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The Pillowman - As perceived by Starry
Notes: Within the text you will find footnote numbers. For easier access you can find all footnotes here.
I'm going to try to comment on The Pillowman here. I have never done it in a form like this and so I don't know if and or how this is going to work. I'll try to concentrate mainly on the visual part of the story as the script for the play can be easily obtained from amazon. Personal little episodes and observations which might hinder the flow of the story will be added as footnotes. As I've seen the play several times all my impressions will be condensed into this one comment, rather than writing a separate comment on each play. As I'm doing this I might point out changes that occurred in the performance between the different plays, so don't let that confuse you.
Katurian = Craig
Ariel = Michael
Tupolski = Jonathan
Michal = Gareth
Mother = Bonnie
Father = Oliver
little Jesus girl / green kid = Brooke
But here we go now…
~*~*~*~
In the beginning, the curtain is drawn and the stage is in complete darkness. The song starts softly but is continuously getting louder. One spotlight is turned on, lighting the stage. There's a table and a chair. On that chair sits a man, blindfolded, breathing quickly and shallowly. His clothes are clean but simple, a pair of dark grey pants and a pale greenish-grey shirt. His head is slightly lowered, his feet are bare, giving him a vulnerable look (1).
Two people enter the stage, dark pants, white shirts, obviously officials of some sort. The stage is brightly lit now, giving it an almost clinical touch. The man on the chair slightly lifts his head, listening to them coming to the centre of the stage. One of them introduces them as Detective Ariel and Detective Tupolski. Tupolski notices the blindfold and removes it. The man blinks a couple of times, the light is hurting his eyes, he is obviously wary of the men, unsure what to expect. Immediately he starts to placate the detectives, trying to assure them of his cooperation and respect. We learn that the man's name is Katurian Katurian Katurian. A fact which doesn't sit well with Detective Tupolski, calling Katurians parents stupid fucking idiots. Katurian doesn't protest.
No matter what he says and how he tries to appease them, Katurian only ends up aggravating the impulsive cop named Ariel and making Tupolski mock him sarcastically. It is obvious that Ariel is short fused and brutal and only waits for the opportunity to torture the prisoner. Feeling more and more threatened, Katurian's desperately trying to guess what they want to hear, or at least to find out what they brought him here for. He is confused and frightened. He's fidgeting nervously, his eyes are darting about the room, his hands are shaking and he's avoiding direct eye contact with Ariel to not provoke him any further.
Still Katurian contradicts Ariel when he calls his brother 'backwards'.
When Ariel yells at him, Katurian repeatedly flinches, trying to stay composed but obviously being intimidated by the shouting. He's sliding a couple of inches further away on his seat. Ariel steps close to him as Katurian lifts one hand to his face, as unsuspicious as possible but clearly showing his fear of the cop. He looks down and turns his head slightly to the side, he can't stop himself from trying to avoid being close, his fear is too great.
Ariel commands him to put his hand down and as Katurian reluctantly does as ordered, Ariel grabs him by the neck and brutally throws him to the floor, following, roughly holding the screaming Katurian down while wounding his face. Katurian does not fight back, he only tries to struggle out from under the cop. Tupolski calls Ariel away calmly and he lets go of Katurian who is still lying on the ground, breathing heavily while his right cheek and ear are bleeding. As if nothing had happened, Tupolski asks Katurian to take his seat again (2). Katurian is in pain, but mechanically he follows the order, keeping a wary eye on Ariel.
Tupolski and Ariel now concentrate on the story about "The little Apple Men" again and Katurian calms down a little bit while he's trying to explain the meaning of the story, the twist of the ending. This is his element, telling stories, they make him feel confident again because he knows that he is a good writer.
But the momentary repose is short, Katurian is back to his confused fearful state quickly as they start asking him about the Jew quarter. After he explains that he doesn't understand his being here, that he has nothing against Jews, against anybody and that he only passes through there on his way to pick up his brother from school, Ariel quite abruptly leaves the room, saying he's going to talk to his brother.
This only adds to Katurians confusion as he is sure his brother is at school. Tupolski smiles at this, obviously pleased with himself. He tells Katurian that his brother is just one door down. This triggers action. Katurian explains to Tupolski that his brother hasn't done anything, that he's easily scared and that he wouldn't understand why he was there. As he is talking to Tupolski he gets more and more wound up until at the end of his little speech he yells at Tupolski to fucking let his brother out right now.
