The Two Faces of Blanche

The Two Faces of Blanche

The Hidden Side

Blanche:

Virgo is the Virgin.

Stanley:

Well, this somebody named Shaw is under the impression he met you in Laurel, but I figure he must have got you mixed up with some other party because this other party is someone he met at a hotel called the Flamingo.

Blanche:

I’m afraid he does have me mixed up with this “other party.” The Hotel Flamingo is not the sort of establishment I would dare to be seen in!

Blanche:

Eureka! Honey, you open the door while I take a last look at the sky. I’m looking for the Pleiades, the Seven Sisters, but these girls are not out tonight. Oh, yes they are, there they are! God bless them! All in a bunch going home from their little bridge party…. Y’get the door open? Good boy! I guess you – want to go now….

Mitch:

Can I – uh – kiss you – goodnight?

Blanche:

Why do you always ask me if you may?

Mitch:

I don’t know whether you want me to or not.

Blanche:

Why should you be so doubtful?

Mitch:

That night when we parked by the lake and I kissed you, you –

Blanche:

Honey, it wasn’t the kiss I objected to. I liked the kiss very much. It was the other little – familiarity – that I – felt obliged to – discourage…. I didn’t resent it! Not a bit in the world! In fact, I was somewhat flattered that you – desired me! But, honey, you know as well as I do that a single girl, a girl alone in the world, has got to keep a firm hold on her emotions or she’ll be lost!

Blanche:

I want you to have a drink! You have been so anxious and solemn all evening, and so have I; we have both been anxious and solemn and now for these few last remaining moments of our lives together – I want to create – joi de vivre! I’m lighting a candle.

Mitch:

That’s good.

Blanche:

We are going to be very Bohemian. We are going to pretend that we are sitting in a little artists’ café on the Left Bank in Paris! [she lights a candle stub and puts it in a bottle] Je suis la Dame aux Camellias! Vous etes – Armand! Understand French?

Blanche has a duel Personality

Blanche's complexity revolves around presentation of one personality and the hiding of another.

Young Man:

I’m collecting for The Evening Star.

Blanche:

I didn’t know that stars took up collections.

Young Man:

It’s the paper.

Blanche:

I know, I was joking – feebly! Will you – have a drink?

Young Man:

No, ma’am. No, thank you. I can’t drink on the job.

Blanche:

Hey! Could you give me a light?

Young Man:

Sure. [with lighter] This doesn’t always work.

Blanche:

It’s temperamental? Ah! – thank you. [he starts to go again] Hey! Uh – what time is it?

Young Man:

Fifteen of seven ma’am.

Blanche:

So late? Don’t you just love these long rainy afternoons in New Orleans when an hour isn’t just an hour – but a little piece of eternity dropped into your hands – and who knows what to do with it? [she ouches him] You – uh – didn’t get wet in the rain?

Blanche:

You make my mouth water.

Young Man:

Well, I’d better be going –

Blanche:

Young man! Young man! Young, young, young man! Has anyone ever told you that you look like a young Prince out of the Arabian Nights? Well, you do, honey lamb! Come here. I want to kiss you, just once, softly and sweetly on your mouth! [she crosses to him and presses her lips to his] Now run along, now, quickly! It would be nice to keep you, but I’ve got to be good – and keep my hands off children.

Blanche:

Honey, there was – a good deal of talk in Laurel.

Stella:

About you, Blanche?

Blanche:

I wasn’t so good the last two years or so, after Belle Reve had started to slip through my fingers…I never was hard or self-sufficient enough. When people are soft – soft people have got to shimmer and glow – they’ve got to put on soft colors, the colors of butterfly wings, and put a – paper lantern over the light…. It isn’t enough to be soft. You’ve got to be soft and attractive. And I – I’m fading now! I don’t know how much longer I can turn the trick.

Blanche:

I said unhand me, sir. [he embraces her.] Now, Mitch. Just because Stanley and Stella aren’t at home is no reason why you shouldn’t behave like a gentleman.

Mitch:

Just give me a slap whenever I step out of bounds.

Blanche:

That won’t be necessary. You’re a natural gentleman, one of the very few that are left in the world. I don’t want you to think that I am sever and old maid school-teacher-ish or anything like that. It’s just that – well –

Mitch:

Huh?

Blanche:

I guess it is just that I have – old-fashioned ideals!

The Exposed Side

Blanche:

Mitch is coming at seven. I guess I am just feeling nervous about our relations. He hasn’t gotten a thing but a goodnight kiss, that’s all I have given him, Stella. I want his respect. And men don’t want anything they get too easy. But on the other hand men lose interest quickly. Especially when the girl is over – thirty. They think a girl over thirty ought to – the vulgar term is – ‘put out.’….. And I – I’m not “putting out.” Of course he – he doesn’t know – I mean I haven’t informed him – of my real age!

Stella:

Why are you sensitive about your age?

Blanche:

Because of hard knocks my vanity’s been given. What I mean is – he thinks I’m sort of – prim and proper, you know. I want to deceive him enough to make him – want me…