Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris

for the directors...

a "quirky" work by e hemingway scholar paul heidelberg .......hem and james dean meeting and buddyize in south florida in 1955..can u imagine?.....also long buddy car ride with talk and thoughts of women, life, art, the corrida...etc..by both......with final scene at sloppy joe's bar in key west.

will attemp to paste...if it doesnt work, pse email paulheidelberg@yahoo.com and i can send to you...........
lms's talk with alan arkin where he told her she was beautiful, and her tears, and talk, etc WAS TOO MUCH

PSE SE MY WEBSITE, WWW.PAULHEIDELBERG.NET FOR POETRY ,

PHOTOS FROM EUOPRE, BIO INFO ETC.
NOTE THIS NEEDS TO BE REFORMATTED.

CIN CIN

THAT IS HOW YOU SPELL THAT NOT CHIN CHIN AS ROLLING STONE MAG DID RECENTLY

I LEARNED THAT IN ITALY

JUST LIKE BOB D..LEARNED SOMETHING ELSE....IN ITALY.

PSE READ BELOW AND DONT MISS THE WORDS AT END................ABOUT THESE TWO CULTURAL AND GENERATIONAL ICONS............

PH
WWW.PAULHEIDELBERG.NET

ERNESTO AND JIMMY (REVISED)
BY PAUL HEIDELBERG
COPYRIGHT U.S. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
REGISTERED WITH WGA # 1070217

WWW.PAUL HEIDELBERG.NET
PAULHEIDELBERG@YAHOO.COM
LOGLINE:
James Dean and Ernest Hemingway meet in Fort Lauderdale in 1955 and drive to Key West in Hemingway's Buick convertible, where they get into a shoot-'em-up with the mean-assed Cajun rumrunner Pierre Puigpelat before the two cultural Icons carouse at Sloppy Joe's Bar.

TRANSCRIPTION INTO SCREENPLAY FORMAT BEGUN IN PARIS -- RUE DE FLEURUS AND RUE MADAME, SIXTH ARRONDISEMENT -- May 3, 2000
NOTE: A GREAT BLUES SOUNDTRACK IS ENVISIONED FOR "ERNESTO AND JIMMY," INCLUDING THE OPENING TUNE, WHICH SHOULD BE REPEATED DURING THE ON THE ROAD TO KEY WEST AND KEY WEST SEQUENCES AND AT THE FILM'S CONCLUSION. THIS PIECE SHOULD BE A TIMELESS TUNE SUCH AS BOB DYLAN'S "MEET ME IN THE MORNING" OR JOHN LEE HOOKER'S "BABY, PLEASE DON'T GO."

FIRST REVISION SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER, 2000, IN SALZBURG, MAINZ, GERMANY AND FORT LAUDERDALE, INCLUDING WORK IN MAINZ ON SEPT. 30, 2000. SECOND REVISION MAY/JUNE 2005, BUBION, GRANADA, SPAIN.

ACT I: FORT LAUDERDALE

INT. KIM'S ALLEY BAR, FORT LAUDERDALE -DAY
March, 1955

Ernesto sauntered into the bar on the balls of his feet, walking his Indian walk, looking admiringly at the beautiful, long, dark wood bar.
ERNESTO
(loudly, to Thomas, a tall, slender man)
Do you know who the hell I am?
THOMAS
No.
ERNESTO
Good. Do you know how to make a double frozen daiquiri?

THOMAS
I can make a frozen daiquiri and double it.

ERNESTO
Do it. I see your bar's name is Kim's Alley Bar. As I just passed through what I would say would be properly identified as an alley, I understand that part of it, but who the hell is Kim?
THOMAS
She's the owner.

ERNESTO
Is she good looking? Is she good looking like the Kraut Marlene?
THOMAS
She's good looking allright.
ERNESTO
Miss Mary's not with me on this trip. If I stay here long enough, maybe I'll meet her.

THOMAS
Maybe.
ERNESTO
The secret to a double frozen daiquiri is easy on the sugar and heavy on the lime.

(Ernesto becomes quiet, watching the barman work. When Thomas had completed putting the ingredients into the metal shaker, and as he was mixing them)

ERNESTO (CONT'D)
I like your little town, from what I've seen. You know I used to chase Kraut submarines out there, just off the coast.
THOMAS
(placing the meticulously made drink in front of Ernesto)
What?

ERNESTO
The Kraut submarines during the war -- they used to be all up and down the coast.

THOMAS
I know. I used to go to the beach and watch the fires on the ships at night after they had been torpedoed. Each time I wondered if the crew got off in time.

ERNESTO

(Speaking as if to explain himself as an outsider at the bar, but being a habitue of bars all over the world, not really feeling necessary to do so)

I'm having my somewhat new, beautiful lily-white 1955 Buick tuned up.
(Thomas walked down the bar and began to clean glasses)

ERNESTO (CONT'D)
That's the sign of a good barman, Thomas, my friend, and I think I can call you a friend as I am a quick judge of character alright, and I liked you right off the bat.

Whether you are talking with customers , or drinking with them, or both, you always want to stay busy.

Tell me Thomas, are you married?

