An excerpt from THE ACADEMIC LIBERATION ARMY (YOUR JOB OR YOUR LIFE) An original screenplay By David A. Chodack FADE IN: EXT. - DAY. A service station on a busy corner in Berkeley California. Clearly visible in the background, about a mile away, is the Campanile, the famous clock tower which marks the campus of the University of California. An old Plymouth Duster pulls up in front of the area containing the rest rooms and a man jumps out. Although it is a beautiful sunny day and passersby are all dressed in short sleeve shirts, shorts, halter tops, etc., he is dressed in a turtleneck sweater and has a dark blue wool knit cap pulled low over his head, covering most of his apparently dark hair. He takes a quick look around and then after making sure no one is observing him, runs inside and sneaks into the ladies' room, carrying a small gym bag with him. Cut To: INT. LADIES' REST ROOM - DAY. The man in the turtleneck sweater locks the outer door, then goes into the stall and locks the stall door as well, before sitting down on the toilet and checking his watch. It says "10:50". With a nervous sigh, he sits back on the seat and leans back against the wall. Fade To: INT. LADIES' REST ROOM - DAY. The man on the toilet seat checks his watch again. It now says "10:55." he reaches into the gym bag at his feet opens it and takes out a reddish blonde women's wig and a pair of high heeled women's shoes. He takes off his athletic shoes, puts them in the gym bag and puts on the high heels instead. Then, he opens the stall door and makes his way shakily to the sink and mirror against the wall. He takes off the blue knit cap, arranges the blonde wig on his head and then puts the blue cap over it, so that the long blonde hair of the wig sticks out underneath it and then reaches in the gym bag again and pulls out a long woolen scarf, which he proceeds to wrap around his neck and the lower portion of his face and then completes the makeover with a pair of dark sunglasses which make it difficult for him to see in the relatively dim light of the restroom. He staggers to the door, opens it and steps outside, heading shakily for his car, carrying the gym bag in his right hand. This time, three or four of attendants who work at the station -- distinguished by their blue uniforms with name patches on the front -- are standing near the rest room entrance, smoking cigarettes and goofing off, presumably on a break. The sight of them seems to make the man in the wig and sunglasses nervous and he begins hurrying towards his car, moving unsteadily on the high heels, weaving and wobbling like a drunk. The station attendants notice this and they begin nudging each other, smirking and pointing in his direction. This causes the man in the high heels to move even faster and then to trip, lose his balance and fall flat on his face. He starts to get up, but then loses his balance again gives up and begins crawling towards the car on his hands and knees instead,. FIRST STATION ATTENDANT Whooee! It ain't lunch time yet, but it looks like someone's had too much to drink! SECOND STATION ATTENDANT Yeah! And just look at her crawl on her hands and knees! Me, I like a woman who knows how to crawl! Crawl over here, baby don't be shy! THIRD STATION ATTENDANT (Grabbing his crotch) Yeah! look at that nice big ass on her, too. Come on over here, Mama. I've got something for you to drink from. FIRST STATION ATTENDANT Yeah Sweetie. You should be crawling towards me, not away. You need help finding your car keys, you just let old Freddie know. I'll start your engine for you! The man in the high heels seemingly ignores them and keeps crawling his hands and knees until he finally gets to his car, pulls open the passenger door and falls in, flinging the gym bag into the back seat. THE CAR DRIVER (Muttering to himself) Unenlightened, unliberated, sexist pigs! The man slides across the front seat to the driver's side, starts the car with a roar, turns on the radio full blast to drown out the laughter coming from outside the car and then slams it into gear as the gas station attendants stand in the back ground, pointing and laughing. Suddenly, the car flies backwards, not forward and crashes right into one of the gasoline pumps, knocking it over, as the station attendants suddenly stop laughing and start screaming and waving their fists with indignation. CUT TO: INT. CAR - DAY. The man in the high heels is struggling desperately to free his right heel, which is tangled up with the gas pedal, forcing it to the floor. THE CAR DRIVER (Muttering to himself) Shit! The man immediately throws the car into forward gear and the car lurches forward and peels out, tires squealing, leaving the broken gas pump, with gasoline spurting out freely in his wake. CUT TO: EXT. GAS STATION - DAY. FIRST STATION ATTENDANT Hey lady! Wait a minute! Where you going? You can't just drive off like that. What about our gas pump?! SECOND STATION ATTENDANT Hey, the crazy drunken bitch is getting away! Let's get after her! THIRD STATION ATTENDANT Yeah, the boss is going to blame us when he finds