Mark’s landlord joins the group to argue his points as the guys read an homage to Wes Anderson and try to get to the bottom of Mark’s marital history.
Welcome to Get It to Dutch, a screenwriter's Journey.
I'm Mark, I'm Greg, I'm Brendan.
And we are a team of Hollywood screenwriters who meet every week to read from an original screenplay that one of us has written. We give notes and rank the scripts, and of course, at the end of the season, we were going to pitch the best script to legendary producer Dutch Huxley. But of course Dutch is dead. We all know that, but that's not going to stop us. We're still going to pitch to a legendary Hollywood producer when we find one, which we will. In the meantime, we're joined this week by a guest, my landlord, mister Hartunian. Welcome, mister Hartunian. Greg. Do you want to explain how he got here? Well?
I ran into him in the hall earlier today. He said he had some cool pictures of cars on his phone, and I thought I'd.
Say that right away, right. We talked for a minute.
We talked and he.
Said, what are you looking at this cool picture cars? Yeah?
And then I said, why don't you drop on by and be a guest on the Yeah.
So you're a You're a guest on the podcast. So welcome, welcome to the pod.
Thanks for having me. This is really cool. It's equipment, it's all really cool.
Yeah. Thanks. Have you done podcasting before?
I think so.
You don't remember though.
No, there was like a bad accident and I like was on a podcast about it.
Oh the cop interviewed you.
Was it that?
What happened?
That's not Was it a deposition?
Was it a true crime thing?
Or was this something that and I saw an accident?
So maybe a court report a report? Okay, it might have been.
Yeah, that's a good idea for a podcast. Just look for accidents.
Can I call you tuney?
I think it was a podcast.
Hearts that sounds like I know heart wouldn't what hearts?
Heartsy?
Oh yeah. When I was coming up, people used to call me heartsy.
Oh coming up in the Landlord game.
Yeah, I was the youngest landlord of all time.
You've done this for a while now.
Yeah, nine year old landlord.
You were the boy landlord of Los Angeles.
That is a superlative.
I didn't know that boy landlord.
So you've had this building, this whole all sorts of buildings, but this is what I am.
Okay, you're the toot in common of landlords.
They common was the accident at one of your buildings.
I was walking and I saw an accident at like car accident mixed with a bike.
The car hit the bike or the bike was on there.
They hit, they hit.
And this is the what I did on the podcast too, is I They would ask me, and I would not give any definitive answer.
I would believe, like, do you know what happened? And you're you're choosing not to say or not really.
I mean I didn't really see it all that well, but I started getting all this attention and you know.
What from the podcast or just from the accident.
Both, I mean the podcast.
Who put a mic in front of you?
Yeah?
Is it? Can we hear the recording?
I don't know where it is?
Okay, but somebody was you were on a mic. Did you're wearing the cans.
Well, don't say cans, Mark, that's kind of a I'm.
Wearing headphones, Tony cans or headphones where you were sitting down wearing headphones talking to Mike like we are now.
It's it was a different podcast thing. It was early days of podcasts, so it was a little bit different. But I had a hat on, and I had a hat.
On that doesn't hats.
Podcast.
It's like they'd ask me anything. I would just like be so confusing. I would just deliberately yes to try to.
Just I just didn't know what the hell was going on.
Were they police? This is I really have to get to the bottom of this. We're police talking to you.
I don't know if it's that important Mark or a reporter.
Like I don't think that's a podcast. What were you doing? Walk right? You saw an accident I saw, and then on the street someone put a microphone up to you. M M okay, that's not it's not a pody.
Some people do field record.
Did they say something like this is street Slams, you're on street Slams or something like that.
Nothing like that. No, I don't think it was a podcast.
Okay, I'm all into bed. It was the bike's fault.
I don't know.
I barely saw it. I definitely told him almost nothing about the accident. What I gave them they already knew.
Maybe it was a podcast about snitches in your past.
Just stop trying to guess it.
Well, you're here, you like fast cars, and uh, you know that doesn't have anything to do with the script that we have today.
So maybe just why don't you tell us a little bit about the script you brought in today.
Yeah, okay, I wasn't prepared to have mister Hartuoni in here with us.
He's just hanging out.
It's nice, I know. It just throws the dynamic, the rhythm of the podcast off.
I'm just glad you thought we had a dynamic up until now.
Well, it's usually just the three of us.
Great to have you here, Yips, you're not hungry at all.
Thank god. So this script, it's a bit of a departure. This is my homage to Wes Anderson. And Okay, I just was kind of watching a bunch of his stuff and I got so inspired that it really just flowed out of me. It was just like, you know, one of those things that you read about where you know, somebody smokes opium and they wake up and there's a poem there that's kind of what do you read? Huh?
What are you reading where someone smokes opium in a pot?
Don't you know that famous poem where the guy smoked opium and he woke up and the poem was there? Yeah, you do know no.
Yeah, and then he somebody broke into his house.
Or something when he was Maybe is that part of it.