THOMAS
Yes.
ERNESTO
Got any kids?
THOMAS
Two.
ERNESTO
I've got three -- all boys.
(glancing up and down the bar at the empty seats)
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
You make a good drink. Where the hell are all your customers? I'd think you'd have plenty of customers in a bar in Fort Lauderdale in March. They must all be at the beach.
THOMAS
It's not sunny today.
ERNESTO
(laughing loudly)
To a snowbird the weather's balmy, Thomas. Christ, I think I'm starting to feel the rum. Let me tell you some stories as if I were writing, OK?

THOMAS
(leaning on bar, as if working to listen intently)
OK. Shoot.

ERNESTO
Let me start with something I recently saw in your sleepy burg. I saw a house not far from your bar here that seemed more suited to the country than the city. It sat in the middle of several lots and was surrounded by croton bushes. I looked at the red, orange yellow and green colors of the croton leaves against the backdrop of the wintry-looking, grey sky. The red leaves had lighter-colored sections at their centers that seemed to give them life as they shook in the breeze.

Looking at the color of the sky, I was reminded of sitting at a table in front of the CLoserie des Lilas cafe in Paris, watching the light change with the progression of afternoon into evening. I thought about my first wife Hadley, who I swear to God, I sometimes wish I would have never left. We lived above this noisy sawmill on the rue Notre Dame des Champs. And the bastards wondered why I wrote in cafes. I wasn't being pretentious like some of the others -- it was just so much quieter there, or at least it was a less distracting noise -- I preferred the clanking of cups and saucers to the whining and cutting sounds of that saw they worked constantly. Make me another one, Thomas -- I want to keep this going. This is nice. I'm feeling as though I am in my 20s again.

CUT TO:

EXT. BEACH -MOMENTS LATER

LESS THAN A MILE EAST OF KIM'S ALLEY BAR, WHERE A YOUNG MAN WITH WAVY BROWN HAIR AND TORTOISESHELL GLASSES PARKS HIS PORSCHE SPEEDSTER AND TAKES OFF HIS SHOES BEFORE RUNNING TO THE OCEAN, SLOWING IN SPURTS TO ROLL UP HIS JEANS TO HIS KNEES.
HE SITS IN THE SAND NEAR THE WATER'S EDGE, WATCHING THE SURF CRASH WHITE.
JIMMY
(talking loudly to himself)
This is the same ocean I used to swim in on Long Island, when I first got into this fucking business, acting in that goddamned Gide play THE IMMORALIST.

(shouting, after several seconds of deep thought, thinking about the beginning of his acting career)
I need a fucking drink.
CUT TO:
EXT. KIM'S ALLEY BAR-MINUTES LATER

Jimmy parked his Speedster in the space closest to the bar's entrance before he entered the bar (handheld camera follows jimmy, before changing to pan of bar) and, seeing the back of the other customer in the center of the bar, went right, to the last stool. Jimmy had ordered his longneck bottle of Budweiser from Thomas and had downed half of it, drinking from the bottle, before he recognized the large man with the grey hair and the grey beard.

JIMMY
(grabbing his beer and rushing to the side of his literary idol, dropping his butt hard on the next stool, before shouting)

Jesus Christ -- DEATH IN THE AFTERNOON.
ERNESTO
Shit. You know who I am.
JIMMY
Do you know who I am?
ERNESTO
(running his fingers through his beard)
Let's see. I'm usually pretty good with faces. That's it -- Coop was telling me about you. He said Steinbeck loved you in "East of Eden." Said you were the character.
JIMMY
Why didn't you want me to know who you are?
ERNESTO
They can drive you crazy. You'll find out; in fact, you should already know. Anyway, prepare for it to get worse.
(looking at Jimmy's longneck bottle)
I like Budweiser. That's what I drink when I drink beer. Have you ever had a double frozen daquiri?
JIMMY
I've had a daquiri.
ERNESTO
You haven't had anything until you have one of these. Eighteen is my record. Maybe I'll go for it today if I decide to spend the night. Thomas, make this man a double frozen, and tell me, where can a man find a place to stay around here?

THOMAS
You've got the Schubert that's just a couple hundred yards away. Can't beat it. Nice, clean place. All lit up at night with neon -- you can't miss it, either.
ERNESTO
(looking at Jimmy and smiling, saying nothing)
JIMMY
DEATH IN THE AFTERNOON is my favorite book. Death, disability, disfigurement and degradation."

ERNESTO
What?
JIMMY
That's what I get from your book. Death, disability, disfigurement and degradation.
ERNESTO
Well, maybe we'll talk about that later. I'm on my way from Key West to Idaho after visiting my good friend Toby Bruce. What the Hell are you doing here?
JIMMY
(finishing his Budweiser and taking the first sip of his double frozen daiquiri)
I had to get away. I just left. And it's too cold up North.
ERNESTO
I know what you mean about having to get away. Writing can be so draining -- fiction writing, that is. It's so much more draining than writing nonfiction. You're playing God and creating characters and reality, and you're responsible for the creation of all the details of both.

