice.

LYDIA. I mean the water.

STEPHEN. They say you put it in his milk. Never in alcohol. Drink some when he drinks it. Say a Hail Mary.

LYDIA. A Hail Mary?!

STEPHEN. Or something – whatever. Say something. I don’t know. I always heard it was a Hail Mary. And then you have to be the first person he sees when he wakes up. And that’s it.

LYDIA. You’ve never tried it?

STEPHEN. Five hundred pound. Look I can’t say fairer...