SCENE ONE
Setting: Vacation town by the ocean, end of summer, present day. (Il Pirata?) Diner interior: Tables, counter in front of open kitchen, register, etc., door with bell / backroom of diner: hallway, storage, boss’ closet, a walk-in fridge. Outside break spot in parking lot through back door at end of hall. Open on chef wincing as he lights a stove, loud clicking of pilot light, title appears over whoosh of lit blue ring: THE MAGNETIC CHEF (and the instrumental theme song begins: piano only?) Old waitress 1 and dishwasher (that is, the person who washes dishes) are seen in background making fun of him. As chef adjusts flame, dishwasher mimics him. (Theme song fades out.) The front door opens with a bell ring and in comes a blind man. His bald head is sausage-like in coloring. Back to kitchen: A can holding spatulas slides toward the chef and almost falls off the counter, but he catches it. He pulls it off this hand with the other. This causes the contents of the can to spill out. As this happens, the other two old waitresses have poked their heads in and all three burst out laughing. The old waitresses each chew on a match throughout. Blind man feeling his way. As he finds a seat, scratches the top of his head, yells A sad waitress is alerted by the voice but doesn’t move right away. She has been reading a book, book open and held out flat, her hip against the counter. We see her face. Then the book. It is a book of fairy tales. The chef is walking around the counter and approaching her with a cup of coffee (poured from same pot as used in scene 5?). The boss is behind the counter, in the kitchen, walking away and out of view. BOSS: Keep it clean back here. Could be anybody. Pan around to each customer’s face. (Swing camera from off right to straight into face, actor looking blankly but directly into lens, then swing camera off toward the left.) Heard over connected panning shots: The chef, now beside her, puts a cup of coffee in front of waitress. He bends down to see what she is reading (to look at the cover). Waitress quickly pulls her skirt in to cover herself, and looks flustered. CHEF: (mortified) Oh! I was just looking to see what you’re reading! WAITRESS: (shows him cover) Nothing. Sorry. How’s it going back there. CHEF: Just fine. An inspector’s supposed to come in— BLIND MAN: Is there a waitress? Overhear customer chatter, loud voice of a customer: Cold! CHEF: Would you like to get some coffee with me maybe Friday? I have it off, and I know you have off… Chef leaves happy. We see appliances rumble as he passes them. There is a musical-saw sound when magnetism is evident. Waitress looks at coffee, looks at her book. She folds something in a napkin and presses it in the book, saying a little prayer. Something drips out the book into the coffee, as if accidentally. We don’t know if she knows. She puts the book down and brings the coffee to the blind man. BLIND MAN: Thank you so much. Just coffee today. Could I trouble you, how many clouds are there, out the window? (pointing) WAITRESS: (looking wistfully) Five. Six. BLIND MAN: (happily) Six! WAITRESS: I’m afraid there are. (walks away) The waitress has bent over to rub a cramp in her calf. She wears a brace. From between her legs, she watches blind man drink. (upside-down shot) Overheard: I heard the iced tea here was bottomless. We see the book flop itself open (unseen by actors) on the counter to the page with the folded up napkin. Then we see a folded up napkin wedged under a table leg. Pan up to a table of two customers, one male one female (blonde, with distinctive clothing). They already have water, menus. The waitress heads toward them during their first line. She gets pulled aside by another table and reaches them at “cripple.” CUSTOMER MALE: So she finds the poor thing. After four weeks mind you. (pause, angry) I know you don’t believe in this psychic stuff but just patronize me can’t you. CUSTOMER FEMALE: (obstinate, ignoring waitress) Why are you always short with me? CUSTOMER MALE: (snaps) Because you’re an emotional cripple. WAITRESS: Hi. Where are you two from. (doesn’t wait) Do you want to hear our specials? CUSTOMER FEMALE: No, I’ll have— WAITRESS: Rum cake. CUSTOMER FEMALE: Rum? WAITRESS: Rum’s missing. Quick shot of boss. He’s shutting his locker, spraying his mouth, and heading to the dining area. (Also, get a shot of the mermaid mural at Il Pirata and a shot of the “inside-out” book rolling maniacally) CUSTOMER FEMALE: I’ll have the BLT. WAITRESS: You want tomatoes? CUSTOMER FEMALE: Yeah, that’s the T. WAITRESS: Tomatoes are not in season. Do you still want them? CUSTOMER FEMALE: I have no idea. Change location to outside break area just outside back door. It’s very bright. An empty parking lot. We hear the ocean, traffic. Dishwasher and chef are smoking cigarettes. Chef is sitting on the ledge in front of the door. DISHWASHER: How’s someone, afraid of fire, smoke? CHEF: (smiles) No. (they smoke) CHEF: Being a chef is all I can do. You know, I was once a chef for Peregrine Andrew Morny Cavendish, 12th Duke of Devonshire, the former Marquess of Hartington. DISHWASHER: Well shit, chef, I didn’t know that. You know, I always defend you around here. To those old girls, and the boss. CHEF: (dreamily, this is a voice-over for shadow play) The Duke was famous for his racehorses (2 horses outside with castle, sound: horse whinnying) and even went so far as to stage marriages between his stallion and prize mares. Each wedding had to have a banquet of course, so the Duke and I had many conversations (inside, table with duke, chef goes over to duke, sound: classical music) about which dishes to serve the guests, even what to feed the horses. When the staff saw how the Duke was speaking to me, they knew he loved me and grew jealous. One fateful day, (no one at table, waiter brings a candelabra to table. It stays, he leaves, sound: sinister effect) as I was preparing scouse-mameluke a la Duke, wind-dried seawolf, fermented bison-head pudding, and prize piccalilli apples for the horses, the headwaiter switched the palace’s wooden candelabras with flimsy metal ones. (table with duke and guests and horses, sound: clattering of dishes, crowd noise) That night, as the guests were enjoying their meal, he told me that on the Duke’s command I was to bring out the savoury course myself, and receive his usual praise. Excited and off guard, (chef walks down to duke, candelabra falls) I marched down the long table with a sweet knickerbocker glory. One by one, the false candleholders shook and fell, igniting the table and then the drapes. (flames, scared horses go back and forth, sound: horse whinnying, crashing, flame crackling) There was nothing I could do about it. And the horses were on fire and racing around, spreading the flames throughout the castle. (pause) (outside, castle, boat sails away, sound: ocean waves) Thanks to the guards, no one was killed, but those charred horses were more than enough to ruin me. I crossed the ocean the next day. Back to actors DISHWASHER: That’s some story. Doesn’t sound like your fault. (pause) Well, you’re here now. This is a place people come for vacation. So you and me now? This (spreads arms) is like a vacation. So cheer up. Like today, you