Taking Sides Page #10

STEVE:

(playing with him)

Doesn't sound much of a trick to

me. Sounds like you made a deal.

FURTWÄNGLER

I made no deal!

STEVE:

I don't buy that.

FURTWÄNGLER

It's the truth.

Silence. Steve paces. Then suddenly turns on Furtwängler.

STEVE:

I keep hearing you helped a lot of

Jews to escape. How did you do

that?

FURTWÄNGLER

I don't remember in detail, there

were so many.

STEVE:

Did you call someone you knew?

FURTWÄNGLER

I may have, as... as I said, I

simply don't remember.

STEVE:

Let me me help you, then. You picked

up the phone and made a call -

(Mimes a telephone.)

'Hello, Adolf? Wilhelm speaking.

Listen, old pal, there's a Jew-boy

musician I want you to help. He

needs a permit to get to Paris.'

Emmi sticks her fingers in her ears and shuts her eyes

tight.

STEVE:

Or maybe you called Goebbels or

Goering? You were so close you

were in the same shithouse as them.

FURTWÄNGLER

May I ask a question?

STEVE:

Sure.

FURTWÄNGLER

When will my case be heard by the

Tribunal?

STEVE:

Your guess is as good as mine.

FURTWÄNGLER

I need to work. I need to make my

living. I live off the generosity

of friends...

STEVE:

Tough, tough!

FURTWÄNGLER

(now more and more

agitated)

Then why is it, please, that another

conductor who was actually a member

of the Party, who used to play the

Horst Wessel before his concerts,

has already been cleared and is

working again while I have to wait

and wait and wait?

STEVE:

I don't know, he wasn't my case.

Why did you escape to Switzerland

just before the war ended?

FURTWÄNGLER

It was because I learned that the

Gestapo was about to arrest me.

STEVE:

Why were they going to arrest you?

FURTWÄNGLER

I believe it was because of another

letter I'd written to Goebbels

lamenting the decline of musical

standards due to racial policies.

STEVE:

You didn't complain about the racial

policies, just about the musical

standards, is that right?

No response.

STEVE:

So, how did you learn that the

Gestapo was out to get you?

FURTWÄNGLER

During an enforced hour-long

interval because of a power failure

at a concert here in Berlin, Albert

Speer, the Minister of Armaments,

said to me, 'You look very tired

Dr. Furtwängler, you should go

abroad for a while.' I knew exactly

what he meant.

STEVE:

You sure knew a lot of people in

high places.

FURTWÄNGLER

It would be truer to say, I think,

that a lot of people in high places

knew me.

STEVE:

You were real close to all of them,

to Adolf, to Hermann, to Joseph,

to Baldur, and now Albert,

(flaring)

So, let's hear the truth, let's

come clean. What was your Party

number?

FURTWÄNGLER

If you are going to bully me like

this, Major, you had better do

your homework. You obviously have

no idea how impertinent and stupid

your questions are.

Steve is stung. His eyes narrow dangerously.

STEVE:

David, you remember I said I had a

question that he wouldn't be able

to answer? Well, I'm gonna ask it

now. You ready for this, Wilhelm?

It's a tough one. Why didn't you

get out right at the start when

Hitler came to power in 1933? Why

didn't you leave Germany?

No response.

STEVE:

I have a list of names here, people

in your profession, who got out in

'33. Bruno Walter, Otto Klemperer,

Arnold Schoenberg, Max Reinhardt...

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