Eric (still uneasy)
Well, I don’t think it’s very funny.
Birling (sharply, staring at him)
What’s the matter with you?
Eric (defiantly)
Nothing.
Edna (opening door, and announcing)
Inspector Goole.
(The INSPECTOR enters, and Edna goes, closing the door after her. The INSPECTOR need not be a big man but he creates at once an impression of massiveness, solidity and purposefulness. He is a man in his fifties, dressed in a plain darkish suit of the period. He speaks carefully, weightily, and has a disconcerting habit of looking hard at the person he addresses before actually speaking.)
Inspector
Mr Birling?
Birling
Yes. Sit down, Inspector.
Inspector (sitting)
Thank you, sir.
Birling
Have a Glass of port – or a little whisky?
Inspector
No, thank you Mr Birling. I’m on duty.
Birling
You’re new aren’t you?
Inspector
Yes sir. Only recently transferred.
Birling
I thought you must be. I was an alderman for years-and Lord Mayor two years ago-and I’m still on the Bench – so I know the Brumley police pretty well – and I thought I’d never seen you before.
Inspector
Quite so.
Birling
Well, what can I do for you? Some trouble about a warrant?
Inspector
No, Mr Birling.
Birling (after a brief pause, with a touch of impatience)
Well, what is it then?
Inspector
I’d like some information. If you don’t mind, Mr Birling. Two hours ago, a young woman died in the Infirmary. She’d been taken there this afternoon because she’d swallowed a lot of strong disinfectant. Burned her insides out of course.
Eric (involuntarily)
My God!
Inspector
Yes, she was in great agony. They did everything they could for her at the Infirmary, but she died. Suicide of course.
Birling (rather impatiently)
Yes, yes. Horrible business. But I don’t understand why you should come here, Inspector –
Inspector (cutting through, massively)
I’ve been around to the room she had, she’d left letter and a sort of a diary. Like a lot of these young women who get in various kinds of trouble, she’d used more than one name. But her original name-her real name – was Eva Smith.
The set for this scene is quite similar to Priestley’s. The Birling’s live in a fairly large suburban house set in Brumley; which is set in the year 1912.
All of the three Acts take place in the Birling’s dining room. The furniture, such as the dining table and show–cases will be of good, solid, dark mahogany of the period. The sofas will be placed cosily near the fireplace that is on the main feature wall with a portrait of the Birling family on it. The largest armchair will be placed nearer to the fireplace; this is where Mr Birling sits.
Near the fireplace there will be a telephone placed on a table which will be used later on by Gerald and Mr Birling in Act 3. On the same wall a cabinet stands holding glasses, port and whiskey. This will make it an easy access for Eric who goes back for port later on.
The heavy furniture and the sofas create a comfortable look, homelike, but it is overly dressed to show the Birling’s off, with their wealth and status as a middle class family. Heavy curtains hang on the window of thick reddish velvet, to again, show off their wealth and status.
The atmosphere on stage will mainly be identified by the lighting which will change with the emotions and actions of the characters on stage, for example when the Inspector enters the light will become brighter and harder.
There will be soft music in the background when all the Birling’s and Gerald are having their dinner. The music should not have any words in it, just plain music as the audience may drift whilst trying to capture the words of the music/song. The music will become hard as the Inspector enters; this is to emphasize his size and solidity, into the room but will fade as the Inspector and Mr Birling begin to talk.
All five of the characters (Mr Birling, Mrs Birling, Eric, Sheila and Gerald) will be dressed in evening clothes, Mr Birling in his middle fifties and Eric in his early twenties will be dressed similarly, they will be in tails and white ties of the period. Mrs Birling and Sheila will be wearing a slim vertical line, simple suit or skirt, of colours such as greens and pinks. This again is to show off their wealth and status as middle class people.
Gerald, who is about thirty, will be wearing similar clothes but they should be better quality, this is again to show off his wealth as an upper class person. Edna, who enters to tell Mr Birling about the Inspector, will be dressed in a black dress with a white apron. The Inspector who is in his fifties will be wearing a plain darkish suit of the period.
The role of Mr Birling is that he is a middle class business man who is celebrating his daughters engagement and he wants to share his comments and experiences with Eric and Gerald talking about family’s and the community. He stands up walking behind Gerald and Eric using slight gestures like moving his hands while he says the opening speech in this scene. He has a rather superior accent and uses a soft tone whilst talking, but his tone and voice changes when the Inspector starts to interrogate him.