seem in a good mood. That’s good. I’m glad. And you don’t have to tell me why. CHEF: (sincere) Thanks. DISHWASHER: You’ll be fine because you’re a fighter—like me. (big smile) Go back to table of customers. CUSTOMER MALE: Can I get a glass of— WAITRESS: We have the lettuce. CUSTOMER MALE: You don’t have the soda? WAITRESS: (defensive) Of course we have soda. Soda and super-soda. CUSTOMER MALE: I’ll have a— WAITRESS: (she stares at them) Soup is fresh. (dramatic music, fairy tale book pages flipping?) CUSTOMER MALE: On a hot day? WAITRESS: Well, the soup’s a bit cold. The chef— (Cut to chef nervously smoking (on green screen with image of iron filings in a rosette around him?)) WAITRESS: He’s special. CUSTOMER FEMALE: I thought the special was rum cake. WAITRESS: Have you been to the waves today? (she looks off wistfully again) CUSTOMER FEMALE: Yes very beautiful. At this point, a table of customers in the background has gotten up suspiciously and dashed out the glass door. We hear from off-camera the oldest waitress yelling: The boss chases after them, out of the diner yelling at them. We follow him as he loses them. He is in the street. He angrily walks not back in through the glass door, but sheepishly around the building to enter through the back door, which is blocked by the sitting chef and standing dishwasher. They are putting out cigarettes. BOSS: Get up. Break’s over. The boss and chef go in first. Dishwasher sees a folded up piece of paper has fallen from the chef’s pocket when he stands up. Dishwasher picks up the paper and starts to open it up. Just then old waitress 2 is coming out the door for her break. OLD WAITRESS 2: (yelling backward) Watch it, fireball! (to dishwasher, about note) What’s that? Back to inside diner. WAITRESS: I’ll be right back with your soup. She walks off CUSTOMER MALE: Is she limping? CUSTOMER FEMALE: (snarky) Perhaps she is an emotional cripple. Cut to waitress giving order to chef. She returns to her book. Image of chef from viewpoint of inside oven. (Inside-out book on a rotisserie?) Image of boss opening his locker. There is a bottle hidden under a folded up red coat. He pulls it out and drinks. On the inside of the locker is a list of names. Chef puts bowl of soup on counter and rings bell. (Bell sticks to hand.) (Perhaps a spoon on a fishing line orbits his head and he swats it away like a bee.) Dishwasher waves him into the kitchen (depends on how diner is set up). Chef is surrounded by the three old waitresses. OLD WAITRESS 2: I think we should read it out loud! OLD WAITRESS 1: Read it to your one-legged waitress! OLDEST WAITRESS: Pocket full of poetry! Ashes! Ashes! CHEF: Give that back to me! Circling chef. OLD WAITRESS 1: Or else it’s fifty dollars from Mr. Charming! OLD WAITRESS 2: One hundred dollars! OLDEST WAITRESS: Twenty dollars! DISHWASHER: (calling out) Hey Rue? Sweet waitress! CHEF: It isn’t right. The boss walks in. BOSS: What the hell? Shot of waitress poisoning the soup (she pours something from a vial (not the book again)) and serving it to the table. When she sees the male customer eat it, she looks wracked with guilt. She pulls at her hair. Establish a dramatic, “poisoning” sound. She hears the commotion and weaves through diner to kitchen. Nearer the chef: All the hanging pans are rattling, the silverware is hopping out the drawers, etc. OLD WAITRESS 1: There she is! The blue-plate princess! Listen to your prince! DISHWASHER: Hey Rue! He wrote you a love letter! Our cook! Waitress looks alarmed, at chef who is humiliated, looking away. WAITRESS: What? DISHWASHER: (reading in an affected voice): Ahem, “And I see well how burning love” BOSS: Ha! CHEF: Ack! Shut up! DISHWASHER: “Poisons the tongue, steals away one’s speech” WAITRESS: Oh God. OLDEST WAITRESS: What did he say? During next line we see the waitress is listening and touched. DISHWASHER: “He who can say how he burns is in only a little fire” The pans fall to the floor making a loud noise. Some magnetic fracas. Oldest waitress falls down with a yell. The boss breaks things up. BOSS: Back to work you jerks! The inspector could be here right now! Could be anybody. Pan around to each customer’s face. (Swing camera from off right to straight into face, actor looking blankly but directly into lens, then swing camera off toward the left.) This time the male customer is choking and spits up soup. The blind man is picking at a slice of ham on his head. The staff dissipates. The chef starts hanging the pans back up. A fork is stuck to the side of his face. Bobby pins. Perhaps he peels aluminum foil off his chest. As the waitress passes the boss, he grabs her elbow. BOSS: Can I see you for a moment, lovebird? WAITRESS: (alarmed, shaking her head “no”) Yes. Boss and waitress begin this alone in the hall, soon the chef is in the background listening in. BOSS: A lot of customers have been getting sick lately. That’s why the inspector’s coming you know. WAITRESS: No. BOSS: Of course it might not be food poisoning. But even the rumor of food poisoning would kill us, you understand. WAITRESS: I just serve the— BOSS: Don’t you worry, I’m going to talk to your little chef next. But we’re talking about you right now. And some of your fellow employees have told me some strange things. WAITRESS: Who? The other waitresses hate me you know they do. BOSS: Don’t worry about that. WAITRESS: I never did anything. (more and more alarmed) What are you saying? BOSS: I said don’t worry about who said what. But if you’re putting something in my food and giving it to my customers it has to stop. WAITRESS: Your customers? BOSS: (stone faced) I’ll call the police do you understand? Waitress starts crying, runs into bathroom. Shot of rusty, leaking tampon box, etc. and her panic, then pulling herself together. (When she emerges from the bathroom, the boss is standing right at the door with a patronizing smile.) CHEF (upset, to boss): What are you going to do? BOSS: Either fire the bitch or have her arrested. Chef starts pacing, Boss heads toward bathroom with back to chef. Chef agitated, walks into the walk-in refrigerator. The metal door shakes and slams behind him. Inside the refrigerator, we see the chef spin and thump at the door in a panic. At the restroom door. Waitress opens door, somewhat composed but loses it immediately at the sight of her boss. Boss has a false, patronizingly forgiving smile. BOSS: Come on, it’s OK. I’m not blaming anyone. You’re fine. Puts his arm around her, she really wants to believe him. BOSS: Just a few sick tourists, probably drunk. A coincidence. WAITRESS: I have to get back to the tables. BOSS: I know you can’t help it. WAITRESS: (quietly, pathetically) It could be the chef. Image of two black wings in a burnt pan flapping a few times feebly? (sound of horses and fire) Cut: In the dining room. The blind man finishes his coffee. A slice of ham is sitting on his scalp. He feels it, moves it, winces. He leaves a dollar and makes his way out of the diner. Meanwhile we overhear the male and female customers at their table. The male is moaning. The female asking: We see the blind man from behind. When he opens the door and gets outside it is blinding, and we hear the ocean. We hear the door’s bell ring as fade to white.
