On top of that, the pneumonia brought by the dust was inevitable.
The dust had got in everywhere,
particularly where no new boards could have provided weatherproofing,
namely through the cracked glass in the window on the stars
above Claire's bed.
Valuables, not to mention cash, were non-existent at Manderlay,
since the elegant clock
miraculously still ticking merrily away on the mantelpiece
turned out to be not Swiss, as Mam believed,
but a copy made quite locally and worth practically nothing.
"The Freed Enterprise of Manderlay" was bust.
Wilhelm and Grace were therefore under no illusions
that anybody would attend class this day.
But then, one by one, the Manderlay flock began to appear.
I'm happy you're all here.
But I don't really have a lecture for you today.
I'd just like to say...
...how badly I feel about this hopeless situation.
But, of course, words aren't much use to you.
No. Missy has learned that much, at least.
But as regards hopelessness, it is something we do know a bit about.
There are a million plants out there beneath the dust.
If we can save but 50 of them,
perhaps we can grow a small quantity of great quality
and get a better price for it.
I reckon we should make a move.
And that is how the greatest disaster turned into a stroke of luck for Grace,
and how the people, with a common foe, the dust, as their excuse,
suddenly found themselves working shoulder to shoulder
with their deadliest enemy
to achieve the common goal as free, grown-up Americans.
Stanley and Bertie had sown the fields with little sticks
so people could tell where to uncover the tender seedlings.
While Flora, ever so childishly, kept teasing Grace
with her digs at Grace's supposed romantic feelings towards Timothy.
Good night, old Wilma.
Good night, child.
We can lie down and talk for a while before we go to sleep.
No, thank you, Wilma.
I'm not weary enough to go to bed yet.
A little walk helps.
A walk when a body ain't sleepy is a very good thing.
I do the same myself.
Good night.
That everything seemed as moving along on its own
could be nothing but welcomed by Grace.
But her lack of an active part to play
had suddenly left her in a kind of vacuum,
and allowed other things inside her to claim attention.
Human things like instincts and emotions.
An ominous sense of homelessness and loneliness
struck Grace this evening.
As she wandered about, Grace suddenly found herself
outside the wooden rear of the bath house.
Without warning, the homelessness transferred into a strange desire
to move up that rusty pipe against the flow of dirty water
into where naked bodies were being washed in cheap soap.
Black skin.
Male and black manhood.
What Grace had felt at the bath house was undignified, shameful.
Her mind was meant to be devoted to policy at Manderlay,
a matter in which these thoughts had no business whatsoever.
Grace had forced herself to sleep, to rid her thoughts of those black bodies,
an achievement that was actually possible
thanks to the stubbornness that flourished in Grace's family.
But the cotton seedling in her love-starved body did not give up.
It manifested itself as a dream.
Grace was in southern climes.
There were women in exotic costumes and men in turbans.
Even in her sleep, she hated with a passion
any idea of allowing that her father might be right.
But it was a harem.
A group of black slaves appeared, bearing a huge charger piled with dates,
and in a twinkling, Grace lay among the dates trembling with pleasure
as a flock of Bedouin satisfied her one by one with their noses.
And it was even more confusing when Timothy appeared
and was both the slave bearing wine, hands shaking,
and the sheik himself, whose authoritative hands
tested the size of Grace's most intimate orifices.
- I must have overslept. - I'm sorry.
Claire's had another turn.
Yeah.
Yeah, she's running a bad fever again.
Has she had anything to eat?
Oh sure. Pork chops and baked chicken.
She's taken a little oatmeal, but it's hard to get it into her.
She had this trouble with her lungs last year when the dust come, too.
But there's far more dust this year.
Honestly, Missy, you oughta go back home
to the clean air and larders full of food.
We're all in this together, no matter how hard it gets.
And hard it will get.
I've seen what's left around here,
though some folks are still filling their bellies.
Right. We've got to talk about that.
Come on, it'll be all right, Rose.
I propose that we ration what we have left,
and spread our provisions over a month
until we can harvest more from the vegetable gardens.
And, as I hear that there are so very few beans and potatoes left,
I think we should give them to Rose, who needs them for Claire.
What's left will be shared out equally among the rest of us.
- Excuse me. - Mm-hm.
The rest of us? That goes for us, too?
