Two Gentlemen of Lebowski Read online

  Praise for

  Two Gentlemen of Lebowski

  “Adam Bertocci has done a stellar job fusing the spirit of Shakespeare with The Big Lebowski. This mashup is one for the ages.”

  —Scott Shuffitt, cofounding Dude of Lebowski Fest and coauthor of I’m a Lebowski, You’re a Lebowski

  “A blast to read.”

  —Zach Dionne, GQ

  “Oh my God … This is so good.”

  —Jonathan Chait, The New Republic

  “Classic lines and scenes now become even more epic.”

  —Whitney Matheson, USA Today

  “The mash-up that toke its time in coming.”

  —Time Out New York

  “Gadzooks, methinks ’tis all as fine a way to waste an hour or so as I have come across in these four seasons.”

  —Clark Collis, Entertainment Weekly

  “Written by the incredibly talented Adam Bertocci, it is arguably one of the most inventive pieces ever created.”

  —Broadway World

  “Brilliantly crafted … Two Gentlemen of Lebowski proves that Shakespearean sharp-tongued eloquence is nifty even in the 21st century.”

  —Marina Galperina, Inside New York

  “It’s wonderful.”

  —Metro (UK)

  “Should be quite the what-have-you.”

  —Gothamist

  “It’s the greatest thing since Geoffrey Chaucer.”

  —Cinematical

  “We were totally blown away to discover … this Swiss fucking watch of a genius named Adam Bertocci…. Verily, Two Gentlemen of Lebowski has to be read to be believed. Zounds!”

  —The Dudespaper (“A Lifestyle Magazine for the Deeply Casual”)

  “Even those of us new to the Dude have become true believers in the Knave.”

  —Lauren Wissot, TheaterOnline

  “Bertocci’s writing is solid, clever, and witty.”

  —Boston Lowbrow

  Simon & Schuster Paperbacks

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  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2010 by Adam Bertocci

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Simon & Schuster Paperbacks Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

  First Simon & Schuster trade paperback edition October 2010

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  Designed by Nancy Singer

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Bertocci, Adam.

  Two gentlemen of Lebowski : a most excellent comedie and tragical romance /

  Adam Bertocci. — 1st Simon & Schuster trade paperpack ed.

  p. cm.

  I. Shakespeare, William, 1564–1616. Two gentlemen of Verona.

  II. Big Lebowski (Motion picture) III. Title.

  PS3602.E7684T96 2010

  812’.6—dc22 2010031819

  ISBN 978-1-4516-0581-5

  ISBN 978-1-4516-0583-9 (ebook)

  Two Gentlemen of Lebowski is not endorsed by or associated with the Coen Brothers, the writers and directors of the film The Big Lebowski, or Working Title or Universal Pictures, the producer and distributor of the film The Big Lebowski. Any and all adaptation rights in and to The Big Lebowski are reserved to the Coen Brothers and Universal Pictures.

  For Richard and Danielle Bertocci,

  from their little achiever

  The Persons of the Play

  CHORUS

  GEOFFREY ‘THE KNAVE’ LEBOWSKI

  BLANCHE

  WOO

  thugs

  SIR WALTER of Poland

  SIR DONALD of Greece

  BRANDT, serving-man of the Big Lebowski

  SIR GEOFFREY OF LEBOWSKI, the Big Lebowski

  BONNIE, wife to the Big Lebowski

  OLIVER, consort to Bonnie

  JACK SMOKE, a cavalier

  JOSHUA QUINCE, a paederast

  LIAM O’BRIEN, partner of Joshua Quince

  MAUDE, daughter of the Big Lebowski

  VARLETS, employed by Maude

  Two NIHILISTS

  PLAYER QUEEN

  MISTRESS QUICKLY, hostess of a tavern

  KNOX HARRINGTON, a tapestry artist

  DOCTOR BUTTS, a physician

  PLAYERS for a dance

  LAURENCE SELLERS

  CLOWN

  JAQUES TREEHORN

  BROTHER SEAMUS, an Irish monk

  GRAVEDIGGER

  TWO GENTLEMEN

  OF

  LEBOWSKI

  ACT 1

  Fair Albion.

  PROLOGUE

  Enter CHORUS.

  CHORUS

  In wayfarer’s worlds out west was once a man,

  A man I come not to bury, but to praise.

  His name was Geoffrey Lebowski call’d, yet

  Not called, excepting by his kin.

  That which we call a knave by any other name

  Might bowl just as sweet. Lebowski, then,

  Did call himself ‘the Knave’, a name that I,

  Your humble chorus, would not self-apply

  In homelands mine; but, then, this Knave was one

  From whom sense was a burden to extract,

  And of the arid vale in which he dwelt,

  Also dislike in sensibility;

  Mayhap the very search for sense reveals

  The reason it inspires me to odes.

  (In couplets first, and then a sonnet brave

  As prologue to the tale of this the Knave.

  Behold him, then, a-tumbling soft in sand

  To pledge his love immortal to the land.)

