I first heard the
joke—around which this ambitious play is constructed—from a friend named Geoff
Webster, at a coffee shop here in Napanee. He says he heard it from some woman he knows.
Director:
Alright, Lawrence, you turn now to Nadine and deliver the first line of
the joke.
Lawrence (muttering darkly): This stupid joke.
Director (irritably): Never mind that, just say the line.
Lawrence:
“Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend.”
Director (pleased): And now, Nadine, you reciprocate by delivering the second line of the joke to Lawrence.
Nadine (muttering darkly): This dumb joke. Ibsen never wrote anything this silly. Nor Beckett neither!
Director (impatient): Never mind, just say the line.
Nadine (reluctantly, lifelessly): “And inside of a dog, it’s too dark to read anyway.”
Director (giggling): Great!
Lawrence (frustrated): How do you get inside a
dog? Nobody’s ever been inside a dog!
Nadine (to Lawrence, in her smarmiest, least
helpful manner): Jonah ended up living inside a whale!
Lawrence (at the end of his rope): But a dog is too small to get inside
of!!
Director (to Lawrence, gently): I think perhaps you’re being too
literal, Lawrence. It’s really
just a little play on words.
Nadine (with brutish decisiveness): You’re so stupid, Lawrence!
Lawrence (outraged): Oh yeh, well let’s see you try to crawl inside of a dog! And you’d have to carry a book too! You won’t think it’s so damned funny then!
Director (soothingly): Lawrence, it’s just
language!
Lawrence (furious): You don’t say!!
(curtain)
