Characters:
Ubu
Ma Ubu
Prosecutor
Supreme Judge
Setting: Poland
Time: Though the inspiration for this piece was written in 1896, the play may be set at any time. Or, as Alfred Jarry might have said, “no time.”
Note: This is a special Middlebrow — a short play I wrote, a fourth entry to Alfred Jarry’s Ubu Trilogy, currently being performed for free in Philadelphia.
(UBU and MA UBU sit together, facing Poland’s combined parliament [the audience] and in front of the SUPREME JUDGE and PROSECUTOR.)
UBU
What’s the point of being king if I have to sit here prosecuted by a prosecutor, Ma Ubu?
MA UBU
Persecutor, I’d call him, Pa Ubu.
PROSECUTOR
Mssr. Ubu…
UBU
Madame Lady Your Supreme Honor of the Judiciary… Before we inculcate this sham bamboozle of a fraud, I move the Prosecutor, in honor of his experience and honesty, and with deep respect for his role as an officer of the court and legislature, be executed for treason, forthwith, post-haste and without dillying. To help fructify the process, Ma Ubu and I will have his last meal back at the palace at six and you are cordially welcome.
MA UBU
We’ll toast his corpse with Mumm Champagne.
PROSECUTOR
Madame Lady Your Supreme Honor of the Judiciary, if you allow the deposed King of Poland to make light–
UBU
I am the rightful King of Poland! I wear the diadem!
MA UBU
I am the Queen of Poland! I sit with he who wears the diadem. And I taught him the word diadem. He was calling it “King Hat.”
UBU
I embody the hearts and dreams of the people of Poland. And who is in their hearts? Us. And who features in their happiest dreams? We do.
PROSECUTOR
The people dragged you both off the battlefield and would have disemboweled you had we not convinced them you should stand trial. Madame Your Supreme Honor, this trial is about society and whether it functions.
UBU
If it is society that is on trial, I move for it to be found guilty and severely punished.
SUPREME JUDGE
We will not put society on trial, Mr. Prosecutor. Let us be moved by facts alone. Summarize the charges, Mr. Prosecutor.
PROSECUTOR
Representing the people of Poland, we move that Ubu and his wife Ma Ubu murdered the rightful King of Poland, usurped the throne, raped the Treasury, robbed our women and sent the King’s son into Russian exile. This led to a disastrous war that only ended when the people rose up to end the short but bloody and thieverous rule of Ubu Roi and Ma Ubu.
SUPREME JUDGE
And for this the State asks?
PROSECUTOR
A sentence of death for Ubu and banishment for his wife.
UBU
That’s sexist.
MA UBU
If I may… I don’t think we raped the Treasury and robbed the women. Had to have been the other way round.
SUPREME
The court notes the error in the Prosecution’s charges. Now, Lord Ubu, your defense?
UBU
As a matter of practice, if you persecute and then execute Kings for the things they do as Kings, then nobody will want to be King. Then what will you have? Anarchy.
MA UBU
Blech.
PROSECUTOR
Madame Supreme Your Honor, let the record show that neither defendant denied any accusation in this case. They have only clarified who was raped and who was robbed, which is an admission of guilt. I move for summary judgment and sentencing.
UBU
Legal doublespeak! The Prosecutor makes an error and uses Ma Ubu’s correction as a confession? I move again that the Prosecutor, who I and Ma Ubu love and respect dearly, be summarily executed for treason.
PROSECUTORMadame Your Supreme Honor, please remind the Defendants that I am not on trial.
MA UBU
If we’re on trial, you should be on trial. Fair’s fair.
UBUThis is what’s wrong with society.
SUPREME JUDGE
Ubus, please either agree to the charges or mount a defense that doesn’t indicate your guilt.
UBU
What we did, we did for Poland. We should be venerated, not incarcerated. We love the magnificent people of Poland with all our hearts and biles.
PROSECUTOR
This is how you justify murdering the rightful King?
UBU
Madame Your Supreme Honor, do you know how that sleepy old curmudgeon became King? He was born to it. How is that rightful? If he could be born King then anyone could be. A potter, an archer, a beggar, a striver, a lunatic, a horseman, a software engineer, a lawyer, an arms dealer, a community activist, a castle builder. Pure anarchy.
MA UBU
Blech.
PROSECUTOR
We were a happy, largely functioning society before these regicidal maniacs showed up.
UBU
To each of you in the gallery, who hold power over our fates, I ask you to imagine yourselves as ourselves, the way we imagine ourselves as yourselves every day. I do not fear this Persecutor. A shadow gives me more fright than this man does. I do not fear the dark of night slamming shut over me like a coffin lid. For death is a bee that stings only once. I fear only for each and every one of you. For each of you could find yourselves where ourselves sit now. My defense is your defense. For if the diadem of Poland cannot protect me and dear Ma Ubu, who or what can protect any one of you from persecution by this highly regarded, qualified and thoroughly evil traitor to everything we stand for collectively?
MA UBU
All through my wild years, my mad existence, I kept my promise. Don’t keep your distance. Evita! Evita! Evita!
