Scene in a Church/Scene in a Park

I’ve re-worked the church scene I wrote before and spliced in scenes from Ryan in SLC. See if you like the juxtaposition.

INT. CHURCH – DAY

The church is old, sort of retro looking with high sloping ceilings and wooden support-beams. The service is already underway. A chubby lady with large pearl earrings directs a hymn enthusiastically with a waving of her hands. She sings in a dramatic opera-style, while everyone else in the audience follows along lamely

CUT TO

EXT. PARK DRUM CIRCLE – DAY

The half-hearted drone of the congregation contrasts sharply with the livelihood of the drum circle. What seems like a very eclectic crowd is gathered all around. Those not playing drums are smiling, clapping, or dancing freely. Many people are smoking, and there is a haze about the group.

CUT BACK TO

INT. CHURCH – DAY

Camera follows BETH, KEVIN and JAMES as they slip in the backdoor and try to find somewhere to sit.

BETH looks uncomfortable, with a colorful kerchief on her head that clashes dramatically with her flowery patterned dress. She tugs awkwardly at the bottom of her skirt. They all hesitate for a moment in the back of the aisle, before JAMES spots an empty bench somewhere near the front.

CUT TO

EXT. PARK DRUM CIRCLE – DAY

In the midst of what seemed before like a random group of people, the camera focuses unmistakably on RYAN standing off to the side. Although he blends in with the crowd in appearance, he stands out because of his apparent lack of enthusiasm.

A shirtless MORDECAI plays in the drum circle near him. Every once in a while he will turn and shoot a smile back at RYAN. RYAN attempts to return the smile but seems preoccupied. He is jostled by the crowd around him, some of whom attempt to make him clap or dance along.

CUT BACK TO

INT. CHURCH – DAY

JAMES, BETH and KEVIN take their seat on one of the only available benches near the front. A woman sitting in front of them turns to greet them, flashing a huge smile. As she does this all four of her young sons turn too, craning their necks and staring openly at BETH. BETH stares down at her lap, and then grabs the hymnbook quickly, flipping through the pages.

CUT TO

EXT. PARK DRUM CIRCLE – DAY

A girl holding a cigarette smashed between two fingers and wearing a long flowy hippy skirt and tanktop, saunters up to RYAN. She dances next to him awkwardly, jostling him.

HIPPY GIRL: Hey! (yelling over the noise)

RYAN doesn’t react. She leans up next to him, placing her head near his ear suggestively.

HIPPY GIRL: Heyyyy.

RYAN looks at her.

HIPPY GIRL: I like your hair! (she touches it. Sort of flips it through her fingers.)

RYAN: …thanks

HIPPY GIRL: It’s…all goldeny…it’s just…it’s beautiful! Hey! (she is still touching his hair and RYAN is sort of moving away)

Hey, dance with me! (she grabs for RYAN’S hands but RYAN is already moving away)

(in a pouty tone) Come dance!

RYAN: I’ve gotta go…(he pulls herself from her and leaves the crowd)

***INSERT SCENE WHERE BETH LEAVES CHURCH.***

I will write that in soon.

Night

KEVIN and JAMES commence with putting up their two tents as Beth scopes out the area and occupies the foreground of the shot.

JAMES: You’re sure you’re fine with the smaller tent, Beth?

BETH: Oh, yeah Dad. There are two of you. Yeah I’m fine.

JAMES: Okay. (to KEVIN) Alright, let’s set up the canopy um… I guess just over the table.

KEVIN: (following JAMES offscreen) Dad, it’s not gonna rain.

JAMES: (offscreen) I know. Don’t worry. (trying to sound hip facetiously) It’s cool.

BETH walks over to the van and grabs a propane tank from the back seat.

BETH: (starting loudly then trailing off) Dad! Dad, what should I…

Ryan’s vehicle pulls in to the adjacent camp-site and collapses noisily in the background, catching BETH’s attention.

*INSERT SHORT SCENE OF THE BOYS GETTING SETTLED.  FOR PACING PURPOSES.*

CUT TO Goodliving Campsite. Night. A shot of two tents side-by-side, lit from the inside by a single flashlight, revealing the sillouhettes of KEVIN and JAMES in the big one, and BETH in the small one. KEVIN turns off the light, leaving them all in pitch black.

KEVIN: Okay I’ll start. A peculiar Frenchman, as Frenchmen usually are, was sitting on his pattio one morning when his cat started to speak.

