How Titus Pullo Brought Down the Republic
Season 1, Episode 2
& Pullo: Here I come, girls. I’m going to drink all the wine, smoke all the smoke and fuck every whore in the city.
Lucius: Show some dignity. You’re under the standard.
Pullo: Well, talk to him.
Lucius: He’s not under the standard.
Pullo: Three hours away from a wife he hasn’t seen in eight years. The man’s terrified.
Octavian: Surely a reunion is a happy event.
Lucius: Talk of something else.
Pullo: Terrified. What if she’s lost her teeth? What if she’s gotten skinny? What if she’s been letting other men between her legs?
Lucius: Silence!
& Atia: Good fearsome specimens you are. I wonder it took you so long to subdue those odious Gauls.
Pullo: There was a great many of them... ma’am.
& Octavian: How many dead altogether?
Pullo: I don’t know. I lost count ages ago.
Atia: Lots though. And you, Lucius?
Lucius: 309 fighting men. I don’t keep count on civilians.
Octavian: You’re very exact.
Lucius: The war temple requires an exact number when you make an offering.
Pullo: That’s a lot of wine and goats.
Lucius: The priests offer a discount when you pass 100.
Pullo: Priests! Crooks, many of them! I just talk direct to whatever god I’m doing business with. Bugger the priests!
& Atia: Surely a plebian like yourself would like to see some changes made.
Lucius: It should remain as it was at the founding of the republic. Why should that change?
Octavian: Because the Roman people are suffering. Because slaves have taken all the work. Because nobles have taken all the land, and the streets are full of the homeless and the starving.
Atia: Well, I had no idea my son was such a firebrand*.
Octavian: The nobles say that Caesar is a war criminal. They say that he wishes to march on Rome and make himself king.
Lucius: That is sacrilege*. No man of honor would follow him.
Pullo: Well, I’m no man of honor then, ’cause I say that Caesar should ride in here with elephants and squash Pompey and Cato and anybody else that wants it. Never mind the law. That’s what I say.
& Atia: Don’t mind my saying it, but... you two make unlikely friends.
& Lucius: What child is that? Answer me! What child is that?!
Niobe: He’s your grandson.
Lucius: Speak sense, whore!
Niobe: Wait, now. Your grandson... The son of your daughter.
Lucius: My daughter is only...
Niobe: She’s 13, near 14.
& Niobe: Girls, this is your father.
& Lucius: A bit of a surprise to see me?
Niobe: A bit surprised to be called “whore.”
& Lucius: So, how did you manage for money?
Niobe: My sister Lyde and her husband helped us out.
Lucius: Well, you won’t need their help anymore. The big phallus is off a Suevi I killed in the Rhinelands... A very strong and fierce people.
Niobe: Nice.
& Cicero: My dear Atia, a pleasure. Forgive us for imposing at such a ludicrous hour.
Atia: Not at all, I adore it. The secrecy, the intrigue... It’s most thrilling.
Cato: Comprehend, woman, this meeting is invisible.
Atia: Be assured, Cato, I do not see you.
& Mark Antony: Good evening to you all.
Cato: General Antony.
Mark Antony: Tribune Antony, if you please.
Cato: You’re inside the sacred precincts of Rome, but yet you wear the bloody red cloak of a soldier. In time of peace, Romans wear the toga. The soldiers cannot be inside the city.
Mark Antony: Quae bruta figura! It completely fell from my mind. I’m most extremely sorry. Will you forgive me, friend Cato?
& Mark Antony: I have been delegated by Caesar to negotiate a compromise. Caesar wishes to avoid bloodshed. He wishes to be seen as a man of reason and probity*. Therefore, when his present term as governor of Gaul has ended, he is willing to accept command of a single legion province. Illyria, by preference.
Pompey: I don’t understand. Command of a province...
Mark Antony: So he will have legal immunity. So that none of you rascals* can go dragging him through the courts.
Pompey: We’re here to discuss the terms of Caesar’s resignation! He could have avoided prosecution by accepting a few years banishment*.
Mark Antony: Banishment for what?
Pompey: For fomenting a tyranny, illegal warfare, theft, murder, treason!
& Pompey: If he does not get a province?
Mark Antony: Caesar will take all measures required to protect both his interests and those of the Republic.
