Primitive London Page #2

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I work in an office.

- I see. Would you say you're a beatnik?

- No.

- You're not?

- No.

- Suzy, how old are you?

- 17.

- Seventeen. What do you do?

- I'm an insurance typist.

- Are you a beatnik?

- No.

- No? Why do you come here?

- 'Cause I've got a lot of friends here.

- Boyfriends or girlfriends?

- Both.

- Both girlfriends and boyfriends?

- Yeah.

- Would you like to marry a beatnik?

- I don't know.

How about you?

Would you like to marry a beatnik?

- No, I wouldn't.

- You wouldn't?

# Well, you can go to the east

# Go to the west

# I don't care where you go, baby

As long as you come back

# I got my brand on you

# I got my brand on you

# Oh, yeah

# There ain't nothing you can do, love

# I got my brand on you #

(EXCLAIMING)

- MAN:
What's your name?

- Larry.

- Would you like to say a few words?

- "A few words."

MAN:
A few words.

Very good, very good, Larry.

- Tell me, what do you do for a living?

- Nothing.

- Nothing at all? How do you live?

- I don't, I exist.

- Who supports you?

- My dad.

My dad? Good old dad.

- What's your name, dear?

- Anne.

- Do you know Larry?

- Yes.

- Are you his girlfriend?

- No, but we're very intimate, though.

- You're very intimate?

- Yes.

- Together, that is?

- Yes, together.

Very good. Tell me,

what do you think about beatniks?

- I think they're great.

- You think they're great?

Do you believe in...

Well, tell me, what is a beatnik?

- GIRL:
A great nit!

- (LAUGHING) A great nit!

- MAN:
Do you think you're a great nit?

- No, I'm not a beatnik.

Well, you just told me

beatniks are great nits.

It wouldn't... I'm not a beatnik.

- You're not a beatnik?

- No!

- Anne, are you a beatnik?

- No.

- Larry, surely you are?

- I'm a tramp.

- You're just a plain old...

- ANNE:
He's a bum.

- He's a bum? Are you sure?

- ANNE:
Yes.

- How much is that camera worth?

- That camera? Two or three hundred quid.

- Ever thought of flogging it?

- Well, we pawn it now and again.

- William's uncle's down the road.

- Uncle's down the road, well done.

What's your definition of a beatnik?

Well, I don't like the word myself,

because if you ask the average person

in the street what a beatnik is,

they'll immediately turn around and say,

"A person who doesn't wash, doesn't work,

"just got long, filthy hair

and is a parasite on society."

MAN:
And you think this is entirely wrong?

- Yes, it is entirely wrong.

- Entirely wrong. Thank you very much.

- Have you been playing together long?

- Yeah, about two years right now.

- Two years?

- Yeah.

What's your ambition, Ryan?

To be the top harmonica player in this country,

what I've always wanted to be, you know.

Wonderful. Tell me,

what do you do in the summer?

Well, we go down the south of France,

usually Cannes,

and busk around the cafs,

and make a few bob. It's pretty good.

- How do you get down there?

- Oh, we go by train.

It costs 12.10 from London to Cannes,

you know.

Oh, I see. Sounds like an advert

for British Railways.

- Well, that's all right.

- I see. And in England, what do you do?

Well, folk singing, and that,

we go busking down the stations

and a few folk clubs,

that kind of thing, you know.

Which station? Mainline?

No. Piccadilly Circus

Underground station, usually.

- Piccadilly Circus? I see.

- Saturday night.

- And how do you get on?

- Eight pound a night.

- Got a girlfriend?

- Me? No.

You know, I just get them when I can,

you know.

But no, I'm not living at home at the moment.

Now I'm living down at Brompton Road.

- Just off the old Brompton Road.

- Do you believe in marriage?

Uh, this I can't really say now, you know.

- I don't really know.

- I see.

- But you'll give it a miss for a while, anyway?

- Yeah.

NARRATOR:
There are others

belonging to no group

because they are unaware of themselves

as members of any society.

They dissipate their identity

in complete passivity.

(MACHINE DINGING)

They become reduced

to human adjuncts of a machine.

And the machine's flashing lights

lend an air of action, of doing something,

a sedative to cover an attitude

of cynical indifference.

(DINGING)

(CLANKING)

And there are adult activities which display

a curious mixture of all these elements.

- Good morning, Charles.

- Morning, Larry.

- Good morning, Basil.

- Oh, morning.

Oh, under the weather.

You haven't taken your fizzy health drink

this morning.

- He was on the booze last night.

- I understand.

- Well, what's on this morning?

- Now, let's see, just one job. Five words.

- We should be finished in an hour.

- I'll bet.

- Mac.

- Morning, all, what's the job?

Well, we were just talking about you.

Now, I'll show you,

this is the original storyline.

I see. All right, now. "The...

"The customer enters supermarket,

passes coffee display, stops, moves back,

"moves hand towards Brand A,

stops, and then..."

That's been scrubbed, Mac.

The sponsor thought that...

Even to show Brand A being considered

would be wrong.

- Right. How did you know?

- So?

So then the customer is going to see

a display of our product.

- Now that's been scrubbed.

- You're right.

The sponsor didn't feel that that shows

that our product beats all the others.

- So?

- So, now we have the customer

entering the grocery store

and asking advice about the best coffee.

Don't tell me. And the grocer,

a nice, friendly old man

who acts like everybody's favourite uncle,

looks wise, points to a sign which reads,

guess what?

"Seor Coffee is real good."

- Mac, you must have written the script.

- And that's been scrubbed.

Oh, let's say it's been altered a little,

but the punchline remains the same.

All right. Well, now,

what sort of voice would you like?

I was thinking of something like...

Like this, perhaps.

(IN BURLY TONE)

"Seor Coffee is real good."

Or perhaps...

(IN MEXICAN ACCENT)

"Seor Coffee, it is really good."

Or...

(IN RASPY VOICE)

"Seor Coffee, it is real good."

Very good, Mac. Very good.

But now, the agency just wants a soft sell,

a nice, easy reading.

Ah, I see, you mean, like...

(IN NORMAL TONE)

Seor Coffee is real good.

That's fine. Now, we should be

finished in 30 minutes.

Wanna bet?

(SIGHING)

(HORN TOOTING)

NARRATOR:
The 20th century has

its own particular booby trap.

The synthetic.

We deal in synthetic emotion,

synthetic music,

ready-made opinions

and hand-me-down philosophy.

In this school, girls are taught

the technique of the striptease dancer.

The law of supply and demand

works everywhere.

(MUSIC PLAYING)

To these pupils, there's no art of dancing.

Merely a few rudimentary rules to be mastered

along the road to making a little money.

As these girls come into London

from the provinces and suburbs,

they find a need and they fill it.

The sadness is not in them,

but in a society that demands

the substitute, the synthetic.

In this case, synthetic,

and mostly cynically indifferent eroticism.

These pupils are not at grips

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