Yes, of course it does.
We've already eaten things your father would never have put up with.
Joseph swears they couldn't be described as food at all...
legally speakin'
Your father used to let us obtain stuff when the coffers were empty.
Surely we could steal something from somewhere.
But I suppose that's no good, either, Miss Grace.
I'm afraid you're one tough cookie.
Maybe I am.
Sadly, the most nourishing fare the estate could still provide
had not improved Claire's condition much.
But she needed meat, and Timothy knew it.
So henceforth, they would have to do without
the loyal old donkey on the treadmill.
It was not a good portent of the level of morale
that the gangsters were now trying hard to fix the car
from the ravages of the dust.
But luckily, Joseph, a legal expert with the ability to interpret
the most incomprehensible of texts,
had met his match in the 1923 Ford owner's manual.
Timothy, thank you.
For Claire.
As time went by, the scattered cotton plants at Manderlay
grew side by side with its denizens' hunger
now that the little that was left of the donkey meat
was reserved for Claire.
And Grace found herself
in the peculiar situation of joining Wilma and the other women
in what had been completely forbidden under Mam's Law,
namely, the Southern tradition of eating dirt.
Having given up on the automobile manuals,
Joseph had found a quaint turn of phrase
in the agreement into which he had originally entered
with Grace's father regarding his employment.
The wording could, with a little good will,
be interpreted to mean
that certain circumstances obliged an employee
to obey a higher authority than his boss,
the authority in this case being his stomach.
The good news was that,
although the drought had been hard on the fields,
Stanley and Timothy had invented a weapon to deploy against it.
Wait, wait.
Watch out! It's coming.
Why didn't we think of it before?
But the best news of all was Claire,
who had miraculously gained so much strength
that she could empty her plate of good food.
Always in the middle of the night and when everyone was asleep
when nobody was looking, but even so...
If Grace had thought hunger would put paid to her forbidden sensual fantasies,
actually the opposite was more the case.
Flora, what's going on with the chickens?
Are they fighting?
You mean the four whites after the black?
You want I should open the door and have a peek?
N-No.
Mind you, that little black hen real proud.
Wouldn't surprise me if them others took the chance
to give her the odd peck.
Now, don't you tease me, Flora.
Good night, then.
Good night.
Flora had teased Grace before with the little black hen.
But they were hurting it in there. No doubt about it.
And to make everything far worse,
that heat in her loins seemed to come back
in spite of that poor chicken's cry for help...
or even intensified by it.
Devastated, humiliated and overcome by fear for her sanity,
she fled.
In a fit of madness, or what others would simply call horniness,
she threw herself onto her bed on her tummy,
and for a moment, forgot all about shame and political correctness,
and did what she had not done since her childhood
when she had not yet known it was so infinitely wrong.
She pressed herself onto the knot she had rapidly and instinctively formed
by bunching her quilt.
Whether it was pleasurable or painful is hard to tell,
but she kept at it.
It was beyond her control.
With no regard for the sleep of the women around her,
or common decency in general,
the pulsating explosions in her nether regions took over her world.
And who knows how it would have concluded
had there not appeared at that very moment, fortunately for Grace,
a person shaking her back to a reasonable state of self-defense.
Miss Grace! You gotta come quick, Miss Grace!
She dead.
I took such care of her.
I fed her the good meat.
She'd been eatin'
She dead.
Now she's dead!
Wilma, I wanna show you. Come outside now.
- You're hurtin' me. - I said come on!
She'd been eatin'
You're hurtin' my arm.
No! She hadn't been eatin'
This 'un had!
Ya gonna tell 'em, Wilma?
I was so hungry.
I get so dizzy.
And my legs hurt when I'm hungry.
Our good friend
and Claire's beloved old Wilma been visiting the windowsill while we slept.
She emptied Claire's plate every single night!
T'was easy as pie, considerin' that there window
could be opened from the outside.
I've eaten so much dirt in my time.
My teeth can't take it no more.
She killed our little girl.
Jack. Jack, she was sick.
- Miss Grace... - She was sick, Jack.
Rose didn't worry too much about feeding her during the day
'cause she ate so much at night.
I want Wilma punished for killin' my little girl!
I want this matter put to the vote.
I want Wilma punished for killin' my little girl.
I want justice, or I'll kill her myself right now!
