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THE EIFFEL TOWER WEDDING PARTY ^
translated by DUDLEY FITTS
PREFACE Every work of the poetic order contains what G id ^ in his preface to Paludes, so aptly calls “God’s share.” ^ i s “Share,” which eludes the poet himself, can surprise him. Such and such a phrase or gesture, which originally meant no more to him than the third dimension means to a paint er, has a hidden meaning that each person will interpret in his own way. The true Symbol is never planned: it emerges by itself, so loh ^ s ~ th e bizarre, the unreal, do~^ ^ n t g r j n t o fliA
rp r* K n n T n ff
In I fairyfand, the fairies do not appear, iR ey walk in visibly there. To mortal eyes they can appear only on the terra firma of everyday. The unsophisticated mind is more likely than the others to see the fairies, for it will not op pose to the marvelous the resistance of the hardheaded. I might almost say that the Chief Electrician, with his re flections, has often illuminated a piece for me. I have been reading in Antoine’s memoirs of the scan dal provoked by the presence on the stage of real quarters of beef and a fountain of real water. But now, thanks to Antoine, w e have come to such a that the audience is displeased if real objects are not used on the stage, an if it is not subjected to a plot precisely as complex pre cisely as tedious, as those from which the theater should serve as a distraction.** “Writing of OrphSe in 1926, Antoine called it “a studio-farce, not even funny” (sic).
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The Eiffel Tower W edding Party, because of its candor, was first of all mistaken for a bit of esoteric writing. The mysterious inspires in the public a sort of fear. Here, I re nounce mystery. I illuminate everything, I underline every thing. Sunday vacuity, human livestock, ready-made ex pressions, dissociation of ideas into flesh and bone, the fierce cruelty of childhood, the miraculous poetry of daily life: these are my play, so w ell understood by the young musi cians who composed the score for it. A remark of the Photographer’s might do w ell for my epigraph: “Since these mysteries are beyond me, let’s pre tend that I arranged them all the time.” This is our motto, par excellence. Your prig always finds a last refuge in re sponsibility. Thus, for example, he will go on fighting a war after the end has been reached. In W edding Party, God’s share is considerable. To the right and left of the scene the human phonographs (like the ancient Chorus, like the com pere and commere of our music-hall stage), describe, without the least “literature,” the absurd action which is unfolded, danced, and panto mimed between them. I say “absurd” because instead of trying to keep this side of the absurdity of life, to lessen it, to arrange it as w e arrange the story of an incident in which w e played an uncomplimentary part, I accentuate it, I push it forward, I try to paint more truly than the truth. f ~ l! h e poet ought to disengage objects and ideas from their veiling mists; he ought to display them suddenly, so naked ly and so quickly that they are scarcely recognizable. It is then that they strike us with their youth, as though they had never become official dotard^. *“ This is the case with commonplaces — old, powerful, generally esteemed after the manner of masterpieces, but whose original beauty, because of long use, no longer sur prises us. in my play I rejuvenate the commonplace. It is my conem to present it in suciTaTigKTfhat it recaptures its teens A generation devoted to obscurity, to jaded realism, does not give way before the shrug of a shoulder. I know that
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T H E E I F F E L T O W E R AVEDDING PA R T Y
155
my text has too “obvious” an air, that it is too recdahly w rit ten, like the alphabets in school. But aren’t w e in school? Aren’t w e still deciphering the elementary symbols? The young music finds itself in an analogous position. It employs a clarity, a simplicity, a good humor, that are new. The ingenuous ear is deceived; it seems to be listen ing to a cafe orchestra, but it is as mistaken as would be an eye which could not distinguish between a loud garish material and the same material copied by Ingres. In W edding Party w e employ all the popular resources that w ill have none of at home, but w ill approve whenever a musician, native or foreign, exploits them out side. Do you think, for example, that a Russian can hear the Petrouchka just as w e do? In addition to the charms of that musical masterpiece he finds there his childhood, his Sun days in Petrograd, the lullabies of nurses. W hy should I deny myself this double pleasure? I assure you that the orchestra of The Eiffel Tower W edding Party moves me more than any number of Russian or Spanish dances. It is not a question of honor rolls. I think I have sufiiciently exalted Russian, German, and Spanish musi cians (to say nothing of Negro orchestras) to permit my self this cri du coeur. f ^ J t is curious to observe the French everywhere repulsing bitterly whatever is truly French and embracing unreserved\ ly the local alien spirit. It is curious, too, that in the case of W edding Party an audience at a dress rehearsal should have been outraged by a classic blockhead character whose presence in the wedding cortege was neither more nor less . controversial than the presence of the commonplaces in the
I
U2?tEvery living work of art has its own ballyhoo, and only this is seen by those who stay outside. Now in the case of new work, this first impression so shocks, irritates, angers, the spectator that he will not enter. He is repelled from its true nature by its face, by the unfamiliar outward appear-
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T H E E I F F E L T O W E R W ED D IN G PA R TY
ance which distracts^ him, as would a clown grimacing at the door. It is this phenomenon which deceives even those critics who are least slaves to convention. They forget that they are at a performance which must be followed just as attentively as a “popular success.” They think that they are watching a sort of street carnival. A conscientious critic who would never think of writing, “The Duchess kisses the Steward” instead of “The Steward presents a letter to the Duchess” in his review of one of these “legitimate” dramas, will not hesitate, reviewing W edding Party, to make the Bicycle Girl or the Collector come out of the camera — which is absurd enough. Not the organized absurdity, the desir able, the good absurdity, but simply the absurd. And he can never see the difference. Alone among the critics, M. Bidou explained to the readers of D ebats that my piece was “a composition of active wit.” ** /"”^ e action of my piece is pictorial, though the text it/self is not. The fact is that I am trying to substitute a “theater poetry” for the usual “poetry in the theater.” “Poetry , in the theater” is a delicate lace, invisible at any considerI able distance. “Theater poetry” should be a coarse lace, a lace of rigging, a ship upon, the sea. W eddin g Party can be ^ as terrifying as a drop of poetry under the microscope. The •-scenes fit together like the words of a poem.
I
The secret of theatrical success is this: you must set a decoy at the door so that part of your audience can amuse themselves there while the rest are inside. Shakspere, Moliere, and the profound Chaplin know this well. “ After the hisses, confusion, and applause which marked the first performance of my piece by the Swedish dancers at the Champs-Elys^es, I should have set it down as a failure if the audience of the “informed” had not given place to the real public. This pubhc always gives me a hearing. “Only he could write of Orphee that it was “a meditation on death.”
T H E E IF F E L T O W E R W ED D IN G PA R T Y
157
After the performance a lady complained to me that the piece did not carry beyond the footlights. Seeing that I was astonished by her criticism (for masks and megaphones are more effective beyond the footlights than ordinary voices and make-up), she went on to explain that she so great ly ired the ceiling of Maurice Denis, who decorated the theater, that she had engaged the highest seats in the house — which necessarily lessened her command of what was going on on the stage. I cite this as an example of the criticism offered by that little group with neither intelligence nor sympathy, the lit tle group that the newspapers call “the elite.” Moreover, our senses are so unused to reacting together that the critics — even my publishers —found it hard to believe that this complicated machinery did not entail two or three pages of text. This faulty perspective must also be blamed upon tbe absence of the development of ideas: a development thatjjthe ear customarily perceives, since the symbolic drama and the drama d these. (Jarry’s Ubu and Apollinaire’s Les mamelles de Tiresias are both symbolic dramas and dramas d thdse). The diction of my human phonographs, Pierre Bertin and Marcel Herrand, also comes in for its share in the general misunderstanding: a diction black as ink, immense and clear as the lettering of a billboard. Here, surprisingly enough, are actors who are content to follow the text, rath er than force the text to follow them: still another lyric novelty to which the audience is not accustomed! Let us touch on the accusation of buffoonery, which has often been hurled at me by our age — an age preoccupied with the false-sublime, an age (let’s it it) still in love with Wagner. If Cold means Night, and Hot means Light, Lukewarm means Dusk. Ghosts love the dusk. The crowd loves the luke warm. Very well: aside from the fact that the buffoon at titude brings with it a clarity that is ill-suited to ghosts
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(by “ghosts” I,mean w hat the crowd calls “poems” ); aside from the fact that Moliere proved himself more of a poet in his Pourceaugnac and h e bourgeois gentilhomme than in his poetic dramas; the buffoon attitude is the only one that permits certain audacities. People come to the theater for relaxation. It is easy to amuse them with th e dancing dolls, to tickle them with the candies that one gives recalcitrant children to make them take their medicine. But once the medicine is taken, w e shall on to other exercises. Thanks to people like Sergei Diaghilev and Rolf de Mare, little by little there is coming into being in a theatrical form which is n ot properly the Ballet, and which has no place in the Opera, the Opera-Comique, or the fash ionable theaters. The future is indicated on the fringe of these conventional forms. Our friend Lugne-Poe has it ted this with considerable apprehension in one of his arti cles. This new form, more consonant vwlth the modern spirit, remains still an unexplored land, rich in possibilities. Revolution which flings the doors wide open for the ex perimentalists! The new generation will continue to experi ment with forms in which the fairy, the dance, acrobatics, pantomime, drama, satire, music, and the spoken word all combine to produce a novel genre: and unaided, they will stage pieces which the oflicial “artists” w ill take for studiofarces, pieces which for all that will be no less the plastic expression of poetry. The mixture of good humor and bad humor in Paris cre ates the most vital atmosphere in the world. Sergei Diaghi lev told me one day that he had felt nothing like it in any other capital. Hisses and cheers; nasty reviews, with here and there an unexpected approval: and three years later the scoffers are applauding and cannot having once hissed. Such is the history of my Parade, and of any other piece that alters the rules of the game. f A theatrical piece ought to be written, mounted, cos tumed, furnished with musical accompaniment, played, and
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danced, all by one and the same man. Such a umversal athlete does not exist, and the next best thing is to, rep ace the individual by what is most like an individual: a tnendly group.
