Morning Sun

Simon Stephens

• Publisher: Methuen Drama
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN: 9781350318670
• eBook ISBN: 9781350318694
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: British Drama

I have kind of become invisible. Nobody looks at me. Not like they used to. You reach an age. Like my age and people stop looking at you. They stop checking you out. In Greenwich Village a generation or so ago, the city is alive. Joni Mitchell sings, friends and lovers come and go, and the regulars change at the White Horse Tavern. As 50 years pass, one woman's life is revealed in all its complexity, mystery and possibility in this enthralling world premiere about mothers and daughters, beginnings and endings in New York City. Simon Stephens's new play, commissioned by MTC, premiered off-Broadway in November 2021 starring Blair Brown, Edie Falco and Marin Ireland.

Scene Three

Three And then there’s fifteen years.

One There’s what?

Three Fifteen years.

One Like that?

Three I mean. Pretty much.

One That’s. Er. That feels quick.

Two It doesn’t feel quick at the time.

One You’re telling me.

Three Fifteen years defined by a desperate need to master a peculiar range of card tricks.

And something of an obsession with listening to the radio shows of Leonard Bernstein. And watching buildings get knocked down.

Two I remember that phase.

Three Standing watching Penn Station get taken away.

One Smashed. Not taken away. Smashed.

Two That is a very peculiar thing for a teenage girl to concern herself with.

One I don’t think so.

Two It is.

One I think it’s a tragedy.

Two You may well think that but most girls your age have better things to be thinking about.

Three Your parents get the opportunity to buy the place on 11th from the landlord at a cost which is a stretch but which manageable.

Two It is.

Three And they take it.

Two We do.

Three They get a mortgage from JP Morgan. And it’s not easy.

Two It’s not.

Three You watch your mother become infatuated with Jane Jacobs.

Two You meet her. On the campaign trail. In Washington Square.

One I don’t remember.

Two Do you know who this is?

One No.

Two This is Jane Jacobs. Say hello, Charlotte.

One Charley. I prefer to be called Charley.

Three Hey Charley. How you doing?

One I’m doing very well, Miss Jacobs. It’s lovely to meet you.

Three You don’t really know who I am do you, sweetheart?

One My mom says you’re the woman who’s going to beat Robert Moses.

Three I hope so.

One She says you’re going to kick his ass.

Two I never used those words.

One Not those words exactly. But your own words to say the same thing.

Three I will, Charley. I will kick his ass from here to Coney Island and back again.

Two She does. It’s the most amazing thing to be part of for a while.

Three You wish you could draw.

One No I don’t.

Three And paint. And recite poetry in a sexy accent. And sing.

One Now that isn’t true. I never had any interest in singing.

Three You so want to sing.

You hear Joni Mitchell sing ‘Song to a Seagull’. A song about a working bird that flies above the city and the ocean looking for a place to call home. And your heart fills completely and you want more than anything to sing like that.

One Well.

Three Or hold Pete Cabnet’s hand out in public so that everybody can see. Or kiss David Parker’s brown eyes. You want to do so well at school.

Two Really?

One I’m trying, Mom.

Two Well, you need to try harder.

One That’s not fair.

Two Fair has nothing to do with it. You could really do something with your life.

One Jesus, Mom.

Two What?

Three But no matter how much you want to do well you just can’t. And after a while you decide to try not wanting so much. The thing you will remember most about those years, and actually remember in the last moments, is the time you spend on the way to High School with your father. You remember the stories you make up together about the people from your neighborhood that you pass every morning.

One She’s a spy. A brilliant spy. She works for the Russians.

Three And she keeps her husband in a locked closet in the basement...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Contents
• Morning Sun
• Three actors
• Scene One
• Scene Two
• Scene Three
• Scene Four
• Scene Five
• Scene Six
• Scene Seven
• Scene Eight
• Scene Nine
• Scene Ten
• Scene Eleven
• eCopyright