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Texas Fox Trot

Characters

Leona:
A very old, yet agile woman, still beautiful, and blessed with a magnificent mane of long white hair
Aldous:
A very old man, courtly and kind, a gentleman, who is sweet and trusting and innocent as a child. He is devoted to Leona, as is she to him

Setting

A single set play: a cut-away of a two-storied (or two-tiered) cottage. Upstairs is Aldous' bedroom and downstairs is an old, simple country kitchen—a stove, a sink, an icebox, a table, a chair. But amidst the naturalism is a mild intrusion of the surreal: Aldous' "world" upstairs is populated with some larger-than-life artifacts—a three-dimensional model of the moon, an oversized apothecary jar filled with iridescent blue butterfly wings, and a large colorful stuffed parrot. The shadow boxes and sensibilities of Joseph Cornell are the inspiration for the set.

Production history

  • Produced, Dark Horse Theater/Nashville Shakespeare Festival, 1992

The Story

The action occurs in three acts and follows the events of Leona and Aldous' day from the time they awaken. They live together and share a significant portion of the day, primarily as Leona tries to get Aldous dressed and prepared for an impending visit by a journalist, Mrs. Settlemeyer. Yet, they live in different worlds: Aldous, his memory failing severely, spends his days making "discoveries" in his room (over and over he "discovers" the moon, the butterflies, the parrot), whereas Leona busies herself making lady fingers, performing her toilet, and dressing—all in anticipation of the visit by Mrs. Settlemeyer. By the end of the play the audience has learned a number of things about them: Who they are (a famous old ballroom dance team), what their days are like (every day is a preparation for another performance of their most famous number, Texas Fox Trot), their happiness and their loneliness (theirs is a mildly psychotic, mildly surreal existence), and their indomitable spirit as they celebrate the daily phenomenon of life.

Download full play here

The Dialogue

Leona:
[Calling in to him] You started as a tap dancer, Aldous . Do you remember that? At the age of three in a tuxedo that your mother had made and a little cane and top hat...you were a very small child, Aldous, you were a very small child...but with a mature face... do you remember the picture? Do you remember the photograph of you at age three in the tuxedo that your mother had made? Do you remember the photographs...do you remember the photographs that you burned? [Pause] And your sister was a tap dancer...you had a sister named Lucy...and you and Lucy became a team and then you started doing ballroom dancing and exhibitions...she was very small too. Do you remember doing exhibitions with your sister Lucy? [Beat] Do you remember being in love with Marjorie Wendle? Do you remember being in love with goddamned Marjorie Wendle and then you met me and forgot about her, do you remember that? We were seventeen, Aldous. Do you remember when we were seventeen? Do you remember when we were seventeen and we started dancing together at Murray Lytton's place and we used to have friends? [Beat] Do you remember when we used to have friends...Murray and the Liebling Sisters...do you remember Patty Liebling?...and Petey Marsden and Betty Bridges and the Billington Brothers...do you remember the Billington Brothers? [Pause] There used to be an audience, Aldous. Do you remember the audience...the blackness and the shining foreheads and eyes ...and the nerves...you were always nervous before we went on, always...do remember how nervous you got before we went on?
Aldous:
[Still dressing] Were we performers, my love?
Leona:
We were dancers, Aldous, dancers, ballroom dancers. Don't you remember dancing at Murray Lytton's club and then for the Schuberts? We had an act, Aldous, and we danced at clubs and on the vaudeville circuit and for exhibitions, and Bradford Branting called us the Nijinaky-and-Pavlova of the ballroom stage...do you remember when we got that review?
Aldous:
You've been a wonderful wife, my love.
Leona:
I am not your wife.
Aldous:
You've been a marvelous wife.
Leona:
We are not married.
Aldous:
Wouldn't you like to have children, my love?
Leona:
Aldous, why did you burn the photographs? If you could see the photographs you'd remember that we were dancers...I'd kept everything, everything...the clippings, the announcements, the reviews and all of the photographs, the productions shots and those wonderful studio portraits that Alston Mantor took in the twenties...I had dozens of albums... everything. And then you burned them, you burned them. I will never understand why.
Aldous:
Did we have photographs, my love?
Leona:
You burned them!