out. Let's go! The Plymouth Duster makes a left turn out of the station, cutting right across three lanes of heavy traffic, with horns and brakes screeching everywhere. The three station attendants jump in a yellow pickup truck marked with the service station logo -- two in the front and one in the back -- and take off after the rapidly disappearing Plymouth Duster. CUT TO: INT. CAR - DAY. The man in high heels is still struggling to work his right foot loose -- while weaving his way through traffic using all four lanes -- and finally succeeds. He gets back on his own side of the road and slows down a bit, just in time to barely avoid hitting a pedestrian in a commando suit sneaking stealthily across the street leading a duck on a leash. The car barely knicks the tail feather of the duck, which immediately flies up in the air squawking in protest. CUT TO: INT. CAR DAY - REAR VIEW MIRROR DRIVER'S POV. A yellow pickup truck suddenly appears in the rearview mirror, also weaving insanely through the traffic and gaining fast. Inside the cab, Two angry young men are waving tools or weapons in a threatening manner. CUT TO: INT. CAR - DAY. The driver presses the gas pedal to the floor again and the car screeches around a corner at a crazy angle as the driver grimly clings to the wheel with one hand and the horn with the other, beeping constantly to warn people out of his way. The car swings around an old man and then goes up onto the sidewalk and down a driveway, back into the street and right up behind a slow moving, smoke spewing old bus, around the bus and face to face with a large truck about three feet away and coming in the same lane from the other direction. Then suddenly the whole car is shaking and there is a scraping, crunching sound from the driver's side as the car swings back into the other lane and passes the truck. CUT TO: INT. CAR DAY - REAR VIEW MIRROR DRIVER'S POV. The rear bumper is hanging from the car, trailing behind like and setting off a shower of sparks and making a roaring, scraping sound which drowns out the radio. The yellow pickup truck is right behind and the person standing up in back is throwing things at the car. Suddenly there is a thump! and a large spider web appears on the back window. CUT TO: INT. CAR - DAY. The driver takes his foot off the gas for a second and swings the wheel hard to the right, cutting off the car next to him and then jumping the curb. he hits the gas again and then hits the brake with his left foot. The car lurches, trembles and groans. The driver slams down on the gas again and throws the car into reverse with a thump! There is another Crunch! and then the driver slams the car back into Drive. CUT TO: INT. CAR - REARVIEW MIRROR, DRIVER'S POV. Suddenly the bumper comes flying off and swings up in the air. It comes down just in time to get mangled by the yellow pickup truck, which then goes spinning wildly out of control. The driver starts singing to himself in a loud voice, but then suddenly police sirens are clearly heard in the background and the yellow pickup truck straightens out somehow and is back on the Duster's tail, even though steam is pouring from under the hood and the left front tire is flat. THE CAR DRIVER (SINGING) I'm free to do what I want ............. CUT TO: INT. CAR -DAY. The driver makes a quick left turn, cutting off a couple of more cars in the process, then a quick right turn and another left and another right . CUT TO: INT. CAR - REARVIEW MIRROR, DRIVER'S POV. Finally, the pickup truck is no longer in sight and the view in the rearview mirror is clear. CUT TO: INT. CAR -DAY. The driver visibly relaxes and begins singing once again. He lifts his foot off the gas again as the car slows down to a normal speed and then the driver's voice suddenly switches to a narrative tone and a voice over begins as the car makes its way onto the freeway and then on to the Bay Bridge, heading towards San Francisco. THE CAR DRIVER (SINGING) Yeah, I'm free to do whatever I want ............. VO: Yes, at last I was free ...... not just free of those barbaric sexist thugs who were chasing me -- if I wasn't wearing heels I would have thrashed all three of them -- but free .... to do what I wanted to do ... what I needed to do ..... not just for myself, but for all of mankind, for all the poor oppressed academic drones yearning to be free ... or at least tenured .... free to launch THE REVOLUTION! Actually, of course, the revolution had already started, earlier that morning, but this was just the first of many signs that it was indeed righteous and destined to succeed ........... CUT TO: INT. KITCHEN - MORNING. The Car Driver, minus his wig, turtle neck sweater and dark glasses is sitting at a kitchen table reading a magazine and holding a pencil in one hand and a mug of liquid in the other hand. he is a good looking man in his mid 30's. Suddenly, he peers intently at the magazine, takes a large gulp of the liquid and then begins frantically circling something in the magazine with the pencil, as the voice over continues uninterrupted. VO: THE REVOLUTION had started suddenly and unexpectedly that peaceful, seemingly ordinary Tuesday morning at exactly 8:03 AM. I was sitting there quietly drinking my seventh cup of coffee and Dexedrine and looking through the Modern Language Association Job Information List, when I saw it! CUT TO: CLOSE UP OF EMPLOYMENT NOTICE: '"Unless the junior professors of the lower class, do suddenly and most wickedly rise up in a fit of rebellion and proceed to maim and murder en masse, the most distinguished senior professors of the upper class, I regret to say that we shall fire, not hire, alas, alas. 