Play It As It Lays

Maria asks rhetorical questions on the nature of evil and points out that such questions often lack logical answers. When doctors present Maria with inkblot tests and question her beliefs about sex, love, and religion, she refuses to give them answers, and instead decides to establish “certain facts” about her life leading up to BZ’s suicide. Maria provides her biographical details, including how to pronounce her name (Mar-eye-ah), her age (31), and the fact that she is divorced and has a four-year-old daughter named Kate.

Maria is from a small town called Silver Wells, Nevada, and she left home at 18 to become an actress. She describes her father, Harry Wyeth, and his business partner, Benny Austin, both of whom are gamblers. Maria relates her experiences in New York, dating a man named Ivan Costello, hearing of her mother’s death, starring in Carter’s films, and marrying Carter. She now avoids socializing and tries not to think about the past. 

Helene relates her attempt to visit Maria in the Neuropsychiatric ward. Describing her visit, she says:

I drove all the way out there, took the entire morning and packed a box for her, all the new books and a chiffon scarf she left at the beach once (she was careless, it must have cost $30, she was always careless) and a pound of caviar, maybe not Beluga but Maria shouldn’t bitch now (11).