(Interior of the Chew-Z Cafe. It is chintzy-looking diner-style restaurant, with a prominent bar, which has been inexpertly made over into a half-hearted coffee shop. There's a makeshift stage at the far wall. A lage papier-mache palm tree sits in the window and gives the joinet some ambiance. The decor is gaudy in green and yellow linoleum.)

(A wet Andrew GILLIGAN walks in. He is immediately hailed over to a booth containing LUXOTTICA Frame and two others. GENERICA Filofax is fresher looking and more stylish than LUXOTTICA, and she looks smart in a blue blouse and little yellow hat. PHINEAS Bizbee, a nervous youth of twenty-one, wears a polo shirt and thick, expensive horn-rimmed glasses. He smiles emptily at Andrew.)

(In the booth behind LUXOTTICA sits an irritating man who is ranting and raving into a cellular phone. Since I know an irritating man with a cellular phone named Irwin, let's disguise our petty little joke by calling him DERWIN.)

DERWIN

...so I said fuck you, just like that I said fuck you. Just like that. Nobody fucks with me. No dumb fucker fucks with me. That's what I told him. Dumb fuckers. I told him, what the fuck is your fucking problem? I says, fuck you, just like that. And he's a fat piece of shit, too. I told him, I tell him, lose some fucking pounds, you fat fuck. No wonder your fucking wife left you. No wonder she left you, you fat, dumb fuck. You wonder why she split. I'll tell you why: because you're a fat, stupid fuck. And 'cause you're a racist fuck and you deserve all the shit of the world dumped onto your head. I told him, just like that. He's just not a good guy. He's just not good people. You know what else I said? I said: you're racist against the German people. I don't put up with no racists. You're racist against the German people, and it takes a sick, sick fuck to be a racist fuck. One thing I can't stand is racists. I heard him say, right with my ears I hear him say I hate those lousy Germans. Now you know me. You know how I feel, I don't care if you're white, yellow, black, brown with polka dots, it's all the same to me. I'm no racist. But this fucking guy, this guy is prejudiced against the German people. This fat, fucking stupid piece of shit, I heard him say I hate those stinking Germans. All the shit of the world, I says, should be dumped onto your head for being a big, fat racist fuck who is racist against the German people. I says, I wouldn't care if you were lying in the gutter and dogs were pissing and shitting in your head. I would laugh. I would kick you in your fat, lousy mouth, you racist fat fuck who is prejudiced against the German people. This guy should be shot in the face. I hate that guy. That fuckin, that's the last time I ever try to help him out. I don't help out racists, you know what I mean? Because you know me, to me, I wouldn't care if all the racists were lying in the gutter and dogs and cats were crapping on their heads. I would just laugh. I said this all right to his face, I didn't care. I just didn't care anymore, I'm sick of trying to help him out. To think of how much I did for that fat fuck, for him to turn around and show me his racistness against the German people. He really showed his true colors. After what I did, I says, I got you transfereed out of that hell-hole. I got you transferred someplace nice, a nice old place. But do you appreciate it? No, you fat fucker, you turn around and show your true colors. You're racist against the German people. I says, we took you on, you fat lousy fuck, because we wanted to give you a chance, and this is how you repay me. This is how you repay me. We lift you up, I give you a helping hand, and you shit all over it. I says, stop fucking with me, you call these sales numbers? You call these sales numbers? I call this horseshit, I call this fucking with me. Me who gave you a helping hand and brought you out of the ghetto and put you someplace nice, which you promptly fuck up. Fuck you, I said. Nobody fucks with me. No fat fucker fucks with me, you fat, fat fuck. I said to him, right to his face, how come you can't sell in a nice old place? How come you can't sell in a nice place where the people are nice and not jungle animals? I helped you out, you fat fuck, now help me out. Help me out by not being a racist fuck against the German people to these people. These are nice people not the animals you're used to. This isn't the law of the jungle anymore, boy. And I don't help out racists. All the shit of the world should be dumped on the fucking racists. I dont' care if they were lying in the gutter with dogs and cats crapping in their faces. I'd laugh, and kick your fat face in. Anyway, let's talk deals. Hello? Hello?

LUXOTTICA

Andrew! Just the person I wanted to see.

Really?

(BHOPAL enters the Chew-Z, and stands askance, watching over Andrew.)

Andrew, meet Phineas.

Hi.

(Lying.) Pleased to meet you.

Phineas just dropped out of Kauffman, and he needs someplace to stay.

