(GUY NOIR THEME)
TR: 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. Me. Guy Noir, Private Eye. (THEME UP AND OUT)
GK: It was April, I was in New York, It was a cold rainy spring back where I'm from and then I got to New York and the sun came out - and people were ebullient who hadn't been ebullient for so long, they'd forgotten how to spell it. It was like New York had become a giant musical.
ALL (SING): The sun'll come out TOMORROW
Bet your bottom dollar that tomorrow
We'll have sun.
GK: People standing in Times Square, shoulder to shoulder, arms up in the air.
ALL (SING): Honey, everything's coming up roses.
GK: In the Park you had bicyclists (SFX) and unicyclists (SFX) and bisexual tricyclists (SFX) and inline skaters (SFX) and people dancing on figure skates (DISCO) and men dancing wearing ankle bells and holding white hankies (MORRIS DANCING). You had preachers on the sidewalk-
TR: And in the Song of Solomon it says-
For, lo, the winter is past,
the rain is over and gone;
the flowers appear on the earth;
the time of the singing of birds is come.
(TROPICAL BIRDS, SHRIEKS, CRIES)
TR: The voice of my beloved!
Behold, he cometh
leaping upon the mountains,
skipping upon the hills
(BAGPIPE)
GK: Amazing what a little photosynthesis can do. People who'd been moody and sullen (TR SWEDISH) suddenly woke up. (TR ITALIAN) And everywhere you looked, there was life, new life, rebirth..... SS (NY): .....so anyway I go to the gynecologist and he says, there's nothing wrong with your ovaries. (FN WOMAN MURMURS) You've got the ovaries of a 20-year-old woman. The problem has gotta be him. It sure isn't you. Not with ovaries like those. (FN WOMAN MURMURS) And this from a doctor. You know? (FN WOMAN MURMURS) This is not some guy I met in a bar. This man knows about ovaries. - What are you so interested in?
GK: Who? Me?
SS (NY): Mind your own business. This is a private conversation.
GK: Sorry.
SS (NY): Pervert. (BRIDGE)
GK: I was in New York on a secret case which required me to work undercover, disguised as a dog walker. (DOGS YIPPING) And on this particular morning I had eight dogs on poop patrol who were not making an effort to get along......Hey. You. (DOG) Yes. You. (DOG) I saw you push him. (DOG) Don't argue with me. I saw it. One more push out of you and I'm gonna put this baggie on your snout and make you pick up after yourself. (DOG) - And it's true what they say about a dog being the way to meet beautiful women.
SS: (BABY TALK TO DOG) Hello you itty bitty little baby come here put your little head on mama's knee. Oh aren't you beautiful, yes you are. Oh yes you are. Oh yes, mama loves you.
GK:I take it you're talking to the dog.
SS: Mama just wants to stroke your hair. Yes, she does. Oh and you enjoy that, don't you. Yes you do. Mama just wants to love you and love you and love you. Mama wants to take you home with her. Yes she does.
GK: Hi. Up here. The one in the black suit.
SS: Not talking to you, mister.
GK: Okay. Just wanted to make sure. (BRIDGE) I was in New York because they needed a man they could trust to investigate the MTA. The A stands for Authority. And MT- well, that means empty. The Empty Authority. Large jowly men in offices (TR, FN JOWLY GIBBERISH) holding meetings and looking at Power Points and tapping at their computers as the phones ring (SFX) and the copiers copy (SFX) and meanwhile the buses that the Empty Authority runs are running (SFX) and down deep in the bowels of the city the trains are full of passengers (CHIMES. FN VOICE: Watch for the closing doors, please.) And late at night, a train goes from station to station. (CHUGGING)
TR (BOGIE): That's the money train.
GK: The money train.
TR (BOGIE): It runs between three and four in the morning and it's run by hunchback dwarves and it collects money from the Metrocard machines and it goes into canvas bags that're loaded onto an armored boxcar that leaves the city at dawn headed west.
GK: Where does the money go?
TR (BOGIE): We have no idea. That's your job. Find out.
(STING, BRIDGE)
GK: So there I was with my pack of dogs, on the watch for hunchback dwarves. New York was suffering from the recession, You could tell. People out of work. People hard up. People who'd worked hard to persuade Bernie Madoff to accept them as clients. And yet, as worried as people might be, as deep in debt, as unemployed, still they were New Yorkers. They had a sense of class.
MEN (SING):
When you're in debt
You're in debt all the way
And you're full of regret
You're unable to pay.
When you're in debt
When the mortgage is due
It's a game of roulette
And the red ball is you.
Your life's not your own
Your phone is disconnected!
You may lose your home
The sheriff is expected,
You'll be ejected
Then you can bet
You'll be thrown in the street
And the bankers will get
The shoes off your feet
When you're in debt
You stay in debt. (AND UNDER, AS BRIDGE)
GK: That's the spirit of New York. You take trouble and you make it into a song. Adversity is a gift. Life wasn't meant to be easy and you wouldn't want it to be and that's why you live in New York, to make sure it won't be. (TRAFFIC, FOOTSTEPS) I headed down into the subway to check on the money train. There was a guy playing the banjo (SFX) and a guy playing steel drums (SFX) and a guy playing a Japanese koto (SFX) and somebody playing a saxophone (SFX) And a man was playing trumpet who looked a lot like Wynton Marsalis.