Nonfiction is seldom so draining. Except for the glossary to my bullfighting book you like so much. That was a bitch. Look, you call me Ernesto, OK? That's what my friends in Spain and Cuba call me.
JIMMY
Alright. You can call me Jimmy. That's what my old buddy Bob Pulley back in Fairmount has been calling me all my life.
ERNESTO
Where's Fairmount?"
JIMMY
In Indiana. Where's your hometown?
ERNESTO
I don't think I would call it my hometown, but I was born in Oak Park, Illinois.
JIMMY
Son of a bitch. We're both Midwesterners.
ERNESTO
Salt of the goddamned earth. Drink up, Jimmy. I think we've got some talking to do.
(looking at Jimmy's bottle of Budweiser)
This guy I used to spar with down in Key West loves Budweiser. I took him a case of it yesterday as a present, in fact. I believe in being generous when you've got the money, Jimmy. I just bought a transoceanic radio from a woman who runs a jewelry shop on Duval Street to replace one I recently gave to a friend in Spain.

Anyway, this guy's a black man -- I've known him since he was a teenager, when I lived in Key West in the 30s. He's one of the few men I've met in my life with the cojones to take a punch at me and he's a goddamned lightweight, about half my size -- you know what cojones are, don't you? They're those things down there that make you do crazy things when you smell the right woman and her body perfume drives you crazy and all you can think about is getting into bed with her and getting inside of her. They're the things responsible for the procreation of the species -- in a word, balls.

So I was refereeing this fight at the Key West outdoor arena and had had a few beers. We used to have bi-weekly fights at the arena and I refereed quite a few of them. This guy -- his name's Kermit Forbes, but all the locals call him Shine or Geech -- was working the corner of a fighter who was getting the shit beat out of him. Well I saw he still had some fight in him and he looked like he wanted to continue, so I didn't want to stop the fight.

Well, Shine kept throwing the towel into the ring wanting to stop the fight, but you know in Florida, as in many other states, only the referee can stop the fight. So I'd just take the towel and throw it back out of the ring. The final time I threw it out -- Shine had been standing up on the ring apron and just climbed through the ropes -- and lunged at me, throwing a roundhouse right. I just caught him by the ears and held him that way for a couple of seconds. Hell, he must have been about 18 at the time and he was putting on one hell of a fight.

The sheriff was in attendance that night and wanted to arrest the kid, but I told him that any man who's got enough nerve to take a punch at me is alright, so leave him alone. Shine came to my house on Whitehead Street that night and apologized -- he didn't know who I was; I think he thought I was some old bum, because I used to look pretty wild back in my Key West days: long hair, long beard, old clothes, and all of that -- and the next day we started some sparring sessions and we sparred on and off for a couple of years. We'd box out by the poolhouse where I did all my writing -- near the catwalk that connected my writing room to the main house. There was another fighter named Iron Baby -- his real name was James Roberts -- and he could really give me a tussle, as he likes to tell people to this day. He was the only one of a group of about five fighters who could really stand up to me -- he was the only heavyweight in the bunch and almost as big as I was.

There was also a good fighter who fought under the name Black Pie, but he didn't spar too much because his trainer was afraid I might hurt him. You know I was a pretty good fighter when I was younger -- I sparred for money back in my Paris days when we lived above the sawmill on the rue Notre Dames des Champs and I was struggling like a son of a bitch. All those bastards at the publishing houses and journals called my stories sketchess or contes back then -- they never referred to them as stories, and I nearly cried each time one of them came back through that maildrop.

(Ernesto stopped when he noticed Jimmy swaying back and forth on his barstool)
Are you getting goddamned drunk, or is that a nervous tick?"
JIMMY
(laughing)
Hell, Ernesto, you're a goddamned comedian, too.

ERNESTO
Hell, it sounds like you've got a nervous laugh to go with your nervous tick. Don't get drunk on me like old Scott used to do. He got so drunk off one bottle of wine one time, I thought he was going to die. Had me take his temperature and everything. You know you kind of look like him -- two pretty boys.
JIMMY
(reacting angrily)

Hey, pretty boy yourself. I'm no fucking queer. They think I'm a fucking queer because of that fucking "Immoralist" play.
(Then, after pausing to finish his first double frozen daiquiri)
Even if I was a fucking queer, it's none of their fucking business.
ERNESTO
(admonishing, father-like)
Hey, you watch that language. And they think I use too much profanity in my writing. I wanted to use that word and they wouldn't let me. My sons don't talk like that. How many people your age talk like that?
JIMMY
Not many. I'm the first of a kind. You wait and see.
ERNESTO
You're a cocky so and so. And they say I'm a braggadocio.
JIMMY
I'm going to be remembered as the first of my generation who mattered. The first of the post-World War II generation. The first of my generation to be like you were to your generation. You fucking wait.
ERNESTO
Go ahead and fucking cuss. I don't care. I want to let loose. I can feel it. I may go for the fucking record.
JIMMY
What record?
ERNESTO
The double frozen daiquiri record. Eighteen. Just don't get the bartender mad at you.
(Ernesto raised two fingers and then pointed to his glass, ordering two more double frozen daiquiris from Thomas)
You're not really drunk already are you?
JIMMY
A little, maybe. It hits me at first, and then I can go on drinking.
ERNESTO
It's like that sometimes for me, too. I get a little wobbly after the first three beers and then I can drink all night.

