by Nick Earls
‘TV news?’
‘Hey, no promises Dad, remember? That’s big time. We don’t start off shooting for that. I reckon this week I might put in some calls to the suburban and student papers, and maybe see what the radio stations think.’
‘Good,’ Ron says, nodding. ‘Great.’ Nodding and smiling. ‘Bloody genius, if you want to know what I think.’
‘No promises, but,’ she says, and her cheeks start to flush. ‘Got to give it a shot though. You don’t get TV if you don’t try for TV.’ Then she smiles too, at the way she’s sounding. As though TV might be big time, but it’s not so big really. ‘Of course, TV’d give us our best shot at targeting the Jean-Paul Sartre end of the market.’
‘Yes . . .’ Ron says warily.
‘It’s a media studies joke, Dad. Hey, Phil?’
‘Kind of literary/media studies crossover. One of Sophie’s ideas that we’ve been talking through at work. It’s a niche market. I think that’s what they’d call it.’
Then it’s my turn. I tell them we’ve got a lot going for us with technique, for a start, and maybe we could be doing more with that. Most people deep fry, but we cook our chicken breast on a hot steel plate.
‘So what are you thinking?’ Ron says.
‘I’m wondering if we can use that. Instead of just calling it “chicken”, maybe call it “hotplate chicken”.’
‘And that . . .’
‘That’s a point of difference,’ Sophie says. ‘You’ve got to go for those. Hey, how about this? “Famous hotplate chicken”.’
‘Famous?’ Ron’s looking troubled. ‘Can we say famous?’
‘Define famous,’ Sophie says defiantly. ‘Of course we can say famous. It’s like “ever popular” or “bestseller” or “cult classic”. You say it first, and then it becomes true.’ She takes a mouthful of Diet Coke. ‘We can say famous, can’t we Phil?’
‘Yeah, it’s a great idea. I’d buy it. “Famous hotplate chicken”. Irresistible. Look what this degree is turning you into. And you always seem like such a nice honest person when you’re in the chicken suit.’
‘Hey, chicken suits’ll do that. You should never make assumptions about people in chicken suits. What else have you got?’
‘Okay, spices. What I’m thinking is that we’re already the only takeaway place in the western suburbs doing five sauces—I’m pretty sure of that—and I wondered if there was an easy way of adding something more. And I thought, spices. Get some commercial spice mixes, like Cajun and oriental five-spice, and put them on the chicken fillets before we cook them. It wouldn’t be hard, and it’d add to the “World” idea. Most of them would go with the sauces we’ve already got. You’d probably only have to add soy.’
‘It’s very gourmet.’ Ron’s wary again. ‘Very top-end.’
‘No, it’s good, Dad. And it doesn’t stop us doing anything else we do, including the whole and half chickens and the regular burgers without spices.’
‘Which,’ Ron says, clicking his fingers, ‘we can call “classic”. Your basic burger becomes “classic hotplate”. Are we writing all this down? Is someone writing all this down? Famous? We can call this famous. It’s going to be bloody famous. Hey love,’ he says, and turns to Sophie with his chin on his hand, ‘which’d be my best side for TV?’
*
On Wednesday, I meet Ron in town. He said he wanted to see a serious film, so I’ve chosen The Killing Fields. I asked him if he’d be okay with a film with some southeast Asian war content and he said he’d manage. That was all years ago now.
Plus, I wanted to say, you were never there. But that’s a place we don’t go.
It’d be an understatement to say that Sophie’s performance last night exceeded my expectations. There I was thinking, I bet Ron’s underestimating her, and I was underestimating her too. At least I’d thought about involving her. Why hadn’t she involved herself already? There must have been times over the past few months when she saw opportunities going by.
Ron’s in the foyer of the cinema, tickets in his hand, when I arrive. He asks if I want popcorn—his shout—and I tell him I don’t eat in movies.
‘I don’t eat,’ I tell him, ‘and I don’t talk. I should be clear about that up front.’
‘Ah,’ he says. ‘An aficionado.’
‘I just figure I’m there for the movie experience. I don’t go to a restaurant expecting a video, so I don’t go to a cinema and buy popcorn.’
