112
LIONEL ABEL
And when the Ken O'Duncs are about to arrive at the MacBird ranch,
this is the exchange between Ma.c and Lady Mac:
MAcBIRD:
Not only will I show them round the ranch
But I'll expose them to our faithful followers.
LADY MAcBIRo:
Expose
him to the fury of his foes.
MAcBIRo:
Expose
him?
LADY MAcBIRD: Just expose him. Nothing more.
I mean but what you mean, but what you want
He that's coming
Must be provided for, and you shall put
The day's great business into my dispatch
Which shall to all our days and nights to come
Give solely sovereign sway and masterdom.
Now what was the day's great business if not the killing of John Ken
O'Dunc? After he is shot, we have this bit:
(A Cop remains on the stage and takes a piece of paper out of
his pocket)
Cop: It says the shots will be from that way sent.
Isn't this likely to signal to readers of the play that Ken O'Dunc
was murdered by conspirators with whom the police were involved? But
this is what many people think is true of the murder of Kennedy; some
have even said so in print. To be sure, Miss Garson's cop is somewhat
Keystone: he reads the directive that has been given him about the
shots
after
they have been fired. The important thing to be noted,
though, is that he holds in his hand a directive and must have been part
of the plot.
Now, did Lyndon Johnson have John F. Kennedy assassinated?
Anyone who could think he did would of course not write a political
burlesque. But if Miss Garson does not think Johnson involved in the
murder, she does not at all mind supporting the rumor that he was.
The assumption of the author of
MacBird,
and of her admirers, too,
I take it, must be this: no stick is too dirty to beat our President with.
Now I happen to think that the dirt on Miss Garson's stick does
not rub off on the President, just as I think the tastelessness of his