JIMMY
Anyway, they're going to remember me. Someday they'll all be saying fucking this and fucking that, and they they can say, "Jimmy died for your sins. He paid for your fucking freedom."

ERNESTO
You're a goddamned martyr, too. Not to change the subject, but let me change the subject. Thomas is approaching us anyway with our beautiful refills, so the timing is perfect. Booze can be like that at times. It can make everything perfect.
(rhetorically)
Don't you feel how the timing is perfect?

Thomas, tell us about this beautiful bar.
THOMAS
They say it's more than 100 years old. Came from a brothel in New Orleans.
JIMMY
(laughing his laugh again)
A goddamned whorehouse. That's about right. We're getting drunk in a goddamned whorehouse.
ERNESTO
I like these four little glass boxes.

(hopping off his barstool excitedly, before he began to walk the length of the bar, bent over, squinting at the foot-high figurines enclosed in each. Then, as if he were a teacher lecturing a class, he said pedantically)
First, at this end of the bar we have Napoleon. The man who knew too much, or thought he knew too much. Ended up dying on a goddamned island screwing his neighbor's wife.
(walking his Indian walk to the remaining boxes)
Next, we have a Mountie, protector of cold asses and hard dicks, followed by George Washington, who actually was a great man and general, although he was considered incompetent early on before he blossomed late and learned how to be a general.
(at the last of the four boxes, Ernesto stopped suddenly, looking confused. Thomas and Jimmy awaited his next speech, staring at him quietly; after several seconds of thought, Ernesto said, finally,)
Who in the hell is this guy in the grey suit?
(his voice dropping in recognition)
Oh, he must be a confederate soldier. We are in the goddamned South, aren't we?. I lost a lot of ancestors in that goddamned war, on both the Hemingway and Hall sides of my family, Jimmy.
(Ernesto returns to his barstool, drinking half a daiquiri at once, before falling silent. Thomas returned to cleaning glasses.)
JIMMY
(affected by Ernesto's speech, speaking very slowly, somberly)
My grandfather used to tell me Civil War stories his father had told him. It must have been awful.

ERNESTO
Yeah, it was bloody awful alright, but nothing like WW One. Do you know more Frenchmen died between the summer and winter of the first year of that war than all the men killed on both sides of our Civil War during the entire goddamned war?
JIMMY
No, I didn't know that.
ERNESTO
Now that is obscene. And the way many of them died. You can't imagine what that mustard gas did to men, not to mention the goddamned shrapnel. Let me show you something.

(Ernesto rolled up the right leg of his pants to reveal a badly scarred knee)
I always whistle when I'm in pain, and I did a lot of goddamned whistling after I got this leg shot up. But that war got me to Europe for the first time -- I can't complain about that. Have you ever been to Europe. Have you ever been to Paris, Jimmy?
JIMMY
No, but I've wanted to get to Paris ever since I did research for that goddamned Gide play. Tell me about Paris, Ernest.

ERNESTO
I asked you to call me Ernesto. We're in the goddamned tropics, Jimmy -- we're not that far from Cuba. Call me by my Spanish name.
JIMMY
OK, Ernesto.
ERNESTO
Say "S'il vous plais."
JIMMY
What?
ERNESTO
Say "s'il vous plait" first.
JIMMY
You must be the one who's getting drunk. OK -- S'il vous plait.
ERNESTO
OK. What do you want to hear about first? The best bar in the world, or the best park in the world?
JIMMY
The best bar.
ERNESTO
Considering our current location, that is the natural, and correct, choice. The best bar, which also happens to be the best working cafe -- that is, the best cafe to work in if one is a writer trying to do his writing as best he can -- is the Closerie des Lilas. I just call it the "Lilas." I wrote most of THE SUN ALSO RISES in that cafe. Not to be pretentious, but to get away from the noisy sawmill we lived above on the rue Notre Dame des Champs.
(Ernesto stopped to order two more daiquiris from Thomas, raising two fingers again as if he were making the "V for Victory" salute; suddenly a broad smile appeared on his round face and he began speaking again, rapidly and excitedly)
Forget the Lilas for now, Jimmy. First I have to tell you about the Notre Dames des Champs -- the most beautiful little street I've ever seen in my life. And just as the Lilas is still the best bar and working cafe there is anywhere, in my opinion, the Notre Dame des Champs is still the most beautiful little street you'll find anywhere in the world. Verily, Verily, she's got the curves of a beautiful woman and if you want to get from the most beautiful park in the world -- that's the Luxembourg Gardens, of course -- to the best bar and cafe, the Lilas, you take the Notre Dame des Champs, getting to it by walking up the rue de Fleurus first and crossing the Boulevard Montparnasse -- I should say the Boulevard du Montparnasse.

People have pointed out that I've left out the "du" before, but I guess I like it better that way. Anyway, I digress. When you get to the Notre Dame des Champs, you go left and keep walking uphill, curving back and forth until you end up at the Lilas.

