Tennessee Williams: A Streetcar Named Desire

[He waits a moment; then he hangs up and dials again]

Eunice! I'll keep on ringin' until I talk with my baby!

[An indistinguishable shrill voice is heard. He hurls phone to floor. Dissonant brass and piano sounds as the rooms dim out to darkness and the outer walls appear in the night light. The "blue piano" plays for a brief interval.

[Finally, Stanley stumbles half dressed out to the porch and down the wooden steps to the pavement before the building. There he throws back his head like a baying hound and bellows his wife's name:

"Stella! Stella, sweetheart! Stella!"]

STANLEY:

Stellahhhhh!

EUNICE [calling down from the door of her upper apartment]:

Quit that howling out there an' go back to bed!

STANLEY:

I want my baby down here. Stella, Stella!

EUNICE:

She ain't comin' down so you quit! Or you'll git th' law on you!

STANLEY:

Stella!

EUNICE:

You can't beat on a woman an' then call 'er back! She won't come! And her goin' t' have a baby!... You stinker! You whelp of a Polack, you! I hope they do haul you in and turn the fire hose on you, same as the last time!

STANLEY [humbly]:

Eunice, I want my girl to come down with me!

EUNICE:

Hah!

[She slams her door.]

STANLEY [with heaven-splitting violence]:

STELLLAHHHHH!

[The low-tone clarinet moans. The door upstairs opens again. Stella slips down the rickety stairs in her robe. Her eyes are glistening with tears and her hair loose about her throat and shoulders. They stare at each other. Then they come together with low, animal moans. He falls to his knees on the steps and presses his face to her belly, curving a little with maternity. Her eyes go blind with tenderness as she catches his head and raises him level with her. He snatches the screen door open and lifts her off her feet and bears her into the dark flat.]

[Blanche comes out on the upper landing in her robe and slips fearfully down the steps.]

BLANCHE:

Where is my little sister? Stella? Stella?

[She stops before the dark entrance of her sister's flat. Then catches her breath as if struck. She rushes down to the walk before the house. She looks right and left as if for a sanctuary.

[The music fades away. Mitch appears from around the corner.]

MITCH:

Miss DuBois?

BLANCHE:

Oh!

MITCH:

All quiet on the Potomac now?

BLANCHE:

She ran downstairs and went back in there with him.

MITCH:

Sure she did.

BLANCHE:

I'm terrified!

MITCH:

Ho-ho! There's nothing to be scared of. They're crazy about each other.

BLANCHE:

I'm not used to such--

MITCH:

Naw, it's a shame this had to happen when you just got here. But don't take it serious.

BLANCHE:

Violence! Is so--

MITCH:

Set down on the steps and have a cigarette with me.

BLANCHE:

I'm not properly dressed.

MITCH:

That don't make no difference in the Quarter.

BLANCHE:

Such a pretty silver case.

MITCH:

I showed you the inscription, didn't I?

BLANCHE:

Yes.

[During the pause, she looks up at the sky]

There's so much--so much confusion in the world....

[He coughs diffidently]

Thank you for being so kind! I need kindness now.

It is early the following morning. There is a confusion of street cries like a choral chant. Stella is lying down in the bedroom. Her face is serene in the early morning sunlight. One hand rests on her belly, rounding slightly with new maternity. From the other dangles a book of colored comics. Her eyes and lips have that almost narcotized tranquility that is the faces of Eastern idols. The table is sloppy with remains of breakfast and the debris of the preceding night, and Stanley's gaudy pyjamas lie across the threshold of the bathroom. The outside door is slightly ajar on a sky of summer brilliance. Blanche appears at this door. She has spent a sleepless night and her appearance entirely contrasts with Stella's. She presses her knuckles nervously to her lips as she looks through the door, before entering.

BLANCHE:

Stella?

STELLA [stirring lazily]'. Hmmh?

[Blanche utters a moaning cry and runs into the bedroom, throwing herself down beside Stella in a rush of hysterical tenderness.]

BLANCHE:

Baby, my baby sister!

STELLA [drawing away from her]:

Blanche, what is the matter with you?

[Blanche straightens up slowly and stands beside the bed looking down at her sister with knuckles pressed to her lips.]

BLANCHE:

He's left?

STELLA:

Stan? Yes.

BLANCHE:

Will he be back?

STELLA:

He's gone to get the car greased. Why?

BLANCHE:

Why! I've been half crazy, Stella! When I found out you'd been insane enough to come back in here after what happened--I started to rush in after you!

STELLA:

I'm glad you didn't.

BLANCHE:

What were you thinking of?

[Stella makes an indefinite gesture]

Answer me! What? What?

STELLA:

Please, Blanche! Sit down and stop yelling.

BLANCHE:

All right, Stella. I will repeat the question quietly now. How could you come back in this place last night? Why, you must have slept with him!

[Stella gets up in a calm and leisurely way.]

STELLA:

Blanche, I'd forgotten how excitable you are. You're making much too much fuss about this.

BLANCHE:

Am I?

STELLA:

Yes, you are, Blanche. I know how it must have seemed to you and I'm awful sorry it had to happen, but it wasn't anything as serious as you seem to take it. In the first place, when men are drinking and playing poker anything can happen. It's always a powder-keg. He didn't know what he was doing.... He was as good as a lamb when I came back and he's really very, very ashamed of himself.

BLANCHE:

And that--that makes it all right?

STELLA:

No, it isn't all right for anybody to make such a terrible row, but--people do sometimes. Stanley's always smashed things. Why, on our wedding night--soon as we came in here--he snatched off one of my slippers and rushed about the place amashing the light bulbs with it.

BLANCHE:

He did--what?

STELLA:

He smashed all the light bulbs with the heel of my slipper!

[She laughs.]

BLANCHE:

And you--you let him? Didn't run, didn't scream?

STELLA:

I was--sort of--thrilled by it.

[She waits for a moment.]

Eunice and you had breakfast'

BLANCHE:

Do you suppose I wanted my breakfast?

STELLA:

There's some coffee left on the stove.

BLANCHE:

You're so--matter of fact about it, Stella.

STELLA:

What other can I be? He's taken the radio to get it fixed. It didn't land on the pavement so only one tube was smashed.

BLANCHE:

And you are standing there smiling!

STELLA:

What do you want me to do?

BLANCHE:

Pull yourself together and face the facts.

STELLA:

What are they, in your opinion?

BLANCHE:

In my opinion? You're married to a madman!

STELLA:

No!

BLANCHE:

Yes, you are, your fix is worse than mine is! Only you're not being sensible about it. I'm going to do something. Get hold of myself and make myself a new life!

STELLA:

Yes?

BLANCHE:

But you've given in. And that isn't right, you're not old! You can get out.

STELLA [slowly and emphatically]:

I'm not in anything I want to get out of.

BLANCHE [incredulously]:

What--Stella?

STELLA:

I said I am not in anything that I have a desire to get out of. Look at the mess in this room! And those empty bottles! They went through two cases last night! He promised this morning that he was going to quit having these poker parties, but you know how long such a promise is going to keep. Oh, well, it's his pleasure, like mine is movies and bridge. People have got to tolerate each other's habits, I guess.