The Potting Shed by Kate Herbert 1998 excerpt & details

THE POTTING SHED BY KATE HERBERT 1998

 

STORY

An old man lives with a disabled BOY in a potting shed on a large estate. He is evidently a GARDENER and the BOY his assistant. They collect holy relics which the BOY: (who may be called Cain, Abel, Isaac etc) digs up in the grounds daily. They keep them labelled on a shelf in the shed. The BOY is building a wooden thing which may be The Ark, the Crucifix or a Coffin.

Carlotta appears to be the Lady of the Manor, their Mistress although their relationship is not clear. The GARDENER awaits the arrival of his long-lost sister for whom he has been carving wooden dolls for decades since he last saw her.

LOCATION

A gardener's shed surrounded by elaborate gardens visible through small windows. Inside is a shelf with relics on it, two chairs, a table, pot-plants and other gardening paraphernalia.   Wood, hammer and other carpentry tools. A shelf with large Rosary beads, dried bouquets hanging, wood carved dolls, a jar saying 'Lourdes" and a lot of tagged relics and an enormous Book.

CHARACTERS

GARDENER             

50-60ish. Hermit-like. An isolate and a religious fanatic who believes in Relics. Cares for BOY: as his own. Despises Carlotta for no reason apart from her class and her power over them it seems. Their mutual past is revealed later. He is suspicious misogynistic and terrified of seduction. Lives in fantasy about his sister. Carves dolls for her return. Resents his past, blames his parents.

BOY

20-30 years. Intellectually disabled. Can speak but is incomprehensible to all but the GARDENER. He digs every day for Relics, tags and labels them carefully. Adores the gardener, is afraid of CARLOTTA, must live a life of repetition in order to maintain some balance.

CARLOTTA

50ish. A classic beauty who dresses the part in a slightly grotesque version of, say, Grace Kelly. She is a Francophile, obsessed with her appearance having beauty treatments daily. She wields power over the two and hints at past sexual relationship between her and the GARDENER. She seems to own the estate and profits from the Relics, using the two men as servants. Her manipulation is a ploy to stay close to the GARDENER: who is her long-term love.

The Potting Shed premiered in June 1998 at La Mama Theatre

Writer: Kate Herbert

Director: Nancy Black

Cast: Jim Daly, Michael Burkett, Anna McCrossin-Owen

Designer: Simon Barley

Lighting: Mikkel Mynster

Stage Management: Lisa Parris

Flyer Design: Diana Walker

 

WRITER'S NOTE

What can I say? This a play which materialised overnight after I saw an old geezer in a French documentary on SBS who had decided to live in his garden shed until he died. It emerged accompanied by various obsessions of my own: literature, gardens, religious iconography, disfunctional relationships, secrets, grief and loss, - and some things I'd rather not claim ownership of at all and for which I refuse be held responsible. They must have been channelled from the old hermit himself. Vive La France!

Kate Herbert  May 1998

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THE POTTING SHED by KATE HERBERT

Excerpt from Scene One.

SCENE ONE

The background music is a religious score eg Mass by Mozart or Handel or Bach. It serves to set the religious tone but to satirically underscore the mock portentousness of the relics.

 

The BOY is sawing, hammering, building a wooden thing which could be a small boat.

GARDENER is moving furniture and gardening gear.

Both are wearing workman's overalls.

GARDENER arranges things on shelf: carved dolls, a huge book and a collection of tagged objects. An outsize Rosary hangs from shelf with bunches of dried bouquets.

 Finally GARDENER carefully unwraps an unfinished wooden doll's head from swathes of cloth and watches BOY work.

A window looks onto a lavish garden and statues.

When the BOY speaks he is barely comprehensible because of his disability. We know from the others' responses what he has said.

GARDENER may speak the following as he moves around the shed.

 

GARDENER:  "And the Lord said, 'Build for me a floating Ark that ye may carry all the animals of my kingdom two by two when the cleansing waters do rise and carry away the dross of the world: the sinners, the tormentors, the blasphemers, the - short people. 'Two by two.' I like that. (sings)'The animals marched in two by two. Hoorah! Hoorah!' Very Colonial. (mock Brit) Very British Raj, d'ya know? Funny that Noah should be a Brit. You'd think he'd be a -  well, God moves in mysterious ways.