With what money we had back in those days, we used to go shopping at a little corner store on the Notre Dames des Champs called "Le Bien Venue." It's still there, in fact. They always had the freshest fruits and vegetables and Hadley used to send me there to get milk for Bumby.
JIMMY
(not understanding)
Bumby?
ERNESTO
My first child.
JIMMY
Oh.
ERNESTO
Yeah, I used to take Bumby in his carriage to the Luxembourg Gardens, down the Notre Dames des Champs -- the same route I just told you about, only going in the opposite direction. I'd hit the rue de Fleurus and hang a right, cross the Boulevard Montparnasse and go all the way to the Luxembourg Gardens. You could rent little sailboats to float in the big fountain in the gardens, and they had ponies for the children to ride. We did both for Bumby when we had the money.

You know, they say I lived off my wives' money in the beginning -- Hadley's and Pauline's. Well, they both had money, but I contributed, too. Hadley did have some money that enabled me to start my serious writing in Paris, though -- it let me quit the journalism I had been writing for the "Toronto Star." Anyway, I paid everybody back. And like I told you already, once you get the money, you should be generous.

Especially if you are an artist or a writer, because you know how difficult it can be. I knew so many of them who finally made it after years of struggle, and then they were cheap sons of bitches about it.

There's nothing worse than being a cheap son of a bitch, Jimmy. You'll burn in hell for sure if you're a cheap son of a bitch. Anyway, I've told the story about killing pigeons in the Luxembourg Gardens by wringing their necks and then hiding them in Bumby's carriage so the police wouldn't see, so we'd have something to take home with us to eat...hell, Jimmy, with these double frozens, and for whatever other reasons unbenownst to us mortals occupying our places on this planet, I feel already like you're an old friend, so I suppose I'll tell you. I just made it up about those pigeons. I didn't really do it.
JIMMY
(in disbelief)
You lied about it?
ERNESTO
I don't think I would state it quite like that. Let me tell you something that's very important, Jimmy. A writer's a bullshitter. You can't bullshit a bullshitter and you've got to be a good bullshitter to be a writer. You've got to be able to tell a story people are going to believe. You know, they tell me I used to jabber a lot and talk to myself when I was a baby -- I mean when I was just a few months old. I guess I got started by being a writer at a very early age -- I must have been bullshitting myself.
(Ernesto roared a laugh that made Thomas' head jerk)
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Shit, Jimmy, I'd better be careful, or our dear friend Thomas might 86 both of us -- you know what that means, don't you? Toss us out on our butts, that's what. I'll just try to keep it down a little bit. Anyway, the rue de Fleurus is where Steinsky used to live.
JIMMY
Who's Steinsky?
ERNESTO
Gertrude Stein. The old Steinsky. I did learn from her, but she got to be too much when she got to be too much like a man. She got to where she believed you had to be a homosexual to be a sensitive artist; that's as bunch of horseshit. Look at Picasso, the greatest painter of the century -- that man's got cojones. I told you what cojones are, remember? Well, that son of a bitch has a pair of them.

Big as a bull's.

That guy goes after the ladies like you wouldn't believe. I love him for that.

(Ernesto paused, and rubbed his forehead with the palm of his hand, before he continued)

ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Speaking about Pablosito and Steinsky, let me tell you a little secret. I guess you could call it a secret. You've told me how much you like DEATH IN THE AFTERNOON, so you'll like this. Do you know who first told me about Pamplona, and the bullfights?
JIMMY
Picasso?
ERNESTO
No, he's Spanish, of course, but it wasn't him. It was Steinsky. Good old Gertrude. She's the one who told me I needed to get my butt down to Pamplona for the fiesta and the bullfights. During her Saturday night soirees at 27, rue de Fleurus, she used to tell me about her exploits down there. After hearing the way she described things, I had to go.

But back to needing to be a bullshitter to be a writer, before I forget, let me tell you something else you need to be a writer -- you've got to be one hell of an egotist to be a writer or an artist. That goes with your man Gide, and his work "The Egoist," doesn't it?

Anyway, you've got to have a hell of an ego to roll with the punches all these sons of bitches are constantly throwing at you. Especially in the beginning, when the bastards have you starving, no matter how good you are. You've got to have a monstrous goddamned ego to put up with it all, to keep believing in yourself and your art.

(Ernesto then paused for about thirty seconds, before he continued)
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
You know what, Jimmy. You know what we should do?

JIMMY
What
ERNESTO
Let's drive to Key West.
JIMMY
Key West, Jesus. We're too drunk to drive anywhere.
ERNESTO
No, we'll rest up here first in this modest burg at the Schubert our helpful bartender already told us about. We'll get started in the morning. Christ, I just left Key West, and Toby, but what the hell. You've got to see Key West, and you've got to see it right.

(Ernesto leaned over and whispered into Jimmy's ear)
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
I don't want to offend Thomas -- the man makes a pretty good drink -- but just wait until you taste the double frozen
daiquiris my man Skinner makes at Sloppy Joe's. He's almost as good as my favorite bartender at the Lilas in Paris.
JIMMY
Tell me about the Lilas, Ernesto. You didn't tell me about the Lilas yet.
ERNESTO
Oh yeah. Guess I got sidetracked. First, let's make our arrangements for tonight.
(calling out loudly)
Thomas, do me a favor and call this Schubert place and get us two singles for the night.
THOMAS
Alright.
ERNESTO
Remind me I've got to give him a good tip, Jimmy. OK, so let me tell you about the Closerie des Lilas. It was right up the crooked Notre Dame des Champs from our flat above the sawmill -- couldn't have takem me more than two or three minutes to get there.

