Script

ACT [1] (AT RISE:  THIS WORK IS TO BE DONE AS A READING, SO THE STAGE CAN BE BARREN OF ALL BUT LECTERNS WITH LIGHTS (IF DECIDED UPON).  THE FIRST OPENING SONGS SHOULD BE DONE IN FRONT OF THE CURTAIN, IF POSSIBLE.  AT THE END OF “JOHNNY, I HARDLY KNEW YE” THE CURTAIN OPENS REVEALING THE READERS.  NARRATOR, LOCATED DOWNSTAGE LEFT OR RIGHT BEGINS THE READINGS.  ACTUAL STAGING THROUGHOUT CAN BE AT THE DIRECTOR’S DISCRETION.

CHORUS (if possible)
Johnny, get your gun, get your gun, get your gun.
Take it on the run, on the run, on the run.

CUT TO:
When Johnny come marching home again, hurrah, hurrah
We’ll give him a hearty welcome then, hurrah, hurrah
The men will cheer, the boys will shout, the ladies they will all turn out,
And we’ll all be gay when johnny comes marchin’ home.)

NARRATOR
Stirring song, eh?  But it is not the only version.  There is also an Irish lament; goes like this:

NARRATOR
While goin’ the road to sweet Athy, huroo, huroo,
While going’ the road to sweet Athy, Hurroo, hurroo,
While goin’ the road to sweet Athy,
A stick in me hand and a drop in me eye,
A doleful damsel I heard cry,

(READER/SINGER TAKES THE NEXT LINE WITH NARRATOR;NARRATOR FADES OUT SINGING)
“Johnny I hardly knew ye.”

READER/SINGER
With yer guns an drums and drums and guns, hurroo, hurroo
With yer guns and drums and drums and guns, Hurroo, Hurroo,
With yer guns and drums and drums and guns,
The enemy nearly slew ye. Oh my darlin’ dear, ye look so queer
Johnny, I hardly knew ye.

Where are yer eyes that were so mild, hurroo, hurroo,
Where are yer eyes that were so mild, hurroo, hurroo,
Where are yer eyes that were so mild, when my heart ye so beguiled,
Oh, why did ye run from me and the child,
Johnny, I hardly knew ye.

And where are yer legs that used to run, hurroo, hurroo,
Where are yer legs that used to run, hurroo, hurroo,
Where are yer legs that used to run, when ye went for to carry a gun,
Indeed yer dancin’ days are done,
Oh, Johnny I hardly knew ye.

Ye haven’t an arm and ye haven’t a leg, hurroo, hurroo,
Ye haven’t an arm and ye haven’t a leg, hurroo, hurroo,
Ye haven’t an arm and ye haven’t a leg,
Ye’re an eyeless, boneless, chickenless egg,
And ye have to be put with a bowl out to beg,
Johnny, I hardly knew ye.

They’re rollin’ out the guns again, hurroo, hurroo,
They’re rollin’ out the guns again, hurroo, hurroo,
They’re rollin’ out the guns again,
but they never will take our sons again,
No they never will take our sons again,
Johnny I’m swearin’ to ye.

NARRATOR:
Screenwriter and novelist Dalton Trumbo wrote what is considered by many to be the most shocking and effective anti-war novel ever written: “Johnny Got His Gun” published in 1939. It’s about a WW I soldier who awakes in a hospital and slowly realizes that he’s lost just about all of his body: no arms, no legs, no eyes, no jaw or larynx — he cannot speak — and he’s also deaf.  He is effectively cut off from humanity and the world. In 1970 Trumbo wrote an addendum to the introduction to the novel. Mr. Trumbo:

READER
Numbers have dehumanized us.  Over breakfast coffee we read of 40,000 american dead in vietnam.  Instead of vomiting, we reach for the toast.  An equation:  40,000 dead young men equals 3000 tons of bone and flesh, 124,000 pounds of brain matter, 50,000 gallons of blood, 1,840,000 years of life that will never be lived, 100,000 children who will never be born. Do we scream in the night when it touches our dreams?  No.  We don’t dream about it because we don’t think about it; we don’t think about it because we don’t care about it.  We are much more interested in law and order, so that American streets may be made safe while we transform those of Vietnam into flowing sewers of blood which we replenish each year by forcing our sons to choose between a prison cell here or a coffin there.  If the dead mean nothing to us, what of our 300,000 wounded?  Does anyone know where they are?  how they feel?  How many arms, legs, ears, noses, mouths, faces, penises they’ve lost?  How many are deaf or dumb or blind or all three?  How many are single or double or triple or quadruple amputees?  How many will remain immobile for the rest of their days?  How many hang on as decerebrated vegetables quietly breathing their lives away in small, dark, secret rooms?  In the words of a researcher for one of the national television networks, “The military itself, while sure of how many tons of bombs it has dropped, is unsure of how many legs and arms its men have lost.” Senator Cranston of California concludes that out of every hundred army veterans receiving compensation for wounds received in action in vietnam, 12.4% are totally disabled.  Totally!  But exactly how many of the dead-while-living does that give us?  We don’t know.  We don’t ask.  So long, losers.  God bless.  Take care.  We’ll be seeing you.

NARRATOR:
Ron Kovic served in Vietnam; took a bullet in his spine and is now (and forever) paraplegic, paralyzed from the mid-chest down.  You may be familiar with Kovic’s memoir, “Born on the 4th of July,” published in 1976 — 35 years ago.  Mr. Kovic:

READER:

For us in 1968 it was the Bronx Veterans’ Hospital paraplegic ward. The wards are filthy. The men in my room throw their bread crumbs under the radiator to keep the rats from chewing on our numb legs during the nights. We tuck our bodies in with the sheets wrapped around us. The most severely injured are totally dependent on the aides to turn them. They suffer the most and break down with sores. These are the voices that can be heard screaming in the night for help that never comes. The sheets are never changed enough and many of the men stink from not being properly bathed. It never makes sense to us how the government can keep asking for money for weapons and leave us lying in our own filth.

NARRATOR:

There was an anti-Iraq War rally in Albany a few years ago and one speaker had been told by a Veterans’ Hospital care worker how every morning, when he went to work, horribly wounded soldiers would beg him to kill them.