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SCENE TWO
Little dialogue. Mostly a montage with narrator voice over. The narrator should have a deep, melodic voice. Or a kindergarten teacher’s female voice? We pause a few times for a character to speak a line or for a peek at the trapped chef’s doings. It is important we never see the old waitresses. The narration copy below can be rewritten/edited to fit the footage. Perhaps have narration rhyme? Film filters should show how it gets hotter, cooler, much hotter. Use degrees of same filter. Keep the chef scenes looking like scene one. The blind man is making his way down the sidewalk. He’s sweating. We leave him and pan around town. We see people dropping their coats on the ground as they stumble along. People look up at the sun, then at each other without emotion, then back up at the sun. A man uses his T-shirt to wipe his face. An old couple with their hands in the air, blocking the sun. Etc. Make sure the severity of the image fits the chronology of the story. Spinning newspaper headline: “HEAT WAVE” Subhead: “Record Temperatures” NARRATOR: All day the sun bloated and burst. At night the moon was a white coal. You couldn’t see the heat, but it was there. And when the town woke the next morning, somehow it was twice as hot. A townsperson goes to open his door to go to work. Has to use his coat to turn the knob. WORKER: (Upon looking through half-open door) Oh God. (yells behind him) Honey! And grabbing letters from hand of mailman. When worker holds letters up, inside his house, head-level, they are on fire. Looks at them, sorts through them as if normal. Fire Alarm goes off. Shot: Inside the walk-in refrigerator, the chef is shivering. The shivering is distinctive and used at the end of the film also. Perhaps arms tight around himself and rocking, looking up at the ceiling. CHEF: I don’t understand! How can no one notice I’m gone? No one? On Friday she’ll wonder why I’m not there to meet her. (paces) Don’t they at least need more food? Who’s cooking? Chef hits the door with some object he’s found; it rings like a church bell. Cut away from fridge. Film tourists at Fisherman’s Wharf, perhaps in slow motion, looking hot. Get clips of fires, etc. to make montage. NARRATOR: Then the pets began to die. Hope dried up like a puddle and no one went to work that day. (pause) The sky was a hurtful red and that night the moon flaked away. A shot of someone in bed tossing and turning, wilting flowers in a vase. Perhaps a fan with wilting blades bangs against its cage. Spinning newspaper headline: “200 DEGREES! SCIENTISTS BAFFLED” NARRATOR: In the clear headache of dawn, beds curled at the corners. But as the sun rose, things got better. The temperature may even have gone down. The town stepped out warily. Tears came to their eyes and evaporated like brandy. Down the road mirages mirrored their relief even as the old and sick continued to die and the birds boiled in their baths. Old couple walking. Dead squirrels on the road. The man goes down on one knee. His wife runs in circles screaming. Birds fall from the sky. (Film bird on road to mimic “Image of two black wings in a burnt pan flapping a few times feebly”?) Dusk: we see the waitress in her kitchen, radio news on, leaning on her refrigerator with the freezer door open to cool her face. NARRATOR: But alas, the following day was three times as hot. (loud alarm) Spinning newspaper headline: “300 DEGREES! EVACUATE!” Subhead: “Mayor Flees Town at Night” NARRATOR: No one had the energy to talk or think. Whoever was still alive abandoned their shut-up homes, their gasping babies, and lurched toward the sea. Their shoes sticking in the asphalt, then being yanked out with a suck. Shot: Inside the walk-in refrigerator, the chef is shivering. Now he is rambling with a stupid smile on his face (he will behave the same at end of film). His face is covered in frost, icicles, etc. Time has passed. Perhaps the little room is disheveled or some bags of food opened. CHEF: (pointing out supplies in the fridge) Peas! Bees! Beer! Sneeze! Fruit! Horse! Horse! Boss! He beats his head against the door and moans. CHEF: (with resolve) I’m not staggering out of the wolves just yet! Here’s a plan: If we take the mercury out of the measure and paint the door the wires inside the, the, lock can’t deliver the trigger is frozen… (pause, confused) Help! I’m in here! (starts up again) OK. What we do is Rue is. (get a “Shining” shot from below of chef with arms out to door) Number one: With a tabled setting I’m betting just so, like this, that we can crawl through the bank if we tighten our bellies and…footprints through the sheets? Fluttering bells? Wait! Let’s not rush matters. I think we’re thinking to fast. There’s got to be a vent in here. (pause) What? You say, there’s a hole in the bottom of the bag! Right! And if we can… Interrupting, a bag of food with a tear like a mouth yells: And, outside again, “heat filter” extreme, more “hot” images, suffering. NARRATOR: The sun was now a blue ring of flame. There hadn’t been a shadow in town for some time and the clouds turned to smoke. What would happen tomorrow? Find a warmer beach? We see blind man, boss, waitress among the crowd. They walk into the water. NARRATOR: The air was burned and tasted wrong. The town decided without speaking. They walked into the ocean, which had begun to steam. And one by one everyone was sucked out to sea.
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[Transition from scene 2 to 3: Narration over shot of the ocean. Note that the narrator is quiet for scene 3 and only returns at the beginning of scene 6. ] NARRATOR: Far out in the ocean, where the water is as blue as the prettiest cornflower, and as clear as a dead man’s mind, where it is very, very deep, and the new coldness of the water was sad… [Although scene 3 (after short incident-at-sea part) is also largely visual and transitional, we don’t need to overdo the voice over. Instead the scene will play out almost like a silent movie (no title cards however), that is in pantomime, the score being the blues song.]
