The Picture of Dorian Gray - Den Jyske Opera

Alasdair
Middletons
libretto til
operaen
The Picture
of Dorian
Gray
Opera med musik af
Thomas Agerfeldt
Olesen.
Opføres som opera
22.-28. august 2013
på Den Jyske Opera
Copyright Den Jyske Opera

THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY
CAST
LORD HENRY WOTTON
BASIL HALLWARD
DORIAN GRAY
A BUTLER
MRS VANE
SYBIL VANE
JAMES VANE
AN OLD WOMAN WHO SELLS OPIUM
A PROSTITUTE
THE DUCHESS OF MONMOUTH
TWO SERVANTS
1

ACT ONE
SCENE ONE;
IN BASIL HALLWARD’S STUDIO. LORD HENRY WOTTON AND BASIL
HALLWARD STANDING IN FRONT OF AN UNFINISHED PORTRAIT.
LORD HARRY
What’s his name?
BASIL
Dorian Gray,
His name is Dorian Gray.
LORD HARRY
Dorian Gray.
BASIL
I had told myself I would keep his name a secret.
LORD HARRY
A secret, why?
BASIL
I have grown to love secrecy.
I want him wholly to belong to me.
I say his name and give away a part
Of him which I would lock inside my heart.
To say his name is to let something I love die.
You must think I have gone mad.
LORD HARRY
No, not at all.
I am a married man.
Secrecy is the foundation stone of a happy marriage.
But I can see the effect he has had upon your work – and you.
This is your masterpiece. When will you exhibit it?
BASIL
I will never exhibit it.
There is too much of myself in it.
LORD HARRY
Too much of yourself?
This beautiful young man?
I had not thought you so vain.
2

BASIL
I am not being vain – but I say again;
I will never exhibit it..
There is too much of myself in this picture.
In every portrait,
It is the artist not the sitter that is painted,
And in this picture I’ve revealed my soul.
I would not have it tainted,
Have my soul displayed
Before the public.
I suppose I’m too afraid
Of all the things that they might think or say.
I don’t want to give my soul away.
This picture is my soul!
And they must never know it.
It is my soul.
So -
I must never show it.
LORD HARRY
Those who look beneath the surface do so at their peril.
Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without charm.
Where did you meet this charming, beautiful thing?
BASIL
At Lady Brandon’s.
Our eyes met -
And it was as though
I already I knew
All the exquisite sorrow or exquisite joy
I would find in the face of that beautiful boy.
I turned to go
But his eyes held my heart,
My soul, my Art,
And there was nothing I could do.
I was afraid,
I tried to leave,
I looked at him again –
And stayed.
LORD HARRY
It is quite a romance.
A romance of Art, one might say.
And Dorian Gray?
Does he care for you too?
3

BASIL
I dare say he likes me.
But now and again
He seems to delight in giving me pain.
Then I feel I have given my soul away,
Like a flower he will wear in his coat, as an ornament for a Summer’s day.
LORD HARRY
Summer days are apt to linger.
And you will tire of him long before he tires of you.
It is true.
Art lasts longer than Beauty
And has, by far, the harder heart.
One day,
His colouring will seem wrong;
His eyes a touch too small;
His nose a shade too long;
One day you’ll look into his face
And see the merely commonplace.
He’ll be no longer your ideal -
He will be the merely real.
You will wonder what it was you saw;
Then more and more
You’ll find him not a Beauty but a Bore.
BASIL
Harry!
As long as I live the personality
Of Dorian Gray will dominate me.
You cannot feel what I feel.
You change too often.
SIR HARRY
My dear Basil - that is exactly why I can feel it.
Those who are faithful know only love’s triviality:
It is the faithless who know love’s tragedy.
BASIL
That’s as maybe,
But
I must get on with my work.
I must finish the painting.
4

SIR HARRY
Yes, you must finish your painting.
You must finish your picture of Dorian Gray.
When, by the way, shall I meet him?
BASIL
Never.
SIR HARRY
Never?
BASIL
I have grown to love secrecy
And you are a bad influence.
SIR HARRY
A bad influence?
Me?
(ENTER A BUTLER)
BUTLER
Mr Dorian Gray is here, sir.
SIR HARRY
Now I must meet him.
It can’t be helped.
BASIL
It can’t be helped.
(ENTER DORIAN GRAY)
BASIL
This is Dorian Gray.
Dorian Gray –
Lord Henry Wotton.
DORIAN
Lord Henry.
LORD HARRY
Call me Harry, Mr Gray. Basil does.
DORIAN
Call me Dorian, Harry. Basil does.
5

LORD HARRY
Dorian
DORIAN
Harry.
BASIL
Now we are all good friends –
But
Harry, I want to finish this picture today
Would you think it awfully rude if I asked you to leave.
LORD HARRY
Must I go, Dorian?
DORIAN
No. Please stay.
LORD HARRY
You don’t really mind, Basil, do you?
You like your sitters to have someone to chat to.
BASIL
If Dorian wishes it, it must be so.
Dorian’s whims are laws, you know.
DORIAN
So that’s settled. Harry stays
BASIL
But pay no attention to a word he says.
He’s a bad influence.
LORD HARRY
A terrible influence.
DORIAN
A terrible influence – is that true?
LORD HARRY
There is no such thing as a good influence.
All influence is immoral – from a scientific point of view.
DORIAN
How so?
6