I think that's figured it out about it because.
They figured that out that he they broke into his house, he.
Took opium, and then so he broke in and wrote a poem.
So you are that's the story. No, this guy wrote the story. It's a great So a great poet came in and wrote the story. I don't think that's the story.
I thought there's two different ones there, very similar.
Huh, two stories where someone smoked opium and a poem came out. Wow, heard a.
Different version than what you heard, and in mind it was crack.
Yeah, that's a way different your story. Someone smoked crack, someone broke into their house, wrote a poem, left it there.
Left there was no poem.
Oh well then that's a that's a whole different. It's not even in the same fat and somebody smoked cracking. Someone broke it.
Sorry, sorry, sorry, Oh.
That's not what I'm talking about. Sorry I said anything about smoking opium. I didn't smoke opium. I know that that is frowned upon in this apartment complex. I got inspired. It flowed out of me in just the kind of easiest way possible. I think you're gonna love it.
You got pretty strong drug laws here and.
You're in the building. Yeah, we have tons of laws. Yeah, tons of like building.
Laws harsher than California laws. Like he says you can't smoke cannabis, which it's legal to smoke.
The one law here is you can't smoke cannabis in here.
Oh okay, why is that you can't?
Yeah?
I mean I just kind of like things I wrote down.
It's like I care really either way.
Oh really, Yeah, I can smoke a joint in here.
No, there's a law you can't.
Right, I made the law, But I just don't really care about these things. Like when I was the boy landlord, I was pushed around a lot because people were.
Like that's a boy, oh, by the tenants.
By everybody. I would be like, you got to pay me, and they'd be like, yeah, sure, boy, get away from me a little kid or whatever. And so a landlord to me, you got to have more laws here.
So I created a bunch of laws of just anything, and and those that's grown over time.
I've had this book of laws since I was nine years old. The boy, I'd love to.
See those sometimes.
Yeah, they're pretty Oh.
That's oh these are them? Is spiral right here? Yeah, spiral notebook written in crayon.
Well the later pages are are not in cram Yeah, I get older.
Oh yeah, as you go starts with crayon, goes to pencil, ballpoint, and then there's sections there you rented out with the printer.
You have to save your change in a pickle jar. Like it's some esoteric stuff.
That's a good movie, like the Rules of a Boy.
Oh, the Boy Landlord is a great movie.
Yeah, you ever, they've tried, really have tried. They've come to me and they've tried. Who Mike Myers, Mike did really.
You wanted to be the Boy Landlord? So did you sell them the rights?
You wanted to play like the Boy Landlord and then my whole family and stuff?
And did he want to do it? Ad you want to be the Boy Landlord with makeup, And he.
Wanted to be the Boy Landlord. He wanted to be the tenants.
It was going to be a clump. He was going to clump the whole movie Eddie Murphy with clumps.
Oh right, yes, I mean it's your story. But would you be willing to give us the rights so that we could write that story. It's pretty cool.
It would have to be a process, but the same that the process with Mike and everything like that. Because the reason Mike lost it because I went and watched some of the movies and I was just like, no way, yeah, no way, because it.
Was like a comedy. You didn't want it to be a comedy.
Most of them. I didn't. Most of them were like not even trying to be funny. I didn't think the ones I saw, Oh, I was like, this is not doing it.
He's too hyper. Who would you want to play you as the boy? Landlord?
I want to me, like, what actor?
Do you feel like this person captures my essence?
Wow?
Not Mike Myers right now?
Me as a boy, or I mean.
Someone you as a boy and someone as you as an adult. Does the story take place as you get older?
Mike wanted to do all sorts of stuff with it, stuff that didn't happen to me and stuff.
Oh okay, so not Mike, But what if there's someone else?
Wow, that's a great question. You're really throwing me for a loop here.
Uh what about that? TikTok?
Boy, which one Husbullah, he's like a little man.
I think that's a terrorist organization.
Mark, Yeah, no, I know that one. Well we could come back.
Yeah, let me think on it.
We can come back just going right to like people don't exist and stuff like that.
Well now you can do like holograms and ai and oh yeah right.
But I'm like, oh, like Barney Rubble or something like that.
Oh yeah, so you're kind.
But I don't think that's perfect. It's just the first name that comes to my mind. I think of actor.
Yeah, Well, we're a long way from casting. I think we could probably. Well, you asked you, It's true. I did ask. I know I'm not putting that on you. I did ask.
Yeah so that Mark?
Yeah, sorry about that all right?
So why did you write a Wes Anderson movie?
Mark?
Like I said it was, it's just kind of an homage. I was inspired after watching it and and it wasn't even a choice. It was just an automatic. It was like I sort of channeled something and out it came. I think you're gonna like it. It's maybe one of my favorite things I've written, definitely recently. I'm just really really excited to read it. We have our first kind of audience member.
Yeah, it'll be fun to see what he thinks.
Yeah, we have had some folks in before, but nobody just to be here to listen and so so I'm excited to have you here, mister Hartunian Thang.
