(GUY NOIR THEME)
TR: A dark night in a city that knows how to keep its secrets, but on the twelfth floor of the Acme Building one man is still trying to find the answers to life's persistent questions ----Guy Noir, Private Eye ---
(PIANO)
GK: It was October, warm, the air golden, the autumn colors pure magic, and my office windows were clean for the first time since the Clinton administration.
(KNOCKING ON GLASS WINDOW)
GK: Yes sir, the window-washer----
(WINDOW OPENS, CREAKILY, WITH GREAT EFFORT)
GK: Yeah------
TR: You mind if I come in and use your phone?
GK: Now?
TR: Yeah. Gotta call the company and tell em the motor sounds funny to me. The motor that pulls me up to the roof. Sounds like the gears are slipping.
GK: Okay, but I'm kinda busy.
TR: You don't look busy.
GK: Here you go, Mr. Tibbs, phone is down there, in the lobby. Here's a quarter----
TR: I can't use your phone? But it's ----
GK: Expecting a call. Sorry. (DOOR SLAM) (BRIDGE) Sydney Schubert, the producer of stage and screen, had asked me to conduct auditions for his new musical, "Ooo La La L'Amour" ---- I'd seen him the day before in his penthouse suite at the Fitzgerald Theater over on Exchange Street.
(FOOTSTEPS, ECHOEY, ON MARBLE)
TR: You've never been to my theater before, Mr. Noir?
GK: Oh I've been in the theater. Just never in your swanky penthouse. Quite a spread.
TR: Yes. Do you like art? This is my Monet.
GK:n This? This big painting of the pond and the lilies---- whooaaaaa ----- (BIG RIP OF CANVAS, WOOD CRUNCH). Sorry about that. I just lost my balance.
TR: (PAUSE, GLARE, SIGH) It's okay. It's insured. But be careful with this one----- this is a Ming vase ---- it's 350 years old.
GK: A Ming vase. Where? I don't see it. (KONK, THEN CRASH) Oh. Sorry.
TR: (PAUSE, BIG SIGH) It's all right. We'll glue it back together. So----- you owe me one, Noir.
GK: I do, sir. What can I do to mitigate the damage?
TR: You can find me a star, Noir. A gal with long legs and that va-va-voom and the (CLICKS)-----
GK: What do you mean by the (CLICKS)------
TR: You'll know it when you see it. (STING, BRIDGE)
GK: Most of the auditioners did not have the (CLICKS).
TR (CAROL): Pardon me, darling, I'm here to audition for the musical. I speak French. (FRENCH) Want to hear me sing? (SINGS)
A kiss on the hand may be quite continental
But diamonds are a girl's best friend
A kiss may be grand but it won't pay the rental
On your humble flat, or help you at the automat
Men grow cold as girls grow old
And we all lose our charms in the end
GK: Excuse me, but this is an ingenue role, you know.
TR (CAROL): What are you saying, darling?
GK: You're too old for the part.
TR (CAROL): Ever hearof makeup? Huh? Gimme ten minutes, I'll be 17 again. (STING)
SS (DORIS): This where you're holding the auditions?
GK: You're too old.
SS (DORIS): Hey, there's a dance in the old dame yet. (SHE SINGS, AS SHE TAP DANCES)
It Had to be you
It had to be you
I wandered around and finally found
The somebody who
Could make me be true -----
GK: Thank you.
SS (DORIS): There's more.
GK: I know. That's enough.
SS (DORIS): That's age discrimination, you dirty rotten (THEY GRAPPLE, AND KNOCK OVER FURNITURE, GLASS BREAKAGE) (STING, BRIDGE)
GK: Wanda was the right age and very charming, but she was a little shaky when it came to pitch.
SS (SINGS):
Quand il me prend dans ses bras
ll me parle tout bas
Je vois la vie en rose
TR: Window washer coming through. Watcher back. Watcher back.
GK: If you don't mind, Mr. Tibbs---- we have an audition going on---
TR: Well, I got some window washing going on.
(KNOCKS ON DOOR)
GK: Come on in, the door's unlocked. (DOOR OPEN, FOOTSTEPS)
AS: Hi. I'm Amber. Amber Turnblad.
GK: She was blonde with bare shoulders. She was a beauty. She gave a whole new meaning to the concept of Caucasian.
SS: I was here first. Beat it. Scram.
GK: I think I've heard you, Wanda. Leave your 8x10 glossy and I'll be in touch.
SS: What was wrong with my song, huh? Tell me ' one thing.
GK: It was fine.