LORD HARRY
If we yield to ‘a bad influence’,
If we follow ‘good advice’,
Then we glow with another man’s virtue,
We burn with a borrowed vice.
But if one realised one’s nature perfectly –
And became one’s self alone-
Then our virtues would become us
And our vices would be, at least, our own.
BASIL
Lift your head a little higher, Dorian.
LORD HARRY
To live life fully and completely,
To give form to what we feel,
To act upon each slight desire,
To make each day dream real,
Is what we were put on Earth for -
But man smothers his own flame,
And shudders at his own desire
And shrinks in guilt and shame.
BASIL
Don’t bite your lip, Dorian.
LORD HARRY
Each impulse we strive to strangle
Rots and poisons the mind.
But action is purification-
Having sinned, we can leave sin behind.
Then nothing is left but remembrance
Or the luxury of regret
The only way out of temptation
Is to yield to it.
DORIAN
Words.
Mere words.
BASIL
Don’t frown, Dorian.
LORD HARRY
No, Dorian, don’t frown.
It quite spoils your beauty.
7

DORIAN
What can that possibly matter?
LORD HARRY
Beauty is a sort of Genius.
Indeed, the highest sort.
For Beauty requires no explanation.
Beauty requires no thought.
Beauty cannot be questioned.
Who would question the moon on the sea?
Beauty confers on those that possess it
The divine right of sovereignty.
DORIAN
I cannot tell whether you are serious or not.
Should I take your words to heart?
Or should I merely smile?
LORD HARRY
Smile, smile
While you may.
Too soon you will wither,
Your beauty decay,
Will you smile then?
When the flower’s freshness withers -
Next Spring it returns
But Youth returns never
Human Beauty lost is Beauty lost forever.
The sullen sun of Time
Scorches and burns
Your looks away.
Scarred by Time’s hate
You will realise, too late,
That you forgot to live,
You did not pluck the fruit that Life could give.
We forget - but Time does not
Our limbs fail, our senses rot
Mocked by the power we had but were afraid to wield.
Tormented by temptations to which we would not yield,
We stumble –nothing worth saving, nothing left to save-
To a bleak and ugly grave.
Time does not forgive.
So live!
What will you snatch from Time?
What Joy, what Rapture, what Sin, what Crime?
Snatch something from Time, somehow
8

LORD HARRY (cont)
Live! Live Now!
A country of wonders lies before you,
Your Beauty makes you King!
Youth and Beauty!
They are everything!
DORIAN
To snatch something from Time somehow.
It’s like I haven’t lived till now.
BASIL
There!
It is quite finished.
LORD HARRY
Basil, it is your masterpiece.
Dorian, come and look at yourself.
DORIAN
Is it really finished?
BASIL
Quite finished.
BASIL.
One afternoon in June
You looked like this.
The sunlight fell on the carpet –so.
The flower trembled at the bee’s kiss.
In years to come, when we are bone
And time has forgotten your name
They will know
This same afternoon in June,
When the sunlight fell on the carpet.
The flower trembled at the bee’s kiss
And you looked like this.
DORIAN
Oh Basil, what have you done?
BASIL
Don’t you like it?
LORD HARRY
How can he not like it?
9

DORIAN
Like it?
Do I really look like this?
I wish……………..
No,
I pray
That I could remain forever
As that painting looks to day;
That age would wither it, not me;
That it would feel Time’s blight
But I would stay forever so beautiful and bright.
The seconds slide to minutes and soon the hour will chime,
And the beauty you call potent is the abject slave of Time.
If Time would only let me
Keep such perfect beauty whole;
If Time would just forget me-
I would give my very soul.
BASIL
When the Gods wish to punish us, Dorian, they answer our prayers.
SIR HARRY
There is no such thing as an answered prayer.
And were the wish to come true,
It would be rather hard lines on your work and you.
BASIL
I should object very strongly.
DORIAN
I believe you would.
You care less for your friends than you do for Art
I know I mean no more to you
Than your marble faun or your miniatures do.
How long will I keep my place in your heart?
Till my first wrinkle? Will you be so ardent then?
When I grow older
You’ll grow indifferent - you know you will,
But you will love this picture still.
Lord Harry spoke the truth;
Nothing is worth more than Youth.
When I lose that then let me die.
BASIL
Dorian, you surely can not be jealous of material things.
10

DORIAN
I am jealous of everything Time does not touch!
The minutes fly by
And already I am older than the figure in this painting is.
Much consolation will it ever bring me!
I can’t see its beauty – just its mockery
‘I will never age’ it jeers- so why must I?
Why can’t it wither, wrinkle and die
Instead of me?
BASIL
This is your doing, Harry.
LORD HARRY
No- This is the real Dorian Gray.
BASIL (lifting a palette knife)
I won’t let a thing of mere canvas and colour
Break my best friend’s heart.
You are dearer to me than this painting is.
Together, let’s rip it apart.
LORD HARRY
Basil! No!
DORIAN
No, Basil! It would be murder!
BASIL
I am glad you appreciate my work at last.
DORIAN
Appreciate it? I am in love with it. It is my Self.
LORD HARRY
I am in love with it too.
I will give anything you like for it.
I must have it.
BASIL
It is not mine.
It belongs to Dorian.
It is himself.
LORD HARRY
Dorian is fortunate.
11

