Decade (NHB Modern Plays) E-Book

Various

• Herausgeber: Nick Hern Books
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2014

Beschreibung

Two towers. Ten years. Twenty plays. Ten years after 9/11, twenty international writers respond to the defining event of our times. Published here are their individual plays, which woven together formed the basis of Decade, an immersive theatrical production from Headlong theatre company. The writers: Samuel Adamson, Mike Bartlett, Alecky Blythe, Adam Brace, Ben Ellis, Ella Hickson, Samuel D. Hunter, John Logan, Matthew Lopez, Mona Mansour, DC Moore, Abi Morgan, Rory Mullarkey, Janine Nabers, Lynn Nottage, Harrison David Rivers, Simon Schama, Christopher Shinn, Beth Steel, Alexandra Wood. 'dazzling... a bold experiment in engaging with history, realised with flair' - Evening Standard 'astonishing... deeply moving... illuminated by humour and a strong sense of human resilience.' - Telegraph

Leseprobe

DECADE

Twenty new plays about 9/11 and its legacy

Samuel Adamson ■ Mike Bartlett ■ Alecky Blythe

Adam Brace ■ Ben Ellis ■ Ella Hickson ■ Samuel D. Hunter

John Logan ■ Matthew Lopez ■ Mona Mansour ■ DC Moore

Abi Morgan ■ Rory Mullarkey ■ Janine Nabers

Lynn Nottage ■ Harrison David Rivers ■ Simon Schama

Christopher Shinn ■ Beth Steel ■ Alexandra Wood

NICK HERN BOOKS

London

www.nickhernbooks.co.uk

Contents

Title Page

Foreword by Rupert Goold and Robert Icke

Original Production Details

Recollections of Scott Forbes   edited by Samuel Adamson

The Enemy   Mike Bartlett

Voices from the Mosque   Alecky Blythe

Electric Things   Adam Brace

Speed Date   Ben Ellis

Gift   Ella Hickson

Olive Garden   Samuel D. Hunter

Grounded   John Logan

The Sentinels   Matthew Lopez

Broadcast Yourself   Mona Mansour

The Children   DC Moore

Superman   Abi Morgan

Trio With Accompaniment   Rory Mullarkey

Black Girl Gone   Janine Nabers

The Odds   Lynn Nottage

not resentful at all   Harrison David Rivers

Epic   Simon Schama

Everyone   Christopher Shinn

Lynndie England   Beth Steel

My Name is Tania Head   Alexandra Wood

About the Authors

Copyright and Performing Rights Information

Foreword

Rupert Goold and Robert Icke

Headlong makes big new plays about provocative, contemporary subjects. Having looked at the financial crisis and at climate change, in mid-2010 we began talking about 9/11 on its tenth anniversary. There will be people who rehearse the argument that theatre has no valid role in examining recent trauma and disaster, but – while it’s certainly true that bad art about any tragedy could be offensive – we have no doubt that theatre is at its most urgent and essential when asking questions about the things that most disturb and frighten us. And, as was later verified on both sides of the Atlantic, 9/11 proved to be an issue that people were burning either to avoid or to talk about. Either way, it felt like there was something to explore.

It was early in the development of Decade that we decided it needed to be a multi-writer production. Everyone can tell you where they were that day. And everyone has a different opinion about 9/11 and its legacies. Combine this with our desire for the piece to have a broader viewpoint than just that of London or New York, and a wilfully fragmented form seemed essential – a Babel with no claims to neatness, where different voices, political viewpoints and forms would fight it out. The progression of the show would come through contraries, not through unity; and the piece itself would endorse no particular political agenda.

We started conversations with several writers we were excited by, asking simply for a piece responding to 9/11 or its legacies, lasting between thirty seconds and fifteen minutes. And, as well as reading a large number of pitches which came in for the project, we set up two development workshops – one in London and one in New York – which were, it turned out, where the show really started to crystallise. Each workshop was attended by a hand-picked group of ten to twelve exciting, emerging writers, and each had the same structure: an evening of group discussion and exercises followed by a weekend of writing punctuated by dramaturgical consultations based on the few pages or whole scripts written thus far.

