July 13, 2002 Mock Screenplay For Next Jigglebox Rant Establishing: A primitive camp in the woods, camper, deck, stacked wood beside a fire circle of river rock. Cops milling about. Ext: Primitive camp in Maine woods - Day DETECTIVE DENTAL HYGIENE closes his car door, ducks under the yellow scene tape and walks to OFFICER ABCESS. DETECTIVE D.H. Jesus! Have you shot that yet? Get your samples for the lab, shoot it, then mop up that mess. OFFICER A. Yes, Sir. Sorry Sir, but the blood is very fresh and appears to have bits of tissue on it. We're getting some plastic to cover it to keep the flies out until forensics arrives. D.H. Abscess, i've been on this job 30 years, yet every time i encounter one of these i have to ask anew, what kind of Rambo-wannabe maniac would do something like this? Flies spin annoying circles around the officers' heads, then return to the pool of blood on the deck. A. I don't know Sir. We're tearing apart the camper now, Sir, in search of the assault weapon. D.H. Did you just fall out of jungle the canopy, you friggin' monkey? Look down, Abscess, what do you see? A. Um, blood, a bunch of hand tools, some empty beer cans… D.H. Those are no ordinary empties, A. This maniac drank Pabst Blue Ribbon! A. …and tequila. That's a gallon there. D.H. Oh, stuff the tequila, boy! The P.B.R is your clue. D.H. crosses to a nearby trash can with the word RECYCLEABLES printed on it, peers in. The can is full of empty P.B.R. cans. D.H. Aha! You see? Only one kind of man would drink P.B.R. with such dedicated conviction, especially up here in Bud country where the King of Beers is cheaper than water. OFFICER ABCESS rolls his eyes. A. OK, Sir. I give up. What kind of man? D.H. Think, Abscess! What evokes almost as much nostalgia as music? Why, beer of course! So, it's obvious that this guy had some personal connection with Pabst, maybe even met the family, slept in their vaulting Aspen, Colorado mountain lodge, shook up cans of stale beer & hosed down their pigs for a laugh - Ha! A. Um, Sir. You're losin' me. D.H. snaps out of his strange reverie, looks down at the blood again. D.H. What's with all the pliers? OFFICER SMITH enters from the trailer carrying two prescription drugs bottles. SMITH No sign of an ice skate. The place is infested with pocket mice, however Johnson just found one in his pocket gnawing on his eye shadow. You want we should round 'em up for interrogation…the mice, I mean? D.H. waves SMITH off with a flick of his wrist, speaks to ABSCESS. D.H. Ice skate? A. Yes, Sir. Obviously your Pabst theory is gonna hold much more water, but before you got here i was going with a more Tom Hanks, Castaway theory. D.H. I see. No, no, this is quite obviously a P.B.R. & pliers job. When you make detective, Abscess, you can make the theories. Until then, would you mind? A. Of course not Sir. You have the floor. D.H. Very well. I see before me the following items: a crescent wrench, bloodied & open to the width of a molar; a small piece of antique mirror; a flashlight; two pair of pliers, both bloodied & singed; also singed, two halves of a razor blade; the singeing indicative that our man attempted to sterilize his crude instruments with fire; lastly, a bottle of Cuervo tequila, a towel, a wad of toilet paper, a hammer, one 16-penny nail, and our pool of blood. Oh, and the two empty bottles of pain killers Smith found. A. So the guy was a mess, so what? D.H. Far from it, Abscess. This guy is methodical, organized, and icredibly resourceful considering what little he had to work with. And courage! This is one big-dicked maniac. Two OTHER COPS enter. One photographs the blood & tools, the other takes samples to study. D.H. OK, so here's what went down. Guy's alone out here in the woods. No tire tracks, so he didn't have a car to get into town. He's got a whopper of an infected tooth and even if he did have wheels there's a 1 in 2 chance he didn't have insurance, and he probably wouldn't be out here eating bark and drinking P.B.R. if he had a job. So, no car, no insurance, no money, mean-ass toothache. Getting the picture, Abscess? OFFICER ABSCESS is absorbed in the movement of flies in the blood. D.H. Abscess! OK, so our man is dyin' out here, a big strong man crippled by the Achilles' heel of a friggin' tooth gone bad. He bides his time, avoids cold or hot beverages, and pops pain pills like a kid with Halloween candy. Then one day, he's out! No more pills. Or worse, he knows he'll be out in a day or so, and decides it's NOW or NEVER! He lays out his tools, wraps the plier claws in rubber bands, eats all the pills he's got left in one mad gamble, pounds several P.B.R.'s, soaks his gums with the tequila, and begins with a razor blade to cut away at the gums of the offending molar. The blood spills from his mouth where he kneels on the deck. It grosses him out. He sits up & howls, "I can't do this!!" He spits and the flies. He begins to swallow the mouthfuls of tequila used for anesthesia. He grabs the pliers, finds purchase and yanks… A. But Sir, we've searched & found no tooth. D.H. bends and points at a pool of blood. D.H. Aha! But look here! Fragments of a tooth. And this. A filling! No, Abscess, I never said he pulled his tooth but he sure as hell tried. I have to admire his tenacity. If he could have pulled the tooth himself, I've no doubt he would have. No, he pulled and pulled, enduring blinding pain, but each time the pliers sprang from his mouth, they brought out only pieces, and soon he had nothing left above the gum-line to grab. By now, the PHOTOGRAPHER COP, the FORENSIC COP and OFFICER ABSCESS are all frozen, staring at the pool of blood. The flies are getting thicker. D.H. You! Get a mop. Clean this shit up! A. Great work, Sir. Amazing how you deduced all that from what little evidence is here. D.H. Thank you, Sam. We at D.I.I. take pride in our work. A. D.I.I., Sir? D.H. Dental Incident Investigation, Sam. A. But Sir, if i may, you never mentioned the hammer and the 16-penny nail. D.H. Just testing you, Abscess. Good work. Well, what do you think, Mr. Hanks? A. Ha-ha. Yes, Sir. I believe that hammer and nail are symbolic of the ice skate and rock used by Tom Hanks in Castaway, absolutely. I think they were his last option, but one he eventually had to employ. D.H. walks to edge of deck, stares off into forest. D.H. Poor bastard. He's out there, somewhere, he and another 100 million Americans without dental coverage. They're out there running scared, chewing gently, lost, helpless, howling in the night, reaching out for pliers, whiskey & the grace of God. RSM Write Me! ©2003 Rick McKinney ALL RIGHTS RESERVED