The Oldest Boy: A Play in Three Ceremonies

The Oldest Boy: A Play in Three Ceremonies

In this moving exploration of parenthood, an American mother and a Tibetan father have a three-year-old son believed to be the reincarnation of a Buddhist lama. When a Tibetan lama and a monk come to their home unexpectedly, asking to take their child away for a life of spiritual training in India, the parents must make a life-altering choice that will test their strength, their marriage, and their hearts. The Oldest Boy is a richly emotional journey filled with music, dance, puppetry, ritual, and laughter―Sarah Ruhl at her imaginative best. A meditation on attachment and unconditional love, the play asks us to believe in a world in which sometimes the youngest children are also the oldest and wisest teachers. “Gorgeous . . . Extremely imaginative and hypnotically beautiful.” ―Marilyn Stasio, Variety “[An] emotional tsunami . . . An extraordinary story [from] a singular new voice in American theater.” ―David Rooney, The Hollywood Reporter “Ms. Ruhl’s drama [ The Oldest Boy ] is among the most easily accessible from this poetic, venturesome playwright . . . It is marked by Ms. Ruhl’s inquisitive intelligence, clean-lined eloquence and spiky humor.” ―Charles Isherwood, The New York Times “Bewitching, ingenious and seriously moving.” ―Linda Winer, Newsday Sarah Ruhl 's plays include In the Next Room, or the vibrator play (Pulitzer Prize finalist, Tony Award nominee); The Clean House (Pulitzer Prize finalist, Susan Smith Blackburn Prize); Passion Play, a cycle (PEN American Award); Dead Man's Cell Phone (Helen Hayes Award); and Stage Kiss and Dear Elizabeth . She has been the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship, the Helen Merrill Emerging Playwrights Award, the Whiting Writers' Award, the PEN Center Award for a midcareer playwright, the Feminist Press's Forty Under Forty Award, and the 2010 Lilly Award . She is currently on the faculty at Yale School of Drama and lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her family. The Oldest Boy A Play in Three Ceremonies By Sarah Ruhl Farrar, Straus and Giroux Copyright © 2016 Sarah Ruhl All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-0-374-53587-2 CHAPTER 1 Act One ONE A tasteful house decorated with rich Tibetan colors. Half Western furniture, half Eastern furniture and rugs. A few large statues of the Buddha. A woman, the mother, sits on the stage. She places a candle on the floor, faces the audience, and tries to meditate. She closes her eyes. She opens her eyes. She sees the audience. She stops meditating. She takes her cushion and candle and turns around and faces the back wall. She meditates. On a baby monitor, a baby cries. The mother stops meditating. She goes to the monitor. She listens. The baby stops crying. She goes and gets a bag of potato chips and starts eating from it. She pages through a book about child-rearing: something like Dr. Sears's Attachment Parenting Book. The doorbell rings. She jumps. It is unexpected. She puts down the potato chips. She goes to the door. Two Tibetan monks are at the door. One is a Rinpoche (a high lama or teacher), the other is a simple monk. MOTHER Hello? LAMA Hello. MONK Hello. An awkward pause. MOTHER Hi. MONK Excuse me — sorry to disturb you — you are the babysitter? MOTHER The babysitter? No. LAMA You are a friend of the house? MOTHER Um — this is my house. MONK But — you are the mother of the house? MOTHER Yes — I am the mother of the house. MONK Oh, I see. LAMA Perhaps we have the wrong house? MOTHER I don't know — sorry — I wasn't expecting you. LAMA Nor we you! They laugh. MOTHER Perhaps you are looking for my husband? LAMA Your husband owns a restaurant in town? MOTHER Oh, yes. LAMA Then it is he we have come to visit. MOTHER Oh! MONK Rinpoche is visiting from India. MOTHER Oh, I see! Welcome! Rinpoche. He bows his head. She bows awkwardly. MOTHER Would you like to come in? MONK And LAMA Yes, yes, thank you. LAMA I have been to your husband's restaurant once, long time ago. Very delicious. MOTHER Of course I think so, but I'm biased. Would you like some tea? MONKLAMA Oh yes yes, we would love some tea, thank you. Thank you, yes. MOTHER I'm so sorry — if I'd known you were coming, I would have — cleaned and — cooked — and — MONK And LAMA No, no. MOTHER I can at least make you tea. She exits to put the teakettle on to boil. The boy cries a little on the baby monitor. The monks listen attentively, with joy. LAMA A baby! The mother pokes her head back in. MOTHER I'm just going to get my son. Are you all right for a moment? MONK And LAMA Oh, yes yes. MOTHER You must excuse me — my husband won't be back from work for another hour. Would you like to come back then? LAMA Oh, that is fine, we can wait. You can bring the baby here, if you like. How old is the baby? MOTHER Almost three! MONK That's good! MOTHER Good? Yes — LAMA A nice age, yes? MOTHER Yes. A pause in which the baby is quiet. MOTHER It sounds as if he's gone back to sleep. MONK Yes, he's slee