BASIL (to DORIAN)
As soon as you are dry, you shall be varnished and sent home.
Then you can do what you like with yourself.
LORD HARRY
What an interesting afternoon!
My hansom is outside.
Shall we take a turn in the park?
DORIAN
I should like that.
LORD HARRY
Basil?
BASIL
I shall stay here with real Dorian.
DORIAN
Is it the real Dorian?
Am I really like that?
BASIL
Yes, you are just like that.
LORD HARRY
Come along, Dorian.
Goodbye, Basil, I will see you soon.
What an interesting afternoon!
(EXIT LORD HARRY and DORIAN)
BASIL
One afternoon in June,
You looked like this.
In years to come and we are bone,
They will see and say
This is what it was that Summer’s day.
This is who he was- Dorian Gray.
12

SCENE 2. SYBIL’S DRESSING ROOM. SYBIL and JAMES.
MRS VANE
What’s his name?
SYBIL
I don’t know.
Romeo.
MRS VANE
You don’t know his name? That’s alarming!
SYBIL
Prince Charming.
I call him Prince Charming.
MRS VANE
Prince? Is he rich?
So he buys you some flowers.
If he is rich, don’t sell yourself cheap.
Flowers live a few hours.
Flowers rot.
Money does not.
Flowers! I’ve had plenty of flowers and they don’t mean a thing!
Jewels! Let him buy you a necklace, a bracelet – hold out for a ring!
Flowers and Promises, Love and Fine words in a moment are gone.
Money lives on!
When all of his Flowers and Promises, Love and Fine words are a thing of the past –
Jewels last.
SYBIL
I don’t want jewels or flowers.
I don’t want what money can buy.
Rich? Why I think myself rich with all he has given me.
MRS VANE
Why? What has he given you.
SYBIL
Happiness, mother, and love.
MRS VANE
Love!
Now Mr Isaacs – all that Mr Isaacs has given us……..
13

SYBIL
Mr Isaac’s is hateful.
MRS VANE
Hateful?
Isn’t he paying for your brother James to go to Australia and start a new life?
SYBIL
Mr Isaacs want James out of the way.
MRS VANE
At least Mr Isaacs is willing to pay.
But if, as you say, your Prince Charming is rich………..
SYBIL
Prince charming loves me. I am content.
MRS VANE
Love, Sybil, won’t pay the rent.
(ENTER JAMES)
MRS VANE.
Here is James. James talk some sense into your sister.
She fancies herself in love.
JAMES
In love?
SYBIL
In love.
MRS VANE
With a gentleman.
(EXIT MRS VANE)
JAMES
A gentleman?
What’s his name?
SYBIL
I don’t know.
Romeo.
14

JAMES
You don’t know?
SYBIL
I call him Prince Charming.
There is no harm in that.
Let’s not talk of him,
Jim,
We’ll only argue
And I don’t want to argue with you,
Least of all today,
When you’re going away.
JAMES
I know what gentlemen are like, Sybil,
You don’t.
You think he’ll treat you like a princess, Sybil,
Well, Sybil, he won’t.
SYBIL
Anyone would think you were my mother, not my little brother Jim.
You wouldn’t say these things about him if you knew him.
If you could see the way he is;
So beautiful, so kind;
If you could hear the things he says –
You’d soon change your mind.
JAMES
If he ever hurts a hair on your head
He’ll answer to me.
SYBIL
He’d never hurt me
JAMES
You don’t know that –
SYBIL
Well –
Let’s agree
To disagree.
I’ve packed your trunk. How small it seems
To hold so many hopes and dreams.
15

JAMES
It doesn’t hold hope –
Just my clothes and stuff –
And it’s more than big enough
To hold my dreams.
SYBIL
You are going to Australia.
A Land where dreams come true.
Gold and riches, Fame and Fortune
Waiting there for you.
JAMES
I am going to Australia.
A land where life is rough.
Bleak and broken, cursed and cursing,
Mean and cruel and tough.
SYBIL
James.
JAMES
No, Sybil, you are right.
I am going to Australia.
A land where dreams come true.
I am going to Australia.
Why don’t you come too?
SYBIL
Come with you?
JAMES
Why not?
Now. Today.
I want to get you away
From the stage,
This life,
That man,
The lot.
SYBIL
James, I can’t come with you.
You are going on a voyage,
I am too.
Soon you will sail to Australia.
Soon we will say goodbye.
16

