William Shakespeare's the Taming of the Clueless Read online

  More likely to taste cake of his own kind,

  Less likely to enjoy romantic dancing,

  More likely to be on the disco floor,

  Less likely to be wild than to read Wilde,

  More likely to be one of Streisand’s lads,

  Less like to Dor’thy date than be her friend—

  Is not my meaning obvious to thee?

  CHER

  A lad’s lad? Nay.

  MURRAY

  —The lad is gay, forsooth:

  He makes his heaven in a fellow’s lap,

  And decks his body in gay ornaments,

  And witches sweet chaps with his words and looks.

  CHER

  Not even—

  MURRAY

  —Yea, most even, verily.

  DIONNE

  Thou must admit, Cher, he doth like to shop,

  To purchase garments in a vast array.

  As thou hast said, the lad is better dress’d

  Than many of compeers—e’en ourselves.

  CHER

  My mind is crawling with these buglike thoughts,

  Which crawl across my brain an ’twere their nest.

  How silly and how reckless I have been!

  MURRAY

  Fie! Other pressing matters are upon us—

  Thou, Dionne, dost approach the boulevard,

  Where carriages are far too swift and wild

  For thy still burgeoning attempts to drive!

  Turn off before disaster doth befall!

  What hast thou done, thou silly, senseless lass—

  We all shall die because of thy mistake!

  DIONNE

  I cannot stop our progress—we are bound

  Unto the boulevard, whatever will!

  They enter a crowded lane, with many carriages around them. Enter other DRIVERS.

  What shall I do t’escape this misery?

  DRIVER 1

  Thou careless girl, where didst thou learn to drive?

  MURRAY

  [to Dionne:] Alas, we shall be slain upon the road—

  How careless, fie! Yet I shall guide thee through:

  Go forward, rest thy mind and be thou calm.

  All shall be well, I swear by heaven’s name.

  I here am with thee, and shall ne’er depart,

  Although thou puttest my life at great risk.

  DRIVER 2

  Thou irresponsible and awful wench!

  MURRAY

  Fie, fie upon’t that I instructed thee

  In th’art of city driving—more fool I!

  Whate’er thou dost, keep hands upon the reins,

  Lest we shall perish ’midst these hooligans!

  DRIVER 3

  I bite my thumb at thee, thou luckless lass!

  CHER

  Alack, alack, we certainly shall die!

  MURRAY

  Now to the right, a chance to exit comes.

  Deliverance, although thou nearly kill’d us!

  [Dionne guides the carriage off the boulevard. Exeunt other drivers.

  DIONNE

  We are alive—thou brought me through the storm!

  MURRAY

  Sweet life—we still exist, and have not died.

  Thou wert a wonder, navigating so!

  I am so proud of thee, my heart may burst.

  [Dionne begins to cry.

  Pray fear no evil, for I am with thee.

  Breathe in, breathe out, and let peace wash o’er thee.

  [Dionne and Murray begin kissing passionately.

  CHER

  [aside:] Escaping from the boulevard intact

  Reminds one how significant love is.

  I’ll wager Dionne’s priz’d virginity

  From technical to nonexistent turns

  Because of this event. I realize, too,

  How much I want a lad to call mine own.

  [To Dionne and Murray:] Farewell, friends, thank you both for new perspective.

  [Cher climbs from the carriage and exits.

  DIONNE

  Sweet Murray, where thou art I’ll ever be—

  Pray take me homeward, bedward, presently!

  MURRAY

  My dumpling, Dionne, empress of my heart,

  Where fretfulness doth end, let romance start!

  [Exeunt.

  Westside Pavilion mall and Bronson Alcott High School.

  Enter CHER.

  CHER

  Good Christian will not be my paramour,

  Yet ’tis a pleasure spending time with him.

  He shall be my new shopping partner, yea,

  And presently he comes to meet me here—

  My place of refuge, Westside Pavilion mall.

  Enter CHRISTIAN.

  CHRISTIAN

  Good afternoon! Such shopping we shall have.

  Yet where is Tai? Was she not meeting us?

  CHER

  She met some unknown fellows at a shoppe

  And took them yonder, as thou mayst behold.

  Enter TAI with two HOOLIGANS. She sits on a railing over the trap door.

  These barneys she doth meet—whence come their kind?

  She doth attract more refuse than the man

  Who comes and takes the garbage ev’ry week.

  CHRISTIAN

  A question for thee, thou of keenest eye:

  This doublet that I purchas’d: doth it call

  To mind James Dean or Jason Priestley, which?

  The answer’s greater than essential, for

  One is the paragon of all that’s manly,

  Whilst th’other is a trifling hobbyhorse,

  The zero found in 90210.

  CHER

  Just carpe diem, Christian—thou look’st fine

  Array’d in’t—let thy misgivings flee!

  CHRISTIAN

  Thou art most sure?

  TAI

  [to hooligans:]  —An I did fall, ye’d catch me?

  HOOL. 1

  As surely as I catch a cold in th’rain.

