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O-LevelLiterature in EnglishDrama2010/12 · May/June 2010 · Q125 Marks

Read this extract, and then answer the question that follows it. JACK thunders up the stairs. GIORGIO, hearing this, dives for the near bedroom, looks round, panic-stricken, and decides, with a certain unoriginality, to hide in the fitted wardrobe. He slides open the door and is all but engulfed in ANITA's numerous frocks that spring from their confined, undersized quarters. 5 Giorgio: Ah! [He fights his way in with difficulty] Jack: [reaching the landing] Cliff! I know you're here! Anita: [following him upstairs] Jack, he's not up there, I swear he isn't. Jack! 10 Giorgio: [during this] Oh, Madonna santissima, fa che non mi spari. Te ne prego, non lasciare che mi ammazzi. Unable to close the door, GIORGIO crouches behind the dresses, muttering a prayer. JACK enters the bedroom and stops short as he hears this. 15 Jack: Who's that in there? That's not Cliff. Anita: I told you it wasn't. Jack: Who is it, then? Anita: It's Giorgio. Jack: That Italian? The one I met the other night? 20 Anita: No, that was Uberto. This is his youngest brother, Giorgio. Jack: How many of them are there? Anita: Five. Jack: Five? Anita: Uberto, Vincenzo, Orlando, Lotario and Giorgio. 25 Jack: All called Rivetti? Anita: Yes. Jack: And you're working your way through them all, are you? Anita: Mind your own business .. Jack: This is very much my business, Anita. I have one or two urgent 30 matters of my own to discuss with the Rivettis ... [advancing on the cupboard] Oy, you! Out! A terrified scream from GIORGIO. Anita: Don't frighten him, Jack, he's only a kid. He hasn't done any harm. He's a good boy, he's very religious 35 Jack: Yes, I can see he is. Says his prayers regularly in married women's wardrobes. Anita, does Cliff know this is going on? Anita: May I get dressed, please, Jack? Jack: Poor bastard. He doesn't, does he? He's down there playing his darts match and he hasn't got a clue, has he? 40 Anita: Please let me get dressed, Jack. Jack: What's this doing to Cliff? What's it done to him already? Ask yourself, Anita. What is this doing to yourself as a human being? Your husband's due back any minute, you've got a fourteen- year-old Catholic Boy Scout in your cupboard and you don't 45 give a stuff, do you? You defy belief. Anita: [wearily] Oh, God. Hold on a minute, Jack, I'll go and put on some organ music. Jack: I'm not a prude. If people want to bore themselves rigid with soft-porn movies or read newspapers full of tits, I don't mind. 50 I don't want to interfere with that. But surely somewhere, Anita, there's got to be a minimum level of decent human behaviour, hasn't there? Beneath which none of us sink? Like not screwing around in your own marriage bed with men who are busy swindling your own family out of thousands of pounds? 55 Something around that level, eh? Anita: [calmly] Oh, I see. That's what all this is about. Sorry, Jack, I was being a bit slow. My mind was still on other things. CLIFF comes in the front door and closes it.

  1. (a)How does Ayckbourn make this confrontation between Jack and Anita so funny?[25]

Mark scheme

Marking points from the official mark scheme (May/June 2010). The mark or mark type is shown in brackets.

  1. Of course, much of the laughter comes from the contrast between Anita's blithe immorality and Jack's spluttering disbelief that any married woman can behave like this.
  2. It follows that there can only be one winner as he is met at every turn by a new revelation which is beyond his grasp.
  3. Even in an adequate answer look for more than an account.
  4. Expect some attempt to get to the roots of the laughter.
  5. When such an approach is central, then we shall begin to think of high reward.

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About this question

Topic
Drama, O-Level Literature in English (syllabus 2010). Structured question, 25 marks.
Source
O-Level Literature in English, May/June 2010 Paper 1 Variant 2, question 1.

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