You Interior Museum of Aviation, Present Day. A young boy, neatly dressed in a Talian sweater jacket, stares up at a replica of an elegant old plane hanging from the ceiling. An old man, neatly dressed with a scarf tidally draped over a top coat and aviator goggle, settled on the top of his Homburg hat, sidles up next to him.
The Merrigol one one nine, top speed one hundred and twelve knots, cruising altitude fourteen thousand feet. The cargo hold held eleven hundred gallons of French champagne and five hundred smoke hams. They don't make him like this anymore.
The boy holds up his point and shoot camera and snaps it out of the airplane.
You know so much about this old bird.
I was the last one to fly it off.
The replica of the plane. We cut to the actual Marigold rattling down the runway. The title says nineteen forty.
Eight, the Marrigold Aviation Company endeavored to build the most luxurious aircraft to ever roam the skies. Would take eleven years and eight models before she finally took flight.
The plane we're looking at lifts off the ground for a moment, then slams back down and plows into a barn at the end of the runway.
The Merrigold one oh one was airborne for only two seconds and got three inches off the ground. Then it rolled through a barn and caught fire.
The barn explodes.
The Merrigold one oh two's kitchen was too heavy and it fell through the bottom of the planet. The Merrigold one oh three was overtaken by pirates. The Merrigold one oh four was made of glass and shattered. The one O five through the one oh seven were all shot down by German U boats who had failed to receive word of the war's end. The one O eight disappeared into the Bermuda triangle and is never heard from again. But the one O nine. The one O nine was the shimmering Silver tri wind free level six engind luxurious turbo pop airliner, and she was the gem of the skies.
We pushed into one of the second level windows to the Marigold's opulent ballroom. The cream of society swirls around to a dance floor and an orchestra place.
At its helm. Captain Percy Northplank, the best pilot in the world.
Captain Percy Northplank, a handsome man with a thin mustache, neatly dressed in a navy blue military uniform, strides down the hallway, trailed by a newspaper reporter.
The Marigold one O nine is the height of excellence when it comes to sky travel. We have everything that anyone could ever need. It has.
We see a life sized cross section of the plane. The camera moves us through a series of elegant and tidy rooms in rhythm with Percy's descriptions.
A solarium, a planetarium, a vomitatorium, a butterfly garden. Two theaters, one to show movies, one to show films, a stone grotto with hot water springs, an Olympic sized swimming pool, three ballrooms, a bank, a barber, a baker, a wooden anchor, and a candlestick maker. It has a speakeasy, a vineyard that makes its own port wine, a printing press, and a full team of reporters to deliver the day's news. And the third finest collection of rare bird books in the known world. A man could live happily on this ship for the rest of his days.
Is that on the record?
Sure?
But after a decade of glory, a rise in rushing gas prices force the Marigold Aviation and its competitors to shutter their luxurious airline divisions.
We see the Marigold one oh nine flying through the sky. The paint peels, patches appear on the rusty wings. The old elegance is still there, but she's shabbier now, an echo of Glory's past. We're now in the cockpit. Percy north Plank stands in front of blinking controls. He's older, a hollownist behind his eyes.
A Marrigold's final flight is set for nine hundred hours October first, nineteen sixty one. It's usual route from New York to Paris. Expected flight time seventeen hours, thirty two minutes, lunch, dinner, and a midnight snack.
Provided the plane rattles down the runway, then groans as it lifts into the air. Interior Marigold post office. Later, a tiny postal plane glides alongside the Marigold. The steward opens a door and a sack of letters fly in. A flight attendant enters the cockpit, neatly dressed in purple and pink.
Mail plane arrived. This one's for you.
Percy slices open the letter and reads it.
It's from my wife.
You sound surprised.
She's dead.
I'm sorry to hear that.
Well, she was dead. She's alive. Now that's a relief my heart.
You poor thing. Would you like tea?
Don't pity me of it. I'm fine.
It's my job. I serve tea. I'm required to ask.
Oh, then no, she leaves.
He inspects the stamp on the letter. It has an island with a palm tree, interior ballroom over the pa a microphone wines.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain. There will be two performances of The Winds Go West this afternoon. Also, we're no longer going to Paris. We're going to find my wife.
Percy turns the wheel and steers into the sunset. Title the final flight of the Merrigold one O nine. Wow, mars Uh, this is completely unlike you. Sort of an unsettling departure, is it.
Yeah, I don't know, man, I made it. You know, I'm kind of art house. I get it.
You know, I'd say I'm gonna walk, not run to this script.
Dude, it is very We don't vote until the end. Man, this is well.
I'm just saying right now where it sits with me.
Buddy, I really love it. It's tidy, it's cool. You're dealing with the death of your ex wife.
No, not doing that. It has nothing to do with my ex wife.
His wife.
Well, we don't have to get into.
Mark's wait for two days and she jumped off the back of a cruise ship and he hasn't seen her since. And I think it's good that your process.