Eric is Sheila’s brother, their relationship as brother and sister isn’t too good, they argue quite a bit. Eric is quite a timid person but also quite assertive at the same time, Eric does not talk much in the scene keeping his character quite hidden from the audience. In this scene Eric is fairly laid back but is tense when Mr Birling and Gerald are joking about him. He nods his head when answering and uses a soft tone when he is talking but then his tone turns tense when he reacts about the joke.
Gerald, who is now engaged to Sheila, in this scene acts exactly like the perfect son–in–law as he agrees with Mr Birling about the Inspector coming in about a warrant as well as other certain parts in play, he is also somewhat of a troublemaker as he tantalizes Eric. His tone is playful and content but also quite serious at the same time. He only makes one gesture in this scene; this is when he nods to Mr Birling at the joke.
One part of the scene that I consider is important is in somehow making the audience suspicious about Eric in the joke section and this is how I would stage it on stage:
Once Eric hears the joke he is nervous and tense and when he says ‘Here what do you mean?’, he will turn around sharply away from the cabinet with a glass of port in his hand slightly shaking with shock, and eyes bulging, the lighting will be focused on his face and Gerald and Mr Birling.
Mr Birling and Gerald are shocked at his response and are rather taken aback but Mr Birling replies casually, ‘Only something we were talking about when you were out. A joke really.’.
Eric answers ‘Well, I don’t think it’s funny’ still looking at them both with a searching look, hands have now stopped shaking as he makes his way back to his seat but not sitting down.
Mr Birling asks ‘What’s the matter with you?’ looking at him curiously. Eric answers ‘Nothing’ shaking his head and sits down drinking, submerged into his glass of port.
In the play, particularly focusing on the speeches that Mr Birling makes, we can say that he likes to think that he knows everything and that he likes the sound of his own voice, you can clearly see this in a few of the speeches he makes in this play as a pompous and self – satisfied person, for example, ‘There’s a good deal of silly talk about these days – but – and I speak as a hard-headed business man who has to take risks and know what he’s about – I’ say you can ignore all this silly pessimistic talk.’, and also when he talks about his friend who goes on the new liner Titanic, and he emphasizes the fact that it is supposed to be an unsinkable ship, but in fact the ship sinks on the 15th April 1912. Also in the rest of the speech, about peace and prosperity that Mr Birling talks about, never actually happens as the First World War in 1914 and the Second World War in 1939 happen later on, the complete opposite of what he said but is exactly what Bernard Shaws and H. G Wellses predicted.
In the opening speech in this scene, he talks about ‘a man has to make his own way – has to look after himself – and his family’ and criticises the thought that ‘everyone has to look after everyone else’ because as he is a ‘middle to upper class’ person, it is an idea that is impossible to him and is asking too much of a person, this is also the same when the National Insurance announced that medical aid would be extended to the poor in 1912, rich people only cared about themselves and they cast the poor people out. This is exactly what Mrs Birling done to Eva Smith when she came to the committee looking for help. Mrs Birling and Mr Birling have a stereotypical view about poor people and Mrs Birling gives evidence about this when she says ‘As if a girl of that sort would ever refuse money!’.
Priestley uses Mr Birling to tell the audience about the hard times, when Mr Birling is having a difficult time dealing with the strikes that the 200,000 working class people nationwide were involved in, the workers went on strike over low wages and rising prices in the year 1911 and the same happens again in 1919, if the strikers do win then there will be major concern because as a hard – headed business man, ‘Well, it’s my duty to keep labour costs down, and if I’d agreed to this demand for a new rate we’d have added about twelve percent to our labour costs.’, he cannot afford the increase in the wages.
Mr Birling, I think is a stereotypical view of a middle class person who is very concerned with his good reputation as a social, business man as well as a family man. ‘But I’d a special reason for not wanting any public scandal just now’, in this quote it is clear that he is concerned about his reputation but is relieved after Gerald called the Infirmary confirming that no girl had died, and acting as if nothing had happened that night.
On a whole this play outlines some of the economic and political issues that Priestley wants to identify for example war, unemployment, technology and of course the strikes. Priestley uses Mr Birling to get these across and of what people thought and tried to avoid.
