The Welkin (NHB Modern Plays) E-Book

Lucy Kirkwood

• Herausgeber: Nick Hern Books
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Seitenzahl: 137

Beschreibung

Rural Suffolk, 1759. As the country waits for Halley's Comet, Sally Poppy is sentenced to hang for a heinous murder. When she claims to be pregnant, a jury of twelve matrons are taken from their housework to decide whether she's telling the truth, or simply trying to escape the noose. With only midwife Lizzy Luke prepared to defend the girl, and a mob baying for blood outside, the matrons wrestle with their new authority, and the devil in their midst. Lucy Kirkwood's play The Welkin premiered at the National Theatre, London, in 2020, directed by James Macdonald and featuring Maxine Peake and Ria Zmitrowicz.

Leseprobe

Lucy Kirkwood

THE WELKIN

NICK HERN BOOKS

London

www.nickhernbooks.co.uk

Contents

Original Production

Epigraph

Note on Play

Characters

The Welkin

About the Author

Copyright and Performing Rights Information

The Welkin was first performed in the Lyttelton auditorium of the National Theatre, London, on 22 January 2020 (previews from 15 January). The cast was as follows:

THE ACCUSED

SALLY POPPY

Ria Zmitrowicz

THE JURY OF MATRONS

HANNAH RUSTED

Natasha Cottriall

JUDITH BREWER

Jenny Galloway

CHARLOTTE CARY

Haydn Gwynne

MARY MIDDLETON

Zainab Hasan

PEG CARTER

Aysha Kala

HELEN LUDLOW

Wendy Kweh

EMMA JENKINS

Cecilia Noble

ELIZABETH LUKE

Maxine Peake

KITTY GIVENS

Dawn Sievewright

SARAH SMITH

June Watson

ANN LAVENDER

Hara Yannas

SARAH HOLLIS

Brigid Zengeni

MR COOMBES

Philip McGinley

FREDERICK POPPY/THE JUSTICE/DR WILLIS

Laurence Ubong Williams

KATY LUKE/ALICE WAX

Emily Hather

Ayomide Mustafa

Shani Smethurst

LADY WAX

Aysha Kala

Other parts played by members of the company

UNDERSTUDIES

SALLY POPPY

Natasha Cottriall

JUDITH BREWER/SARAH SMITH/CHARLOTTE CARY/LADY WAX

Jules Melvin

MARY MIDDLETON/SARAH HOLLIS/EMMA JENKINS

Daneka Etchells

KITTY GIVENS/PEG CARTER/HANNAH RUSTED/HELEN LUDLOW

Shaofan Wilson

ELIZABETH LUKE/ANN LAVENDER

Rebecca Todd

FREDERICK POPPY/MR COOMBES/THE JUSTICE/DR WILLIS

Daniel Norford

Director

James Macdonald

Set and Costume Designer

Bunny Christie

Lighting Designer

Lee Curran

Sound Designer

Carolyn Downing

Movement

Imogen Knight

Fight Directors

Rachel Bown-Williams and Ruth Cooper-Brown of RC-Annie Ltd

Vocal Arranger and Rehearsal Music Director

Osnat Schmool

Company Voice Work

Simon Money

Dialect Coach

Michaela Kennen

Staff Director

Sara Joyce

‘When beggars die there are no comets seen’

Julius Caesar, Act II, Scene II

Characters

THE ACCUSED

SALLY POPPY, the murderer, twenty-one years old or thereabouts

THE JURY OF MATRONS

ELIZABETH (LIZZY) LUKE, the midwife, thirty-five years old, give or take

AND

JUDITH BREWER, older

CHARLOTTE CARY, older

KITTY GIVENS, young, Scottish

HELEN LUDLOW, middle-aged

SARAH HOLLIS, middle-aged, older than Lizzy

EMMA JENKINS, middle-aged

ANN LAVENDER, young

MARY MIDDLETON, young, pregnant

HANNAH RUSTED, young

SARAH SMITH, older

PEG CARTER, young, pregnant

AND ALSO

MR COOMBES, the bailiff

FREDERICK POPPY, the husband

MR WILLIS, the doctor

To be played by the same actor

KATY LUKE, the midwife’s daughter

ALICE WAX, the victim

To be played by the same actor

LADY WAX, the mother

Note on Play

I prefer the Justice to be a disembodied voice but this might be an additional cast member. If live or recorded there should be a sense his voice could be that of God. It must come from above.

The play is set in March of 1759 on the border of Norfolk and Suffolk, in England.