  CHER

  Behold their antics—could they be more bland,

  More unoriginal as they do woo?

  [The hooligans grab Tai and hold her over the railing, as if threatening to drop her.

  TAI

  Help! Stop, ye villains! Help! O, bring me up!

  [Christian rushes to give her aid, pulling her safely back over the railing and out of the hooligans’ arms.

  CHRISTIAN

  You gleeking beetle-headed maggot-pies!

  HOOL. 2

  ’Twas no more than a jest.

  CHRISTIAN

  —A jest, forsooth!

  You’d play your horrid games with women’s lives?

  [Christian pushes them away. Exeunt hooligans.

  TAI

  Cher, I was sore afeard. I, innocent,

  Did sit conversing with the charming lads,

  When suddenly, amidst the laughter warm,

  They grabb’d me, pushing me—

  CHRISTIAN

  —Tai, art thou well?

  TAI

  I am.

  CHRISTIAN

  —Art certain?

  TAI

  —Verily. My thanks.

  Too much adventure I have had today.

  CHRISTIAN

  Let’s get thee home for needed R and R.

  TAI

  What do those letters stand for? Ribs and rice?

  [Christian laughs. He and Tai walk on together, leaving the mall and walking toward school. Cher follows.

  CHER

  [aside:] Considering how clueless young Tai is,

  She plays the part of damsel in distress

 
As if she had rehears’d it all her life—

  A perfect actor in her starring role.

  Enter various STUDENTS at the school, including DIONNE and AMBER, sitting down to lunch. TAI sits and begins telling her tale. Exit CHRISTIAN.

  Observe now how she sitteth round her stage,

  Soliloquizing o’er her incident—

  A harmless jest by mindless hooligans

  Turn’d—like a monologue writ by a bard,

  With drama heighten’d—to a brush with death.

  STUDENT 2

  [to Tai:] When thou knock’d on the door of death, what was

  The vision in your mind? A montage of

  The many scenes thou witness’d in thy life?

  TAI

  No montage, nay—my brain’s not on the A-team—

  More like the ending of a tragedy,

  Where all is death before the exeunt omnes.

  Enter SUMMER.

  SUMMER

  Cher, is it true that members of a gang

  Attempted to shoot Tai at yonder mall?

  CHER

  Nay, though the rumors fly on eagles’ wings,

  ’Tis manifestly, absolutely false.

  SUMMER

  All do report the news as if ’twere true.

  CHER

  Whatever you desire to think, you shall—

  E’en when ’tis plainly facts alternative.

  STUDENT 2

  [to Tai:] When I was nine years old, I tumbl’d from

  A structure made for play—a gymlike jungle—

  And could have sworn I saw a vision black—

  [Cher approaches the group.

  TAI

  Make way for Cher, my best and truest friend.

  CHER

  [aside:] Shall she have other folk make way for me?

  My station is revers’d with hers—now am

  I supplicant while she is master turn’d.

  AMBER

  [to Tai:] Say more of what befell thee!

  TAI

  —Where was I?

  AMBER

  Thou ponder’dst over what is truly vital.

  TAI

  Of course! Before one dies—as I near did—

  The mind becometh suddenly aware,

  As if a fog did clear in one fell swoop.

  ’Tis both intense and spiritual as well—

  CHER

  When I was held at gunpoint recently—

  STUDENT 2

  [to Cher:] Beg pardon, for the lass would tell her tale.

  [To Tai:] Go on, I pray. Thy tale, Tai, would cure deafness.

  TAI

  It is a matter of the spirit, friends,

  Which I, though, cannot pinpoint for thy mind;

  It is impossible that I discuss

  The subject sans a common frame of ref’rence.

  CHER

  [aside:] Is this some alternate reality,

  Wherein I am a meager hanger-on

  And Tai is diva to the yearning masses?

  I’ll put my status to the test anon.

  TAI

  Since ye have ne’er experienc’d the like—

  CHER

  Tai, to the Tow’r of Records I shall go,

  To purchase some small souvenir for Christian.

  TAI

  Indeed? What is’t to me?

  CHER

  —Wouldst thither come?

  TAI

  Yea, for I owe the man my very life,

  My health, my whole existence, by my troth.

  CHER

  Then I shall come for thee when school doth end?

  TAI

  Yet not today, for I have other plans—

  With Amber unto Melrose am I bound.

  AMBER

  We two—we best of friends—to Melrose go.

  CHER

  Perchance tomorrow better works for thee?

  TAI

  Next Monday, peradventure, would suffice.

  My week doth fill like bucket ’neath a spout.

  CHER

  [aside:] I have been snubb’d. Cher Horowitz is snubb’d!

  TAI

  [to Dionne:] Thy boyfriend hither cometh—ha! A jest—

  For none in their right mind would choose his kind.

  DIONNE

  My Murray? O, I see, ’tis Travis. Ha!

  Enter TRAVIS.

  TRAVIS Tai, look upon this trick I’ve master’d.

  [He spits a bite of food into the air, then catches it in his mouth.