(TRUMPET)
GK: He stood there by a trash barrel and played his music and nobody seemed to want to listen.
FN (NYER): Oh shut it, wouldja.
SS (NYER): Can it, turn that thing off. I'm trying to read, okay?
TR: Give it a rest, buddy.
GK: And the express train roared by (SFX) and announcements came over the P.A. (TINNY INCOMPREHENSIBLE BLARE) and still he kept playing......
(TRUMPET CONTINUES)
GK: And I was so drawn in by his music that I didn't notice when the train came in (TRAIN BRAKES) and a bunch of hunchback dwarves got off (DWARVES CHATTER) and went to the Metrocard machines and (SFX) opened them up and got out the money (SFX) and (DWARVES CHATTER) got back on the train.
FN (DWARF): Hey man, like your music.
(TRAIN PULLS AWAY)
GK: And I reached into my pocket for a dollar and found a couple quarters and put them into his hat.
WM: Hey, thanks.
GK: Sorry it can't be more.
WM: That's okay.
GK: You know, you sound a lot like Wynton Marsalis.
WM: Well, thanks. I'm trying to sound like him.
GK: You're not?
WM: I'm his younger brother Pierpont.
GK: Quite a family.
WM: My dad's the pianist. Ellis Marsalis. And there's Wynton and Branford and Jason and Delfeayo and my younger brother Barack Hussein Marsalis.
GK: What happened to him?
WM: The Marsalis name was too big a burden to him so he changed it and he got out of music and went into politics.
GK: And you're trying to make it in music-
WM: Well, my Daddy had his heart set on me going into investment banking. That's why he named me Pierpont. Put me in wingtip shoes when I was four years old. By the time I was eight, I was reading the Wall Street Journal. Had to play music in secret. Had to play quietly. Which helps develop your tone.
GK: I can imagine. So you have hopes of making it-
WM: Lincoln Center. This is how you get there. On the No. 1 train. Here it comes. (TRAIN PULLS IN) Gotta go.
GK: Good luck, Pierpont.
WM: Same to you, Guy. (BING BONG, DOORS OPEN, CLOSE, BRIDGE)
GK: I rode the next train up to 59th Street, Columbus Circle, and got off (TRAFFIC) and headed into the park and there in the corner of the Park was the streetcorner preacher....
TR (PREACHER): And it says in the Song of Solomon,
Behold, thou art fair, my love;
thy hair is like a flock of goats,
thy teeth are like a flock of sheep,
thy lips are like a thread of scarlet,
thy neck is like the tower of David,
And thy two.......
Never mind.
GK: and a stranger came up-
FN: Guy?
GK: Who're you?
FN: You know me. It's Tom.
GK: Okay. I know who you are, but who are you?
FN: Tom. You remember. From Facebook.
GK: Right.
FN: You friended me yesterday.
GK: You mean, I befriended you.
FN: That's what I said. Listen, I was going to send you an e-mail but let me ask you something- I'm taking my girlfriend to meet my family on Easter Sunday and I'm kind of nervous because my girlfriend doesn't speak English.
GK: What language does she speak?
FN: I'm not sure. We don't talk that much. I met her online. Mainly we exchange music files and YouTube links.
GK: Uh huh.
FN: Maybe Portuguese. Hard to tell.
GK: How old is she?
FN: I don't know. Young.
GK: So her ovaries are okay?
FN: Her ovaries?
GK: Your mother's interested in getting grandchildren, so she needs to know what shape the ovaries are in. If you can bring a lab report, that's good. Any sonograms, all the better.
FN: Okay. Thanks. Where you going?
GK: Looling for hunchback dwarves.
FN: Oh. Okay. I thought I saw some over on the West Side. Near the train tracks. Under a bridge.
GK: Thanks. (BRIDGE) I headed over to the West Side and there was a bunch of what looked like hunchback dwarves and when I got close, I saw that it was a bunch of elderly men. They were all bent over and wearing black leather jackets and carrying chains and knives. An old street gang. New York. No matter who you are, or how odd you think you are, there's a group made up of people just like you.
MEN (SING): When you are old
And you start to slow down
And you can't see so well
And you can't hear a sound!
When you are old
And the nurses come round
And your butt's hanging out
Of your hospital gown
But we know what's what
Our tickers still are tickin
And we can kick butt
'And we're still kickin like the dickens
Here come the old
People, get out of here
Or we'll shove a catheter
Tube in your rear.
Here come the old
And we're looking for you
We got drugs that'll make
You senile too
MEN SING (CONT.):
We're not invalids
But we had a snootful
We're sick of you kids
We're being truthful
We are anti-youthful !
We're gonna beat you
And it won't be purty
Cause we are old guys
And we love to play dirty And we don't
Trust
anyone
Under
Thirty.
No!
(THEME)
TR: A dark night in a city that knows how to keep its secrets, where one guy is still trying to find the answers to life's persistent questions - Guy Noir, Private Eye.
(MUSIC OUT)