,
T
There are many cliques, but few such groups. I am for tunate enough to belong to one made up of various young musicians, poets, and painters. The Eiffel Tow er W eddtng Party, taken as a whole, is the manifesto of a poetic spin 40 which I am proud to have contributed already a great deal. Thanks to Jean Victor-Hugo, my characters, instead of being (as is so often the case in the theater) too true to life to b e able to the mass of ligliting an ddcor, were constructed, corrected, built up, raised by ev ery device of artistry to a likeness on an epic scale. I hnd in lean Victor-Hugo a certain atavism of monstrous reality. Thanks to Irene Lagut, our Eiffel Tower suggests forgetme-nots and lace valentines.
j- t
7
Georges Auric’s Overture, The Fourteenth of J u y marching bands whose music blares out at the ^ reet ^rner and moves away - calls up the strong enchantment of the sidewalk, of the popular fair, of red-festooned like guillotines, where drums and trumpets make the ste ographers and the sailors and the shipping clerks dance And his ritoumelles accompany the pantomime ]ust as a circus band repeats a motif during an acrobatic act. The same atmosphere breathes through Mffhaud s Weditw March, through Germaine Tailleferres Quadrille arid W altz of the Telegrams, through Poulenc’s The Sveech and The TrouviUe Bathing Beauty. Arthur Honegge amused himself by making fun of what phers gravely call; m u sic . It is unnecessary to add that they all fell into the trap. Hardly had the first notes of die F«neral March sounded when all those long ears "P in grave attention. Not one noticed that that march w beautiful as a sarcasm, written with a taste, J^traord nary feeling for appositeness: not one of the critics, a
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whom praised the _piece,„j:BcognizeH the Waltz in Faust whjch served as its hassi How can I express my gratitude to MM. Rolf de Mare and Borlin? The former with his generous insight, the latter with his modesty, made it possible for me to crystallize a formula with which I had been experimenting in Parade and in L e Boeuf sur le toit. JE A N COCTEAU
1922 Les Maries de la Tour Eiffel was first played on June 8, 1921, by Rolf de Mare’s Swedish Ballet Company. The chor eography was by Jean Cocteau and Jean Borhn, the decor by Irene Lagut, and the costumes and masks by Jean VictorHugo. The musical program was as follows: Overture W edding March (entrance) The General’s Speech The Trouville Bathing Beauty The Massacre (fugue) W altz of the Radiograms Funeral March Quadrille W edding March (exit)
Georges Auric Darius Milhaud Francis Poulenc Francis Poulenc Darius Milhaud Germaine Tailleferre Arthur Honegger Germaine Tailleferre Darius Milhaud
During the course of the action there were three ritournelles by Georges Auric.
CHARACTERS PH O N O G R A PH I PH O N O G R A PH I I T H E OSTRICH T H E H U N T ER T H E M A N A G ER O F T H E E IF F E L TO W ER
•
T H E PH O TO G RA PH ER T H E BRIDE T H E BRIDEGROOM T H E M O T H E R -IN -L A W
/
T H E F A T H E R -IN -L A W T H E GEN ERAL T W O BRIDESMAIDS T W O USHERS T H E CYCLIST T H E CH ILD T H E TROUVILLE BATHING BEAUTY T H E L IO N T H E COLLECTOR O F PA INTINGS T H E ART DEALER FIV E RADIOGRAMS
DfiCOR The first platform of the EifiEel Tower. The backdrop rep resents a bird’s-eye view of Paris. Upstage, right, a camera at eye level: the black funnel forms a corridor extending to the wings, and the camera front opens like a door to permit the entrances and exits of the characters. Downstage, right and left, half hidden by the proscenium arch, two actors costumed as Phonographs: their bodies are the cab inets, their mouths the horns. It is these Phonographs which comment on the action and recite the lines of the charac ters. They should speak very loudly and quickly, pronounc ing each syllable distinctly. The action is simultaneous with the comments of the Phonographs.
THE felFFEL TOWER W EDDING PARTY The curtain rises w ith the drum-roll which ends the Over ture. Em pty set. PHON O
You are on the first platform of the Eiffel
I.
Tower. PH O N O H . Look! An ostrich. She crosses the stage. She goes off. And here’s the Hunter. He’s tracking the ostrich. He looks up. H e sees something. He raises his gun. H e fires.
Heavens! A radiogram.
PH O N O I.
A large blue radiogram falls from above. The shot wakes up the Manager of the Eiffel Tower. H e appears. PH O N O H .
PH O N O
I.
Hey, Mac, where do you think you are —
hunting? PH O N O H . I was trailing an ostrich. I thought I saw it on the cables of the Eiffel Tower. PH O N O I. PH O N O
And you kill me a radiogram!
n. I didn’t mean to do it.
PH O N O I.
End of
th e
dialogue.
PH O N O H . Here comes the Photographer of the Eiffel Tower. He speaks. What is he saying? PH O N O I . You haven’t seen an ostrich around here any where, have you? PH O N O
n. I most certainly have! I’m trailing it right
now! PH O N O I. W ell, it’s like this: my camera’s out of order. Usually when I say, “Steady, now, watch for the httle bird” — a little bird comes out. This morning I said to a lady.
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THE E IF F E L TOW ER WEDDING ^ ^ R T Y
“Watch ,for the little and out came an ostrich. So now I §m looking for the ostrich in order to make it get back into the camera. PHONO n. Ladies and Gentlemen, the situation is getting complicated, for the Manager of the Eiffel Tower has sud denly discovered that the radiogram was addressed to him. PHONO I. He opens it. PH O N O n . M A N A G ER E IF F E L TO W ER STOP ARRIVE W EDDING BREAKFAST PLEASE RESERVE T A B LE. PH O N O I.
But this radiogram is dead.
PH O N O n. It’s precisely because it’s dead that everyone can understand it. PH O N O 1. Quick quick! W e’ve just got time to set the ta ble. I remit your fine. I appoint you Waiter of the Eiffel Tower. Photographer, on your job!
PHONO n . They set the table. PH O N O I.
W edding March.
PHONO n. W edding Procession.
W edding march. The Phonographs announce the m em bers of the w edding party, who enter in pairs, strutting like trained dogs in an animal act. PHONO I. The b r i d e , s w e e t as a la m b . PHONO n. The father-in-law, rich as Croesus. PHONO I. The bridegroom, handsome as a matinee idol. PH O N O II.
The mother-in-law, snide as a wooden nickel.
PHONO I. The General, d u m b as a goose. PHONO H. Look at him. He thinks he’s on his mare Mira-
belle. PHONO I. The ushers, strong as Turks.
T
■w
T H E E IF F E L TOW EB WEDDING PARTY
IDD
PHONO H. The bridesmaids,'fresh asjoses. PH O N O I. The manager of the Eiffel Tower is doing them the honors of the Eiffel Tower. He is giving them a bird’seye view of Paris. PH O N O H .
It makes me dizzy!
The Hunter and th e Manager bring in a table w ith plates painted on it. The cloth sw eeps the ground, PHONO I. The General is shouting, “Sit down. Sit down!” The wedding party sits down to the table. PHONO n. All on one side of the table, so that the audi ence can see them. PHONO i. The General rises. PH O N O H .
Speech by the General.
The General’s discourse is orchestral. H e m erely gesticu lates. PHONO I. Everyone is deeply moved. PHONO H. After his speech the General describes a mirage
that deceived him in Africa. PHONO I. I was eating pie with the D ue dAumale. The pie was covered with wasps. W e tried to brush them away. No luck. W ell, those wasps were tigers. PH O N O H .