Back of a cruise Well, she did.
It doesn't matter. This has nothing to do with her. We don't have to bring that up. Mister Hartoonian doesn't need to know about. I think there's a law about sharing too much information.
I think that's what doctors in the building.
Yeah, yeah, don't overshare. I mean, I guess you could take that however you want to have been.
In your twenties because it's written in marker, right right, right.
Yeah, But if I want to hear about it, I'm I allowed to ask any question I want, really.
Can I? No?
No, no, that's just don't overshare. A lot of these are like, don't overshare with me much.
But if I have to tell you something, that's fine, or if I need your help or whatever I'm allowed to do.
Or if you want me to share, right, okay, well off the back of a what if I don't want.
To share what it seems like you are sharing market?
Do I have to?
It? Says you got to answer?
Is there a law that says I have to share? If you ask?
Yeah?
There is.
Well, he's writing in it.
You don't write now, that can't be that.
It's in there now. He says you got it, says you don't overt w I okay, I got to talk about wife.
Yes, okay, it's fine, talk about what. I'm over it. I have grieved she jumped off the back of a cruise ship.
This is not inspired by her. No, she's not the woman who wrote the letter in this. No, okay, I'm just asking. I'm allowed to ask things.
You're allowed to take things from your life and write about That's how you make allowed.
His buddies are allowed to point at the book.
Yeah, don't tell him what to put in the book. This is my apartment complex.
That has Mark has to take a note in the book.
Yeah, I'm not taking suggestions for this is no putting.
That, Thank you, mister har Years.
I might not know where the hell Mark is.
Did you know Mark before you came down here today? As in, did you know that this was his place?
No?
Really, I don't know where people are going. I've seen him, seen him walking around. What the hell is that guy doing? See him?
I come in here and I'm like, oh my god, Like I just came in here, and then he goes into door and I don't you know?
But no, I did not know.
He looked at you. Well, he does live here.
Yeah, you cartooning in You've come in here several times. You told me about the hot water heater. I told you that the refrigerator makes that noise?
What noise?
That like that? Low?
Like these they don't make noises.
You were in here like two weeks ago.
And did I said? I heard it?
Yeah, we had a conversation about it and then we talked about like what dogs can hear and what humans can't hear, and like the like pulsing that comes from outer space as it does. You brought the whole alien thing to me. We sat and chatted. Jen. Did you read that I after you mentioned it, I read it fucked up? Yeah, it's like, what is that noise? It's some weird pulse right?
That was fucked up, isn't it. Yeah, you don't tell everybody. That's all.
Anytime there's a law, if there's a law, I hate lulls. Okay, so there's a lull, I just start going. Like dogs can hear like a train from countries.
Away, A dock can hear a train, dog can hear a country from a dog can hear a train county.
Country is away, a dock, can hear a train in a dog's head. It's just like it's nuts in there.
Everyone just listened right now, it happened. Well, it's it's not happening right now. That's always what it is. Well, it comes on intermittently like that.
It's it just comes so so maybe we'll it come on while we're doing this, while you're having me on this.
Don't get mad, at me.
It's not mad.
It seems like you're mad.
I get mad, you'll definitely know that's the void.
No, I can't do it because I'm not mad. That's me trying to show what it's like.
But oh god, if I got mad, it would be But just showing you what I think it is.
It's like you don't talk to me like that.
But that's not it, because I can't do it unless I'm really actually mad.
Okay, now you're saying if the refrigerator was making noise a dog in India would hear it?
I said, trains idiot?
Hereins and look that voice, that was the real voice.
What do you do you want?
You're mad? You're mad.
I'm in it. I'm one of the gang. I'm one of the writers.
But what do you do on it?
I write, I do the acting.
Did you did you hear his voice?
He was doing the voice, he was talking earlier.
He was the narrator.
I was the narrator.
That was me. You didn't hear his narration?
My eyes somewhere else?
Oh, did you have any thoughts on the first setup of this?
What are you doing here if you don't want to hear this? When you're not listening to What are you doing here?
I'm here talking to you. There it is, that's not close.
That's still me faking it.
I'm at all. Let him alone.
I'm happy. Really, face is so red.
Who cares?
Stop grabbing my collar?
Let me go, let me stop, yelly yell.
Collar. Sit down. I guess you can't walk with those headphones on, man, Sit down?
You got wireless at all?
No, I don't have a wireless.
Hey did you hurt your neck? It seemed like that jerked your head pretty hard.
My neck is totally fine. Watch you're turning your whole body, you know?
Is that okay?
Okay, okay, okay, his whole body to look at me. I just we don't have We don't get off of him.
We don't have to get physical.
Not us hates me.
Let him fix it, all right.
Nothing is wrong with his collar.
I want to see what you do on this thing.
It's a fair question. Pay attention, mister Hartoon.
Probably the keeps saying that, probably the best one.
That's debatable. Listen, he's gonna say some things in this next scene. Can we set up the next scene?
Yeah, I'm a double.