Let me go home.
Stop, stop, stop! We will talk about this tomorrow!
- She killed my little girl! - Stop it!
And so, the very next evening, a gathering took place
under the magnificent, clear, twinkling, starry sky of Manderlay.
Now we've heard 'em all, Wilhelm.
Wilma showed no mercy to our Claire,
so no mercy oughta be shown to her. She must die!
Jack...
Killing old Wilma won't bring Claire back.
All we want is justice.
You've said so many times that we're entitled to it.
I propose... that...
...that she be banished from Manderlay for stealing food in an emergency.
She probably won't survive that anyway, as old as she is.
After all, we don't know if the matter of the food
made any difference at all in Claire's fate.
Wilma can't have known whether it would kill her.
But she didn't care a bit when it came to riskin' somebody else's life,
that of our little girl!
All Wilma saw was a plate nobody was touching.
She was hungry.
What do you think the rest of us was?
All of us here ate what we'd agreed.
What do you think little Claire was?
We all hungry,
and that just makes it far, far worse.
I'd like to ask y'all to vote on Jack and Rose's motion.
All those who believe that Wilma deserves to die,
raise your hands.
Thank you.
Thank y'all.
Stop!
Grace?
I thought we were the ones who made the decisions here.
That's what you always told us. Or maybe it's only sometimes.
Of course not. It's always.
Then they's the decisions you're here to defend, ain't they?
So let me go across and do it.
No.
If anybody is going to do it, it's going to be me.
It must not be an act of vengeance.
That's all right by me.
As long as she suffers as much as Claire.
That will be up to me.
I'll let you know when it's over.
Grace...
Be so kind as to tell me...
What they decide?
Am I gonna die?
No, Wilma, you're not going to die.
What you mean?
I mean the ballot did not go Jack's way.
You're not gonna die.
See, they didn't think Claire would have eaten the food on her plate anyway.
And anyhow, she'd certainly have died from pneumonia
from the dust.
Did they really say that?
Yes. They really said that.
If you knew how terrible the waitin' was...
I'm just so weary.
I know.
I know you are.
But now you can sleep easy.
Yes. I can.
Lie down and get some sleep.
You are the daughter I might have had.
- Lie down. - Will you stay till I sleep?
I'll do that, Wilma.
Here.
Lie down.
Wilma?
# Sheep, sheep #
# Yes, my Lord #
# Sheep, sheep#
# Yes, my Lord #
Harvest time finally did arrive and the cotton went safe into the sacks.
# Yes, I know #
Despite the fewer bushes, the harvest was splendid.
# Yes, I know #
It was as if all the trials and tribulations
had made the cotton extra white and the fibers extra strong.
And even at current prices, it would bring in a record sum.
# Yes, my Lord #
And although nothing was the way it had ever been,
the harvest was as precise as always at Manderlay.
The moment the last tuft of cotton was in the sack, the swallows arrived,
dropping from the skies towards the marshes.
Everyone observed the sight in awe and for a moment it was greater
than all the words and politics in the world.
The old gin was as ready as ever.
It had been for a week.
Greased and stripped down and reassembled by Sammy
who had teamed up with Niels.
They worked well in harness.
Niels had never found a joke funny in his life,
so Sammy, the Clownin' Nigger, had given up, not unrelieved,
trying to entertain him with his somewhat weak material.
That's fine.
That's fine? All right.
Miss Grace? Miss Grace?
Edward!
I hardly recognized you. You've certainly changed the way you dress.
Yes. Your father thought it was time for a change.
He's on his way into a new area of business.
Is Daddy here?
No, he sent me on ahead to give you a message.
Your father says he'll be by a week, Monday, at 8:00 in the evening.
He told me to tell you he will wait in the car outside the gates
for a quarter of an hour, not a second longer,
the way he did in Dogville, he says, and the way he did with your mother,
I think it was.
- When he asked her to marry him. - Yeah, something like that.
If you want to go with him, you better be there
'cause he says he'll just push on.
I know, I get the message.
All right, I'm on my way.
- Take care, Miss Grace. - You, too, Edward.
- Oh, Edward. - Hmm?
Just tell Dad that new times have come to Manderlay.
But no, Grace had no intention of going with her father when he arrived.
She had her own life to lead now, and it suited her just fine.