SYBIL (cont)
You’re off to Adventure.
Well, James, so am I.
The winds of Change are blowing.
Our guides are the stars above.
You are sailing to the Realms of Gold.
I sail to the Isle of Love.
Your ship is called ‘Opportunity’.
Mine is called ‘Heart of Fire’.
You are sailing to a World of Wealth.
I sail to the Land of Desire.
JAMES
He has driven you mad.
SYBIL
Who wants to be sane?
JAMES
He has enslaved you.
SYBIL
I kiss my chain.
JAMES
Break it off.
Don’t see him again.
For your own good.
SYBIL
If you understood………..If you only knew…….
JAMES
I understand.
Do you?
You think gentlemen are ‘charming’.
You think love is good.
You think there’s no harm in giving your heart away
But it’s time you understood –
Gentlemen charming?
That’s not true.
Love is good?
Not always so.
I’m not charming.
I’m not good.
That’s how I know.
17

JAMES (cont)
You think people always mean well.
You think hearts are true.
You think that everyone is wonderful like you.
But it’s time you knew –
People mean well?
That’s not so.
Hearts are true.
That’s a lie.
Hearts are false
And people are bastards
I know –
So am I.
If he thinks that he can hurt you,
Treat you like some toy,
Thinks of having some fun then skipping away
Then it’s time you understood, my boy-
Hurt my sister?
I’ll kick your head in.
Leave her crying?
I’ll hunt you down.
Break her heart and you’re a dead man.
I will kill you.
I will
And I can.
SYBIL
James, I know you wouldn’t hurt anything that I loved.
Isn’t that so? Isn’t that so.
JAMES
Yes.
SYBIL
So you wouldn’t hurt him.
Would you?
JAMES
I suppose not.
No.
Not if you loved him.
18

SYBIL
And I will always love him.
Poor James.
You think life treats people harshly
You think life is bad.
I don’t blame you for thinking that,
When I think about the life you’ve had.
One day you will love somebody
And then you will have understood,
Love and life are not the things you call them.
Love makes people good.
JAMES
It is time I was going.
SYBIL
Kiss me, James.
JAMES
Give your Prince Charming a message from me.
SYBIL
Yes, James.
JAMES
Tell him…..
SYBIL
Yes, James?
JAMES
Tell him,
If he ever hurts a hair on your head
I will hunt him down like a dog
And shoot him dead.
(ENTER MRS VANE)
MRS VANE
James, cab is here.
JAMES
Goodbye, Sybil. Remember what I said.
19

SCENE 3; LORD HARRY. BASIL. DORIAN.
LORD HARRY
What’s her name?
DORIAN
Sybil Vane.
She is an actress.
LORD HARRY
An actress?
DORIAN
A genius.
I love her.
I have seen her stand on a balcony and whisper her love to the moon.
I have watched her give herbs to a guilty king whilst singing an antique tune.
I have witnessed her in a Courtroom in Venice saving her love from the knife.
I have seen her white throat in the Moor’s dark hands, heard her sigh away her life.
Desdemona!
Ophelia!
Juliet!
Portia!
She is all of these.
LORD HARRY
And when is she Sybil Vane?
DORIAN
Never.
LORD HARRY
You are a fortunate man.
But an actress is a rather commonplace debut.
DORIAN
You will not say so when you see her.
It is the greatest romance of my life.
LORD HARRY
It is the first romance of your life.
BASIL
Where did you find her?
20

DORIAN
There are nights when I love to linger in the labyrinth of lanes
That flow like veins from this city’s dark heart.
I follow my feet till I come to a part
Where I may walk where Crime has walked and can stare at her scarlet stains.
There was one night as I wandered that I found myself at the doors
Of a gaudy Theatre, glittering like Sin,
And some strange perverse instinct made me go in
And take a seat there, where sailors’ curses clashed with the shrieks of whores.
She stepped on the stage like a pure white swan upon on a noisome lake.
She seemed to be living not acting her part
And her Beauty touched even that mob’s foul heart,
And her voice was the music that the swan with its dying breath might make.
SYBIL (off)
Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face,
Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek
For that which thou hast heard me speak tonight.
Dost thou love me?
DORIAN
I love to think that dead lovers can feel our love and grow sad;
Love that age won’t wither nor custom rust;
That they feel our Passion, and it stirs their dust,
Wakes their ashes into pain, makes them ache to feel again the love that they once had.
BASIL
And may we meet this miracle?
DORIAN
Come to the theatre tonight.
Tonight she is Juliet.
BASIL
Tonight then.
LORD HARRY
Tonight.
21

SCENE 4; SYBIL’S DRESSING ROOM. LORD HENRY. BASIL. DORIAN.
SYBIL (offstage to a chorus of boo’s and catcalls)
Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face
Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek
For that which thou hast heard me speak tonight.
LORD HARRY
She is quite beautiful but she can’t act at all.
Let us go.
BASIL
I am sure she must be ill.
DORIAN
I wish she were ill.
Last night she was a great artist.
Tonight she is commonplace and mediocre.
BASIL
Don’t talk like that about someone you love.
Love is more wonderful than Art.
LORD HARRY
They are both simply forms of imitation.
We must not stay here any longer.
It is not good for one’s morals to see bad acting.
DORIAN
Go away, Harry, can’t you see my heart is breaking?
LORD HARRY
Don’t look so tragic- the secret of remaining young is never to have an emotion that is
unbecoming.
She is beautiful. What more can you want?
BASIL
Come away, Harry.
LORD HARRY
If she knows as little about life as she does about acting, she will be a delightful
experience.
There are only two sorts of people that are really fascinating – those who know
everything and those who know nothing.
(EXIT LORD HARRY AND BASIL)
22