Tupolski remains completely calm over this outburst, but Katurian knows that he's overstepped the boundaries. He lowers his head shocked and frightened, it's too late to take the words back. Tupolski's calm is successfully making Katurian feel uncomfortable and so he is quiet and subdued again.
The way Tupolski further questions Katurian adds to his uncertainty and when they discuss "The Three Gibbet Crossroads" he is being more and more insecure about his answers. Right at the beginning he was confident talking about his stories, sure about them and their meanings and twists, but here he starts questioning himself: "…there is nothing worse, is there? Than the two things it says." … "…is there?" And in the end it's Tupolski who starts explaining the story to the writer as he sees it. He calls the story a pointer and though Katurian doesn't quite understand, he agrees.
The detective's question about his best story brings the two to "The tale of the Town on the River." Tupolski tells Katurian to read the story to him. Katurian gets up from the chair, takes the story and wants to sit down again. In the midst of sitting down, he stops as he hears Tupolski say: "Standing." He stands up straight again: "This feels like school, somewhat." When Tupolski comments: "Except at school they didn't execute you at the end. Unless you went to a real rough fucking school", Katurian looks up from the paper, stunned, but since Tupolski says nothing more, Katurian begins reading.
During his reading it shows that he loves his story very much, paying attention to the details, the pronunciation, the emphasis on the right words. When he finishes, he insecurely looks at Tupolski, waiting for a reaction. As no comment comes, he puts the story back on the table and sits down. He starts explaining the story's twist to Tupolski when the detective takes out a small tin box and puts it on the table.
Just as Katurian asks what's in the box, he hears terrible screams from the background. He stands up, alarmed. "That's my brother." He demands answers from Tupolski who is completely indifferent. This only aggravates Katurian more, he's desperate, demanding answers from Ariel as he enters the stage again. Tupolski and Ariel ignore him and talk among themselves, Tupolski is mocking him and Katurian starts yelling, almost choking on the tears he tries to hold back. Ariel immediately picks up on that and provokes him some more. They yell at each other across the table while Tupolski stands in between them, from time to time telling Katurian to open the box.
At some point he gets through to him and Katurian opens the box, drops it back onto the table and hastily takes a couple of steps back. Shocked, he puts his hand before his mouth, disgustedly. "What are they?" Ariel runs over and grabs Katurian, he pins him to his seat again, brutally holding him in a headlock grip (3). Katurian breathes labouredly while trying to pull Ariel's arm from his throat. He gags and struggles more when Tupolski brings the toes that were in the box right in front of his face. When Katurian desperately exclaims that he 'just writes stories', Tupolski tells Ariel to make him swallow the toes.
Ariel wrestles Katurian to the ground, right in the front of the stage. Katurian has his back turned to the audience while Ariel kneels partly on partly beside him, trying to force the toes into Katurian's mouth. Katurian gags and chokes, writhes and makes sounds of distress, but before Ariel succeeds, Tupolski calls him off again, telling him NOT to make Katurian actually swallow the toes, to have some sense. Ariel is pissed off and lets go of the coughing Katurian, throws the toes to the floor and leaves the office.
Katurian heavily drags himself off the floor and sits on the chair. Exasperated and at the end of his patience, Katurian tells Tupolski that he will not say another fucking word until they let him see his brother, no matter if they torture him.
Tupolski only replies indifferently: "I see… I'd best go and get the electrodes then." He exits.
Katurian exhales a deep and shaky breath and lowers his head. The lights go out.
~*~*~*~
Music, a spotlight is turned on again, Katurian is alone. The detectives are gone, the table is gone. At the back of the stage, there is a projection of children's toys, a pig, a shooting star, a toy dog,… Katurian tells his story (4).
He walks around a bit on stage, looks at the audience, tells them about his childhood. When he comes to the conversation between little Katurian and his mother, he goes to sit sideways on the chair, drawing his legs up and sitting on them. The single spot light from the side of the stage illuminates one side of his face, while the other side is in the dark.
When he says "he axed through the door to find…" Katurian leaves the chair and goes to a column on the left side of the stage, with much force he turns it 180° and it reveals a bed on which his parents are sitting. The father has a goatee and is smoking a pipe, the mother (5), beautiful, wearing lots of jewellery and a pretty dress.