BETH: Are there pattios in France?

KEVIN: Yes, but they call them Pah-twaa.

JAMES: This particular Frenchman, who was both usual and peculiar, noticed that his cat was speaking Chinese and he didn’t understand a word of it.

BETH: “How did you learn Chinese?!” said the Frenchman to his cat, nearly falling off his seat.

KEVIN: And that’s when our Frenchman did something so unnexpected, so relentlessly creative and fascinating that one is likely to have a heart attack just hearing about it!

JAMES: He… went… He… went… swimming…

(silence)

KEVIN: Dad?

JAMES: Hmm?

KEVIN: I think I just had a heart attack.

CUT TO The Boy’s Campsite, that night. The three of them are sitting around the campfire. TOPHER and MORDECAI are wrapped in large quilts, sitting on a blue tarp. RYAN occupies the only chair they have, a pink one of the lawn variety.

TOPHER laughs to himself.

TOPHER: She thinks she can get away with it.

MORDECAI: Dude, she’s already gotten away with it.

TOPHER:  Yeah but soon, or maybe unsoon… either way – karma’s gonna do its thing.

RYAN:  You use the phrase “either way” like it’s nobody’s business.

TOPHER:  That’s because it is nobody’s business.

MORDECAI:  What about Leah? Karma hasn’t gotten her yet, she’s dating that guy.

TOPHER: You mean Lex Luther? He is her bad karma. He’s a diver, I rest my case.

RYAN:  There’s no way he’s as accomplished a napper as us.

TOPHER:  Exactly.  He’s not a part of the Nap Culture.

MORDECAI:  (to himself)  Nap Culture…

RYAN takes a thermis from a bag lying next to him.

TOPHER:  I think it’s my turn, right?

RYAN stands up.

RYAN:  (gesturing to the chair)  She’s all yours, I’m gonna go get something to drink.

RYAN starts to walk away.

MORDECAI:  We have green tea.

RYAN:  (walking off screen)  I feel like some rusty water.

CUT TO The Public Bathroom.  RYAN rinses out his thermis in the sink and notices a red lighter someone left on the adjacent sink.  He puts it in his pocket, fills his thermis with water and walks outside.  He leans against the restroom wall facing their neighbor’s camp, takes a few sips and then dumps the rest on the ground.  He takes out the found lighter and plays with it a bit, elliciting it’s final two flames and prompt retirement.  He sees the shape of someone exit the otherwise dormant tents and run to the nearby minivan.  He stops playing with the lighter, sits on the ground, watches and listens.  Sobbing is heard very softly from the van.  A sudden rustling in the bushes right next to him startles the previously transfixed RYAN and he stands up.  He looks around and catches a glimpse of a rabbit just before it dashes into the desert.  He sighs, glances once more toward the van and then walks off.

CUT TO The Boys’ Camp.  TOPHER is snoozing on the lawn chair.  MORDECAI is staring into the fire.  RYAN enters the frame, sits down in TOPHER’s old spot, exhumes the lighter, drops it in his thermis, and places the lid on.  MORDECAI gives him an inquizitive look.

RYAN:  A time capsule.

MORDECAI:  Where you gonna barry it?

RYAN unrolls his sleeping bag on the tarp and climbs in.

RYAN:  We’ll scope out some spots tomorrow.

They both settle down for bed.

FADE TO  Wide shot of The Boys’ Camp, later that night.  The three have assumed more comfortable and sprawled positions and the fire is considerably lower.

CUT TO  The inside of JAMES and KEVIN’s tent.  Close up on JAMES’ sleeping face.  The sound of the minivan’s sliding door shutting wakes him.  Footsteps, and then the sound of the tent flap being unzipped.  A slightly hunched and heaving BETH appears under the arch of the opening, looking for her dad.

BETH:  Dad?

JAMES:  What Sweety?

BETH:  Can I have the big tent?

JAMES:  Yeah.

JAMES gets to his feet as quickly as the grips of sleep will release him.  He nudges KEVIN with his foot.

KEVIN:  (waking abruptly, apparently from the middle of a dream)  What?!  I can’t…

JAMES:  Sure you can Kev, we’re moving to the other tent, Beth needs space.

KEVIN fades into comprehension, then silently assembles his blankets and vacates the tent.

CUT TO outside of the tent.  JAMES follows KEVIN out.  KEVIN walks off screen, JAMES turns and faces his sniffling daughter.

BETH:  I’m sorry…

JAMES:  (overlapping)  No no no no no.