With me? Oh, no. No. I need, total concentration in my, um, flat.

You're so selfish, Andrew.

Why? Why can't, you know I, I have a big, huge match coming up this week.

(To PHINEAS.) Andrew here is a chess champion.

(Unimpressed.) A chess champion?

Isn't that funny?

At the very least, be a gentleman and help poor Phineas find an apartment tomorrow.

I didn't know they even had chess champions anymore. Are you like from Moscow?

(To PHINEAS.) Yes, yes, so while we're at work, working, Andrew will take you apartment hunting tomorrow.

Wait, what do you mean? I can't --

Oh, come on!

Come on, Andrew. It's not like you have anything else to do. You just sit around the house all day, playing games.

(BHOPAL grimaces.)

Playing games?!?!?

It's okay. I can, I don't want to waste any of his, like, valuable time.

(To a stupefied Andrew.) You jerkoff. Look what you've done.

(Skeptically.) No, it's okay. If he's like, a champion or something, then I guess he thinks he's, like, too good for the rest of us.

No, it's not like that, I mean, look. I have to, it isn't just a game, it's, I have to prepare. Really.

I think you owe everybody here a big apology.

 

 

(GENERICA and GILLIGAN are sitting at the "counter" of the diner/cafe. She is eating a small piece of cherry pie, while he saw into an overcooked potato and onion knish. Next to them, the short order cook and a big fat customer are having a wheedling conversation. The SHORT ORDER COOK fills a mustard container as he talks.)

SHORT ORDER COOK

...becuz if ya live long enough, ya see everting. Then, there ain't nothing else to see.

CUSTOMER

And they, he just kept tallin me there's lots of money in it. But I think there's more to it than that.

SHORT ORDER COOK

Money talks.

CUSTOMER

Yeah, money talks, yeah, but really. Be a construction worker. Be a doctor, lawyer, indian chief. Keep your balls is my point of view.

SHORT ORDER COOK

(Quite ruminative.) You know, though, he always did, you know, he's a little slip of a thing.

CUSTOMER

(Incredulous.) What? Whattya mean, what?

SHORT ORDER COOK

I'm just saying, you know, in this life, you have to do what makes you happy. I'm a live and let live guy. If he wants to be --

CUSTOMER

I can't believe, that's what I just got through saying. He's doing it for the money. Money only. He says that for all the tricks he'll turn in two years, all, will pay back the costs on the operations and then some. He says that that's the hot market right now, the guys, on this itnernet, they really go for this. It's just he all wants, money, money, money.

SHORT ORDER COOK

Says you. He might have another reason why is what I'm saying. Maybe there's more to it than that.

CUSTOMER

Don't you start yelling at me. I'm the customer here, remember?

SHORT ORDER COOK

Sorry, sorry.

CUSTOMER

The customer is always right. Or I will go frequent some other establishment. I got the power.

SHORT ORDER COOK

I know.

CUSTOMER

Investment my eye. Twelve, eighteen months, tops, before that ass of his starts sagging. Past the point of no return.

SHORT ORDER COOK

I know that point.

(And on the more repressed side of the counter:)

GILLIGAN

You look, um, I, that's a nice hat.

GENERICA

You and I concur. It is, in fact, a nice hat.

(Pause.)

That is why I purchased it.

GILLIGAN

Do you, let's go someplace a little quieter?

GENERICA

(With a big forkful of pie, in the same dark red shade as her lipstick.) Are you asking me out on a date, Andrew?

GILLIGAN

No! No! I meant, like, the other side of the room, maybe.

GENERICA

Oh. Okay.

(Pause.)

Why is it that you are so mean?

GILLIGAN

Me mean?

GENERICA

Yes, you mean, Andrew. Why can't you be nice to, why can't you help out that poor boy?

GILLIGAN

Okay, Generica, look. I have a big match with the top, big player. The best young player in Russia. Oliver Klozov. And --

GENERICA

(Pushing her pie aside and hopping off her stool.) No, I don't care about your silly game, your silly bully game.

GILLIGAN

Then, why are you, bully game? What do you mean by, bully game, what?

GENERICA

Well you told me so yourself, Andrew. Everybody tries to be white, because white always beats black, you said so yourself.

GILLIGAN

What? What are you, Generica, white doesn't always win. It's just a, it's a big advantage to be white. You want to be whit. But black can, um, always surprise.