'Tis a pity, 'tis a shame but that's the way 'tis and shall be, all the same.' Thornton Dexter, Chairman Department of English University of California at Santa Carla" CUT TO: INT. KITCHEN - MORNING. The Car Driver jumps up excitedly as the voice over continues uninterrupted. He runs into the bedroom and begins rummaging in a closet until he comes out with the blonde wig in one hand and the high heeled shoes in the other hand. VO: My own school! My own department! My own chairman! I couldn't believe it, but I knew right away what I had to do, what I was destined to do and I knew that Thornton Dexter had to die .... not because he had fired me, denied me tenure because of "budget cuts", while my wife was granted tenure and promoted to Dean of Humanities, not because he had been fucking my wife and she was now pregnant with his lecherous, treacherous, 70 year old, dirty-old-man baby even though she denied it and tried to claim it was mine ....... V/O: No, I could never kill anyone for personal reasons like that. It would be wrong. After all, I'm a civilized man, a college professor, not a vengeful, bloodthirsty savage. But this wasn't personal, this wasn't for me. Thornton Dexter was just a symbol, a warning to all the others, all those who enjoyed tenure and privilege and looked down on those who didn't .... They would see. They would all face a choice, either they would give up their jobs ... stand aside and let younger, untenured people take over .. or they would die! Killing Thornton Dexter would be an act of War. Yes, THE REVOLUTION had started, just as Thornton Dexter himself had so sagely prophesied. And I, Field Marshall Matthew Toller, distinguished hero of both the Gulf War and the Haiti Invasion, had been chosen to lead it and head the Academic Liberation Army on its glorious march to victory. A communiqué had to be sent to all the news media, but of course, I couldn't do it openly under my own identity. I had to disguise myself somehow -- that's where Marion's wig and shoes came in -- and I couldn't do it from Santa Carla, so I decided to drive to Berkeley instead. After all, where better to announce the start of THE REVOLUTION than the revolutionary capital of the world? With any luck, I could drive there and back in a few hours and be back in time to make dinner and have it ready for Marion by the time she got home, just like a good, dutiful, liberated husband. But now, of course, all my plans had changed and so I decided to make my escape across the Bay Bridge and send the communiqué from San Francisco State instead .......... CUT TO: INT. OFFICE - DAY. An attractive woman in her early 30's (Marion Toller) is sitting behind a desk engrossed in paperwork when the door opens silently and a thin, balding man in his late 60's or 70's, (Thornton Dexter) dressed like an aging bohemian, with an open shirt and an ascot which matches the handkerchief in the pocket of his tweed sport coat, slips inside, walks over and sits down on the edge of the desk and begins very obviously looking down her dress while he rummages freely through the mail and other materials on the desk, holding a sealed envelope up to the light so he can tell the contents without opening it. She does not notice until the man speaks and then she put her feet up on the desk and spreads her legs apart so that he can look right up her dress. THORNTON DEXTER Good morning. And how is our beloved Dean of Humanities this morning? All settled in yet? MARION TOLLER Oh yes. I'm all settled in. Just like a bug in a rug. THORNTON DEXTER (Putting his hand on her thigh) Why Marion my dear -- or should I say Madame Dean? -- you don't sound at all sincere. Don't you like your new job? You worked so awfully hard to get it. MARION TOLLER I'm too busy being caught up in the silly frustrations of a petty bureaucrat! Oh, I'm sorry Thornton. I guess I was yelling. But there's no more poetry, no drama, not even Theory of Criticism as applied to ...... THORNTON DEXTER Really my dear. It's only been two months. You just need time to adjust. Especially considering your delicate condition MARION TOLLER The hell with my condition! I'm sick of writing requisitions for toilet paper to stock the bathrooms and trying to reschedule classes which can't stand the room they've been assigned to ..... THORNTON DEXTER (Caressing her right foot) Ah, but that's not the soul of the job, dear Marion, just the bulk. It's the intellectual and emotional side of the job which requires your special