Heathcote Williams - The Speakers

In the mid‐sixties, Heathcote Williams wrote “The Speakers,” A compelling documentary ‐style play about the real and fantasy world of Speaker's Corner, Hyde Park...A half‐naked tattooed man, his face a maniacally scrawled doodle, tells of his association with Al Capone, for whom he allegedly, worked for many years. Another, a bearded Teuton who admits that if he didn't speak publicly he would probably perpetrate horrendous crimes, proclaims, with Old Testament fervor, the historical ,superiority of ,the German race...But of all the social misfits in Williams's world, the most riveting is MacGuinness, a coal‐eyed Irishman for whom oration is an exercise in salvation. MacGuinness talks about his life, invents outrageous tales about his sexual adventures, pretends to a human grandeur which, he declares, his own being cannot contain. “There is not enough MacGuinness for MacGuinness,” he wails.