What?
PHONO I. Tigers. Thousands of them, all stalking a r o u n d . A mirage had projected their image, much reduced, o n to our pie, and w e took them for wasps. PHONO H. You would never think he was seventy-four
years old. PHONO I. But who is this charming bicycle girl in shorts?
Enter Cyclist in shorts. She dismounts.
THE E IF F E L TOW ER WEDDING PARTY
166 PH O N O 1I5
girVs voice. Excuse me, gentlem en.. -.
PH O N O I.
Madam, in what way can w e be of service to
you? PH O N O H .
Am I on the right road for Chatou?
PH O N O I.
You are, Madam. You have only to follow the
car .line. It is the General who answers her, for he has
PH O N O H .
just recognized her as a mirage. The Cyclist remounts and rides off. PH O N O I . Ladies and Gentlemen, w e have just been for tunate enough to witness a mirage. They often occur on the EifEel Tower. That bicycle girl is actually pedaling along the Ghatou road. PH O N O H . After this instructive interlude the Photog rapher appears. What is he saying? PH O N O I. I am the Photographer of the Eiffel Tower and I am going to take your picture. PHO NOS I AND I I. PH O N O I .
Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes!
Arrange yourselves in a group.
The party groups itself behind the table. PH O N O n. You are wondering what has happened to the ostrich hunter and the Manager of the Eiffel Tower. The Hunter is trailing the ostrich up through every platform. The manager is trailing the Hunter, and running the Eiffel Tow er. This is no sinecure. The Eiffel Tower is a world, like Notre-Dame. It is the Notre-Dame of the Left Bank. PH O N O I .
It is the Queen of Paris.
PH O N O H .
It was the Queen of Paris. Now it is a telegraph
girl. PH O N O I.
After all, a man’s got to live!
T H E E IF F E L . T O W E R W ED D IN G PA R T Y
167
PHON O n. Now, don’t move. Look pleasant, please. Look straight into the camera. A little bird’s going to come out.
A Trouville Bathing Beauty comes out of the camera. She wears a one-piece bathing suit, carries a butterfly net in which there is a heart, and has a picnic basket slung over one shoulder. C olored lights. The w eddin g party lifts its hands in iration. PH O N O I .
Oh the pretty postcard!
Dance of the Bathing Beauty. But the Photographer does not share the delight of the wedding party. This is the second time today that his cam era has gone back on him. He is trying to make the Trouville Bathing Beauty get back into the camera. PH O N O H . Finally the Bathing Beauty goes back into the camera. The Photographer has convinced her that it is a
bathhouse. I End of the dance. The photographer throws a bathrobe (over the girl’s shoulders; she exits into the camera, skippip^, throwing kisses. PH O N O S I AND
n. Bravo! Bravo! Bis! Bis! Bis!
PH O N O I . If only I could tell beforehand what surmise this crazy camera had in store for me, I should be able to put on a show. As it is, dear Lord! - I shudder every time I pronounce the fatal words. God knows w hat is coming next! Since these mysteries are beyond me, le ts pretend that I arranged them all the time.
He bows profoundly. PH O N O S I AND H .
Bravo! Bravo! Bravo!
PH O N O H . Ladies and Gentlemen, in spite of my earnest desire to please you one and all, I regret, that the lateness of the hour makes it impossible for me to P^sent a secon^^ time that popular number, “The Trouville Bathing Beauty.
16S
THE E IF F E L TOW ER WEDDING PARTY
PH O N O S I AND n .
Yesl Yes! Jfesi
P H O N O ir r h e Photographer is lying in order to save face and at the same time make a hit. He looks at his watch. Two o’clock, and that ostrich hasn’t come back yet! PH O N O H. The Wedding party rearranges itself. Madam, your left foot on one of the spurs. Sir, drape the veil over the comer of your mustache. Perfect. Now, don’t move. One. Two. Three. Look straight into the camera. A little bird’s going to come out.
He squeezes the bulb. A fat child, crowned w ith green paper, comes out. Under its arm it carries some prize books and a basket. PH O N O I.
Hello, Mama.
PH O N O II.
Hello, Papa.
PH O N O I.
More perils of photography. This child is the very image of the wedding
PH O N O II.
party. PH O N O I.
And just listen to them!
PH O N O H .
H e’s the image of his mother.
PH O N O I.
He’s the image of his father. He’s t h e
PH O N O II. PH O N O I.
He’s the image o f his grandpa. He has our mouth.
PH O N O H . PH O N O I .
im a g e o f h is g ra n d m a .
He
has our
eyes.
n. My dear parents, on this auspicious occasion accept my expressions of esteem and love. PH O N O
PH O N O I .
The same sentiment from a different point of
view. PH O N O H .
Accept my expressions of love and esteepi,.
T H E E IF F E L TOW ER WEDDING PARTY
He might have learne.(J a longer sentiment!
PH O N O I. PH O N O
169
n. Accept my expressions of esteem and love.
PH O N O I. PH O N O
He shall be a Captain.
n. Architect. Boxer.
PH O N O I.
Poet.
PH O N O H .
President of the Republic.
PH O N O I.
A pretty little corpse for the next war.
PH O N O H .
What is he looking for in his basket?
PH O N O I . PH O N O
n. Bullets.
PH O N O I. What does he want with bullets? It looks a s though he were planning something naughty. PH O N O '
n. He is massacring the wedding party.
PH O N O I .
H e is massacring his own family to get some
macaroons. The Child bombards the guests, who flee w ith screams of terror. PH O N O H .
Mercy!
PH O N O I .
When I think of the trouble it eost us to brmg
him up. PH O N O H . PH O N O I . PH O N O PH O N O PH O N O
All the sacrifices w e made for him. Wretch, I am your father!
n. Desist, for yet there is time! I. W ill you have no pity on your grandparents? n. W ill you show no respect for the Uniform?
PH O N O I.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
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T H E E I F F E L T O W E B W ED D IN G PA R TY
PHONO H. I forgive you. p h o n o "I.
Be damned.
PHONO H. No bullets left. PHONO I. The wedding party is massacred. PHONO H. The Photographer is chasing the child about. H e is threatening it with a whip. He is ordering it to get back into the camera. PHONO I. The child is dodging. He screams. H e stamps his foot. He wants to “hve his own hfe.” PHONO H. I want to live my own life! I want to live
my own life! PHONO I. But what is this other noise? PHONO II. The Manager of-the Eiffel Tower. What is he
saying? PHONO I. A little less noise, please. Don’t scare the radio
grams. PHONO II. Papa! Papa! Look at the radiograms. PHONO I. There are some big O nes. PHONO H. The wedding party gets up again. PHONO I. You PHONO H. c o u ld h e a r PHONO I. a phono h .
p in
PHONO I. d r o p . p h o n o h . The trapped radiograms fall onto the stage and flutter about. The guests run after them and jump on them.
T H E E I F F E L T O W E R W ED D IN G PA R T Y
171
PHON O I . Look, look. I’ve .got one! Me too! Help, it’s biting me! Hold it down, hold it down! PHON O n. The radiograms are calming down. They draw up in a line. The prettiest one steps forward and gives the military salute. PH O N O I , burlesque comedian’s voice. W ell well well! And who are you? PH O N O n. I am a wireless, and like my sister the stork I’ve come from N ew York. PH O N O I , voice of a burlesque queen. Ah N ew York! City of lovers and midday twilights! PH O N O H .
Music, music!
Dance and exit of the Radiograms. PH O N O I . Son-in-law, you can thank me for all this. Whose idea was it to come to the Eiffel Tower? Whose idea was it to have the wedding on July Fourteenth?
The child is stamping again.
PH O N O H . PH O N O I.
Papa! Papa!
PH O N O H .
What is he saying?
PH O N O I .
I want to have my picture taken with the Gen
eral. PH O N O II.
General, you wouldn’t refuse our little Justin,
would you? PH O N O I.
As y o u
lik e .
PH O N O H . Poor Photographer! He’s worried to death, but he loads his camera again. PH O N O 1. The child straddles the General’s saber and pre tends to listen to the General, who pretends to read to him out of a book by Jules Verne.
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THE E IF F E L TOW ER WEDDING J>ABTY
PH O N O H . Now, don’t move. "Perfect. A little bird’s go ing to come-out.
