I had mentioned One, Two, Three here before; it’s a terrific movie, and I had been wondering for years whether the play was nearly as good. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find a translation. Well, after reading Farewell, My Heart, I discovered that there was a translation, but that the English version was called President. Which presumably is why I couldn’t find it. That version is included in Romantic Comedies, a 1952 collection of eight plays in English. It turns out it’s not the best play in the book.
The worst, I think, is Actor from Vienna, a one-act melodrama that fails to be witty or likeable. Another one-act, Anniversary Dinner, is igry in the extreme. Blue Danube is all right, with some very funny bits and one very funny supporting character, but it feels slow to me on the page. I liked the first act of Game of Hearts, but the second act was painful rather than funny, and the third act didn’t pay it off. The Good Fairy has a couple of great parts for a comic actor and actress, and some humor of a kind I particularly like, where characters who are restrained from talking about sex by propriety and whatnot find a way to discuss it without discussing it. The titular Good Fairy has set up an assignation, and there’s a good deal of discussion of exactly when she will lose her virtue, as it affects how other people will appropriately act regarding her. She does wind up losing her virtue, but an hour later and with another fellow entirely, which, well, you know, plot stuff.
Waxworks also has a subplot involving the exact timing of losing one’s virtue, except that the scrupulously correct woman demands that the wedding takes place first, so she doesn’t lose her virtue:
BLOCK: And so, the day the decree is granted, Mr. Thomas will take the first train, and you’ll be married the day after.
ANN: The same day.
BLOCK: The same day. But the train doesn’t arrive in Vienna until after eleven at night.
ANN: That doesn’t matter. We’ll rush right from the station to the Archbishop.
BLOCK: The Archbishop is an old man. He’ll be asleep by that time.
ANN: Wake him up.
BLOCK: That’s strictly forbidden. Wait till morning.
ANN: No. The Archbishop can’t demand that a woman should give herself to a man the night before their wedding.
KRON: But Ann! The Archbishop doesn’t demand that of you. He wouldn’t suspect that you are capable of such a thing. (to BLOCK) Just the same, you’d better wake him up.
ANN: I hope you realize that I am motivated by powerful ethical factors.
CLEMENTINE: I can’t imagine any more powerful.
That’s from an Arthur Richman text in English. If you don’t like it, stay away from Ferenc Molnar, I suppose.
But the big surprise, actually, was a play called Arthur. or at any rate the English version is called Arthur. In German it was called Jemand, closer to the original Hungarian Valaki, or Someone. The adaptation is by P.G. Wodehouse who had so successfully translated Mr. Molnar’s The Play’s the Thing; I don’t know why the thing was never produced. Neither was Mr. Wodehouse’s version of Game of Hearts. I assume that after the War, there wasn’t much interest in either Mr. Molnar or Mr. Wodehouse; it seems odd, but there it is. Ferenc Molnar seems to have dropped out of our memory altogether, actually; he was a tremendously successful and prolific playwright, with dozens of successful plays all over Europe, a ton of movie adaptations, and then, nothing. Sic transit, if you know what I mean. Arthur was produced in Germany, Austria, Hungary and Italy, but not in the US. Actually, it was made into a television play for “Startime” in 1960 (adapted by Gore Vidal! Starring Rex Harrison!), but somehow I doubt there’s a copy of it anywhere.
Anyway, I think Arthur is an incredibly funny play. It has a great role for a woman of, say, thirty; old enough to have been married eight years before the opening of the play. There’s another, even better role for a man of, say, fifty or so (that’s mine). The Young Man is mostly decorative, and then there are eleven other parts which I think could be played by five actors or so; the florist can also play the butler, the bishop can be the hotel manager, or the other way around. There are three sets for the three acts, and really they should be posh and elaborate, but I suspect that it could all be done pretty cheaply.
I’ve actually written to Samuel French to see if they still manage the licensing. Not that it’s likely to happen any time soon, but I want to be prepared, if it does.
Tolerabimus quod tolerare debemus,
-Vardibidian.