Threat actor writer, talker triple triple threat.
Just if you're not doing any of that right now, all you're doing is bothering me.
I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
Stop bothering him. Let's just get back and he's the script.
He's my guest.
He's my guest. Technically, in fact.
This whole building, everybody here's my guest.
Well, I'm legally paying.
I want to turn this into a burger king I can you are said? If I want?
I do have renners' rights. I know my rights in this state.
Not if you don't have a lease.
There is.
There's I don't have a clue what you're doing here.
Okay, you'll find out in this next scene.
Okay, Okay, set it up. Mark scene too.
So yeah, this is what do you want to do with this one?
Mark?
This is when we were getting into the second act. It's it's pretty straightforward. I don't know. Let's just read it. You didn't get it, okay, and.
Miss Hartunian, I'll probably be switching my voices around, but you'll see that I'm a guy who's an actor and a writer and a director.
Okay, man, cool, let's check it out.
Are you gonna pay attention to what to the script.
Yeah, I'll pay attention to this time where you guys all start talking all quiet.
Yeah, I'll do that.
Do you want us to talk like we're in a Wes Anderson movie. It kind of seems like we're all doing that.
Yes, that that is the you're completely getting the vibe. That's exactly what it's supposed to be. That's how he expresses emotion. I mean, that's that's that's what's so great about Wes.
Anders I don't know if he does express emotion, it doesn't seem well, just.
Keep reading, keep reading, you'll it just jumps off the page. We haven't started, mister Hartner.
Everybody talked over each other and being but this is all still part of it, this part of the podcast.
I'll probably have to cut a ton of this.
You're gonna cut some of this stuff.
Yeah, I don't want it to be like forty minutes of you yelling at Brendan. Who hell's Brendan?
How you doing? Hey? Nice to me?
Oh he's been here, that was him.
Yeah, the guy that you were see you were just grabbing his collar, he has been here the whole time.
The guy that you were showing. How you would be mad if you got mad? That was him?
What's he doing?
You will see?
Okay, we'll show you right now.
I am ready to wow you, sir.
Okay. Scene two, the Marigold flies by the screen. A long banner flaps behind, reading Act two Mutiny Interior Marrigold Day. Captain Percy is pressed back on the cockpit door, trying to hold off a neatly dressed mob of passengers.
Ladies and gentlemen. Please, I understand you're upset, but let's not lose our heads.
Losing our heads is precisely what I'm afraid of. In a manner of speaking, the camera finds doctor Henry Lammel, world famous brain surgeon, holding up a cooler that says, brain on it. If I'm not in surgery in four hours, this brain is toasted. The mob gripes and shouts, Ladies and gentlemen.
Please, the reason why I've done what I've done is well, to put it, Plaine, my dead wife's not dead.
The mob goes quiet. Percy continues. In a flashback, Percy, young and full of life, walks through a small regional airport. He stops in front of an elegant bookstore entirely dedicated to Polynesia intrigue, Percy enters to find Marjorie. Bookish but beautiful. She looks up from a tiny potted palm tree. She's watering.
If you're looking for the John, it's a door over.
Marjorie was the type of person you meet and you think, wonders, what a person I've just met. I'm looking for a book. I guess she was stunned. Most folks don't come to an airport looking for books on Polynesia.
After all, she was the preeminent scholar of Polynesian history. Opened the store ten years ago. Three years after that, they built an airport around it.
Percy and Marjorie now sit at a small table in the shop, sharing teaki drinks out of coconuts.
Polynesia certainly seems a wondrous place.
I wouldn't know. I've never been.
You're in an airport. You could go today? Or wouldn't your husband allow it? No, we wouldn't, dang it. So you're married.
Happily, I should get back to her.
She stands up and falls through the table.
I would visit her often, finding any excuse to lay over. I would bring her trinkets for my travel, and she would tell me the Wonders of Polynesia.
We see Marjorie and Percy reading together in her shop, the shelves and tables around them filled with Percy's gifts. Marjorie's husband, State Senator Richard Jenkins enters speaking to two men in suits. Gentlemen, this is my wife's bookstore, and that is my wife. And I assume you're the man to thank for all these wondrous dude ads.
Yes, sir, Captain Percy north Plank.
State Senator Richard Jenkins. These men are in soap. They're planning to build a factory here. How's that for dodad? Join us for dinner, won't you? Cut to Codcakes, a fancy restaurant in the airport. Percy, Marjorie, and Senator Richard Jenkins eat codcakes. All the servers are neatly dressed in Beajian white linen suits, perfectly matching the color of the codcakes. Let me ask you, Captain north Plank, what do you think of our little airport? Well, it's Percy's eyes find Marjorie beautiful, ain't you though? I've never cared much for airports because airports take you away, and why would I ever away? I love it here though I suppose the upside is it also brings people here.
You mean to tell me you've never left Newchester?
Got No, we have everything right here. Roots, Roots are what's important. I hope you take no offense, captain, But you, sir, are rudderless, afloat upon the wind, a potted plant. No roots.