GENERICA

Andrew. Think about it. You spend all day playing a war game where the white guys beat the black guys. In a war. This doesn't affect you? You haven't got any problems with that?

GILLIGAN

It's not, can you let me finish my knish?

(GENERICA puts her hands on her hips.)

White just goes first. It doesn't mean anything.

(Pause.)

It's just a game.

(Andrew's living room at night. A hush. There is no sound but that of the rain pattering on the window.)

(Andrew GILLIGAN sits in a crouch before the large central chessboard, deep in thought. He periodically moves pieces on the board and jots notes in a square, chessboard-shaped notebook of his own devising. Books on chess are scattered around the room.)

(White queen pawn to queen pawn four. Furious scribbling.)

(There is a sound like beating, fluttering wings. It's coming from the bathroom. Andrew, who had been in a trance-like state of concentration, gets a quizical look. He stands up and walks into the bathroom.)

(Andrew flicks on the light. He sees nothing but a cramped but elegant little apartment bath. He goes over to the window, and checks the casing. Everything looks okay.)

(Andrew glances in the mirror. Therein he sees his face: no longer young, eyes sagging, skin and teeth yellowish, hair unkempt. Andrew averts his glance.)

(Looking to his left, he notices something quite odd. A black rook sits incongruously atop the shink white plastic surface of the toilet seat.)

(The fluttering sound reoccurs. Andrew looks at the rook in wonder.)

(Turning back toward the mirror, Andrew sees another face beside his. Startled, he hollers.)

RABINOWITZ

(In a preposterously phony French accent.) Eet eez uncouth for you to be shouting like zat.

(Guy de Maupassant RABINOWITZ is youngish, with dark, greasy brown hair, a wispy beard, and a thin, waxed moustache. He wears a beret. His teeth are bad. He doesn't look that much like GILLIGAN, but he is about the same height, and the same build.)

GILLIGAN

(Still looking in the mirror, wide eyed.) Who the, how did you get in here?

RABINOWITZ

I am Guy de Maupassant Rabinowitz, revolting French stereotype.

GILLIGAN

Look, I don't know why, just don't, if you're here to rob, just go ahead and --

RABINOWITZ

Yes, I am here to rob, you Amereecan bastard. I am here to rob you of your disgusteeng self-consciousness, your puny excuse for composure, your whiny, grotesque manner, your eenarticulate wrangling. I weel steal zees traits from you, Andrew Gilligan, and replace zem wis, no!, allow zem to be replaced by your true nature. Your French, French nature.

GILLIGAN

But I'm, there must be a mistake. I'm, I'm Jewish, I'm not French.

RABINOWITZ

Yet. You are not French yet.

(At the chessboard. GILLIGAN's face is in profile over the white pieces, RABINOWITZ's over the black. They speak in harsh, confidential whispers.)

RABINOWITZ

What ees your last name, may I ask?

GILLIGAN

You know it. You said it before.

RABINOWITZ

I want you to say eet.

GILLIGAN

It's Gilligan.

RABINOWITZ

Gilligan! Gee-lee-gahn. A noble French name, wheech has been dragged through ze muck of your feelthy American television programs. Andrew Gee-lee-gahn: you are French. French, French, French! Your father, he was French.

GILLIGAN

I, I never knew my father.

RABINOWITZ

He was a brave man. A French Legionnaire. He died of ze Legionnaire's disease.

GILLIGAN

No, no, he didn't, he's alive, he lives in Texas.

RABINOWITZ

Paris, Texas.

GILLIGAN

Look, this is ridiculous. Am I, I must be dreaming.

RABINOWITZ

(With compassion.) Andrew, Andrew, look at yourself. You are slovenly, eegnorant, graceless, eencompetent weeth women. But inside you ees ze cultured, sopheesticated Frenchman waiting to burst forth. You have a spark of class as your birthright as a Frenchman, we must fan it into ze blazing fire. You are a chess champion, no?

GILLIGAN

Yes, but that's different, there's like, I mean, there's nothing French about chess.

RABINOWITZ

Zeenk you so?

(He points down toward the chessboard. Andrew looks down. Resting in the center of the board is a croissant.)

(Andrew jolts awake. He finds himself sleeping, face down on the chessboard, with a bishop jutting painfully into his jaw. He shakes his head, and stands upright.)

(Taking a step, he puts his foot down on something squishy. Grossed out, Andrew bends to examine it. He comes up with a finger full.)

GILLIGAN

Brie?

 

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