Katurian is sitting back down on his chair, telling about his parents experiment with his creativity that led to him winning a prize for a short story. After the parents applause they leave the room, turning the column 360°, leaving them behind in the dark and only the bed facing the stage.
Katurian continues telling the story, how the boy went back to the old house, walked around his old room, then entered the room of his brother. Katurian sits down on the bed, telling how the little Katurian found the corpse of his brother there, a story in his lifeless hand. Katurian looks at his hand as if reading the story, he is bitter at how much better this story is than anything he had ever written. Then he makes a gesture with his hand as if the story was falling to ashes though his fingers.
After covering the corpse of his brother back up, Katurian gets up and walks over to his chair.
He then tells us that this was the ending of Katurian Katurian's story "The Writer and the Writer's Brother" and that in real life, it was quite different and that Katurian found of course…
Here the music comes on really loud and the corpse suddenly sits up, breathing heavily. The audience is shocked, Katurian smiles enigmatically (6).
His brother was alive.
The parents enter the stage again and lie down on the floor to sleep. Katurian takes the pillow from his brothers bed and walks over to the parents. He stands over his father and bends down to press the pillow over his father's head. The father first struggles to free himself, but soon he stops moving. Katurian gets up and speaks looking at the audience as he moves over to his mother and – after she has seen her dead husband – he puts the pillow over her head and holds it down even though she screams and writhes under him. The light goes out and the screams are fading in the increasing loudness of the music.
~*~*~*~
As the light goes on again, we see Michal sitting cross-legged on a thin mattress, there is nothing but a pillow and he leans slightly against the column behind him. From the background, terrible screams are heard. They obviously distract and irritate Michal in telling a story and even though he knows it's Katurian's voice, he doesn't feel sad for him, even though knowing that his brother is being tortured he is incapable of quite understanding the meaning of that.
When Ariel brings Katurian to Michal's cell, Katurian is bleeding profusely down the front and back of his shirt, his face and feet are bloody and he's slumped in Ariel's grip, barely able to walk as Ariel drags him along and hurls him into the cell. Katurian falls to the floor and coughs up some blood. He is in pain and when he sees his brother, he crawls to him and holds on to his legs.
When Katurian makes Michal promise that he didn't kill the kids, he affectionately puts his hand on Michal's head, looking deep into his eyes. After that, the two settle down on the mattress, Katurian moving very slowly and carefully. They slouch against the column and sit there, barefoot, their legs comfortably on the mattress. As the two talk it becomes clear that Michal is thinking in the patterns of a small child, repeating what his brother says rather than coming up with ideas of his own. The love between the two brothers is shown in the way they touch each other, Katurian holds his hand over Michal's or sometimes lays a hand on Michal's thigh while they are talking. They sit closely together while Katurian is trying to understand what is going on and how the two of them could get out of the mess again.
How vulnerable Michal is shows in the moment when he teases Katurian saying he'd sign the confession with 'Katurian Katurian'. Not quite seriously, Katurian says: "I'm gonna beat the shit out of you", and Michal flinches just a bit and replies seriously: "Don't". Katurian draws him into an embrace then. Michal hugs him back which hurts Katurian and he withdraws from the embrace and skids away a little bit.
When Michal tells him about his 'itchy ass', Katurian smiles. He jokes about Michal continuing to tell him about it cause it's really keeping his spirits up, but Michal doesn't understand it's a joke, at first. It takes a while till he realises his brother isn't being serious and when he tells him "You can't have an ass keep your spirits up", Katurian can't help replying, "Depends on the ass", while a smile plays around his lips.
Michal wants to hear a story to distract him from his itchy ass and Katurian agrees on telling him the story of the Pillowman. Michal snuggles up to Katurian and Katurian puts an arm around his shoulders, telling the story to Michal as if he was telling it to a child.
With his gestures, Katurian emphasizes his story, showing just how tall the Pillowman was, touching Michal's arms, legs and body as he mentions them being pillows. And he shows with his fingers just how tiny the little white pillows for his teeth were. He wants to make his brother really like this and so he complies when Michal wants the Pillowman's head to be 'circular' rather than round. Michal wants him to 'do his mouth smiley like the Pillowman's mouth' and Katurian gives a big smile, showing all his teeth. Michal gently and reverently touches Katurian's lips and teeth and makes him smile even a little bit more. Then Michal tries the same smile, touching his own lips and teeth to see if he succeeds while Katurian watches him patiently, smiling warmly.