A Lion comes out. PH O N O I. Heavens, a lion! The Photographer is hiding behind his camera. All the guests are climbing up the cables of the EifiEel Tower. The lion is glaring at the General, for the General is the only one who has not moved. He is speaking. What is he saying? PH O N O II. No need to b e afraid. There can be no lions on the Eiffel Tower. Therefore, this is a mirage, a simple mirage. Mirages are the lies of the desert, so to speak. This lion is really in Africa, just as the bicycle girl was on Ghatou road. The lion sees me, and I see the lion; but to each other we are nothing more than projected reflections. PH O N O I . To confound the unbelievers, the General is approaching the Hon. The lion suddenly roars. The Gen eral dodges, followed by the lion. PH O N O n. The General disappears under the table. The lion disappears after him. PH O N O I. After a minute which seems a year, the lion comes out from under the tablecloth. PH O N O
n. Horror of horrors! Ahhhhhh!
PH O N O I .
What is he carrying in his jaws?
PH O N O n. A boot, with a spur. Having eaten the General, the lion goes back into the camera.
Dirge. PH O N O S I AND H . PH O N O I.
Ahhhh! Ahhhh!
Poor General!
PH O N O H . He was so lighthearted, so eternally youthful! Nothing would have amused him more than this death: he would have been the first to chuckle over it.
T H E 5 IF F E L TOWER W E p p p i G PARTY
173
PHONO I. Funeral o f the*General.
Funeral march. PHONO II. The father-in-law is pronouncing the eulogy. What is he saying? PHONO I. Farewell farewell old friend! Since first you girded on the sword, you have given evidence of an intel ligence far above your rank. Your end is worthy of your career. W e have seen you brave the ferocious beast, care less of danger, nay, unaware of its very existence; and flee ing only when you began to understand at last that it did exist. And so once more Farewell, or, better. Till w e meet again: for your kind will be with us as long as there are men upon the earth. PHONO II. Three o’clock, and that ostrich isn’t back y e t! PHONO I. She probably wanted to walk back. PHONO II. That is stupid. Nothing is more fragile than os
trich plumes. PHONO I. Attention! “The Eiffel Tower W edding Party,” a quadrille, played by the band of the Garde Republicaine: director, Par^s.
Quadrille. PHONOS I AND H. Bravo! Bravo! ’ray for the Garde R^pub-
licaine! PHONO II. Oof, what a dance! PHONO I. Your arm. PHONO n. Mister Photographer, you wouldn’t turn down a cup of champagne? PHONO I. You are too kind. I’m overcome. PHONO II. “When in Rome . . . ” — But what does my grandson want now?
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T H E E I F F E L T O W E R W ED D IN G PA R T Y
PH O N O I. I want someone to buy- me some bread so I feed the Eiffel Tower. PH O N O
can
n. They sell it down below. I am not going down. Wanna feed the Eiffel Tower!
PH O N O I.
PHONO H. They feed it only at certain hours. That’s w hy it’s surrounded by wires. Wanna feed the Eiffel Tower!
PH O N O I. PH O N O H .
No, no, I
s a id
no!
PH O N O I. The guests are beginning to shout: here comes the ostrich. She was hidden in the elevator all the time. Now she is looking for another place to hide. And here comes the Hunter. The Photographer wishes the ostrich would take advantage of the camera box. PH O N O H . Suddenly he re that to make an os trich invisible all you have to do is hide its head.
He hides the ostrich’s head under his hat. Just
PH O N O I .
in time! The Ostrich walks about invisible, the h a t on its head. Enter the Hunter. Have any of you seen the ostrich?
PH O N O H .
PHO NOS I AND H . PH O N O II.
No. W e have seen nothing.
Strange! I thought it jumped down onto the
platform. PH O N O I.
It may have been a wave, and you took it for
an ostrich. PH O N O H . No, the sea is calm. Well, I shall hide behind this phonograph cabinet and wait for it. PH O N O I.
No sooner said than done.
PH O N O H . The Photographer is approaching the ostrich on tiptoe. What is he saying?
T H E E I F F E L T O W E R W ED D IN G P A R T Y
175
PH O N O I . Madam, youTiave not a minute to lose! He has not recognized you in your veil. Make haste: I have called
a cab. He opens the shutter of the camera. The os trich disappears. PH O N O H .
PH O N O I.
Saved, thank God!
PH O N O H . You can imagine the joy of the Photographer. He is shouting for pure delight. PH O N O I.
The guests are asking him why.
PH O N O H . Ladies and Gentlemen, at last I am able to photograph you in peace. My camera was out of order, but it is working now. Now, don’t move! PH O N O I. But who are these two gentlemen who have come just in time to upset the Photographer again? PH O N O H . Look, the wedding party and the Photogra pher have frozen stiff. The guests are immobile. D o you not find it a b i t . .. PH O N O I.
A bit — w edding cake? A bit — arty?
PH O N O H . PH O N O I .
A bit — Mona Lisa? A bit — O ld Master?
PH O N O H .
PH O N O I. The Modem Art Dealer and the Gollector of Modem Paintings halt before the wedding party. What is the dealer saying? PH O N O H . I have brought you up here on the Eiffel Tower so that you may be the first to see a unique piece: The W edding Breakfast. PH O N O I .
And the Collector replies:
PH O N O H .
I follow you blindly.
PH O N O I.
W ell, is it good, or is it not? It looks like a primi
tive.
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THE E IF F E L TOWEH WEDDING PARTY
P H O N o n .W h o s e is .it?
*p h o n 6 I. What! W hose is it? It’s one of God’s very latest
things! PHONO n. Is it signed? p h o n o I. God never signs — But I ask you? is it paint ed] And what texture! Observe the style, the nobility, the joie de vivrel It might almost be a funeral.
PHONO n . I s e e a w e d d i n g p a r t y . PHONO I. Then y o u see wrong. It is more than a wedding. It is all weddings. It is more than all weddings. It is a cathedral. PHONO II. What do you want for it? PHONO I. It is not for sale, except to the Louvre or you. See here: you can have it at cost price. PHONO H. The Dealer displays a huge placard.
The placard reads 10000000000. PHONO I. W ill the collector let himself be convinced? What is he saying? PHONO H. I take The W eddin g Breakfast.
The Dealer turns the placard over. The reverse reads SOLD in huge letters. H e places it against the w edding party. PHONO I. The Dealer addresses the Photographer. PHONO n. Make me a picture of that wedding party, v(Tth the placard. I want to have it in all the American magazines. PHONO I. The Collector and the Dealer leave the EiflEel
Tower. PHONO n. The Photographer is getting ready to take the picture, but — what’s this! His camera is speaking to him.
T H E E IF F E L TOW ER WEDDING PARTY PHON O I.
What is it saying? „
T H E CA M ERA ,
in a distant voice. I w a n t . . . . I w a n t .-...
Speak out, sweet silver swan!
PH O N O H .
T H E CA M ERA. PH O N O
177
I Want to give up the General.
n. He is perfectly capable of giving himself up.
PH O N O I . The General reappears. He is pale. One boot is missing. After all, he comes from far away. H e will in form them that he is returning from a mission about which he must not speak. The wedding party is motionless. Head lowered, the General crosses the platform and strikes a modest pose among the rest. PH O N O H . This will be a pleasant surprise for the Col lector of masteipieces. In a masterpiece one is never through discovering unexpected details. PH O N O I . The Photographer turns away. H e finds the wedding a bit stiff. If the wedding can reproach the Gen eral for being alive, he in his turn can reproach the W ed ding for letting itself be sold.
The Photographer is a man of feeling.
PH O N O H . PH O N O I.
He speaks. What is he saying?
PH O N O H . Now, Ladies and Gentlemen, I am going to count up to five. Look straight into the camera. A little bird’s going to come out. PH O N O I.
A
The machine is working.
PH O N O H . PH O N O I.
dove!
Peace has been declared.
PH O N O H .
One.
The Bride and Bridegroom leave the group, cross the stage, and exit into the camera.
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T H E E IF F E L 'T O 'V p:R WEDDING PARTY
Two.' Same business for th e Father-in-law and Mother-in-law. Three.
'
Same business for the First Usher and Bridesmaid. Four. Same business for the Second Usher and Bridesmaid. Five. Same business for the General, alone, head hanging; and for the Child, w ho leads him b y the hand. PH O N O I. Enter the Manager of the EifEel Tower. He is waving a megaphone. PH O N O II. PH O N O I.
Closing time! Closing time! He goes out.
PH O N O n . Enter the Hunter. He is in a hurry. He rushes up to the camera. What is the Photographer saying? PH O N O I. PH O N O H . PH O N O I .
Where do you think you’re going? I want to make the last train. The gate is closed.
j *
!
PH O N O H . This is disgraceful. I shall complain ,to the Minister of Railroads.
( !
No fault of mine. That train,of yours — there
she goes!
; ''
The camera starts to m ove to the left, its bellows stretching out after it like railway coaches. Through openings the w edding guests can be seen, waving handkerchiefs; and, underneath, feet in motion.
.
PH O N O I.
