Pounding Nails in the Floor with My Forehead

Eric Bogosian

• Publisher: Theatre Communications Group
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9781559360968
• eBook ISBN: 9781559367424
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: American Drama
• Index: Literature

In his brashest solo show, performer and playwright Eric Bogosian once again aims his searing social commentary at the contemporary urban and suburban scene. "Never miss Bogosian, because the sharp-tongued, sharp-shooting Bogosian never misses."--Clive Barnes, New York Post

POUNDING NAILS

IN THE FLOOR WITH MY FOREHEAD

Pounding Nails in the Floor with my Forehead opened February 3, 1994 at the Minetta Lane Theatre, New York. Directed by Jo Bonney. Produced by Frederick Zollo, Nick Paleologus, Ron Kastner and Randy Finch.

AMERICA

A silhouette against the back wall of the theater reveals a man speaking into a microphone. We hear a basso profundo radio voice a la Rush Limbaugh.

I was shaving this morning. Shaving with a disposable razor and suddenly I thought of my Dad I wondered, “What would I be doing right now, if it were forty years ago? If it wasn’t 1994, but 1954 and I’m my own Dad?” And I imagined myself going downstairs, and there’s my wife and she’s not racing to meet the car pool no, she’s making me breakfast. She’s got a gingham apron on, she’s making me bacon and eggs ... which I eat with tremendous pleasure because I’ve never even heard of cholesterol before.

And here are my children sitting at my 1954 breakfast table and they’re well-behaved and well-dressed. In fact, my son is wearing a necktie. I’m wearing a necktie. I pick up the morning newspaper—all the news is good: we’ve won the war in Korea, they’ve found a cure for polio, employment’s up, housing’s up, everybody’s happy.

I own my own home, I own my own car (which I wash every single Saturday), I love my wife, I like baseball, I believe in the President, and I pray to God in a place called church. No drugs. No drugs anywhere. Only people doing drugs in 1954 are William Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg!

No one’s complaining. We’re not hearing about women’s rights and homosexual rights and minorities’ rights and immigrants’ rights. No victims. No sexual harassment. No worries about the environment. The environment is just fine, thank you.

No therapists. No twelve-step groups. No marches on Washington. No homeless people. No AIDS. Just good old-fashioned values like honesty and hard work and bravery and fidelity. And that’s it. It’s America forty years ago. Everybody’s working. Everybody’s straight. Everybody’s happy.

And I thought to myself, what a wonderful world that must have been, a world without problems. I would love to be there right now. And then I remembered a terrible nightmare I’d had last night.

Now lemme tell you about this nightmare: It’s the middle of the night, I’m in bed, of course, who shows up in my bedroom but Bill Clinton. As I said, it’s a nightmare. He takes my hand and he says, “Come with me.” And we float out the window and into the night air, and down to the street and we drop into this open manhole.

And we’re walking around in the sewers, Bill and I. I’m thinking, I never trusted this guy, where’s he taking me?

We walk and we walk and we come to this big cave and in this cave there are all these people lying around on mattresses, smoking things: pot, crack, hashish, opium. Whatever these people smoke.

And through the haze, I see all these familiar faces! Oh, there’s Whoopi Goldberg reading the Communist Manifesto. And there’s Ralph Nader bitching about something. And Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins leading a peace rally. And Roseanne Arnold having sex with Madonna. And Ice T and Ice Cube and Vanilla Ice and all the other pieces of ice and all the other troublemakers and commies and lefties and people with green hair and tattoos and goatees and rings through their noses and rings through their nipples and rings through their penises.

And some of them are marching around protesting something ... there’s another bunch of them counting their food stamps and welfare checks. Right in front of me a bunch of idiots are watching Beavis and Butt-head on MTV.

And I’m horrified. And I turned to Bill and I said, “Bill, where are we? I’m frightened.” And he said, “Don’t you know?” And I said, “No. Hell?” And he laughed and he said, “No, of course not! This isn’t Hell. Look around you. Don’t you recognize the place? This is America, 1994! Better get used to it.”

Let’s go to a commercial.

MOLECULES

Man emerges from darkness, coughing, scratching his balls, picking his butt and ranting.

Good afternoon ladies and gentlemens, homeboys and homeless, welcome to the soul train. We be making all local stops including fear, insanity, incarceration and death. Cigar, cigarette smoking is not permitted on my train, but if you got your stems, BEAM ME UP SCOTTY! HAHHHHHHH!

I’m coming to Brooklyn, I’m coming to Queens, I’m coming to Manhattan!