DORIAN
Has she been commonplace and stupid all along?
How could I ever have loved her?
How could I have been so wrong?
(ENTER SYBIL)
SYBIL (joyfully)
How badly I acted tonight.
DORIAN
Horribly. You have no idea what I suffered.
SYBIL
You should have understood. But you understand now, don’t you?
DORIAN
Understand what?
SYBIL
Why I was so bad tonight. Why I shall always be bad. Why I shall never act well again.
DORIAN
You made yourself ridiculous.
SYBIL
This painted world was once the only world I knew-
And I thought it true-
I lived among shadows and thought those shadows real
Until you.
You taught me how to feel.
You opened this painted prison of my soul
And made me whole.
Now I see
The Blasphemy of apeing Love upon a stage.
Now I feel,
Now Love is real, the lines I spoke were dead things on a page.
My life – till you- has been a silly play.
You are more to me
Than all Art can ever be.
Take me away.
Love.
DORIAN
Love?
You have killed that.
23

SYBIL
Love?
DORIAN
Once I loved you.
Once I thought you fair.
Once you led me to a magic world
And showed me all the treasures there.
Now I look into your face
And see the merely commonplace;
A painted puppet; a silly doll;
That is all.
Once you leant me wings,
Once you helped me soar
To skies of Art above.
Not anymore –
You have murdered Love.
SYBIL
Romeo!
Love!
How can you be so cruel?
DORIAN
If I am cruel
You are to blame.
I will forget your face.
I will forget your name.
SYBIL
Romeo, please.
DORIAN
Stop it. There is always something ridiculous about the emotions of those one has ceased
to love.
(EXIT DORIAN)
SYBIL
Romeo!
‘Wilt thou be gone?’................Don’t go! Kiss me again
My brother…..No, he didn’t mean it
Come back. I will be better. Romeo! I..
‘My grave is like to be my marriage bed.’
‘Since all else fail, myself have power to die.’
24

SCENE 5; DORIAN looking at the picture.
DORIAN
That look in the eyes – was it always there?
Weren’t they once more innocent and clear?
What can it be?
Cruelty?
And that sneer?
Is that me?
Sybil!
Cruelty.
(DORIAN looks in a mirror)
And yet no trace upon my face.
Can it be?
Those sins that scar the picture won’t mark me?
END OF ACT ONE
25

ACT TWO
SCENE ONE. DORIAN AND LORD HARRY
DORIAN
Dead?
LORD HARRY
Dead.
Sybil Vane is dead.
DORIAN
Suicide?
There can be no doubt?
LORD HARRY
No doubt.
The papers are full of it.
Sybil Vane killed herself.
But don’t worry, my dear boy, you are not implicated.
DORIAN
Sybil Vane killed herself.
Sybil Vane is dead.
And the roses are as lovely as they ever were.
A breeze blows through the birches and their small leaves stir.
And Sybil Vane is dead.
The birds are singing and the sun shines still.
And the seconds slide to minutes as they always will.
And Sybil Vane is dead.
LORD HARRY
How I envy you.
DORIAN
Envy me?
For what?
My cruelty?
I murdered Sybil Vane. I took her life
As surely as if I had cut her little throat with a knife.
26

LORD HARRY
I envy you.
Many women have adored me,
Loved me till their passion bored me.
Not one of them would ever do
What Sybil Vane has done for you.
Poor Sybil with her broken heart
Changed something sordid to a work of Art
She learned her part and played it well.
She loved. She died. The curtain fell.
That is why I envy you
This strange affair that you’ve been through.
She burned in the flame that she adored.
So do not mourn. Admire! Applaud!
I did not guess that life could be
So like a perfect tragedy.
Mourn, if mourn you must, for Juliet in her tomb
Not for a dead actress in a tawdry dressing-room.
DORIAN
You have explained myself to me.
She was not real – she was a figure in a tragedy;
That is why I do not feel her death as I thought to.
You do not think me heartless, Harry, do you?
LORD HARRY
Not heartless, no.
Life has everything in store for you.
There is nothing that you, with your extraordinary good looks
Will not be able to do.
DORIAN
But suppose I become wrinkled and haggard and old?
What then?
LORD HARRY
Then you must learn to fight.
But you must not lose your looks.
We cannot spare you.
Come along, I will drive you to the Opera.
DORIAN
I will meet you there.
LORD HARRY
And thank God, Dorian, that you live in a Century where such wonders happen.
27

DORIAN
Such wonders?
LORD HARRY
True love. Passion. Romance.
That sort of thing.
DORIAN
Death?
LORD HARRY
You are alive, Dorian.
Live!
(EXIT LORD HARRY)
DORIAN
I am alive.
And she is dead.
I am alive.
And still no trace upon my face.
Can it be
Those sins that scar the picture won’t mark me?
Has Time forgot me?
Let others bleat and mourn then,
Not me.
I am alive.
So live!
What shall I snatch from Time
What Joy, what Rapture, what Sin, what Crime?
A country of wonders lies before me!
My Beauty makes me King.
Youth and Beauty!
They are everything.
28

