A View From the Bridge: A Play in Two Acts Read online

  RODOLPHO: Yes! Laughs, indicating Catherine: Especially when they are so beautiful!

  CATHERINE: You like sugar?

  RODOLPHO: Sugar? Yes! I like sugar very much!

  Eddie is downstage, watching as she pours a spoonful of sugar into his cup, his face puffed with trouble, and the room dies.

  Lights rise on Alfieri.

  ALFIERI: Who can ever know what will be discovered? Eddie Carbone had never expected to have a destiny. A man works, raises his family, goes bowling, eats, gets old, and then he dies. Now, as the weeks passed, there was a future, there was a trouble that would not go away.

  The lights fade on Alfieri, then rise on Eddie standing at the doorway of the house. Beatrice enters on the street. She sees Eddie, smiles at him. He looks away.

  She starts to enter the house when Eddie speaks.

  EDDIE: It’s after eight.

  BEATRICE: Well, it’s a long show at the Paramount.

  EDDIE: They must’ve seen every picture in Brooklyn by now. He’s supposed to stay in the house when he ain’t working. He ain’t supposed to go advertising himself.

  BEATRICE: Well that’s his trouble, what do you care? If they pick him up they pick him up, that’s all. Come in the house.

  EDDIE: What happened to the stenography? I don’t see her practice no more.

  BEATRICE: She’ll get back to it. She’s excited, Eddie.

  EDDIE: She tell you anything?

  BEATRICE comes to him, now the subject is opened: What’s the matter with you? He’s a nice kid, what do you want from him?

  EDDIE: That’s a nice kid? He gives me the heeby-jeebies.

  BEATRICE, smiling: Ah, go on, you’re just jealous.

  EDDIE: Of him? Boy, you don’t think much of me.

  BEATRICE: I don’t understand you. What’s so terrible about him?

  EDDIE: You mean it’s all right with you? That’s gonna be her husband?

  BEATRICE: Why? He’s a nice fella, hard workin’, he’s a good-lookin’ fella.

  EDDIE: He sings on the ships, didja know that?

  BEATRICE: What do you mean, he sings?

  EDDIE: Just what I said, he sings. Right on the deck, all of a sudden, a whole song comes out of his mouth —with motions. You know what they’re callin’ him now? Paper Doll they’re callin’ him, Canary. He’s like a weird. He comes out on the pier, one-two-three, it’s a regular free show.

  BEATRICE: Well, he’s a kid; he don’t know how to behave himself yet.

  EDDIE: And with that wacky hair; he’s like a chorus girl or sump’m.

  BEATRICE: So he’s blond, so—

  EDDIE: I just hope that’s his regular hair, that’s all I hope.

  BEATRICE: You crazy or sump’m? She tries to turn him to her.

  EDDIE—he keeps his head turned away: What’s so crazy? I don’t like his whole way.

  BEATRICE: Listen, you never seen a blond guy in your life? What about Whitey Balso?

  EDDIE, turning to her victoriously: Sure, but Whitey don’t sing; he don’t do like that on the ships.

  BEATRICE: Well, maybe that’s the way they do in Italy.

  EDDIE: Then why don’t his brother sing? Marco goes around like a man; nobody kids Marco. He moves from her, halts. She realizes there is a campaign solidified in him. I tell you the truth I’m surprised I have to tell you all this. I mean I’m surprised, B.

  BEATRICE—she goes to him with purpose now: Listen, you ain’t gonna start nothin’ here.

  EDDIE: I ain’t startin’ nothin’, but I ain’t gonna stand around lookin’ at that. For that character I didn’t bring her up. I swear, B., I’m surprised at you; I sit there waitin’ for you to wake up but everything is great with you.

  BEATRICE: No, everything ain’t great with me.

  EDDIE: No?

  BEATRICE: No. But I got other worries.

  EDDIE: Yeah. He is already weakening.

  BEATRICE: Yeah, you want me to tell you?

  EDDIE, in retreat: Why? What worries you got?

  BEATRICE: When am I gonna be a wife again, Eddie?

  EDDIE: I ain’t been feelin’ good. They bother me since they came.

  BEATRICE: It’s almost three months you don’t feel good; they’re only here a couple of weeks. It’s three months, Eddie.

  EDDIE: I don’t know, B. I don’t want to talk about it.

  BEATRICE: What’s the matter, Eddie, you don’t like me, heh?

  EDDIE: What do you mean, I don’t like you? I said I don’t feel good, that’s all.

  BEATRICE: Well, tell me, am I doing something wrong? Talk to me.

