Jerusalem: Act 2 Summary & Analysis

Davey, Pea, and Lee are outside Johnny’s trailer creating profanity-filled signs to ward off the city council. Professor arrives with a bunch of gnomes in a wheelbarrow and begins lining them up along the ground according to Lee’s direction. Johnny walks out the front door of his home and blows a whistle, causing everyone to stand at attention. Johnny hands a jar to Ginger. Ginger opens the jar, which contains pills, and begins feeding everyone drugs. Everyone starts dancing together, including Tanya, who comes out of Johnny’s trailer holding drinks.

Johnny begins telling everyone fake stories about his father and his childhood. No one believes a word he says, Ginger least of all. Ginger gets stuck on a story Johnny tells about how he was born with a bullet clenched in his mouth because someone shot at his mother. Ginger questions how Johnny could have caught the bullet in his mouth because babies do not have teeth. Johnny pulls a bullet out of his pocket and hands it to Ginger as proof. Still, no one believes him.

Johnny bangs on a table and starts a lengthy speech about how he plans to take a stand against the council that seeks to rob him of his home. Every once in a while, the surrounding crowd cheers in support. At the end of his speech, Tanya sings about Lee leaving for Australia. Lee thanks Tanya for the song and then starts to cry. Davey and Ginger lightly tease Lee until he snaps out of his somber mood.

Johnny gives another speech about how later he plans to storm Flintock and burn it to the ground. Once more, the crowd cheers in support. As the speech concludes, Wesley appears. Johnny points at Wesley and declares him an enemy, which causes everyone else to make rude remarks about him. Wesley notes that Johnny has not taken his warning seriously. Johnny and his cohort take turns suggesting what they should do with Wesley. Their answers include torturing him and putting his head on a pike.

Wesley explains that he just came to say goodbye to Lee. He hands Lee a T-shirt that says, “Farewell Lee?” on the front. Wesley explains that the question mark was supposed to be an exclamation point, but the printer messed it up. After wishing Lee well, Wesley admits that he also came to score some speed from Johnny. Johnny tells him that he will give him three grams if Wesley will dance around in his morris dancer costume. Wesley agrees to the deal. As he dances, Johnny, Lee, and Davey make fun of him. Afterward, Johnny holds up his end of the deal and sends Wesley into his home to get the drugs.

While Wesley is inside, Tanya asks Johnny if he used to be a daredevil and if he ever jumped Stonehenge. Johnny responds that he never tried to jump Stonehenge, but he met the giant that built it. Ginger asks him to elaborate, knowing that a fake story is coming. Johnny tells a story about he met the giant on a cliff while wandering around the outskirts of Wilcot in the middle of the night. He guesses that the giant was somewhere between 90 and 100 feet tall.

Johnny says he chatted with the giant about the weather. The giant predicted what the weather would be like in the come months, but his predictions turned out to be wrong. The giant also told Johnny that he built Stonehenge. Johnny concedes that the giant could have been lying, but he does not know for sure. Then, he claims, the giant also gave him a large drum and told him to bang on it if he ever gets himself in a difficult situation. The giant explained that the other giants will hear the drum and come help.

When Johnny finishes his story, Ginger begins to pick apart the logic of his story. He says that the BBC would have covered a 90 feet tall giant showing up out of nowhere. Everyone agrees with him except Davey, who thinks the news does not always cover what it should. Davey convinces both Lee and Pea that he is right, so they start thinking Johnny is telling the truth.

Ginger asks Johnny to show him the drum to prove that it is indeed real. Johnny tells Ginger he is sitting on it. Ginger stands up and everyone looks at the drum. Lee points out some markings on it, which he calls “runes.” He also suggests that they bang on it, but Johnny cautions him not to. He says the giants will be angry if they summon them for nothing. Once again, Ginger expresses his skepticism. Johnny tells Ginger that he should bang on the drum if he doesn’t believe him. Ginger refuses, so Lee gets up and hits it instead.

After hitting the drum a few times, Lee goes silent and looks at something behind Johnny. Johnny turns around to find his six-year-old son, Marky, standing there. Johnny shoos everyone away so he can talk to Marky alone. A few moments later, Dawn, Johnny’s ex-girlfriend, also appears. Dawn asks Johnny if he is still able to take care of Marky for the day. Johnny responds that he can take care of Marky, but he does not plan to go to the fair. Dawn immediately grows irritated. As she starts to express her disapproval, Wesley comes out of Johnny’s trailer with white powder on his lip. He starts to comment on the drugs but stops himself when he sees Dawn and Marky.

