(GUY NOIR THEME)
SS: A dark night in a city that knows how to keep its secrets. But one man is still trying to find the answers to life's persistent questions--Guy Noir, Private Eye.
(THEME UP AND OUT)
GK: It was the week before Halloween and so the cobwebs in my office had a festive feeling about them and the squeaking drawer on my file cabinet (LONG SQUEAK OF DRAWER BEING OPENED). It's the drawer where I keep my disguises, the wigs, the mustaches, the dark-glasses-with-fake-nose attached, that I used to use back when I used to do real detective work. Now? It's just a lot of junk work. I come in and play the messages on the answering machine and get depressed all over again.
(BUTTON PRESS, TAPE REWINDING, BEEP)
TR(ON PHONE): Mr. Noir, it's Louie over at the garage. Your oil change is going to take a little longer than we thought.
GK: What are they changing it into?
(BEEP)
SS(ON PHONE): Mr. Noir, it's about your membership contribution of $100 to public radio - the check bounced. If we don't hear from you within 15 days, we're going to have to come and take back the coffee mug and the Bulgarian folk music CD.
(BEEP)
TK(TEEN, ON PHONE): Mr. Noir, I need you to help me write a term paper. It's due on Monday. (BEEP)
GK: There it was. My life. I came here to St. Paul years ago, following a girl I was in love with who since has gone off I don't know where and here I remain. Why? Why do I stay here? Why am I a detective? - I sat back in my old swivel chair and put my feet up on the desk and suddenly I wasn't in St. Paul anymore. (DREAM MUSIC) I was someplace warm. Someplace incredibly rich. Beside the Pacific.
(BIRDS CHIRPING)
SS(STARLET): Oh, Guy, I absolutely adore your home. The pool is totally awesome. The waterfall. The egrets. (BIRD CRIES) Let's have breakfast on the deck! Caviar and bluebird eggs and blinis. And that Moroccan coffee.
GK: Sounds nice. I'll tell the staff.
SS: And speaking of blinis, that bikini bathing suit of yours is pretty awesome too. I never saw a man's swimsuit so brief.
GK: It's a gift from a fan. Woven from the cotton in an aspirin bottle.
SS: It's cool.
GK: Thanks, Nicole.
SS: I see you've been working out -
GK: I try.
SS: Your abdominals -- they're like steel that was melted and poured into forms and then left to cool and harden again.
GK: Well, I'm about to make another film, Nicole. In fact, the screenwriter should be here any moment.
SS: I despise writers. They have such terrible tans.
GK: Well, I'm afraid they're part of the business. Like accountants. Or lens pullers. Or drivers. (FOOTSTEPS) Speak of the devil. Good morning, Norman.
TR: Good morning, Mr. Noir.
GK: Norman, this is Nicole. Nicole, Norman. Nicole, weren't you planning to get exfoliated at ten-thirty?
SS: Oh. Right. I forgot. --- Later. (FOOTSTEPS)
GK: So-- how's the screenplay coming?
TR: We fixed the opening.
GK: Good.
TR: You thought it was weak-
GK: It was.
TR: So now we open with the ocean liner crashing into the Golden Gate Bridge and the Bridge falling and the city catches on fire and the ship sinks and the last car to get across the bridge is a silver Rolls Royce and it flips over and blows up and you crawl out of the burning wreck and --
GK: I crawl out?
TR: You crawl out of the window on the driver's side.
GK: I don't want to crawl.
TR: No?
GK: I want to be thrown clear of the wreckage and land on my feet. I want to walk away.
TR: Okay, you walk out. Even better. Then these ninjas pop out from behind rocks and start shooting laser guns at you.
GK: Good, good.
TR: You dive for cover, and-
GK: Wait, what? I dive for cover?
TR: Yeah. They're shooting at you.
GK: Is this an action movie or a hiding movie?
TR: Okay--then you stand and face the hail of deadly laser rays.
GK: That's better.
TR: And after you've killed them all with a pair of fingernail clippers, you steal their ultralight aircraft (SMALL ENGINE) and you strafe their headquarters. (MACHINE GUNS)
GK: I'm liking this more and more.
TR: But they shoot you down-
(DIVE BOMB)
GK: How?
TR: They just, you know, shoot you down.
GK: Why didn't I outsmart them?
TR: Well, you have to get shot down and captured. Otherwise we don't get the scene of you withstanding torture.
GK: I see. Then why not make it a design flaw in the aircraft?
TR: Works for me.
GK: Just make it totally clear that it's a design flaw and not my fault.
TR: You got it. So then, you're being tortured, (DENTIST DRILL) when-
(PHONE RING)
GK: Excuse me, I have to take this. (PICK UP) Hello? They offered what? Sixteen million? For me? For a picture? Listen, you tell 20th Century Fox that unless they make a real offer, they can go pound sand. And while you're at it, tell them the 20th century is over. (SLAM PHONE DOWN) So anyway----- you were saying?