  We stray now from fair Albion and from France

  And see no Queen of bawdy songs and cheers

  And in an angel’s city take our chance

  For stupefying tales to take our ears.

  To war on Arab kings acoast we go,

  Needing a man of times, though hero not;

  Hear me call him not hero; what’s in a hero?

  Sometimes there’s a man, your prologue’s thought.

  The Knave, though scarcely man of honour’d grace,

  Nor god Olympian, nor yet employ’d,

  Was nonetheless for all his time and place,

  The man befits the circle he’s enjoy’d.

  A man of lazy ways, of epic sloth;

  But, losing train of thought, I’ve spake enough!

  Exits.

  A theatre.

  ACT 1

  SCENE 1

  THE KNAVE’s house. Enter THE KNAVE, carrying parcels, and BLANCHE and WOO. They fight.

  BLANCHE

  Whither the money, Lebowski? Faith, we are as servants to Bonnie; promised by the lady good that thou in turn were good for’t.

  WOO

  Bound in honour, we must
have our bond; cursed be our tribe if we forgive thee.

  BLANCHE

  Let us soak him in the chamber-pot, so as to turn his head.

  WOO

  Aye, and see what vapourises; then he will see what is foul.

  They insert his head into the chamber-pot.

  A chamber-pot.

  BLANCHE

  What dreadful noise of waters in thine ears! Thou hast cool’d thy head; think now upon drier matters.

  WOO

  Speak now on ducats else again we’ll thee duckest; whither the money, Lebowski?

  THE KNAVE

  Faith, it awaits down there someplace; prithee let me glimpse again.

  WOO

  What, thou rash egg! Thus will we drown thine exclamations.

  They again insert his head into the chamber-pot.

  BLANCHE

  Trifle not with the fury of two desperate men. Long has thy wife sealed a bond with Jaques Treehorn; as blood is to blood, surely thou owest to Jaques Treehorn in recompense.

  WOO

  Rise, and speak wisely, man—but hark;

  I see thy rug, as woven i’the Orient,

  A treasure from abroad. I like it not.

  I’ll stain it thus; to deadbeats ever thus.

  He stains the rug.

  THE KNAVE

  Sir, prithee nay!

  BLANCHE

  Now thou seest what happens, Lebowski, when the agreements of honourable business stand compromised. If thou wouldst treat money as water, flowing as the gentle rain from heaven, why, then thou knowest water begets water; it will be a watery grave your rug, drown’d in the weeping brook. Pray remember, Lebowski.

  THE KNAVE

  Thou err’st; no man calls me Lebowski. Hear rightly, man!—for thou hast got the wrong man. I am the Knave, man; Knave in nature as in name.

  BLANCHE

  Thy name is Lebowski. Thy wife is Bonnie.

  THE KNAVE

  Zounds, man. Look at these unworthiest hands; no gaudy gold profanes my little hand. I have no honour to contain the ring. I am a bachelor in a wilderness. Behold this place; are these the towers where one may glimpse Geoffrey, the married man? Is this a court where mistresses of common sense are hid? Not for me to hang my bugle in an invisible baldric, sir; I am loath to take a wife, or she to take me until men be made of some other mettle than earth. Hark, the lid of my chamber-pot be lifted!

  WOO

  Search his satchel! His words are a fantastical banquet to work pell-mell havoc and confusion upon his enemies. There sits eight pounds of proof within.

  BLANCHE

  Villainy! Why this confounded orb, such as men use to play at ninepins; what devilry, these holes in holy trinity?

  An orb.

  THE KNAVE

  Obviously thou art not a colfer.

  BLANCHE

  Then thou art a man to carry ball in his sack? Thou varlet, a plague upon your house; I return thine orb to earth.

  Exeunt: they exit

  severally: separately

  He drops the ball.

  Thy floor cracks in haste, sir; thou art not a man of ample foundation. Woo?

  WOO

  Speak, friend; I am but of droplets.

  A dry aspergillum.

  BLANCHE

  Was this not a man of moneys and repute? Did not Treehorn speak of chalcedony halls, and three chests of gold, as was hard food for Midas? What think’st thou?

  WOO

  O undistinguish’d man! We are deceived; this man has put not money in his purse.

  THE KNAVE

  Weep not for grief of my own sustaining, sir. At least I am house-broken, none to break the houses of others.

  WOO

  If dog you are, in time you’ll have your day; Waste time, but Jaques Treehorn will you pay.

  Exeunt severally.

  SCENE 2

  Ninepins.

  The bowling green. Enter THE KNAVE, WALTER, and DONALD, to play at ninepins.

  WALTER

  In sooth, then, faithful friend, this was a rug of value? Thou wouldst call it not a rug among ordinary rugs, but a rug of purpose? A star in a firmament, in step with the fashion alike to the Whitsun morris-dance? A worthy rug, a rug of consequence, sir?

  Morris-dancing.

