Broken Glass

Table of Contents

 

 

 

Arthur Miller was born in New York City in 1915 and studied at the University of Michigan. His plays include All My Sons (1947),
Death of a Salesman
(1949),
The Crucible
(1953), A
View from
the Bridge and A Memory of
Two
Mondays (1955), After
the
Fall (1964), Incident at Vichy (1964),
The Price
(1968),
The Creation of the World and Other Business
(1972), and
The American Clock
(1980). He has also written two novels, Focus (1945) and The Misfits, which was filmed in 1960, and the text for In Russia (1969),
Chinese Encounters
(1979),
and In the Country
(1977), three books of photographs by his wife, Inge Morath. His most recent works include a memoir, Timebends (1987), and the plays The Ride
Down
Mt. Morgan (1991), The Last Yankee (1993), Broken Glass (1993), which won the 1995 Olivier Award for Best Play of the London Season, and Mr. Peters'
Connections
(1998). He has twice won the New York Drama Critics Circle Award, and in 1949 he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize.

BY ARTHUR MILLER

DRAMA
The Golden Years
The Man Who Had All the Luck
All My Sons
Death of a Salesman
An Enemy of the People
(adaptation of the play by Ibsen)
The Crucible
A View from the Bridge
After the Fall
Incident at Vichy
The Price
The American Clock
The Creation of the World and Other Business
The Archbishop's Ceiling
The Ride Down Mt. Morgan
Broken Glass
Mr. Peters' Connections

 
ONE-ACT PLAYS
A View from the Bridge,
one-act version, with
A Memory of Two Mondays
Elegy for a Lady (in Two-Way Mirror)
Some Kind of Love Story (in Two-Way Mirror)
I Can't Remember Anything (in Danger: Memory!)
Clara (in Danger: Memory!)
The Last Yankee

 
OTHER WORKS
Situation Normal
The Misfits
(a cinema novel)
Focus
(a novel)
I Don't Need You Anymore
(short stories)
In the Country
(reportage with Inge Morath photographs)
Chinese Encounters
(reportage with Inge Morath photographs)
In Russia
(reportage with Inge Morath photographs)
Salesman in Beijing
(a memoir)
Timebends
(autobiography)
Homely Girl, A Life
(novella)

 
COLLECTIONS
Arthur Miller's Collected Plays (Volumes I and II)
The Portable Arthur Miller
The Theater Essays of Arthur Miller
(Robert Martin, editor)

 
VIKING CRITICAL LIBRARY EDITIONS
Death of a Salesman
(edited by Gerald Weales)
The Crucible
(edited by Gerald Weales)

 
TELEVISION WORKS
Playing for Time

 
SCREENPLAYS
The Misfits
Everybody Wins
The Crucible

PENGUIN BOOKS
Published by the Penguin Group
Penguin Books USA Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.
Penguin Books Ltd, 27 Wrights Lane, London W8 5TZ, England
Penguin Books Australia Ltd, Ringwood, Victoria, Australia
Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 10 Alcom Avenue,
Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4V 3B2
Penguin Books (N.Z.) Ltd, 182-190 Wairau Road,
Auckland 10, New Zealand

 
Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England

First published in Penguin Books 1994

 
Copyright © Arthur Miller and Inge Morath, 1994

All rights reserved

All inquiries concerning rights should be addressed to International Creative Management, 40 West 57th Street, New York, New York 10019.

 
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Miller, Arthur.
Broken glass : a play / by Arthur Miller.
p. cm.

eISBN : 978-0-140-24938-5

1. Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)—Foreign public opinion,
American—Drama. 2. Jewish men—New York (N.Y.)—Drama.
3. Marriage—New York (N.Y.)—Drama. 4. Bankers—New York (N.Y.)—
Drama. I. Title.
PS3525.15156B76 1994
812'.52—dc20 93-20949

 

CAST OF CHARACTERS

Phillip Gellburg
Sylvia Gellburg
Dr. Harry Hyman
Margaret Hyman
Harriet
Stanton Case

Ron Rifkin
Amy Irving
David Dukes
Frances Conroy
Lauren Klein
George N. Martin

Directed by John Tillinger

 
The original production was staged at the
Long Wharf Theater in New Haven,
Connecticut.

 
 
Final Acting Version

SCENE ONE

 
MARGARET: He'll be right with you, he's just changing. Can I get you something? Tea?

 
GELLBURG,
faint reprimand:
He said seven o'clock sharp.

 
MARGARET: He was held up in the hospital, that new union's pulled a strike, imagine? A strike in a hospital? It's incredible. And his horse went lame.

 
GELLBURG: His horse?

 
 
MARGARET: He rides on Ocean Parkway every afternoon.

GELLBURG,
attempting easy familiarity:
Oh yes, I heard about that... it's very nice. You're Mrs. Hyman?