I take a small offense me.
I was born here, I senatored here, and I'll be buried here. Actually, right there we whipanned to a small plot. Dug up and ready. A tombstone reads Senator Richard Jenkins nineteen fifteen to blank A stone carver stands there with a chisel and hammer, just waiting. Not today, Taka, you can go home. Taka nods and walks off. As he goes, we see another tombstone that reads Missus State Senator Jenkins. Percy looks at Marjorie. Her chin quivers. Later, in the bookstore, Marjorie stands on a ladder as Percy hands her books.
That man is smothering you. If I may be so bold, I think it's high time Missus State Senator Jenkins became just plain Marjorie again.
Okay, just plain Marjorie.
It is.
She pulls off her wedding ring and sets it on a shelf. Percy takes a new ring from his pocket.
Just plain, Marjorie, would you do me the honor of becoming missus? Captain Percy North blank Marjorie.
Marjorie smiles as we cut to the jetway the maregold flies a banner reading just Married, with tin cans and ribbons hanging from the tail. Percy and Marjorie, neatly dressed in wedding attire, stand outside the cabin door, holding his and hers potted palm trees.
We spent one wondrous night together over the Atlantic as husband and wife.
In the wedding suite, Percy faces Marjorie. She slips the strap of her gown off her shoulder and it falls to the ground. Percy's eyes go wide, and he takes the pipe out of his mouth.
Sweet Jesus be He moves.
In to kiss her. The next morning, a steward burst into the room, jolting Percy awake.
Captain Norklink the rear door was a jar and a parachute is missing.
Percy looks to the bedside table. His tiny palm tree stands alone. We cut back to present day. Percy looks down at the potted plant. Everyone has tears.
In their eyes.
I thought she had perished until this arrived.
He holds out a letter.
It reads, my dearest Percy, I'm alive. If you're still in possession of my book, Rare Birds of the South Pacific, could you be a sport and bring it. These are my coordinates. I realize this. It's a lot to ask warmly, Marjorie.
Do you have the book? Percy pulls it out of his suit coat. It has a bullet stuck in it.
It saved my life the last time the passengers mutinied when we ran out of steaks in the main dining room. Old Earl Habitsham lost his mind. Sorry, Captain, it's all right, Earl.
Oh scene too interesting scene. So it's clearly about your ex wife.
This is definitely about your ex wife.
I mean there's a little bit about you know, Mallory in there here. It is.
Yeah, just I mean, it's not.
Like a it's a sprinkling. It's like a little salt in the soup.
You're dealing with some emotions. But I think you need to talk about Yeah.
No, that's that's what I'm saying. It's it's not because of her, It's just emotions come out when I watch Wes Anderson.
Did you at least get to see what he could do this time? Mister Hartunians or Hartunia?
What did you think of my performance?
Performance? Yeah?
I read three different parts in there. I was Marjorie the.
Love Yeah, did all like?
It all sounded the same? Everything a sound the same. So every time he talked, I was like, who the hell is this?
Is this the one from before? Everything sounded the same?
I thought I was doing different voices?
Could you you could follow the story though?
I mean I got at I got ripped up a couple of times because I'm like, how the hell's that person talking to this themselves? Because you don't change your voice enough, okay, to where it just sounds like it's all the same person.
Like, think about when he got this is my lady voice, that's okay. Think about when he got mad how much his voice changed?
Right? And that's me even I can't even do the real version. That's an imitation because you're not mad yet. I'm not mad at all. I haven't been mad the entire time I've been here.
Thing is I got like mail marks on my neck from when you were.
Really shipped up is embarrassed.
Okay, God, you're getting hot again.
You seem mad, so mad?
This is about your wife?
Yeah, well sort of Like I said, it's a seasoning in the stew mark.
I think you have a lot of stew in you that it's time to put in a pot and deal with. And I'm glad it's happening here. All right, I'm glad you're talking about your dead wife, is what I'm trying to say.
Can I make an announcement? She's not dead?
Whoa what?
She's not dead?
What do you mean?
All right? Full disclosure. I got an email from her and she wants her plant.
Back the plan you've been pissing in.
Well, I have to because Greg's dog won't let me go the bathroom at night.
I don't think it's a matter of letting.
The dog gets mad at me. Well, no, Greg brought his dog over it. No, it's not my dog. It's Greg. Greg found a dog and he put it on the couch and it was just the dog got on the couch.
Huh did you jump up or he put it there?
I don't know. I came home and the dog was on the couch, Greg was gone, lost the.
Dog the coucher to jump up.
I wasn't here, Mark was here.
I wasn't here. I fucking showed up and you were gone and lost in the desert, and the fucking dog was on the couch.
It jumped up, then, does it? I didn't.
I didn't put it up there.
Gentlemen, gentlemen, please stop fighting.
What is that?
Is that a voice?
A southern bell?
What is that thing?
I just did?
One thing?
