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THE BROTHEL
MADAM:
THE
CHRISTIAN DEMOCRAT PARTY IN CHILE
by Dario Fo
translated
by Ed Emery
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reproduced or recorded in a retrieval system.
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written consent.
For performance rights, please contact:
ed.emery [@]
britishlibrary.net
Please be aware that this translation can only be performed with
explicit permission in writing from the agency representing Dario Fo and Franca
Rame, the Danese-Tolnay agency in Rome.
Original text copyright © Dario Fo
Translation copyright © Ed Emery
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
THE
BROTHEL MADAM:
THE
CHRISTIAN DEMOCRAT PARTY IN CHILE
by Dario
Fo
translated
by Ed Emery
Prologue
The
piece that follows was performed for the first time in 1973, in Sassari,
Sardinia, as part of our show People's
War in Chile, a few weeks after the Chilean coup. The next evening, Dario
was arrested and hauled off in handcuffs to the town jail. That tells you
something about the political climate in Italy, during those years. And now
that Chile is slowly, painfully, returning to a semblance of democratic life,
we thought it would be appropriate to perform this piece for you, just as I
performed it throughout that season of 1973-4 in hundreds of town squares all
over Italy.
[A drum kit stands centre stage: a bass drum
with a pedal, a smaller drum, a snare drum, and various cymbals.
A number of singers with guitars stand
at the back of the stage. They sing Chilean songs in low voices, as a backdrop
for the words spoken by the actress.
A woman enters – or rather, a lady. She
walks with difficulty, as if she has just been running hard. She is mumbling
indistinctly and panting like a dog. She stops, and looks around, in
desperation. She is crying. Before she begins speaking, the Chorus sings a
verse of a Chilean song, in low voices.]
I
can't bear it. It's terrible, unbelievable... People being slaughtered, beaten
to death... [She looks out over the
audience, as if following the course of a long river] There, there... a
corpse... two corpses... floating... It's horrible! Stop it! Stop it! What are
you doing? Brother against brother... Killing each other... Guns... Shooting...
[She sits at the drum kit, picks up a
drumstick and strikes one of the drums] Stop it! Enough of this killing...!
Peace! Pray, pray for peace! Listen to your heart, listen to the voice of the
Holy Father. [She imitates the voice of
the Pope. The Chorus sing, in the background] "My Chilean brothers, I
weep for you, for all of you... For those who have been killed, and for those who
did the killing! For the officers, especially, because they, more than anyone,
need the word of Christ's enlightenment! [The
song begins again. She plays a military drum-roll, as if for a firing squad]
But it was obvious, it was bound to end like this... This is where exaggerated
populist rhetoric leads you. That president... I told him: [She plays a drum break] "You'd
better go gently with some of these reforms!" [She plays the drums in a slow rhythm, using brushes] What about the
agrarian reform... Sure, that was in our programme too, the Christian
Democrats' programme, but it's one thing to have a programme of reforms, and
it's another to actually apply it! The true reformist doesn't put reforms into
action; he just promises them. Otherwise he becomes a revolutionary! That was
the big mistake of that lunatic Allende! But there you go, even his name was
enough to tell you where the man was going: in Chilean, Allende means
"beyond"! That's right, beyond the bounds, beyond moderation, beyond
reason, in other words, towards anarchy! It was bound to end up like this! Yes,
of course, we were partly responsible too... We supported some of the
expropriations, at the start, and even voted for them... But we were confused
because of the situation... I repeat, this whole situation is crazy! Look at my
fellow Christian Democrats in Italy: they voted through laws as much as twenty
years ago, and they've still not put
them into effect! That's what I call responsible government! But when people
start deciding they're going to do
things... positive action, new laws, changing things... Well, you can't expect
to get away with upsetting the media and the bourgeoisie! Some things have to
be paid for... And who pays for them? The poor devils, the workers and
peasants, who believed in it all, that's who. [At this point she speaks as if answering somebody's question]
"You
mean who you deceived! [She replies] Me...? Of course. It was my
fault too! It's true. I supported the Allende government. Only thirty-six per
cent of the votes for his Popular Unity government came from the Left. If I,
the Christian Democrat party, had not supported them, they would never have
come to power. When I asked Fanfani, Moro and Colombo, in Italy, they agreed
with me supporting the Popular Unity front.
