SCENE 1, PART 1: Little Women (Jo)

need to memorize lines eugh

PROFESSOR BHAER: Miss March! Another letter has arrived for you! Miss March!

JO: (entering) Mrs. Kirk, the mutton you ordered is on the kitchen table!

(grabs letter)

JO: Thank you, Professor!

(reading envelope)

JO: Christopher Columbus! Another publisher?

(looking at the Professor)

JO: Another rejection?

PROFESSOR BHAER: I have no idea. I do not read your letters. But they keep arriving and I keep bringing them to you.

JO: And I keep hoping—

PROFESSOR BHAER: We all keep hoping for your success, Miss March. The entire boarding house keeps hoping. You have us all on edge.

JO: (reading) ‘My dear Miss March. I read your story.’ Well, he’s read it. ‘Unfortunately…unfortunately I found your tale tasteless and vulgar. Not at all suitable for my readers. My advice to you—

(SHE hands Professor Bhaer the letter)

PROFESSOR BHAER: (reads) ‘My advice to you is to return home and have babies. This is what women are made for. Sincerely F. Putnam.’

JO: Twenty-two.

PROFESSOR BHAER: Twenty-two?

JO: Twenty-two rejections since I’ve been in New York. They all say the same thing. Go home. Give up.

PROFESSOR BHAER: F. Putnam is an idiot. His words are stupid.

JO: F. Putnam is one of the most powerful publishers in the city.

PROFESSOR BHAER: You cannot lose faith, Miss March. There will be someone who will like your story. I am certain of it…

JO: Professor Bhaer? Is it possible I could read my story to you? I would so respect your opinion.

PROFESSOR BHAER: Yes. Of course.

JO: Actually, it’s one of my best.

(reads)

JO: It’s a mean and stormy night. The moors are bleak and bloody. Thunder claps. Lightning strikes!

(music begins)

JO: The fair Clarissa, her clothes in disarray, races across the wild coastal heath—

(#1-An Operatic Tragedy)

AFTER AN OPERATIC TRAGEDY

(interrupting her diplomatically)

PROFESSOR BHAER: Miss March!

(smiling)

PROFESSOR BHAER: Tell me, what is it you are writing here?

JO: Blood-and-guts stuff. It’s all the rage. The magazines and periodicals are full of it.

PROFESSOR BHAER: Violence and seduction on every page?

JO: Read Shakespeare. Read history. Read the newspapers.

PROFESSOR BHAER: It is getting late. Perhaps it is best we pursue this some other time.

JO: No. I want to know what you think, Professor.

PROFESSOR BHAER: Blood and guts stuff? What you think the world wants to hear? If I have noticed nothing else about you, Miss March, I have noticed you are unique. Something you should try not to forget. I think you could do better.

JO: Better? …And who are you anyway: an aging German professor, close to 50—

PROFESSOR BHAER: I am 34.

JO: 34, really? Well—you look a lot older.

PROFESSOR BHAER: I worry a lot.

JO: And just what do you worry about?

PROFESSOR BHAER: How to avoid a conversation such as this! Now I will go to dinner.

(starts away, turns back)

Miss March, since you have been here—six weeks now, is it? —you shout, you rant, you upset the whole order of this boarding house. I am a serene and peaceful man—

JO: You’re aloof, you’re arrogant—

PROFESSOR BHAER: Arrogant? Miss March, I spoke my mind, as you spoke yours. Obviously, it was not appreciated on either side.

JO: Obviously!

(he leaves)

My stories were a great success in Concord.

#2 - Better

Transition to the March Attic