Just outside London, heated discussions went on into the early hours – and at The Public Theater in New York, on a weekend which was to end with the death of Bin Laden, writers talked with humour and passion about 9/11’s various aftermaths in the last decade. And, though we could never have hoped to include all of the work created, even in a three-hour show, these workshops marked the moment where we saw – with some excitement – the production itself first begin to emerge.

This is not a playscript of the production we will create (at the time of publication, the shape of the show is changing daily) but a collection of the material we rehearsed and developed in the rehearsal room. There isn’t space in this foreword to tell the full story of our inspirations in creating this production, or our process in developing it, but as a company dedicated to ambitious and provocative new plays, we are proud and excited to be making a piece of work which is already inspiring opposing and passionate reactions – and which has produced this extraordinary collection of plays.

HeadlongSeptember 2011

Headlong

DECADE

Writers

Samuel Adamson

Mike Bartlett

Alecky Blythe

Adam Brace

Ben Ellis

Ella Hickson

Samuel D. Hunter

John Logan

Matthew Lopez

Mona Mansour

DC Moore

Abi Morgan

Rory Mullarkey

Janine Nabers

Lynn Nottage

Harrison David Rivers

Simon Schama

Christopher Shinn

Beth Steel

Alexandra Wood

Ensemble Cast (in alphabetical order)

Jonathan Bonnici

Leila Crerar

Emma Fielding

Kevin Harvey

Tom Hodgkins

Samuel James

Arinze Kene

Amy Lennox

Tobias Menzies

Claire Prempeh

Charlotte Randle

Cat Simmons

Chloe Faty

Isabella Mason

Charlotte St Croix

Creative Team

Director: Rupert Goold

Set Designer: Miriam Buether

Costume Designer: Emma Williams

Choreographer: Scott Ambler

Lighting Designer: Malcolm Rippeth

Composer & Sound Designer: Adam Cork

Associate Director: Robert Icke

Assistant Director: Nadia Latif

Technical Sound Design: Sebastian Frost

Casting: Pippa Ailion

Decade was conceived and developed by Rupert Goold with Robert Icke.

With thanks to The Public Theater, New York.

Decade is the result of Headlong’s collaboration with many writers.

Decade was produced in association with Chichester Festival Theatre.

First performance of Decade at Commodity Quay, St Katharine Docks, London, on 1 September 2011.

www.headlongtheatre.co.uk

RECOLLECTIONS OF SCOTT FORBES

Edited by Samuel Adamson

Characters

SCOTT FORBES, fifty in 2011, born Widness, lives London, resident New York City 1998–2003

My brain tells me there’s no danger.

This plane’s full of water to put out the flames on the first tower, like a forest fire. So I just watch it, and watch it, and watch it; and then it comes over to fifteen degrees to my right, and the wings dip and it goes what I think – what my brain tells me – is behind the Towers; so I’m confused because I thought it was going to drop water on it; and then it doesn’t come from the side, so I’m like, where’s it gone? Because I’m on the west, so I can’t see anything, the Towers are hiding me from what’s going on; what I’m seeing from my living room, I don’t see on TV, what I’m seeing on TV shows me flames, and the plane going into the building, so, um, I’m swearing down the phone to Bernard and then…

then our building is transformed into sand.

It goes like this, (Demonstrates.) this sandcastle falling down.

And Bernard and I, both of us were like,

— ‘This is complete madness, what’s going on?’

and both of us kind of at the same time say,

— ‘What did we do at the weekend? What the hell did I do at the weekend?’

I felt almost respxonsible. I felt like it was something we’d done on our technical systems that caused the building to collapse. I felt guilty.

* * *

The best was that you’d be looking over the clouds. Sometimes, you’d be above them so you couldn’t see anything; you were just above the clouds with planes flying around you. My company was on five floors in the South Tower; I worked on the ninety-seventh. Our cafeteria faced north – and I can show you a picture – the view was that, towards the Empire State; so you’d be looking all the way up Manhattan, and if you’re sitting there having breakfast and that’s your view, it takes your breath away, particularly when you see a plane flying across; or on 9/11 – I didn’t see it because I wasn’t there – one of my colleagues saw the plane coming down and hitting the other tower, from the cafeteria.

You never got bored, every day was different. There was always something going on. It was like being in a cinema, with screens all around you.

I loved the World Trade Center. I did, I loved it. It was a glory to work in.