  TAI

  Disgusting!

  TRAVIS

  [to Dionne:] —May I sit by Tai’s side?

  DIONNE

  Nay.

  TAI

  —Be thou gone! Do not ye slackers lounge

  On yonder grassy knoll in infamy?

  TRAVIS

  [aside:] The lass is changèd, not for better.

  She doth abuse me to win favor.

  [Exit Travis.

  CHER

  [aside:] Ne’er felt I sympathy for Travis ere,

  Yet Tai’s mistreatment is deplorable.

  Is this what I have help’d her to become?

  Is’t possible I so coldhearted am?

  DIONNE

  Tai, let us speak as two mature adults,

  Who know the ways of pleasure and men’s bodies.

  Hast thou e’er, in the water, done the deed?

  TAI

  Yea, natur’lly!

  DIONNE

  —E’en so? How does it work?

  [Exeunt all but Cher as she wanders off by herself.

  CHER

  [aside:] What is this strange, unlikely circumstance

  Where Dionne asketh Tai for love advice

  And Tai exceeds my popularity?

  Hath all the world gone hurly-burly now?

  ’Tis like a universe in parallel,

  Where all is similar, yet deeply chang’d.

  To make these matters worse, I soon must take

  My driving test, that I may legally

  Direct a carriage on its forward course.

  I shall unto my home, to find my most

  Responsible-appearing outfit. O—

  I cannot bear these ripples in my fate,

  Which shall my happy spirit obfuscate.

  [Exit.

  The Horowitz house and the streets of Beverly Hills.

  Enter LUCY.

  LUCY

  How, sometimes, I miss my El Salvador,

  Land whence I came, where I was born and rais’d.

  The child of two adoring parents I,

  Who wish’d a better, broader life for me.

  “Stay not within thy native country, Lucy!”

  So often they directed me, in hopes

  That more adventures elsewhere did await.

  At twenty-one, unto America

  I came with hope and wonder burgeoning,

  Sure—in the land of opportunity—

  My life would flourish with prosperity.

  Instead, it seem’d that, as an immigrant—

  One for whom Spanish was the native tongue—

  I was unwanted, lesser, and the aim

  Of ev’ry prejudice some people had.

  ’Twas not prosperity that I did find,

  ’Twas not adventure that did greet me here.

  Instead, I was expected to want less,

  Became a cleaner in a rich man’s house,

  And here I dwell—a woman sans a home.

  Enter CHER.

  CHER

  O, Lucy, thou art heaven-sent! Where is

  My shirt sans collar made by Fred’rick Segal?

  LUCY

  Belike �
��tis at the cleaners, Lady Cher.

  CHER

  Today, though, is my carriage driving test.

  Dost thou not see? The garment makes me look

  More capable than any other doth.

  LUCY

  Shall I call on them for thee?

  CHER

  —’Tis too late!

  We also—almost I forgot—receiv’d

  Another notice from the fire brigade

  Declaring we must clear the flamm’ble bush.

  Didst thou not say José would clip the hedge?

  LUCY

  He is thy gardener—ask him thyself.

  Enter JOSH.

  CHER

  Thou, Lucy, know’st I speak not Mexican.

  LUCY

  No Mexican am I!

  [Exit Lucy, angrily.

  CHER

  —Why shouted she?

  JOSH

  Thy Lucy cometh from El Salvador.

  CHER

  Thy point is what?

  JOSH

  —It is another land,

  A country in its own right, which hath naught

  To do with Mexico.

  CHER

  —What doth that matter?

  JOSH

  Thou say’st it matters if someone declares

  Thy house is somewhere south of Sunset, Cher!

  CHER

  Wilt thou not salve my mind? Is’t all my fault?

  I am forever wrong, a country girl

  Declaring ever matters incorrect.

  JOSH

  Thou art a brat—a silly, foolish lass.

  [Exit Josh.

  CHER

  Hath all the world against me harshly turn’d?

  First Tai and Dionne, Lucy and then Josh,

  Is no one left who loveth gloomy Cher?

  Enter DRIVING INSTRUCTOR.

  INSTRUCT.

  If thou art ready, we’ll begin thy test.

  CHER

  [aside:] ’Twas not the comfort for which I did seek.

  [Cher and the instructor climb into a carriage together, with Cher driving.

  An overwhelming ickiness comes o’er me,

  As waves wash over feet that stand on shore.

  I shall apologize to Lucy soon

  Enow, yet still my heart is plagu’d with doubt.

  For Josh to think me cruel drives me mad,

  And makes my driving equally as poor.

  Enter other DRIVERS and PEDESTRIANS in the lane.

  INSTRUCT.

  Move thou into the right lane presently.

  CHER

  [aside:] Why should my mind be troubl’d over the

  Opinion Josh hath of me anywise?

  Why am I into turmoil toss’d to think

  That in his eyes I may have dropp’d a peg?

  [She veers quickly into the next lane, almost hitting a pedestrian.

  INSTRUCT.

  Behold where thou dost turn, or thou shalt kill!