But she'd be at the gates, anyhow.
She just had to show him what she had achieved:
a new and better Manderlay.
It was examination day for Stanley and the family.
Because even though things had been going well recently,
when Stanley partook of his traditional beer with Mr. Miller,
nobody would be able to prevent him from revealing what had happened
on the plantation, and thereby ruin it all.
Wilhelm had been highly skeptical
about letting the whites talk to the drivers at all.
But Grace had insisted.
She trusted them.
Oh, Sammy! Oh, Lord, Sam.
Eejit nigger!
Are you totally useless?
Sorry, Mr. Mays.
Ha ha! I'm jokin'
Stanley Mays and the family passed.
That very evening,
Grace pronounced them graduate Americans.
Bertie!
And although they were free to go, they had elected to stay,
as there was talk of hiring the family and Stanley Mays
on a permanent basis.
And before anybody knew it, the days had passed,
and the money was in the bank from where it had been picked up
by proud Timothy on horseback.
Niels and Sammy had fixed the car...
wisely without reference to the manual.
- Thank you for everything. - Thank you.
What are you gonna do now?
I don't know.
You could always go back to gangstering.
Where's Mr. Robinson?
He's been down in the cabin, shakin' hands.
Grace was touched by Mr. Robinson's sudden social interest
in the former slaves.
But it felt right when the car left.
It was time for Grace to say good-bye to power.
# Brave and strong, thy men and women #
# Better this, than corn and wine #
# Make us worthy, God in Heaven #
# Of this goodly land of Thine #
# Hearts as open as our doorways #
# Liberal hands and spirits free #
# Alabama, Alabama #
# We will aye be true to thee #
He's watching you.
- No, he's not. - He's watching you.
No, he's not.
I reckon it have somethin' to do with them gangsters leavin'
See, honey, when you was boss, he was visitin' your kingdom.
Now you're visitin' his.
I reckon he wants you now.
He should have some dinner. I'm gonna go get him.
- You gonna go get him? - Uh-huh.
You've gotta come get some dinner.
Be quiet, woman.
In Mam's bedroom, Grace recalled Flora's worrying, intimate little details.
Sexual intercourse amongst the Munsi was determined by ancient traditions.
It would not appeal to Grace, Flora had said.
Not with Grace's modern ideas of equality of people and the sexes.
But Grace seemed to have left her progressive attitudes at the table.
Now actually in the situation she had dreamed of,
it was all more bizarre than erotic.
Anyway, Grace decided to hang on to this opinion.
Timothy, wake up!
Timothy's horse had got out of the stable when fires had been lit
around the Manderlay slave quarters while Grace was asleep.
What happened?
I can't tell you.
If you want a clear answer, you're gonna have to ask somebody else.
- The gangsters took the money. - What?
The gangsters took the money.
That's the answer.
And I reckon it's a pretty clear answer, too.
It certainly is very clear.
What makes you think so?
When the party ended...
...we all left the table...
...to go and take a look at the money.
Timothy had hid it behind the red slope.
Timothy was meant to be keepin' an eye on the place,
but he wasn't there.
And the box had been pulled up.
It was empty.
One of the gangsters dug up the money
when he was pretendin' to say good-bye.
But he couldn't have done it alone.
Someone must have told him where the box was.
And Sammy refused to admit it was him,
although he'd spent a whole lot of time with Niels.
And then everybody started yellin' and screamin' and...
and folks is angry, and no one's listenin'
Stanley Mays and the family got away, I believe.
Although Philomena and Bertie got cut up real bad.
Elizabeth is dead, too, although that was mostly by accident.
It was too soon to send the guns away.
We weren't quite ready yet.
For once, Grace had nothing to say.
She could but reproach herself in silence
for her tasteless joke to the gangsters
about resorting to their former occupations if things got tight.
- Wilhelm, I can't rouse Timothy. - No, I bet you can't.
He drank three bottles of hooch before we ate.
The Munsi don't drink.
Well, maybe... they do on special occasions.
Well, it certainly is lively around here.
Didn't I tell you I didn't want to see you here again?
Yes, but I've not come to do a deal,
I've come to conclude one.
And in the hope, of course, you'll see that I am an honest man.
I needn't have come back here to settle up at all.
This is your 80%.
