The White Card: A Play

The White Card: A Play

A play about the imagined fault line between black and white lives by Claudia Rankine, the author of Citizen The White Card stages a conversation that is both informed and derailed by the black/white American drama. The scenes in this one-act play, for all the characters’ disagreements, stalemates, and seeming impasses, explore what happens if one is willing to stay in the room when it is painful to bear the pressure to listen and the obligation to respond. ―from the introduction by Claudia Rankine Claudia Rankine’s first published play, The White Card , poses the essential question: Can American society progress if whiteness remains invisible? Composed of two scenes, the play opens with a dinner party thrown by Virginia and Charles, an influential Manhattan couple, for the up-and-coming artist Charlotte. Their conversation about art and representations of race spirals toward the devastation of Virginia and Charles’s intentions. One year later, the second scene brings Charlotte and Charles into the artist’s studio, and their confrontation raises both the stakes and the questions of what―and who―is actually on display. Rankine’s The White Card is a moving and revelatory distillation of racial divisions as experienced in the white spaces of the living room, the art gallery, the theater, and the imagination itself. “The ideas discussed in The White Card are always compelling. . . . The lines of an urgent debate are clearly and thoroughly drawn.” ― The Nation “The footsteps of giants are often soft, we hardly hear them coming. But determined to leave a mark on the landscape, Claudia Rankine is a giant―generating a quiet storm as she probes the extraordinary contemporary moments in which we live. The White Card is a flash of brilliance―a hand well played. Read it and weep!”― Carrie Mae Weems “Claudia Rankine’s captivating and seductive provocations about modern life have moved seamlessly in and out of several genres. As a dramatist, her searing mind and sharp sense of humor give us much to debate, ponder, and love about the American race story when we need it most.” ―Anna Deavere Smith Claudia Rankine is the author of Citizen: An American Lyric and four previous books, including Don’t Let Me Be Lonely: An American Lyric . Her work has appeared recently in the Guardian , the New York Times Book Review , the New York Times Magazine , and the Washington Post . She is a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, the winner of the 2014 Jackson Poetry Prize, and a contributing editor of Poets & Writers . She received a MacArthur Fellowship in 2016. Rankine is the Frederick Iseman Professor of Poetry at Yale University. The White Card A Play in One Act By Claudia Rankine Graywolf Press Copyright © 2019 Claudia Rankine All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-1-55597-839-6 CHAPTER 1 Scene One The sounds of a tennis match. The living/dining room is a tastefully elegant and spare NYC loft. In the room is contemporary work by artists representing the victimization of African Americans and Rauschenberg's White Painting. They are well lit and prominent in the space. The art pieces are projected on canvasses around the white room. Everything in the room is white except for the art. The round dining table gestures toward dinner but need not have actual settings. Over the mantel is a piece of art covered by a cloth. At the back of the stage, doors lead onto a terrace. If possible the audience surrounds the dinner party to enable audience members to also be looking at each other. This is a lovely Saturday night in Tribeca, March 2017. The new administration has been in office for three months and the Spencers are awaiting their guest. From the balcony the city lights are in full view. Eric, Charles, and Virginia are watching the Australian Open a month after it aired. VIRGINIA: Serena is a beauty. ERIC: I prefer Venus. VIRGINIA: They're both stunning. ERIC: You're stunning. VIRGINIA: Well, I suppose all people are stunning — what's your issue with Serena? ERIC: I don't have to love everyone. In any case, she's okay. CHARLES: Okay? Serena is anything but. VIRGINIA: Who would have thought the sisters would play each other again in a final this late in their careers. My favorite thing is watching Serena win. ERIC: Why are you watching if you know the outcome? What fun is that? VIRGINIA: I don't watch her until after; I get too nervous. But I did want to see the Australian Open finals before the next Grand Slam came around. Can you tell she's pregnant? CHARLES: ( looking at TV ) She's pregnant? While she's competing? ERIC: I read she got some hormonal rush from the pregnancy. People were complaining it was an unfair advantage. VIRGINIA: Now, that's insane. I spent my first trimesters between the bathroom and the sofa. Why are men so challenged by the Williams sisters? ERIC: I don't have a problem — CHARLES: ( interrupting ) She means men like that Russian tennis guy from a few years ago? Th