You just did that sounded just like my regular voice. It's not exactly how you sound out. What are you trying to do?
This is Brendan's mimic. He's pretty good at mimicking anybody.
I wouldn't see.
I'm gonna throw someone out there. You do it, okay, Simon Cowell the best?
That was atrocious?
No stars, no.
Stars, by hell giving someone?
He doesn't give out stars.
They don't give out stars. Let's just say yes or no.
I don't give you. You're mad you're mad about at Yes, I'm not bad about that.
Okay, that seems so mad when you guys hear this thing.
If you actually get me mad, trust me, you're gonna be wishing you didn't.
Someone else anyway, somebody else put the dog up on the couch because I didn't.
Nobody put the dog, put the dog anywhere.
What does it don't matter? What does it matter? Because I don't want.
People putting dogs places.
Okay, a dog ghost to it. It's you don't know what happened. The dog was on the couch.
None of you put it there.
He doesn't like it if people pick up the dog. Mark don't pick up dog is huge.
I could not pick up the dog. It was like four hundred pounds.
You can't left four hundred pounds. I could.
Yeah, me too, No you can't, No one can.
What do you think, mister Dartonia, Look at.
The Kermit, Kermit the frog, Hi, everybody, he wants some more lyft and iced tea, lifting iced tea.
That was great? Oh my god, it was fucking perfect.
Why did he want the hell did he giving.
People iced tea?
I saw him on a commercial for.
It once a Kermit.
Yeah, it was in a commercial, yes, for little.
Would that work? They just did it.
They hired the muppets.
Excuse me, what hired the muppets?
The Lipton iced tea went to the Muppets and hired.
What to the Muppets?
Where at Muppet Studios?
If you're not mad, what do you call this?
Ask you questions? You're so mad though, I'm not mad at all. I'm fine. I'm just asking him.
He's got every time he does a mimic, there's something at the end of it that I don't.
Know what the hell he's nailing these things? Gathering fucking crew?
What's that?
Don't want to feel good to be together?
That's Kermit?
Sound like Kermit at all?
I don't like got some lip and sweet ice?
That sounds great.
James Bond, pardon me, ma'am.
Where'd you happen to have that much any shaking?
Not just that that's great?
He's drunk. Michael Kane very good?
Can we get back to the script.
Well, I guess this thirteen is coming up in Brendan. Maybe try to do like a different voice so that.
You know, I just make him like so I know that it's somebody new. Okay, he's got some dead weight.
You don't have to perform for, mister Hartoon.
Jos and my belly. Can we.
Really start to like you a lot?
He's not a dog, mister Hartoony and stop scratching.
Him, mister Hartoony, I can't sit on the weight bench of her there. I don't want to sit on your lap.
Don't pat your knee, mister Hartoony. Let him sit where he wants. Can we focus on the podcast? The most important don't perform for him. The most important thing is we do.
Just don't do for me, do for yourself so you can define yourself here.
Okay, I think he's doing great. Can we do the last scene?
Yeah, let's just seem perfect, all right?
Exterior tropical beach day. Captain Percy North Playing stands on the sand, the passengers fanned out and the tableaux behind him. Further back, the smoking wreckage of the Marrigold one oh nine slowly sinks into the ocean, reverse on a dozen or more natives and grass skirts, standing motionless, wielding spears.
I suppose this is the end.
Then a native bangs a drum twice. The group parts to reveal Marjorie, also in a grass skirt, her hair adorned with tropical flowers.
Marjorie, do you have the book?
Percy pulls it out of his suit coat. It has a bullet stuck in it. Percy hands the book to Marjorie. She opens it and holds it up. Through the bullet hole. We see an exotic island bird standing in the water that perfectly matches the picture on the page.
Colden, Christen Sapsucker, thank you for bringing this. It occurred to me that seeing you might bring up some old feelings, has it?
Yes?
Later, Percy and Marjorie walk together through the village.
Did you ever love me?
Of course I did?
Why'd you jump?
I needed time to beat just plane? Marjorie?
Do you still need time love me?
They arrive at the base of a large palm tree. He looks up at the fronds.
Is that yes?
She looks down at the withered, potted palm he's holding.
What's wrong with it?
I've been pissing in it. There's a dog. Won't let me go to the bathroom. It's a long story.
A rumble from the volcano.
That thing's gonna blow.
Our planes could put we still.
Have this one. The natives pull back some vines and reveal the missing until now Marigold one oh eight.
Everyone on to the plane. Marjorie, I'm staying here.
They share a long, meaningful stare. Then Percy walks over to the tree he digs a hole plants his tree. He turns back to look at her. She smiles.
What does that mean?
It means he's staying too.
Who's gonna fly the bird?
He will?
