Thank You and Good Night

by Ray Succre

  “Let’s do the opener,” Buck said. Vance and Lemar agreed and readied themselves. This would give Emery some time to work on the monologue and say hello to his family. Buck was an understanding sort, so long as a person didn’t take it for granted. The crew readied for this scene’s rehearsal, which would take place in the episode immediately after Emery’s monologue. It was still the same shot, but later in the timeline.

  “And we go in on Butler, 3…2… now the deal,” Buck said, initiating. Vance, as Butler, lifted a dealt card from the table. Emery stayed out of sight, but near enough the scene to get its feel for the camera.

  CUT TO:

  INT. THE MAVERICK CASINO AND LOUNGE - NIGHT

  A busy, well-lit casino full of slots and people and dealers and hostesses.

  We focus on the blackjack tables, moving in until we see a DEALER (JIMMY) and MR. BUTLER. They are the only two at this particular table.

  BUTLER glances at the card he has been dealt. We have an ECU of the turnout: Deuce and a five.

  BUTLER:

  (frowns)

  Jimmy, you’re killin’ me. Ah, you’re really killin’ me.

  JIMMY:

  That’s the breaks, Mr. Butler.

  BUTLER:

  Oh, I know the breaks. Uh, hit me again.

  JIMMY deals another card. BUTLER glances at it and we have an ECU on the hand: Deuce, five, and an eight. There’s a pause.

  JIMMY:

  Another?

  BUTLER:

  I can’t get a leg up tonight. You’re keepin’ the royalty all to yourself, I think.

  JIMMY:

  Ah, I’m sorry to hear it.

  BUTLER:

  Sure you are. Well, it’s not just tonight, of course. Poker. Blackjack. Roulette. Ever see a losing streak like this? Months.

  JIMMY:

  I’ve seen worse.

  BUTLER:

  Can’t have been much worse, though.

  JIMMY:

  Not much worse, no. Eh, it’s just a bad spell. When it gets like this is when a guy bounces back. You gotta be right next to it, by now.

  BUTLER:

  Let’s hope.

  JIMMY:

  Hey, be sure to try me again tomorrow. Find my table. It’s my kid’s birthday; might have some luck in my hands for you when I get here.

  BUTLER:

  (a friendly nod)

  Say, I’ll do that. Couldn’t hurt.

  JIMMY:

  (smiles)

  No, sir.

  BUTLER lifts his half-empty bourbon, ice long ago melted.

  BUTLER:

  Well, I think I’ve lost enough for the evening. Better save what little I’ve got left for another night.

  JIMMY:

  Good seein’ you, Mr. Butler.

  BUTLER:

  Yeah, you too, Jimmy. Hey, at least buy yourself a drink with my losses, eh? Take a tip. I’d like to know SOMETHING comes from a losing streak this bad.

  JIMMY:

  I wish I could; can’t drink until I’m off the floor for the night. As for taking a tip, well believe me, every last dime that comes near me is accounted for by management.

  BUTLER downs the rest of his drink, then licks his lips.

  BUTLER:

  Well now, that’s a good policy. No drinks while at the table. Maybe I should use it, too, huh?

  CUT TO:

  The set. A short reprieve of quiet. Buck Mifflin stood.

  “And that’ll be the cut. That was just right. Great stuff, you two. On the first run, even.”

  “Okay?” Lemar asked, peering around Vance from the dealer position at the table.

  “Yeah, that was nice,” Buck sated, “We’ll top off a few more to keep it clear.”

  James Vance removed himself from the stool and stood up, rotating his shoulders to clear them from the previous posture of leaning against the table’s rim. It was rather marvelous to see him take on fifteen years when the camera was watching, but then stand up after a shot, having returned to his more youthful self. He was a strong actor, had come from live theater, but was one of the few that understood how to re-work his technique for a camera, how not to overemphasis. Vance had been difficult to obtain, but he had loved Belmont’s script, and signed on after a few details were ironed out. Lemar had been simple to arrange, having only worked in television and one film. Vance and Lemar did not seem to regard one-another much, but had a nice back-and-forth in the scene.

