COMPANY "But who will I take care of?"

I've never understood why after "The Ladies Who Lunch" Bobby and Joanne do their bit and she says "I'll take care of you" "But who will I take care of?" and then she flips out at him.

Can someone explain?

Bobby, for several reasons, sees a great deal of himself in Joanne. Most importantly, he sees everything that he is afraid of. That scene, between the two of them, is really where you see Bobby's breaking point; she's the person who, for all of those reasons, finally gets through to him. He may be able to shrug off a lot of the things he's told (though I don't think he truly does), but he listens to her. What she says to him, in that scene and in the song, makes him finally get The Point, as it were. It makes him realize that what she's offering him -- to be taken care of -- is not what he wants. It's not enough. He needs to give it back, too.

Look at what she says when she "flips out" at him after he asks that, though:

Joanne: Well, did you hear yourself? Did you hear what you just said, kiddo?
Robert: I didn't mean that.
Joanne: Oh, I just heard a door open that's been stuck a long time.

She's not angry at him. She's FINALLY gotten through to him. She's gotten him to say what he's been refusing to say, and possibly realize, for, maybe, as long as she's known him. I know there's a certain... bite to a lot of readings of that line, but I don't think she's "flipping out" at Bobby, per se. I think there's a certain bitterness there, because he still has time. Joanne is tremendously unhappy. Bobby's younger. He hasn't given himself away to people who were wrong for him, or wasted time like Joanne has, and knows she has. I think she's jealous of him, and that he's realizing these things in time to make a change.

And since someone brought it up, I think the fact that they're both intoxicated in this scene is actually tremendously important (especially if you're looking at it through the lens of John Doyle's production, where Bobby had that drink in his hand for the entire show). It's a representation, I think, of the idea that when we're drunk, we speak the truth. Or, at least, our truth. Bobby's not only drunk at that moment at the club with Joanne; he's been getting drunk all night that we're with him during the show.

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Updated On: 1/6/11 at 07:27 PM

Hahah, thank you, that made me smile.

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It was one of my favorite choices. A lot of people ask whether it was deliberate, and of course it was. I just loved the directness of its implication. I saw a production out in Chicago a few months ago that borrowed that image, and used it a little differently, but just as effectively.

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Updated On: 1/6/11 at 11:54 PM

Well, it is. The whole thing, save for the beginning and the end that take place in "real time," is happening in Bobby's head. The actual timeline of Company is that Bobby comes home from work or whatever, listens to his voicemails, finds out about this party, freaks out, sits around thinking (getting drunk) -- and all of those memories are the vignettes -- and then leaves his apartment, leaving his friends sitting by and waiting for him.

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Updated On: 1/7/11 at 12:01 AM

I don't think Bobby necessarily runs out and gets married, but "Being Alive" is still a breakthrough in that, for the first time, he's able to admit that maybe he wants to really connect with someone. I think he probably moves, starts over, and probably does some dating but doesn't emotionally close himself off from everyone. Although it would be interesting to think that maybe when he leaves he falls into the same patterns...

I've had a few good discussions about whether Joanne was legitimately hitting on Bobby, or was trying to get him to see what he really wants. I tend I lean towards the former, with the breakthrough being, while not unwelcome, incidental. I think she absolutely would have slept with him, and it would have fed perfectly into her self-loathing (although surely would have been fun), but deep down she'd be disappointed that he went the same way.

Updated On: 1/7/11 at 06:53 AM

I've just never been able to accept the notion that Bobby is straight.

No doubt I'm reading my own agenda into the character.

Nonetheless. He absolutely strikes me as a certain kind of closety faux-heterosexual "sensitive" and terminally single self-deluding guy who very much existed in the world in 1970.

I agree that I don't think Bobby runs out and gets for a while. I think I want to believe that he does eventually, but he needs time. People have moments of instant realization that they need to change, which is what Bobby is going through with Being Alive. They don't change overnight.

I read the idea of "flipping out" at someone as giving it a sense of anger or... scolding, in a way. But like I said, I don't think it's that, either. Something in the text is a bit triumphant; she's done something nobody else has really been able to, or achieved it at a more successful level, and she knows that. But the tone with which it's often read adds something else to that.

And I agree with sweetestsiren about Joanne's proposition, though we have talked about this at length.

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Updated On: 1/7/11 at 11:43 AM