& Pompey: He’s weak, Cicero. Dying. Is that not when all the proverbs tell us to be wary?
Cicero: Does not the dying serpent bite deepest?
& Pullo: Let’s play.
— Where are you from, friend?
Pullo: 13th.
— Better you keep that quiet. This is deep Pompeian territory.
Pullo: So, we’re all Romans, eh?
& Niobe: Who is this man?! I don’t want people dying in my house!
& Doctor: There will be copious pus... First putrid, then wholesome... And mayhap fits of the spleen, but that will be all to the good. A purging of the malignancy will follow...
Hey! This is brass!
Lucius: When will he wake up?
Doctor: Today, tomorrow, maybe never. You might try an offering to Spes. A white rabbit often works.
& Niobe: Where are you going?
Lucius: I have business.
Niobe: Business? What business?
Lucius: I understand that you are upset, but I will ask you do not question me in that tone.
Niobe: Tone. My father’s cock! How’s that for tone?!
& Pullo: Marry me, goddess!
Niobe: What? A porcine object like you? Besides, I’m already wed, thanks be to evil spirits.
Pullo: You’re wrong, friend wife. He’s a good man, your man.
& Niobe: And now he’s home, and I wish he was in Gaul. He’s a cold, mean brute. Not one loving word to me or his daughters, not once since he has been home...
Pullo: He has no skilled hand with the women. But in all these years I fought with him, he never took a woman. “Pullo”, he’d say to me, “Pullo, my old friend, I have a wife back home, Niobe is her name and she’s worth more to me than all the women of Gaul.”
Niobe: I thank you for your kind words, but I know you lie. He’s no friend of yours. He told me so.
Pullo: Why? He has a... an
& Caesar: I had hoped to provoke some kind of aggression, sure, but to try and kill a tribune?.. In the forum?.. The man’s found some hard black iron in his soul.
Mark Antony: I’m sure it was yonder demented little worm Cato who put him up to it. It’s excellent, this. So, what next?
Caesar: Let’s see what the men have to say.
& Caesar: Any of your people I can mention ?
Mark Antony: Titus Pullo. Took the head off the first man that came at me.
& Caesar: Soldiers, Pompey and the Senate have formally declared that Gaius Julius Caesar is an enemy of Rome. They have declared that I am a criminal. They have declared, in effect, that all of you also are criminals! The tribune’s veto was not exercised. Peoples tribune Mark Antony and 50 men of the 13th were assaulted by 1000 head of Pompeian scum. A tribune of the plebs assaulted on the steps of the Senate house! Can you imagine a more terrible sacrilege? Our beloved Republic is in the hands of madmen. This is a dark day, and I stand at a fork on a road like a burden surrounding in my arm to the Senate and watch the Republic fall to tyranny and chaos! Or, I can go home with my sword in my hand and run those maniacs to the Tarpeian rock!
& Caesar: Legionary Titus Pullo, step forward! {...} Are you with me, Titus Pullo? Will you come with me to Rome?
Pullo: Y... Yes. Yes, sir! Certainly!
Caesar: Titus Pullo is with me! And you? Are you with me?!
& Lucius: Water? We’re moving. The whole legion, sounds like. Where to? It’s a river. What river? This is the Rubicon.
Pullo: Stay calm.
Lucius: This is rebellion and treason, and I am no traitor!
Pullo: It’s too late now. We’re across. We’re in Italy. You’re a rebel whether you like it or not.
Lucius: Caesar... Caesar, what have you done?
Pullo: He had no choice, had he? Pompey did try to kill Mark Antony after all.
Lucius: You of all men should not dare make that argument.
Pullo: How’s that?
Lucius: You know who was being attacked.
& Niobe’s daughter: What’s going to happen?
Niobe: War is going to happen. Who’s my greedy little piglet?
-- Dict:
firebrand — смутьян; подстрекатель; зачинщик
sacrilege — святотатство; кощунство
Quae bruta figura = What a moron
probity — честность; неподкупность
rascal — негодяй; мошенник; каналья; шельма; плут
banishment — изгнание
copious pus — обильный гной
putrid — гнилой
wholesome — полезный
fits — Устанавливается
malignancy — злокачественность
brass — латунь
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