  The real spark would be Death, who was being played by the gifted Tom Ward. Ward was the first Oscar winner they had approached who was fond of the show. So fond, in fact, that he signed on after being pitched a script, without having actually read it. His one contingency, beyond his schedule (which was awkward), was that, as Death, he not wear a black gown with a hood. Ward found this device to be dull and ancient when it came to acting and stages. Jamison, who had obtained Ward surprisingly fast, had assured the well-known actor that there would be no reaper costume. Ward would look like a well-put-together man of certain stature. It would not be a cliché wardrobe arrangement. Tom Ward had consented to the role and would be on set in but two days.

  “We’re on schedule; we shoot the monologue and opener in twenty. Let’s get it right, guys,” Buck announced then, “Em, you get your makeup on. I want to see out the monologue a few times before we shoot.”

  Emery brushed himself off and walked off the casino set, made his way to a chair near the side of the stage. He waved Beth and the girls over and then sat back as Nina knelt before him and began applying his makeup. She would place hints here and there of definition, and the wondrous, powdery layer of pallor the cameras preferred. Brightening the white made the black more defined. Darkening the black made the white bloom against a lens. Contrast was key, but always a work in progress.

  Beth and the girls came over and Rebecca sat on the floor, beside her father’s legs. He reached over and frisked her hair a moment as Vivian, riding Beth’s hip, motioned to go to him.

  “Oh sweetie, I can’t. I have to hold still to get my makeup on,” Emery said. Vivian did not register this bit of information in the technical sense, but the child knew enough of tone to understand her want had been declined.

  “You have any trouble at the front gate?” Emery asked.

  “No, they let us right in.”

  “Okay, good.”

  Emery, without moving his face, carefully lit a cigarette. The smoke rose from the tip, much to Nina’s agitation.

  “Sorry.”

  Beth described the day she and the two daughters had seen prior to arriving on set. It had been a series of errands with a stop at the park to play. She said he looked good in his suit, then. He inquired about his height and no, she did not feel he looked too short on the stage.

  “Everyone says that, but I feel like a dwarf up there.”

  There was a small amount of conversation between the two, cramped and minor due to the proximity of Nina. Emery had a habit of affecting a mild tone when talking with his wife near others who might inadvertently listen, a sort of mechanism. Shortly, the director called for a ten minute curfew. Something was going on, but Emery did not know what that might be. Rebecca batted at her father’s leg then, a bit annoyed at not getting much attention.

  “So, have you decided what you want to do for your birthday?” he asked her.

  “I want a party,” Rebecca said.

  “I see. That’s an idea I can get behind. Who are you going to invite?”

  “I don’t know. You. And mommy. Viv.”

  “No one else?”

  “Girls from my class.”

  “No boys, huh?” he said with a tease.

  “There’s a boy, because you’re a boy and you’ll be there,” she replied.

  “That’s more observant than you know. And I would love to attend a pretty girl’s birthday party. I thank you cordially for your invitation.”

  “Is this your story, daddy?” she said then, changing the subject while looking at the stage.
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br />   “Oh,” he said, surprised she would ask something regarding the script, “Well, not this one, no. This one Larry wrote. You remember Larry and Helen?”

  “Uh huh.”

  “Larry writes stories, too. That’s our job, here.”

  “I know.”

  “Ah, good. Well this one is all Larry.”

  “What’s it about?” Rebecca asked. Beth smiled at this and sat down beside her daughter while trying to balance with Vivian. This was one of those moments she found touching, but Emery was not present in full, being much more at work than at home.

