Arsenic and Old Lace

We used to have this old lady

Who’d come to the first preview of every show

And accost all the actors afterwards

Telling them what a bad job they were doing

And how she couldn’t believe she wasted her money

On the crap she’d just witnessed

I should probably mention

That the first preview of any show

At the theater

Was always pay-what-you-can

And she always gave us a penny

So now you can feel free

To generate an opinion about her

One of our nicknames for her

Was Penny Pincher

I can’t say the other nicknames

Without making some of you blush

So I’ll abstain

She especially hated me

We were doing Arsenic and Old Lace

In the winter of 1979

And after the first preview

I could see her waddling towards me

In the theater lobby

So I started pushing through the crowd

To avoid her

I don’t know how an able-bodied young man

And a weather-beaten old hag

Seemed to maneuver a crowd

At exactly the same pace

But somehow she still wound up getting outside

At the exact same time I did

But before she could say anything

She stepped on a patch of ice

Right in front of the theater

I saw her legs kick out from under her

And down she went

Like a pile of bones and skin

Coincidentally, Pile of Bones and Skin

Is one of the other nicknames we had for her at the theater

The whole time she was on the ground waiting for the ambulance

She was holding onto the leg of my pants

So I couldn’t move

I thought about kicking her arm away

And making a run for it

But there were too many witnesses

When the ambulance finally got there

She told them I was her son

And could I ride in the back with her

They said sure and—What was I going to say?

No?

If you’re thinking the fall

Exposed her truer, kinder self

You’re wrong

On the way to the hospital

She told me how much she hated the show

And how it was the worst thing she’d ever seen me do

And why didn’t I just give up acting

And become one of those guys who checks the meters?

I asked her why she keeps coming to the theater

If she hates what we do so much

She told me her husband used to drag her there

Against her wishes

And when he died

She kept going

Because it was something they always did together

When we got to the hospital

I made sure she got a room

And then I wished her luck

And we exchanged a surprisingly pleasant good-bye

‘Will I see you at the next preview,’ I asked

‘I don’t know,’ she said, ‘Maybe I’ll just get lucky and drop dead before then.’

I looked right at her and said—‘God willing’