SCENE TWO; DORIAN’S CREDO (while danced orgies happen around him)
DORIAN
I believe in Beauty
I believe in Youth
I believe in the Holy Truth
Of Pure Sensation
I believe in yielding to temptation
I believe that Vice is just a word
I believe that Virtue is absurd
I believe in Beauty
I believe in Youth
I believe that Pleasure is the only Truth.
Let Time and Conscience, Regret, Remorse ignore me
And let me drain the cup Life’s prepared for me.
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SCENE THREE. IN BROTHELS AND BALLROOMS. DORIAN’ BACCHANAL.
DORIAN
There is pleasure in cold diamonds
There is pleasure in warm pearls
There is pleasure in old women
There is pleasure in young girls
There is pleasure in an emerald
There is pleasure in meat
There is pleasure which half-tasted savours twice as sweet.
There is pleasure in duchesses
There is pleasure in a whore
There is pleasure when you open the secret seventh door
There is pleasure in the panting flesh by candlelight revealed
There is pleasure in the panting flesh being forced to yield
There is pleasure in the common
There is pleasure in the rare
There is pleasure in the drawing room
There is pleasure on the stair
There is pleasure in the winning
There is pleasure when you lose
There is pleasure in a kiss
There is pleasure in a bruise
(ALAN COMES TO THE FOREGROUND WITH A GIRL)
There is pleasure in watching
Warm blood flow
There is pleasure in admiring it
Like rubies in the snow
There is pleasure in piss
There is pleasure in shit
There is pleasure lying moaning where you least expected it
There is pleasure in violence
There is pleasure in death
There is pleasure in catching a final dying breath
There is pleasure in revulsion
And then doing it again
There is pleasure
Forever
And ever
Amen.
(ALAN UNDER DORIAN’S DIRECTION HAS RAPED AND MURDERED THE
GIRL)
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SCENE FOUR; DORIAN’S APARTMENT. DORIAN AND BASIL.
BASIL
My dear fellow, I want to speak to you seriously.
DORIAN
I hope it is not about myself.
I am tired of myself tonight
I should like to be someone else.
BASIL
It is about yourself
And I must say it.
It will only take me half an hour.
DORIAN
Half an hour.
Time is so precious.
BASIL
I think it right that you should know the most dreadful things are being said about you.
DORIAN
I don’t wish to know anything about them.
I love scandals about other people but scandals about myself bore me.
They have not got the charm of novelty.
BASIL
That’s Harry talking.
Every man must be interested in his good name.
You don’t want people to talk of you as a thing of shame.
I don’t believe these rumours are true.
I can’t believe them when I look at you –
Still so youthful – still so full of grace.
Sin is a thing which writes itself across a face,
Men talk of secret vices. Vice cannot hide.
The face always betrays the soul inside.
DORIAN
Are you so sure?
31

BASIL
Dorian, I believe you pure.
But…
People talk………
That wretched boy in the guards who committed suicide;
Adrian Singleton and his wretched end;
Henry Ashton, exiled with a tarnished name;
Lord Kent’s only son – his father grey with shame;
All friends of yours-
All sense of decency, honour, goodness gone.
It is said……..
You made them mad for pleasure
They went down to the depths of vice
And you led them there,
Smiling,
Smiling as you smile at me now.
DORIAN
Basil do not lecture me
Did I teach them vices, their debauchery?
BASIL
Then there are other stories…..
Stories that see you creeping at dawn out of dreadful houses,
Slinking in disguise into the foulest dens in London.
Corrupting and corrupt.
Are they true?
I once knew you.
Are they true?
Do I know you?
I wonder -
To answer that I should have to see your soul.
DORIAN
To see my soul?
BASIL
Yes, to see your soul.
But only God can do that.
32

DORIAN
Then tonight you shall be God.
I will show you my soul.
Why not? It is your own handiwork.
You wish me to answer your charges?
Come upstairs.
I keep a diary of my life from day to day
And you shall see it.
(THEY APPROACH THE PICTURE)
You think that it is only God who sees the soul.
Draw that curtain and you shall see mine.
(THE PICTURE IS REVEALED)
BASIL
Good God!
What does this mean?
DORIAN
Years ago, when I was boy
You met me, flattered me and taught me to be vain of my good looks.
A friend of yours revealed to me the wonder of Youth.
Your Picture revealed the wonder of Beauty.
In a mad moment, that even now, I don’t know if I regret
I made a wish, perhaps you would call it a prayer……….
BASIL
I remember it, how well I remember it.
But the thing is impossible.
This room is damp, the canvas has rotted.
It is impossible.
DORIAN
What does impossible mean?
BASIL
I don’t believe it is my picture.
DORIAN
Don’t you recognise your ideal?
BASIL
Christ! What a thing I have worshipped.
If this is true and this is what you have done with your life
Then you are even worse than they imagined.
Pray, Dorian, pray!
33