Anyway, it had great tables and chairs set outside where I wrote in good weather and banquettes and chairs and tables inside where I could keep warm in the winter. Outside, or inside, for the most part, you had one of the things you need most as a writer.

JIMMY
What's that?

ERNESTO
Privacy. I used to find that the people who went to the Dome and Select down the Boulevard Montparnasse were always showing off -- they were more interested in being seen than in being with their friends and enjoying themselves. At the Lilas, it was just the opposite, and it was a good place to work.

And you know what's funny? Here we are 30 years later and it's still the same. If you're by yourself, or with friends, and want to enjoy yourself rather than show off, go to the Lilas -- that's the place.

Anyway, back in the 20s there was one barman in particular, Jean-Louis, who was the best I've ever seen. Watching him work was like watching a magician -- so graceful with the hands. Everybody used to go there, and they still do. It used to be Pound, Modigliani, Picasso; hell, Gershwin used to play the damned piano. The place is big now with the Existentialists -- Sartre is a regular. He's a friend of mine -- a fellow scribe.

The restaurant is emphasized more than it used to be, but it's still a great place. They have great fresh seafood and they still have a piano.
(after gazing off wistfully)
We'll have two more Jimmy, and then we'd better find something to eat, so we can get up early. Does that sound alright?"
JIMMY
(still rocking on his stool)
It's alright with me.
ERNESTO
What are you driving?
JIMMY
A Porsche.
ERNESTO
That sounds too small to me. I'll do the driving; I've got a nice big Buick. We'll leave your car here so Thomas can keep an eye on it and you can pick it up on the way back. We've got to come back this way, Jimmy; there's only one way.

CUT TO:

EXT. SECOND FLOOR ROOM AT THE SCHUBERT -NIGHT

after a meal of pork chops with white rice and black beans and Key Lime pie for dessert, Ernesto and Jimmy sit outside their second floor rooms in comfortable lawn chairs, with a cooler filled with a case of Budweiser packed in two bags of ice Ernesto had bought at a liquor store. Their rooms overlook a swimming pool, and further, a beautiful canal.
ERNESTO
(sounding very contented)
This is the life, Jimmy. You saw that I gave Thomas a ten dollar tip, didn't you?
JIMMY
Yeah, I saw. I didn't like you telling him my Porsche was his if we didn't make it back, though. Don't make jokes about my car. That's my baby.

ERNESTO
Yeah, I know what you mean. I love my Buick and have loved every other car I've ever owned. Anyway, about the tipping -- I learned that when I was about your age, living in Europe.

I always liked that part about going back home to France after being in Spain -- you could always win a friend with a good tip. They'd remember you the next time -- that's your number one rule in France, Jimmy: always leave a good tip. It also means you respect their hard work.

JIMMY

(as if he were listening to a teacher in high school, or a professor in college)

OK.
ERNESTO
Now for rule number two: when you are in Florida, always buy enough ice for the beer. Especially in the summer, when it's so damned hot and humid. I've said I'd rather eat monkey shit that die in Key West in the summer, and I really mean it. God, it can get hot.

I went to a party a friend of mine gave in Key West -- it was in the goddamned winter, even -- and he didn't have his beer chilled properly. That's an unforgivable sin. Christ, we aren't the bloody British are we? We want our beer cold. Anyway, everybody complained -- not to his face, of course -- about how warm the beer was. He had these huge garbage cans he had bought for the occasion filled with different brands of beer, but he hadn't thought about getting enough ice.
(as they drank, Jimmy became even more quiet. They both seemed mesmerized by the beautiful view of the canal, as it reflected the lights from the buildings on either side of it, and reflected the lights of small fishing boats that ran North and South, their motors barely audible, peaceful. After several minutes of silence, Ernesto said:)
ERNESTO (CONT'D)

Since my first days as a writer in Paris, when I went from being a journalist to being a writer, I always said I was trying to write as Cezanne had painted. Take a look at the Schubert neon sign being reflected in the water, the pink and blue colors from the sign with the yellow from the streetlight below them. It would be easy enough to say those colors "shimmered" in the water, but that's too trite, even if it might be correct. Look at the beauty of it, and the real reflected into another world, and think about all the things you could say about it.

JIMMY
Can't you just enjoy it?
ERNESTO
You can enjoy it, but you also want to record that enjoyment, to preserve it so someone in the future will understand the enjoyment that you had. If you're really good, it will be fresh years from now -- when someone reads it, it will be as if it were written the day before.
(after a pause of a minute or more)
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
But back to the more mundane, Jimmy. If there is one thing I learned from living in Key West for ten goddamned years -- it's getting ready to rain. You can feel the humidity in the air. When you feel the humidity like this, it's going to rain, even if it looks only partly cloudy like it does now -- you just wait.

(within minutes they are watching, and listening to, a torrential downpour)

ERNESTO (CONT'D)
When it rains like this, I always remember how an old Conch I knew described a Florida rainstorm: "Like a cow pissing on a flat rock." A storm like this lets you know how insignificant, how inconsequential, we are. We can't do a damned thing about it. It's a little like being in a hurricane. We are powerless to do anything to change it.

