Beauty of the Father

Nilo Cruz

• Publisher: Theatre Communications Group
• Year: 2008
• Print ISBN: 9781559363105
• eBook ISBN: 9781559366083
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: American Drama
• Index: Literature

“In Beauty of the Father one of the American theater’s most promising voices rings true and strong.”—Lynn Jacobson, Variety

“Cruz conducts arias with his pen. He is a writer of ideas, who fills the stage with a kind of lush dramatic literature . . . Beauty of the Father brings to mind the playwright Maria Irene Fornes. Like his artistic forebear, Cruz recognizes the magic in the everyday. And he has found an astonishing language with which to describe it.”—Hilton Als, The New Yorker

In his latest play, Nilo Cruz asks: What will we sacrifice in the name of love?

A young woman named Marina reunites with her father Emiliano in his artistic home, populated by his worldly wise female companion Paquita and the irresistible young Moroccan Karim, whom father and daughter both fall for. Set in the south of Spain, Beauty of the Father invokes the ghost of Federico García Lorca, both with its lyrical language and as a character in a white linen suit who appears to Emiliano as he paints. The play’s rhythms are infused with the spirit of the Andalusians—a people who sing their sorrows in the cante jondo—as Cruz once again creates poetry to the tune of unrequited love.

Nilo Cruz won the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for his play Anna in the Tropics. Other works include Two Sisters and a Piano, Lorca in a Green Dress, Night Train to Bolina, A Bicycle Country, and Dancing on Her Knees. He is one of this country’s most produced Cuban American writers.

ACT ONE

SCENE 1

The sound of bells. A long shaft of orange light bathes Federico García Lorca. He is dressed in a 1930s white linen suit.

LORCA: Five o’clock in the afternoon. The hour that bullfighters

get killed. (Writes a note) There was no death today at five o’clock in the afternoon. No, no death reported. Perhaps there was a wound. But there is always a wound in the world, open and exposed for everybody to see, and a little sand bucket of tears by the edge of the sea.

(A flash of white light. Emiliano stands with a pair of espadrilles in the palms of his hands. Flamenco music plays.)

EMILIANO:

This is a picture of a pair of espadrilles I bought for you.

In the South of Spain we use espadrilles in the summer.

If you come to Salobreña, you have a pair waiting for you.

Now that your mother is no longer alive, why don’t you come and live with me.

Love, your father, Emiliano.

(A flash of white light. Marina stands holding an old birdcage.)

MARINA:

This is a picture of me with a birdcage I bought at the market.

I’m going to buy myself a green parakeet.

This way the house will seem less lonely.

I can’t get used to living without Mamá.

I think I’m coming to see you.

(Marina exits. A flash of white light. Emiliano holds a bird’s nest.)

EMILIANO:

This is a picture of a nest I found in one of my walks to the woods.

I’ve been making sculptures of nests ever since you told me that you’re coming to see me.

I want to father you again after all these years.

Don’t buy the green parakeet. Just come to Spain!

(A flash of white light.)

LORCA: I would’ve been a hundred this year. Yes, me, Federico

García Lorca. But now I’m dead and gone, and there is no difference between a wisp of smoke and myself, so I constantly have to remind myself that I’m only a spirit and I have to look at life from a distance and not get too involved with humanity. But the living have a way of beckoning us back to life through prayer or a work of art, and sometimes what pulls us to the world exists independently of our will. And it’s only natural that we respond, because as spirits we have our little sad attachments to the world, and there’s always work to be done.

(The lights change. Paquita enters the stage running. She holds a cloth and is drying her hands.)

PAQUITA: She’s here, Emiliano. She called from the airport. She took an earlier flight from Madrid.

EMILIANO: How long ago did she call?

PAQUITA: Twenty minutes.

EMILIANO: How do I look? Why didn’t you call me?

PAQUITA: I did. But your phone didn’t pick up.

EMILIANO: Where are my car keys? I have to change my shirt.