We whippan to the young stowaway, who nods. Percy tosses him a ring of brass airplane keys, his captain's hat, and his captain's jacket. The stowaway lowers his aviator's goggle. Marragold one to eight. Moments later, the young stowaway sits in the cockpit as the passengers and natives dragged the Marrygold one aweight up the volcano with ropes and vines. The volcano shutters and shakes. In the cockpit, the young stowaway, neatly dressed with aviator goggles, settled on the top of his Homburg hat, expertly flips knobs and buttons. He looks over to Adelaide, who's strapped into the co pilot's seat. She lifts up her eye patch, kisses him on the cheek, and puts it back down. Then boom, the eruption blasts the Maragold like a rocket into the blue sky. The engines sputter to life, as it buzzes up and down and then finally away. Back on the beach, Percy and Marjorie stand in front of their trees block pinkies as the plane dips over the horizon.
Wow, Mark, you're.
Bomb what's up man?
Nothing?
I just.
I just I'm touched by the story.
Of your own screw emotional story because it just makes me.
This time tomorrow. It's so good.
Simon cal gives that singing two stars.
So good. Okay, No, Moore, note, I can't. I can't do notes. I can't do notes.
What happened when Mallory jumped off the back of the cruise ship? Why did she jump?
She didn't jump, She jumped jump.
What did you say to her before she jumps?
I was talking to her about Ora Boros. But that's not why she jumped. She didn't.
She didn't.
She didn't. She got into a Metavac helicopter with an EMT and then she flew off. She spelled it out in her email.
She throw someone off the back. I didn't do.
I didn't throw anybody off the back.
This is my Did a body hit the water?
No? I thought that it did. That was the story. But I just got an email from her. She's still technically my wife might be dead.
And got hacked.
That's a good point.
That's a good point, got hacked. I cannot take just getting emails from my grandma for years.
No, she has a photo of her with SHEMT.
Your grandma.
She's a lot.
Oh but she does an email?
Does an email?
Oh?
Just getting for years and years?
Thanks for following up with me.
Guys, did you reply to the email? You just thought it was her for years? I was here for years, but she was hacked.
Did you guys have a good relationship anyway?
My wife, the version of the hacker was way better grandma than my grandma ever was.
That's sweet?
That was beautiful. She ran off with an EMT named Darryl Spice.
Darryl Spice, Darryl Spice, the guy with the TV show Miami Spice.
Yeah, I mean I know you didn't know you knew him, but yeah, that's.
Him Reality TV EMT Darryl.
Spe Yeah, Reality EMT.
That's awesome show.
You got to seen that. What's good?
It's on all the.
Time, A spice of life.
It's like he's like the How but for like hunky ampts. So in this script, you're actually State Senator Richard Jenkins.
Nobody is anybody in this script.
The whole time. I know North Plank, But that's god.
It's not my story.
It's Darryl Spice's story.
No, it's just story. No, it's not Darryl Spice's story.
If it is, he could come after you.
So wait, you're on the back of a cruise ship. You're telling your dead wife about a screenplay that you want to write. She jumps, She didn't jump.
So why did you say she jumped?
Because I thought she jumped based on what she wrote a note that said I'm jumping.
Jumping, she took the g off wait.
Jumping, yeah, and she handed you the note said I'm jumping, and then did it. No.
I woke up and she was gone, and she there was a note there that said I'm jumping, and so I went out and she was gone. It turns out she was on a Metavac helicopter with Darryl Spike.
If there's no G in an apostrophe, she swing down.
That means it's fun, means fun. Who maybe maybe that's what it meant. Maybe it just meant jumping, like I'm jumping out.
You say the back.
If she just said I'm jumping jump off the Yeah.
Because I thought she jumped off the back? Like, where else are you gonna jump? I don't know where the fuck she went?
Easier to die for the front.
Where are you fucking hackling this man? Let him?
He's my guest, that's true. If you're gonna jump.
I'm me a grief party here, assholes.
Hey, hey, asshole, I'm.
Going through something emotional and you guys are jumping all over me about it? Not even dead?
How's that emotional?
Not because she's gone and she was gone for years.
You're starting to piss him off? Right? Are you pissed?
Yeah?
I'm not mad at all, really not at all.
I think this script as it stands now is going to be a pass from me. I think it needs more truth.
Okay, Can I ask the question? Was the young stow away the old man at the beginning?
Yes?
Oh that's fun?
Yeah, nice catch man? Good?
Give it a five.
It's a good movie. What do you give it?
I'll give it a zero?
What do you give it?
Uh?
Really enjoyed it?
Twenty five? I think this is the one. No, why No, he's your guest? If he's part of the podcast.
He can count I'm part of this.
Well, I mean today you are wow, what days do do this?
As standing Thursday?
But it'd be great.
Don't are you kicking me out of the podcast?
Well, he said, you didn't do anything.
I just don't know what he does. And I've done the whole time. I've been here the whole time. I'm still like, what the hell is this guy? Don't you know what he does? Him? Yeah, runs it, he doesn't run it.
He did the stage direction. All right, Well, thank you, mister Hartunian for being here.
I would like to take you to dinner, sir. Get to know you if you get to know me.
Yeah.
Well, until next time, it's lights, camera action, but for writing.