The Carbone family consists of, Eddie, Beatrice and Catherine. Eddie is recognised as the
master of the house and both Catherine and Beatrice are used to Eddie laying down the
rules. Catherine is Eddie’s niece but Eddie is like a father to Catherine and in one scene
Eddie has a go at Catherine because of the way she dresses as all the boys are looking at her
on the streets, “you are walkin' wavy! I don't like the looks they're givin' you in the candy
store”. Eddies relationship with Beatrice seems to be fading as on Page 25 she says, “When
am I going to be a wife again?”. Eddie ‘can’t speak’ and is unable to speak and he feels.
Beatrice also has a conversation with Catherine about being independent, she tells
Catherine to stand up for herself more. At the end, she is brave enough to take a practical
approach as she says, “You want somethin’ else, Eddie, and you can never have her!”. When
the cousins arrive at first Marco and Rodolpho are excited and thank Eddie for letting them
stay over however it becomes clear that Rodolpho and Catherine are in love with each
other. Catherine keeps referring to Rodolpho’s blonde hair as she has never seen anything
like it before, however Eddie sees it as un-manly and implicitly implies that Rodolpho is gay.
Eddie quickly builds dislike towards Rodolpho and tries to convince Catherine that he only
wants her to gain Citizenship. Catherine refuses to believe this and ends up running off in
tears. Eddie also shows his dislike for Rodolpho by stopping him doing things that he is good
at or impress Catherine such as singing by using the excuse that it will make the neighbours
suspicious because they’ve never had a singer in the house before. At one point Eddie
squares up to Rodolpho and says he will teach him how to box, Eddie puts his hands up and
trains Rodolpho for a bit before punching him in the face and wiping him knuckles on his
chin saying he was just playing. Marco, unhappy with this, gets 2 chairs and asks Eddie to
come over, he asks Eddie to put one hand behind his back and lift the chair up by the
bottom of one of its legs using only one hand keeping it upright. Marco manages to lift the
chair above his head showing male dominance showing Eddie that he should not mess with
his brother again. Later in the play we realise that this is because Eddie wants something
else from Catherine, he wants more than just a father-daughter relationship. We also see
that Beatrice knows this as when Catherine fetches and lights Eddies cigar, which was a
phallic symbol in the 1950’s as they weren’t allowed to show anything explicit or sexual.