When he comes to the sad part of the Pillowman's difficult job, Michal says, "uh oh, here it comes", and Katurian hugs him tenderly and when he says "Hold on a minute" he says it into Michal's ear as if he were the Pillowman talking to a suicidal person.
Katurian shows Michal the size of the big gloopy tears the Pillowman would cry and for 'the knock on the door' he gently knocks on Michal's head, making him touch his head in surprise, then smile.
When Michal asks Katurian to skip to the end, Katurian is hurt and slides away from his brother a bit. But he soon forgives him, knowing it wasn't meant as an offence and so he tells the end of the story. When Michal throws in "I like this bit…", all is well again and Katurian lets Michal back into his embrace.
As Katurian sees how anxiously Michal hopes for the toy dog to be one that 'yaps', he says "yes" and smiles broadly at Michal's enthusiastic reaction.
After the story, Katurian smiles when Michal admits to not really getting the end, but he reacts firmly when Michal asks him whether the Pillowman went to heaven. Then a mischievous smile spreads on Katurian's face before he casually asks: "Is your itchy ass alright now?"
Mirth turns to disbelief and shock on Katurian's face as Michal starts telling him about hiding the toes of the little boy. He has a hard time believing that Michal has just lied to him about killing the kids. Michal does not really seem to be aware of having done something horrible, neither the lie nor the killings really seem to weigh heavily on his conscience.
Katurian is close to tears, keeping distance to his brother. He can't get through Michal's childish logic and make him understand just what he's done. Still Michal wants to comfort his crying brother, but Katurian backs away from him in disgust (7).
Michal even blames Katurian for making him kill the kids because he had read the stories to Michal. Katurian is horrified as he interrogates his brother and gradually finds out more. He scolds him like a little child, yells at him, calls him a sadistic retarded pervert and Michal gets progressively more defensive. Katurian is becoming aware of the severe consequences his inexperience in the upbringing of his brother has on their lives now.
After Katurian yelling at Michal to never having told him to butcher any kids, Michal is upset. "Butcher them?!" He doesn't see his murders as the violent act they are, he thinks there is a big difference and he enacts his impression of butchering someone before – as he did in his opinion – gently chopping the little boy's toes off with one well aimed strike and putting them aside neatly or putting little apple men with razor blades in them down a little girls throat and making her swallow them. In revulsion, Katurian is moving even further away, staring in horror at Michal's imitation of the murders.
Katurian is torn, he loves his brother, but he can't understand how it came to all this. He wants to push away all guilt, but he realizes that as much as he was unaware of this he is not completely innocent as now it is too late to talk to his brother about morals, about right and wrong, about fiction and real life.
When Michal is upset about Katurian seemingly worrying more about his stories than about their lives, he calls Katurian's stories 'just paper'. Katurian slowly comes closer and steps up behind Michal, an angry and determined look on his face (8). Suddenly he grabs Michal from behind and bangs his head on the floor once (9). As Michal is on the floor, screaming in pain and surprise, Katurian stands over him for a moment, rage clearly shown on his face, then he gets down to lean over his brother, grabs him by the hair and shouts at him that – had he the choice – he would have Michal burned first, then himself and his stories would be saved.
After this violent outburst, he lets go of Michal who disentangles himself from under his brother and disbelievingly accuses him of banging his head on the floor. "Yeah, I noticed that", is all that Katurian answers. He is still angry.
When Michal accuses Katurian to be just like mom and dad, he laughs in disbelief of being compared to them. Instead he tells Michal that his parents would be truly proud of him. Michal is so upset now that he starts shouting back at his brother, threatening to kill him if he doesn't stop saying these things, but his weak gesture of clenching his hand into a fist and Katurians calm and cold reaction show clearly that they both know it to be an empty threat. Michal is not a murderer in that sense.
Desperate and close to tears at his failure to make his brother understand the consequences of his actions, Katurian decides to find out more about the third kid. Michal is reluctant to tell, still upset about having been hurt by his brother, but also a bit scared that Katurian is going to be angry with him if he tells him. Katurian tries to reassure him and after thinking for a couple of seconds, Michal tells him he acted out 'The little Jesus'.