 

BOY: Mysteries.

 

GARDENER: Later. Mysteries come later, Abel. Are those nails in straight?

 

BOY: Straight.

 

GARDENER stands amongst the bits of wood, holding two pieces up to form sides of a little boat.

 

GARDENER: A little boat to float off to a better world.

 

BOY: Can I come too?

 

GARDENER: You? Come with us? I'll consult with my dear sister Alice when she arrives. Might not be big enough, what with all our two-by-twos. (looks at pieces of wood) Four-by-twos actually, if we're being pedantic.

 

BOY stops his work and stares at the GARDENER a moment then his face begins to crack into tears in slow motion. GARDENER softens as he sees the BOY distressed.

 

GARDENER: Now, now, Cain my boy. No need for that sort of thing. You know what happens when you start that kind of nonsense, don't you?

 

GARDENER stands up in the boat/coffin as if to make a speech. He is being comical as if to distract a child.

 

GARDENER: The Boy stood on the Burning Bush, With a string of sausages round his moosh.

 

BOY laughs. GARDENER puts his hands on BOY warmly, lovingly.

 

GARDENER: What did you dig up today?

 

BOY scrabbles to find something in his pocket, his previous distress forgotten momentarily. He pulls out a rag wrapped around something, opens it carefully then holds out the opened parcel for GARDENER to see.

 

GARDENER: Ah! Nice digging. A genuine relic. Lottie will be pleased. Not as if she deserves it. Not as if she can own holy relics. (studying rock) Now this definitely is a chip off the old Rock from His tomb. Good slab too. Sandstone. Makes sense. Sea of Gallilee. Lots o' sand. No mystery there.

 

BOY: Mystery. (excited)

 

GARDENER: Later. Mysteries later. Put the Holy Rock with the others.

 

BOY touches head, heart, belly as if blessing himself. Then he touches his crotch and the GARDENER: slaps his hand away.

 

BOY: Ow!

 

GARDENER: Stop it or you'll go mad.

 

It is obviously a repeated scenario: the blessing, slapping then threat. BOY carefully carries the stone fragment to shelf where he lays it with the others which are labelled with string and a cardboard tag. He turns and curtsies to GARDENER: who in turn bows to him. Another obvious routine/ritual.

BOY grabs a pile of objects and takes them to GARDENER who puts down carving and sits to receive them.

 

GARDENER: All right. Settle down Aquinas. (holds stick) his we - I - found hidden amongst the rose tree stakes right here in the Potting Shed just before you were born. Moses parted the Red Sea with it.

 

GARDENER waves stick as if divining.

 

BOY: Ow!

 

GARDENER: (holds stone) This fragment of the Rosetta Stone   was buried under our old Gatehouse.

 

GARDENER: (holds old cup) The Holy Grail. Intact.

 

GARDENER: (holds paper) St Paul's letter to the Rastafarians.

 

BOY: Hair.

 

GARDENER: Yes, the ones with the hair.

 

BOY picks up a wad of tatty hair.

 

BOY: Hair.

 

GARDENER: Oh. Magdalen's hair.

 

BOY: Dyed.

 

GARDENER: Yes she died a long time ago.

 

BOY: Hair dyed.

 

GARDENER: (outraged) She would never dye her hair. She was a saint not a whore... (considers) Well - perhaps before the washing of the feet episode..... But with something natural - henna - not like a whore – (realises irony) Well...

 

BOY looks bemused. GARDENER goes to window.

 

GARDENER: That Carlotta wants a new plan for the Spring. (as Carlotta) The people expect a glorious show in Spring.

 

BOY:  Glorious!

 

GARDENER: Later. She wants it all drawn on a plan, but I have it all in my head. Beds of Iceberg Roses           with a sea of gold and mauve Fresias nestled at their feet. (builds to near ecstasy) Masses of Petunias around rocky knolls with banks of snow-white Allysum shot with Lightening Blue Lobelia flooding over paths. Tilting heads of Lavender swaying in the breeze and thickening the air with scent, so that the visitors have to gulp breaths to recover their balance. And we'll have enormous Grecian pots spilling Impatience of every hue. (sudden end to ecstasy. He considers) Why can't we give people real names like that? Impatience. We call them 'Faith' or 'Hope'. Why not 'Smugness' or 'Inferiority'? "Good morning Surly. How's little Irascible today?"