CURTAIN
translated by DUDLEY FITTS
PREFACE Every work of the poetic order contains what G id ^ in his preface to Paludes, so aptly calls “God’s share.” ^ i s “Share,” which eludes the poet himself, can surprise him. Such and such a phrase or gesture, which originally meant no more to him than the third dimension means to a paint er, has a hidden meaning that each person will interpret in his own way. The true Symbol is never planned: it emerges by itself, so loh ^ s ~ th e bizarre, the unreal, do~^ ^ n t g r j n t o fliA
rp r* K n n T n ff
In I fairyfand, the fairies do not appear, iR ey walk in visibly there. To mortal eyes they can appear only on the terra firma of everyday. The unsophisticated mind is more likely than the others to see the fairies, for it will not op pose to the marvelous the resistance of the hardheaded. I might almost say that the Chief Electrician, with his re flections, has often illuminated a piece for me. I have been reading in Antoine’s memoirs of the scan dal provoked by the presence on the stage of real quarters of beef and a fountain of real water. But now, thanks to Antoine, w e have come to such a that the audience is displeased if real objects are not used on the stage, an if it is not subjected to a plot precisely as complex pre cisely as tedious, as those from which the theater should serve as a distraction.** “Writing of OrphSe in 1926, Antoine called it “a studio-farce, not even funny” (sic).
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The Eiffel Tower W edding Party, because of its candor, was first of all mistaken for a bit of esoteric writing. The mysterious inspires in the public a sort of fear. Here, I re nounce mystery. I illuminate everything, I underline every thing. Sunday vacuity, human livestock, ready-made ex pressions, dissociation of ideas into flesh and bone, the fierce cruelty of childhood, the miraculous poetry of daily life: these are my play, so w ell understood by the young musi cians who composed the score for it. A remark of the Photographer’s might do w ell for my epigraph: “Since these mysteries are beyond me, let’s pre tend that I arranged them all the time.” This is our motto, par excellence. Your prig always finds a last refuge in re sponsibility. Thus, for example, he will go on fighting a war after the end has been reached. In W edding Party, God’s share is considerable. To the right and left of the scene the human phonographs (like the ancient Chorus, like the com pere and commere of our music-hall stage), describe, without the least “literature,” the absurd action which is unfolded, danced, and panto mimed between them. I say “absurd” because instead of trying to keep this side of the absurdity of life, to lessen it, to arrange it as w e arrange the story of an incident in which w e played an uncomplimentary part, I accentuate it, I push it forward, I try to paint more truly than the truth. f ~ l! h e poet ought to disengage objects and ideas from their veiling mists; he ought to display them suddenly, so naked ly and so quickly that they are scarcely recognizable. It is then that they strike us with their youth, as though they had never become official dotard^. *“ This is the case with commonplaces — old, powerful, generally esteemed after the manner of masterpieces, but whose original beauty, because of long use, no longer sur prises us. in my play I rejuvenate the commonplace. It is my conem to present it in suciTaTigKTfhat it recaptures its teens A generation devoted to obscurity, to jaded realism, does not give way before the shrug of a shoulder. I know that
G
T H E E I F F E L T O W E R AVEDDING PA R T Y
155
my text has too “obvious” an air, that it is too recdahly w rit ten, like the alphabets in school. But aren’t w e in school? Aren’t w e still deciphering the elementary symbols? The young music finds itself in an analogous position. It employs a clarity, a simplicity, a good humor, that are new. The ingenuous ear is deceived; it seems to be listen ing to a cafe orchestra, but it is as mistaken as would be an eye which could not distinguish between a loud garish material and the same material copied by Ingres. In W edding Party w e employ all the popular resources that w ill have none of at home, but w ill approve whenever a musician, native or foreign, exploits them out side. Do you think, for example, that a Russian can hear the Petrouchka just as w e do? In addition to the charms of that musical masterpiece he finds there his childhood, his Sun days in Petrograd, the lullabies of nurses. W hy should I deny myself this double pleasure? I assure you that the orchestra of The Eiffel Tower W edding Party moves me more than any number of Russian or Spanish dances. It is not a question of honor rolls. I think I have sufiiciently exalted Russian, German, and Spanish musi cians (to say nothing of Negro orchestras) to permit my self this cri du coeur. f ^ J t is curious to observe the French everywhere repulsing bitterly whatever is truly French and embracing unreserved\ ly the local alien spirit. It is curious, too, that in the case of W edding Party an audience at a dress rehearsal should have been outraged by a classic blockhead character whose presence in the wedding cortege was neither more nor less . controversial than the presence of the commonplaces in the
I
U2?tEvery living work of art has its own ballyhoo, and only this is seen by those who stay outside. Now in the case of new work, this first impression so shocks, irritates, angers, the spectator that he will not enter. He is repelled from its true nature by its face, by the unfamiliar outward appear-
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T H E E I F F E L T O W E R W ED D IN G PA R TY
ance which distracts^ him, as would a clown grimacing at the door. It is this phenomenon which deceives even those critics who are least slaves to convention. They forget that they are at a performance which must be followed just as attentively as a “popular success.” They think that they are watching a sort of street carnival. A conscientious critic who would never think of writing, “The Duchess kisses the Steward” instead of “The Steward presents a letter to the Duchess” in his review of one of these “legitimate” dramas, will not hesitate, reviewing W edding Party, to make the Bicycle Girl or the Collector come out of the camera — which is absurd enough. Not the organized absurdity, the desir able, the good absurdity, but simply the absurd. And he can never see the difference. Alone among the critics, M. Bidou explained to the readers of D ebats that my piece was “a composition of active wit.” ** /"”^ e action of my piece is pictorial, though the text it/self is not. The fact is that I am trying to substitute a “theater poetry” for the usual “poetry in the theater.” “Poetry , in the theater” is a delicate lace, invisible at any considerI able distance. “Theater poetry” should be a coarse lace, a lace of rigging, a ship upon, the sea. W eddin g Party can be ^ as terrifying as a drop of poetry under the microscope. The •-scenes fit together like the words of a poem.
I
The secret of theatrical success is this: you must set a decoy at the door so that part of your audience can amuse themselves there while the rest are inside. Shakspere, Moliere, and the profound Chaplin know this well. “ After the hisses, confusion, and applause which marked the first performance of my piece by the Swedish dancers at the Champs-Elys^es, I should have set it down as a failure if the audience of the “informed” had not given place to the real public. This pubhc always gives me a hearing. “Only he could write of Orphee that it was “a meditation on death.”
T H E E IF F E L T O W E R W ED D IN G PA R T Y
157
After the performance a lady complained to me that the piece did not carry beyond the footlights. Seeing that I was astonished by her criticism (for masks and megaphones are more effective beyond the footlights than ordinary voices and make-up), she went on to explain that she so great ly ired the ceiling of Maurice Denis, who decorated the theater, that she had engaged the highest seats in the house — which necessarily lessened her command of what was going on on the stage. I cite this as an example of the criticism offered by that little group with neither intelligence nor sympathy, the lit tle group that the newspapers call “the elite.” Moreover, our senses are so unused to reacting together that the critics — even my publishers —found it hard to believe that this complicated machinery did not entail two or three pages of text. This faulty perspective must also be blamed upon tbe absence of the development of ideas: a development thatjjthe ear customarily perceives, since the symbolic drama and the drama d these. (Jarry’s Ubu and Apollinaire’s Les mamelles de Tiresias are both symbolic dramas and dramas d thdse). The diction of my human phonographs, Pierre Bertin and Marcel Herrand, also comes in for its share in the general misunderstanding: a diction black as ink, immense and clear as the lettering of a billboard. Here, surprisingly enough, are actors who are content to follow the text, rath er than force the text to follow them: still another lyric novelty to which the audience is not accustomed! Let us touch on the accusation of buffoonery, which has often been hurled at me by our age — an age preoccupied with the false-sublime, an age (let’s it it) still in love with Wagner. If Cold means Night, and Hot means Light, Lukewarm means Dusk. Ghosts love the dusk. The crowd loves the luke warm. Very well: aside from the fact that the buffoon at titude brings with it a clarity that is ill-suited to ghosts
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T H E E I F F E L T O W E R W ED D IN G PA R TY
(by “ghosts” I,mean w hat the crowd calls “poems” ); aside from the fact that Moliere proved himself more of a poet in his Pourceaugnac and h e bourgeois gentilhomme than in his poetic dramas; the buffoon attitude is the only one that permits certain audacities. People come to the theater for relaxation. It is easy to amuse them with th e dancing dolls, to tickle them with the candies that one gives recalcitrant children to make them take their medicine. But once the medicine is taken, w e shall on to other exercises. Thanks to people like Sergei Diaghilev and Rolf de Mare, little by little there is coming into being in a theatrical form which is n ot properly the Ballet, and which has no place in the Opera, the Opera-Comique, or the fash ionable theaters. The future is indicated on the fringe of these conventional forms. Our friend Lugne-Poe has it ted this with considerable apprehension in one of his arti cles. This new form, more consonant vwlth the modern spirit, remains still an unexplored land, rich in possibilities. Revolution which flings the doors wide open for the ex perimentalists! The new generation will continue to experi ment with forms in which the fairy, the dance, acrobatics, pantomime, drama, satire, music, and the spoken word all combine to produce a novel genre: and unaided, they will stage pieces which the oflicial “artists” w ill take for studiofarces, pieces which for all that will be no less the plastic expression of poetry. The mixture of good humor and bad humor in Paris cre ates the most vital atmosphere in the world. Sergei Diaghi lev told me one day that he had felt nothing like it in any other capital. Hisses and cheers; nasty reviews, with here and there an unexpected approval: and three years later the scoffers are applauding and cannot having once hissed. Such is the history of my Parade, and of any other piece that alters the rules of the game. f A theatrical piece ought to be written, mounted, cos tumed, furnished with musical accompaniment, played, and
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danced, all by one and the same man. Such a umversal athlete does not exist, and the next best thing is to, rep ace the individual by what is most like an individual: a tnendly group.