Katurian is stunned and silent. He looks down on the floor, slowly starts crying and through his tears asks: "Why that one?" Michal can't give him a satisfying answer and Katurian continues crying. Michal lays a hand on his shoulder but Katurian shrugs it off, then shouts at his brother again. He is desperate. Again saying that he hasn't done anything.
When Michal muses about going to heaven, Katurian gets sarcastic and mean, tells him he will end up in a house in a little forest, with mom and dad taking care of him in the way they'd always done and he – Katurian – wouldn't be there to save him cause he had never butchered any kids.
Michal is completely shocked. He says this to be the meanest thing he's ever heard. But Katurian does not even really pay attention to what he says, he's consumed by his own thoughts… then he adds as his voice breaks: "I used to love you so much." Tears run down his face. Michal is even more upset and for Katurian, all is said. He suggest waiting in silence for the execution.
Of course, Michal can't be silent for long and so the discussion starts again. Katurian learns that Michal has been snooping around his room, finding the story 'The Writer and the Writer's Brother' which upset him very much as – in the story – he dies. He doesn't understand Katurian who tries to explain to him that it's not about being dead or alive in the end but about what one leaves behind.
He tries to make Michal understand the importance of his stories, he says his stories are all he's got to which Michal innocently answers: "You've got me." Katurian only stares at him, then lowers his gaze.
After a while, Michal decides that he is tired and will sleep a little before being executed. He asks Katurian to tell him a story, like in the olden days, the good olden days. Katurian is bewildered at first, but then agrees and tells him to settle down.
Katurian idles around the cell as Michal makes himself comfortable, head on the pillow. Again, he tells the story as if to a little child and Michal much responds in that way, being all excited to hear his beloved story of the little green pig. Katurian chides Michal gently and lovingly for interrupting him by asking and commenting and slowly Michal gets more calm and sleepy. Katurian gradually lowers his voice , observing Michal who seems to be falling asleep. As he continues with the story, Katurian starts crying silently. His voice is choked and when he finishes he sits down on the mattress behind Michal and tenderly strokes his hair. After saying goodbye with tears streaming down his face, he gently holds his brother's head while he pulls the pillow from under him and places it on his face. As Michal starts jerking and making sounds under the pillow, Katurian holds him down forcefully until Michal does not move anymore. He takes the pillow off Michal's head and closes his eyes, then kisses him gently on the lips while he is crying. He closes his eyes for a moment. Then, he calls out for the detectives, wanting to confess to his crimes. The stage turns dark.
~*~*~*~
As the light is turned on again we find Katurian sitting at the desk, staring straight ahead at no one in particular. On the left of the stage, there is a little girl in a short white dress wearing a beard and sandals. Katurian starts telling this story, emotionally detached, as if reading the news on television.
While Katurian tells the story, the little girl and her parents are acting out what he describes (10).
During this story, Katurian is intensifying the girls' part by imitating some of her moves, like when she cries one single tear, he does the exact same hand gesture down from his eye as she does.
As the foster father beats and whips the girl, Katurian does not even flinch at the whipping and her horrible screams, but when he says "she bore it with a smile" he himself puts on a brave smile.
And when he tells of the blind man by the road that the girl wants to heal by mixing some spittle in the dust and rubbing it in his eyes, he too imitates the mixing and applying to the eyes motion of the girl.
When the mother places the crown of thorns on the girls head and when the father nails the girl to the cross (11), blood is splashing on the column in the back of the stage, and also in Katurian's direction when the father nails her feet (12).
The girl survives the night and is being laid down into a coffin and buried alive. Her foster parents mock her, telling her that she would rise again if she truly was Jesus. The girl thinks about this, then smiles to herself and whispers, "Exactly… exactly", while Katurian smiles with her and silently mouths 'exactly… exactly' with her. The light on the girl is being gradually dimmed as Katurian tells the last part of the story and as he comes to the end all of the stage is in darkness and only Katurians face is lit with a single spotlight.
The spot is getting smaller with each of his words when he says "…empty… empty… empty…" and with the word "…forest…" all is dark.