 
MARGARET: I've nodded to you on the street for years now, but you're too preoccupied to notice.

 
GELLBURG,
a barely hidden boast:
Lot on my mind, usually.
A certain amused loftiness.
—So you're his nurse, too.

 
MARGARET: We met in Mount Sinai when he was interning. He's lived to regret it. She laughs in a burst.

 
GELLBURG: That's some laugh you've got there. I sometimes hear you all the way down the block to my house.

 
MARGARET: Can't help it, my whole family does it. I'm originally from Minnesota. It's nice to meet you finally, Mr. Goldberg.

 
GELLBURG: :—It's Gellburg, not Goldberg.

 
MARGARET: Oh, I'm sorry.

 
GELLBURG: G-e-l-l-b-u-r-g. It's the only one in the phone book.

 
 
MARGARET: It does sound like Goldberg.

 
GELLBURG: But it's not, it's Gellburg. A distinction. We're from Finland originally.

MARGARET: Oh! We came from Lithuania ... Kazauskis?

 
GELLBURG,
put down momentarily:
Don't say.

 
MARGARET,
trying to charm him to his ease:
Ever been to Minnesota?

 
GELLBURG: New York State's the size of France, what would I go to Minnesota for?

 
MARGARET: Nothing. Just there's a lot of Finns there.

 
GELLBURG: Well there's Finns all over.

 
MARGARET,
defeated, shows the clipper:
... I'll get back to my roses. Whatever it is, I hope you'll be feeling better.

 
GELLBURG: It's not me.

 
 
MARGARET: Oh.'Cause you seem a little pale.

 
GELLBURG: Me?—I'm always this color. It's my wife.

 
MARGARET: I'm sorry to hear that, she's a lovely woman. It's nothing serious, is it?

 
GELLBURG: He's just had a specialist put her through some tests, I'm waiting to hear. I think it's got him mystified.

 
MARGARET: Well, I mustn't butt in.
Makes to leave but can't resist.
Can you say what it is?

GELLBURG : She can't walk.

 
MARGARET: What do you mean?

 
GELLBURG,
an overtone of protest of some personal victimization:
Can't stand up. No feeling in her legs.—I'm sure it'll pass, but it's terrible.

 
MARGARET: But I only saw her in the grocery ... can't be more than ten days ago ...

 
GELLBURG: It's nine days today.

 
MARGARET: But she's such a wonderful-looking woman. Does she have fever?

 
GELLBURG: No.

 
 
MARGARET: Thank God, then it's not polio.

 
GELLBURG: No, she's in perfect health otherwise.

 
MARGARET: Well Harry'll get to the bottom of it if anybody can. They call him from everywhere for opinions, you know ... Boston, Chicago ... By rights he ought to be on Park Avenue if he only had the ambition, but he always wanted a neighborhood practice. Why, I don't know—we never invite anybody, we never go out, all our friends are in Manhattan. But it's his nature, you can't fight a person's nature. Like me for instance, I like to talk and I like to laugh. You're not much of a talker, are you.

G
_ELLBURG
,
a purse-mouthed smile:
When I can get a word in edgewise.

 
MARGARET,
burst of laughter:
Ha!—so you've got a sense of humor after all. Well give my best to Mrs. Goldberg.

 
_GELLBURG
: Gellbu ...

 
MARGARET,
hits her own head:
Gellburg, excuse me!—It practically sounds like Goldberg ...

 
G
_ELL
BURG: No-no, look in the phone book, it's the only one, G-e-1-1 ...

 
Enter Dr. Hyman.

 
MARGARET,
with a little wave to Gellburg:
Be seeing you!

 
GE
_L
LBURG: Be in good health.

 
Margaret exits.

 
HYMAN,
in his early fifties, a healthy, rather handsome man, a determined scientific idealist. Settling behind his desk—chuckling:
She chew your ear off?

 
GELLBURG,
his worldly mode:
Not too bad, I've had worse.

 
HYMAN: Well there's no way around it, women are talkers ...
Grinning familiarly:
But try living without them, right?

GELLBURG: Without women?

 
_HYMAN
,
he sees Gellburg has flushed; there is a short hiatus, then:
... Well, never mind.—I'm glad you could make it tonight, I wanted to talk to you before I see your wife again tomorrow.
Opens cigar humidor.
Smoke?

 
GELLBURG: No thanks, never have. Isn't it bad for you?

 
HYMAN: Certainly is.
Lights a cigar.
But more people die of rat bite, you know.

 
GELLBURG: Rat bite!

 
HYMAN: Oh yes, but they're mostly the poor so it's not an interesting statistic. Have you seen her tonight or did you come here from the office?

 
_GELLBURG
: I thought I'd see you before I went home. But I phoned her this afternoon-same thing, no change.

 
HYMAN: How's she doing with the wheelchair?