Shrdlu, Rehearsal, The Adding Machine

I've got some time off from rehearsal, so I'm doing some serious re-work on Shrdlu's first scene . . .

Shrdlu

My first overall approach was to use massive substitution to empathize with how I imagine Shrdlu’s mother and Dr. A. felt about the things he talks about in his monologue. A LOT of hard work! But really, I think the heart of Shrdlu is that he doesn’t, he never, really understood why these things (e.g., the book, adventure) were “bad,” “evil,” and why other things were “good” (e.g., church 3 times a day).

This interpretation comes from two sources: first -- Shrdlu. He gives no hint that he doesn’t understand what’s happened to him until he talks about the murder, and then it’s clear that, to him, the act just ‘came out of the blue.’ He makes no connection, the way the audience clearly does, between everything he talking about in the monologue and its climax, telling how he murdered his mother.

He simply accepts his mother’s and Dr. A’s ideology, and this is the second source: this is true of all the characters in the play – it’s what the play is about: people ‘not awake,’ not thinking, but rather simply, unquestioningly accepting the conventional wisdom. They are all living under ‘false consciousness,’ i.e., any belief, idea, ideology, etc., that interferes with an exploited and oppressed person or group being able to perceive the objective nature and source of their oppression.

So, the new choice is to simply defend a set of ideas (or convince Mr. Zero of their truthfulness) -- ideas and beliefs that he doesn’t understand, and here it is easy to find a parallel with my everyday experience: How often have I marshaled out arguments I haven’t really followed, parroted a position I haven’t fully explored, all for the sake of being right? I feel embarassed to admit this, and I think Shrdlu feels a bit embarassed when he tries, and fails, to make sense of his life.

This is definitely more ‘actable’ than what I was doing before, it ‘makes sense’ given the stance of the entire play (though I suppose that’s very debatable), and if Shrdlu is, in a sense, coming from this type of place, I can definitely understand how he feels, and I can see how he’s so lost, and why, and how just by simply ‘waking up,’ Shrdlu would really understand himself, see himself the way the audience does.

I think this is ultimately the point Rice wanted to make by writing the play – Daisy is simple, but she doesn’t have an ideology that’s a substitute for herself . . . so she can, and is, guided by love. Moreover, this love, for a moment, wakes Mr. Zero to what he really wants, who he really is . . . that is, until poor Mr. Shrdlu redefines reality for him.