Three Kings (NHB Modern Plays)

Stephen Beresford

• Publisher: Nick Hern Books
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781788503440
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: British Drama
• Index: Literature

When Patrick is eight years old, his absent father returns unexpectedly for a brief but memorable encounter.

Years later – recalling that meeting, and the revelations that followed – Patrick traces the events of his father's life, laying bare a journey of grandiose plans, aching disappointments and audacious self-delusion.

Three Kings by Stephen Beresford is a heartbreaking and hilarious play for a solo actor about fathers and sons, the gifts and burdens of inheritance, and the unfathomable puzzle of human relationships.

It was written for Andrew Scott to perform as part of Old Vic: In Camera, a series of live performances streamed from The Old Vic, London, in 2020. This edition includes an introduction by the director Matthew Warchus.

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‘I have never understood the enthusiasm people have for dying by the sea.

‘I like the sea. I like the sucking of waves on shingle – I’m not… This isn’t a condemnation of the poetic principles of nature.’

I have no idea why I am speaking like this.

I’m looking around the café. It has tiles on the walls in yellow and blue. A scene – like a mural – stretching across them. I think it’s a bull facing down a matador, but half of it’s hidden behind a fridge.

‘This is one of the more… authentic places,’ he says. And I can’t quite detect whether that’s a boast or an apology.

I have a brandy in front of me – which, I’m aware, has raised some eyebrows at ten o’clock in the morning – but since I’ve been brought here on the business of death, I appear to have been excused –

At least by him.

A television, above the bar, is showing football.

There are little plates of octopus and potato skewered onto toothpicks. A neon sign in the window – ‘Estrella’.

He taps my hand and, nods over at the glass counter.

‘Don’t touch the ham.’

His name is Dennis.

‘I was a friend of your father’s,’ he says. ‘In as much as he…’

‘Had friends?’

‘Allowed people in.’ Dennis replies.

He seems pleased with that – and he lets it sit there between us for a moment.

Dennis has lived here for almost fourteen years. He is a leading light among the expatriate community. He offers all kinds of services – mortgage broking, naturalisation, currency exchange.

‘Not that he was unpopular…’ he adds. ‘Oh, far from it. He was always a very…’

I can see that the dangling of unfinished sentences is going to be Dennis’s style.

‘Especially with the ladies, of course.

‘I helped him with all his difficulties.’

‘You mean prison?’ I say.

‘I gave him advice. I advised him. Especially about the divorces. His will. There were – this being Spain – the inevitable land and property issues…’

He’s obviously going to gloss over my father’s brief but significant criminal career, so I say it again.

‘Did you help him when he was sent to prison?’

‘He was incarcerated, yes. Briefly. In Madrid. I gave advice to his wife…’

‘You must remind me – ’ I say, ‘would that have been Barbara?’

‘Barbara?’

‘Barbara. An older lady. Made a lot of money in care homes, I think…’

‘No…’ he says. He looks troubled for a moment. ‘I think Barbara might have been before my time. This was Concepción.’

‘Concepción?’

‘A younger person. Very pretty. At one time she was a stewardess for Jet Blue.’

‘Oh.’

I’ve never heard of Jet Blue. I try not to make that a reflection on Concepción, but I’m not entirely sure I succeed.

‘And did she last the course?’ I say.

‘No… She was a little… excitable. She didn’t take too kindly to him being carted off like that. It was rather a shock.’

‘It must have been.’

‘Extremely heavy-handed – but then, that’s the guarda civil for you. Frankly, I can’t think what was gained by it. Apprehending him, like that, at the

Royal Málaga Yacht Club… Parading him past the buffet in handcuffs…’

Dennis is exercised by this miscarriage of justice so he’s keen to change the subject.

‘You’ve been here before!’ He says, brightly. ‘Three months ago!’

I fold the napkin.

‘My sister told me he was dying and so I came. I came and visited him.’

‘I wasn’t here.’

Dennis seems genuinely saddened by that.

‘I was visiting the mainland – for a client in concrete.’

‘I didn’t expect to be back again so soon.’ I say.

He pats my hand.

‘That trip must have been good for you,’ he says. ‘And him.

‘Closure.’

He says the word as though he’s only recently come across it – and perhaps he has.

His wife may have used it in front of him. Or his daughter.

I can see them sitting on a terrace, sharing a jug of sangria. Dennis loves his family – I know that from spending a few minutes with him.

I see them everywhere – men who love their families. I have an antenna for it.

I see them young – pushing swings and standing outside of schools. I see them old – in booths at restaurants – at graduation ceremonies…

My father was not such a man, I think.

And neither am I.

‘He was completely exonerated.

‘They sent him all the way back to Ireland and he was released. A full acquittal.’

‘I know,’ I say.

‘He may have owed a great deal of money – he may have been l...