Weekly Reflection on David Mamet's "Glengarry Glen Ross"

At the beginning of the play Williamson and Levene are discussing Levene taking a "lead." Initially, I did not know what they were referring to, "I need the leads. I need them now. Or I'm gone, and you're going to miss me, John, I swear to you" (Page 18). Finally I looked up the definition of "lead," even though I obviously know the usual contextual definition of lead and this is what it read:

• lead: a suggestion or piece of information that helps to direct orguide; tip; clue: I got a lead on a new job. The phone list providedsome great sales leads.

Then I realized that Levene was referring to a piece of information that related to Glen Ross Farms, and he actually wanted to take over the sales for this development. After realizing what they were referring to when they were talking about "leads" I was able to make much more sense of the play. 

Throughout the entire beginning of the play I noticed the use of profanity and the tone of the play. I was extremely surprised that Levene was speaking to his boss, Williamson, in this manner and it seemed like his boss did not care and actually felt bad for Levene. Then I realized that Williamson probably felt bad for Levene because he knew that if Levene did not increase his sales by the end of the month he'd be fired, "Levene: ...You don't look at the f*****g percentage. You look at the gross. Williamson: Either way. You're out. Levene: I'm out. Williamson: Yes" (Page 21).

• defeatist: 1. a person who surrenders easily or is subject to defeatism. 2. an advocate or follower of defeatism  as a public policy. (Page 24)

Finally, Levene tries to make an offer with Williamson: "...Get on my side. Go with me. Let's do something. You want to run this office, run it" (Page 24). Initially, Williamson did not go for the deal but finally he increased the percent Levene initially asked for and asked for cash for every lead he gave Levene. After noticing that there is a conspiracy building stamina in this story, it became that much more interesting and it was only the first scene.

So far, the first scene shows the "behind the scenes" side of, probably, many offices that we would not expect to have so much conspiracy. The fact that these two men are so relax with each other and the tone they are using with one another represents the closeness to the office but also the comfortableness, which sometimes could work out negatively or positively. I think that Williamson makes the right decision by not initially agreeing with Levene, but negotiating with him thereafter and even remotely considering the deal shows that he, like many others in today's age, would do close to anything for money. Clearly this entire situation and conspiracy is going to evolve into something over the course of this play.