Mirror Teeth

Nick Gill

• Publisher: Oberon Books
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9781849431927
• eBook ISBN: 9781849436601
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: British Drama
• Index: Literature

"You might at least say thank you, Jenny. I've been out digging a hole for your boyfriend all night. Not to mention severing his legs. Have you ever severed a leg? It's not as easy as it looks. Not with a blunt spade." Jane is a housewife. James sells guns. They live in one of the larger cities in Our Country and are both terrified of ethnic youths who might well be wearing hoods and carrying knives, or something. All is well in the Jones household, until their sexually frustrated eighteen-year-old daughter Jenny brings home her new boyfriend, Kwesi Abalo... A visceral, smart, brutally hilarious play about prejudice, arms dealing, and what it means to be English. Nominated for four Off West End Awards Best Director - Kate Wasserberg Best Female performance - Louise Collins Most Promising Playwright - Nick Gill Best New Play

I

The Jones’s house, in one of the larger cities of Our Country. JAMES enters.

JANE: Hello, darling.

JAMES: Hello, darling.

JANE: How was work?

JAMES: Fine, fine. A few sales, meeting potential clients, sushi for lunch, squash with Peter from accounts, very funny anecdote from Paul in the mid-afternoon, something about a horse his cousin has, little bit of a cheeky flirt with the new girl at reception, down the pub for a quick one with Paul, another anecdote from him, good anecdote day for him, and now here we are. And how are our two children, John and Jenny?

JANE: Oh, our two children, John and Jenny, are fine; they’re upstairs, waiting for dinner.

JAMES: Excellent. And how was your day?

JANE: Nothing remarkable, I must say. It’s been a day of powerful drama for many in the political and financial spheres, I dare say, but for we housewives in one of the larger cities of Our Country, it’s been a relatively quiet day.

JAMES: Well, it can’t all be excitement and adventures, can it?

JANE: No, I suppose not. It’s a good life, though.

JAMES: It is a good life.

JANE: Now then, you have a sit down and a read, and I’ll just finish making our dinner.

JAMES: Thank you, my love. Oh dear. More news in the papers about another stabbing, I see.

JANE: No.

JAMES: Yes, I’m afraid so. Another teenager in one of the poorer districts of this, one of the larger cities of Our Country. An Ethnic, they’re saying. A black Ethnic.

JANE: Oh darling.

JAMES: I know, I know.

JANE: I know how it troubles you.

JAMES: If I’m honest, it does, my darling.

JANE: Oh but my love, there’s nothing you could have done.

JAMES: That’s what I tell myself.

JANE: The trouble is the blacks themselves, isn’t it? It’s just them. They’re just a violent race, they can’t help it. How else do you explain the violence? It’s something genetic, I suppose; they’re just different to us.

JAMES: Mmm.

JANE: I mean to say, we all live in the same country, we all have the same social advantages, but you don’t see me out on the streets with a shiv, do you? I’m not a violent person. I know what I want from life – I want to be able to provide for my family, I want to have a comfortable house for us all to live in. And my children, I know what I want for them, and what they want for themselves – they work hard to study at school and at University, and they’ll go to find a good job so they can have their own family, and support them. But…I just don’t know what the blacks want. You see them everywhere with their hundreds of children, that you and I are working so hard to support with our taxes, darling, and they don’t seem to want to better themselves at all – they just live off the state, don’t they?

JAMES: The very generous state.

JANE: The very generous state, exactly. How are they ever going to better themselves if they’re not going to work their way up through society?

And as for their children, well. I certainly don’t know what they want. They just seem to want to fight and stab each other. It is true, I’ve read it. Well, I say let them. Once all the ones who want to kill each other have killed each other, then only the ones who don’t want to kill each other will be left, and then we can all get along in peace.

JAMES: You make a lot of sense, you know; but I’m sure it isn’t all the blacks, though, love.

JANE: No, of course, you’re right; I’m generalising. It’s not all of them.

JAMES: There’s that nice young man who works at the Bank.

JANE: You see, that’s my point, darling. He’s been naturalised, hasn’t he? He’s really taken on our culture, hasn’t he? He’s stopped carrying a knife, hasn’t he? He’s taken a position at a reputable establishment, hasn’t he? He’s started wearing suits and packing his own lunch, hasn’t he? He has a subscription to the right magazines, hasn’t he?

JAMES: Hasn’t he?

JANE: Yes, hasn’t he? He really has.

JAMES: He really has.

JANE: Yes. But he’s the exception, isn’t he?

JAMES: Isn’t he?

JANE: I mean to say, the other night I was coming back from the train, after popping out to get some things from Town, and there was a group of blacks just standing near the platform. Just standing.

JAMES: You didn’t tell me about this.

JANE: Well, I didn’t want to worry you, darling.

JAMES: Were they blocking the platform, these young Ethnics?

JANE: No; but that was what was so sinister.

JAMES: Cowards.

JANE: They were just there, just standing, talking. Laughing sometimes; I don’t know what at. And any one of them could have had a knife.

JAMES: You’re so brave.

JANE: And I just didn’t know what to do. I almost froze, James; I was there, on the train, and I very nearly couldn’t bring myself to step off onto the platform. I was so scared. They had hoods, you know.

JAMES: Hoods?

JANE: You couldn’t see their faces at all, James, because they were black, as I say; did I mention they were black?

JAMES: Black? I don’t think you did, darling, no.

JANE: Well, I couldn’t see their faces because they were, and because their hoods...

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Half-title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Characters
• I The Jones’s house, in one of the larger cities of Our Country
• II The Jones’s house, in one of the larger cities of A Middle Eastern Country
• III The same house, strangely & disconcertingly different