(Faces the audience)

I am your worst nightmare! I got shit in my pants, I got fleas in my beard, I got so much syf-liss and gonorrhea pouring outta my penis, you can turn it on and off like a faucet.

(Arms flailing)

I am an exploding SUPERNOVA of negative energy. I am a cosmic comet moving through space, spewing my essence wherever I goes!

Hey sister. How you doing today? How you doing? This is my train, you know this is my subway train? It is! I’m the captain of this train. Where you going? You going to work? That’s good. Nothing wrong with work, baby, get your ass on to work.... See that strap you hanging from, baby? I sneezed all over that strap jus’ this morning. I did. You too, have a nice day.

Yo, homeboy! How you doing today? Watch out for that door you leaning against. Watch out! I threw up all over that door jus’ last week. I did. Chicken pot pie. Was good. You dig around in those cracks and the crevices, you welcome to all the peas and carrots you can find.

See this seat here? This is my seat. This is my favorite seat in the whole train. Right in the middle so I can see both ends. I’s sitting in this seat jus’ yesterday. Jus’ yesterday. Got all nice and comferble. I got so nice and comferble, I wet my pants.

That pee went running down through my curly hairs, down through my crusty underwears, made a little puddle. Made kind of a soup out of myself. Hah! Got all the ingredients right there, stuck on me. Smear of dog food left over from breakfast. Some rat blood from some rat I stomped. Some Chinaman’s snot, they don’t give you no respect, you’re lying on the ground, (Mimes blowing nose) hit you when you’re trying to get some rest. All that stuff boils together, make a soup.

I sat in that soup for awhile then it got all cold. Then I wasn’t comferble no more.

So I got up, went down the other end of the train. It’s alright, it’s alright.

(Indicates seat)

It dries. It dries. All’s left on the seat were some molecules. Can’t even see ’em.

Know you can’t see ’em, ’cause a guy came on the train, Frank, Frank the businessman in his camel’s hair coat and his briefcase, came on the train, sat right down in those molecules, didn’t bother him in the least.

He was rushing home, had to rush home ’cause he’s got to see the evening news, find out what’s going on in the world. He can’t see with his own eyes, he’s gotta see it on the TV set.

Go home to his condominium. Walked in the door, threw his camel’s hair coat on the couch and said, “HONEY, I’M HOME!” That’s what they say those suburbs people, gots to let everyone know where they are at. “Honey, I’m home.” “Honey, I’m going out for five minutes.” “Honey, I’m back!” Who gives a shit where he is?

Frank sat down, ate his dinner. Yum!

And then Frank stood up and said, “Honey! That was delicious! That was the best roast duck I had all week. Hey, honey! Guess what I did at work today? I fired a hundred and fifty motherfuckers! My dick is ten feet long, I’m feeling sexy, let’s fuck!”

And then he grabbed his wife, who has a beautiful body ’cause she’s on the Stairmaster three hours a day and drug her into the living room and threw her right on the couch. And they proceeded to have some really really good sex. That’s ’cause they got this video called “How to Have Really Really Good Sex.” And they did it every which way, up and down all around. The one-legged position. Doggie style. Handstands.

And they be bouncing up and down on that couch. And the camel’s hair coat be bouncing up and down on that couch. And all my molecules they be bouncing up and down, right along with ’em.

And then Frank decided to do something he hadn’t done in a long time. He took his wife’s legs and he spread ’em like this and he took the tip of his tongue, he’s gonna put that tongue right on his wife’s vagino. Don’t ask me why.

But just as the tip of his tongue was going to touch those wet curly hairs, just as it was going to touch, shwoop, one a my molecules went right down his throat!

He didn’t feel it. Didn’t feel a thing. But he will ’Cause my shit’s strong. And those molecules gonna bubble and boil, gonna mutate and grow down there deep inside of Frank. Gonna make a change in Frank. Gonna change his lifestyle.

Those molecules, they gonna start spinning inside Frank’s brain. He’s gonna start doing shit he never done before. He’s gonna get himself some bulletproof underwear. He’s gonna start sterilizing his water. Get his wife checked for HIV, his kids checked for HIV, his Granma checked for HIV. He’s gonna start looking over his shoulder when he walks down the street.

He’s gonna put radar on his roof. He’s gonna put extra alarms on his car, extra locks on his doors.

He’s not gonna let his kids out ...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Dedication
• INTRODUCTION
• ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
• POUNDING NAILS - IN THE FLOOR WITH MY FOREHEAD
• ORPHANS