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SCENE THREE
Boss and waitress treading water out at sea (lake). They are about 20 feet apart. Another woman is farther off, watching. BOSS: Hey! It’s you… A lot of people went under, you know. WAITRESS: Sir? BOSS: Small world… Crazy… My little waitress… You know Stan Zbornak? He couldn’t swim… lives by the water and never learned!... he wouldn’t let go of me… trying to climb up on my head… almost drowned us both! WAITRESS: Oh God! BOSS: I’m worn out! WAITRESS: Do you think land is near? I’m so tired… and hungry. BOSS: Swim over here… I’ve got a candy bar left (holds it up)… What are the chances… two people in the whole ocean. WAITRESS: I’m coming over. She swims to him and he to her. When she gets near, he attacks her, grabbing her, holding her close and laughing. She kicks away. (underwater footage?) Now they awkwardly tread water about 10 feet from each other. When he moves in, she moves away, etc. BOSS: (out of breath) I was just kidding… Come here honey… WAITRESS: (crying) No… leave me alone! …What’s wrong with you? BOSS: Stop crying you bitch. (pause) Murderer. You poisoned my customers. WAITRESS: No! I never wanted… I can’t control it. BOSS: (mimics) I caint contwol it! (or just laughs?) WAITRESS: My mind goes white and… and it’s like I’m watching… the TV (sobbing) BOSS: Stop swimming away... I’m going to teach you… a lesson. Waitress yelps. Swims away on her back, kicking with her legs. BOSS: You swim pretty… well with that… leg of yours. WAITRESS: Go away! BOSS: (laughs) Were should I go sweetheart? Nowhere and everywhere! You and me! WAITRESS: Shut up! BOSS: …I wonder how deep it is out here. …You just keep drinking until you find out. A swirling current or wave now separates them. We see it sucking the boss backward. (Good example of a puppet show moment. Or tug the actor in a lake with a boat.) We zoom in on him for his line then let him shrink out of sight. The mermaid has been watching all of this from afar with a blank look. We just think she is another townsperson until now, when she dives under and her tail splashes up out of the water. fade out/in People washed up on a new beach, including waitress. A few stragglers walking out of surf up on the sand and sitting down for a rest, etc. This new land is always filmed with a specific filter, so it’s clear where we are. No dialogue; the instrumental intro of the blues song fades in under the sound of the sea. The lyrics can begin before we see the blues men. I don’t think we need to match the song to the blues men. (All played by same actor.) That would be nice, though. Blues Song: The pin cut the cat The girl took the pin Nancy Needle love her man What is a bee? Dust on the bell Nancy Needle love her man The song in the bird The girl made the bed Nancy Needle love her man What’s with the girl Her bad heart hurt Nancy Needle love her man (On the new beach. (Ocean Beach at Moraga?) Song has begun.) All the survivors have wet, tattered clothes. We hear a buzz and someone in the background shoos a bee. One survivor points forward, others look. We see houses in the distance. Close up on waitress. She tries to fix herself up a bit, wrings out her skirt, tears off her nametag and throws it down in the sand, then starts walking with the others. The people work their way to the edge of this new town. Occasional swatting at bees. On the corner is a blues man, sitting on a chair with a metal pot of coffee and open guitar case in front of him. He is playing the one song. The survivors pass him by without a glance. We hear a louder buzzing. Possible shots to cut to quickly: (stock footage of bees?) Bees on a balloon; bees coming out the guitar hole; smoke coming out the coffee pot; survivors swatting at bees; closed-up houses and streets without people and cars; etc. The waitress tries a door of one of the shut-up houses. She puts her ear to the door. A loud slow sarcastic clapping is heard. Waitress moves on. Another survivor tries another door. Ear to door. Someone inside kicks the other side of the door frightening the survivor away. Etc. As the group continues, each corner they pass has the same blues man continuing the one song. The bees get worse and worse until everyone is running frantically. We see another instance of someone trying to enter a house and hearing the clapping. Shot from afar on the street and survivors all trying doors. The sparse clapping overlays itself until it’s a chaotic roar. The waitress sees survivors running back toward the beach but her leg hurts. She is rubbing it and limping badly. She loses the group. We see the survivors dejected and covered in welts. They escape the bees by going back into the water. They are sucked out to sea. The waitress remains. She passes a last blues man and drops a quarter in his guitar case. The song has just ended and he says: WAITRESS: The bees aren’t so bad here. BLUES MAN: If you’re very very still it seems to be best. Coffee? WAITRESS: What? No. She runs, bees chasing her, to a tall, brightly colored house. Instead of the sharp clapping, she hears women laughing. The door is unlocked and she enters. She goes down a hall, following the cackling, and opens a door quietly. Inside are three old women in waitress outfits (Change aprons? Heavy makeup?) sitting or squatting in a circle on the floor. They look like the three old waitresses from scene one (same actresses), but with some fanciful differences. (It should be clear they are probably not the three from scene one, but an exaggeration of their likeness.) The three women don’t notice her. The room (our kitchen, painted?) is almost candy-like and there are both domestic and diner items. A large oven. The sound of a calliope perhaps. She comes closer and sees they are looking at a large fly on its back, spinning around in a puddle of water with a stuttering buzz. The old women twitter and cackle, amused as if at some cruelty. The oldest finally looks up and notices the waitress. Points at her (camera is now waitress POV, so the old ladies end the scene looking at the camera). The other two waitresses look up at camera with a growl, baring their teeth and starting to get up.
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SCENE FOUR
Seaside town from scene 1. Use filter from before heat wave. On the original beach, we see boss coming from the sea, walking up the sand. Exhausted. Looks up at sun. He looks around, rolls his eyes, etc. BOSS: I thought this place would be ash by now. Shot from inside empty diner. (Perhaps male customer is lying on the floor?) We see the boss come in. Bell rings. BOSS: Ding! He goes straight to his locker. Looks at the red coat. BOSS: It’ll be winter again after all. Pulls out Santa outfit. The bottle it hid rolls out of the locker and smashes on the floor. The boss gasps. We hear a banging from the closed walk-in refrigerator next to him. Boss looks around, shoves the coat back into the locker and closes it. He opens the refrigerator door and the chef comes stumbling out, falling on the floor, covered in frost. He is clutching an open bag of food. BOSS: Ho! Ho ho! Have you been in there this whole time? Break’s over! CHEF: (chattering teeth, wide-eyed) Where was everybody? Why didn’t anybody let me out! BOSS: You missed a lot. (holds out his torn shirt) Most of the town’s gone. Don’t worry about it. (waves his hand dismissively) Back to work. (starts to walk away, stops) Come over here. They walk to the dining room and sit at a table. On the way, boss grabs a towel and throws it around chef’s shoulders. BOSS: It’s high time we reopened the diner, champ. And you’re in a great