The Pillowman - Tupolski Line Memorization

ACT ONE SCENE ONE

Police interrogation room. Katurian sitting at table,

centre, blindfolded. Tupolski and Ariel enter and sit

opposite him, Tupolski with a box file containing a large

sheaf of papers.

Mister Katurian, this is detective Ariel, I’m detective Tupolski … Who left that on you?

KATURIAN: What?

Tupolski takes the blindfold off.

Who left this on you?

KATURIAN: Um, the man.

Why didn’t you take it off? It just looks stupid.

KATURIAN: I didn’t think I was supposed to.

It just looks stupid.

KATURIAN: (pause) Yes.

(pause) Like I was saying, this is detective Ariel and I’m Detective Tupolski.

KATURIAN: Well, the main thing I want to say is, I have complete respect for you and for what you do and I'm glad to help you in any way I can. I have complete respect.

Well, that’s good to hear.

ARIEL: Am I mumbling? Tupolski, am I mumbling?

No, you’re not mumbling. You’re quite clear.

KATURIAN: I am going to try not to make you fuck me up at all because the reason is I will answer everything.

Well, that’s a start, isn’t it?

Eyeing Katurian, Ariel idles to a side wall, smokes a cigarette.

Why do you suspect we have brought you here? You must suspect some reason.

ARIEL: Look, why don't we just start torturing him and

cut out all this shit?

KATURIAN: What...?

Who’s the Number One on this case, Ariel, me or you? (Pause.) Thank you. Don’t listen to him. Anyway, so why do you suspect we have brought you here?

KATURIAN: I’ve been racking my brains, but I can’t think.

You’ve been racking your brains but you can’t think?

KATURIAN: No.

Well, yes or no?

KATURIAN: Yes.

Huh?

KATURIAN: Because I’ve never done anything. I’ve never done any anti-police thing. I’ve never done any anti-state thing …

You’ve been racking your brains but you can’t think of a single reason we might have brought you here?

KATURAIN: I can think of a reason or not a reason but a thing I assume there might be a linkage, although I can’t see how there can be a linkage.

The linkage of what? Of what to what? Or, of what to what?

KATURIAN: What? Just, only the thing of how you took my stories away too when you took me, and that you have them there, is the only thing.

And that I have them where? Have you been reading the papers I’ve got in front of me?

KATURIAN: I haven’t been reading …

Papers which, for all you know, may have been some immesnely classified, very very secret thing.

KATURIAN: My eyes only caught the titles, just glancing.

Oh, like your peripheral vision?

KATURIAN: Yes.

But, hang on, for it to be your peripheral vision, you’d have to be turned around this way … (Tupolski turns sideways on, glancing down at papers.) See, like this way. Like sidewards, like this way …

KATURIAN: I meant …

See? Like this way. Like sidewards.

KATURIAN: I meant my peripheral vision at the bottom of my eyes.

Ohh, the peripheral vision at the bottom of your eyes.

KATURIAN: I don’t know if there’s a word for that.

There isn’t. (Pause.) Why would there be a linkage, your stories, you being taken here? It isn’t a crime, you write a story.

KATURIAN: That’s what I thought.

Given certain restrictions …

KATURIAN: Of course.

The security of the state, the security of the general whatever-you-call-it. I wouldn’t even call them restrictions.

KATURIAN: I wouldn’t call them restrictions.

I would call them guidelines.

KATURIAN: Guidelines, yes.

Given certain guidelines, the security of the whatever, it isn’t a crime, you write a story.

KATURIAN: That's what I thought. That's the whole thing.

What’s the whole thing?

KATURIAN: I mean, I agree. You read these things, these"stories', supposedly, "The police are all this,' "The government is all this.' All these political. what would you call 'em? "The government should be doing this." Please. Fuck off. You know what I say? I say if you've got a political axe to grind, if you've got a political what-do-ya-call-it, go write a fucking essay, I will know where I stand. I say keep your left-wing this, keep your right-wing that and tell me a fucking story! You know? A great man once said, "The first duty of a storyteller is to tell a story, and I believe in that wholeheartedly, 'The first duty of a storyteller is to tell a storv.' Or was it ‘The only duty of a storyteller is to tell a story’? Yeah, it might have been ‘The only duty of a storteller is to tell a storv.' I can't remember, but anyway, that's what I do, I tell stories. No axe to grind, no anything to grind. No social anything whatsoever. And that's why, I can't see, if that's why you've brought me in here, I can't see what the reason would be, unless something political came in by accident, or something that seemed political came in, in which case show me where it is. Show me where the bastard is. I’ll take it straight out. Fucking burn it. You know?

