Scene 139

(Scene opens outdoors, sound of traffic, birds, etc.)

BUT: So, I see we’ve got the sound effects thing figured out.

PAZ: So, that’s what the inside of a warehouse is supposed to sound like?

BUT: I was being sarcastic for Christ’s sakes.

MIK: Oh, faith and a lamb, we can’t take the Lord’s name in vain! Sure and I’d rather you cut me legs off at the knee with a nail file and stomp me to death with me own feet.

PAZ: I don’t think that will be necessary, Mike. Maybe we could just apologize…

MIK: Oh, apologizing is it? I’d rather you cut off me head and spun it around quick so’s I could watch me own headless body drop to the ground.

BUT: Doesn’t that seem a bit excessive, Mike?

MIK: Excessive? EXCESSIVE? To please the Lord? Excessive would be to have you take down the crucifix from the wall and have me do this and you ram it…

ALL: WE GET THE IDEA, Mike!

BLI: Why does he have to be so gross all the time?

BUT: He’s just passionate about the way he feels, I guess.

PAZ: Getting back to this warehouse…

(SFX: Cattle, jets, babies crying, typewriters, car racing, bird songs)

BLI: Lookout! That number 43(or whatever is Tony Stuart) car almost hit me.

PAZ: Better luck next time.

BLI: Shut up Pazlo. You wouldn’t want to end up in the bread line.

PAZ: Bread line, soup line, buffet line…as long as it’s food. We haven’t eaten for like 12 or 15 scenes.

BLI: Most of us.

PAZ: Okay, Mike. We need you to lead us to where they were keeping the guy locked up.

MIK: Aye. Right down this corridor to the elevator. Through these doors here…

(SFX: music, sirens, anything but a door opening)

BUT: Great sound effects.

BLI: That’s what you get for hiring Sunbright rejects.

PAZ: I didn’t know Stewart came from Sunbright.

BLI: That’s not all you don’t know, too.

MIK: Now it gets pretty dark down in here, sure as yer born.

PAZ: What does that mean, exactly “Sure as you’re born”? I mean, you wouldn’t be talking to me if I wasn’t born.

MIK: You see the wisdom in it, then. A fine boy.

BUT: All these doors look the same. How do you know where Marsh is being held?

MIK: Well, it’s down here somewhere, sure enough. I’d stake me own name on it. I’d stake me brother’s name on it. But not my father’s. Oh, he was a no-account bastard from the old days. Thought nothin’ of keepin’ us kids squirreled away in that house, isolated.

BUT: Well, you were home-schooled in a mansion. It’s not exactly like it was tough on you.

MIK: Oh, the days on end! Breakfast, lessons, nap, lunch, lessons, supper. Over and over. Torture!

PAZ: That pretty much describes like an idyllic life…

MIK: But if you lived it! Rather I’d have you pull my intestines out through my nose and make me smell ‘em.

PAZ: Oh, God, here we go.

MIK: Rather you sawed off my arms and beat me to death with them.

BUT: Okay, Mike. Maybe you could stop there.

MIK: Better you chop off my leg and sharpen it like a spear and jam it far up…

ALL: THANK YOU, Mike.

PAZ: We, uh, get the idea.

BLI: Get the idea? It’s gross! Why is he so gross?

BUT: It’s a cultural thing, I guess.

(SFX: A ship’s bell, boat whistle, tires screeching)

BLI: Look, the door is opening. Not that you could tell by the SOUND EFFECTS!

PAZ: Alright, everybody freeze!

MORitorium: Stay right where you are or you won’t get hurt!

BUT: You mean “Stay where you are or you WILL get hurt.”

MOR: What? Are you prepared to not die?

PAZ: You mean “Are you not prepared to die?”

BUT: No, I don’t think that’s it.

PAZ: Sure, it’s like a double-negative.

MOR: Silence! Morons!

BLI: Don’t lump me in with them. This is just my day job. I’m not gonna die for it.

PAZ: I’ll kill you for that myself!

MOR: Stop! Shut up! I am the great and powerful…no that’s trite. Wizard of Oz. I AM Professor Moritorium. You shall…

BLI: Wait, wait. The fat guy’s talking, I can’t hear.

PAZ: Probably the bad sound effects.

MOR: How am I supposed to make my big entrance if you guys keep walking all over my lines?