"Your
boat is sinking," they said. "It's time to hand over the helm. For
the moment!"
So
we had to choose: either ally ourselves with the fascists, in order to make up
a government, which would mean dirtying our hands and losing credibility... Or support
the Left, and let the socialists and the communists run the country for a bit,
so that they carry the can for the
whole mess.
[After a double drumbeat, she falls to the
floor, dead. Then she picks herself up again, like a puppet come back to life.]
That's a lie! Who said that? Yes, I know, people accuse us of manoeuvring so as
to get the Americans to throttle the Chilean economy! They say that we moved
heaven and earth to stop the international banks giving any more credits to our
nationalised industries. Some bastard put round a rumour that our secretary,
Frei, actually went to Rome to see prime minister Rumor, to ask him to block
imports of industrial goods, and FIAT cars in particular, and that Agnelli
blocked them immediately and completely? I even hear people saying that we
organised strikes to paralyse the transport sector in Chile, and other
sectors... dirty, mafioso tactics... When I hear these vile, shameful
accusations, all I can say is... "Yes, it's true!" But what else
could we do? The situation was becoming intolerable. The workers were going too
far with the business of the nationalisation and socialisation of industry. I
mean to say, for God's sake! There are industries and industries! There are
those which can be nationalised. Must be nationalised, in fact, because
they're non-productive and on the edge of bankruptcy – so you hand them over to
the state, and get three times their effective value for them. But there are
also very profitable industries, belonging to individual American companies,
and to high-ups in the Christian Democrat party... us, in other words... and those mustn't be touched! These crazy
workers... they were going off and expropriating left, right and centre, with
out's even waiting for Parliament's say-so. And the same was happening with the
peasants! They needed land? So they went out looking for non-producing land,
and, without so much as a by-your-leave, they set up cooperatives... They'd
simply take a red flag and stick it up in the middle of a field! They even took
over a golf course and a hunting reserve! I ask you, can this be allowed? [The song continues in the background]
The government was in a dilemma: either it went along with the expropriations,
or it would find itself with thousands, hundreds of thousands, of angry workers
and peasants against it. There was an amazing consumption of bits of red cloth
in this period! Vermilion, scarlet, carmine, cadmium, geranium, every kind of
red... Linen, cotton, silk, artificial silk, nylon, you name it! They didn't bother
with land deeds any more – all they needed was their red flags! [She strikes one of the drums] As you
went round the suburbs, every day there seemed to be a different factory with a
red flag flying. I even saw a church in the slum area of Santiago with a red
flag flying from the roof! You can't allow that sort of thing! They were going
too far! And as we know, red attracts red... And this time the red was blood! [As she bangs her hand on the table, she
knocks over a pot containing red paint] Because the military don't mess
about when it comes to restoring order. As some general once said: "What I
call order is a tidy row of white crosses in a graveyard!"
And
then the sale of black cloth began... [She
notices the red paint on her fingers] Yards and yards of the stuff... [She
tries to clean her hand with a rag] Whose stupid idea was it to put this
paint on the table? I know. Somebody's trying to make a cheap point about the
Christian Democracy having blood on its hands? Well, let me tell you, this is
no time for jokes! [She rattles out the
sound of machine-gun fire on the drums. The lights change with every rattle.
The Chorus begins to sing quietly; a sad song. She changes character]
"My son... My husband... Let me see them... They're there, in the stadium,
along with seven thousand others... I heard shooting last night... somebody
told me that people were being executed! Let me see them..." [She resumes the character of the Christian
Democrat party] Don't you think that I suffer for these poor women... Suffer
with them...? Because I am them...! I
am the people... We Christian Democrats are the heart of the people! [A beat on the drum] Ha, ha... That
sounded good, didn't it! Heavens... I was almost believing it myself! Sure, it
was a terrible massacre. But didn't I warn Allende? "Watch out, Allende,
because things are going too far!" Yes, of course, I did, and at the same
time I was busy digging his grave! And who's denying it?
And
anyway, we know the story: if I hadn't given the word, the military would never
have moved!