  EDDIE—Pause. He can’t speak, then: I can’t. I can’t talk about it.

  BEATRICE: Well tell me what—

  EDDIE: I got nothin’ to say about it!

  She stands for a moment; he is looking off; she turns to go into the house.

  EDDIE: I’ll be all right, B.; just lay off me, will ya? I’m worried about her.

  BEATRICE: The girl is gonna be eighteen years old, it’s time already.

  EDDIE: B., he’s taking her for a ride!

  BEATRICE: All right, that’s her ride. What’re you gonna stand over her till she’s forty? Eddie, I want you to cut it out now, you hear me? I don’t like it! Now come in the house.

  EDDIE: I want to take a walk, I’ll be in right away.

  BEATRICE: They ain’t goin’ to come any quicker if you stand in the street. It ain’t nice, Eddie.

  EDDIE: I’ll be in right away. Go ahead. He walks off.

  She goes into the house. Eddie glances up the street, sees Louis and Mike coming, and sits on an iron railing. Louis and Mike enter.

  LOUIS: Wanna go bowlin’ tonight?

  EDDIE: I’m too tired. Goin’ to sleep.

  LOUIS: How’s your two submarines?

  EDDIE: They’re okay.

  LOUIS: I see they’re gettin’ work allatime.

  EDDIE: Oh yeah, they’re doin’ all right.

  MIKE: That’s what we oughta do. We oughta leave the country and come in under the water. Then we get work.

  EDDIE : You ain’t kiddin’.

  LOUIS: Well, what the hell. Y’know?

  EDDIE: Sure.

  LOUIS—sits on railing beside Eddie: Believe me, Eddie, you got a lotta credit comin’ to you.

  EDDIE: Aah, they don’t bother me, don’t cost me nutt’n.

  MIKE: That older one, boy, he’s a regular bull. I seen him the other day liftin’ coffee bags over the Matson Line. They leave him alone he woulda load the whole ship by himself.

  EDDIE: Yeah, he’s a strong guy, that guy. Their father was a regular giant, supposed to be.

  LOUIS: Yeah, you could see. He’s a regular slave.

  MIKE, grinning: That blond one, though—Eddie looks at him. He’s got a sense of humor. Louis snickers.

  EDDIE, searchingly: Yeah. He’s funny—

  MIKE, starting to laugh: Well he ain’t exackly funny, but he’s always like makin’ remarks like, y‘know? He comes around, everybody’s laughin’. Louis laughs.

  EDDIE, uncomfortably, grinning: Yeah, well ... he’s got a sense of humor.

  MIKE, laughing: Yeah, I mean, he’s always makin’ like remarks, like, y’know?

  EDDIE: Yeah, I know. But he’s a kid yet, y’know? He —he’s just a kid, that’s all.

  MIKE, getting hysterical with Louis: I know. You take one look at him—everybody’s happy. Louis laughs. I worked one day with him last week over the Moore-MacCormack Line, I’m tellin’ you they was all hysterical. Louis and he explode in laughter.

  EDDIE: Why? What’d he do?

  MIKE: I don’t know ... he was just humorous. You never can remember what he says, y‘know? But it’s the way he says it. I mean he gives you a look sometimes and you start laughin’!

  EDDIE: Yeah. Troubled: He’s got a sense of humor.

  MIKE, gasping: Yeah.

  LOUIS, rising: Well, we see ya, Eddie.

  EDDIE: Take it easy.

  LOUIS: Yeah. See ya
.

  MIKE: If you wanna come bowlin’ later we’re goin’ Flatbush Avenue.

  Laughing, they move to exit, meeting Rodolpho and Catherine entering on the street. Their laughter rises as they see Rodolpho, who does not understand but joins in. Eddie moves to enter the house as Louis and Mike exit. Catherine stops him at the door.

  CATHERINE: Hey, Eddie—what a picture we saw! Did we laugh!

  EDDIE—he can’t help smiling at sight of her: Where’d you go?

  CATHERINE: Paramount. It was with those two guys, y’know? That—

  EDDIE: Brooklyn Paramount?

  CATHERINE, with an edge of anger, embarrassed before Rodolpho: Sure, the Brooklyn Paramount. I told you we wasn’t goin’ to New York.

  EDDIE, retreating before the threat of her anger: All right, I only asked you. To Rodolpho: I just don’t want her hangin’ around Times Square, see? It’s full of tramps over there.

  RODOLPHO: I would like to go to Broadway once, Eddie. I would like to walk with her once where the theaters are and the opera. Since I was a boy I see pictures of those lights.