Pause. Tupolski stares straight at him.

You know what I mean?

I have to fill this form out now. It’s a form in case anything bad happens to you in custody. (Pause.) We’ve got a mistake here with your name, I think. Your surname is Katurian, yes?

KATURIAN: Yes.

See, we’ve got your first name as Katurian.

KATURIAN: My first name is Katurian.

(pause) Your first name is Katurian?

KATURIAN: Yes.

And your second name is Katurian?

KATURIAN: Yes.

Your name is Katurian Katurian?

KATURIAN: My parents were funny people.

Hm. Middle initial?

KATURIAN: K.

Tupolski looks at him. Katurian nods, shrugs.

Your name is Katurian Katurian Katurian?

KATURIAN: Like I said, my parents were funny people.

Mm. For ‘funny’ I guess read ‘stupid fucking idiots’.

KATURIAN: I’m not disagreeing.

Your address is Kamenice 4443?

KATURIAN: Yes.

Which you share with … ?

KATURIAN: My brother. Michal.

Ah, Michal. At least it’s not fucking ‘Katurian’!

ARIEL: He's backward, your brother, yeah?

KATURIAN: He's not backward, no. He's slow to get things sometimes.

ARIEL: He’s slow to get things. Okay.

Next of kin?

KATURIAN: Michal. My next of kin?

Just formalities, Katurian. You know what I mean? (Pause.) Place of work.

KATURIAN: The Kamenice abattoir.

ARIEL: This writer.

KATURIAN: It’s not so bad.

You like your work there?

KATURIAN: Yes.

ARIEL: I see.

Pause. Tupolski puts his pen down, then tears the form he has been filling in in two.

That wasn’t a form in case anything bad happens to you in custody. I was just mucking around.

KATURIAN: What was it?

It was a piece of paper I was about to tear in two.

Tupolski flips through the sheaf of stories till he finds the one he is looking for.

Here we are, 'The Little Apple Men'.

KATURIAN: What about it?

Ariel idles back to table, sits, stubs cigarette out, as Tupolski familiarises himself with the story.

It's not one of my best. (Pause.) It's pretty good, though.

This is a story, it starts off, there is a little girl, and her father treats her badly …

KATURIAN: He slaps her around and that. He’s a …

You seem to have a lot of st … He’s a what?

KATURIAN: What?

The father.

ARIEL: 'He's a ... ' something, you said.

He represents something, does he?

KATURIAN: He represents a bad father. He is a bad father. How do you mean, ‘represents’?

He is a bad father.

KATURIAN: Yes. He slaps the little girl around.

This is why he is a bad father.

KATURIAN: Yes.

What else does he do to the little girl, ‘he is a bad father’?

KATURIAN: I know.

ARIEL: Fucking ... hah?!

Ariel gets up and paces.

Ariel’s getting a bit aggrieved because ‘We can draw our own conclusions’ is, sort of, our job. (Pause.) And the first conclusion we are drawing is exactly how many stories have you got ‘a little girl is treated badly’, or ‘a little boy is treated badly’?

Ariel (approaching) 'I am trying to say? He's putting words into my fucking mouth now, 'I am trying to say,' let alone draw our own fucking conclusions...

KATURIAN: No...!

ARIEL: We can't even speak now, this fucking man says! Pur your fucking hands down ... !

Ariel pulls Katurian off his chair by the hair, kneels across him and gouges into his face. Tupolski looks at this, sighs.

Any time you’re ready, Ariel?

Ariel stops, breathing heavily, goes back to his seat.

(to Katurian) Retake your seat, please.

In pain, Katurian does so.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention … I’m the good cop, he’s the bad cop. (Pause.) So, back to the literature. The father, as we have established, treats the little girl badly, and one day the girl gets some apples and carves some little men out of these apples, all little fingers, little eyes, little toes, and she gives them to her father but she says to him they’re not to be eaten, they’re to be kept as a memento of when his only little daughter was young, and naturally the pig of a father swallows a bunch of these applemen whole, just to spite her, and they have razor blades in them, and he dies in agony.

