Very Bad Things

The guys break. Fisher goes to Liz.

LIZ: will you please call the chair people?

FISHER: I will.

LIZ: Do you love me?

FISHER: Of course.

LIZ: Just call and let me know that your okay.

FISHER: I love you.

LIZ: have a nice bachelor party.

Adam kisses Lois and the kids goodbye. Adam jr. nearly looses his balance in the excitement, Adam catches him.

Boyd starts to get in the drivers seat.

ADAM: Not on your life.

Boyd slides over shotgun, cranks the MUSIC.  Fisher’s the last one in. He slides the big Minivan door shut and they’re off.

Adam looks in the rearview mirror, Lois, Liz, Timmy wave goodbye. Adam Jr. waves one of his crutches.

16   EXT. - FWY - SERIES OF SHOTS - DAY      16

The minivan cruises east: from Santa Monica; through downtown Los Angeles; and the City of Industry. At the turn off, a freeway sign reads; “Las Vegas 385 miles.”

17   INT. MINIVAN - LATER        17

BOYD: You’re a fucking moron.

MICHEAL: It’s my fucking opinion.

ADAM: It’s really a stupid opinion. You have developed an annoying habit of talking for what seems to be no other reason than to hear yourself speak.

MICHEAL: Because my opinion threatens yours, it’s poorly developed?

ADAM: No, because your opinions are idiotic and have nothing to do with what any given conversation is about, which makes 85% of your eagerly injected thought process highly offensive to me.

MICHEAL: Boyd brought up divorce statistics.

BOYD: The hell I did!

MICHEAL: The hell you didn’t!

BOYD: The hell I did!

MICHEAL: You said one in two marriages end in divorce.

BOYD: I never heard that.

FISHER: You said that Boyd.

BOYD: Well, I didn’t mean it.

MICHEAL: You’re an asshole Adam.

ADAM: You’re an asshole.

MICHEAL: Oh, and why am I an asshole?

ADAM: Multiple reasons.

MICHEAL: Name one.

ADAM: I don’t have to...

FISHER: SHUT UP!

DEAD SILENCE. As they ride through the lifeless desert, Fisher dials his cell phone.

FISHER (cont’d): (into phone) Is this Pico Party rents? Can I speak to whomever is in charge of chairs? Chairs.

Boyd checks his watch.

BOYD: Four hours and fifteen minutes. I can make Vegas in 3 and change.

ADAM: I’m not getting a ticket.

FISHER: (on cell phone) Tony? This is Keith Fisher. You’re doing my wedding and I’m calling about the chair situation. Yeah, I’ll hold.

BOYD: Who’s up for making some real money?

ADAM: Don’t even start.

BOYD: You want to hear me out?

MICHEAL: nope.

BOYD: Moore?

MOORE: No I don’t.

BOYD: Fish?

FISHER: Not really. (into phone) Yes, the Fisher wedding chairs...

BOYD: Prison Communication Systems. (no response) An acquaintance friend of mine is professionally involved with a communications outfit in Denver that I just happen to know for a fact is about to be rewarded a very large, exclusive contract to rewire every state prison in Colorado. Yes sir.

Nobody gives a fuck.

FISHER: (into phone) No, I’m holding for Tony. In chairs. Keith Fisher. Okay.

BOYD: That would translate to government guaranteed contract in excess of 35 million dollars.

FISHER: (into phone) We need padded chairs.

BOYD: Or a stock kick of approximately 125% on shares which are currently sitting around $4.38, or, in plain English... 

ADAM: SHUT UP!                     MICHEAL: NO!

BOYD: What is wrong with you people? I’m a helper here.

MOORE: Your investment ideas never work out.

BOYD: That’s the whole point. They rarely work out. But on occasion they do. And when they do, they do big.

MICHEAL: Your ideas never work out.

BOYD: Oh really? Starbucks?

ADAM: That’s one idea.

FISHER: (into phone) No...we want padded chairs...okay?

BOYD: One idea that if you had fucking listened to, you would each be worth approximately 15 million dollars.

ADAM: You can’t keep bringing up Starbucks. That was your only real hit in like 75 tries.

BOYD: I set up Fisher with the broker that found his house. Took care of that one, didn’t I? (beat) Prison Communications.

MORE: I don’t think so Boyd.

BOYD: Fine. Don’t com crying to Boyd. No sir.

He turns away from the guys and stares out the window.     

FISHER (O.C.): Yes, I was holding for Tony in chairs. I have a chair problem. No, I’m not Tony, I need to speak to Tony.

18   EXT. DESERT          18

The minivan cruises through Death Valley in route to Vegas.

19   EXT. RED ROCK NAT’L PARK - CANYON - MAGIC HOUR      19

North of Vegas. The minivan is parked high on a cliff overlooking the city. A couple of Tequila bottles on ice, a case of Heineken. The boys are arming up.

ADAM: All the bullshit aside Fish, we’ve been coming up here for what, eight years?

Boyd, carving a branch with his boy scout knife...

BOYD: More.

ADAM: Over eight years of some of the hardest raging experiences of my life.

MOORE: Good times.

MICHEAL: Drum banging real times.

FISHER: Real times.

