Free Prater Violet by Christopher Isherwood Page A

corner, amidst these ruins, there is life. A single set is brilliantly illuminated. From the distance, it looks like a shrine, and the figures standing around it might be worshippers. But it is merely the living room of Toni’s home, complete with period furniture, gaily colored curtains, a canary cage and a cuckoo clock. The men who are putting the finishing touches to this charming, life-size doll’s house go about their work with the same matter-of-fact, unsmiling efficiency which any carpenters and electricians might show in building a garage.
    In the middle of the set, patient and anonymous as tailor’s dummies, are the actor and actress who are standing in for Arthur Cromwell and Anita Hayden. Mr. Watts, a thin bald man with gold-rimmed spectacles, walks restlessly back and forth, regarding them from various angles. A blue-glass monocle hangs from a ribbon around his neck. He raises it repeatedly to observe the general effect of the lighting; and the gesture is incongruously like that of a Regency fop. Beside him is Fred Murray, red-haired and wearing rubber shoes. Fred is what is called “the Gaffer,” in studio slang. According to our etiquette, Mr. Watts cannot condescend to give orders directly. He murmurs them to Fred; and Fred, as if translating into a foreign language, shouts up to the men who work the lamps on the catwalk, high above.
    â€œPut a silk on that rifle.… Take a couple of turns on number four.… Kill that baby.”
    â€œI’m ready,” says Mr. Watts, at length.
    â€œAll right,” Fred Murray shouts to his assistants. “Save them.” The arcs are switched off and the house lights go on. The set loses its shrinelike glamour. The stand-ins leave their positions. There is an atmosphere of anti-climax, as though we were about to start all over again from the beginning.
    â€œNow then, are we nearly ready?” This is Eliot, the assistant-director. He has a long pointed nose and a public-school accent. He carries a copy of the script, like an emblem of office, in his hand. His manner is bossy, but self-conscious and unsure. I feel sorry for him. His job makes him unpopular. He has to fuss and keep things moving; and he doesn’t know how to do it without being aggressive. He doesn’t know how to talk to the older men, or the stagehands. He is conscious of his own high-pitched, cultured voice. His shirt collar has too much starch in it.
    â€œWhat’s the hold-up?” Eliot plaintively addresses the world in general. “What about you, Roger?”
    Roger, the sound-recordist, curses under his breath. He hates being rushed. “There’s a baffle on this mike,” he explains, with acid patience. “It’s a bloody lively set.… Shift your boom a bit more round to the left, Teddy. We’ll have to use a flower pot.”
    The boom moves over, dangling the microphone, like a fishing rod. Teddy, who works it, crosses the set and conceals a second microphone behind a china figure on the table.
    Meanwhile, somewhere in the background, I hear Arthur Cromwell calling, “Where’s the invaluable Isherwood?” Arthur plays Toni’s father. He is a big handsome man who used to be a matinee idol—a real fine old ham. He wants me to hear him his part. When he forgets a line, he snaps his fingers, without impatience.
    â€œWhat’s the matter, Toni? Isn’t it time to go to the Prater?”
    â€œAren’t you going to the Prater today?” I prompt.
    â€œAren’t you going to the Prater today?” But Arthur has some mysterious actor’s inhibition about this. “Bit of a mouthful, isn’t it? I can’t hear myself saying that, somehow.… How about ‘Why aren’t you at the Prater?’”
    â€œAll right.”
    Bergmann calls, “Isherwood!” (Since we have been working in the studio, he always addresses me by my surname in public.) He marches away from the