The Drunkard

for jane

Acknowledgements

The Drunkard by Tom Murphy, after the melodrama by W.H. Smith and A Gentleman, is also indebted to Ten Nights in a Bar Room by William W. Pratt and Fifteen Years of a Drunkard’s Life by Douglas Jerrold; and for lines, freely used, from ‘Let The Toast Pass’ by R.B. Sheridan in Scene Two Act Two. Songs: the lullaby, ‘Child and Mother’ is by H.A.J. Campbell and Eugene Field; ‘O Kisses They are Plenty’ (anonymous); ‘Down Among the Dead Men’ is by Dyer; ‘Soft Music is Stealing’ is by F. Pax.

Additional music:

Additional, original music for the premiere of Tom Murphy's The Drunkard was composed and performed live by Ellen Cranitch and Hélène Montague. It included some set pieces – the wedding scene, the tavern scenes and the final ‘hymn’. Extensive underscoring was also used almost continuously – this was devised in response to the rhythm of language, and the actions and interactions of the characters.

Characters

Sir Arden Rencelaw

Edward Kilcullen

Phelim McGinty, a lawyer

Arabella

Mother

Agnes Earley

Tavern-Keeper

William Earley

Alanna, a child

Widdy Spindle

Bartender

Man

Villagers, Loafers, Floozies, Policemen

The play benefits from a musical accompaniment.

Prologue

The prologue is delivered by Sir Arden Rencelaw, dramatist and philanthropist. He is innocently himself.

Rencelaw: When steadfast man, with riches to enjoy, well-born and nobly to ambition’s cause intent, begins to slide into perdition’s way, what topples him? What insidious attraction tempts the tender heart from that straight and goodly narrow to the rude bent and vulgar broad? Why, when in safe harbour, his wont to drift the foul-hard foetid waters from the soft moorings of a lovely wife?

Apply to Intellect’s highest school, man’s overflowing treasury of light, philosophy, and draw a blank. And the Holy Alternative in His infinite wisdom guards His motives still. Our heavenward appeal is not for answer but to implore first aid.

Yet, I have some, and not a little knowledge of this turpi-tude, for I was once – though never wedded – one such.