MIK: I guess you shoulda thought about that before you married the Devil, eh?

ALL: What?

MIK: As my dear sainted mother would say: “Close the damned door you stupid kids!”

(SFX: door slamming)

BUT: So, all of a sudden you get the right sound effects?

PAZ: Who turned out the lights?

(SFX: a fight ensues, breaking glass, maybe a gunshot)

BLI: Help! Help! I’m being repressed! (gagged, mumbling: mum mum mum)

PAZ: Alright. Do you really think they had to write out “mum mum mum” for Blinds mumbling.

BUT: Well, he doesn’t do well without stage direction. His ad-lib skills are weak.

PAZ: Yeah, but “mum mum mum”? I mean, how about “Gning mnm mummavum”? Now there’s some creative writing.

MIK: Don’t look now, but I think your sister’s been nabbed by those goons!

PAZ: My sister? Blinds? This isn’t another plot twist, is it?

BUT: Paz, they’re taking Blinds!

MIK: Blinds? But there’s not window one in this place, lad.

BUT: No, Blinds the twittering dingbat who doesn’t know what you’re doing here.

PAZ: Do you think Blinds could really be my sister?

BUT: Well, he was adopted. Anyways…we better get after those goons before Blinds is killed!

PAZ: Wait! You can’t do that to my sister! I’ll kill ‘em.

MIK: Aye! Murder’s a sin, son. You can’t be talking like that! Surely I’d rather have my ears cut off and taped to a fire siren ‘til I was deaf, rather than hear you talk like that.

BUT: Oh, geez.

MIK: Rather you’d pop out my eyes and set my head on fire and blind me with the flames as I watch.

PAZ: Okay, Mike. We get that you’re serious about it.

MIK: I’d rather you took a Bosch Bulldog Hammer drill with an 18-inch mortar bit, about three-quarters inch diameter, and set that thing on hammer and take it and put it right…

ALL: OKAY! OKAY! Thank you, Mike.

PAZ: Blinds was right. He is kinda gross.

BUT: Well I didn’t hire him, so don’t look at me.

PAZ: Wait. How do those two things fit together? What’s the correlary?

BUT: What?

PAZ: You didn’t hire him, and I can’t look at you. Why the two concepts stuck together? What happens if I look at you? (pesty) I’m looking at you. See? Look, look, look, look

BUT: Yup. Real mature.

PAZ: Na-na-na-na-na…I’m still looking at you. Still looking! Still…

(a brief pause followed by the sound of someone falling ten feet onto junk you’d have outside a studio)

BUT: You should have been looking where you were walking. (Shouting) Alright, I’m taking off after Blinds and the goons. Maybe you’ll catch up?

PAZ: (voice distant): Yep. I’m okay! It’s alright. I’m alright! Just a little blood. Or is that taco sauce?

BUT: Oh, boy. Now if I can get this crazy car started. Zuzu? Start the engines.

ZUZ: There is only one engine, Mr.Butto.

BUT: Well, start the engine then. I gotta go!

ZUZ: Do you wish me to wait until after you’ve relieved yourself?

BUT: Not that kinda go. We need to make tracks! Go! After those goons!

ZUZ: Where do you want to make tracks? Or did you mean “record tracks”?

BUT: No, I mean let’s go! After those goons!

ZUZ: Did you mean “loons”?

BUT: Goons! Bad guys! Go! After them!

ZUZ: Bad guys go after goons? Please rephrase your question in the form of a question.

BUT: Can we go now?

ZUZ: Yes.

(silence)

BUT: So… going now? Come on. You can do it!

ZUZ: Do you wish to accelerate toward the loons?

BUT: Toward the GOONS! Yes! Accelerate.

(SFX: rocket engines, screeching tires, noise galore, super-speed Zuzu tearing down the road)

BUT: AHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!

(Zuzu & screaming Butto fade off into the distance)

PAZ: Wow. That only hurt a lot. Say, where is everybody?

STEWART: They went to look at the loons with Mr.Butto.

PAZ: Loons? Like Blinds?

STE: Yes.

MIK: It looks like your friends held onto your friend and took off with your friend.

PAZ: Yes, I…wait a minute…I don’t have any friends! You’re an imposter!

MIK: No impasto, no. I dabble a bit in oils, but mostly it’s watercolors. After me kinsman, Frank Clark.