* * *

I lived as the crow flies a mile and a half from the Trade Center, across the Hudson, in Jersey City; I looked straight at it from my living room. At night it would be lit up, and in the morning, the sun would be rising behind it. I found it astonishing to look at. It would change colour, depending on the light and clouds. Every day was different. It just kind of reflected everything that was going on around it. It was a very proud piece of Manhattan. I remember once one of my colleagues, Mark, said,

— ‘I hate the Trade Center,’

and I was really angry with him,

— ‘How can you say that, this is such a symbol for New York and America; look how beautiful that façade is, it’s absolutely beautiful!’

I think he was reflecting about how he didn’t like his job; I was talking architecturally about this structure, which wasn’t just a structure; it embodied a city, it embodied a time, it embodied a country, and I was proud of it; and just to take that thought on a bit, on 9/11, when the first plane hit and there were flames and so on – I remember I felt really guilty about having this thought at the time – I felt that the symmetry was broken, and I was more angry about that than anything, and that’s a terrible thing to say, really, but I was really upset about that. ‘Well, if that Tower’s been on fire, companies are not going to be in, so it’s all going to be black and horrible, but we’re going to work in the Tower, and it’s probably going to be two weeks and it’s going to be temporary offices, oh, bloody hell.’ Instinctive and initial: ‘Oh, crap, I’m going to work in a building with one Tower.’

It’s difficult to explain. Probably I’ve not fully realised how important the building was to me.

It was… a bit like an altar. It was… absolutely… um… dominant.

* * *

The day before 9/11, we went to a Mexican restaurant for lunch and had frozen cocktails because my manager Rod was pissed off and he was like,

— ‘I don’t care, we’re going out.’

Three weeks earlier, the company had been given notice by the Port Authority that the power supply on the top fifty per cent of the South Tower would be halted for a period on the 8th and 9th of September, for a re-cabling exercise. As a financial institution we were required to have recoverable systems, so on Saturday the 8th we had to power things down logically – applications, databases, the network, hardware – lots of ancillary pieces as well, like external connections and feeds, all sorts of stuff, it was very complicated; you know, this is why I remember it so vividly. Once all of our systems were down, we handed the environment over to the Port Authority. Just over twenty-four hours later, on Sunday the 9th, we were told, ‘Okay, the power’s back, you can start everything up again.’ Now the vast majority of systems came back up fine. But two were a problem, and on Monday the 10th we just couldn’t get one of them up and running and my manager Rod just made the decision – he was like that – so four of us went to this Mexican place. I drank like a great big yellow thing, and when we went back to the office we were all, ‘whey-hey’; that afternoon, we were in a really good mood.

At seven, I took the ferry home. I’d arranged to take the 11th off with another guy who normally took Tuesdays off. That was Carlos. As I left, Bernard said,

— ‘See you tomorrow, Scott.’

— ‘No you won’t; I’ve got the day off, I need a break, ’cause I worked at the weekend,’

and Bernard was jealous so he arranged to take the day off as well.

And I don’t know if it’s my imagination, but I can remember sitting on top of the ferry – lovely, lovely evening – wistfully watching the Trade Center going off in the distance.

It was nice. It was warm. And then, a very quiet night.

* * *

It sounded like a big juggernaut jumping in the road like it hit a block. I went to the window and looked down and there was nothing. Then I looked up, and I remember it was a Spielberg moment, it was that boom-boom-boom, that focus in my eyes just went onto it: smoke rising from the North Tower. I thought it was coming out of the Windows on the World restaurant and I just kind of looked at it for three or four seconds and instinctively felt really bad about it and picked up my phone and dialled the first number I could think of in the office which was Mark. He answered immediately on speakerphone,

— ‘Did you hear that?’

— ‘Yes, Mark, I heard it, but there’s smoke coming out of the North Tower, I feel really bad about this,’

— ‘Was there an explosion or something?’

— ‘I don’t know, Mark, but it looks really bad, I feel really bad about it,’

— ‘Okay, okay, I think we’re going to evacuate.’

— ‘Okay.’