‘Exactly, exactly. The movie experience . . .’
‘Plus, food noises. Food noises drive me crazy in there. Don’t they get to you too? It’s like, some important character’s got a gun to their head, munch, munch, munch. Two people are breaking up, hand in the chip bag, fistle, fistle, crunch, crunch. Atmosphere. It counts for something. The beauty of the cinema is that it’s not like TV. You get to immerse yourself.’
‘Good. This’ll be good, then. I like the way you’re thinking. This is absolutely what we’re here for. Just one thing—could I get myself an ice cream if I promise to eat it before the film starts? There’d be ads, wouldn’t there? I’ve kind of got my heart set on it.’
He buys a choc top and slurps his way through it during the ads and the previews. But he got my message. I made it as clear as I could that he wasn’t going to be doing what he likes. It would have been family-size popcorn if I hadn’t spoken up. Somehow I just know he’s the kind of guy who tongues the chocolate off Maltesers, keeps his drink ice so that he can suck at it periodically and steps on all his old wrappers exactly when dramatic tension’s essential. With some people you can tell. They never eat this stuff the rest of their lives, in cinemas they go mental. It’s as though if you eat shit food in the dark, it doesn’t count.
Ron flinches often during The Killing Fields and there isn’t one long jolly musical number to break the tension, but he did say he wanted a serious film.
‘Jesus,’ he says when the closing credits roll. ‘Holy bloody Jesus. Makes you grateful to be an Australian.’
‘Quite a film, wasn’t it?’
‘Mate, it was awesome. Leaves you feeling pretty rough, though.’
‘Exactly. And that’s the point sometimes. It’s got to be. That’s why we picked it. I’m not against entertainment, but sometimes you’ve got to shake people.’
On the way out of the cinema, Ron’s limp is more pronounced than usual. He’s had to battle his way through the last two hours.
‘Ah, daylight,’ he says. ‘Beautiful Brisbane daylight.’
He pulls his wallet from his pocket while we’re standing in the foyer, and tells me he wants to fix me up for the movie now, before he forgets. He leafs through some notes and pulls out a twenty, and I tell him it’s okay. I really don’t need to be paid to go to a movie.
I particularly don’t need to be paid the same amount that Frank gets from Zel for sex, but that’s one point that’s better left unmade.
He pushes the note into my hand and tells me I should step back sometimes and take a look at what I’m doing. He’s off to buy gourmet spice mixes after this, the first new signs should be out at World of Chickens as early as this evening and he thinks things could be about to turn around. Plus, he would never have seen a movie like The Killing Fields if it hadn’t been for me. And it’s not the kind of film you’d like to see every day, but every once in a while you’ve got to go there. It’s socially responsible.
‘Quite a change for me,’ he says. ‘I’m used to films where, if they’ve got a problem, there’s a song in it for sure.’
‘It’s a genre thing. There are plenty of films where the girls wear big skirts and fall for guys because of the cars they drive, but you can’t have every film like that.’
‘Not that there’s not meaning in them.’
‘No, of course not.’
‘Take “Beauty School Dropout” in Grease, for example. Quite clearly a song about the importance of education. But you want to get into this game, the film game. What have you got in mind? If you were
going to make a movie here and now, what would it be?’
‘Here and now? I don’t know. I don’t know what kind of movie you’d make here. I think the way Woody Allen does things is really interesting, but there’s something very Manhattan about it. People don’t talk like that here. People don’t go out on balconies above all that traffic and have those conversations here.’
‘Conversations like what? If I wanted to see what Woody Allen was about, what’s one I could get out on video?’
‘There’d be a few. Annie Hall?’
‘Annie Hall.’ He takes a pen from his pocket and writes the name on his palm. He reads it and laughs. ‘Better be careful going around with some woman’s name on my hand.’ He writes the word ‘video’ underneath, which either fixes the problem or makes it look like Annie Hall’s a porn star. ‘It’s not . . . um, it’s not like The Killing Fields, is it?’
‘No. Not at all.’
‘Good, ’cause . . . that was excellent, but something a little different’d be fine too.’