ACT TWO: ON THE ROAD TO KEY WEST

Note: Much of the footage, and resultant film time in Act Two will be shots of the drive to Key West without dialogue; various views of Ernesto and Jimmy and the Buick speeding down the Overseas Highway, with background music such as late 1940s Blues tunes by such musicians as Lightnin' Sam Hopkins and John Lee Hooker.
CUT TO:
EXT. ON THE ROAD TO KEY WEST - NEXT DAY
with the top down on a brilliantly sunny day, Ernesto drove the big Buick and Jimmy road shotgun as they headed South down U.S. 1. Both are groggy and say little at first; Jimmy seemed bored as they drove trough Miami. But after they passed Homestead and Florida City, and the two-lane highway took them through the first stretches of the Keys, he perked up, alternating between throwing his head back and resting it on the seat to soak up the sun, to gazing East and West in amazement at the expanse of water on either side of them, the Buick slicing this beautiful merging of blue sky and blue-green water that at the horizons joined sea and air into one, transforming the elements.

JIMMY
(very excitedly)
Holy Shit! This is beautiful.
ERNESTO
Didn't I tell you this would be something, Jimmy boy. When I first moved to Key West in the 20s, you didn't have this road. Hell, they didn't even have the railroad until the 30s. This is some sight, isn't it?

JIMMY
Sure as hell is. It's like a huge Indiana cornfield, but you have the ocean instead of corn. I always liked the ocean.

ERNESTO
You've got the Atlantic on the left, and the Gulf of Mexico on the right. Islamorada is a good place to fish because you can go for fish like dolphin and marlin in the Atlantic, and snapper and bonefish back in the Gulf. Maybe we'll do some fishing down in Key West. I wish old Bra Saunders was around.
JIMMY
Who's Bra Saunders?
ERNESTO
An old guy I used to go fishing with all the time. Bra, Sloppy Joe Russell and myself -- we all did our share of fishing on my boat "Pilar," let me tell you.
JIMMY
(exhilarated by the landscape)

Tell me some more about Paris, Ernesto.
ERNESTO
(yelling, with almost the entire force of his voice to be heard above the road noise and the roar of the wind blowing through the car)

Alright. I don't think I ever finished telling you about the Lilas. I finished my first novel, THE SUN ALSO RISES, one morning sitting at a table inside at the Lilas. I loved working in that cafe. As I already told you, the other cafes in the Montparnasse area were too boisterous, too show-offy. I'd drink cafe cremes when I was writing during the day at the Lilas.

At night, I drank biere pression -- fresh draft beer. I also drank biere pression at the Brasserie Lipp -- that's a place down the Boulevard Montparnasse from the Lilas. The Lipp has the best choucroute you'll find anywhere in the world. Do you know what choucroute is?

JIMMY
No.
ERNESTO
Well, then, I'll tell you. It's the freshest sauerkraut you can imagine, piled high on a plate with ham, sausages, and mashed potatoes. It's an Alsatian specialty -- you know from places like Strasbourg in the section of France that's near Germany. I'd drink the draft beer in half-liter goblets at the Brasserie Lipp, always served good and cold. Hell, I'm getting thirsty talking about it. Hold on a minute.

CUT TO:

EXT. ERNESTO PULLS THE BUICK OFF THE TWO-LANE HIGHWAY ONTO THE GRAVEL SHOULDER - MOMENTS LATER
Ernesto opens the trunk and returned with a towel, four beers and bread and cheese. He spreads the towel over the hood of the car to serve as table for their brunch.
ERNESTO
How about a little bread and cheese?
JIMMY
Alright. Christ, it smells like dead fish around here.
ERNESTO
The smell of the ocean, my boy. Dead fish, flotsam and jetsam. Look at all that seaweed over there on the shore.
(Ernesto pulled a Buck Rancher pocketknife from his right pocket and opened it to cut a small wheel of brie cheese into several large pieces)
I had to search like hell to find this cheese in Florida, Jimmy, but I think it's worth it. I love the French cheeses, and the butter -- sometimes I like the butter from Normandy and the Charente regions more than the damned cheese. Do you know what the Charente is, Jimmy?
JIMMY
No, tell me.
ERNESTO
It's down in Southwest France, on the way to Spain, about 80 miles north of Bordeaux, where the great wine comes from. Well, the Charente is where the great brandy cognac comes from. It's the best brandy in the world. Hadley -- that's my first wife, Bumby's mother -- and I spent a couple of days there in a little village named Segonzac that's near the town of Cognac. The two big towns in the region are Jarnac and Cognac -- that's where the name cognac comes from.

Anyway, Segonzac is right in the middle of the best growing region there, where the finest cognacs come from. I believe there are six altogether, but Segonzac is the one considered far superior to the others; it's called the Grande Champagne. But it's got nothing to do with champagne, the wine. Champagne is also a French word that refers to open countryside -- that's where the name comes from.

So we stayed out in the country with the father of a friend of mine from Paris. They had an old still that ran on coal and wood, and I helped the old man stoke the fire, and even helped him roll these cognac barrels around. I tell you Jimmy, it was like watching a goddamned ballet watching this old fellow roll these barrels -- they're big, 350 liters, and he couldn't have weighed more than 160, about the size of a middleweight, but he was moving these barrels around like they were nothing.