~*~*~*~
The next scene shows Katurian still sitting at the desk, writing away quickly at his confession while Tupolski sits to his right and Ariel – as often – paces the office impatiently as he's smoking. Katurian hands the first page to Tupolski who reads it aloud… and when he comes to the end of the page, Ariel gets impatient. He wants to read over Katurian's shoulder who defensively hunches over his page. Ariel smacks him upside the head, Katurian quickly sits up straight with an annoyed stare into the audience but then apologizes and continues writing.
Ariel reads the story 'The Little Jesus' while Katurian continues with his confession. Slowly, Ariel starts crying, Katurian quickly looks up from writing but just as quickly lowers his eyes back to the page before Ariel can react to that. He is still very afraid of him.
Ariel is surprised when he learns that Katurian has killed his mom and dad. Over this, the two of them finally start something that could be called a discussion rather than threats and shoutings. Though Katurian fears Ariel, he also admits to trusting him, saying that he can't really tell why, but there's something about Ariel. Ariel reacts badly to that, to him Katurian is a child murderer, someone he hates and despises with all his heart and the sympathy he might have felt for Katurian's childhood is quickly vanished again.
While Ariel explains his understanding of police work to Katurian, Katurian flinches away from him as Ariel grows more agitated again (13). In the end, Ariel brings out a huge battery with electrodes connected to it. He wants to torture Katurian again. As Katurian sees him bring in the battery he gets up from his chair, backing away a few steps, fear in his eyes, his body shaking slightly.
As Tupolski enters again, Katurian looks to him as if seeking help, but Tupolski doesn't care a bit and silently motions to him to follow Ariel's order and kneel down next to the battery. Hesitantly, Katurian obeys. As he kneels down, though, he asks Ariel who was the first to make him kneel down. This completely puts Ariel off his stroke. He freezes in his motion while Tupolski comments this with "ah, fuck!"
Tupolski and Ariel start arguing whether or not Ariel has told Katurian about his problem childhood. Katurian is still kneeling there, listening intently. Ariel tries to continue connecting Katurian to the electrodes, putting them on his fingers, two on the left, two on the right hand. Katurian is watching him. (14) In his work Ariel is unfortunately not only sabotaged by Tupolski commenting further on his problem childhood but also by Katurians insistent questions about what happened with his father.
Ariel quickly loses his temper, but though he slightly turns away from the menacing Ariel, Katurian does not back down from his questions. Ariel threatens him with the electrodes and tells him: "You shut your mouth also, pervert." Katurian just replies coldly: "Or what? You're going to torture and execute me?!" He knows where this will lead and he has nothing to lose.
Just when Ariel wants to turn the battery on – Katurian draws a deep breath and closes his eyes – at the very last moment Tupolski says that Ariel had murdered his father. Katurian looks up surprised as Ariel throws down the electrodes and strides to the back of the room. Shaking his head.
Another argument breaks out between Ariel and Tupolski, Katurian and the battery seem to be forgotten. As they continue their arguing, Tupolski tries to teach Ariel a lesson by questioning Katurian about the third girl. Katurian answers all his questions calmly, until he is being asked if the girl was still alive when they buried her. Katurian looks dumbfounded, draws in a breath, gets nervous. "W-What?" He needs time to think but can't come up with an answer. So he quietly admits that he doesn't know. Tupolski sends Ariel away to inform the search team that the girl might still be alive. Ariel storms off.
Tupolski steps up to the battery now and starts fiddling with the wires. He threateningly says: "How could you not know?" Katurian braces himself for the torture that is to come, but Tupolski steps away from the battery again, much to Katurian's relief.
Katurian is shocked and confused by the thought that the girl might be still alive, he tries to convince himself more than anyone else that the girl would have to be dead by now. But there is still some doubt left.
Tupolski takes his chair over to Katurian and sits down to tell him a story he once wrote (15). He motions for Katurian to disconnect the electrodes, grab a chair and sit opposite of him. Katurian immediately takes off the electrodes and sits down (16). After hearing the title Katurian makes a sour face and when Tupolski gives him permission to speak truthfully. Katurian works himself into a state of agitation as he explains to Tupolski just how impossible a title like this one is. Tupolski is hurt and quickly takes back his permission to be entirely truthful. Katurian just as quickly adepts to the changed situation and once again only says what the detective wants to hear.