Quite a tidy little sum it is, too, as you can see.
It's the money from our harvest.
I expect so.
It's that time of year.
See, I had a little game with a young man who came to see me.
I knew he'd come from here, so... I've made my humble return.
Don't you think you just might have been wrong about me?
Who did you play for all this money?
Well, it was a day ago now. I'd have come sooner,
but I passed this black car
with some gentlemen in dark coats.
They began to follow me,
shouting the whole time that I was going to die,
that I was a con man who dealt from the bottom.
What an accusation, eh?
It just took me a while to get away...
Who was it?
The nigra fellow arrived on horseback.
What was his name?
Timothy.
That was it!
Timothy, yeah, that was his name.
He's a Munsi.
They don't gamble.
Well, I know Munsi don't gamble.
I'm a bit of an expert in this field.
You have a devil time gettin' them to the gamin' table. No.
He's no Munsi.
In fact, he's what I'd call a splendid fella at the card table.
He just stayed bein' splendid, no matter how much he lost.
But he told everyone he was a Munsi.
Of course.
See, all the girls were wild about the tales he told.
All the Munsi tales. The proud African, the royal line.
You know, all that old-fashioned morality.
And the accent, of course.
So, on account of that, the girls was easy to bed.
I'm not even going to avail myself of your gratitude.
That's just the kind of fella I am. Hey, ho!
Now bless me if I can come up with a motto for today.
They say the Mansi are better hung than the Munsi.
Or, the Munsi are so up-stuck, but the Mansi, how they fuck!
Well, I'll be seein' you.
We can talk business another day.
Grace went straight to the last pages with the tables of personal details
on the slaves of Manderlay.
Where was Timothy now?
Yes, his name had a "1"beside it.
A Proudy Slave, as she'd read earlier.
Or did it?
She looked more closely at the handwritten number.
She compared it to the "7" next to Elizabeth's name.
The Pleasin' Nigger of the chameleon type.
An expert in changing character according to whatever was opportune
and what would titillate and enthrall the other person.
And then Grace could see it.
Timothy's number was not a "1", but a '7."
She had only wanted to read it as a "1."
There was even a note beside Timothy's name:
"Caution. Diabolically clever."
Grace had called a final meeting for everybody at Manderlay,
for that evening, she had decided to leave the place forever
with her father when he arrived.
Oh, you're all here.
I persuaded the community to assemble extraordinarily...
for two ballots.
Whatever they involve, they can scarcely have anything to do with me anymore.
Don't be too certain of that, Miss Grace.
Well, I am certain.
I've come to say good-bye.
If you've had two ballots today,
oddly enough, that coincides with the two presents I've brought.
Farewell presents, if you like.
The first... is this.
It's the money from our harvest.
Actually it's 80% of it.
A card shark kept the other 20% as commission.
He scammed the money off somebody from Manderlay in a game of cards.
So the gangsters didn't take it?
No. No, they didn't.
And I won't prolong the tension.
It was the treasurer who did it.
The man charged with looking after the money.
He was overcome by his eagerness to play.
Probably because he isn't a Munsi at all...
...but a Mansi.
However unimportant that may sound.
Which brings me to my second present.
This one. Painful to you or not, it has to come out.
In this book,
which I still regard as the most abominable, contemptible document
ever written,
Timothy is listed as a Pleasin' Nigger.
A person who can change his appearance to please the beholder,
as he has done.
Let me find the page.
It's on page 104.
How do you know?
I thought no slave had ever seen this book.
How do you know what's on page 104 of Mam's Law?
'Cause I wrote it.
It's all in my meticulous hand.
Mam and I were very young when the war suddenly ended
and this new statute terrified us.
Terrified you?
We tried to imagine what kind of world would these slaves be let out into.
Were they ready for it?
Or more correctly...
Was it ready for them?
Legislators promised all kind of things, but we didn't believe them.
It was then that Mam urged me to commit to paper
the way I thought things should be done here
if everyone stayed on at Manderlay.
But it's the prolongation of slavery.
You might call it that.
You also might call it the lesser of two evils.
But did the others know that you wrote this book?
Groups 2, 3 and 5... always knew.
A few members of the other groups were better off not knowing.
But everyone knows now.
I wrote Mam's Law for the good of everyone.
"For the good of everyone."
