go.
He goes out. OPHELIA falls on to her knees upstage, her sobs barely audible. A slight silence.
PLAYER-KING: Full thirty times hath Phoebus' cart
CLAUDIUS enters with POLONIUS and goes over to OPHELIA and lifts her to her feet. The TRAGEDIANS jump back with heads inclined.
CLAUDIUS: Love? His affections do not that way tend, Or what he spake, though it lacked form a little, Was not like madness. There's something In his soul o'er which his melancholy sits on Brood, and I do doubt the hatch and the Disclose will be some danger; which for to Prevent I have in quick determination thus set It down: he shall with speed to England.
Which carries the three of them-- CLAUDIUS , POLONIUS , OPHELIA ---out of sight.
The PLAYER moves, clapping his hands for attention.
PLAYER: Gentlemen! ( They look at him. ) It doesn't seem to be coming. We are not getting it at all. ( To GUIL :) What did think?
GUIL: What was I supposed to think?
PLAYER ( To TRAGEDIANS): You're not getting across!
ROS had gone halfway up to OPHELIA ; he returns.
ROS: That didn't look like love to me.
GUIL: Starting from scratch again...
PLAYER ( to TRAGEDIANS): It was a mess.
ROS ( to GUIL): It going to be chaos on the night
GUIL: Keep back---we're spectators.
PLAYER: Act Two! Positions!
GUIL: Wasn't that the end?
PLAYER: Do you call that an ending?---with practically everyone on his feet? My goodness no--- over your dead body.
GUIL: How am I supposed to take that?
PLAYER: Lying down. ( He laughs briefly and in a second has never laughed in his life. ) There's a design at work in all art surely you know that? Events must play themselves out aesthetic, moral and logical conclusion.
GUIL: And what' that, in this case?
PLAYER: It never varies---we aim at the point where everyone who is marked for death dies.
GUIL: Marked?
PLAYER: Between 'just desserts' and 'tragic irony' we are given quite a lot of scope for our particular talent. Generally speaking, things have gone about as far as they can possibly go when things have got about as bad as they reasonably get. ( He switches on a smile. )
GUIL: Who decides?
PLAYER ( switching off his smile): Decides? It is written.
He turns away. GUIL grabs him and spins him back violently.
( Unflustered. ) Now if you're going to be subtle, we'll miss each other in the dark. I'm referring to oral tradition. So to speak.
GUIL releases him.
We're tragedians, you see. We follow directions---there is no choice involved. The bad end unhappily, the good unluckily. That is what tragedy means. ( Calling. ) Positions!
The TRAGEDIANS have taken up positions for the continuation Of the mime: which in this case means a love scene, sexual and passionate, between the QUEEN and the POISONER -
KING .
PLAYER: Go!
The lovers begin. The PLAYER contributes a breathless commentary for ROS and GUIL .
Having murdered his brother and wooed the widow---the poisoner mounts the throne!
Here we see him and his queen give rein to their unbridled passion! She little knowing that the man she holds in her arms---!
ROS: Oh, I say---here---really! You can't do that!
PLAYER: Why not?
ROS: Well, really---I mean, people want to be entertained---they don't come expecting sordid and gratuitous filth.
PLAYER: You're wrong---they do! Murder, seduction and incest ---what do you want---
jokes?
ROS: I want a good story, with a beginning, middle and end.
PLAYER ( to GUIL): And you?
GUIL: I'd prefer art to mirror life, if it's all the same to you.
PLAYER: It's all the same to me, sir. ( To the grappling LOVERS) All right, no need to indulge yourselves. ( They get up. To GUIL :) I come on in a minute. Lucretius, nephew to the king! ( Turns his attention to the TRAGEDIANS) Next!
They disport themselves to accommodate the next piece mime, which consists of the PLAYER himself exhibiting a excitable anguish (choreographed, stylized) leading to an impassioned scene with the QUEEN (cf. 'The Closet Scene,' Shakespeare Act III, scene iv) and a very stylized reconstruction of a POLONIUS figure being stabbed behind the arras (the murdered KING to stand in for POLONIUS ) while the PLAYER
himself continues his breathless commentary for the benefit of ROS and GUIL .
PLAYER: Lucretius, nephew to the king... usurped by his uncle and shattered by his mother's incestuous marriage loses . . his reason... throwing the court into turmoil and disarray as he alternates between bitter melancholy and unrestricted lunacy... staggering from the suicidal ( a pose) to the homicidal ( here he kills ' POLONIUS ' )... he at last confronts his mother and in a scene of provocative ambiguity---( a somewhat oedipal embrace) begs her to repent and recant. ( He springs up, still talking. ) The King---( he pushes forward the POISONER - KING) tormented by guilt---haunted by fear ---decides to despatch his nephew to England---and entrusts this undertaking to two smiling accomplices---
friends--- two spies
He has swung round to bring together the POISONER - KING and the two cloaked TRAGEDIANS the latter kneel and accept a scroll from the KING .
---giving them a letter to present to the English court and so they depart---on board ship The two SPIES position themselves on either side of the PLAYER , and the three of them sway gently in unison, the motion of a boat; and then the PLAYER detaches himself.
---and they arrive
One spy shades his eyes at the horizon.
-and disembark---and present themselves before the English king---( He wheels round.
