{"id":16142,"date":"2019-12-24T11:09:32","date_gmt":"2019-12-24T16:09:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/workersvoiceus.org\/2019\/12\/24\/waiting-for-santy-a-christmas-playlet\/"},"modified":"2019-12-24T11:09:32","modified_gmt":"2019-12-24T16:09:32","slug":"waiting-for-santy-a-christmas-playlet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/workersvoiceus.org\/es\/2019\/12\/24\/waiting-for-santy-a-christmas-playlet\/","title":{"rendered":"WAITING FOR SANTY: A CHRISTMAS PLAYLET"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Merry-Old-Santa-Claus-Thomas-Nast\"(With a Bow to\u00a0Mr. Clifford Odets)<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

From The New Yorker, Dec. 26, 1936<\/em><\/p>\n

Scene: The sweatshop of S. Claus, a manufacturer of children\u2019s toys, on North Pole Street.\u00a0 Time: The\u00a0night before Christmas.<\/span><\/p>\n

At rise, seven gnomes, Rankin, Panken, Rivkin, Riskin, Ruskin, Briskin, and Praskin, are discovered working furiously to fill orders piling up at stage right.\u00a0 The whir of lathes, the hum of motors, and the hiss of drying lacquer are so deafening that at times the dialogue cannot he heard, which is very vexing if you vex easily. \u00a0(Note: The parts of Rankin, Panken, Rivkin, Riskin, Ruskin, Briskin, and Praskin are interchangeable, and may be secured directly from your dealer or the factory. )<\/span><\/p>\n

Riskin (filing a Meccano girder, bitterly)\u2014 A parasite, a leech, a bloodsucker\u2014 altogether a five-star nogoodnick!\u00a0 Starvation wages we get so he can ride around in a red\u00a0team with reindeers!<\/span><\/p>\n

Ruskin (jeering) \u2014Hey, Karl Marx, whyn\u2019tcha hire a hall?<\/span><\/p>\n

Riskin (sneering)\u2014 Scab!\u00a0 Stool pigeon!\u00a0 Company spy! \u00a0(They tangle and rain blows on each other.\u00a0 While waiting for these to dry, each returns to his respective task.)<\/span><\/p>\n

Briskin (sadly, to Panken)\u2014 All day long I\u2019m painting \u201cSnow Queen\u201d on these Flexible Flyers and my little\u00a0Irving lays in a cold tenement with the gout.<\/span><\/p>\n

Panken\u2014 You said before it was the mumps.<\/span><\/p>\n

Briskin (with a fatalistic shrug)\u2014 The mumps\u2014 the gout\u2014 go argue with City Hall.<\/span><\/p>\n

Panken (kindly, passing him a bowl)\u2014 Here, take a piece of fruit.<\/span><\/p>\n

Briskin (chewing) \u2014It ain\u2019t bad, for wax fruit.<\/span><\/p>\n

Panken (with pride)\u2014 I painted it myself.<\/span><\/p>\n

Briskin (rejecting the fruit)\u2014 Ptoo!\u00a0 Slave psychology!<\/span><\/p>\n

Rivkin (suddenly, half to himself, half to the Party) \u2014 I got a belly full of stars, baby.\u00a0 You make me feel like I swallowed a Roman candle.<\/span><\/p>\n

Praskin (curiously)\u2014 What\u2019s wrong with the kid?<\/span><\/p>\n

Riskin\u2014 What\u2019s wrong with all of us?\u00a0 The system!\u00a0 Two years he and Claus\u2019s daughter\u2019s been making googoo eyes behind the old man\u2019s back.<\/span><\/p>\n

Praskin\u2014 So what?<\/span><\/p>\n

Riskin (scornfully)\u2014 So what?\u00a0 Economic determinism!\u00a0 What do you think the kid\u2019s name is\u2014 J. Pierpont Rivkin?\u00a0 He ain\u2019t even got for a bottle Dr. Brown\u2019s Celery Tonic.\u00a0 I tell you, it\u2019s like gall in my mouth two young people shouldn\u2019t have a room where they could make great music.<\/span><\/p>\n

Rankin (warningly)\u2014 Shhh!\u00a0 Here she comes now! \u00a0(Stella Claus enters, carrying a portable phonograph.\u00a0 She and Rivkin embrace, place a record on the turntable, and begin a very slow waltz, unmindful that the phonograph is playing \u201cCohen on the Telephone.\u201d)<\/span><\/p>\n