JAMES hugs her.  BETH cries freely.

BETH:  I don’t understand…

JAMES:  What?

BETH:  Mom’s been gone for a year, but I don’t miss her.  I wish I missed her.  At least it’d be better than this.

Another burst of tears.  (Note:  The audience is not supposed to be feeling much of this with her.  This is more informational crying (to establish her situation) which is why it can be so open.  For later scenes meant to engage the audience, let’s keep in mind the observation of Orson Scott Card that usually if the characters are crying the audience is not.)

JAMES:  Shhhh.  Understanding is overrated.  Just remember…  Beth?

BETH:  Hmmm?

JAMES concludes their hug and looks into her eyes.

JAMES:  This too shall pass.

What JAME’s comfort lacks in understanding it makes up for in sincere delivery and succeeds in eliciting a curtious, if not short-lived, smile from BETH just before she retires to her tent and JAMES walks off-screen.

CUT TO Sunrise the next morning.

           

Go to him with a glass of orange juice and Dora the Explorer

INT. KITCHEN – DAY

JAMES: You guys hungry? You guys want something? I know we still have leftovers from the Cardenas’. Some of that…what’s that? That pozale? Pazilli?

JAMES is searching through the fridge.

JAMES: Dang it guys, where’s the pozole?

KEVIN walks nonchalantly through the kitchen pulling out his shirttails and loosening his tie.

KEVIN: Oh, I ate that.

BETH is sitting at the kitchen counter, absentmindedly flipping through a magazine.

JAMES: That’s all right. That’s okay. We’ve still got plenty of….

(he searches the fridge, hands hovering over one item then the next. He grabs for a half-carton of orange juice.)

This stuff!

(he waves it in his hand, smiling)

and cereal… Here’s the cereal. Lets just do the whole breakfast for dinner thing.

(he turns to the cupboards and grabs several boxes of cereal in his arms and then walks over and dumps it all onto the table)

KEVIN re-enters the frame and looks at all the stuff on the table.

JAMES: (to Kevin) I guess we need bowls.

KEVIN: Got it.

He goes to get bowls.

JAMES: …and milk.

KEVIN: Nope…none.

JAMES: Yeah, I know. sorry guys. I guess we’ll get groceries tomorrow.

CUT TO

INT. DINING ROOM – DAY

It’s several minutes later. The table is now set with mismatched bowls, spoons, glasses of orange juice. 6 or 7 types of cereal boxes. JAMES is munching on dry Grapenuts and is staring attentively at another box with Dora the Explorer cartoons on it. He pulls out Spanish flashcards.

BETH sips at her juice.

KEVIN has no cereal yet. He seems to be trying to make a decision.

KEVIN: Do you think lucky charms would taste good mixed with grapenuts?

JAMES: (in a mostly distracted tone. He is looking at his flashcards)

Worth a try.

(quieter) I didn’t know there was so little pazole left…

KEVIN: I don’t know..

JAMES: (in the background w/out interrupting Kevin) carro. Carro.

KEVIN: Hey Beth. What do you think?

(beat)

She’s doing it again.

JAMES: What?… Carro. (he tries to roll the R)

KEVIN: That thing.

JAMES: (he looks up) Beth!

BETH: (snapping out of it) Yeah..

JAMES: Hey sweetie. Are you here with us?

BETH: Yeah. Sorry. Just thinking.

JAMES: Okay.

After a prolonged and concerned glance, they continue eating. James continues with his flash cards.

CUT TO

INT. LIVING ROOM – NIGHT

BETH is sitting alone on the couch hugging her legs to her chest.

KEVIN: You’re still up.

BETH: (a little startled, although her movements are slow and lethargic. She glances behind her where Kevin is passing by) Yeah. Just thinking about things I guess. I don’t know why.

KEVIN: I do.

BETH: You do?

KEVIN: Sure.

BETH looks quizzical.

KEVIN: Beth…

(he inserts a long, semi-dramatic pause)

BETH: What?

KEVIN enters the living room, and sits down on the armchair by the couch.

He leans forward, obviously drawing out his response.

BETH: What? (more annoyed)

KEVIN: (pause) GO to him. (said in his most dramatic tones)

He tries unsuccessfully to hold back a smile.

BETH grabs a pillow and starts hitting him. She looks annoyed but also smiles.

KEVIN: Hey. Hey. heyy! (fighting against the attack) I mean it though. I think he made you happy.

