Game 6

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INT. LOFT APARTMENT - MANHATTAN - MORNING

STEVEN SCHWIMMER, a drama critic, asleep on his bed. He

wears a sleep mask.

The bed is a mattress on a makeshift platform.

Papers strewn on the floor.

An exercise bike.

A desk with and old manual typewriter, reference works,

periodicals, Styrofoam cups.

A cast-off sofa with pants, shirts, sweater, underwear and

socks tossed haphazardly on the cushions and arms.

A counter that sets apart the kitchen area. A portable TV set

on the counter. The remains of dinner for one.

A row of stacked cardboard boxes with mail spilling out on

the floor. Boxes are labeled in crayon: HATE MAIL.

A coffee table with a candle nub in a saucer and six gleaming

rounds of ammunition scattered next to a Llama Comanche .357

Magnum with a checkered walnut stock -- overall length, nine

and a quarter inches.

A Port-O-San toilet, about seven feet high, orange, scarred

and dented -- scavenged from a construction site.

A snapshot on the bedside table. It's a blurry picture of

Steven holding a cat. Steven wears a peaked cap, and a shadow

falls across his face. Next to the picture is a clock radio,

which comes on with a buzz as the clock shows nine AM.

RADIO ANNOUNCER begins to speak --

LONE EAGLE (V.O.)

(softly)

Traffic flowing smoothly on the

Deegan right now but if you're

lucky enough to have a ticket for

tonight's game, be sure to leave

early because it's going to be

bumper to bumper.

Steven does not stir.

EXT. LOFT BUILDING2

Steven's loft is in an old squat building on 47th Street near

Twelfth Avenue. The structure looks abandoned. Graffiti

everywhere. Entranceway filled with debris.

LONE EAGLE (V.O.)

Another day of traffic. Traffic

everywhere I look. Cars stop and

move and stop again. People sit at

the wheel thinking their thoughts.

EXT. UNITED NATIONS PLAZA APTS - - MORNING

The shimmering glass facade of the United Nations Plaza

Apartments at 48th Street and First Avenue. A man visible at

a window on one of the high floors, a cup of coffee in his

hand.

LONE EAGLE (V.O.)

Day in, day out. Red light, green

light. Traffic on the major

arteries and traffic in the little

veins.

From his POV we see the traffic below creeping along, nearly

at a standstill.

LONE EAGLE (V.O.)

Cars, vans, taxis, trucks, limos,

Mopeds, bikes and buses. Emergency

vehicles screaming and wailing.

Birth and death, walk and don't

walk.

The man takes a sip of coffee.

LONE EAGLE (V.O.)

Traffic yesterday, today and

tomorrow. Bumper to bumper, soul to

soul. This is Lone Eagle over and

out.

EXT. 47TH STREET AND FIRST AVENUE - A LITTLE LATER

The same man -- the playwright Nicky Rogan with his hand in

the air, hailing a cab. He is forty-five, vigorous, wearing

well-made sporty clothes.

In a corner of the screen --

OCTOBER 25, 1986

INT. TAXI

Stalled in traffic.

NICKY:

I used to drive a taxi.

DRIVER:

Where you're going, mister?

Nicky glances at the driver's name plate

KAGANOVICH:

ANATOLI:

NICKY:

I used to drive a taxi.

DRIVER:

I used to be head of neurosurgery.

Big hospital in USSR. This

hospital, I'm not kidding.

NICKY:

Very big.

DRIVER:

I opened thousands of brains.

NICKY:

What did you find?

DRIVER:

Big mess every time.

NICKY:

I loved my taxi. Went twelve hours

nonstop. Stopped only to pee. I

peed under the Manhattan bridge.

Peed many times in parks and

playgrounds.

EXT. STREET CORNER

47th Street and Third Avenue. A man is dancing with a life-

size cloth doll. His tape player is on the sidewalk, playing

and instrumental version of "Beautiful Dreamer" and there is

a cigar box for donations. A few people look on from a

distance. The man wearing an old cutaway, with running shoes,

and the doll has long red tresses and wears a frilly gown.

Nicky emerges from a taxi at the corner and walks rapidly

past the dancing man.

Nicky crosses the courtyard to Buchanan Apartments.

INT. FOYER

JOANNA BOURNE reaching for the door. Joanna is fifty-ish,

handsome, stylishly dressed.

INT. BUCHANAN APARTMENT - SECONDS LATER

Nicky and Joanna embracing with wordless abandon.

They are in the hallway clutching each other, stumbling. The

walls on either side are hung with expensive art.

They grapple past the living room. Fleeting look at the

paintings by Longo and Fischl, a poster by the Guerilla

Girls.

The edge of the bedroom. Nicky is crawling into the room and

Joanna is hanging on to him, being dragged. They are fully

dressed except for one of Joanna's shoes.

The bedroom. A Lichtenstein, a Hockney, a silk-screen of

Joanna by Andy Warhol. A Jeff Koons piece. Nicky and Joanna

roll on the floor until they are halfway under the bed.

INT. HALLWAY

Muffled sounds from the bedroom. We track to:

The maid's room. The maid is smoking a cigarette and reading

New York magazine. The cover is partly obscured by her hand

but we can see a blurry black-and-white photo of a man

hurrying along a street with a newspaper over his face,

shielding himself from the camera. Over the photo, three

words visible:
THE PHANTOM WHO -- A second line of type is

too small to be legible.

INT. BEDROOM -- LATER

Nicky and Joanna are undressing after the fact, very slowly

and distractedly. Joanna stands by a chair near the window.

Nicky is on the other side of the bed and he alternates

between standing and sitting as he takes off his clothes.

JOANNA:

Last night. Alan Albright called me

a handsome woman. Second time he's

done that. Son of a b*tch.

NICKY:

I hear Alan's sick.

JOANNA:

Alan's very sick. He has to go to

New Mexico and sit in a lukewarm

solution.

NICKY:

You know about Adele.

JOANNA:

What about her?

NICKY:

She's dying.

JOANNA:

She died.

NICKY:

I talked to her two days ago.

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