 

BOY: Garden.

 

GARDENER: Yes. The garden. We'll have a jungle of exotics for the Conservatory: orchids from all over the globe. And the hedges we'll clip into a Crucifix to remind her of her sins. And the other we'll make into the Ascension. Tricky. I'd need to clip it off the ground for that. Could be a problem with the roots.

 

BOY points to shelf.

 

BOY: Book.

 

GARDENER:Yes. It'll be in the Book. Everything's in the Book.That woman! She wants a lake! With fish! Sick! Fish belong in the sea where they can feed the multitude and watch Him walk on water with their little mouths gaping. Constantly surprised.

GARDENER makes fish mouth. BOY copies him.

Wouldn't you be? "Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the trout. And the carp saw that it was good." John: Chapter and verse.

 

BOY: Trout Ark?

 

GARDENER: Yes, we need Trout.

 

BOY: Two by two?

 

GARDENER: Mmm. Two. Rainbow Trout.

 

BOY begins hammering excitedly.

 

BOY: Where?

 

GARDENER: Oh, from Vic Market I expect. Gotta see a man about a trout.

 

BOY: Lottie you two-by-two?

 

GARDENER: Lottie is not my two-by-two. She's a harlot. (sudden anger) Carlotta is a harlot. We are waiting for my sweet and chaste sister to arrive and she shall be my two-by-two.

 

BOY looks panicky at Gardener's anger=, puts down hammer and tries to appease him.

 

BOY: Tea?

 

GARDENER: If Lottie thinks she's coming with me, she's got another thing coming....

 

BOY: Tea?

 

GARDENER: "So I would have had him leave,So I would have had her stand and grieve."

 

BOY: Tea now? (agitated now)

 

GARDENER: "So he would have left.." (hearing finally) Tea? What's the time? Yes. Tea. We'll practise for      Alice's welcome party.

 

BOY:  Alice.

 

GARDENER: (quoting) "Weave, weave the sunlight in your hair /Clasp your flowers to you with a pained surprise-" (suddenly organised) So, prepare the table first.

 

The BOY tips scraps off the table onto the floor excitedly.

 

 GARDENER: Good.

 

GARDENER: Time?

 

BOY: Four-fifteen.

 

GARDENER: Four-fifteen. Ready!

 

BOY crouches in starting position.

 

GARDENER: Set!

 

BOY prepares to run.

 

GARDENER: Go!

 

The BOY follows directions, acting out the Tea Ritual without actually making any tea. It is a practise run. He watches the Gardener and never really mimes the objects, just their position in the room and the time it takes to enact each action.

 

 GARDENER:  Kettle on.

 

The BOY places a kettle and whistles as if it is boiling.

 

GARDENER: Warm the pot.

 

BOY stands at table with hands apart for pot making "ooh it's hot" noises.

 

GARDENER: One for each person one for the pot.

 

BOY counts out four fingers then smiles.

                 

GARDENER: Teacups, saucers, teaspoons, sugar basin, milk jug, scones, plates, knives, jam spoon, jam, cream.

 

BOY points at places on table at each item on list.

 

GARDENER: We've forgotten something.

 

BOY waves excitedly and tucks something under his chin.

 

GARDENER: Serviettes. Time?

 

Both check time. GARDENER on fob-watch, BOY on wall clock.

 

GARDENER: One minute forty-five seconds.

 

BOY:  One minute forty-five seconds.

 

BOY curtseys. GARDENER: bows.

 

GARDENER: Bit slow. Need to check on the serviettes.

 

BOY stands at window hopping from foot to foot.

 

BOY: Alice coming now?

 

GARDENER: Soon. Not now.

 

BOY: Today?

 

GARDENER: Not today. I don't think Alice will get here today. She has a long way to travel -from the farm - carrying all those pontiac potatoes in a hessian sack. And a few butternuts too I expect. She's thoughtful like that. Knows I like a good butternut. It's a long journey, particularly at the end of winter.

