Opening scene

Mozart
Salieri
PETER SHAFFER
Opening scene

Savage whispers fill the theatre.

WHISPERERS
Salieri …..Salieri …..Salieri

Two middle aged gentlemen hurry in from either side. They speak rapidly
V1
I don’t believe it

V2
I don’t believe it

WHISPERERS
Salieri …..Salieri …..Salieri

V1
They say

V2
I hear

V1
I hear

V2
They say

V1 and V2
I don’t believe it

V1
The whole city is talking

V2
You hear it all over

V1
The café

V2
The operaV1 The prater

V2
The gutter

V1
But why now

V2
After so long

V1
Thirty two years

V1 and V2I
don’t believe it

WHISPERERS
Salieri …..Salieri …..Salieri

V1
They say he shouts it out all day

V2
I hear he cries it out all night

V1
Stays in his apartment

V2
Never goes out

V1
Not for a year now

V2
Longer…. Longer…

V1
Must be seventy

V2
Older….older…..

V1
Antonio Salieri
V2
The famous musician
V1
Shouting it aloud

V2
Crying it aloud

V1
Impossible

V2
Incredible

V1
I don’t believe it

V2
I don’t believe it

WHISPERERS
Salieri …..Salieri …..Salieri

V1
What sins he shouts

V2
What horrors have you heard?

V1
What does he cry?

SALIERI(In a great cry)Mozart……Mozart………

V1
Pardon Mozart….

V2
Pardon your assassin…….

V1
Thirty two years ago

V2
When Mozart was dying

V1
He claimed he’d been poisoned

V2
Some said he accused a man

V1
Some said that man was Salieri

V1
But no one believed it

V2
After thirty two years

V1
What do you think?

V2
What do you think?

V1
I don’t believe it

V2
I don’t believe it

WHISPERERS
Salieri …..Salieri …..Salieri

V1 and V2 remain, on either side of the stage. We see a man of seventy in an old stained dressing gown with an old turban on his head. He rises and squints at the audience, as it trying to see it.
WHISPERERS
Antonio SalieriSalieri …..Salieri …..Salieri

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