PAQUITA: No. You stay here. I sent Karim to pick her up in your car.

EMILIANO: Will he recognize her? He doesn’t know her.

PAQUITA: Vale, hombre! Calmate! Calm down . . . He’s seen pictures of her.

EMILIANO: Damn it! I wanted to pick her up at the airport. (Takes out his cellular phone) What’s wrong with this shit!

PAQUITA: I’ll go tell Tomasa she can start preparing lunch.

(Paquita exits. Emiliano stays with Lorca.)

EMILIANO: It’s my daughter.

LORCA: Good!

EMILIANO: I have to pick up this place. I started painting and I made a mess . . . (In a sort of frenzy he starts organizing the mess on top of his work table)

LORCA: How long has it been since you saw her last?

EMILIANO: Almost ten years.

LORCA: Why that long?

EMILIANO: Her mother thought I was unfit as a father.

LORCA: And what on earth does that mean?

EMILIANO: I think you understand.

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LORCA: Bah, that’s like saying that a woman in order to be a mother has to knit, milk cows and know how to cut a sausage.

EMILIANO: I have to change my shirt.

LORCA: Then change your shirt, hombre, and wash your face. You’ve been out in the fields gathering your nests. You must smell like a horse.

EMILIANO (Running offstage to get a clean shirt): Yes, I want to look good. I don’t want her to get the wrong impression of her father. (Reenters wearing a clean shirt) We really don’t know each other that well. I left home when she was a little girl. Does this shirt look better?

LORCA: Much better. Oh, I wish I had a daughter!

(Emiliano sees a mess under the table and starts arranging his paint tubes.)

EMILIANO: I have to pick up these paints. And if you don’t mind, Federico, I don’t think you should be around when she gets here.

LORCA: Ashamed to introduce me?

EMILIANO: No. But what would she think when she sees that I converse with a dead man?

LORCA: Thank you, my dear. Perhaps I should leave now.

EMILIANO: No, I didn’t mean . . . Not just a dead man, my dear friend Federico García Lorca—Did you have anything to do with my daughter coming?

LORCA: Do you think I can perform miracles?

EMILIANO: I don’t know. You’re the first dead man I’ve met—

LORCA: Departed, Emiliano. Perished. There are words that can alleviate reality.

(Paquita enters running.)

PAQUITA: The car just pulled in. They’re taking the bags out of the trunk. Oh, she’s even more beautiful than the photos. And she speaks Spanish, too!

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EMILIANO: How do I look?

PAQUITA: You look fine! You look fine! Let’s go! Let’s go! (Starts to go, then stops) Oh wait! So what are we going to tell your daughter when she asks about me?

EMILIANO (Playfully): We’ll tell her that you had a lobotomy and forgot who you are!

PAQUITA: You fool! (Hits him playfully)

EMILIANO: Let’s go! Let’s go!

(Paquita and Emiliano start to exit. Emiliano signals Lorca to leave.)

LORCA: A whole new life is starting for you, Emiliano. A new

beginning . . . Now you’ll recover your place in the world and you’ll cease to be an exiled father. Just remember that your past with your daughter never made it to the future, so you might encounter that unforeseen tear.

(Lorca exits. We hear laughter outside. Marina, Emiliano, Paquita and Karim enter the stage.)

MARINA: You should’ve seen what happened, Papá. Should I tell him? (Breaks into laughter)

EMILIANO: Don’t tell me he was late to the station.

KARIM: She makes me laugh.

MARINA: I won’t tell you if you’re going to get upset with him.

EMILIANO: No. I don’t think anything can make me upset today. (Changes tone) So what did you do, Karim?

KARIM (Looks at Marina and breaks into laughter): Your daughter makes me laugh.

MARINA: We got...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• BOOKS BY NILO CRUZ AVAILABLE FROM TCG
• Dedication
• PRODUCTION HISTORY
• CHARACTERS
• ACT ONE
• ACT TWO
• Copyright Page