Fairview comes close to calling for white people to become spectacle only [“…simply ‘Look! A white person!’”]—but draws back, opts for “A Person Trying.” Fairview is a comedy—& thus ends w/ a marriage.
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I’m fascinated by the roughly six-page monologue delivered by Jimbo, Fairview’s villain [or, rather, the play's most obnoxious character]. While Fairview references late 1980s / early ‘90s American television sitcoms, specifically those centered on Black family life, Jimbo’s monologue introduces Hostel (2005) & Hostel II (2007) to the material of Fairview—he explains why both are “kind of good” movies. He doesn’t name the films—perhaps to muffle incongruity of the reference?
Hostel & Hostel II are witty exploitation films concerned w/ gender, w/ American parochialism, &, most of all, w/ class. A wealthy European aristocracy rule over the merely rich who purchase from them kidnapped travelers to torture (not poor people; the kidnapped are young people of leisure—some of modest means, others rich; the only poor represented in the Hostel films are direct or indirect employees of the torture club). Any member of the torture club who break rules / show weakness suffer consequences—they are merely rich.
Jimbo recounts a specific moment from the first Hostel film:
vrr-ng-ng-ng-ng
and slips in blood or something
and the rich guy decapitates himself
with his own chainsaw.
And it’s pretty obvious what that means.
Do you know what I mean?
It means he’s the victim of his own damn thing.
This scene is misremembered; the rich guy cuts off his leg—his victim, the film's protagonist, shoots the rich guy in the head. Easy to check (search: “Hostel chainsaw scene”). Deliberate? Details don’t matter to Jimbo. & his point weakens if, in fact, “the rich guy” is ultimately the victim of “his own damn thing” + the victim of a victim determined not to die. Alternatively, it’s possible Drury didn’t bother to check. She saw the Hostel films & remembers the impression they made & that was enough for her.
Do the Hostel films appear in Fairview as shorthand? Jimbo isn’t a character but a mouth; he is incapable of subtlety & lacks culture. Hostel is as close to art as he gets. Hostel & American television. Jimbo watches the show w/in Fairview & has a store of sitcom tropes—specifically Black sitcom tropes—well-memorized. Instead of Hostel, is there a less dissonant shorthand Drury might’ve reached for?
I first read Fairview in 2018. Then, I made the following marginal note on the script’s last page: “This play is weirder than the critics say it is.”