BETH relents her assault.

BETH: (thoughtfully) I think you’re right.

KEVIN: Then GO to him.

BETH smacks him one more time with the pillow.

BETH: You make that sound easy.

KEVIN: Easy enough.

BETH: Ha!

Coming Back

Int. Kitchen. Day. KEVIN is wearing an apron and beating some eggs with an electric beater. Chopped vegetables of various colors are in neat piles on the counter. The door-bell rings, he quickly washes his hands and goes to answer it.

He finds BETH looking slightly frazzled sitting in a chair in the hallway by the front door, which is ajar.

KEVIN: Who is it?

BETH: Some lady asking for Mom.

KEVIN: Is she still out there?

BETH nods airily.

BETH: She asked if Megan Olson was in.

KEVIN: And what did you say?

BETH: I said ‘just a minute’ and then I sat down.

KEVIN walks to the door with an air of adultish concern (still wearing the apron)…

KEVIN: Can I help you?

WOMAN: Hi Sweety, my name is Gracie Huntsman. I’m an old friend of your mother’s. Is she in?

KEVIN: She left.

WOMAN: Do you know when she’ll be back?

KEVIN: No.

WOMAN is a bit put-off by his stoic (but not overly so) responses.

WOMAN: Okay Sweety. Thanks for your help.

WOMAN starts to walk away.

KEVIN: (loudly and abruptly) Can I take a message?

WOMAN turns around.

WOMAN: Oh, that’s okay Sweety. I’m sure I’ll run into her. How is she doing? How’d she take the news?

KEVIN: I’m sorry?

WOMAN: About Mr. Bailey’s passing – I know how close they were. I’m one of your mom’s old class-mates. To tell you the truth English was just about my least favorite subject but Pat Bailey was an icon of my childhood too so… No, you don’t need to tell her anything. I’m in a little early from California; doing the rounds; reconnecting. I’m sure I’ll be over for dinner soon so… Anyway, thanks again!

WOMAN walks off. KEVIN closes the door, walks in, sits down next to BETH and assumes a similar glaze.

BETH: You making omelets?

KEVIN: Yeah.

James Goodliving

James Goodliving

 

Occupation:  Contractor.  He employs many Mexicans to fix people’s roofs.  Mostly he works in the office, delegating much of the outdoor work to his right-hand man Jesus, whom he trusts completely and in whom he sometimes confides.

 

Ticks:  Chews his fingernails.

 

He enjoys personal goal setting and self-help books are a guilty pleasure.  He’s currently working on learning Spanish with flash cards.

 

“Sometimes you know what you’re supposed to feel about something – what a rational person would feel – but you just can’t.  Just who is this rational person we are compelled to compare ourselves with?  I suppose he lives somewhere in West Virginia; that seems like a pretty rational state to me.  And he sits on his crickety front porch and says how he’s planning on fixing the rain gutters.  And his wife pokes fun at how he never finishes projects he announces so he should probably save his announcing for office-related developments.  It’s the worst with things that are supposed to be permanent.  I heard on TV the other day from some guy who wrote a book that permanence is an illusion.  I don’t think I got the whole meaning of what he was saying but, I don’t know, it made sense at the time.  It’s not true but it made sense.  I know it’s a cliché but I’m gonna say it anyway – Women!  Am I right?  I mean seriously!  It’s like, they work in theory, but when there’s one flaw in the equation everything just gives up working.  It’s too hard.  It would be bad enough if it was her fault.  Sometimes I think it wouldn’t be half bad.  Maybe three fifths bad.  I don’t know.  I blame words, actually.  We built this mansion out of words, delicate and steep.  It felt like an accomplishment the first few years.  Each expression of love followed logically after the next.  But then, I don’t know if we reached the top or what…  I don’t like this analogy anymore.  The point is our words led the way and now they’re all that’s left to make sense of everything but I don’t like them anymore.  I don’t trust them.  Even what I’m saying right now, can you see how it’s working against me?

I feel so selfish.  Why do I feel so selfish?  I want people to stay, that’s why.  I want my life to be a venus fly trap.”

Parking

EXT. DRIVEWAY – DAY

The car pulls up, and KEVIN parks it smoothly.

KEVIN: There you go.

He pulls the keys from the ignition and tosses them to his dad.

KEVIN: Not too shabby, right?
(no response)
Hey..right?

FATHER shakes his head as they all climb out.

FATHER: Completely illegal.

he’s suppressing a smile and doesn’t actually look too bothered.