The matrons can be of any ethnic background, indeed it is crucial the group reflects the present-day population of the place the play is being performed in, not East Anglia in the 1750s.

Key

A dash (–) indicates an abrupt interruption.

A forward slash (/) indicates an overlapping.

An asterisk (*) indicates two lines that begin simultaneously.

A comma on its own line (,) indicates a beat, a breath, a shift in the direction of thought.

Words in square brackets are not spoken aloud.

This ebook was created before the end of rehearsals and so may differ slightly from the play as performed.

ACT ONE

1. HOUSEWORK

CHARLOTTE CARY is polishing pewter

EMMA JENKINS is soaping her husband’s collars

HANNAH RUSTED is carrying pails of water on a yoke

HELEN LUDLOW is mending a dress by candlelight

ANN LAVENDER is changing a screaming baby

KITTY GIVENS is scrubbing a floor with sand and brushes

PEG CARTER is sweeping the floor and ceiling with a besom

JUDITH BREWER is using a smoothing stone to force creases from linen

SARAH HOLLIS is beating a rug

MARY MIDDLETON is kneading bread as she rocks a crib with her foot

SARAH SMITH is plucking a pheasant

ELIZABETH LUKE is drying washing at a wringing post

The baby cries, the brush scrapes, the water slops, flour rises, feathers fall, silver squeaks, the broom and the carpet send up clouds of dust.

2. THE NIGHT IN QUESTION

The middle of the night. A labourer’s house. SALLY POPPY, in the dark, and FREDERICK POPPY with a single candle. SALLY has been searching for something. We cannot see herproperly yet.

FRED. Home then.

SALLY. Thought you’d be sleeping.

FRED. Four months.

SALLY. I had ten shillings and a nice piece of lace in that tin, where’s that gone?

FRED. Four months and not one word.

SALLY. Only four was it? Felt like more. Where’s my money Fred?

FRED. I spent that.

SALLY. That’s not yours, I put that by.

FRED. You put that by from bilking me on butter, where you been?

SALLY. That’s got like a midden in here, don’t you know where the broom lives?

FRED. Sally.

SALLY. Thought I’d been away years. Thought I’d walk in here to find it all different and you with a long grey beard but everything’s just the same but dirtier.

FRED. Wife, / where have you

SALLY. Disappointing.

FRED. where the fuck have you been?

,

SALLY. I wanted to see the comet when it came.

FRED. Comet?

SALLY. It has been predicted by Mr Halley, / don’t you read the newspaper?

FRED. [don’t] talk to me of comets wife, November you left this house on the back of another man’s / horse

SALLY. Right, no

FRED. no, do not deny it, you were seen, so do not give me fucking sludder about comets Sally, though I don’t doubt you were gazing at stars, flat on your back in a / ditch

SALLY. May I

FRED. I am speaking

SALLY. Oh.

FRED. at church I had to make out you’d gone to mind a sick cousin in Stowmarket. A lie, I told, in the house of God.

SALLY. Going to church is like housework, people judge you by how well you do it, it makes your back ache, and after you have done it, it needs doing all over again a week later.

FRED. That’s a dry bob. But you cannot wash a soul as easily as you wash a floor.

SALLY. You are right Fred. Washing a floor is much harder, particularly when you have a dog as we do. Where is Poppet?

FRED. Tied up, out back.

SALLY. Fed?

He puts the candle down and takes his belt off.

SALLY picks up the candle and uses it to light three more.

FRED. No, not fed. She’s lucky I have not broke her neck, feeding’s too good for her, lift your skirts. Put your hands on the wall.

SALLY. Pick one. I can’t do both.

She turns. We see her illuminated for the first time. Covered head to toe in blood.

FRED. my God.

He drops his belt.

Are you hurt?

FRED begins a frantic but tender examination, trying to locate the source of bleeding.

Who has done this? Who has harmed you?

SALLY. No one has harmed me.

FRED. I cannot find a wound… where is / the?

SALLY. There is no wound. It is not my blood.

FRED. But… how / then

SALLY. You stink, by the way.

FRED. I… I have been shovelling out the earth closet…

SALLY. This parish is full of secrets and yet we spread our shit on the fields for all to see and eat the grain that grows in it.

FRED. Whose blood is it? Whose – my god – my god Sal, what was it, an accident?

SALLY takes a hammer out of her pocket.

SALLY. It was not an accident.

FRED. Whose blood is it? Sally whose blood? Speak maw!

SALLY. I’m having a baby. It ent yours.

He slaps her.