Two
nights before the coup, there was a vote taken at the Christian Democrat party
headquarters in Santiago. Result: thirty-seven in favour of a coup d'etat, ten
abstentions, and eleven against. Yes, it was us who decided on the coup. I voted for it! I wanted it! You see how candid I am! You don't really
think that eighty thousand armed men would have moved if they didn't have a
political consensus behind them, do you...? And the support of an entire social
class, in other words, in our case, the upper and middle bourgeoisie? [A sharp drumbeat] What was that? A shot?
Have they started shooting again? [Another
sharp drumbeat] Sounded like a shoot-out... Oh no... it was an execution...
Just as well... Single shots? Sinpers. How I hate those snipers! The last
desperate fling of suicidal terrorists... They know their cause is hopeless.,..
there's only a few of them... they're poorly armed... and they're isolated!
At
least, that's what our guerrilla warfare experts tell us... No, I don't mean
guerrillas... where are you going to find guerrillas in our country? I'm
talking about theoreticians, researchers, specialists in urban guerrilla
warfare... These researchers tell us that the Andes are quite unsuitable for
guerrilla warfare. They're too rugged. Too cold, too, in the South... You'd
freeze to death up there. The central part of the Andes is more reasonable, but
it's only a small area, easily controllable by a well-equipped modern army like
ours. What's more, sociological studies have shown that the peasant population
of those provinces is not at all inclined to collaborate with rebels. They are
a peaceful, submissive people. Simple, you might say. [The Chorus begins the song El Pueblo Unido] What was that bang? Eh?
An explosion? Where? Casentas? Where is Casentas?! In the South?! The frozen
South?! What's going on? A rebellion, you say? How many of them? Six...? Six
what...? Six hundred...? Six thousand!! Impossible! Technically impossible!!
Six thousand people is the entire peasant population of the area! They're all
peasants, you say? And they're armed...? Who armed them? What do you mean, you
don't know?! The carabinieri?! The peasants seized the barracks, and the guns
were in the barracks?! The carabinieri's guns? So why do you give guns to carabinieri
if they're going to let them be stolen?! [A
loud crash] But that sounds like artillery fire... [Reassuring herself] Or maybe it was thunder... [She is frightened] A bomb? But where? In
Santiago!! For God's sake! Now the soldiers are bound to get nervous, and
react: tatatata... in the stadium! [She
is worried, and tearful]. But what is the Holy Father doing... the Pope?
"My brothers..." Is he going to recognise...? [Relieved] The Pope has recognised the military government! Of
course this fact will help save lives... We should forget politics and think of
saving lives. Anyway, things are going well... The Americans are supporting us,
and funding us too... And France, Britain and Germany... Everybody has
recognised our military government. Italy not yet, for all that Piccoli and
Fanfani are raring to go! [A drum roll]
Ah, if only something like this could be pulled off in Italy!
Listen
how quiet and peaceful everything is! A deathly silence, you might say!
Everything
is under control. The party's over. Order has been restored. What's that mess
of bodies there? Get rid of them at once. And fish out those bodies floating in
the river.
The
president of the United States has said that he's coming to visit us.
What's
that you say – he's not coming? He says he doesn't want to compromise
himself... He "can't get involved with a coup d'état"? You really mean that not one single foreign head
of state is coming to visit us? Not one? Not even the Italian Christian
Democrats?
The
Pope has promised, though... The Pope says he's going to come.
Now
the Americans are going to have to come out in the open.
They
won't? In fact they're distancing themselves?They say that we're not good
business for them. We've not been a good investment. They're fed up with
lending us money.
The
rats, they're cutting our funds!
We
Christian Democrats have always said that it was dangerous to get involved with
certain people. The military have never understood economics.
We're
almost bankrupt. Batten down the hatches. Down with tyranny! Long live
democracy! What we need here is a democratic patriotic front... To oppose the
military. Anyone who's in favour, come over here, under my petticoats. There's
room enough for everyone!
No,
not communists, though... I have my reputation to think of.
We
want free elections... Down with tyranny!
What?
The Pope is coming to embrace the tyrant? Oh God, what a gaffe... He must be
crazy! He'll ruin everything for us! Down with the Pope!
Blackout.
Ends
[Excerpted
from Guerra di popolo in Cile [“People's
War in Chile”], Palazzina Liberty, Milan, 18 June 1973.]