For the good of everyone?
How dare you?
It's a recipe for oppression...
...and humiliation from start to finish.
I think you've been reading it through the wrong spectacles,
Miss Grace, if I may take the liberty of saying so.
And then, Wilhelm initiated Grace
into the humane qualities of the lesser of two evils...
Mam's Law.
How it guaranteed food and shelter
and allowed anybody the privilege of complaining about their masters
instead of having to blame themselves for the life of no hope
that they would surely have to lead in the outside world.
How the noonday parade was a blessing
since the parade ground was the only place with shade
at the warmest time of day.
How the numbered groups were determined
according to the patterns of behavior
that human beings resort to in order to survive in an oppressive community
so that life could be made easier for each of them.
Since a Proudy Nigger,
not that Manderlay had seen many, if any of these,
survives by perceiving himself as proud and could be helped
by this system to believe
that he was a bit more persecuted and punished than the others.
Since a Clowning Nigger would benefit greatly from the laughter
that Mam's Law strictly demanded of his master
just as any other groups benefited from similar obligations.
How cash was forbidden,
so that gambling had to be done with cotton money
to prevent ruination and misery for the families.
Et cetera, et cetera.
Until Grace's head felt fair ready to explode.
Damn it, Wilhelm, they're not free!
That's what matters!
I'd call that a philosophical argument,
which neatly brings me to the two ballots I just mentioned.
Was Mam's Law still relevant?
We agreed that unfortunately it was as relevant now as it ever was.
America was not ready to welcome us Negroes as equals
seventy years ago, and it still ain't.
And the way things are goin', it won't be in 100 years from now.
So we agreed we'd like to take one step backward at Manderlay...
...and re-impose the old law.
Excuse me, but I'm going.
As for your going, I'd better tell you about the second of our ballots.
As you know, sadly, we lost Mam,
and unfortunately we've good and well frightened off her descendants.
In short, we lack a Mam.
- No! - I needn't tell you
that you received every single vote.
Never.
With all your idealism,
I think you could enjoy
being the guardian for a kind of menagerie of creatures
who have no chance in the wild.
Just as you thought the notion of community would be good for us.
You were so sure, you permitted yourself to use force to convince us.
I'd be sorry if we had to do likewise.
What do you mean? Do you intend to keep me prisoner?
Only until you understand the way you wanted us to understand.
The gate has been repaired and is closed.
The fences are in good shape, but of course, they ain't particularly high.
Those fences... come on.
Two men with a rusty shotgun and a toy pistol.
How dumb do you really think we are?
Too dumb to build a ladder if we really wants to get away?
Grace had spent a great deal of time on this meeting
which, from her point of view, didn't seem to be getting anywhere.
Her father and his car would be at the gate at 8:00.
That was in half an hour. She had no ladder,
and she was on her own and guarded by many.
Just how was she to get out of Manderlay?
When was a section of the fence always down?
Grace would have to change her tactics rapidly
if she was to make the rendezvous.
All right. I'll do as you want.
Not from my heart, though surely, none of you could expect that,
but as my only option.
And you needn't be scared.
I'll obey your beloved law.
So we'd better start by dealing with the present matter: Timothy.
A slave from Group 7
has committed a theft that almost ruined us all.
As I've determined that Mam's Law does not prescribe
any punishment for stealing money, I shall have to be creative.
What was it you once said, Flora?
Something about planting a bottle of Rhenish wine?
I do believe there's a bottle of Rhenish wine
under Timothy's saddle.
Don't you?
So that's what I seen when I went there yesterday.
If it wasn't a bottle of Rhenish wine!
There was still ten minutes until her slavishly punctual father
would arrive outside
to wait for his 15 minutes and not a second longer.
Just enough time for a verbal farewell salute.
Timothy, you can stop being proud and silent.
Cry... and shout...
...and beg for mercy...
...like the Mansi you are.
The Mansi who you despise so much.
And it's that hatred, Timothy, and the rest of you
bear towards yourselves that you'll never make me accept!
You are a cheat of the lowest kind.
And Wilhelm and all of you who follow him
are nothing but a bunch of traitors to your race.
I hope that your fellow Negroes will, one day,
uncover your betrayal and punish you for it!
You make me sick!
I'm sure you're quite right, Miss Grace.