  “Well, it’s called Losing Streak, and it’s about a man so addicted to gambling that he’s ruined his life. He’s had a bad run. That means he can’t win at gambling. Which is something… something you should never do. Gamble. Bad habit. But the main character, the man who loses in the story- his name is Mr. Butler. You saw him up there, on the stage. In the story, he keeps losing at gambling. Almost all of his money is gone. It’s very sad and he’s very lonely. He just can’t win. The thing is, after leaving the casino one night, the night you’ve just seen on the stage, Mr. Butler sees a quarter on the ground in the street, right out in front of the casino. He’s happy to see that and says ‘Look there. Free money. Maybe my luck has finally changed,’ and he stops to pick it up but he isn’t paying attention, and a car hits him.”

  “He goes under a car?”

  “Well, not under. He gets hit by it and bounces off. Just out in the street. And the driver panics and doesn’t want to get in trouble, so he leaves. He drives off quickly and Mr. Butler is badly hurt.”

  “Does he die?”

  “That’s the thing. At first, we don’t know, because he wakes up after a moment and he finds himself facing a strange man, a real big shot who turns out to be Death. Mr. Butler is almost dead, see. He’s scared, of course, and he begs Death to spare him, to let him keep living. He says he’s willing to make a bet with Death. Well, Death is intrigued enough to hear him out. Mr. Butler figures that his losing streak has to be over, that getting hit by a car must have surely drained the last of the bad luck out of him all at once. He challenges Death to a game of blackjack. If Mr. Butler wins, he gets to live, and he won’t be injured from the car. If he loses, he’ll die, but the stakes have been raised, because Death will make sure he dies very painfully. That’s the bet. Either he beats Death and lives, or he’ll die in terrible pain, and not quickly. And then Death makes the rule that they’ll play five hands only. If Mr. Butler loses to the house, it’s over.”

  “Does he have red cards?” Rebecca asked.

  “Red?”

  “The cards on the set have red backing,” Beth threw in, “she saw them.”

  “Oh, I see. Then yes. He’ll have those red cards. Both of them will. Huh... maybe I should change that, so they’re not like the casino cards, or maybe... Eh, at any rate, on the final hand (that’s the last part of the game), both Mr. Butler and Death have won two hands. They’re at a tie. So it’s all down to the last hand. Death flips and deals. Mr. Butler hits, hits again, and ends up with a great hand. He’s got 20. Uh, in blackjack, the goal is to get as close as you can to 21 without going over. And Death, with 17, draws another card and gets a 5, which gives him 22, and so he’s busted. Mr. Butler wins the game.”

  “He wins?”

  “Yes, and he wins the bet.”

  “Then what happens?”

  “Death leaves and we come back from commercial. Mr. Butler steps into a bar and orders a drink. While he’s there, he sees a slot machine against the far wall. He thinks about his night, and he’s still got that quarter he found in the street. So, he argues with himself a little, and then decides to gamble the quarter. Just one pull at the slot machine. He puts the quarter into the machine, pulls the handle, and loses. He gets nothing. That’s all. We end with a sad man who just can’t win but for the one time when it counted the most.”

  “He’s cheated death, is the main point,” Beth added.

  “Well, I suppose, but without actually cheating. The connotation would be different because it’s blackjack. He plays fairly and his luck starts- oh, wait wait,” Emery said, trailing off. A moment passed while he thought and nibbled his lip. Rebecca had lost interest.

  “Okay, hold on,” he said, excited.

  Beth watched as he reached into his pocket, carefully so as not to trouble Nina and the appliance of his makeup. Emery obtained his tape recorder and, holding it near his mouth and with his cigarette in his free hand, depressed the record button.

  “Uh, this is for the close on Losing Streak: ‘No, you can’t cheat death. But in Mr. Butler’s case, maybe, just maybe, it’s possible to beat him without cheating, and when playing on The Other Side’…no no, ‘but only when playing on the-” He stopped there, pausing the recorder. Emery thought a moment, and then began recording again, “Okay, ‘It’s possible to beat the dealer if you’re playing on The Other Side.’ Oh, scratch that. ‘No, you can’t beat the house and you can’t cheat death. But in the case of Harold Butler, maybe, just maybe, a person CAN beat the house, even against death, himself, if one happens to be playing… on The Other Side.’ Nope. ‘If you’re hand has been dealt from… The Other Side.’ Work with this later. Also, change the color of cards that involve the bet with Death. Death should have his own cards, I think. Black ones. Or maybe go with white. Really white. That could be good.”