Wesley tries to make polite conversation with Dawn and Marky but quickly leaves when he realizes he is only making the situation worse. Dawn tells Marky to go play in the mobile home so she can talk to Johnny alone. Once Marky is gone, Dawn chastises Johnny for his behavior. She knows the government plans to claim his land soon, and she also knows about his drunken antics. She says that Marky knows about them, too, because people make fun of Johnny at school.

Dawn asks Johnny to borrow his cellphone. Then, she calls an unidentified person and asks them if they can take care of Marky for the day. Her reaction suggests that the person said yes. Before giving the phone back to Johnny, she deletes the number so he cannot figure out whom she was talking to. Johnny asks Dawn how she has been doing. Dawn responds that she is great because she met a new man. Then, she asks Johnny how he has been. Johnny begins making up a story about being kidnapped and tied up in a basement. As he speaks, he cuts up lines of cocaine. When he is finished, Dawn walks over and snorts a few lines.

As Dawn snorts the cocaine, Johnny reaches into her purse and pulls out a pair of knitted booties. He asks Dawn if she is pregnant. Dawn responds that it is none of his business. When he presses her further, Dawn says that she has a new job at a knitting company. Uninterested, Johnny changes the subject back to Dawn’s new boyfriend. However, Dawn refuses to give him any information other than a first name. 

Then, Johnny asks Dawn to come over and look into his eyes. She does as he asks. After a moment, he asks, “Did you see it, Dawn?” He does not specify what “it” is, but Dawn says “Yes.” A moment later, Marky comes back outside to complain that the television is gone. Johnny tells him it is in the repair shop. Then, Dawn asks Marky if he wants to go to the fair. Before they leave, Johnny gives Marky ten dollars to spend. Then, Johnny goes inside his mobile home.

Once Dawn and Marky leave, Tanya and Lee return to the clearing. Lee tells Tanya that there are ley lines running through the woods, which run from the Avebury Standing Stones to Stonehenge. Moments later, Pea and Professor also return. Tanya points to the leftover cocaine, and then she and Pea snort a few lines. Davey becomes angry when the girls don’t share with him.

Davey picks up the card the girls were snorting cocaine off of and sees it is from Trivial Pursuit. He begins asking them trivia questions. Pea and Tanya don’t know any of the answers, so Johnny starts yelling them from inside of his home. After a few questions, Johnny comes back outside and bets everyone a hundred pounds that all of them combined cannot beat him at trivia.

Pea starts asking questions. Johnny answers all of them before she can even finish asking, which makes Ginger angry. He accuses Johnny of rigging the game by memorizing the questions in advance. Everyone gets angry with Johnny and calls him a cheater. Johnny continues answering questions, occasionally getting a few wrong but mostly getting them right. Sometimes, he answers before Pea can say the second word of the question.

Just then, Troy Whitworth, Phaedra’s stepfather, shows up, interrupting the trivia game. Johnny invites Troy to join the party. Troy says he does not plan to stay. He asks Johnny where he can find Phaedra. Johnny plays dumb and says he isn’t sure whom Troy is talking about. Troy gets annoyed and orders Johnny to send everyone else away so they can talk alone. Johnny refuses, which makes Troy angrier. He begins insulting Pea and Ginger, who try to stick up for Johnny and Phaedra. In response, Johnny says, “You’re just worried. It’s not just you feel a little bit randy today.”

Troy tells Johnny to shut his mouth. However, Johnny continues insinuating that Troy has a sexual interest in his stepdaughter. In response, Troy mocks Johnny for the life he leads. He also relates a story about how two men named Frank and Danny walked by Johnny’s home the previous summer and found him passed out and covered in his own urine. According to Troy, when Frank and Danny spotted Johnny, they urinated all over him, and someone filmed it. After, they sent around the video. Troy claims that everyone knows the story, but they are too afraid to bring it up to Johnny. He thinks it is likely that Lee even has the video on his phone.

Johnny looks around at his friends to see if the story is true. When nobody says anything, Johnny storms off, embarrassed. Once Johnny is gone, Davey admits to filming the urine incident, and the others admit to laughing at it. Everyone decides to leave the clearing except Professor, who is too high on drugs to do anything. After everyone else is gone, Professor tells a story to himself about a knight fighting a dragon. When he finishes speaking, Phaedra walks out of Johnny’s mobile home, still dressed as a fairy. She is trembling and taking quick, short breaths.