Daily Dialogue — January 6, 2014
INT. REHEARSAL HALL — DAY
Barris sits with a several network executive and some other staff members watching a fat man tap dance badly and, because of his weight, extremely loudly. It’s painful for everybody to watch. The fat man finishes.
BARRIS: Thank you. Thanks. That was great.
The fat smiles and exits. Barris puts his head in his hands.
EXECUTIVE WOMAN: I don’t know, Chuck. It’s looking bleak.
BARRIS: There’s gotta be somebody in America with some talent. Ted Mack got bookings every week.
The executives look at each other.
BARRIS: Bring in the next thing.
An assistant opens the door and a middle-aged woman in pale blue polyester pants and Joan Crawford painted on eyebrows enters with a guitar. She begins to sing a folk song, very sincerely, in a very off-key monotone. It’s unbearable and depressing. Barris glances over at the executive; she’s checking her watch again. The song is endless.
Barris’s eyes grow cloudy.
DISSOLVE TO:
EXT. FIELD — DAY
This is the same field where Renda was shot. Now, the folk-singing woman is in the field singing. Barris pulls out a gun and aims it at the woman. Her eyes widen in terror, but she keeps singing. A church bell chimes and Barris shoots her. She flies back, spurting blood. Her guitar hits the ground with a twang.
INT. REHEARSAL HALL — DAY
Barris snaps out of his fantasy with renewed energy.
The folksinger is still droning on.
BARRIS: (ushering out) Thank you. Thank you. We’ll be in touch. That was wonderful.
Barris closes the door behind the folksinger and turns to the executives.
BARRIS: We’ve been going about this all wrong. Rather than killing ourselves trying to find good acts, we just book bad ones and kill them.
EXECUTIVE #2: Chuck, it’s torture to sit through even one of these people –
BARRIS: We kill ’em before they’re through. As soon as it gets unbearable, we kill ’em. Dead.
— Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002), screenplay by Charlie Kaufman, book by Chuck Barris
The Daily Dialogue theme for the week: Explain the mission, suggested by Shaula Evans. Today’s suggestion by Zach Jansen.
Trivia: George Clooney’s directorial debut.
Dialogue On Dialogue: Commentary from Zach: “Perhaps not the intention, but this scene is in the spirit of explaining the mission.
The fun of this scene is, of course, the double meaning of “kill.” Barris (an undercover assassin) fantasizes killing the “talent” and uses that inspiration to create “The Gong Show,” where the point was for celebrity judges to kill the performance if/when it became unbearable.
It’s a simple play on words, but in a dark comedy, those double meanings can add subtext and humor to an otherwise okay scene.”
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