Daily Dialogue — August 8, 2012
GAINES: You come here out of the blue asking for twenty hits. Just so happens twenty is the magic number where intent to sell becomes trafficking.
RONNA: Todd, I would never fuck you like that.
GAINES: How would you fuck me? Would you strap it on?
He climbs over the sofa to a dresser. In a drawer, he digs down through a pile of socks to find a wide-mouthed bottle. And an empty Tylenol bottle. Blows out the dust.
GAINES: What’s the occasion?
RONNA: There’s this big Christmas party thing.Warehouse, you know. A bunch of us are doing sort of a pre-party thing.
GAINES: Friends of yours. You’re not going to go and try to sell this on me, are you?
RONNA: No.
GAINES: You’re not dealing.
RONNA: Swear to God.
He transfers pills from the big bottle to the Tylenol bottle.
GAINES: This is the real thing. Pharmaceutical grade, not that crunchy herbal rave shit. Don’t let anyone double dose or you’ll be frying eggs off ’em in the emergency room. One hit per headbanger.
RONNA: Understood.
He snaps the cap on tight.
GAINES: Twenty at fifteen is 300.
RONNA: Fifteen? I was thinking more like ten.
GAINES: You already did strap it on.
RONNA: It’s just that I know you charge Simon ten.
GAINES: Inflation’s a bitch.
He offers it to Ronna, who doesn’t reach out for it.
RONNA: Here’s the deal. There’s 20 of us. I need all of this. But I only have two hundred. I mean, that’s all I have.
Gaines undoes the cap of the Tylenol bottle, starts pouring the pills back out.
RONNA: No, hear me out. This two-hundred is like a down payment. You give me the stuff, I get the extra hundred from them, then I come right back and pay you.
GAINES: See, that would be doing you a favor, and you know how I feel about favors.
RONNA: I could leave something with you. Collateral.
He gives her a quick look over.
GAINES: I already got a fucking Swatch. I need something I know you’ll come back for.
Ronna looks at the Tylenol bottle in his hands. Thinking…
EXT. THE BEAST — NIGHT
Ronna kneels down beside the passenger window. Knocks on the glass. Claire rolls down the window. MUSIC spills out.
RONNA: Claire, could you come up with me for a sec?
EXT. DOORSTEP — NIGHT
The release BUZZER stops as Ronna pulls open the door to the stairs. Claire just stands there, disbelieving, making no motion to go in.
RONNA: Forty-five minutes. Hour, tops. You just have to sit there.
CLAIRE: Hello! He’s a drug dealer.
RONNA: Jesus, Claire. Don’t get 818 on me here. How much shit have I done for you? This is nothing.
CLAIRE: No. No! You’re making me an accessory.
RONNA: Claire. That bracelet of mine you’re wearing is an accessory. You are just some chick who’s sitting in an apartment. That’s it.
It’s not just the matter at hand, but years of minor adjustment
and one-upsmanship. Ronna finally drops the bravado.
RONNA: Okay, no bullshit. I need this. I don’t get this money, I get evicted. My ass is
out the street.
— Ronna (Sarah Polley), Gaines (Timothy Olyphant), Claire (Katie Holmes), Go (1999), written by John August
http://static.movieclips.com/embedplayer.swf?shortid=yr7R
The Daily Dialogue theme for the week is drug deals suggested by Jonathan Webb. Today’s suggestion by Teddy Pasternak.
Trivia: Writer John August had originally intended “Go” to be a short film. The original screenplay was made up basically of the “Ronna” part of the script. The other two sections were added to explain why Simon went to Las Vegas and who Adam & Zack are.
Dialogue On Dialogue: Any scene involving drug deals must achieve a sense of verisimilitude, it has to be believable. Attitudes, jargon, slang. August achieves that here.