I knew he wouldn’t move. Mark sat in the same cubicle as I; like this; I’m here, he was there. He would come in and sit there in the morning for half an hour and do nothing, it used to irritate me beyond belief because he would take his shoes off, he would put his soft shoes on, he would get a tissue, he’d move his coffee around, he would turn his bloody machine; really annoyed me, so I knew he would faff around and be taking his soft shoes off and putting his hard shoes on, he’d be gathering his bag together, he’d have to get his Filofax, so I just hit redial,

— ‘What?’

— ‘Mark, you’ve got to get out, I feel really bad about this!’

— ‘Okay, okay,’

and at the same time another colleague, Brian, shouted,

— ‘Is that Scott? Was it a plane?’

— ‘I don’t know, hold on,’

and I turned on the TV and they showed a picture from the north, so I’m looking from the west eastwards and I’m seeing pictures from the north, so I say to Mark,

— ‘They’re saying a plane has hit the Tower, I think they think it’s a passenger jet,’

— ‘Holy shit, we’re going.’

* * *

I didn’t hear from Mark until midnight. He got out. He spoke to Rod, my boss; he spoke to his boss, Ed; to a few other people:

— ‘We’ve gotta go, we’ve gotta go,’

and none of them would go, so Mark left with another colleague. He was lucky.

Carlos sat next to Mark on the other side of the cubicle. He heard our conversation, he also heard the plane hit, and he didn’t speak to anyone, he just picked up his bag and walked out, great instinct. He just got out, no small talk, nothing, just left. Of course I was concerned because I’d swapped time off with him.

Brian didn’t get out. Brian was killed.

Rod my boss was killed.

Ed, Mark’s boss, was killed.

All of our managers in Technology were killed, none of them were left.

* * *

It took me a while to start thinking the powerdown through. After about six months, I got in touch with the 9/11 Commission and the Port Authority to get a full explanation. I didn’t get any response from either of them.

In 2003 I said something really naive on a blog like,

— ‘Hello, my name is Scott Forbes, I worked in the Trade Center on 9/8 and 9/9; there was a powerdown; I’ve not been able to register this with the 9/11 Commission, I’m not able to get any further information, can anyone help me find out more and duh-duh-duh’ –

and I was inundated with responses, I got hundreds of emails, some of them quite bizarre; some of them, terrifying. One was some guy asking me if I was

— ‘The Scott Forbes that had an IBM laptop with the chip number so-and-so purchased in 1992?’

and the answer is yes! Where the hell did he get that information from? I had one guy in Sri Lanka telling me,

— ‘You are an American patriot!’

and I politely told him,

— ‘I’m no such thing, how dare you?’

(Laughs.) I was contacted by journalists and radio stations and TV stations and the guy who made Loose Change, this film about the US government being responsible for 9/11. It’s a fascinating film; a high-level conspiracy story with a contemporary soundtrack; it’s like a piece of inner-city cinematic hiphop; a great piece of amateur, online editing that fed on and into the 9/11 Truth phenomenon. When he spoke to me, he already had the first version on YouTube and going viral. I explained about my day off and the powerdown, but when I cautioned I was still working for the company and couldn’t use the company name, he dropped me like a lead balloon.

Frankly I’m not sure I was sensational enough.

You know, 9/11 occurred in parallel with the growth and power of online media, and in a way I regretted making that blog entry because it was like, ‘Oh, I’ve released this demon now, this is quite scary.’ Some of the stuff I’ve had to deal with is ludicrous. I was invited to a 9/11 group meeting in the House of Commons. After, there was a guy asking me questions about disaster recovery procedures; he does the same job as me and he was testing whether I was genuine or not. And I felt elated: this is validation, you know? The next person that comes to me gives me a CD with his theories on it that

— ‘Invisible spacecraft were sending power beacons against the Trade Center to demolish it,’

and it’s like: where do these people come from? I had one woman who pestered me and has sent me endless emails because she wants to

— ‘Paint your aura.’

(Laughs.) And it’s like,

— ‘Okay, I’ve got an aura, but I’m not interested, love.’

I’m trying to make a serious point: the 9/11 Truth movement is like a magnet for these disparate people, and a lot aren’t there for the truth, they’ve got their own truth already. I’ve been labelled by these people, and if you don’t fulfil what they see as an obligation, they’re not happy. They’re as political as any politician: they’re happy to use you when it suits and not when it doesn’t.