  EDDIE, his little patience waning: I want to talk to her a minute, Rodolpho. Go inside, will you? RODOLPHO: Eddie, we only walk together in the streets. She teaches me.

  CATHERINE: You know what he can’t get over? That there’s no fountains in Brooklyn!

  EDDIE, smiling unwillingly: Fountains? Rodolpho smiles at his own naïveté.

  CATHERINE: In Italy he says, every town’s got fountains, and they meet there. And you know what? They got oranges on the trees where he comes from, and lemons. Imagine—on the trees? I mean it’s interesting. But he’s crazy for New York.

  RODOLPHO, attempting familiarity: Eddie, why can’t we go once to Broadway—?

  EDDIE: Look, I gotta tell her something—

  RODOLPHO: Maybe you can come too. I want to see all those lights. He sees no response in Eddie’s face. He glances at Catherine. I’ll walk by the river before I go to sleep. He walks off down the street.

  CATHERINE: Why don’t you talk to him, Eddie? He blesses you, and you don’t talk to him hardly.

  EDDIE, enveloping her with his eyes: I bless you and you don’t talk to me. He tries to smile.

  CATHERINE: I don’t talk to you? She hits his arm. What do you mean?

  EDDIE: I don’t see you no more. I come home you’re runnin’ around someplace—

  CATHERINE: Well, he wants to see everything, that’s all, so we go.... You mad at me?

  EDDIE: No. He moves from her, smiling sadly. It’s just I used to come home, you was always there. Now, I turn around, you’re a big girl. I don’t know how to talk to you.

  CATHERINE: Why?

  EDDIE: I don’t know, you’re runnin‘, you’re runnin’, Katie. I don’t think you listening any more to me.

  CATHERINE, going to him: Ah, Eddie, sure I am. What’s the matter? You don’t like him?

  Slight pause.

  EDDIE turns to her: You like him, Katie?

  CATHERINE, with a blush but holding her ground: Yeah. I like him.

  EDDIE—his smile goes: You like him.

  CATHERINE, looking down: Yeah. Now she looks at him for the consequences, smiling but tense. He looks at her like a lost boy. What’re you got against him? I don’t understand. He only blesses you.

  EDDIE turns away: He don’t bless me, Katie.

  CATHERINE: He does! You’re like a father to him!

  EDDIE turns to her: Katie.

  CATHERINE: What, Eddie?

  EDDIE: You gonna marry him?

  CATHERINE: I don’t know. We just been ... goin’ around, that’s all. Turns to him: What’re you got against him, Eddie? Please, tell me. What?

  EDDIE: He don’t respect you.

  CATHERINE: Why?

  EDDIE: Katie ... if you wasn’t an orphan, wouldn’t he ask your father’s permission before he run around with you like this?

  CATHERINE: Oh, well, he didn’t think you’d mind.

  EDDIE: He knows I mind, but it don’t bother him if I mind, don’t you see that?

  CATHERINE: No, Eddie, he’s got all kinds of respect for me. And you too! We walk across the street he takes my arm—he almost bows to me! You got him all wrong, Eddie; I mean it, you—

  EDDIE: Katie, he’s only bowin’ to his passport.

  CATHERINE: His passport!

  EDDIE: That’s right. He marries you he’s got the right to be an American citizen. That’s what’s goin’ on here. She is puzzled and surprised. You understand what I’m tellin’ you? The guy is lookin’ for his break, that’s all he’s lookin’ for.

  CATHERINE, pained: Oh, no, Eddie, I don’t think so.

  EDDIE: You don’t think so! Katie, you’re gonna make me cry here. Is that a workin’ man? What does he do with his first money? A snappy new jacket he buys, records, a pointy pair new shoes and his brother’s kids are starvin’ over there with tuberculosis? That’s a hit-and-run guy, baby; he’s got bright lights in his head, Broadway. Them guys don’t think of nobody but their-self! You marry him and the next time you see him it’ll be for divorce!

  CATHERINE steps toward him: Eddie, he never said a word about his papers or—

  EDDIE: You mean he’s supposed to tell you that?

  CATHERINE: I don’t think he’s even thinking about it.

  EDDIE: What’s better for him to think about! He could be picked up any day here and he’s back pushin’ taxis up the hill!

  CATHERINE: No, I don’t believe it.

  EDDIE: Katie, don’t break my heart, listen to me.

  CATHERINE: I don’t want to hear it.

  EDDIE: Katie, listen ...

  CATHERINE: He loves me!