position now the staff’s all dead or lost at sea. CHEF: Dead! (looks around at empty diner) What about— BOSS: (annoyed) Your waitress is fine as far as I know, headed out to some other town across the ocean. Wherever the current takes her, as they say. CHEF: What are you talking about? What happened here? BOSS: I saw her way out at sea. She was happy as a clam. She said you should forget about her, I said “What about your little chef?” and she was like, (imitating her) “That freak? I never liked that guy,” I couldn’t believe it. Especially after your poem and everything. Sorry. Women you know. Now listen, we’ve got to get this place running again. Top priority. CHEF: I should go find her. BOSS: (puts his hand on chef’s shoulder) Look man, she said you were poisoning the food! She tried to blame it on you, you understand. (chef shakes off hand) Now she’s gone and good riddance. (pause) She was a tired-out slut anyway, if you must know. Used to laugh at you behind your back. Call you a— CHEF: What’s going on here! BOSS: Don’t worry partner, the tourists will come back eventually. They always do. The town will rebuild, and we’ll be hitting the ground running. Ahead of the curve. (moves in close) In fact, we can be a little proactive, hit the competition before they get back. (smiling and looking around) I’m surprised the whole town isn’t burned down. The chef gets up and walks out of the door with a ring. He walks down the street, looking at the dead animals, lack of people, and other evidence of the heat wave. Cut to the ocean where he runs into a townsperson coming up out of the water. TOWNSPERSON 1: Oh thank God everything’s back to normal. CHEF: Where did everybody go? TOWNSPERSON 1: Across the ocean’s some horrible town full of bees. We all just decided to swim back home and hope for the best. Look at this nonsense. (holds out arm full of welts) I got all bit up. Or stung up I guess. (turns around and pulls up shirt to show back, starts to pull up a pant leg) CHEF: Did you see a waitress. Rue, with a metal brace on her leg? TOWNSPERSON 1: Yeah yeah. (guiltily) She stayed I guess. (walking away) CHEF: I’m going to find her. (heads into the ocean) TOWNSPERSON 1: (calling back) Dumb move! Shot of chef swimming out to sea. He passes another townsperson swimming the other way who says The chef fights on, treading water. He struggles and goes under with a scream. (another underwater shot?) We find out later he was pulled under, but for now it should be ambiguous. Fade out Fade in: waitress in the strange house of old waitresses (from end of scene three, use that filter). The oldest waitress is at the counter with a measuring cup, bottle of rum, flour, rolling pin, etc. The other two old waitresses are sitting in chairs in the foreground. The waitress is scrubbing the floor between them. OLD WAITRESS 1: What’s she doing? (nods toward oldest waitress) WAITRESS: She’s baking a cake. ALL THREE OLD WAITRESSES: Shut up! OLD WAITRESS 1: And stop your crying. OLD WAITRESS 2: (sing song) It is not of the least use. OLD WAITRESS 1: No one will come to help you. (to oldest) So you’re making a cake? OLDEST WAITRESS: I have my flour and my rum. OLD WAITRESS 1: You’re making a rum cake? OLDEST WAITRESS: (drinking from measuring cup) No. A flushing sound like a laugh track. The waitress looks around for source of noise, continues scrubbing. The actors should wait unnaturally for each of these laugh track sound bits, like they do in sitcoms. OLD WAITRESS 2: Bzzz bzzz! Sounds like the bees have settled down outside, knock on wood. (she knocks on her chair’s armrest) OLDEST WAITRESS: Hello? Come in! A flushing sound like a laugh track. The waitress looks around again for source of noise. OLD WAITRESS 1: (points at waitress) No thanks to this lazy barnyard, barging in here like a hussy. OLD WAITRESS 2: (oblivious) Why did the bee go to the doctor? OLD WAITRESS 1: Which reminds me. (to waitress) Keep your window closed or I’ll cut off your toes! OLD WAITRESS 2: (happily) It had hives! WAITRESS: Yes ma’am. ALL THREE OLD WAITRESSES: Fetch us some milk and sweet-cakes! Fade out on waitress’ frightened, dirty face. Return to sea, that filter. The chef has a bit of a beard now and is sitting on a rock in the middle of the ocean with a mermaid. A bottle is floating nearby. The chef is combing her hair. (Shore or rock at lake.) The mermaid is playing an accordion and sings part of a song. Chef beats time with comb? Mermaid Song: As the clatter of lanterns turns into oysters When the heavy-soaked travelers sink in the tavern
CHEF: (interrupting song) What’s this? (looking down at her tail while the bottle floats by) MERMAID: What? Another message in a bottle. (she plucks it from the water with contempt) CHEF (pulls a tail scale up, white worms) Ick? Lice? Are you sick? MERMAID: (Grabbing her tail from him.) How dare you! I saved you from drowning. CHEF (quietly) And you never stop reminding me. MERMAID: (part of this might be a flashback of underwater rescue with a voice over continuing line) I dove deeply under the dark waters, rising and falling with the waves, till at length I managed to reach you; you were fast losing the power of swimming, your limbs failing you, your eyes closed, and you would have died had I not held your head above water, letting the waves drift us where they would. And I kissed your forehead and wished my last wish that you might live. CHEF: (snarky) I’m quite aware of what happened. You tell me the same story every day. Same fishtail. MERMAID: You dummy. You don’t know anything. CHEF: I know I almost drowned looking for my love. MERMAID: Because I arranged it. CHEF: What are you saying? MERMAID: I pulled you under. (part of this might be a flashback of underwater reenactment with a voice over continuing line) You were swimming along and I grabbed your feet. You splashed about for a bit, then a few gulps of the sea and you were like a little boy in my arms. (end of flashback) (pause, Chef is wide-eyed) Look around you. There’s no one else for me for miles around. What? Should I play with the crabs for the rest of my life? Instead of a man? If I see another starfish I’ll pluck out my eyes. (pause) Now you’ll get upset and say you’re leaving. CHEF: I’m leaving. MERMAID: You won’t. I will sing you a song and you’ll forget. Forget what I told you, forget your silly waitress. This is how it always happens. I love you. Willy. (pause, singsong) My wee wet white Willy. O wee wet white will stay. Ooooeee…(starts up accordion? Perhaps plays opening song again, but live and poorly.) Chef shakes off a dream. MERMAID: (angry) Stop what exactly? Keeping you alive? You’ll drown. And I won’t help you. You will die and the water will crush your bones. Wait until the (threateningly) Sea Duke hears about this! Chef looks at compass he just made (cork/needle/in an oyster shell full of water), but the needle points at himself. MERMAID: Ha! Everything’s about you. (nastily) The most important little cook and his soggy white hat. CHEF: I don’t care. (Jumps in water, hat in hand, starts swimming) MERMAID: (yelling) You shrimp— you don’t know what it is to be a man. I need a sailor, not some lovesick cook! CHEF: (yelling back over shoulder) You’ve kept me here and for what? Half a woman. There’s a girl… who’s important to me… A real person. Mermaid cries. Chef treads water 20 feet away. MERMAID: Then leave if I’m such a drain, keeping you here, poor thing. (sobs) You can’t know when a mermaid cries. (yelling) You can never come back you know! You haven’t paid! Pride must suffer pain— Chef POV—He goes underwater and can’t hear anything else. (underwater footage?)
