The End of the Tour Page #4

18.

33D INT. RESTAURANT/TABLE - BLOOMINGTON - 1996 - LATER 33D

The food is decimated. David is loosening up.

DAVID:

The thing about this tour is... I

would like to get laid out of it a

couple of times, but... Like, people

come up, they kinda slither up during

readings or whatever. But it seems

like, what I want is not to have to

take any action.

LIPSKY:

Like...?

DAVID:

Like, I don’t want to have to say,

“Would you like to come back to my

hotel?” I want them to say, “I am

coming back to the hotel. Where is

your hotel?”

Lipsky laughs.

DAVID:

I can’t stand to look like I’m

actively trading on this sexually.

Which of course I would be happy to

do. In retrospect, it was lucky that

I didn’t.

LIPSKY:

Why?

DAVID:

Basically, it just would have made me

feel lonely.

LIPSKY:

Why lonely?

DAVID:

Because it wouldn’t have had anything

to do with me, it would have just

been...

LIPSKY:

Your fame?

DAVID:

Yeah. Whatever.

19.

LIPSKY:

You’re famous. You can say that.

Except... if they’re responding to

your work, and the work is so

personal... then trading on it is

actually another way of meeting you,

isn’t that right?

A beat. David is impressed by Lipsky’s analysis.

DAVID:

That is so good.

LIPSKY:

Thank you.

DAVID:

This piece’ll really be good if it’s

mostly you. Talk all you want, man,

save me a whole lotta trouble.

Lipsky laughs, sensing his stock has risen, relaxing more

into the rhythm of their conversation.

34 I/E. CAR/COMMERCIAL DRAG - BLOOMINGTON - 1996 - NIGHT 34

David at the wheel, driving Lipsky’s rental. Lights from

fast-food restaurant signs light up their faces. Tape

running.

DAVID:

So this is what a real car feels like.

The one I have is like riding a power

lawn mower.

LIPSKY:

You think being handsome has anything

to do with your success?

DAVID:

(incredulously) What?

LIPSKY:

You are photogenic... You look good in

your author’s photo.

DAVID:

You’d have to come put me down if I

even start thinking that way.

LIPSKY:

Thinking what way? About how books

are sold?

20.

DAVID:

Like, “Do you want to do a Rolling

Stone interview, do you want to do X,

do you want to do Y” worries me that

what I’m doing right now is being a

whore.

LIPSKY:

A whore? Why?

DAVID:

You know, cashing in somehow, or

getting some little celebrity for

myself. That will, from some bizarre

set of misunderstandings, sell more

copies of the book.

LIPSKY:

Right.

DAVID:

You can quote that. Preferably in a

context where I don’t sound like a

total dweeb.

(A beat.)

By the way, are they gonna send Annie

Leibovitz to take pictures?

LIPSKY:

I’m not sure. Possibly.

DAVID:

I know:
You’re a good-looking guy. We

should have ‘em photograph you, and

say you’re me. Maybe I’ll finally end

up getting laid.

Lipsky laughs.

35 INT. 7-ELEVEN - BLOOMINGTON - 1996 - NIGHT 35

Muzak. In the blue-white fluorescent light, David and Lipsky

ad-lib while stocking up on six-packs of Diet Rite, chewing

tobacco, Oreos, etc.

At the cash register, Lipsky prepares to pay.

LIPSKY:

Let me.

DAVID:

You don’t have to pay for my sh*t.

21.

LIPSKY:

It’s not coming out of my pocket...

I’ve got an expense account.

DAVID:

All right, if you insist...

David goes back for more.

36 INT. CAR/COMMERCIAL DRAG - BLOOMINGTON - 1996 - NIGHT 36

Riding through town, the Davids are eating candy liketeenagers on a joyride.

DAVID:

If you ate this stuff all the time,

what would be wrong with that?

LIPSKY:

Except for your teeth falling out andgetting really fat?

DAVID:

Yeah, it doesn’t have any of the

nourishment of real food, but it’s

real pleasurable masticating andswallowing this stuff.

LIPSKY:

Like seductive commercial

entertainment.

DAVID:

Exactly, and what saves us is thatmost commercial entertainment isn’t

very good.

LIPSKY:

What about good seductive commercial

entertainment - like Die Hard?

DAVID:

The first Die Hard? Great film.

LIPSKY:

Brilliant, right?

The best.

DAVID:

37 EXT. DAVID’S HOUSE - 1996 - NIGHT 37

The car pulls up, parks. They get out with the spoils fromthe 7-Eleven. Mid-discourse:

22.

DAVID:

So if the book’s about anything, it’s

about the question of: Why am I

watching all this sh*t? It’s not

about the sh*t, it’s about me. Why am

I doing it? And what’s so American

about what I’m doing?

We hear the dogs barking as David unlocks the door and they

enter the house.

38 INT. DAVID’S HOUSE/LIVING ROOM/KITCHEN - 1996 - CONTINUOUS 38

The dogs run out to do their thing. David puts away the soda

and snacks.

DAVID:

The minute I start talking about this

stuff, it sounds, number one: very

vague. And, two:
really reductive.

LIPSKY:

I don’t think you’re being reductive

or vague at all.

DAVID:

Because it’s like, I don’t have a

diagnosis, a system of prescriptions.

You know? Like, why are we - and by

“we” I mean people like you and me:

mostly white, upper middle class,

obscenely well-educated, doing really

interesting jobs, sitting in really

expensive chairs, watching the best,

most sophisticated electronic

equipment money can buy - why do we

feel empty and unhappy?

LIPSKY:

Kinda like Hamlet. With channel-

surfing.

DAVID:

I’m not saying TV is bad or a waste of

your time. Any more than, you know,

masturbation is bad or a waste of your

time. It's a pleasurable way to spend

a few minutes. But if you're doing it

twenty times a day, if your primary

sexual relationship is with your own

hand, then there's something wrong.

23.

LIPSKY:

At least with masturbation, some

action has been performed, though,

right?

DAVID:

All right, you could make me look like

a real dick if you print this: Yes,

you're performing muscular movements

with your hand as you're jerking off.

But what you're doing is running a

movie in your head, and having a

fantasy relationship with somebody who

isn't real, in order to stimulate a

purely neurological response.

Look:
as the Internet grows in the

next ten, fifteen years, and virtual

reality pornography becomes a reality,

we're gonna have to develop some

machinery, inside our guts, to help us

turn off pure, unalloyed pleasure.

Otherwise, I don’t know about you, but

I’m gonna have to leave the planet.

LIPSKY:

(smiles uncertainly) Why?

DAVID:

Because the technology is just gonna

get better and better. And it's gonna

get easier and easier, and more and

more convenient, and more and more

pleasurable, to be alone with images

on a screen, given to us by people who

do not love us but want our money.

Which is fine. In low doses. But if

that's the basic main staple of your

diet? You're gonna die. In a

meaningful way, you're going to die.

Silence. Lipsky mulls over the gravity of what David has

said. David breaks the portentous silence when he pops a wad

of tobacco in his mouth.

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