‘No wars, but there’s a lot of talking. Be ready for character stuff.’
‘Character stuff. Good.’ He nods.
‘And, for something a bit edgier but also great film-making and some amazing acting, Taxi Driver. Robert de Niro in Taxi Driver. You’ve got to see that.’
‘Taxi Driver.’ The pen comes out again and, with the extra two words, his palm is full. ‘So, um, same time next week, hey?’
‘That’d be good, but it might be a bit close to the end of term next week. Maybe in a couple of weeks.’
‘Oh, sure, sure. And your pick again of course but, if I could just put in a word for one I’ve been wanting to see for a little while, I think there’s a film out with Madonna that’s supposed to be rather good. Entertaining but thoughtful. And every young person these days loves Madonna, don’t they? What’s it called? Desperately Seeking Susan?’
*
I try ignoring the phone when it rings but, since I’m watching TV, I know I’m expected to answer it. My mother’s still reading Your Child in Trouble, so she’s in one of her strange distract-me-at-your-peril head-in-a-book moods. TV, around here, is seen as occupying one of the lower rungs on the cultural ladder. But my parents are pre-baby-boomer. It’s not their fault.
It’s Frank.
‘I’m calling,’ he says in a creepy, husky voice, ‘from the lair of the Evil Ddotnor.’
‘You can’t be serious.’
‘Yes, I can.’ The husky voice again. ‘I’d recognise the purple heart-shaped bed and the ceiling mirrors anywhere.’
‘No, surely not.’
‘I thought you’d had the tour.’ Back to his normal voice again. ‘Didn’t they show you upstairs? Didn’t they tell you they bought the place from a guy in the magazine business?’ He says magazine business as though it’s definitely in inverted commas. ‘He bought it when it was a display home and he had the master bedroom fitted out with the gear and then he moved interstate or went bankrupt or something. And it’s all fixtures. You can’t interfere with the bed without buggering up the jacuzzi.’
‘Frank, I’m okay about not having had the upstairs tour.’
‘Mate, it’s a fucking palace. I’m serious. I feel like Hugh Hefner in here. There’s even gold bits on the phone.’
‘Good. I’m happy for you.’
‘Listen, I need to talk to you. Seriously. I didn’t quite get what you were on about the other night. Monday, in the car. You were lining up Vanessa and Sophie to do things . . .’
‘Because there’s no budget.’
‘Yeah, and I wasn’t thinking. It was kind of a reminder that the place isn’t doing so well, and I need that job.’
‘I think it’s doing better than it was. It’s just . . . for various people’s states of mind, yours included, I thought it’d be good if we could get it to do a bit better.’
‘Yeah. I know. You should see Vanessa’s signs. She’s done a great job. It’s practically all she’s been doing since you gave her the go-ahead. We’re borrowing the truck to take them over there tonight, actually, and she was thinking we might come by your place and pick you up. I think she wants you to see them first, since you lined her up for it. How would that be? Would six o’clock get us there by six-thirty?’
‘Yeah, it probably would.’
‘Righto then. Well . . .’ There’s a noise in the background, perhaps a voice. His hand moves over the mouthpiece and, for a few seconds, every sound is muffled. When he lifts it off again there’s a new noise, something industrial, like a powerful vacuum cleaner or a pool filter. Then a sound that might be the frenzied quacking of a nearby rubber duck. ‘Listen mate,’ he says. ‘Got to go. Six o’clock, hey?’
And, with that, his Carindale adventure continues.
*
Vanessa tells me she’s come up with something ‘a bit tricky’, but she’s determined to make it work. She says she took the Dylan clip as her inspiration, but she figured we couldn’t go tossing the signs away one word at a time.
‘Just wait,’ she says, sitting between Frank and me on the bench seat of the Green Loppers truck. ‘Just wait.’
We drive across town and the cab smells of sweat, fuel and mulched vegetation. Frank drives like he knows the truck well. Well enough that, to him, it probably doesn’t even smell.
‘Have you seen Frank’s hands?’ Vanessa says. ‘Have you seen how wrinkly his fingers are? He’s been in water most of the afternoon. He’s got this lady . . .’