(TS Eliot quote)

"A cold coming we had of it. /Just the worst time of the year for a journey. And such a long journey."

 

BOY: Flowers.

 

BOY holds out a bunch of scruffy, sad flowers.

 

GARDENER: "And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory...." Love that word. (savouring) "Refractory."

 

BOY: Flowers.

 

GARDENER: Like 'recalcitrant', only better. 'Rambunctious camels'. 'Tetchy'. No. No class. 'Lugubrious camels'.

 

BOY:  Flowers.

 

GARDENER: Hmm? Ah yes. Put those with the others. My Alice will have quite a collection when she arrives, won't she? Quite a collation of floral miscellany. (proudly) Ha! Nearly as good as 'refractory'.

 

BOY stares blankly at him for a long moment then obediently hangs the bunch up with the other bunches. He stands watching the GARDENER: then looking at the window in anticipation.

 

GARDENER: Not today Impatience.

 

There is a knock on the door. The BOY: almost leaps out of his skin as he runs to hide behind the wood, realises he is visible, hides under the shelf which is too high to hide him, then stands still in the centre of the room like a deer in the headlights.

 

GARDENER: (startled) It's Alice. She's here.

 

BOY: Alice. She here.

 

GARDENER: The doll's not ready.

 

GARDENER stands staring at the door, wipes his hands on his trousers, pushes his hair out of his eyes, starts towards the door then stops, turns to pick up the flowers, hands them to BOY: and pushes him to the doorway.

 

GARDENER: "Weave, weave the sunlight in your hair -/ Clasp your flowers to you with a pained surprise." Are we ready? Hair, shirt, trousers....

 

BOY touches head, heart, belly, crotch and the GARDENER slaps his hand away.

 

BOY: Ow!

 

GARDENER: Not now!

 

GARDENER opens the door but stands obscured by it.

CARLOTTA is standing smiling demurely as the door opens. She wears a Chanel suit.

CARLOTTA speaks genuinely and politely to both of them in spite of GARDENER’S behaviour. She remains charming and alluring until quite late in the scene.

 CARLOTTA sees BOY.

 

CARLOTTA: (to Boy) Hello Elijah.

 

 CARLOTTA doesn’t look at GARDENER. She walks into shed and looks around almost as if taking inventory

GARDENER joy turns to surprise then disdain.

 

GARDENER: Isaiah.

 

CARLOTTA: (to Boy) How was Passover?

 

GARDENER: Not Elijah.

 

CARLOTTA stands close, staring into the Boy’s face. He is frozen to the spot.

 

CARLOTTA: (To Boy) Have a nice din-dins? Did they leave you a chair at table? And a nice bit of gefillte fish? Find anything for me today? 

 

 BOY holds out flowers coyly to her.

 

CARLOTTA: (To Boy) For moi? Again? So sweet. You shouldn’t have.

 

CARLOTTA takes flowers from him politely but from a safe arm's length distance and curtsies to him. BOY: curtsies in response almost automatically then beams at her. He steps closer to her. She backs off subtly, still smiling politely but obviously unwilling to be close to him.

 

CARLOTTA:  Much prettier than these don't you think?

 

She takes flowers. She pulls out notebook, walks to shelf ticking off ‘relics’ in her book. 

 

GARDENER: They are relics.

 

CARLOTTA: Darlings, I made a mint on that branch of the Burning Bush. The Museum loved it. Can you get me a root? Excuse my Francais. They might be able to grow it. Or a piece of the Sacrificial Lamb. They could clone it and call it Dolly. Is this sweet thing for me?

 

She reaches for the doll. He snatches it away.

 

CARLOTTA: Well I must say you are getting better at it. The face. I’m jealous. This is for little sister Alice, isn’t it? You thought it was her at the door again, didn’t you? ( sincerely) Sweet chaste little Alice.  It’s four-thirty. It’s always me at four-thirty. Or perhaps four thirty-five but that’s neither here nor there. You are loyal. Ten, twenty, thirty, a hundred years you have waited and still, every day, at four-thirty, you open the door and - Quelle astonishment! C'est moi! Carlotta.

 

BOY steps close to her.

 

END EXCERPT __________________________________