Stella (dreamily)\u2014 Love me, sugar?<\/span><\/p>\n

Rivkin\u2014 I can\u2019t sleep, I can\u2019t eat, that\u2019s how I love you.\u00a0 You\u2019re a double malted with two scoops of whipped cream; you\u2019re the moon rising over Mosholu Parkway; you\u2019re a two weeks\u2019 vacation at Camp Nitgedaiget!\u00a0 I\u2019d pull down the Chrysler Building to make a bobbie pin for your hair!<\/span><\/p>\n

Stella\u2014 I\u2019ve got a stomach full of anguish.\u00a0 Oh, Rivvy, what\u2019ll we do?<\/span><\/p>\n

Panken (sympathetically)\u2014 Here, try a piece of fruit.<\/span><\/p>\n

Rivkin (fiercely)\u2014 Wax fruit\u2014 that\u2019s been my whole life! Imitations! Substitutes!\u00a0 Well, I\u2019m through!\u00a0 Stella, tonight I\u2019m telling your old man.\u00a0 He can\u2019t play mumblety-peg with two human beings! \u00a0(The tinkle of sleighbells is heard offstage, followed hy a voice shouting, \u201cWhoa, Dasher! Whoa, Dancer.\u201d \u00a0A moment later S. Claus enters in a gust oi mock snow.\u00a0 He is a pompous bourgeois of sixty-five who affects a white beard and a false air of benevolence.\u00a0 But tonight the ruddy color is missing from his cheeks, his step falters, and he moves heavily.\u00a0 The gnomes hastily replace the marzipan they have been filching.)<\/span><\/p>\n

Stella (anxiously)\u2014 Papa!\u00a0 What did the specialist say to you?<\/span><\/p>\n

Claus (brokenly)\u2014 The biggest professor in the country \u2026 the best cardiac man that money could buy \u2026\u00a0I tell you I was like a wild man.<\/span><\/p>\n

Stella\u2014 Pull yourself together, Sam!<\/span><\/p>\n

Claus\u2014 It\u2019s no use.\u00a0 Adhesions, diabetes, sleeping sickness, decalcomania\u2014 oh, my God!\u00a0 I got to cut out climbing in chimneys, he says\u2014 me, Sanford Claus, the biggest toy concern in the world!<\/span><\/p>\n

Stella (soothingly)\u2014 After all, it\u2019s only one man\u2019s opinion.<\/span><\/p>\n

Claus\u2014 No, no, he cooked my goose.\u00a0 I\u2019m like a broken uke after a Yosian picnic.\u00a0 Rivkin!<\/span><\/p>\n

Rivkin\u2014 Yes, Sam.<\/span><\/p>\n

Claus\u2014 My boy, I had my eye on you for a long time.\u00a0 You and Stella thought you were too foxy for an old man, didn\u2019t you?\u00a0 Well, let bygones be bygones.\u00a0 Stella, do you love this gnome?<\/span><\/p>\n

Stella (simply)\u2014 He\u2019s the whole stage show at the Music Hall, Papa; he\u2019s Toscanini conducting Beethoven\u2019s Fifth; he\u2019s-<\/span><\/p>\n

Claus (curtly)\u2014 Enough already.\u00a0 Take him.\u00a0 From now on he\u2019s a partner in the firm. \u00a0(As all exclaim, Claus holds up his hand for silence.) \u00a0And tonight he can take my route and make the deliveries.\u00a0 It\u2019s the least I could do for my own flesh and blood. \u00a0(As the happy couple kiss, Claus wipes away a suspicious moisture and turns to the other gnomes.) \u00a0Boys, do you know what day tomorrow is?<\/span><\/p>\n

Gnomes (crowding around expectantly)\u2014 Christmas!<\/span><\/p>\n

Claus\u2014 Correct.\u00a0 When you look in your envelopes tonight, you\u2019ll find a little present from me\u2014 a forty-percent pay cut.\u00a0 And the first one who opens his trap\u2014 gets this. \u00a0(As he holds up a tear-gas bomb and beams at them, the gnomes utter cries of joy, join hands, and dance around him shouting exultantly.\u00a0 All except Riskin and Briskin, that is, who exchange a quick glance and go underground. )<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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