* * *

I’m not a conspiracy theorist. I don’t have a theory, that’s wrong. Some accuse me of being a 9/11 Truther and of having an agenda: I don’t have an agenda. Some have said I don’t work for the company, and I do. Never did work for the company: and I did, I do. Some have told me I’m lying. And I’m not. Some want me to be, um, like, a hero? And I don’t want to be a hero, I just want the truth.

You know, the building came down on 9/11. Two days before, we had a powerdown when electric cabling was removed and replaced. I saw contractors. I saw workmen in overalls with boxes and cables on the lobby of the seventy-sixth floor. It did occur, and I want it explained. I want to know the contracting company or companies that were there and I want to know how many people, and I’d like to know exactly what they were doing. I’m sure in the Port Authority there are records. Conceivably access to those building spaces… could have been a risk… it could have been… you know… if I… putting it out there blindly… I don’t say I believe this, but… these outrageous ideas that are there… I’m not saying I believe, but – — I met this guy, William Rodriguez, who escaped as the building collapsed. He was a janitor, worked for the Port Authority: he’s called the Last Man Out. He was hailed as a hero by the American media and given a presidential medal of honour because he saved people; he had keys to open doors that were locked and so on. His testimony is incredible. Apparently, there was a delivery guy delivering sodas; the van had driven down, and he was delivering these soft drinks four floors underground, and Rodriguez went down and rescued him from the rubble.

Rodriguez was called to the 9/11 Commission, and he says there were explosions in the basement of the World Trade Center. The guy he rescued validates the story.

None of this was included in the report. He asked for it to be made public, though it never was; it was held in private session, and it was never acknowledged or published.

He was dropped by the media and politicians. So, you know, because his story doesn’t fit the official storyline, he becomes invisible: except he doesn’t. He’s all over the web. He goes around the world giving this lecture. He’s become incredibly well-known. He’s one of the very few 9/11 Truth celebrities, if you like.

Kind of interesting.

* * *

It seems virtually impossible, at the moment, with my information, to get proof, to get concrete evidence. I can’t get the information out there which nobody can deny that this powerdown occurred. Uh… it’s really… I can’t get it… I can’t do it. The fact that the 9/11 Commission in particular didn’t acknowledge my information or didn’t deem it to be important upset me, because all information is important. It just leaves a gaping hole; even more so after reading about how inefficient and unfocused they were, how clearly they were given a remit by the White House on what they could look at and not look at, on what they could say and not say.

You know, that’s where all my questioning and anxiety arose from.

It’s just disappointment all round.

I do honestly want to get to the bottom of it.

Hopefully one day I will.

* * *

I don’t want to sound cynical, but I’m not optimistic about the world. I don’t mean that with a heavy heart, it’s just the way it is; you know, that’s what experience teaches you. You can find your optimism wherever – in a flower, or an uninterrupted journey home – but on that political level you can’t really talk about optimism, and if somebody does, they’re not being genuine; it’s Disney. This has been a decade politically of cynicism; people are very cynical of cause and effect now in politics. Political decisions were made which have piggybacked on 9/11. Individual politicians made of it what they will, and still do. Like Bush and Blair and Giuliani. Regarding Bush now I have… um… (Laughs.) it’s funny… I don’t feel… you know, he’s almost like a vacuum. (Laughs.) Blair on the other hand is very not a vacuum. Blair used 9/11. Eulogised about it. Put a lot of weight on it. Used it to validate his support of Iraq. I think Blair is pivotal, Bush isn’t. You know he was called to the Iraq Inquiry and he was so over-prepared for that. There’s no simple honesty there: and no, that is not endemic to politicians; I think it’s a weakness of some politicians, some very able politicians.

There were nearly a hundred Brits on 9/11. And there was a memorial put up to them in New York. And there are events regularly supported by the British Embassy and Blair – along with lots of other bodies, charitable foundations and so on – and that’s the irony; you know, on 9/11 I should have been in the office, but I took the day off, and I would have been in the office when the plane hit, I wouldn’t have left. Had I died on 9/11, I would have been one of the people honoured by Blair: now I’m a survivor but I’m not.

I feel powerless in relation to 9/11, really powerless.

It’s like purgatory.

THE ENEMY

Mike Bartlett

Characters

JOHN