Samuel Beckett's New Musical: Waiting for the Surrey

Celebrate Beckett’s birthday on April 13th with his revisionist, toe-tapping, “Oklahoma”. He came back from the dead to write it for you.

Samuel Beckett strumming, “If It Takes Forever, Lefty, I Will Wait for You.”

ACT 1

Oklahoma Territory, 1907, desolate and dusty. A run-down farmhouse porch with four chairs. A tree. Morning.

Curly, a handsome young cowboy, enters, singing.

Curly: There’s a bright golden haze on the meadow,

There’s a bright golden haze…

Aunt Eller, a no-nonsense older woman, steps out onto the porch.

Aunt Eller: (Annoyed). Curly, you singin’ again? How many times do I got to tell you? Ain’t nothin’ to sing about out here in the territories. It’s empty and it’s windy and it’s bleak. And then you die.

Curly: Forget all that, Aunt Eller. Today’s gonna be special. We’re waitin’ for a surrey.

Aunt Eller: What?

Curly: A surrey with fringe on the top. They told me they would deliver it here this morning. Meet me right under that tree.

Aunt Eller: That tree?

Curly: That very one.

Aunt Eller and Curly sit, staring at the tree. Minutes pass.

Laurey, an attractive if emotionally volatile young woman steps out onto the porch and sits down heavily next to her aunt. Curly rises to his feet.

Laurey: (dismissively). Mornin’, Curly. And if you’re here to ask me to the box special, I ain’t interested. Ain’t nothing in life that’s special. You, especially.

Curly: I bet you’re gonna change your tune when you see my surrey. Chicks and ducks and geese gonna scurry when I take you out in that surrey. And there’s fringe on top. It cost me $5 a day extra, but I insisted. Nothin’s too good for my gal.

Aunt Eller: Would you say the fringe was made of silk?

Curly: Wouldn’t have no other kind but silk. Sewn by foreigners in sweatshops back east. They lock ’em in to make sure they keep workin’. Sometimes there’s fires in the shops and they die.

Aunt Eller: (Impressed). Ridin’ under somethin’ like that would sure make a gal proud.

Laurey: Oh, p’shaw! P’phooey. You don’t have no surrey.

Curly: I do! The wheels are yellow and the upholstery is brown and the fella told me to wait right here next to the tree and he’ll deliver it, 9 a.m. sharp. And I can tell from the angle of the sun it’s 8:58. Just keep a look out for high steppin’ strutters, which was another option.

Curly and Aunt Eller and Laurey sit on the porch, staring at the tree, waiting.

Curly: There will be a team of snow-white horses coming down that road any minute now. I mean, one’s like snow, the other’s more like milk.

Curly, Aunt Eller, and Laurey stare intently at the tree.

A crack of a whip is heard offstage.

Judd: (offstage) Take that!

There is the sound of pathetic mewling.

Judd Frye, a burly man in virile clothing accessorized with dirt, enters, whip in hand.

Judd: Damn kittens! Always rolling around, playing, like life is a game. I’ll tell you one thing, LIFE AIN’T NO GAME!

Laurey sighs, puts her hand over her heart, then turns to address the audience.

Laurey: I know he’s no good, but he excites me.

Judd: What you all doin’ out here, starin’ at that tree? Is there gonna be a hanging? Nobody told poor Judd about it. Nobody tells poor Judd nothin’. I might as well kill myself.

Aunt Eller: (Coldly). That ain’t a bad idea, Judd. We all know about your porn addiction.

Laurey: (Hotly.) We’re waiting on the surrey Curly hired to take me to the box special. Only there ain’t no surrey. There ain’t ever gonna be no surrey. And I’d rather go to the box special with you, Judd. Then you can do terrible things to me, later.

A Farm Boy runs on stage.

Farm Boy: The surrey agency told me to tell you no surrey today but definitely tomorrow. Sorry, big mix-up, they over-booked. Tomorrow, same time, same tree. Oh, and I forgot — they’re comping the strutters.

The farm boy exits.

Laurey laughs cruelly.

Curly: Everything will be better tomorrow.

Act II

Next day. Same time. Same place.

Laurey, Aunt Eller, and Judd are sitting on the porch, annoyed and disappointed. Curly is standing in the yard, staring at the tree.

Curly: It’s coming today. I know it. Nosey folks will peak through their shutters. The whole territory will be talking about it.

There is dust in the distance.

Curly: (Excited). You hear it? That faint clip-clop?

Aunt Eller: (Standing and hollering). I see somethin’!

Ado Annie, wholesome in a cheap, sluttish way, enters.

Ado Annie: I know I shouldn’t have said yes to that gang of men raisin’ that barn, but I’m just a girl who can’t say no. And then I hate myself in the morning.

Judd: (Very interested.) How many men does it take to put up a barn?

Ado Annie: (Counting on her fingers.) Let me see, now. It was ‘Yes’, ‘yes’, ‘yes’, ‘yes’…then four more ‘yes’s after they framed the silo…

Curly: (Interrupting). Annie, comin’ here did you happen to see a surrey pulled by two white horses? Yellow wheels? Snazzy leather interior?

Ado Annie: No.

Judd: Y’know, Annie, since you’re interested in architecture and such, maybe you’d like to see my shack. I’ve been thinking of puttin’ a fire-pit next to the hog pen.

Judd takes Annie’s arm and they exit.

Laurey: (Desperate, running after them). Judd, wait, I’m interested in architecture, too! That porch, I repurposed it. It used to be a tree.

Curly joins Aunt Eller on the porch, where they sit despondently.

Aunt Eller: I hear everything’s up to date in Kansas City, but that don’t matter to us out here.

Curly: Not a bit.

Aunt Eller: A surrey with isinglass windows you could roll right down in case there’s a change in the weather — now that would mean something.

Curly: It would be a game changer, all right.

Aunt Eller: Two bright side-lights winkin’ an’ blinkin’, that’s worth waiting for. (A long pause). You think it’ll come?

Curly: I know it’s comin’. They said it’s comin’.

Aunt Eller: You want to go inside for a spell and get some lemonade?

Curly: Let’s go.

They do not move.

The curtain falls.