KEVIN: Whatever. Just say it: I was amazing.

FATHER: I was on pins and needles the entire time.

KEVIN: You were sleeping.

Brooke: small follow-ups.

EXT. ROAD – DAY

Camera follows as a car passes through a long stretch of farmland.
Music can be heard softly, trailing. Camera jumps to

INT. CAR – DAY

KEVIN is barely old enough to drive, but seems to be a natural.
He taps the steering wheel, and hums/quietly sings out lyrics to Sunset Soon Forgotten

KEVIN:
…brother’s left here shaved and crazy…

FATHER doses off, head drooping against the window, the soft singing does not disturb him.
BETH is wide-awake and alert. She’s still fiddling with her bandana and staring blankly forward, although now there are no tears.
After a few quiet moments, she joins in with her brother, in a soft mumble.

BETH:
…down and down, gone again…

KEVIN glances up through the rearview mirror and gives her a little smile.
She smiles back. They keep singing together.
The moment is fragile. It always feels like she might break any second.

Art – Maybe I’m Missing Something…

Here’s a snippet from the latest instalment in the Orson Scott Card Reviews Everything column.

“Because my wife was preparing to teach an art history class this month, for Mother’s Day I got her (among other, much nicer gifts!) a copy of The Museum of Bad Art Masterworks, a hilariously appalling book by Michael Frank and Louise Reilly Sacco.

The museum really exists, in the basement of a movie-theater outside Boston. There are four hundred pieces of bad art in the permanent collection. Some pieces were actually donated by the artists — a refreshing sign of genuine self-knowledge — while others were scavenged from dumpsters, curbs, garbage cans, and garbage dumps.

The thing about this art isn’t that it’s talent-free — I can produce art like that whenever I want. It’s that it was meant to be good.

It’s easy to look at art you don’t understand or art of a kind you don’t care for and dismiss it as “trash.” But when you have samples of genuine trash, it changes your perspective completely. Now you can see, easily, that even art of a kind you don’t care for can be good — of its kind.

…If you care about art, you have to own this book. If anybody questions your taste in art, just hand them the book and say, “This is bad. What I have on my walls is good. Or at least it’s better than these!”"

This greatly disturbs me because upon checking out some of these “bad” pieces of art, I discovered I actually like, not just some, but most of them.  In fact, there are quite a few in which I am hard-pressed to identify a single flaw.  Exactly what rules are being so blatantly broken as to warrant such open scorn and snickering from the intellectual elite?

I know it’s silly to get so worked up over something as harmless as a museum whose soul purpose is to brighten people’s days, but the combination of the words “art” and “bad” stirs my innermost predilections to extreme discomfort.  It gives me flashbacks to one precarious afternoon when I showed some friends one of my all-time favorite films only to elicit a “this is supposed to be art?”  That comment wouldn’t have lingered quite so long in my boyish cockles if not for the fact that its deliverer was an Art Major who studied in Europe.

For all I know this film, which penetrated me more thoroughly than almost any other, could be the laughing stock of the “art world.”  What does that say about me?  Am I in some way an unworthy vessel for “high” artistic expression?!

The answer seems to me so obvious that the whole root of my confusion on the matter comes from the fact that everyone else hasn’t figured it out yet.  This is that ART is SUBJECTIVE.  So much so that the two words are often used as synonyms!  Correct me if I’m wrong, but it occurs to me that the value of something that matches so completely the description “subjective” can ONLY be measured by one all-encompassing, sacred criteria: the individual’s response to it.

Adopting this philosophy is no trivial adjustment. To embrace it is to give up many treasured words and expressions in common use which are in direct contradiction to its presupposes. No besmirched piece of art can be redeemed by saying it’s simply “over (someone’s) head.” Neither can a universally praised piece be dismissed as pretentious drivel. In fact, let’s just throw out the word “drivel” all-together. And along with it goes the inherently objective words “good” “bad” and “ugly.”

The L Word

BETH and RYAN are dancing to a U2 song.

BETH:  I love U2.

RYAN:  What was that?

BETH:  I said ‘I love U2.’  This song rocks my world.

RYAN:  Oh, I thought you said something else…

BETH:  (smiling because she already knows the answer)  What did you think I said?

RYAN:  (he knows she knows)  Um…  I thought you said ‘I scrub blue shoes.’

BETH:  And if I had said that.  How would you have reacted?

RYAN:  I scrub blue shoes too.

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