'Educating Rita' - Willy Russell

Act One, Scene Eight

Rita I went into the pub an' they were singin', all of them singnin' some song they'd learnt from the juke-box. An' I stood in that pub an' thought, just what the frig am I trying to do? Why don't I just pack it in an' stay with them, an' join in the singin'?

Frank And why don't you?

Rita (angrily) You think I can, don't you? Just because you pass a pub doorway an' hear the singin' you think we're all OK, that we're all survivin', with the spirit intact. Well I did join in with the singin', I didn't ask any questions, I just went along with it. But when I looked round me mother had stopped singin', an' she was cryin', but no one could get it out of her why she was cryin'. Everyone said she was pissed an' we should get her home. So we did, an' on the way I asked her why. I said, 'Why are y' cryin', Mother?' She said, 'Because - because we could sing better songs than those.' Ten minutes later, Denny had her laughing and singing again, pretending she hasn't said it. But she had. And that's why I came back. And that's why I'm staying.

Blackout.

Rita goes out.

This is a fragment of stage comedy 'Educating Rita' by Liverpool-born playwright Willy Russell, first performed at the Warehouse in June 1980. The play centers on its only two characters, Frank and Rita, who are different when it comes to education and social class and Russell focuses on the extreme differences and the boundaries Rita has to overcome in order to improve her lifestyle and knowledge.

It is located on act one, scene eight of the play and Rita is beginning to change and realizing that she can no longer relate to her family and friends or educated people as she is in the process of becoming one. In the fragment she is explaining to Frank of an event that happened during a family reunion at the pub, where she realized that even her own mother was not happy with the life she was leading so, in order not to end up like her, Rita comes back to Frank more determinated to learn than ever and that way change her lifestyle. This is the moment of epiphany for Rita, when she really starts to make a transition from the person she was to the one she wants to become.

As we can read, she still has the Liverpool accent with the use of contractions like an', y', cryin', which reveals her working-class status when she talks. This is one of the major themes of 'Educating Rita', education, she wants to learn "everything" in order to change, but as it happens in the play it can be something dangerous if someone looses his/her own personality in the process and Russell condemns this using the figure of Frank, Rita's teacher, who doesn't like at first the person that she is becoming. But she finally reaches a balance between both extremes and finally getting the happiness she was looking for in her life. The scene shows us another main theme of the play linked with the previous one I have just mentioned, that is how a person can develop in a positive and negative way.

Another key theme is class divisions as she tells Frank, "Just because you pass a pub doorway an' hear the singin' you think we're all OK, that we're all survivin', with the spirit intact", Rita knows she belongs to a lower class postion than Frank and that is a boundary for her to learn and become educated, and she knows she has to overcome this even when this sets her apart from her relatives and her husband Denny. This use of the language is a great characterization device as one can guess where this character comes from and her education by knowing how she speaks. Rita tries to fit between the two positions, "Well, I did join in with the singin', I didn't ask any questions" but she has to change from one class to the other in order to make that improvement she wants. Escaping from her previous life with Denny and working as a hairdresser will make her have the freedom to choose her own life, which she can not do if she continues being stuck with them in the pub as if nothing happens, just like her mother does. Rita's mother response to why she was crying in the pub, "Because we could sing better songs than those" it is what pushes Rita to make that change, now in a more serious way than at the beginning, and the tone of the play changes from having a lot of humour, to become a more serious piece.

Here, it can be applied the Actantial Model, and Rita would be the subject, her object would be to have more knowledge and Frank would be the helper, as he is the one who is contributing to the subject to get the object. There may be several opponents, most particularly Denny and Rita's father, as they do not want her to study and want her to get pregnant instead. On the other way round, the subject would be Denny, Rita's husband, who wants her to have a baby and start a family, being that the object. The helper would be his father-in-law as he also wants Rita to have a baby and tries to push her and the opponent would be Rita and Frank, as they do not want that same object for her. At the same time, we could also use the model having Frank as a subject, because his object is to make Rita become an educated person but without loosing who she really is. The helper would be Rita because she is willing to reach that and the opponents would be Denny, Rita's father and also Trish and her friends who influence Rita in a negative way because she starts imitating them and loosing part of her personality.

The figure of Rita can be linked to Willy Russell's own life, as he was born in a working class family and worked as a hairdresser as well as in many other jobs until he returned to full-time education and decided to become a dramatist. In a way it can be seen as a play of the search of self-fulfillment and the struggles one person having working class roots have to overcome and this fragment is a clear exemplification of this.