PAZ: As in Frank Clark’s Paint Box? You know Frank Clark?

MIK: Oh, me and Frank go way back. We were in third grade together. Yes, plenty of afternoons on the hall bench. Plenty of recesses spent being whacked with a ruler.

PAZ: Your teachers hit you with a yardstick?

MIK: No a ruler! Sometimes it would be Queen Elizabeth, sometimes Sheik Ahmad.

PAZ: (narrating:) Now I really needed a plan. Actually, I needed a plan a lot earlier. I mean a plan for the plot. Not a health plan. Pots and pans. A man with a plan. Stan the plan-man…

STE: Mr.Pazlo?

PAZ: Scan the land for a plan man. Making a plan. Planning.

STE: Excuse me, Mr.Pazlo?

PAZ: Yes, Stewart. What is it? You’re interrupting our recording session here, y’know.

STE: Yeah, the session ended about five minutes ago. We need to clear the studio for the jingle people.

PAZ: The Jango People? From the Amazon? My dear old friend Garza?

STE: JINGLE! JINGLE! The people who sing the jingles, from Sunbright.

PAZ: Sunbright? What are they doing here?

STE: Well, they’re remodeling over at Sunbright. New lights, windows, Blinds.

BLI: I’ve been kidnapped, Stewart, not installed at Sunbright.

PAZ: Wait! Why would we let people from Sunbright use our studio? They’re our direct competition! What jingles are they recording?

STE: Billy Fermento’s. And Mom Mocady’s Taco and Small Arms Stand. And Presto.

PAZ: Oh. Um…I gotta go.

STE: Okay. But what about these air ferns?

Mr. Pazlo?

Mr.Pazlo? Hello?

ANNOUNCER: Perhaps you’ll have the grave misfortune of joining us for our next exciting episode of The Adventures of Butto and Pazlo and also Blinds the flittering wheezbag.

STE: That’s a long title. Good thing we’re not on TV.

BLI: Who put in the flittering wheezbag bit? Wait ‘til I get my hands on ‘em. Where are you?

ANNC: We’d like to thank our sponsors for bringing us tonight’s episode. We’d like to, but we don’t have a sponsor since Sulphur-Wonder Polish dropped us like a hot potato.

BLI: Did you say potatoes? I love potatoes.

<SCENE END>

Continued from 12/2/12

PAZ: Wait, were you looking at me? You weren't looking at me when you said that. You must mean Blinds the unkempt ungulate, who doesn't know what he's doing here! Ugly..bad clothes..poor diction...

BLI: Right now he's composing a memo to the HR Lady about staff reductions...

PAZ: You mean HR PERSON.

BLI: No, that was her maiden name.

COP: Would yous guys shut yer faces and reach for the sky!

BUT: We can't reach the sky! What kind of idiot are you?

PAZ: How many kinds are there? (PAZ & BLI errupt in sophomoric laughter)

SFX: car horn, cow, anything that's not a gun.

BLI: What was that?

COP: It was supposed to be a gunshot.

BUT: Dean? DEAN!? Who's in the sound booth?

BOOTH: Yeh. Just a sec. Mislabeled carts. Interns. Amateurs. These jerks..

PAZ: Your mic is still on, Dean.

BOOTH: Oh sh..

SFX: Something like gun noise, but maybe a cannon or something.

COP: Alright! Hold it right there or you'll be pasting daisies.

BUT: What?

PAZ: But wait, the cheese is still in the locker.

COP/BUT/Everyone: WHAT?

BUT: Are we having an almonds problem again?

PAZ: And Professor Moritorium is at the theater already.

COP: What?

BUT: What revision are you reading from?

COP: I'm gonna revise all yer faces if you don't SHUT THE HELL UP!

(Deafening silence. A pin drop)

COP: That's better. Now we're gonna get down to some ass tacks...

BUT: You mean brass tacks.

COP: You buy the kinda tacks you like and I'll do the same.

PAZ: Ass tacks?

COP: SHUT IT! Word has it that yous guys is sniffin' around following after our revered and retired detective Frank Marsh. We don't like things happening to our own, if you get my drift, so yous guys better start talkin'

ALL: Start talking randomly, to each other, on the phone, reciting poetry, etc.