SS: Ha!!!! You're gonna pick her, I know it. Just cause she's blonde. Well, I don't care. I'll show you. You're nothing but a bum, that's what you are, and someday you're gonna be lying in the gutter on Broadway and look up and see my name in lights. I'll be riding by in my smoked-glass limo and you'll be lying there with a bottle of muscatel, and my chauffeur will ask if I want him to stop and check your respiration, and I'll laugh. Like this. (HARD LAUGHTER)
Goodbye. (DOOR SLAM)
GK: Nice exit. Very nice. (DOOR OPEN)
SS: YOU LIKE THAT, YA BUM?? Well let me say this, I wouldn't waste my spit on you if you were on fire! (DOOR SLAM)
GK: Okay.n So----- Miss Turnblad. Sing for me.
AS (SINGS, TAP DANCING):
Moon river, wider than a mile,
I'm crossing you in style someday.
O dream maker, you heart breaker,
Wherever you're going I'm going your way.n(DOOR OPEN)
SS: I can sing better than that. Lots better. (DOOR SLAM)
GK: You sound fine, Amber.
(KNOCKS ON WINDOW)
GK: Excuse me, Amber. (RAISING WINDOW) What is it, Mr. Tibbs?
TR: Listen, I gotta release the brake on the pulley for just a couple seconds so I need you to hang onto this line and don't let it slip, okay?
GK: Got you.
TR: Hang onto this line with all your weight and don't let it slip or else I'm gonna fall twelve stories and become a large grease stain. Okay? You got hold of it?
GK: I got it.
AS: Be careful.
GK: I got it.
TR: Put all your weight on it, now.
GK: Got it.
TR: You got it?
GK: Got it.
TR: You sure you got it?
GK: Got it.
AS: Want me to help?
GK: I got it.
TR: Okay. All set?
GK: All set.
TR: Got it?
GK: Got it.
TR: Okay, here goes. (RATCHET OF BRAKE, THEN GK WHOOOOOOAAAAAA AND WHIRRING OF ROPE RISING)
GK: I flew up into the air up to the top of the pulley and my hands got jammed in the pulley wheel (CRUNCH). And then I started to fall (SFX) as Mr. Tibbs was coming up and right around the 8th floor (KONKS, TR CRY OUT) we banged into each other and he swung in through a window (GLASS CRASH) and I fell eight stories onto a load of garbage (SFX) and the next thing I knew I was in the hospital (SFX), in the ICU (VENT) and my broken leg was suspended up in the air and a nurse was leaning over me----- whose face was familiar.
SS: Didn't know I was a nurse, did you, Mr. Noir? You kicked sand in my face and broke my heart. But what goes around comes around. Now you're flat on your back and guess who is holding your oxygen hose in her hand? Huh? (HARD LAUGHTER)
GK: There was a call button at the end of a cord and it was four inches from the tips of my fingers. I had to slip over to my right to reach it. And I edged that way, quarter inch by quarter inch. One more inch and I got it.
SS: Ha!!!! Got it first.!!!! Good luck, Mr. Noir. Night is coming. And guess who volunteered for night duty. (SHE LAUGHS)
I've got you under my thumb.
I've got you completely in my power
And as the clock goes round and we come to the midnight hour
I've got you under my thumb.
I snap my fingers and you will come
And if I twist the clamp on your oxygen hose
You'll go to dreamland and your life will come to a close
I've got you under my thumb.
n-----How do you like that, Mr. Noir? Want to hear another one?
(SINGS) OOOOOOOOOOOO In a coma when all the body functions go
And we pull the plug and cover your mug and tie a tag to your left toe...
OOOOOOOOOO in a coma and we tell your weeping family
And they sit and pray and go away and then your corpse belongs to me----- (SS TAP DANCE)
GK: She was evil. Pure evil. And she was feeling so powerful, she didn't notice Amber Turnblad coming through the door. Amber had a hypodermic and she poked it in Wanda's butt as she was dancing.
SS (SINGS, SLOWING DOWN AS THE NARCOTIC WORKS) You look like a big slab of pork
And we're sending you down to the morgue
But as we say...Hey, aye yip aye yo dee aye
We're only saying, You're very cold, Mr. Dead Man
Happy landings, O-K. (SHE FALLS TO GROUND)
AS: Looks like I saved your life, Mr. Noir.
TR: Noir, it's me, Sid Schubert. Who is this dazzling star you discovered?
AS: Oh gosh.
TR:nYou're the real thing, kid. And in three weeks, you're starring as Sharon Chanel in "Ooo La La L'amour"----- You're going out there a kid, a nobody...and you're coming back.
GK: A star.
TR: A star.
(MUSIC)
TR: A dark night in a city that keeps its secrets, and there on the twelfth floor of the Acme Building is a guy still trying to find the answers to life's questions, Guy Noir, Private Eye.