TR: You're captured by the dark force and you go through torture at the hands of evil dental hygienists and then one hygienist ----- there's something different about her and you smile and she ------(FOOTSTEPS APPROACH)
GK: She what? Oh. Nicole.
SS: Hi, Guy. Notice anything different?
GK: You would appear to have been exfoliated, Nicole. Nice job.
SS: She took everything except my scalp and my eyebrows.
GK: I see that.
SS: How's your meeting?
GK: Good meeting.
SS: Mind if I go in the pool?
GK: Not at all.
(DIVING BOARD, DIVE)
TR: Nice kid. Friend of yours?
GK: We did a picture together. "Moby Dick".
TR: Oh.
GK: Fishing picture. Came out ten years ago. I was Ahab and she was Ishmael.
TR: I heard it was good.
GK: It was. I had an obsession over a whale and I sort of transferred it to her.
TR: Not hard to understand.
GK: I killed the whale with a Swiss army knife and we returned to port and said goodbye and I said, "Call me, Ishmael," and she did. You know, if you could work a nude swimming scene into this script somehow--
TR: Will do.
GK: Good. We're done for today.
TR: Thanks, Mr. Noir. Good day, ma'am.
(FOOTSTEPS)
SS: Guy, please tell me this is your last picture.
GK: But why?
SS: I can't take L.A. any more, Guy. It's so toxic here. So shallow, and false. I want to go away from here with you. Move someplace real. Like--Aspen.
GK: Aspen, eh?
SS: We could live the simple life. Like real people. We'd start a family. We could even let some of the staff go.
GK: I don't know.
SS: You could keep the house in Cannes, of course.
GK: Well, that goes without saying.
(PHONE RING)
GK: Just a minute, Nicole. (PHONE PICK UP) Hello?--Oh, they're offering twenty-three million, are they? About time. And the 40 foot trailer?--Good. What about the water? Did you specify Icelandic water? No bubbles. I can't have bubbles. They're always bringing me bubbles. I can't work under those conditions. I need Icelandic still water. And make sure it's Icelandic. Not Iranian. Icelandic. Okay, good. (HANG UP) Now ----- where were we---- you were saying something about the house in Cannes-----(PHONE RING) (PICKUP) Hello?
TR(ON PHONE): It's Louie, over at the garage. Listen, we found a couple problems with your car.
GK: My car? My Rolls Royce?
TR(ON PHONE): It's an '84 Chevy Caprice. Anyway, your muffler isn't muffling, your transmission isn't transmitting, and your tires are tired. The exhaust is exhausted, your brakes are broken, and ya need new grommets.
GK: I replaced the grommets just last year.
TR(ON PHONE): Ya need new grommets.
GK: That sounds pretty bad.
TR(ON PHONE): I got an estimate for you.
GK: Is it more than I think it's going to be?
TR(ON PHONE): You're not on any sort of medications, are you?
GK: No.
TR(ON PHONE): Not prone to fainting spells or dizziness?
GK: No. (BRIDGE) She was gone and it was almost November. My car was a pile of junk, and so I was going to have to take any case I could get.
(BEEP)
TK(TEEN, ON PHONE): Mr. Noir, I got a paper, it's due Monday, for social studies, a paper on France, it's gotta be ten pages and I got soccer this weekend. I can pay six bucks. Okay? (BRIDGE)
GK: The tough part about writing term papers is to capture the voice of the 13-year-old. (AS HE TYPES) "A part of the old Europe and a major chocolate-producing nation, France is a nation of 60 million people, most of whom speak French most of the time. With an area of 210,000 square miles, it is smaller than Texas. It does not have much oil, but most French persons have telephones, and indoor toilets, or know someone who does, but compared to America, there are many fewer telephones in toilets, although the country does have its own website, france-dot-org where one can obtain interesting information about this ancient and yet contemporary land. Did you know, for example, that a mountain is a mont in France? Like Vermont. And that in addition to chocolate and wine and cheese, France also manufactures machinery and there is a major timber industry there, which I for one do not associate with the French, but nonetheless there is. This is why we have social studies, I guess, is to acquaint (FADING) ourselves with other societies, such as France, just to name one. Let us turn now to the subject of mining and minerals----"
GK: No.
TR(ON PHONE): Okay. I estimate it's gonna run you fourteen, fifteen hundred-----
(HE SWOONS, HIS BODY FALLS TO THE FLOOR, WITH PHONE IN HAND. HUBCAP SPIN)
SS: A dark night in a city that knows how to keep its secrets. But one man is still trying to find the answers to life's persistent questions--Guy Noir, Private Eye.