* * *
SCENE FIVE
“Bee town” filter. The old waitresses’ house. Old waitresses 1 and 2 are again looking at a spinning fly. Waitress, more disheveled (6 months have passed), covered in dirt, long hair in a bun or beehive, is putting a sleeping girl in the oven (use close-up of girl in back of a car, through back window, pull out on glass of oven door with a picture of girl inside it) after pulling out a cookie sheet of black apples. Otherwise, cleaning, etc. OLD WAITRESS 1: (contemplative) You can suck out the sugar from its legs. OLD WAITRESS 2: (childish) What has wings, But cannot fly? OLD WAITRESS 1: (contemplative) It has no hands, it can’t wash. OLD WAITRESS 2: (childish) I fly in the air, but I’m not always there. OLD WAITRESS 1: What’s the old thing doing? WAITRESS: She’s in the bathroom. ALL: Hold your tongue! OLD WAITRESS 1: Estelle, where are you? Are you all right? The toilet flushes. A flushing sound like a laugh track. Oldest waitress enters, standing. OLD WAITRESS 1: No, honey. OLDEST WAITRESS: Does honey help? OLD WAITRESS 1: (pause) No.
OLDEST WAITRESS: Do you have Ginger ale? OLD WAITRESS 1: No. OLDEST WAITRESS: Pepto-Bismol? OLD WAITRESS 1: Does it say K-Mart on the back of my dress?! OLDEST WAITRESS: Actually it does, you cheapskate! A flushing sound like a laugh track. Background: When waitress hears the talk of upset stomach, she looks around nervously. Drops something and gets a dirty look. Oldest waitress moans, holds stomach. OLD WAITRESS 1: Nonsense. And she’s been here longer than the last girl. Six months is hardly new. Oldest waitress throws up on the floor. A flushing sound like a laugh track. OLD WAITRESS 1: Jesus Mary and Joseph! I think you better sit down. (to waitress) Clean that up, it stinks! Old waitress 1 walks over to oldest waitress, and assists her to a seat. Oldest waitress continues to moan, grabbing her stomach. OLD WAITRESS 2: Um, should I get her a glass of Alka-Seltzer? OLD WAITRESS 1: No. You should sit here and watch her moan herself to death. OLD WAITRESS 2: Are you sure? A flushing sound like a laugh track. OLD WAITRESS 1: (to waitress 2) Get the Alka-Seltzer you dope! OLD WAITRESS 2: (to waitress) Get the Alka-Seltzer you dope! (throws something at waitress’ head) WAITRESS: Yes ma’am (hurries through cabinets. Finds baby shoes, lunchboxes, red hoods, crowns, etc.) OLD WAITRESS 2: I'm a moron and I deserve to die. (pause) I said I'm a moron and I deserve to die. OLD WAITRESS 1: And it was worth repeating. A flushing sound like a laugh track. Back to fly spinning on its back. The fly stops buzzing and flips over. OLD WAITRESS 1: Look at the fly. You can suck out its mind. OLD WAITRESS 2: It has one wish to wash out. WAITRESS (to herself): I wish someone would whisk my lifetime away. OLD WAITRESS 1: Hey, hey snap-to gimpy! This house is a regular mess! The dishes are to the ceiling and the glass slippers in the moat are spotted. OLD WAITRESS 2: And where are my sleepytime apples already?! I can’t sleep with those neighbors (cranes head) growling all night! WAITRESS: Yes ma’am. (runs out of shot) OLD WAITRESS 2: Lazymoans! If I had to thank her, I'd choke on the words. OLD WAITRESS 1: Please risk it. A flushing sound like a laugh track as we follow waitress to her room. She shuts the door on the camera. Cut to: The beach of the town of bees. The chef emerges from the waves and wrings out his hat. In the sand he finds the waitress’s name badge. He walks up the beach. Cut to: Waitress in her room (where film this?) with window open. We hear a songbird in the distance as the music fades in. Perhaps a painted backdrop unfurls behind her. She undoes her bun/beehive, sings her song, and lowers her hair out the window. We cut to the chef on the sand dunes for his part of the duet. Waitress Lament: Waitress:
Little tame pigeons and turtle doves too,
Chef: Waitress:
My prince here’s your signal, shackled in silver.
Chef: As he finishes his last line of the song, he reaches town. He runs down the street. We hear a buzzing. He starts flailing at bees. He stops at a blues man on a corner. The blues man is between songs, drinking a steaming cup of coffee. CHEF: I’m allergic to bee stings! BLUES MAN: Coffee? Blues man holds out his cup. A bee is spinning in it like the cork-and-needle compass. But its stinger ends up pointing away from the chef, down the street. CHEF: No thanks. Say, I’m looking for a waitress with a brace on her leg? Dark hair? The steaming pot of coffee is next to the blues man, on the ground. Neither the chef nor blues man notice it shake and slide toward the chef while they talk. It sticks to the chef’s calf and stays with him when he leaves, emitting a lot of steam. BLUES MAN: (winning smile) Have you ever heard “Wee-Wilma the Waitress” by Blind Hoot the Skoot Mitchell? (he puts down the coffee and starts to tune up) CHEF: No. I don’t think so. (looks around uneasily) Look, I’ve got to run. Sorry. (drops a quarter in the open guitar case) Chef walks down the road, smoking from the calf. We hear the never-ending tuning of a guitar. The chef passes the same blues man tuning at the next corner and looks at him incredulously as he passes. The blues man looks up while tuning. He has a coffee pot next to him. BLUES MAN: One second sir! Just got to tune up ol’ Beatrice. (indicates guitar) The bees are kept at bay because the coffee pot acts as a bee smoker. Perhaps we can show this with a clip of documentary footage of a beekeeper? Chef looks up and sees long dark hair hanging out a high window. He smiles. CHEF: Ah! It’s her! It’s her! Chef starts to run, notices smoker on his leg. Grabs it and pries it free. Runs with it in his hand. Smoke billowing behind him. Cut to: Waitress in her room with window. Her hair is going out the window, tugging her head. She braces herself against the window frame. We hear bees buzzing. The three old waitresses burst through the door. OLD WAITRESS 1: What’s going on here? Why is this door shut? Good God! Why is this window open? The three old waitresses grab the waitress. They pull her out of the room and drag her to the center of the main room. Shot of window: Her hair is thus yanked back up through the window. Before it is all the way out, the window falls shut on it and rips out a few locks. We hear an off camera “Ouch!” Cut back to main room. OLD WAITRESS 2: I’ll get the scissors! Oldest waitress does not wait, starts ripping out clumps of hair with her hands. Old waitress 1 is punching the crying waitress in the face. Old waitress 2 arrives with three large metal scissors and they all start cutting off the flailing waitress’ locks. Hair on the floor, flying in the air, red-faced screaming waitress, cruel smiles on excited old waitresses, etc. A shot from waitress’ POV, spinning circle of mean faces. Oldest waitress flicks open comb/switchblade. The scissors start to tremble and drop out of the three old waitresses’ hands, vibrating on the floor. The old waitresses look at them with surprise. The waitress finally turns her teary face to the scissors and has a look of hope. Her head swings toward the door, as does the camera. Cut to: Chef enters house, leaving the coffee pot by the door. He hears a scream. He runs up the stairs and down a hallway (our apartment hall?). He puts his ear to one of the doors. Behind him, three bears walk past, further down the hall, and the largest bear pulls out keys and opens a door. Chef does not notice bears. Cut to: Inside old waitresses’ main room. Scissors jump off floor, whiz by the old waitresses, just missing their heads. They gasp. Cut to: Outside of door. Chef with ear against door. Three scissor blades pierce the door with three quick thuds, and almost hit his head. (Like a knife-throwing act.) CHEF: Holy smokes. Cut to: Inside room. Chef bursts through the door. (Ta-da music?) OLDEST WAITRESS: Ack! Intruder! The old waitresses get to their feet with an effort. Help each other. Silence except for their creaks and groans, sound of a clock. WAITRESS: Help! (waiting for old waitresses to get upright) It’s you! Help! CHEF: What’s going on here!? OLD WAITRESS 1: (with a sneer) Ah, you’ve come to kidnap your happiness, but that bird will never sing. The cat has fetched it away, and she intends to scratch your eyes out. The appliances shake and the oven door crashes open. The girl jumps out and starts running around the room squealing. OLD WAITRESS 2: Catch that piggy! (as she chases) Little pig little pig! GIRL: Weeeeeee! Weeeeeee! The waitress grabs the oldest waitress by the shoe and trips her. When she hits the ground, her front teeth go skittering across the floor. Old waitress 1 charges the chef and they grapple a bit. Waitress goes to his aid, is in turn tripped by oldest waitress, etc. Hullabaloo. People running about. The girl squealing and darting across frame. People slipping on cut hair. Someone steps on the fly and jelly squirts out of it. Chairs are knocked over. Metal objects skate around. Etc. The old women tire. Chef grabs waitress. Oldest waitress, still on the floor where she’s been crawling about, sees this and grabs his ankle. He drags her halfway to the door and shakes her off. The two escape. Cut to outside house. Chef and waitress run out the door of the house, the chef grabbing the coffee pot. The waitress looks at him. Her hair is all different lengths. CHEF: A bee smoker! And they walk away like lovers arm in arm. WAITRESS: (smiles, one lock down her face which she tucks behind an ear) I thought you were afraid of fire? CHEF: (smiles) Not smoke. As they walk off, her brace sticks to his leg and they have to walk like a three-legged race. They stop after a bit to rest and kiss. WAITRESS: (looking again at smoker) Is that a coffee pot? CHEF: Yes. WAITRESS: Then that’s steam isn’t it. Not smoke. CHEF: (as if to a child) Steam and smoke are the same thing. And they walk off into the sunset. Cut to: Shot of three old women in their house, looking at each other, defeated. Girl’s gone. The fly is squished. OLD WAITRESS 1: (righting a chair) There's just something I don't like about that chef. I can't put my finger on it, but if I did, I'd have to wash it. A flushing sound like a laugh track. OLD WAITRESS 2: (playing idly with a lock of hair in her hand) Penny for your thoughts, Estelle. OLDEST WAITRESS: (front teeth missing) You're stupid, and that's on the house. A flushing sound like a laugh track. [Perhaps (may be too much): Image freezes. Applause. Credits roll very quickly. Black screen. Title card: EPILOGUE]
* * *
SCENE SIX
The scene begins with a montage like scene two. In this case, the weather gets exponentially colder. Below is some voice-over copy that can be edited to fit the footage. The narration can be rewritten to rhyme, if it rhymed in scene two. Same narrator as in scene two. (Possible footage for below narration: Montage of happy couple moving in, coffee pot steaming, dead old waitresses, blue sun, snowfall, thermometer falling, blues man falling off stool, iced over pond, etc. Perhaps a frozen mailman (same actor as mailman in scene 2). Following footprints in the snow to a dead person. Get clips of blizzards, etc.) NARRATOR: And so the chef and the waitress were to live happily ever after, planning their bright future in this strange town. They found an empty house and moved right in, keeping a pot of coffee on at all times to ward off any bees. The other houses clapped warmly for them now, and the three old ladies died mysteriously, drawing all the flies in town to watch their three spinning, icy corpses. Montage continues in a “colder” filter. Music grows menacing (an increasingly demented “Winter Wonderland”?). NARRATOR: But after a week, the sun suddenly turned its back. Winter came and covered the city with its dazzling drapery of snow. The cold, cold hearts of the dead, dead ladies seemed to spread broadcast. Spinning newspaper headline: “LET IT SNOW! RECORD LOWS!” NARRATOR: The next day, it was twice as cold. Bad frost smeared the sky. The lawn was littered with white bees. And the following day? The blues men’s fingers snapped off, and those poor souls stuck outdoors fell off their stools and crawled into their guitar cases to meet their makers. Spinning newspaper headline: “OH NO! 100 BELOW?!” Subhead: “Mayor Flees Town in Dogsled” NARRATOR: Even the ocean waves slowed down, and the whole town was buried in ice except for the occasional smoking chimney. Fade to white. Cut to: (Dome? Decked with icicles, picture of frozen blues man against window, windows white with “snow”) Chef and waitress wearing winter coats, blankets. The house has a living room and kitchen. House should be rather empty, perhaps icicles hang from shelves. The windows are white with snow. One pane has a dead, blue face pressed against it, perhaps. Occasional lines spoken should involve smoke coming out of the actor’s mouth. A frozen pet might be accidentally kicked on occasion and slide across the floor. Chef’s behavior should remind us of his shivering/rambling behavior when he was in the refrigerator (scene two). Perhaps something in the score reflects this rambling state. CHEF: I’m not so cold anymore. WAITRESS: I think you’re getting sick. (Puts her hand to his forehead, perhaps she notices and removes a thimble from his neck.) CHEF: (with resolve) I’m not staggering out of the wolves just yet! Here’s a plan. We go back to your old captors—no no listen—and we ask them if this is a normal winter here, if it will ever let up. And we can take all their blankets because you know they deserve what’s coming to them. WAITRESS: (tired) They’re all dead. The bluesman on the corner told me a few days ago. Just before it started getting really cold. Waitress wraps a blanket around herself and walks into kitchen. Conversation continues, however neither listens very carefully to the other. CHEF: (in a louder voice, undeterred) It’s obvious, sweety! We burn down their house, use the dead as kindling. I think that was a gas oven wasn’t it? And the heat will burn a tunnel in the ground all the way to the other side of the Earth. Where the season’s opposite. Cut to kitchen. (We see waitress, hear chef.) WAITRESS: Yes dear. She begins to prepare the soup. Voice from off camera. Waitress rubs her temples and winces as he repeats singsong phrase. Waitress begins to speak, loud enough for chef to hear, but not really speaking to him, more to herself. The chef on occasion responds to her pauses, but largely is rambling. WAITRESS: (craning head) You’re delirious again, dear. Image of two black wings in a burnt pan flapping a few times feebly? (sound of horses and fire) CHEF: I’ve got it! The sea must be frozen solid by now. It’s what 200 below? How crazy! Anyway, we fashion some ice skates and just skate across the ocean back home. Or cross-country ski! We can use the banisters! WAITRESS: I could never make it with this leg. (looks down at brace) You know how I hurt it? CHEF: (not listening) We could ski all the way back to the diner in no time. And below us the mermaids will watch and cry and cry. WAITRESS: Twenty-some years ago (she seems to see what she describes), in St. Augustine. They’ve got these ruins, Fort Marion, my little brother and I used to hide there. Anyway, the TV’s blaring (have a blue flashing TV light cast over her? Sound effects of story?) and Dad’s asleep on the couch as normal. Mom’s in the kitchen trying not to cry. Oh Mom, just get it over with. (cutting vegetables fiercely) And there she goes with the waterworks. She’s wearing every piece of jewelry she owns, and she’s moaning and jingling like a wind-chime and Dad’s awake. People always wake you up. They should take a hint. (grabs poison bottle (skull and crossbones label) from shelf) CHEF: Sleep’s the worst thing for us dear. We’d never wake up. Frozen solid! We have to move around, try to keep each other awake! WAITRESS: Dad, he’s awake but pretending to be asleep. I’m just keeping my eyes on the TV. I can’t blame him. She’s always crying, isn’t she? She bored the hell out us. The nerve. Crying into our dinner every night. You could taste her in everything. (wakes, looks confusedly at poison, puts back on shelf) I swear Dad weighed less than a hundred pounds. Sad. Cut to living room. We see chef, hear waitress. CHEF: (as if drawing a map in the air with his finger) We’ll head to where the school used to be. Make a left, (a battle hymn in the background that fizzles out?) keep going until we reach where the park was. I think it was six or seven bluesmen. Make a right. And straight out to the beach. Wait. What was I saying? WAITRESS: There goes Dad, brushing by her and out the garage and in the Chevy to go to the store. The store you go to all day and come back home with nothing. CHEF: And we have nothing to lose! Do we have any more hats? Chef wrinkles brow. Takes off his chef’s hat to scratch his head. A slice of ham lies on the top of his head. He feels it, winces. Cut to living room. We see waitress, hear chef. WAITRESS: But that day he runs over Robbie in the driveway (repeat image from scene one of “inside-out book” spinning?) and comes back in screaming and Mom’s got a real reason to cry and everybody’s going nuts. And like I’m someone on TV and not me, I’m walking out the front door and down the street in my blue boots. I’m like 13. (grabs poison absent-mindedly) CHEF: Listen baby, I’m a fighter! The 13th Duke of Devonshire! If the sky is lead and slate is gray too we can gallop up the ridges like steps and see if I can’t talk some sense into that sun. What did you all say to the sun back home, when I was locked up in the fridge? How did you make it get so hot? WAITRESS: (this is a voice-over for shadow play ) (forest, girl walking around trees, sound: wind, hooting owl) And at the end of our block there’s a dried up lot they’re about to clear for more of the same houses. There’s still tall trees, but they look like garbage. (girl climbs a tree) And there I am climbing this rickety tree. (long pause? Switch puppets to falling girl, sound: creaking branch) And there I am falling out of the tree (long pause?) and my leg crinkled, and right away crying for Mommy, (pause) (moon rising, sound: soft crying, wolf howl) like I really loved her after all. And somewhere (new setup: skeleton dancing around a crowd of people (add skeleton(s) afterward using green screen or Paul), nativity, ambulance rolls across scene: a small ambulance crosses one way above the crowd and off camera, then a large ambulance crosses the other way behind the crowd), sound: siren, crowd mumbling) Mom and Dad and the neighbors and the ambulance and God knows are all huddling up and holding each other, and now they’re rushing to the hospital when it’s obvious the little darling’s smushed. And now (forest, new girl puppet on ground, moon, sound: ticking, dog barking, collar jingling) it’s getting dark (pause) and there I am with a crooked leg. Lying in some dirt field that in six months is covered with houses. (pause) (dog runs up to girl) And I have to wait until dawn for the dog to bother to find me. Back to actors (she adds lots of poison to pot as we hear chef off-camera) CHEF: Oh, I’m thinking too fast. I’m getting confused. Sorry for rambling on dear. Dear? How’s the soup coming? It smells wonderful! WAITRESS: Mom turned completely useless. Once my leg healed up as much as it would, I had to do all the cooking (stirs soup violently), watch Dad’s drinking. They got sick—heartsick the neighbors said. Then Dad drove into a canal. The dog ran off. (pause, she ladles a bowl of soup) Then Mom noticed me, then she needed me. Wouldn’t take her medicines, the baby, so I just started to mix them in her food. And she’s moaning all night and her face turning silver (quick laugh) and her teeth bleeding. She walks to chef holding steaming soup as if in a trance. Stands in front of him. She comes to and gives the chef the soup with a smile. CHEF: Oh! Thank you so much! I feel better already! While he gets ready to eat, her face darkens and she looks at him with anticipation. (dramatic music) Chef tries to eat the soup but his spoon clangs off it. It has frozen solid. He looks up with a tender smile: He sees her malicious smile, her hands kneading. She suddenly looks angry, annoyed. Then she comes to, confused. Chef’s face drops, he looks down at the soup and back up at her in shock. WAITRESS: I’m sorry! Sorry! She grabs at her hair and runs off into the kitchen sobbing. A bell ends the movie when his shaking hand in a close up drops the spoon to the floor with a ring. But the spoon wobbles then flies back up to stick to his shaking palm (silently). Cut to silent black screen. Cut to silent black screen. Title card: DIRECTED AND EDITED BY LYNN B. JOHNSON Cut to silent black screen. Cast credits scroll upward. Thanks scroll. Title card: END Open on three bears in their apartment. Mom and Dad in chairs, watching TV. TV trays with bowls of porridge. Baby bear is sitting on the floor in front of TV with bowl. MOM: Brrr! It has been so cold. I can’t remember so serious a winter I really can’t. (pause) I just cannot get warm. (pause) I’m telling you my feet are like three blind mice! DAD: (annoyed) So hibernate. MOM: Why are you always short with me? DAD: Because you are an emotional cripple. MOM: Is that a joke? Even my porridge is cold. BABY: Mine has a yellow hair in it. Silence but for TV All three look guiltily over to the side. We see a dead blonde girl in the corner covered in blood. It is the female customer from scene 1. Bloody claw streaks on floor, etc. Gruesome. (overheard off-camera while camera stays on dead girl) A flushing sound like a laugh track.
BLACK OUT
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