,
T
There are many cliques, but few such groups. I am for tunate enough to belong to one made up of various young musicians, poets, and painters. The Eiffel Tow er W eddtng Party, taken as a whole, is the manifesto of a poetic spin 40 which I am proud to have contributed already a great deal. Thanks to Jean Victor-Hugo, my characters, instead of being (as is so often the case in the theater) too true to life to b e able to the mass of ligliting an ddcor, were constructed, corrected, built up, raised by ev ery device of artistry to a likeness on an epic scale. I hnd in lean Victor-Hugo a certain atavism of monstrous reality. Thanks to Irene Lagut, our Eiffel Tower suggests forgetme-nots and lace valentines.
j- t
7
Georges Auric’s Overture, The Fourteenth of J u y marching bands whose music blares out at the ^ reet ^rner and moves away - calls up the strong enchantment of the sidewalk, of the popular fair, of red-festooned like guillotines, where drums and trumpets make the ste ographers and the sailors and the shipping clerks dance And his ritoumelles accompany the pantomime ]ust as a circus band repeats a motif during an acrobatic act. The same atmosphere breathes through Mffhaud s Weditw March, through Germaine Tailleferres Quadrille arid W altz of the Telegrams, through Poulenc’s The Sveech and The TrouviUe Bathing Beauty. Arthur Honegge amused himself by making fun of what phers gravely call; m u sic . It is unnecessary to add that they all fell into the trap. Hardly had the first notes of die F«neral March sounded when all those long ears "P in grave attention. Not one noticed that that march w beautiful as a sarcasm, written with a taste, J^traord nary feeling for appositeness: not one of the critics, a
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whom praised the _piece,„j:BcognizeH the Waltz in Faust whjch served as its hassi How can I express my gratitude to MM. Rolf de Mare and Borlin? The former with his generous insight, the latter with his modesty, made it possible for me to crystallize a formula with which I had been experimenting in Parade and in L e Boeuf sur le toit. JE A N COCTEAU
1922 Les Maries de la Tour Eiffel was first played on June 8, 1921, by Rolf de Mare’s Swedish Ballet Company. The chor eography was by Jean Cocteau and Jean Borhn, the decor by Irene Lagut, and the costumes and masks by Jean VictorHugo. The musical program was as follows: Overture W edding March (entrance) The General’s Speech The Trouville Bathing Beauty The Massacre (fugue) W altz of the Radiograms Funeral March Quadrille W edding March (exit)
Georges Auric Darius Milhaud Francis Poulenc Francis Poulenc Darius Milhaud Germaine Tailleferre Arthur Honegger Germaine Tailleferre Darius Milhaud
During the course of the action there were three ritournelles by Georges Auric.
CHARACTERS PH O N O G R A PH I PH O N O G R A PH I I T H E OSTRICH T H E H U N T ER T H E M A N A G ER O F T H E E IF F E L TO W ER
•
T H E PH O TO G RA PH ER T H E BRIDE T H E BRIDEGROOM T H E M O T H E R -IN -L A W
/
T H E F A T H E R -IN -L A W T H E GEN ERAL T W O BRIDESMAIDS T W O USHERS T H E CYCLIST T H E CH ILD T H E TROUVILLE BATHING BEAUTY T H E L IO N T H E COLLECTOR O F PA INTINGS T H E ART DEALER FIV E RADIOGRAMS
DfiCOR The first platform of the EifiEel Tower. The backdrop rep resents a bird’s-eye view of Paris. Upstage, right, a camera at eye level: the black funnel forms a corridor extending to the wings, and the camera front opens like a door to permit the entrances and exits of the characters. Downstage, right and left, half hidden by the proscenium arch, two actors costumed as Phonographs: their bodies are the cab inets, their mouths the horns. It is these Phonographs which comment on the action and recite the lines of the charac ters. They should speak very loudly and quickly, pronounc ing each syllable distinctly. The action is simultaneous with the comments of the Phonographs.
THE felFFEL TOWER W EDDING PARTY The curtain rises w ith the drum-roll which ends the Over ture. Em pty set. PHON O
You are on the first platform of the Eiffel
I.
Tower. PH O N O H . Look! An ostrich. She crosses the stage. She goes off. And here’s the Hunter. He’s tracking the ostrich. He looks up. H e sees something. He raises his gun. H e fires.
Heavens! A radiogram.
PH O N O I.
A large blue radiogram falls from above. The shot wakes up the Manager of the Eiffel Tower. H e appears. PH O N O H .
PH O N O
I.
Hey, Mac, where do you think you are —
hunting? PH O N O H . I was trailing an ostrich. I thought I saw it on the cables of the Eiffel Tower. PH O N O I. PH O N O
And you kill me a radiogram!
n. I didn’t mean to do it.
PH O N O I.
End of
th e
dialogue.
PH O N O H . Here comes the Photographer of the Eiffel Tower. He speaks. What is he saying? PH O N O I . You haven’t seen an ostrich around here any where, have you? PH O N O
n. I most certainly have! I’m trailing it right
now! PH O N O I. W ell, it’s like this: my camera’s out of order. Usually when I say, “Steady, now, watch for the httle bird” — a little bird comes out. This morning I said to a lady.
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THE E IF F E L TOW ER WEDDING ^ ^ R T Y
“Watch ,for the little and out came an ostrich. So now I §m looking for the ostrich in order to make it get back into the camera. PHONO n. Ladies and Gentlemen, the situation is getting complicated, for the Manager of the Eiffel Tower has sud denly discovered that the radiogram was addressed to him. PHONO I. He opens it. PH O N O n . M A N A G ER E IF F E L TO W ER STOP ARRIVE W EDDING BREAKFAST PLEASE RESERVE T A B LE. PH O N O I.
But this radiogram is dead.
PH O N O n. It’s precisely because it’s dead that everyone can understand it. PH O N O 1. Quick quick! W e’ve just got time to set the ta ble. I remit your fine. I appoint you Waiter of the Eiffel Tower. Photographer, on your job!
PHONO n . They set the table. PH O N O I.
W edding March.
PHONO n. W edding Procession.
W edding march. The Phonographs announce the m em bers of the w edding party, who enter in pairs, strutting like trained dogs in an animal act. PHONO I. The b r i d e , s w e e t as a la m b . PHONO n. The father-in-law, rich as Croesus. PHONO I. The bridegroom, handsome as a matinee idol. PH O N O II.
The mother-in-law, snide as a wooden nickel.
PHONO I. The General, d u m b as a goose. PHONO H. Look at him. He thinks he’s on his mare Mira-
belle. PHONO I. The ushers, strong as Turks.
T
■w
T H E E IF F E L TOW EB WEDDING PARTY
IDD
PHONO H. The bridesmaids,'fresh asjoses. PH O N O I. The manager of the Eiffel Tower is doing them the honors of the Eiffel Tower. He is giving them a bird’seye view of Paris. PH O N O H .
It makes me dizzy!
The Hunter and th e Manager bring in a table w ith plates painted on it. The cloth sw eeps the ground, PHONO I. The General is shouting, “Sit down. Sit down!” The wedding party sits down to the table. PHONO n. All on one side of the table, so that the audi ence can see them. PHONO i. The General rises. PH O N O H .
Speech by the General.
The General’s discourse is orchestral. H e m erely gesticu lates. PHONO I. Everyone is deeply moved. PHONO H. After his speech the General describes a mirage
that deceived him in Africa. PHONO I. I was eating pie with the D ue dAumale. The pie was covered with wasps. W e tried to brush them away. No luck. W ell, those wasps were tigers. PH O N O H .