FRED. You liar

SALLY. I want my ten shillings. I need / to go away

FRED. you old drab

SALLY. and I must have something to pay the Midnight Woman when / the time comes

FRED. dirty, wicked bunter

SALLY. having a baby isn’t / dirty

FRED. hedge-whore

SALLY. or maybe it is, it probably depends on who puts it in and who takes it out again – no.

He has grabbed the hammer, she shoves him away with force.

No. No more of that.

FRED falls to his knees and looks up to Heaven.

FRED. May God forgive you.

SALLY yawns.

SALLY. [’Scuse me] God isn’t up there, Fred. He’s inside us. In our bodies. In your body and mine and Poppet’s too. He is in your blood and your flesh and your brain, which by the way looks like a dirty sponge that’s been used to clean windows. A filthy grey thing. I’ll say it one more time. I want my ten shillings. You can keep the lace.

FRED sobs, fearful and wretched.

FRED. What’s happened gal? What you done?

From her other pocket SALLY takes a long golden plait tied with a sky-blue ribbon. She uses one of the candles to set fire to it.

Sally Poppy, you tell me right now where the Hell you’ve been!

SALLY. I’ve been to look at God.

Sudden black. In the dark the hard and continuous banging of a butter churn.

3. EXECUTION DAY

It is wash day, there are linens hung.

ELIZABETH LUKE is churning butter.

COOMBES enters. A bunch of daffodils. One arm in a sling.

COOMBES. Good day Mrs Luke.

ELIZABETH. Afternoon, Mr Coombes.

He watches her. She is conscious of his eyes on her.

You’ll forgive me, I cannot stop to talk, this butter will not come.

He continues to watch her. Quietly:

Not now, Billy.

COOMBES. You did not come Thursday / last

ELIZABETH. Shhh.

COOMBES. I waited for you for an hour and a quarter.

ELIZABETH. I have told you I am done with it.

COOMBES. I cannot stop thinking about your commodity.

She sighs. Shifts her grip on the churn. Wipes sweat from her brow.

Where is the wrong in it? We are both widowed.

ELIZABETH. I am widowed Billy, your wife is very much alive.

COOMBES. Yes but she is gone to Lowestoft.

ELIZABETH. What do you want?

He offers the daffodils with a smile.

Billy!

COOMBES. Oh, alright. I come from the assizes. The Justice calls for a jury of matrons.

ELIZABETH. Does he want me?

COOMBES. He does.

ELIZABETH. Could he not have someone else?

COOMBES. I am sent to fetch you.

ELIZABETH. By name?

COOMBES. On account of your experience as midwife.

ELIZABETH. Could you tell him it is my Grand Wash today?

COOMBES. Justice cannot stop for your linens.

ELIZABETH. But could it not wait a little?

COOMBES. It is your civic duty.

ELIZABETH. It is an inconvenience.

COOMBES. What strong arms you have.

ELIZABETH. Billy.

COOMBES. They have caught and tried the murderers of little Alice Wax.

She looks up, surprised. Pause.

ELIZABETH. I did not realise they had found the, that they had found a body.

COOMBES. Two nights ago the curate noticed a preponderance of crows above the old Pearl house. They found her in pieces in two sacks stuffed up the fireplace.

ELIZABETH. Expect that is the closest a Wax child ever got to sweeping a chimney.

COOMBES. Lizzy! A girl has been killed. And the Waxes are a good family.

ELIZABETH. Certainly. They’ve a house full of decencies to put between themselves and the rest of the world but now the world has got in nonetheless.

COOMBES. What is the matter with you, they are in grief!

ELIZABETH. I’m sorry, I am tired.

COOMBES. It is only midday.

ELIZABETH. And yet I am tired Billy what is your question?

COOMBES. Lizzy / don’t

ELIZABETH. I am sorry for Lady Wax, but seems to me people round here are too ready to mourn little girls and too slow to mourn grown men.

ELIZABETH resumes churning.

COOMBES. Look, you know I am sympathetic to your grievances, but John Wax is a gentleman –

ELIZABETH. John Wax has enclosed my sister’s husband’s pasture and given him instead a scrubby spit of land a quarter of the size, I would not dry my linens on it. And David Swain is hanged under the Black Act for killing two deer that were destroying his clover after many requests to John Wax that he should control his beasts.

COOMBES. He was apprised of the law.

ELIZABETH. He is hanged Billy! Hanged for old venison! There are evils happening in this country at present that are worse than the death of a child.

COOMBES. What of poor Lady Wax then? Her life will be an open wound.