  EDDIE, with deep alarm: Don’t say that, for God’s sake! This is the oldest racket in the country—

  CATHERINE, desperately, as though he had made his imprint: I don’t believe it! She rushes to the house.

  EDDIE, following her: They been pullin’ this since the Immigration Law was put in! They grab a green kid that don’t know nothin’ and they—

  CATHERINE, sobbing: I don’t believe, it and I wish to hell you’d stop it!

  EDDIE: Katie!

  They enter the apartment. The lights in the living room have risen and Beatrice is there. She looks past the sobbing Catherine at Eddie, who in the presence of his wife, makes an awkward gesture of eroded command, indicating Catherine.

  EDDIE: Why don’t you straighten her out?

  BEATRICE, inwardly angered at his flowing emotion, which in itself alarms her: When are you going to leave her alone?

  EDDIE: B., the guy is no good!

  BEATRICE, suddenly, with open fright and fury: You going to leave her alone? Or you gonna drive me crazy? He turns, striving to retain his dignity, but nevertheless in guilt walks out of the house, into the street and away. Catherine starts into a bedroom. Listen, Catherine. Catherine halts, turns to her sheepishly. What are you going to do with yourself?

  CATHERINE: I don’t know.

  BEATRICE: Don’t tell me you don’t know; you’re not a baby any more, what are you going to do with yourself?

  CATHERINE: He won’t listen to me.

  BEATRICE: I don’t understand this. He’s not your father, Catherine. I don’t understand what’s going on here.

  CATHERINE, as one who herself is trying to rationalize a buried impulse: What am I going to do, just kick him in the face with it?

  BEATRICE: Look, honey, you wanna get married, or don’t you wanna get married? What are you worried about, Katie?

  CATHERINE, quietly, trembling: I don’t know B. It just seems wrong if he’s against it so much.

  BEATRICE, never losing her aroused alarm: Sit down, honey, I want to tell you something. Here, sit down. Was there ever any fella he liked for you? There wasn‘t, was there?

  CATHERINE: But he says Rodolpho’s just after his papers.

  BEATRICE: Look, he’ll say anything. What does he care what he says? If it was a prince came here for you it would be no
different. You know that, don’t you?

  CATHERINE : Yeah, I guess.

  BEATRICE: So what does that mean?

  CATHERINE slowly turns her head to Beatrice: What?

  BEATRICE: It means you gotta be your own self more. You still think you’re a little girl, honey. But nobody else can make up your mind for you any more, you understand? You gotta give him to understand that he can’t give you orders no more.

  CATHERINE: Yeah, but how am I going to do that? He thinks I’m a baby.

  BEATRICE: Because you think you’re a baby. I told you fifty times already, you can’t act the way you act. You still walk around in front of him in your slip—

  CATHERINE: Well I forgot.

  BEATRICE : Well you can’t do it. Or like you sit on the edge of the bathtub talkin’ to him when he’s shavin’ in his underwear.

  CATHERINE: When’d I do that?

  BEATRICE: I seen you in there this morning.

  CATHERINE: Oh, ... well, I wanted to tell him something and I—

  BEATRICE: I know, honey. But if you act like a baby and he be treatin’ you like a baby. Like when he comes home sometimes you throw yourself at him like when you was twelve years old.

  CATHERINE: Well I like to see him and I’m happy so I—

  BEATRICE: Look, I’m not tellin’ you what to do honey, but—

  CATHERINE: No, you could tell me, B.! Gee, I’m all mixed up. See, I—He looks so sad now and it hurts me.

  BEATRICE: Well look Katie, if it’s goin’ to hurt you so much you’re gonna end up an old maid here.

  CATHERINE: No!

  BEATRICE: I’m tellin’ you, I’m not makin’ a joke. I tried to tell you a couple of times in the last year or so. That’s why I was so happy you were going to go out and get work, you wouldn’t be here so much, you’d be a little more independent. I mean it. It’s wonderful for a whole family to love each other, but you’re a grown woman and you’re in the same house with a grown man. So you’ll act different now, heh?

  CATHERINE: Yeah, I will. I’ll remember.

  BEATRICE: Because it ain’t only up to him, Katie, you understand? I told him the same thing already.

  CATHERINE, quickly: What?

  BEATRICE: That he should let you go. But, you see, if only I tell him, he thinks I’m just bawlin’ him out, or maybe I’m jealous or somethin’, you know?

  CATHERINE, astonished: He said you was jealous?

  BEATRICE: No, I’m just sayin’ maybe that’s what he thinks. She reaches over to Catherine’s hand; with a strained smile: You think I’m jealous of you, honey?