touch. Expediting, working with the various factions to get those classes scheduled and the rooms filled, to get that toilet paper rolling, so to speak. Besides, everyone is so proud and happy for you. Not only your colleagues in the department ...... MARION TOLLER Who were all relieved to see you kick me upstairs to a job no one else wanted -- including you -- so that they have can their exclusive all-male club to themselves again. They're all happy to get rid of me, all except Matthew and of course, you're getting rid of him ............. THORNTON DEXTER So that's what this is all about! Matthew! How is the dear ----------------- glmph! MARION TOLLER (Shoving her foot in his mouth) That's right, it's about Matthew! THORNTON DEXTER (Pulling foot from his mouth) But I thought your marriage was a model of felicitous harmony? Or is it harmonious felicity? MARION TOLLER (Standing up) It was -- until you came along with your nasty games and ruined our lives. Budget cuts? Surely Thornton, you could have thought of something more original if you wanted to get rid of Matthew so badly. THORNTON DEXTER Yes. I suppose I could have, except it happens to be true. Our budget has been cut -- as you, as Dean of Humanities should know -- and from now on, we will only hire part-time and temporary instructors, so there will be no more false expectations as in Matthew's case and even though it is against the strict spirit of the regulations, I'm sure we can keep Matthew on that basis ..... MARION TOLLER How can I enjoy this job when my husband is losing his? THORNTON DEXTER Now there's gratitude for you. I got you the job you wanted and so now I'm responsible if you don't enjoy it? MARION TOLLER You could give Matthew tenure if you wanted to, especially now that I'm gone and there's an opening in the department THORNTON DEXTER But not in the budget. besides, my dear, you know that Uncle Thornton rewards all his nieces and nephews according to what they have done for him lately. Now what have you done to show your gratitude for this job. Let's see ... hmmm. Mmmmmph!!!!!! Thornton Dexter's cries of pleasure turn to muffled choking sounds as Marion Toller shoves her foot in his mouth again. CUT TO: EXT. DAY - Matthew Toller gets out of his bashed and battered car and goes into a typical-looking suburban home. He is carrying a long package which he puts in is in a closet. Then he goes into the kitchen and begins chopping vegetables with a knife and doing it with particularly vicious glee and vigor. Gradually, the vegetables turn into babies with Thornton Dexter's face as a Voice -Over begins again. V/O: Sending the communiqué had been easy. The hard part came afterwards, when I had to decide how Thornton Dexter was going to die and then walk into the sporting goods store to get the materials I needed. They all laughed at me when I walked in, still tottering in my high heels and they smirked and looked at each other when I brought the spear gun to the counter and paid for it in cash. But their tone would change, the horror would hit them when they realized that in a daring bit of revolutionary improvisation, I had also stolen two pairs of sweat socks, slipped them right out under their nose without them even knowing. When they read about Thornton Dexter, then they would know. That's when they would cringe in horror and fear, along with the rest of the world, but by then, it would be too late. Thornton Dexter would be dead and The Revolution would be in full progress .................. Suddenly, Matthew's attention snaps back to reality as the door opens and Marion Toller comes breezing in ....................... and suddenly, the vegetables start turning into little versions of Marion ....... MARION TOLLER Oh, Matthew, you're just doing that now? MATTHEW TOLLER You're home early. MARION TOLLER You're not going to wiggle out that way, Matthew Toller. It's 5:30, the same time I get home every day now with my new job. You, on the other hand, had a light day today and were home by 10 O'clock. You had plenty of time to get supper ready and you know I come home tired and hungry. MATTHEW TOLLER I had a lot of papers to grade. And I was also working on my book and looking for jobs. I guess I just lost track of the time. I'm sorry. Marion comes up behind Matthew and begins tickling his ribs. While Matthew tries to ignore her and continue chopping vegetables. MARION TOLLER Sorry, sorry, sorry. Little Matty is always sorry. How soon will supper be ready, Little Matty Sorry? MATTHEW TOLLER About a half hour if you leave me alone and stop bothering me. MARION TOLLER Let's get it on the stove and go to bed. MATTHEW TOLLER That would be nice, but I thought you were tired? MARION TOLLER I am. MATTHEW TOLLER Well, then we could wait until later. MARION TOLLER Ummm, that would be nice too, but I'm going out later and there won't be time. Marions' hands begin working on Matthew's body more slowly and carefully. Matthew pushes her away roughly. MATTHEW TOLLER Great! Which is it tonight? Another night out with the girls? BACK TO THE SCREENPLAYS PAGE HOME |