Most likely it's impossible to revile us niggers enough.
But what I don't get is, why it makes you so angry?
What do you mean?
Aren't you forgetting something?
You made us!
Probably the only thing that could have stopped the lady with the whip
from carrying on forever
was the cheerful tinkle that announced her father's presence.
She needed his support now.
Manderlay, too, really was a place the world would be better off without.
Grace recognized her father's handwriting.
"Dear Girl,"it said.
Dear Girl.
So you tricked your father yet again.
I waited the 15 minutes first, but I am too kind-hearted.
So I popped over to the fence behind the bushes and peeked inside
to check that you were okay.
To my great surprise
it really did look as if you had a good grip on things, for once.
I'm proud of you, my girl.
I hope we meet up some day
so you can tell me what you actually meant
by "new times at Manderlay."
Love, Your dumb old Dad.
Ballots could be unrivaled,
but determining the time by public debate was rarely feasible.
That was quite apparent.
Grace had but a few seconds to choose the direction in which to flee
away from her swarthy pursuers who,
as her father had so teasingly predicted, were carrying torches.
Grace was in a hurry and did not notice Bert, the former fugitive
with a liberal attitude to other races who never did make it far.
Grace was angry.
Manderlay had fossilized in a picture of this country
that was far, far too negative.
America was a many-faceted place, no doubt about it.
But "not ready" to accept black people?
You really could not say that.
America had proffered its hand, discreetly perhaps,
but if anybody refused to see a helping hand...
... he really only had himself to blame.
# They pulled in just behind the bridge #
# He lays her down, he frowns #
# " Gee, my life's a funny thing, am I still too young?" #
# He kissed her then and there #
# She took his ring, took his babies #
# It took him minutes, took her nowhere #
# Heaven knows, she'd have taken anything but #
# All night #
# She wants a young American #
# Young American, young American #
# She wants the young American #
# All night #
# She wants the young American #
# Scanning life through the picture windows #
# She finds the slinky vagabond #
# He coughs as he passes her Ford Mustang #
# But Heaven forbid she'll take anything #
# But the freak and his type, all for nothing #
# He misses a step and cuts his hand but #
# Showing nothing, he swoops like a song, she cries #
# "Where have all Papa's heroes gone?" #
# All night #
# She wants the young American #
# Young American, young American #
# She wants the young American #
# All night #
# Well, she wants the young American #
# All the way from Washington #
# Her breadwinner begs off the bathroom floor #
# "We live for just these 20 years #
# Do we have to die for the 50 more?" #
# All night #
# He wants the young American #
# Young American, young American #
# He wants the young American #
# All right #
# He wants the young American #
# Do you remember your President Nixon? #
# Do you remember the bills you have to pay #
# Or even yesterday? #
# Have you been an un-American #
# Just you and your idol singing falsetto about #
# Leather, leather everywhere #
# And not a myth left from the ghetto #
# Well, well, well, would you carry a razor #
# In case, just in case of depression? #
# Sit on your hands on the bus of survivors #
# Blushing at all the Afro-Sheerners #
# Ain't that close to love? #
# Well, ain't that poster love? #
# Well, it ain't that Barbie doll #
# Her heart's been broken just like you have #
# All night #
# All night you want the young American #
# Young American, young American #
# You want the young American #
# All night #
# You want the young American #
# You ain't a pimp and you ain't a hustler #
# A pimp's got a Caddy and a lady's got a Chrysler #
# Blacks got respect and whites got a soul train #
# Mama's got cramps and look at your hands shake #
# I heard the news today, oh boy #
# I got a suite and you got defeat #
# Ain't there a man who can say no more? #
# Ain't there a woman I can sock on the jaw? #
# Ain't there a child I can hold without judging? #
# Ain't there a pen that will write before they die? #
# Ain't you proud that you've still got faces? #
# Ain't there one damn song that can make me #
# Break down and cry? #
# All right #
# I want the young American #
# Young American, young American #
# I want the young American #
# All right #
# I want the young American, young American #
# Young American, young American #
# I want the young American #
# All night #
# You want it, I want you #
# You want I, I want you want #
# Young American, young American #
# I want the young American #
# All night #
# And all I want is a young American #
# Young American, young American #
# I want the young American #
Subtitles by LeapinLar