  Emery moved his finger and there was a dull snap as the record button jutted upward, ending the recording. He chewed at the inside of his cheek a moment while Nina applied his foundation. Beth nodded, slightly irked.

  “I do like that part about not beating the house or cheating death. And the last one with the hand being dealt from The Other Side.”

  “Oh good. I have a line about it already, but I’m not happy with how it sounds. Sorry for jumping away like that. If I don’t record something fast-”

  “I’m well aware of your secret love affair with the tape recorder,” she said. Emery smiled.

  “She means so little to me, honey. It’s just an occasional rendezvous between a needy man and a lonely machine. A trashy sort of affair, really.”

  “Mmm hmm.”

  “Well, either I talk all day into Edison’s toy, or instead it all builds up and I end up talking all evening in your ear.”

  “Oh, keep your little mistress on the side. It’s fine. She’s pretty, yes, and I could say she’s even demure, but I don’t really feel threatened by her.”

  “You’re very understanding.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Among those creative with words, those who wrote out their notions in novels, scripts, in comics and comedic routines, there were always a few flies amid the steak. Larry Belmont and Calvin Moffat were culpable blessings to the show, but the celebrated novelist, Orson Banry, had become a problem. Banry’s work with television was sparse; he had penned a few scripts before, and one of his screenplays had been made into a film, but Banry was a novelist in both spirit and output. Emery had waited for some time, and Banry, a celebrated writer of fiction, had been dragging his feet the whole way. When the final revision was submitted, retracted, and submitted a week later, it was but one more of his incidental trickeries. Banry truly did not seem to know how to write a script. This had happened several times, and Emery had grown tired of waiting for the story. Worse, when the script had finally been delivered, after the long wait and incessant problems, it was even more problematic than the original draft Orson Banry had retracted a year prior. The script was based off one of Banry’s short story, I Speak of Arms and a Man, and the script had kept the title. This was a story that Emery had read in the past and enjoyed much, but Banry simply could not script it well, which, while at first surprising, had now become a thorn in Emery’s side. Banry’s unreliability, specifically while under contract, was proving to be a gauntlet of minor squabbles and unfulfilled deadlines.

  Orson Banry, while being esteemed on page and well-regarded in the science fict
ion world, had put together a teleplay that did not fit the show much. It neglected the space for introduction, did not break well for the three acts that would edge the commercial breaks, and the summary came on too suddenly, at the very end. Emery was thrown-off by Banry's final draft, at how carelessly the writer seemed to have constructed it. Worse, Banry had removed several of the key components of the story, and inserted new ones that were not as effective. Banry had seemingly spent more time on these drafts than Emery would spend on an entire year’s provision of scripts, and Banry had rewritten the “final” draft many times before submitting it for approval. This was a script from a capable writer, yet despite the skill of its creator and notwithstanding the time spent on it, Banry's script was strangely amateurish. If Emery had been in a bad mood while reading it, he might have even concluded the script to be downright awful.

  In the end, with swollen heads butting and words quickly escalating into minor venom, the two writers, giants in their respective fields, had begun to dislike each other much. Emery’s respect for Banry was strong, but annoyance was beginning to cloud his view of the man. Banry’s respect for Emery, however, had utterly vanished. The script, in view of being filmed for television, needed to be overhauled. Emery, prizing what he suspected to be Banry’s great skill, had asked the author to do the rewrite, and did not want to have his own writers patch it up, out of respect, but Banry was now refusing to do anything at all with the script. This left Emery, Larry, and Calvin, in the position of re-working the script themselves, as was the nature of their position with the studio, and Emery’s production role with the show. Banry had been paid at the start (at Emery’s novice insistence), and now they needed a shootable script.