‘Ness.’ Frank stops her. ‘We’re not talking about that tonight, remember. Not at all tonight, okay? You’re part of the team this evening, and we’ve got a no-smutty-talk-at-work rule.’
‘Okay.’ She looks straight ahead, as if nonchalantly accepting what he’s said, and then she turns back to me. ‘Frank reckons he’s been riding the skin train to . . .’
‘Ness.’
‘But we’re not at work yet. I’m just trying to fit it all in before we get there.’ Suddenly, she’s less nonchalant. ‘It’s not fair. I don’t get to say that stuff at home, but this is the Loppers truck. This is where Dad and Nev and that sit and swear all day. And you told me I’d be part of the team tonight, with the signs. I’m part of the team, I’m in the truck, I get to talk the talk. I get to say skin train to tuna town if I want to.’
‘You don’t even know . . .’
‘It’s a fish, Frank, it’s a fish. You’re not catching me out, pal. I’m part of the bloody team now.’
‘Oh, so it’s a bloody team now?’
‘It is if I want it to be,’ she says, and laughs.
‘Ness and her bloody team, driving around town in the bloody Loppers truck.’
‘Yep,’ she says. ‘Bloody yep.’
She turns the radio up. There’s a Creedence double-play beginning, and she sings along to most of ‘Lookin’ Out My Back Door’, and makes us join in on the choruses. If Jackson Browne’s next, I know she’ll have me doing oooos to ‘Running on Empty’. They’re that kind of family.
When we get to World of Chickens, we stop in the driveway to unload. The individual signs are light, but my muscles need every bit of their sporadic bullworking when Frank passes something large, timber and chickeny out of the back of the truck. It’s the board that the signs will hang on, with its rooster’s head on top and chicken legs. Four chicken legs—two for the front view and two for the back—with the pieces of wood joined by hinges at the top and ropes around knee level. Do chickens have knees? Surely everything has knees.
‘I’ll just take the truck down the back and get to the counter with Sophie, hey?’ Frank says. ‘You two should be right setting this up. And, Ness, you’ve got to be careful with Sophie. She’s a devout Christian. So we all watch our mouths around here. Language and content, okay? You get what I mean? For Sophie’s sake, we pretend all that sexual stuff doesn’t exist. Including wrinkly fingertips, right? And we don’t even mention god, ’cause her religion’s very private. So you have to pretend
I didn’t tell you.’
Vanessa looks as though that’s almost too much to remember, as though she came here for the signs, not for all this work politics and being careful with people.
‘Honestly,’ she says when he’s back in the truck and she’s picking the signboard up more easily than I’d like her to. ‘That florist I work with, they don’t come much more Christian than her, and we get on okay. I’ve got to go easy on the blasphemy, obviously . . .’
‘Blasphemy?’
‘Blasphemy. The god words, used for swearing purposes. First couple of times I cut my finger or spiked myself, she went nuts about the blasphemy. Of course, I kept doing it till she told me what it was. Now we’re fine. There’s plenty more words you can use.’ The signboard slips from her hands and lands on her toe. ‘Fuck. Fuck.’ She scrunches her face up, in genuine pain. ‘Ah, my fucking toe.’
‘It’s heavy, isn’t it?’
‘Nah, it’s just the new paint. It’s slippery.’
We open the board out and stand it by the roadside. There are runners on the front where all the signs go, one behind the other like files in a filing cabinet. To keep it interesting for the traffic, the chicken every so often has to pull up the front sign and move it to the back, displaying a new message. She starts to show me how it works, and tells me it’ll really kick arse when she plugs the strobe in.
The board is white like a chicken’s front and the writing on the signs is in bright primary colours, like T-shirt slogans for the chicken to wear. She says she got a bit artistic with the chicken features, and she hopes that’s okay. We start racking the signs, with Vanessa reading them aloud as we put them up—‘eat me $4.95’ (with a picture of a half-chicken meal), ‘I am your burger—$1.95’, ‘it’s your World’, ‘burger meister’ and ‘real meal deal’.