ADAM: They’ve all been real times. And as you prepare to enter into a new phase of life, as you prepare for new roles; father, husband, teacher, you will, as I have, come to except the letting go of of old ways. Soon, the mellowing will begin...

BOYD: But not tonight.

MOORE: Not tonight.

ADAM: Tonight we return once again to the cave. Tonight we let the monsters out. We fill ourselves with the spirits of Genghis Kahn, Joe Namath, JFK, Paton, Lombardi, Hemingway...

MICHEAL: (screaming) Franco mother-fucking Harris!

MOORE: Keith Richards, Dean Martin...

BOYD: Jack Kerouback, Herman Melville, Henry Miller and Hunter S. Thompson. I dedicate this evening to feat and to major loathing. So from sun set to sun rise, let me be heard...

Boyd holds the bottle above his head as the guys raise their glasses in a toast.

ALL: He who acts the beast, rids himself of the pain of being a man!

The guys smash the bottles together in an explosion of glass and the golden Tequila.

20   INT. CASINO - Gambling Montage         20

Improvised DIALOGUE.

CARDS fly.

CASH and CHIPS PLAY

FISHER on cell phone calls about the chairs again.

TEQUILA POURS. Shot after shot after shot after shot.

MICHEAL throws back a shot, falls off his stool.

21   CASINO PHONE BOOTH         21

Fisher sneaks a call to liz.

LIZ (V.O.): Hello.

FISHER: Hi.

22   INT. DEN - LIZ’S AND FISHER’S APARTMENT       22

Liz is making place cards, “I Love Lucy” is on the TV.

LIZ: Hi. (teasing) Are you calling from jail?

FISHER (V.O.): Not yet.

LIZ: Well, the night is young. Did you straighten out the chair situation?

FISHER (V.O.): I’m working on it, I’ve made three calls. (beat) I can’t stop thinking about how much I love you.

LIZ: That’s sweet.

FISHER (V.O.): Well I do.

LIZ: Well you should.

FISHER (V.O.): What are you doing?

LIZ: Just a bit of organizing.

FISHER (V.O.): Nesting?

LIZ: Yeah. Nesting.

FISHER (V.O.): I’m mad at you.

LIZ: Go have fun. Not too much.

FISHER (V.O.): I’ll see you tomorrow...

23   CASINO         23

Fisher hangs up, a “Crazy about the girl” smile on his face.

24   INT. FISHER’S SPLIT-LEVEL HOTEL SUITE - NIGHT       24

The MUSIC is LOUD. The boys are super drunk in the swank bachelor party suite.

MOORE stagger-dances on a table.

BOYD AND MICHEAL stand at the wet-bar.

BOYD: I don’t hate women.

MICHEAL: You hate women.

BOYD: False.

MICHEAL: True.

BOYD: Not true.

MICHEAL: You have a King fantasy.

BOYD: I am a lover. In Africa, you can stay king as long as you can service your women every night.

MICHEAL: And what happens when you can’t?

BOYD: (swigs whiskey; looks up) New king.

25   EXT. BALCONY         25

Adam and Fisher.

ADAM: No. No. No. It’s what my father said to me. He said it and he meant it...He said to me...He said, Adam, he said...He told me and I heard him...he said... (struggles to remember) Hell he said so many Goddamn things I can’t remember everything he said for Christsake.

FISHER: Right! That’s exactly what I’m saying. My father said, first of all, I’m your father not your friend. I’m your father.

ADAM: Are you solid with that?

FISHER: No. I think it’s fucked.

ADAM: Then fuck what your father said, cause I’m gonna tell you right now...You’ll know what it’s all about, why you got married and why you love her when you wake up at three in the morning, and the streetlight’s coming through the window and it’s just catching a corner of her face, like a sleeping angel. And her hair smells sweet and she’s your’s. She’s all your’s. Do you see where I’m going here?

26   MICHEAL AND BOYD AT THE BAR       26

speed hitting cocaine.

BOYD: If I’m the king of Israel, I say to myself, King, I say to myself, King...Take a good look around. What do I see?

MICHEAL: Israel doesn’t have a King.

BOYD: Then what do they have?

MICHEAL: They have a president. A Benjamin Yahoo something.

BOYD: I say to myself, look at the map. Look what’s all around you. People who wish bad bad things for you and your people. For thousands of years the Jews are fighting everybody. It used to be they’d throw rocks, then the iron revolution and they would attack with spears. Then the gunpowder revolution. Now they’re shooting fire power back and forth, all day bullets flying, babies getting shot.

MICHEAL: What’s your point?

BOYD: Now if I’m the King of Israel and all these sand niggers are armed to the gills and you know it’s just a matter of time...right? Am I right?

MICHEAL: The Israelis can protect themselves. They got the Mossad thing happening. Mossad’s for real, man. They scalp babies.

BOYD: There’s my point exactly.

MICHEAL: What? What’s your point?

BOYD: Take Mexico.

MICHEAL: What?

BOYD: Look up the chickens, dig up the holy dirt, pack up the wailing crying wall thing they bang their heads on all day long, stick it all on a big fucking tug boat. The whole country picks up and takes Mexico.