BASIL
‘Lead us not into temptation.’
‘Forgive us our sins.’
Let us say that together.
The prayer of your Pride has been answered,
The prayer of your repentance will be answered too.
I worshipped you – and I am punished
You worshipped yourself – we both are punished.
Pray.
DORIAN
It is too late.
BASIL
It is never too late.
‘Though you sins be as scarlet, yet I will make then white as snow’
Pray.
DORIAN
It is too late.
Too late for me.
Too late for you.
(DORIAN KILLS BASIL)
SCENE 5 AN OPIUM DEN. JAMES. AN OLD WOMAN OPIUM DEALER. A
WHORE.
JAMES
Sybil dead.
And I am alive.
And he is alive.
OLD WOMAN (to James)
Another pipe, dearie?
Nothing like a little smoke to help you forget.
WHORE (to the Old Woman)
God, it’s dead in here tonight.
34

JAMES
I buried my hopes in a dead country,
And so sailed back to this dead dark city
Over a dark dead sea,
To find my sister – murdered,
By her dead dark love.
The single dark prayer I utter
To the dead dark God above,
The single thought that flickers
In my dark dead head,
Is to find the man that killed her-
Find him – and leave him – dead.
OLD WOMAN
Another pipe, dearie?
WHORE
Fancy some loving, darling?
JAMES
Loving?
She thought love delightful.
She thought hearts were true.
She never guessed that love was just a filthy whore like you.
When she died – she knew.
WHORE
Who are you calling a filthy whore?
OLD WOMAN
We won’t have any trouble here.
This is a respectable establishment.
I count gentleman among my clients.
JAMES
Gentlemen?
She thought gentlemen were charming.
She thought love was good.
She thought there’s no harm in giving her heart away.
When she lay dying then she understood;
Gentlemen charming?
That’s not true.
Love is good?
Not always so.
She’s dead -now she knows.
35

(ENTER DORIAN)
WHORE
Here he comes, the Devil’s Bargain.
DORIAN
Don’t call me that.
WHORE
What would you prefer?
Prince Charming?
JAMES
What?
WHORE
Here, mother, get a pipe for Romeo.
OLD WOMAN (giving DORIAN a pipe)
Best opium this side of Peking.
JAMES (to the WHORE)
What did you call him?
WHORE
That’s Prince Charming.
Romeo.
The Devil’s Bargain.
JAMES (grabbing hold of Dorian)
Murderer!
DORIAN
What do you want, you madman?
OLD WOMAN
We won’t have not trouble here.
This is a respectable establishment.
JAMES
Sybil Vane was my sister. She killed herself. Her death is at your door.
I swore to kill you. I had no clue, no trace except the pet names she called you.
Get down on your knees and make you peace with God – I am going to kill you.
DORIAN
Sybil Vane? I have never heard of her. You are mad.
36

JAMES
Get down on your knees and pray to God for you are going to die.
DORIAN
Wait! Wait for God’s sake. How long ago is it since your sister died?
JAMES
How long? Eighteen years. What do years matter? What does time matter?
DORIAN
Eighteen years! Eighteen years? Set me under the lamp and look at my face.
(JAMES does so)
JAMES
My God, you are a boy….no older now than she was then…….. and I would have killed
you. God forgive me. Forgive me.
(JAMES releases DORIAN)
DORIAN
Let this be a warning to you, not to take vengeance into your own hands.
(EXIT DORIAN)
WHORE
Why didn’t you kill him? You should have killed him. He has lots of money and he’s as
bad as bad.
JAMES
He’s not the man I am looking for. I want no man’s money. I want a man’s life.
The man I am looking for must be nearly forty by now.
This one is little more than a boy. Thank God I do not have his blood upon my hands.
WHORE
Little more than a boy? - Why, man, it’s nearly eighteen years since Prince Charming
made me what I am.
JAMES
Liar!
WHORE
By God, it’s the truth. They say he sold himself to the devil for a pretty face.
It must be eighteen years since I met him – he hasn’t changed a bit. I have though.
JAMES
His name? What’s his name?
37

WHORE
His name is Dorian Gray.
SCENE 6a. BEFORE THE BALL. DORIAN IN EVENING DRESS. ALONE.
DORIAN
The woods decay, the woods decay and fall,
Loves spring and wither; pleasures glow then fade,
Flowers are dust and after many a summer dies the swan,
Me only Time forgets.
Sybil.
Love.
Regrets.
It must be nearly time.
No.
My Midnight Hour will never chime.
SCENE 6b THE BALL. MASKED DANCERS. DORIAN. LORD HARRY. DUCHESS
OF MONMOUTH. JAMES, LURKING.
DUCHESS to LORD HARRY
Art?
LORD HARRY
A disease.
DORIAN
Keep dancing.
We unmask at midnight.
DUCHESS
Love?
LORD HARRY
An illusion.
DORIAN
Keep dancing
We unmask at midnight
DUCHESS
Religion?
LORD HARRY
The substitute for belief.
38