ELIZABETH. Good. That’s a woman who never had nothing taken from her in her whole life, perhaps the experience will sweeten her, like frost on a parsnip.

COOMBES. I never heard you speak so cruel before.

ELIZABETH. Well you never met me in the middle of my housework before.

She steps away from the churn, exhausted.

COOMBES. Give us a kiss.

ELIZABETH. No.

COOMBES. Go on.

She sighs. Checks they are not observed. She gives him a kiss. He strokes her head.

I ent gonna higgle with you Lizzy. But you ent being fair. The Waxes been decent to me.

ELIZABETH. Since when?

COOMBES. Since them’s offered me work.

ELIZABETH. Doing what?

COOMBES. Scaring rooks.

ELIZABETH. That’s child’s work.

COOMBES. It’s work.

ELIZABETH. Anyway, you ent a labourer. You’re a thatcher.

COOMBES. Not with one arm I ent. That’s been a hard old year that has, Lizzy.

ELIZABETH. I know.

COOMBES. I know you know, whole town knows, whole town laughs except the Waxes. A tied cottage they offered me this morning. A tied cottage, in my condition, I call that very Christian.

ELIZABETH. Which one?

COOMBES. You know where old Weasel Humphrey live?

ELIZABETH. That one that’s always full of bees?

COOMBES. That’s it. Spacious that is.

ELIZABETH takes up the churn and continues to work.

ELIZABETH. No, but I do feel wretched for Lady Wax. The child’s bonnet was always goffered beautiful. And if there are murderers in our midst I am glad they are not at liberty.

COOMBES. They were apprehended last night. A man and a woman. Only took eighteen minutes to find them both guilty.

ELIZABETH. Not local people?

COOMBES. Thomas McKay was a stranger, come down from Scotland. He was hanged already this morning. You should have seen the crowds.

ELIZABETH. I do not care to watch the life going out of a body, I never have. And I have been locked in a dark room these past two days delivering Mrs Lovell of twins.

COOMBES. I heard only a son.

ELIZABETH. I delivered a girl as well.

COOMBES. Oh. And did / she?

ELIZABETH. no she lived only a few minutes.

COOMBES. Another? I am sorry for it darl.

He reaches for her gently. She lets herself be comforted.A tenderness between them.

ELIZABETH. Mrs Lovell would not drink her caudle. And their house is so cold, that was impossible to stop up all the draughts.

COOMBES. Nobody blames you.

ELIZABETH starts churning vigorously again.

ELIZABETH. Twelve babies lost in as many months

COOMBES. It is / God’s will.

ELIZABETH. and I am the very first person they blame, God? No, they don’t blame God. Nobody blames God when there is a woman can be blamed instead. Who is the accomplice? A foreigner too?

COOMBES. No, it is Sally Poppy, from Metfield.

ELIZABETH. Don’t know her.

COOMBES. Fred Poppy’s wife. Francis Cobb’s daughter.

ELIZABETH stops churning.

ELIZABETH. Sally? Janet Cobb’s girl?

COOMBES. Might have been predicted, the whole family is hell-born, the father is a shit sack, the brother is no better, the mother is a slamkin and all of them stub-faced and rank. Sally is the same, been joining giblets with sailors since she was ten years old.

ELIZABETH. Billy –

COOMBES. oh don’t Billy me, you know that’s true.

ELIZABETH. But… had she met the Wax child before?

COOMBES. Sally was employed as laundry mistress in the Wax house for a time.

ELIZABETH. Oh. I did not, and then did she quarrel with the girl?

COOMBES. No, by all accounts the girl doted on her and was distraught when she was dismissed.

ELIZABETH. Why was she dismissed?

COOMBES. Some stomachers disappeared from Lady Wax’s wardrobe.

ELIZABETH. So, so, so Sally has confessed?

COOMBES. No, but she is guilty without question. Her husband says she arrived home in the middle of the night covered in blood with a hammer in her hand and laughed and laughed and rapped out a volley of oaths to the Devil.

ELIZABETH. I heard she was not very happy in her marriage.

COOMBES. Yes, at least the poor man is free now. A discontented wife is a Hell on earth.

ELIZABETH. And Sally is, she is sentenced to hang is she?

COOMBES. She is and she will, there’s a crowd fifty-deep outside the assizes waiting to see it, but she pleads the belly. We have eleven women empanelled but must have a twelfth.

ELIZABETH shakes her head, disturbed, and starts churning again.

ELIZABETH. Find someone else, I cannot.

COOMBES. The girl is lying.

ELIZABETH. I cannot be the one to say so.