DEBORAH: I could come over here and cook.
DANNY: You could.
DEBORAH: Yes.
DANNY: You could come over here and cook dinner, you'd like to do that?
DEBORAH: Yes.
DANNY: We could do that ...
DEBORAH: Sure.
DANNY: Yeah. We could do that... Let's do that
This exchange is the essence of David Mamet’s dialogue. Characters repeat themselves, parrot another character and spend a lot of time saying the same thing. One might think that the purpose and consequence of this “conversational” manner of writing dialogue is the intensifying of reality. And on paper, it does read that way: this exchange does carry the rhythm of real life dialogue. In performance, however, it is just the opposite. What seems like conversational dialogue is revealed as highly stylistic and serves to distance the audience from making an emotional connection with the characters. It is a dramatic device that will often be referred to as “Brechtian.”
“So hold on. So I see you seated at this table and I say to myself, `Doug McKenzie, there is a young woman,' I say to myself, `What is she doing here?', and I think she is here for the same reasons as I. To enjoy herself, and perhaps, to meet provocative people.
(Pause.)
I'm a meteorologist for TWA. It's an incredibly interesting, but lonely job. ... Stuck in the cockpit of some jumbo jet hours at a time ... nothing to look at but charts ... What are you drinking?”
First, the lies we know: His name is not Doug McKenzie, he’s not a meteorologist, he doesn’t work for TWA and his job doesn’t require him to look at charts in a cramped space for hours. Second, the lies he is probably telling Joan as he tries to pick her up in a bar: everything else.
Bernie aka Doug is a big talking teller of tales who hates woman and loves the fact that he has found in Danny someone too gullible so far to see right through him for the insecure woman-hating misogynist he really is.
“You're going to like Bernie, you're going to like him a lot. Ah! Ask him to tell you about Korea, he has got some stories you are not going to believe.”
This is maybe the definitive line from the entire play to describe Danny. If he actually thinks that Deborah is going to like Bernie, it proves his cluelessness. If he’s just saying that to be loyal to Bernie…it also proves his cluelessness. Bernie will eventually admit to having been in Korea, actually, and when he does it is further proof that not only is incredibly gullible when it comes to believing his friend, but he’s in so deep that he is bound to reveal his flaws to any girl he tries to get to be friends with Bernie.
“Swell. Life in the Primary Grades is a real picnic. The other kindergarten teacher got raped Tuesday.”
Her friend and roommate Deborah is making conversation and so asks Joan how things are going with her job as a schoolteacher. Joan’s reply is representative of her personality. It sounds caustic and sarcastic and, indeed, it is. Joan’s got a sharp tongue and a short fuse. This is revealed by what comes next. Deborah, still just making idle conversation, says “How terrible.” To which Joan responds vigorously replies that, of course, being raped is terrible before dismissing her friend by telling her that she really can surprise her sometimes. The point being that even though Joan was being sarcastic, she was also being sincere; a combination that most men—especially those like Bernie—cannot even begin to interpret.