While Tupolski slowly tells his story, remembering more details here and there, Katurian just sits and quietly listens to him (17). Only once he interrupts him and only then he smiles at Tupolski's witty answer.
When Tupolski is finished, Katurian admits that the story was "pretty good". Even though he's not supposed to make any more truthful remarks, Katurian – the writer in him – can't just let it be, he wants to give Tupolski literary advice.
Tupolski is angry (18) at this and threatens to burn Katurians stories which quickly makes him come around and tell Tupolski that his story was better than all of his stories and that he thanks him again for keeping his 'lesser' stories safe with his case file. This appeases the detective even though it's obvious that Katurian is being sarcastic.
There is a moment of calm between them, causing Tupolski to make a remark about it being a shame that they were so cosy and he would have to shoot Katurian in twenty minutes. Katurian looks down, reminded of his impending death. Tupolski then tells him that some of his stories are good, too. Quickly, Katurian grabs that straw and asks which ones. The Pillowman is one that Tupolski likes because it suggests that a child does not die alone. Katurian quickly draws the conclusion: "Did you lose a child?". He says this very gently, giving him a look of genuine sympathy as Tupolski admits to it.
After a moment of silence, Katurian asks what is going to happen to him. His insecurity is audible in his shaking voice, also he hands are slightly shaking when he asks if Tupolski is going to do it out of the blue.
Suddenly, Ariel enters again. He stops a moment, then goes straight to Katurian who tries to lean back in his chair, frightened. Ariel places a hand on Katurian's head and makes him look at him, even though Katurian fearfully tries to turn away and so only glances at him sideways. But Ariel is gentle with him as he stares at him, then releases him and tells Tupolski that they found the girl alive.
Katurian is shocked first, but when Ariel waves to the girl and she enters, waving hello to Katurian and Tupolski, painted all green from head to toe but clearly unhurt, Katurian starts smiling in relief. Ariel translates into sign language and with this makes the conversation possible between the girl and Tupolski. After establishing that she is happy and only wants to keep the piglets and go back to her mom and dad, the girl is leaving the stage again waving goodbye to the stunned men.
The attention now focuses on Katurian. Why did he confess to a murder that obviously hasn't happened? Katurian is confused, relieved, he admits not to know why the girl is alive, but he says he is glad she is. Ariel believes him and now his curiosity is aroused. He starts questioning Katurian and quickly finds out that he has only killed Michal and his parents, but no children. For Ariel, this changes everything. He sees Katurian in a different light now and takes his side.
Tupolski though is adamant, his pride is hurt by being lied to by Katurian and by Ariel actually discovering the truth, so he is determined to burn the stories and informs Katurian of this. Katurian feels miserable as he sees the only important thing in his world slip through his fingers, he pleads with Ariel to help him, but being the Number Two in this case, he can't do anything. His hand's are also tied because Katurian did not confess truthfully.
While Katurian and even Ariel are trying to convince Tupolski to change his mind, Tupolski just tells Katurian calmly to put on the hood while he starts a fire in the trash bin. Katurian is close to crying but he is as powerless as Ariel. He walks over to the place Tupolski wants to shoot him, kneels down, fingers the hood nervously and says his last words, which then are mocked by Tupolski's "Was being the operative word."
With a deep breath Katurian places the hood over his head. Ariel takes his shooting stance, aims and counts down. Just after FOUR he fires. Katurian falls to the floor, face down, feet to the front of the stage, not moving anymore.
Ariel argues with Tupolski that this wasn't nice, but Tupolski just asks him back what exactly there was nice about shooting a man on his knees with a bag on his head? He tells Ariel that they have cleared up that case and that's what counts, then he tells him to clean up the mess and burn the stories. Tupolski leaves the stage.
While Ariel is gathering the papers, suddenly the dead Katurian lifts his bloodied feet off the ground and stretches them (19). Slowly, Katurian gets up on his feet again and as he turns back to the audience, he takes off the hood and reveals his face, blood running down the side of it forming a wonderful contrast to his radiant blue eyes (20). Beautiful and eerie. He smiles and looks at the audience as he sits down in his chair again to tell the end of the story (21), with that same enigmatic smile he wore while he told the story of the little Katurian earlier in the play. Again the spotlight closes in on Katurian while he comes to the end of the play and when he finishes all fades to black.
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