COP: STOP! STOP! Shut off those mics and sit your ass tacks down here. Nobody's going anywhere 'til we figure this out.

WAITER: Uh, correction there, Columbo. This place is closed. Can't you take this show downtown?

BUT: Gosh we tried. We were almost booked in the Paladium but SOMEBODY got scared about ponying up for a performance bond...

PAZ: The Paladium? Cool!

BUT: Well, we didn't get the gig, so not cool...

COP: SHUT UP! SHUT UP! I should just shoot all of you. What a headache.

PAZ: Too bad yer gun is a cow or a car or whatever (PAZ & BLI snickering)

SFX: Two gun shots.

BUT: What? You killed BOTH my partners! Hmm...there could be an upside here.

PAZ: Hey! Come on! I'm not even cold yet.

BLI: Luckily for you I wore my Kevlar underwear today...

BUT: Lucky for you, you mean

PAZ: And you wear the Kevlar EVERY day!

BLI: Shut up Pazlo. You're dead. You're dead AND washed up. You're dead and washed up and have new bosses! (maniacal hee!hee!) How does it feel to be on the short end of the wrong stick this time?

PAZ: I can't answer you, I'm dead.

BLI: Just once I'd like the satisfaction of seeing you really killed off of this show. You've been a pain in my ass tacks for twenty years now. I've been waiting for this chance, and I'm gonna get it!

PAZ: Got that right.

SFX: A punch. Blinds flops to the floor.

COP: Thanks Pazlo. I was reloading my cow.

BUT: So, Copper, what's your role in all this?

COP: What do you mean what's my role? I'm the cop.

PAZ: Seemed like a straightforward question to me "What's your role?". Where's the ambiguity?

BUT: Oh, I left the ambiguity back east. There's a surcharge for extra luggage.

COP: Alright you maroons, let's see if we can settle this downtown.

PAZ: What's to settle, we didn't eat anything but the breadsticks.

COP: Let's go!!!

Shuffles & SFX as they all exit the building to the street.

Episode 37.1, Part 3

FADE IN---

SFX: Restaurant Scene

BUT: (Voiceover): We finally arrived at the Brown Derby at seven, where we'd arranged to have Marsh for dinner. To dinner. Dinner with Marsh. Me, Paz, Blinds and Marsh at dinner in the Brown Derby. The restaurant, not the hat.

PAZ: What the hell are you saying?

BUT: Wow. Those were some great almonds...

PAZ: And why are you doing the narrative again? We've been through this before. The name of the show? "Mick Pazlo"? Remember?

BLI: Yeah, flatfoot, since when do you get the narratives?

PAZ: Look, short stack, I don't need your help.

BLI: Listen up, Smart guy, you can't push me around.

PAZ: Back off four-eyes, or feel the wrath.

BLI: Hey, hiwaters, expecting a flood?

PAZ: Keep it up, carrot top, and you'll get yours.

BLI: I already got mine there, bucky. See?

(ALL SCREAM. UNISON): BLINDS! Put down that relish tray!

BUT: And pass the breadsticks.

(SFX machine is still malfunctioning and inserts entirely innappropriate noises here.)

PAZ: I'll take the narrative now.

BUT: Well, there's something we should talk about...

BLI: Don't move, or you'll do push-ups in daisies!

PAZ: (paper shuffling): What? Where's that. Do you have that?

BUT: What Rev are you on?

BLI: I've got 11-26 here.

PAZ: You idiot, there's no 11- 26! Everyone knows that, pea-brain.

BLI: Shut your fat gob, fish breath. It says right here...11, then here 26.

PAZ: Hah! That's parsley, freckle-face!

BUT: SHUT UP! SHUT UP! Stop your incessant fighting or you'll both get canned!

PAZ: We are near Cannery Row...

BUT: And your wise-crack ad-libs. This show is way over budget already, YOU already cost us one sponsor, YOU almost cost us another, and I'm not going to stand for this!

PAZ: Well, why don't you sit down then?

BUT: Oh, thanks. Corns. Hurt like mad.

PAZ: Corn?

BLI: Look out for that bison!

BUT:(grabbing paper) Give me that script! Here. Take mine. Now sit down and shut up 'til your cue comes up. Follow along with your finger if you have to. And YOU look at your menu and decide what to order. I wonder where Marsh is.