KATURIAN: And that's kind of like the end of the story, that should be like the end of the story, the father gets his comeuppance. But then it goes on.

But then it goes on. The girl wakes up that night. A number of applemen are walking up her chest. They hold her mouth open. They say to her …

KATURIAN: (slight voice) ‘You killed our little brothers … ‘

‘You killed our little brothers.’ They climb down her throat. She chokes to death on her own blood. The end.

ARIEL: But you don't have anything against any Jews?

KATURIAN: No. Should I have?

‘Should I have?’ Good answer. ‘Should I have?’ Kind of lily-livered and subservient on the one hand, yet vaguely sarcastic and provocative on the other. ‘Should I have?’

KATURIAN: I wasn’t trying to be provocative?

Were you trying to be subservient?

KATURIAN: No.

Then you were trying to be provocative. And now Ariel is going to hit you again …

ARIEL: This reminds me. I'm going to talk to the brother.

Ariel exits, Tupolski smiles, Katurian stunned, scared.

KATURIAN: My brother's at school.

Me and Ariel, we have this funny thing, we always say ‘This reminds me’ when the thing hasn’t reminded us of the thing we’re saying it reminds us of at all. It’s really funny.

KATURIAN: My brother’s at school.

Your brother is one door down.

KATURIAN: (pause) But he’ll be scared …

You seem a little scared yourself.

I am a little scared.

What are you scared about?

KATURIAN: I'm scared my brother is all alone in a strange place, and I'm scared your friend is gonna go kick the shit out of him, and I'm scared he's gonna come kick the shit out of me again although if he does it's okay, I mean I'd rather he didn't but if there's something in these stories you don't like then go ahead and take it out on me, but my brother gets frightened easily, and he doesn't understand these things and he's got nothing to do with these stories anyway, I've only ever read them to him, so I just think it's completely unfair you should've brought him down here and I think you should just fucking go and fucking let him out of here right now! Right fucking now!

(pause) I bet you’re all adrenaline now, aren’t you, all "‘Ooh just shouted at a policeman,’ all ‘Ooh probably shouldn’t’ve but ooh got really angry.’ Ooh. Calm the fuck down. Alright? Do you think we’re animals?

KATURIAN: No.

Well we’re not animals. We deal, sometimes, with animals. We’re not animals (Pause.) Your brother will be fine. I give you my word.

Tupolski looks at another story from the pile.

‘The Tale of the Three Gibbet Crossroads.’ This does not have your theme it sems.

KATURIAN: What theme?

Y’know, your theme, ‘Some poor little kid gets fucked up.’ Your theme.

KATURIAN: That isn’t a theme. Some of them have come out that way. That isn’t a theme.

Although maybe, in an oblique way, it does have your theme.

KATURIAN: I don’t have themes. I’ve written, what, for hundred stories, and maybe ten or twenty have children in?

Have murdered children in.

KATURIAN: So, what, this is about stories with murdered children in! Do you think I'm trying to say, 'Go out and murder children?'

I’m not saying you’re trying to say ‘Go out and murder children.’ (Pause.) Are you trying to say, ‘Go out and murder children’?

KATURIAN: No! No bloody way! Are you kidding? I'm not trying to say anything at all! That's my whole thing.

I know, I know, your whole thing, the first duty of a storyteller is to …

KATURIAN: Yes …

… Blah blah blah, I know. This ‘Three Gibbet Crossroads’ …

KATURIAN: If there are children in them, it's incidental. If there is politics in them, it's incidental. It's accidental.

Except, the thing is, don’t interrupt me when I’m talking …

KATURIAN: No, I’m, sorry …

If I ask you something outright, or if I go with my eyes, like, ‘Go ahead and say something,’ like with my eyes, then you go ahead and say something, but if I’m in the middle of something …

KATURIAN: I know, I’m sorry …

And you’re fucking doing it again! Did I ask you something outright?! Did I go with my eyes like, ‘Go ahead and say something’?!

KATURIAN: No.

No, I didn’t, did I? (Pause.) Did I? See, that was an outright question and I did go with my eyes like, ‘Go ahead and say something.”