  THE KNAVE

  It was of consequence, I should think; verily, it tied the room together, gather’d its qualities as the sweet lovers’ spring grass doth the morning dew or the rough scythe the first of autumn harvests. It sat between the four sides of the room, making substance of a square, respecting each wall in equal harmony, in geometer’s cap; a great reckoning in a little room. Verily, it transform’d the room from the space between four walls presented, to the harbour of a man’s monarchy.

  WALTER

  Indeed, a rug of value; an estimable rug, an honour’d rug; O unhappy rug, that should live to cover such days!

  DONALD

  Of what dost thou speak, that tied the room together, Knave? Take pains, for I would well hear of that which tied the room together.

  WALTER

  Didst thou attend the Knave’s tragic history, Sir Donald?

  DONALD

  Nay, good Sir Walter, I was a-bowling.

  WALTER

  Thou attend’st not; and so thou hast no frame of reference. Thou art as a child, wandering and strutting amidst the groundlings as a play is in session, heeding not the poor players, their exits and their entrances, and, wanting to know the subject of the story, asking which is the lover and which the tyrant.

  THE KNAVE

  Come to the point, Sir Walter.

  WALTER

  My point, then, Knave: there be no reason, if sweet reason doth permit, in enlightenment’s bower—and reason says thou art the worthier man—

  DONALD

  Yes, Sir Walter, pray, merrily state the fulcrum of thine argument.

  THE KNAVE

  My colleague, although unframed and unreferenced, speaks plain and true. That these toughs are those at fault, we are agreed; that I stand wounded, unrevenged, we likewise are agreed; yet you circle the meanings unconstantly, like blunted burrs, unstuck where they are thrown.

  WALTER

  I speak of aggression uncheck’d, as crowned heads of state once spoke of Arabia—

  DONALD

  Arabia! Then we have put a girdle round the earth. On what does Sir Walter speak?

  WALTER

  Cast it from thy sieve-like books of memory, Sir Donald; thou art out of thy element.

  DONALD

  I know not of your ‘element’; I should know more hereafter.

  WALTER

  Wherefore was I curs’d only to minister

  To congregations held in deafen’d pits?

  I must hobble my speech; of elements, sir,

  A doctor of physic did once explain

  That all the earth is province elemental,

  Sure and steady as the stone-wall foursome

  A-holding up the Knave’s roof, tied together

  By power that we spake on, our traffic

  Unmarred by thy rough and idle chatter.

  And the complexion of the element

  In favour’s like the rug that ties the room.

  O, a muse of fire the first element,

  Airy breath the second; though this wind

  May well be yours for all you flap your tongue,

  O ill-dispersing wind of misery!

  Thou hast no wings, and, liable to plunge,

  You fit not fowl; yet foul your interruption,

  Fish’d for facts, yet fish you cannot be;

  So water, elemental third, you’re not,

  How much salt water thrown away in waste.

  Of earth, no woman left on earth will have thee,

  No man of middle earth will tend thy land,

  So walk the plains like to a lonely dragon;

  I care not.

  The four classical elements.

  THE KNAVE

  Good sir, s
peak plain. I know not these villains; surely would I ne’er traffic with this man of Orient birth who so abused my rug. I have not the facility to present him with the rate of usance and demand money in kind for that which he has spent upon’t; so I entreat thee, speak plain.

  WALTER

  I speak it well; my words are straight and true.

  The man of Orient birth is not the issue.

  DONALD

  The Orient, Sir Walter?

  WALTER

  I speak, old friend, of truths in desert land.

  The hour is nigh to draw line in the sand.

  THE KNAVE

  Deserts? I had made it plain that he was Orient-man.

  WALTER

  Though words in haste be only human nature,

  ‘Orient-man’ is not preferr’d nomenclature.

  The Orient.

  THE KNAVE

  Give me no further counsel; my griefs cry softer than advertisement.

  WALTER

  I speak of this other man, Sir Geoffrey of Lebowski. Is not thy name, sir, Geoffrey of Lebowski? To be or not Lebowski, that is the question; I see we still did meet each other’s man. Shall we not make amends? A gentleman of high sentence ought to be of unsequestered location, possess’d of resources fit to restore a thousand rugs from vile offence. He’s not well married that lets his wife a borrower be, such that men gravely offended bespoil another man’s rug. Be I wrong?

  THE KNAVE

  No, but verily—

  WALTER

  Be I wrong?

  THE KNAVE

  Yea, but verily—

  WALTER

  That rug, in faith, tied the room together, did it not?

  THE KNAVE

  By my heart, a goodly rug.

  DONALD

  And in most miserable tide did these rogues besmirch it.

  ‘Most miserable tide’

  WALTER

  Prithee, Donald! Thou too eagerly hold’st the mirror up to nature.

  THE KNAVE

  My mind races; I might endeavour to seek this gentleman Lebowski.

  DONALD

  His name is Lebowski? Verily, ope thine ear; that is thy name, Knave!

  THE KNAVE

  On good authority; and his nobleness must oblige. His wife taketh up quarrel and borrows, and they bespoil my rug.

  WALTER

  Marry, sir, my heartstrings do you tug;

  They urinate upon thy damnèd rug.