What?
PHONO I. Tigers. Thousands of them, all stalking a r o u n d . A mirage had projected their image, much reduced, o n to our pie, and w e took them for wasps. PHONO H. You would never think he was seventy-four
years old. PHONO I. But who is this charming bicycle girl in shorts?
Enter Cyclist in shorts. She dismounts.
THE E IF F E L TOW ER WEDDING PARTY
166 PH O N O 1I5
girVs voice. Excuse me, gentlem en.. -.
PH O N O I.
Madam, in what way can w e be of service to
you? PH O N O H .
Am I on the right road for Chatou?
PH O N O I.
You are, Madam. You have only to follow the
car .line. It is the General who answers her, for he has
PH O N O H .
just recognized her as a mirage. The Cyclist remounts and rides off. PH O N O I . Ladies and Gentlemen, w e have just been for tunate enough to witness a mirage. They often occur on the EifEel Tower. That bicycle girl is actually pedaling along the Ghatou road. PH O N O H . After this instructive interlude the Photog rapher appears. What is he saying? PH O N O I. I am the Photographer of the Eiffel Tower and I am going to take your picture. PHO NOS I AND I I. PH O N O I .
Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes!
Arrange yourselves in a group.
The party groups itself behind the table. PH O N O n. You are wondering what has happened to the ostrich hunter and the Manager of the Eiffel Tower. The Hunter is trailing the ostrich up through every platform. The manager is trailing the Hunter, and running the Eiffel Tow er. This is no sinecure. The Eiffel Tower is a world, like Notre-Dame. It is the Notre-Dame of the Left Bank. PH O N O I .
It is the Queen of Paris.
PH O N O H .
It was the Queen of Paris. Now it is a telegraph
girl. PH O N O I.
After all, a man’s got to live!
T H E E IF F E L . T O W E R W ED D IN G PA R T Y
167
PHON O n. Now, don’t move. Look pleasant, please. Look straight into the camera. A little bird’s going to come out.
A Trouville Bathing Beauty comes out of the camera. She wears a one-piece bathing suit, carries a butterfly net in which there is a heart, and has a picnic basket slung over one shoulder. C olored lights. The w eddin g party lifts its hands in iration. PH O N O I .
Oh the pretty postcard!
Dance of the Bathing Beauty. But the Photographer does not share the delight of the wedding party. This is the second time today that his cam era has gone back on him. He is trying to make the Trouville Bathing Beauty get back into the camera. PH O N O H . Finally the Bathing Beauty goes back into the camera. The Photographer has convinced her that it is a
bathhouse. I End of the dance. The photographer throws a bathrobe (over the girl’s shoulders; she exits into the camera, skippip^, throwing kisses. PH O N O S I AND
n. Bravo! Bravo! Bis! Bis! Bis!
PH O N O I . If only I could tell beforehand what surmise this crazy camera had in store for me, I should be able to put on a show. As it is, dear Lord! - I shudder every time I pronounce the fatal words. God knows w hat is coming next! Since these mysteries are beyond me, le ts pretend that I arranged them all the time.
He bows profoundly. PH O N O S I AND H .
Bravo! Bravo! Bravo!
PH O N O H . Ladies and Gentlemen, in spite of my earnest desire to please you one and all, I regret, that the lateness of the hour makes it impossible for me to P^sent a secon^^ time that popular number, “The Trouville Bathing Beauty.
16S
THE E IF F E L TOW ER WEDDING PARTY
PH O N O S I AND n .
Yesl Yes! Jfesi
P H O N O ir r h e Photographer is lying in order to save face and at the same time make a hit. He looks at his watch. Two o’clock, and that ostrich hasn’t come back yet! PH O N O H. The Wedding party rearranges itself. Madam, your left foot on one of the spurs. Sir, drape the veil over the comer of your mustache. Perfect. Now, don’t move. One. Two. Three. Look straight into the camera. A little bird’s going to come out.
He squeezes the bulb. A fat child, crowned w ith green paper, comes out. Under its arm it carries some prize books and a basket. PH O N O I.
Hello, Mama.
PH O N O II.
Hello, Papa.
PH O N O I.
More perils of photography. This child is the very image of the wedding
PH O N O II.
party. PH O N O I.
And just listen to them!
PH O N O H .
H e’s the image of his mother.
PH O N O I.
He’s the image of his father. He’s t h e
PH O N O II. PH O N O I.
He’s the image o f his grandpa. He has our mouth.
PH O N O H . PH O N O I .
im a g e o f h is g ra n d m a .
He
has our
eyes.
n. My dear parents, on this auspicious occasion accept my expressions of esteem and love. PH O N O
PH O N O I .
The same sentiment from a different point of
view. PH O N O H .
Accept my expressions of love and esteepi,.
T H E E IF F E L TOW ER WEDDING PARTY
He might have learne.(J a longer sentiment!
PH O N O I. PH O N O
169
n. Accept my expressions of esteem and love.
PH O N O I. PH O N O
He shall be a Captain.
n. Architect. Boxer.
PH O N O I.
Poet.
PH O N O H .
President of the Republic.
PH O N O I.
A pretty little corpse for the next war.
PH O N O H .
What is he looking for in his basket?
PH O N O I . PH O N O
n. Bullets.
PH O N O I. What does he want with bullets? It looks a s though he were planning something naughty. PH O N O '
n. He is massacring the wedding party.
PH O N O I .
H e is massacring his own family to get some
macaroons. The Child bombards the guests, who flee w ith screams of terror. PH O N O H .
Mercy!
PH O N O I .
When I think of the trouble it eost us to brmg
him up. PH O N O H . PH O N O I . PH O N O PH O N O PH O N O
All the sacrifices w e made for him. Wretch, I am your father!
n. Desist, for yet there is time! I. W ill you have no pity on your grandparents? n. W ill you show no respect for the Uniform?
PH O N O I.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
170
T H E E I F F E L T O W E B W ED D IN G PA R TY
PHONO H. I forgive you. p h o n o "I.
Be damned.
PHONO H. No bullets left. PHONO I. The wedding party is massacred. PHONO H. The Photographer is chasing the child about. H e is threatening it with a whip. He is ordering it to get back into the camera. PHONO I. The child is dodging. He screams. H e stamps his foot. He wants to “hve his own hfe.” PHONO H. I want to live my own life! I want to live
my own life! PHONO I. But what is this other noise? PHONO II. The Manager of-the Eiffel Tower. What is he
saying? PHONO I. A little less noise, please. Don’t scare the radio
grams. PHONO II. Papa! Papa! Look at the radiograms. PHONO I. There are some big O nes. PHONO H. The wedding party gets up again. PHONO I. You PHONO H. c o u ld h e a r PHONO I. a phono h .
p in
PHONO I. d r o p . p h o n o h . The trapped radiograms fall onto the stage and flutter about. The guests run after them and jump on them.
T H E E I F F E L T O W E R W ED D IN G PA R T Y
171
PHON O I . Look, look. I’ve .got one! Me too! Help, it’s biting me! Hold it down, hold it down! PHON O n. The radiograms are calming down. They draw up in a line. The prettiest one steps forward and gives the military salute. PH O N O I , burlesque comedian’s voice. W ell well well! And who are you? PH O N O n. I am a wireless, and like my sister the stork I’ve come from N ew York. PH O N O I , voice of a burlesque queen. Ah N ew York! City of lovers and midday twilights! PH O N O H .
Music, music!
Dance and exit of the Radiograms. PH O N O I . Son-in-law, you can thank me for all this. Whose idea was it to come to the Eiffel Tower? Whose idea was it to have the wedding on July Fourteenth?
The child is stamping again.
PH O N O H . PH O N O I.
Papa! Papa!
PH O N O H .
What is he saying?
PH O N O I .
I want to have my picture taken with the Gen
eral. PH O N O II.
General, you wouldn’t refuse our little Justin,
would you? PH O N O I.
As y o u
lik e .
PH O N O H . Poor Photographer! He’s worried to death, but he loads his camera again. PH O N O 1. The child straddles the General’s saber and pre tends to listen to the General, who pretends to read to him out of a book by Jules Verne.
172
THE E IF F E L TOW ER WEDDING J>ABTY
PH O N O H . Now, don’t move. "Perfect. A little bird’s go ing to come-out.