DORIAN
Keep dancing
We unmask at midnight
DUCHESS
Women?
LORD HARRY
Sphinxes without secrets.
DORIAN
Keep dancing
We unmask at midnight.
JAMES unmasking and pointing a pistol at DORIAN)
Dorian Gray- I accuse you – I accuse you of Murder.
I accuse you of the death of Sybil Vane.
She loved you.
I accuse you of stamping on her heart
I accuse you of crushing her youth.
She was an angel of love.
I am an angel of death.
She was my sister.
I promised her that I would hunt you down.
She was my sister
She said love made people good.
I promised her……….
I promised her I would not hurt something she loved.
She loved you.
She was an angel of love.
I could not hurt something she loved.
She was my sister.
I am an angel of death.
(JAMES shoots himself. DORIAN faints)
DUCHESS
My God.
A madman.
LORD HARRY
I didn’t think people did things like that anymore.
39

SCENE 7. DORIAN and LORD HARRY
DORIAN
I am going to change.
LORD HARRY
You are still in shock.
Don’t ever change - you are quite perfect as you are.
DORIAN
I am going to be good.
LORD HARRY
Then you must move to the country.
There are no temptations there.
That is why country people are so uncivilised – in the country there is neither culture not
corruption.
DORIAN
Culture and Corruption – I have known something of both.
It seems terrible to me that they should ever be found together.
I am going to change – I feel I have changed – for the good of my soul.
LORD HARRY
There is no such thing as Soul.
Art has a Soul but Man has not.
DORIAN
Don’t Harry, the soul is a reality.
It can be bought and sold, it can be poisoned or made perfect.
There is a soul in each one of us.
LORD HARRY
Are you quite sure of that?
DORIAN
Quite sure.
LORD HARRY
Then it must be an illusion – the things one feels absolutely certain of are never true.
Don’t be so serious.
What have you or I to do with the superstitions of our age?
No – we have given up our belief in the soul.
Play me something – play me a nocturne, Dorian
(DORIAN starts to play)
40

LORD HARRY
And as you play, tell me how you have kept your youth – your secret - whisper it to me-
You have never looked more wonderful than you do tonight.
You remind me of the day I first saw you- still as beautiful- still as bright.
I am faded – old and wrinkled and yellow and worn
I can almost hear the grave yawn.
Youth!
I would do anything to get back my youth, anything in the world
Except exercise or get up early.
Youth.
The tragedy of old age is not that one is old but that one is young.
DORIAN
He said I murdered her.
LORD HARRY
Who?
Oh, that extraordinary madman – melodrama, my dear boy, learned no doubt at one of the
shocking theatres these people frequent.
DORIAN
They say Basil was murdered.
LORD HARRY
Who would murder Basil? He wasn’t clever enough to have made any enemies.
DORIAN
What would you say, Harry, if I told you I had murdered Basil?
LORD HARRY
I would say you were posing for a picture that didn’t suit you.
All crime is vulgar – just as all vulgarity is crime.
It is not in you to commit a murder – I am sorry if I hurt your vanity.
Crime belongs exclusively to the lower orders.
Crime is to them what Art is to us – simply a method of procuring extraordinary
sensations.
DORIAN
Simply a method of procuring extraordinary sensations.
LORD HARRY
By the way, what has become of that wonderful portrait he did of you.
I don’t think I have ever seen it since he finished it?
41

DORIAN
Why do you mention it?
It used to remind me of those lines in some tragedy –
‘Like the painting of a sorrow,
A face without a heart.’
LORD HARRY
‘A face without a heart’.
How perfect you were – how perfect you are.
What an exquisite life you have led.
You have drunk deeply of everything.
Nothing has been hidden from you.
And it has all been to you no more than the sound of music.
It has not marred you.
You are still the same.
DORIAN
I am not the same.
LORD HARRY
Yes, you are – what will your future be?
Don’t spoil it by renunciations – don’t make your self incomplete.
I wish I could change places with you.
The world has cried out against us both but it has always worshipped you.
It will always worship you.
You are its ideal
Your life has been your Art
You have set yourself to music.
Your days are sonnets.
DORIAN
I have drunk deeply of everything?
Everything I have drunk was bitter – poisoned – poisoned by you.
Nothing has been hidden from me – and I have only seen horrors – horrors of your
making.
Music – howling
Sonnets – lamentation.
Your worship is corruption.
Your praise is poison.
If I had never met you – what might I not have been?
Something pure?
Something of Truth.
Go, Harry
You foolish old man.
(EXIT LORD HARRY)
42

DORIAN (in front of the portrait)
Is that a smile that wasn’t there before?
A smile?
A sneer?
Is virtue vanity?
Curiosity?
Hypocrisy?
Nothing more in renunciation than that?
What?
Confess?
Who would believe me?
They would think me mad.
Still sneering.
I will kill you.
I killed the painter.
I will kill his work.
I will kill youth and beauty.
I will kill conscience.
I will kill the past.
Time return.
Midnight strike.
(DORIAN STABS THE PICTURE. A HIDEOUS SCREAM.)
(THE REAL DORIAN LIES ON THE FLOOR, DEAD.)
(ENTER TWO SERVANTS)
FIRST SERVANT
Who is that?
SECOND SERVANT
Dorian Gray.
END OF ACT TWO.
43