The Rats & the Cockroach: Two Plays

By Robert Manns

The Rats is the story of Dr. Rago and Fujikawa. Rago uses a profession of nobility and admiration to questionable ends. The other, Fujikawa, a wino and derelict, supplies the ethic and humanity.

The Cockroach is a fusion of cultures in America, north and south. A light little comedy of high intent invaded by lowly interferences.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Dec 5, 2001
• ISBN: 9781469728452

Robert Manns

Robert Manns was born in Detroit; spent six years in New York, where he received his first productions; and later moved to Florida and eventually Atlanta. He wrote his first play when he was 19, his first poem when he was 21. He has taught dramaturgy at Emory University in Atlanta and, while director of Callanwolde Art Institure in that city, initiated the poetry readings still held today. Even before serving as field representative for the National Audubon Society, wildlife and the environment had solidly manifested themselves in his writing.

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THE RATS & THE COCKROACH

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Two Plays

Robert Manns

Member of Dramatists Guild

New York

Writers Club Press

San Jose New York Lincoln Shanghai

The Rats & The Cockroach

Two Plays

All Rights Reserved © 2001 by Robert Manns

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage retrieval system, without the permission in writing from the publisher.

Writers Club Press

an imprint of iUniverse, Inc.

For information address:

iUniverse, Inc.

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ISBN: 0-595-20450-3

ISBN: 978-1-4697-2845-2 (eBook)

Printed in the United States of America

Contents

THE RATS

CAST OF CHARACTERS

1   

2   

3   

4   

5    

6   

7    

8   

9 

10

11

12

13

THE COCKROACH

CAST OF CHARACTERS

The Rats was first produced by Skua Productions at Actors Express Theater in Atlanta, March 1996. Directed by Teresa Norman, the parts of Dr. Rago and Fujikawa were played by Jeffrey Watkins and Dikran Tulaine, respectively

Do not waste your time on social questions. What is the matter with the poor is poverty; what is the matter with the rich is uselessness.

—G. B. SHAW

THE REVOLUTIONISTS HANDBOOK

THE RATS 

A PLAY

BY

ROBERT MANNS

CAST OF CHARACTERS 

Dr. Rago

Fujikawa

George

Servio

Mince

Dim

Lea

Waiter

Man

Woman

Wade

Kamm

Mrs. Rago

1    

A roadway. A short time before dusk in the relaxing hours of a late sun. Summer. A fully bloomed wisteria tree casts shade, in the middle of which sits Fujikawa. He wipes, with the dirtiest of all possible handkerchiefs, sweat down from his hair, temples and face and neck. He is unclean, unkempt, unshaven. Doctor Rago, when he enters, will be clean, kempt and shaven, dressed in respectable summer suit. Slightly militant, employing mannerisms. He will stand, for the most part, in the sun.

FUJI: Gaah. Sticky. Perishing. Dying as he writes his memoirs. Dear Fathers: I am capitulating. Send Wisteria shade to Fujikawa. (He looks at the shade around him) Ah, thank you, thank you. Now, it’s very cool. No more memories. (He relaxes) Wine! (He brings a small wine bottle from his haversack) Wine is a way to rummage around inside oneself. (He swills, spilling down his front, rolls, grunts with pleasure, kicks and flops like a pig in rut, then lies still. The wine bottle is empty)

(Enter Doctor Rago)

RAGO: There you are, you rascal. You overfed, drunken dog. On your back again? What’s to become of you? What, for that matter, could anyone expect to become of you? On your feet. An hour of straight walking will see us in the town.

FUJI: No, boss, you go. I want to rest.

RAGO: Up! I’ve been called to treat the mice of the town for infection.There’ll be a general epidemic among Mus musculus spreading to sylvaticus, perhaps reaching minutus, if we’re not prompt.

FUJI: It’s useless, sir.

RAGO: I pay you to be useful, have you forgotten? You’re carrying my instruments. You’re to assist!

FUJI: Dear doctor. Dear Doctor Rago. Put Fuikawa on unemployment. No one will think less of you and I’ll bless you to my fathers. I was born a useless man and will remain one.

RAGO: All right. But not now. After we’ve cured the town’s mice.

FUJI: You have said that for the past twenty-nine cases. Always afterward. But now is after your last case in which you cured a man of happy deliriums. So fire me. Here’s your bag of instruments.

RAGO: All right. You’re fired. Fired, d’you hear?! Set loose to starve! Canned! You wanted it and now you have it! That should put a boot in your behind. How does it feel, eh? Hungry? Thirsty? Need new trousers? Now, once a week, you can stand in a ten-mile line with others of your kind. Collect your smoking money!

FUJI: You’ve made me a happy man, boss.

RAGO: Happy! I’ve just fired you!

FUJI: I’ll bless you to my fathers.

RAGO: Thanks. I have to carry on alone. Up your fathers’ ___ , you slough of ingratitude. Phew, it’s hot.

FUJI: The shade is cool; come under the tree.

RAGO: What a useless fellow you are; how do you stand yourself?

FUJI: I read, I play music, I like to write a line of poetry.

RAGO: Ah! You hide yourself in others, eh?

FUJI: You’re a foolish man. I hide others in me. What can you boast you have hidden in you? Nothing. Not even yourself. You are all surface, boss. You use everything. It is safe to say, I fear, you carry no more weight than you can see and see. A thoroughly useful man.

RAGO: Ha! And that’s bad, I suppose.

FUJI: No, but though your cup may be found full on occasion, it will never run over.

RAGO: Who the hell knows what you’re jabbering about half the time. Cups running over. You’re useless; that’s it.

FUJI: True, I’m useless. I use no one and don’t allow myself to be used.

That’s a useless person. You use everyone for your own purposes.

RAGO: I’m a physician with a family to feed.

FUJI: You are useful to them.

RAGO: What else, may I ask?

FUJI: There are—(He struggles, quits, allows himself a mannerism— waves his hand, wiggles his toes, whatever.)

RAGO: Well?

FUJI: How will you save the mice in the town?

RAGO: Weed out the infected. Injections for the healthy. A long job in all. But life is life.

FUJI: And money, money.

RAGO: Right! You’ll find that out someday!

FUJI: Not through Chaucer, boss, not through Krishna. They know love very well but not much about money. They know their wines, their truths, their forms of things to be gaped at, women as well as good tapestry and thoughts, divine and not so divine. They scent the air among the pine boughs, seize the power in a marble figure, but have little nose for, and no captivity for, money. (Silence) So the mice regain their health and appetites and eat the peoples’ food, and lives are lost.

RAGO: I ask no questions. I do what’s required. I perform a physician’s services.

FUJI: Why not exterminate the mice?

RAGO: Listen, stupid, a man called from a realty company and asked for extermination. Am I exterminator?! He couldn’t even pay an exterminator’s price! The other man had a reasonable offer, at least: Save the mice medicinally.

FUJI: Why save, boss?

RAGO: How do I know?! He’s a councilman or something. I didn’t ask; I have responsibilities, you know, a family, duty to profession, reports to the medical association. Chance at national publicity! God, what an idiot!

FUJI: Maybe so. I’d exterminate the mice.

RAGO: And get not a coin for it. Or notoriety.

FUJI: I see your point.

RAGO: Useless!

FUJI: You’re on the ball, all right. I can see that.

RAGO: Right!

FUJI: A thankless job.

RAGO: Right! You’re the most useless