BUT: (Voiceover): This wasn't good. We'd waited for over an hour and still no sign of Marsh. We've had some bad cases, but this one smelled the worst.

PAZ: Maybe he's still in the studio. Remember he's in scene eleven and we never explain why he's on the east coast for like three minutes then he's back in California.

BLI: The magic of radio!

BUT:(Voiceover) We hailed a cab to take us to Marsh's apartment on the north side of town. As we rolled I tried Marsh's home, office and cell numbers, and got voicemail at all of them. After several minutes of explaining the difference between "fare" and "fair" and using it too many times in one scene, we arrived at Marsh's apartment complex.

PAZ: Wait! Wait! I want to hear the "fare" "fair" bit.

BLI: You know that doesn't make sense unless you're looking at the printed pages...

PAZ: What do you mean? I don't even have it. What's the Rev number on that?

BUT: Hmm. Kensington Road. Been a long time since we've seen these hills, eh old bean?

PAZ: Bhutto! Look! That jar's a jar.

BUT: Door.

PAZ: Oh. Yeah, that door's a door! Let's go!

BLI: You mean "that door's ajar." Can't you read, fiddle head?

BUT: It's Marsh's apartment.

PAZ: It's been ruck-sacked!

BLI: You mean ranshackle.

PAZ: Don't step in that! It could be evidence!

BUT: You both mean ransacked. (calling out):Marsh! Are you here? Marsh? It's Bhutto & Pazlo.

PAZ: (calling out) He means Pazlo & Bhutto. He must have a bad revision.

BUT:(still calling out) I have the last revision. Some old timers just don't realize when they've been bought out.

PAZ: (still calling out) No idea about that. Marsh has been traded?

BUT:(still calling out) That last transaction puts my stock ownership at 53% in the production company, so basically I'm in charge.

PAZ:(still calling out, less enthusiatically) But the show has my name on it. Besides it's a corporation...

BUT: (more of a mock calling out than real) It's a private corporation. Majority rule. I own a majority, with only two other shareholders.

PAZ: (no longer calling out, but talking as if doing so) And I own 14%...

BUT: ("   "           "          "         "         "          "       ) and Blinds the other 33%.

PAZ: Sooo..."B & B Productions" is... (crashing to floor passing out)

BLI: Come on Pazlo, lazy louie, get up and help find Marsh!

BUT: It might have been too much for the old guy. That might have been a grabber.

BLI: Commercial sign! The break light is on!

BUT: Hey, that would be another good bit! "Brake" and "break".!

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Break

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SFX: (Darth Vader noises)

BUT: Blinds, put down the bong and get over here!

BLI: Woah! Good almonds.

BUT: Help me pick up Pazlo.  Hmm seems to've gained a few pounds since our last episode.

PAZ: What happened?

BLI: You keeled over like a ferry full of geriatric passengers.

PAZ: I remember, I had this terrible dream that you and Butto were running My show!

BUT: Umm Paz? We are.

PAZ: But what happened?

BLI: Are you mental? I told you you keeled over!

PAZ: No, not that, how did you two side kicks get in charge?

BUT: While you were watching skirts and martinis, we were watching our stock options.

PAZ: That's just wrong, this can't be happening!

SFX: Door opens/shuts

BUT: Who's that?

PAZ: I hope it's a script girl with a new revision, this one bites!

BUT:That won't change the fact that I am número UNO

PAZ:This isn't a card game Butto

BLI:Yahtzee!

PAZ:Shut up Blinds! 

BLI: But it’s Dr. Yahtzee!

BUT:Dr. Yahtzee? I thought he was the Bulgarian cleaning woman?

PAZ:And just how do you know what a Hungarian cleaning woman looks like?

BUT:Not Hungarian, Bulgarian! You know, overweight, smells like garlic & beets, has a mustache. 

PAZ:Beets have mustaches?

BLI:Not the point!

CLEAN: No, not Yahtzee, Yahtchezka, cleaning woman of Bulgaria.

I brought new script. Revision 42 & 2/3.

PAZ: Whew, that was close, I thought we were goners for sure.

SFX: Door crashing open.

COP: FREEZE!  Everybody put your hands in the air.

You, the ugly one in the stupid clothes, stop with the jazz hands or I'll pump you full of lead!

BLI: Party pooper.