A Lion comes out. PH O N O I. Heavens, a lion! The Photographer is hiding behind his camera. All the guests are climbing up the cables of the EifiEel Tower. The lion is glaring at the General, for the General is the only one who has not moved. He is speaking. What is he saying? PH O N O II. No need to b e afraid. There can be no lions on the Eiffel Tower. Therefore, this is a mirage, a simple mirage. Mirages are the lies of the desert, so to speak. This lion is really in Africa, just as the bicycle girl was on Ghatou road. The lion sees me, and I see the lion; but to each other we are nothing more than projected reflections. PH O N O I . To confound the unbelievers, the General is approaching the Hon. The lion suddenly roars. The Gen eral dodges, followed by the lion. PH O N O n. The General disappears under the table. The lion disappears after him. PH O N O I. After a minute which seems a year, the lion comes out from under the tablecloth. PH O N O
n. Horror of horrors! Ahhhhhh!
PH O N O I .
What is he carrying in his jaws?
PH O N O n. A boot, with a spur. Having eaten the General, the lion goes back into the camera.
Dirge. PH O N O S I AND H . PH O N O I.
Ahhhh! Ahhhh!
Poor General!
PH O N O H . He was so lighthearted, so eternally youthful! Nothing would have amused him more than this death: he would have been the first to chuckle over it.
T H E 5 IF F E L TOWER W E p p p i G PARTY
173
PHONO I. Funeral o f the*General.
Funeral march. PHONO II. The father-in-law is pronouncing the eulogy. What is he saying? PHONO I. Farewell farewell old friend! Since first you girded on the sword, you have given evidence of an intel ligence far above your rank. Your end is worthy of your career. W e have seen you brave the ferocious beast, care less of danger, nay, unaware of its very existence; and flee ing only when you began to understand at last that it did exist. And so once more Farewell, or, better. Till w e meet again: for your kind will be with us as long as there are men upon the earth. PHONO II. Three o’clock, and that ostrich isn’t back y e t! PHONO I. She probably wanted to walk back. PHONO II. That is stupid. Nothing is more fragile than os
trich plumes. PHONO I. Attention! “The Eiffel Tower W edding Party,” a quadrille, played by the band of the Garde Republicaine: director, Par^s.
Quadrille. PHONOS I AND H. Bravo! Bravo! ’ray for the Garde R^pub-
licaine! PHONO II. Oof, what a dance! PHONO I. Your arm. PHONO n. Mister Photographer, you wouldn’t turn down a cup of champagne? PHONO I. You are too kind. I’m overcome. PHONO II. “When in Rome . . . ” — But what does my grandson want now?
174
T H E E I F F E L T O W E R W ED D IN G PA R T Y
PH O N O I. I want someone to buy- me some bread so I feed the Eiffel Tower. PH O N O
can
n. They sell it down below. I am not going down. Wanna feed the Eiffel Tower!
PH O N O I.
PHONO H. They feed it only at certain hours. That’s w hy it’s surrounded by wires. Wanna feed the Eiffel Tower!
PH O N O I. PH O N O H .
No, no, I
s a id
no!
PH O N O I. The guests are beginning to shout: here comes the ostrich. She was hidden in the elevator all the time. Now she is looking for another place to hide. And here comes the Hunter. The Photographer wishes the ostrich would take advantage of the camera box. PH O N O H . Suddenly he re that to make an os trich invisible all you have to do is hide its head.
He hides the ostrich’s head under his hat. Just
PH O N O I .
in time! The Ostrich walks about invisible, the h a t on its head. Enter the Hunter. Have any of you seen the ostrich?
PH O N O H .
PHO NOS I AND H . PH O N O II.
No. W e have seen nothing.
Strange! I thought it jumped down onto the
platform. PH O N O I.
It may have been a wave, and you took it for
an ostrich. PH O N O H . No, the sea is calm. Well, I shall hide behind this phonograph cabinet and wait for it. PH O N O I.
No sooner said than done.
PH O N O H . The Photographer is approaching the ostrich on tiptoe. What is he saying?
T H E E I F F E L T O W E R W ED D IN G P A R T Y
175
PH O N O I . Madam, youTiave not a minute to lose! He has not recognized you in your veil. Make haste: I have called
a cab. He opens the shutter of the camera. The os trich disappears. PH O N O H .
PH O N O I.
Saved, thank God!
PH O N O H . You can imagine the joy of the Photographer. He is shouting for pure delight. PH O N O I.
The guests are asking him why.
PH O N O H . Ladies and Gentlemen, at last I am able to photograph you in peace. My camera was out of order, but it is working now. Now, don’t move! PH O N O I. But who are these two gentlemen who have come just in time to upset the Photographer again? PH O N O H . Look, the wedding party and the Photogra pher have frozen stiff. The guests are immobile. D o you not find it a b i t . .. PH O N O I.
A bit — w edding cake? A bit — arty?
PH O N O H . PH O N O I .
A bit — Mona Lisa? A bit — O ld Master?
PH O N O H .
PH O N O I. The Modem Art Dealer and the Gollector of Modem Paintings halt before the wedding party. What is the dealer saying? PH O N O H . I have brought you up here on the Eiffel Tower so that you may be the first to see a unique piece: The W edding Breakfast. PH O N O I .
And the Collector replies:
PH O N O H .
I follow you blindly.
PH O N O I.
W ell, is it good, or is it not? It looks like a primi
tive.
176
THE E IF F E L TOWEH WEDDING PARTY
P H O N o n .W h o s e is .it?
*p h o n 6 I. What! W hose is it? It’s one of God’s very latest
things! PHONO n. Is it signed? p h o n o I. God never signs — But I ask you? is it paint ed] And what texture! Observe the style, the nobility, the joie de vivrel It might almost be a funeral.
PHONO n . I s e e a w e d d i n g p a r t y . PHONO I. Then y o u see wrong. It is more than a wedding. It is all weddings. It is more than all weddings. It is a cathedral. PHONO II. What do you want for it? PHONO I. It is not for sale, except to the Louvre or you. See here: you can have it at cost price. PHONO H. The Dealer displays a huge placard.
The placard reads 10000000000. PHONO I. W ill the collector let himself be convinced? What is he saying? PHONO H. I take The W eddin g Breakfast.
The Dealer turns the placard over. The reverse reads SOLD in huge letters. H e places it against the w edding party. PHONO I. The Dealer addresses the Photographer. PHONO n. Make me a picture of that wedding party, v(Tth the placard. I want to have it in all the American magazines. PHONO I. The Collector and the Dealer leave the EiflEel
Tower. PHONO n. The Photographer is getting ready to take the picture, but — what’s this! His camera is speaking to him.
T H E E IF F E L TOW ER WEDDING PARTY PHON O I.
What is it saying? „
T H E CA M ERA ,
in a distant voice. I w a n t . . . . I w a n t .-...
Speak out, sweet silver swan!
PH O N O H .
T H E CA M ERA. PH O N O
177
I Want to give up the General.
n. He is perfectly capable of giving himself up.
PH O N O I . The General reappears. He is pale. One boot is missing. After all, he comes from far away. H e will in form them that he is returning from a mission about which he must not speak. The wedding party is motionless. Head lowered, the General crosses the platform and strikes a modest pose among the rest. PH O N O H . This will be a pleasant surprise for the Col lector of masteipieces. In a masterpiece one is never through discovering unexpected details. PH O N O I . The Photographer turns away. H e finds the wedding a bit stiff. If the wedding can reproach the Gen eral for being alive, he in his turn can reproach the W ed ding for letting itself be sold.
The Photographer is a man of feeling.
PH O N O H . PH O N O I.
He speaks. What is he saying?
PH O N O H . Now, Ladies and Gentlemen, I am going to count up to five. Look straight into the camera. A little bird’s going to come out. PH O N O I.
A
The machine is working.
PH O N O H . PH O N O I.
dove!
Peace has been declared.
PH O N O H .
One.
The Bride and Bridegroom leave the group, cross the stage, and exit into the camera.
178
T H E E IF F E L 'T O 'V p:R WEDDING PARTY
Two.' Same business for th e Father-in-law and Mother-in-law. Three.
'
Same business for the First Usher and Bridesmaid. Four. Same business for the Second Usher and Bridesmaid. Five. Same business for the General, alone, head hanging; and for the Child, w ho leads him b y the hand. PH O N O I. Enter the Manager of the EifEel Tower. He is waving a megaphone. PH O N O II. PH O N O I.
Closing time! Closing time! He goes out.
PH O N O n . Enter the Hunter. He is in a hurry. He rushes up to the camera. What is the Photographer saying? PH O N O I. PH O N O H . PH O N O I .
Where do you think you’re going? I want to make the last train. The gate is closed.
j *
!
PH O N O H . This is disgraceful. I shall complain ,to the Minister of Railroads.
( !
No fault of mine. That train,of yours — there
she goes!
; ''
The camera starts to m ove to the left, its bellows stretching out after it like railway coaches. Through openings the w edding guests can be seen, waving handkerchiefs; and, underneath, feet in motion.
.
PH O N O I.
CURTAIN
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