This post is Copyright 2007 Jeremy Osborne, All Rights Reserved.
7/22/2005 - Written by: Jeremy Osborne, Vincent Lowe, and Brooks Graham for a 24-hour script/filming competition. (Ultimately, this script, which was basically my script, was scrapped. I still like my version of the script better than the filmed version and post it here for a third round of reading.)
Genre: Horror
Character to Portray: Hercules
Circumstance: Flight
Theme: How absurd we are to think we know anything
Main Characters:
Sally: (Aubrey) 29 year old woman. Energetic, a grafter, a pickpocket, a barfly, edgy, a slut, visualize Joan Jett and Jodie Foster, a schemer, a self-centered woman.
Mark: (Vincent) Early 40s, a drifter, ex-murderer, done a lot of shit in life. He’s reformed, settled in his life, in love with this woman he just met about four hours ago.
Minor Characters:
Narrator: (Susan) Narrates certain things.
Interviewee #1: Country Bumpkin who talks about Mark killing the serpents. Tortured small animals as children.
Interviewee #2: Urban neveau riche. Unnerved that she/he lived next to someone who seemed so normal who killed his wife and children.
Interviewee #3: A recovered alcoholic. Defends that Mark is a great guy because he passed the 12 Step Program.
Interviewee #4: The princess. Describes what a great guy Mark is for saving her from a gang of the Urban Serpents.
Interviewee #5: Man or Woman who lives in an Apartment Complex. Knows Sally, who ends up Killing Mark.
Act 1:
[Door opens and light floods the bedroom. Bed and normal bedroom furnishings in backround. The actors can be seen briefly in detail, staggering in from the door, obviously drunk. The man staggers in first, the woman, slumps against the wall next to the door.
The man walks back to the door, slams the door shut on his way to making out with the woman as she pulls him against her.]
Mark: [Breaking the kiss] Janet, where’s your bathroom?
Sally: You drunk, it’s behind you. Don’t bother about my stuff.
[Mark staggers towards the bathroom, visible only by silhouette.]
Sally: [Turns television on and we hear the "television power on audio"]
[Cut to Interview #1 after the door closes to the bathroom]
Scene with Interviewee #1: I just can’t believe… [pause] … that Bobby and Teddy had to go the way they did.
Narrator: Bobby?
Interviewee #1: Yeah, my anacondas. I woke up one morning to Bobby and Teddy just lying there. Who could have done something like this. I’m going to interview my neighbors from now on, even if they live a mile away.[Cut to the bedroom scene.]
[Mark walks towards the bathroom, turns back and grabs Sally in an embrace. Sally pushes him away...]
Sally: Go clean up, and come back here fast.
[Mark walks towards the bathroom, flooding the room with a bit of light before closing the bathroom door.]
[Sally channel surfs for some time]
[Cut to Interview #2, pause for a moment on Emotionally moved Interviewee.]
Narrator: Go on, we’d like to hear what you have to say.
Interviewee #2: I, really can’t believe it. I mean this stuff is supposed to happen on television.
Narrator: What stuff?
Interviewee #2: I went over to Mark’s house to have a beer with him and no one answered the door, so I let myself in. And, I’m sorry, I can’t talk about what I saw there. I’m really sorry, I thought I could, but I can’t.
Narrator: It’s okay, take a deep breath.Interviewee #2: I mean, Janet and the kids, lying on the floor… I’m sorry, I can’t continue, I’m really sorry.
Act 2:
[Sally channel surfs, lighting in the background changes. Sally, after sometime of channel surfing, stops at a certain channel. Narrator begins speaking.
Sally ignores the Narrator, silhouette shows Sally looking through a wallet.]
[Cut to Interview #3]
Interviewer: So how did that make you feel.
Interviewee #3: I have to say that only God can make a difference with people, not drugs. Mark did what he did, and I find strength for myself.
Interviewer: I mean I know you consider yourself a recovering addict, but let us know more.
Interviewee #3: Mark gives me strength. I know that I can make it through because of how he made it through the twelve labors.
Interviewer: Don’t you mean the twelve steps?
Interviewee #3: Yes, I mean the twelve steps. Mark talked about it like the twelve labors, but I just thought he meant what we always prayed over.
Interviewer: Which Prayer is that?
[Fade back to the silhouetted bedroom with Interview #3 voice over of the prayer voice: God grant me the strength to accept what I cannot change...]
[Sally finishes looking through Mark's wallet, tossing it aside and keeping what appears to be a card from the wallet.]
[Fade back to Interview #4]
Narrator: So you say you told us earlier that without him you wouldn’t be alive?
Interviewee #4: I told you earlier. God, you just don’t listen to, jeez. I told my mom that this is just a waste of time. Look, if he wasn’t there, I’d be dead, plain as can be.
Narrator: What do you mean?
Interviewee #4: On Friday night I was out and got lost. I wondered into the alley, someone must have spiked my drink, because I don’t drink. But anyway, I walked down the alley, and these guys jumped me, but this guy who I had danced with earlier came out of nowhere and kicked all of their asses.
Narrator: One guy?
Interviewee #4: All of them, single handed. I couldn’t even believe it, and the fucker just walked away after that. I couldn’t even say thank you.
Act 3:
[Fade back to the bedroom. Sally tosses aside the card in her hand.
Bathroom door opens, flooding the room with light for a moment until Mark shuts off the bathroom lamp.]
Sally: Come to daddy, Mark!
Mark: [Stumbling out of the bathroom doorway towards the bed.] Who the hell are you talking to, I never introduced myself to you.
Sally: Yeah you did, about an hour ago, at the last call.
Mark: Whatever, here I come baby.
[Mark stumbles over to the bed. Sally grabs him in an embrace, pulls him underneath her.
Sally mounts Mark and pulls her shirt over her head.]
Sally: So Mark, I never did tell you my name.
Mark: I’m not here to find out your name.
Sally: But I bet you’d love to hear how close we’ve become over time.
Mark: What do you mean?
Sally: Don’t worry, just close your eyes darling.
[Sally reaches over and picks up the nearest heavy object, lifting it over her head.]
[Final shot of bedroom with Sally mounting Mark, bringing heavy object down over head.]
Interviewer: You say you lived next door to her?
Interviewee #5: Yep, for 3 years. Never a peep from her, but late at night I heard her crying a couple of times a week.
Interviewer: About what?
Interviewee #5: I don’t know, just a lot of crying, something about someone she lost, close to her heart. Anyway, it’s a lot more quiet without her next to me anymore. I get a lot more sleep.