(A corresponding chant wells up softly from the Senate gallery. MA UBU stands and blows kisses.)
PROSECUTOR
You’re all being flummoxed by a pair of self-involved narcissists!
UBU
Objection, redundant. All narcissists are self-involved.
SUPREME JUDGE
Sustained.
MA UBU
Objection, the Prosecutor has repeated himself.
SUPREME JUDGE
Sustained.
PROSECUTOR
Forgive me, Madame Your Supreme Honor. There’s no great way for me to say this… Do you feel your rulings might betray some bias towards the accused?
SUPREME JUDGE
My rulings are… legal. In that they are rulings on matters of law.
MA UBU
You see it, just as Lord Ubu said… The Persecutor turned against the Supreme Judge, who represents the very law he claims to revere, just as he will someday turn against each and every one of you.
PROSECUTOR
I hopoe the ladies and gentlemen of the legislature who will ultimately decide this case understand that I obey the rule of law, not arbitrary whim. How can a society–
SUPREME JUDGE
Society is not on trial here.
PROSECUTOR
You seem beholden to these Ubus. Is it because they made you Supreme Judge?
MA UBU
You’re a treasonous snake who should be poisoned, boiled, quartered, beheaded and audited.
UBU
Respectfully.
SUPREME JUDGE
I will prove my objectivity and fair-mindedness by putting some questions to you, Mr. Prosecutor. To get you back on track, as it were.
PROSECUTOR
That’s very unusual.
SUPREME JUDGEFirst question. Why was the previously dispatched King, born into his role by mere cosmic lottery, a more legitimate King than Ubu, whom you suggest murdered his way to power?
PROSECUTOR
If we allow ascension via murder, then what sane person would want to be king? It would lead to anarchy. And to quote Ma Ubu: “Blech.”
UBU
Nonsense, I would still want to be King. Nobody would try to kill me. Who would kill King Ubu?
MA UBU
He’s trying to kill you and have me tossed out of the country.
PROSECUTOR
Everybody tried to kill you. The Russians. The people of Poland. The son of the rightful king. The ghost of the king, even. Everybody.
UBU
I… forgive them.
SUPREME JUDGELet the record celebrate the forgiving nature of King Ubu.
UBU
In fact, with the exception of the Prosecutor who is trying to kill me… I pardon everyone.
SUPREME JUDGELet the record reflect the mercy of King Ubu.
UBU
Yes, yes… everyone is forgiven. It was all a laugh. Everyone can have their taxes back for the year, too. Less expenses.
(A cheer rises from the gallery.)
PROSECUTOR
You conniving, scheming, manipulative– Don’t you all see what he’s doing?
MA UBU
You did it, King Ubu, my love.
SUPREME JUDGE
Let the record celebrate the adored royal couple, returners of our tax payments…
UBU
Less expenses.
SUPREME JUDGE
Let the record memorialize their love as an example to us all.
(Cheers.)
PROSECUTOR
When they were captured and put into prison, Ma Ubu herself brought me the testimony and evidence that led to most of the charges against the King. That is why his head is on the block and she only has to move to France.
UBU
Ma Ubu, how could you?
MA UBU
I was upset.
UBU
Because of my fiddle-e-dees with the Countess of Parimbibi?
MA UBU
She sinks in the well of Diana.
UBU
“The Well of Diana, in which maids did swim and whores were drowned.”
SUPREME JUDGE
How learn-ed. Let the record note that Ma Ubu reads poetry and that King Ubu gets her references.
PROSECUTOR
Now they sit together, playing the happy marrieds. They hate each other. Their marriage is much a bamboozle as his pardons. He pardons you? Really? For rising up for your freedoms? Are you all so happy to have your taxes back–
MA UBU
Less expenses.
PROSECUTOR
They took the money in the first place.
UBU
What a scold he is. What a placid, flaccid, boring marm of a man. You all would let him tell you what to do, how to think, how to judge your King? If I were you, I’d lock him up.
MA UBU
See how he likes justice. Lock him up.
UBU
Lock him up.
MA UBU
Lock him up.(The Senate slowly joins the chant. The Prosecutor retreats.)
UBU
Madame Your Supreme Honor, how long is this strangury of decency going to go on?
MA UBU
We have theater tickets.
SUPREME JUDGEYou all heard the senate. Guards, come for the persecutor. Lock him up. It’s the law.
UBU
Ma Ubu, we are indicated, as I indicated.
MA UBU
I don’t really want to go to the theater. I’d rather go to France.
UBU
As you will, Ma Ubu. As for me, I’m going to tabulate our expenses. And when you do go to France, if they need a King, wire me and I’ll rush to you with sword in hand.
-END-
Wow! Funny and chilling all at once. I believe I hear overtones of a present legal case in Florida, though you must have had this in development before the Trump indictment. It's discomfiting that the assigned judge in Florida seems to fit your dramatic prediction. Yikes. Great showcase of your literary versatility! You've managed a very delicate tone here.