You getting bored?
JIMMY
(taking a long drink from his beer before grimacing))

Boy, that's good and cold. No, keep going.
ERNESTO
(again taking on the air of a teacher or professor)

OK. All cognac is double distilled and the wine they make from it tastes terrible -- very acidic, but after they distill it and age it in French oak, it's the most complex, tasteful spirit in the world. You can't beat it. Remind me, and I'll buy you a snifter full at Sloppy Joe's. Oh Christ, Jimmy, I've got to tell you about this and then I'll tell you more about Paris, I promise. This beer is taking the edge off the hangover -- I can feel it.

You know I'm living in Cuba now at my Finca Vigia outside of Havana. Well, we went out one day on a salvage run on Pilar and got all this cognac off a wrecked ship. Having lived in France, I knew how valuable cognac was, but I wasn't familiar with this particular brand. That night, a bunch of us invented a technique called "carburation," where you suck in air at the same time you're taking down the cognac, and the result is just something else. Anyway, we passed out this cognac all over my part of the island this one night and then found out this stuff was ancient.

It had been aged so long, and was of such a high quality, that it was worth a fortune, but we had every Cubano we ran across drinking the stuff with us a la "carburation." They loved it.

(Ernesto took a sip of his beer and sighed).

ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Back to Paris, and Hadley and Bumby. We had great times in Paris, and in Spain, Switzerland and Germany, on vacations. The Krauts were hurting so bad after the war that after the first week of a two-week trip, we had more money than we had started with. I mean inflation was so bad, that the money had inflated since we had arrived in the country and what we had left was worth more than what we had started with.

We might have been hungry some of the time in Paris, but we sure as hell were happy. I guess, in part, because we were young. We had our whole lives in front of us. Sort of like you, Jimmy. You've got your whole life ahead of you.

JIMMY
(throwing his head back as he ran his fingers through his long, reddish-brown hair)

Yeah, I've got my whole life ahead of me. Go on. You tell me about Paris, so I'll know about it when I get there.

ERNESTO
Hell, they'll all love you there, Jimmy. They'll treat you like a king, just wait and see. Wait until you see how many people recognize you. In France, and especially in Paris, they respect artists and writers; I suppose you're enough of a serious actor to warrant the term "artist."

I sure as hell don't use the word loosely. Anyway, Paris is the one city in the world for all artists and writers,
believe me.

JIMMY

Why's that?
ERNESTO
In this country, most people could give a shit about aesthetics and artists and writers, but not there. There is so much culture, tradition and history in Paris,

Balzac, Hugo, and all the great visual artists, including friends of mine from the 20s like Picasso and Modigliani. Whenever you happen to be there, there's all the tradition of art that was there before you were; there's all the art going on at the time you are there, and there is all the art that will be going on long after you've gone, you can be damned sure about that.

There's so much that you take with you from Paris. That's why I call it "A Moveable Feast."

JIMMY
A what?
ERNESTO
"A Moveable Feast." A feast that you always carry with you. Anyway, Hadley and I were in heaven. She played a beautiful piano and used to play it for friends, French and American. After the war, the dollar was so strong in France that a little money went a long way. We had a little money to start with, and I was getting paid for freelance work I was doing for "The Toronto Star." Hell, after a while, they were sending me all over the place -- they even had me go to Italy to interview Mussolini. They were supposed to send me to Russia, but it fell through.

Well, I left the journalism work to write seriously. My first book ever published was published in Paris and it was indeed a slim volume -- it was called THREE STORIES AND TEN POEMS and that's about what was in it. My first long fiction was THE SUN ALSO RISES. I learned how to write a novel writing that one. Before I started it, I didn't know if I could write a novel.

You know, the goddamned critics. Jesus Christ, that's the first novel I ever wrote and some are saying it's the best I ever wrote. They think it's a hell of a lot better than ACROSS THE RIVER AND INTO THE TREES, that's for damned sure. They're crucifying me for that book. Of course, I finally got the Pulitzer in '52 for Santiago's story, and last year I was kissed by the most exalted Bitch Goddess when they gave me the Swede's prize, the Nobel. Jesus, I am going on like the Old Man lecturer. You haven't had enough yet?

JIMMY
No, tell me more about Paris -- I want to hear more about Paris. I'll take another beer, too.
ERNESTO
(handing Jimmy another Budweiser as he opened one for himself)
Alright. When you get to Paris, Jimmy, you've got to head to the Sixth Arrondisement.
JIMMY
The sixth what?
ERNESTO
The Sixth Arrondisement. Paris is divided into what are called arrondisements; they're like the boroughs in New York City.
JIMMY
(understanding)
Oh.
ERNESTO
Anyway, they're 18 of them -- something like that. The sixth Arrondisement is where most of what I've been telling you about is. That's where Steinsky used to live at 27, rue de Fleurus, that's where the Brasserie Lipp and the Lilas are, that's where our flat above the sawmill on the Notre Dame des Champs was. Old Steinsky, she hated Joyce. Hated him with a passon. I think she was a little jealous. They were both experimenting with language and Joyce got all the credit.

You never saw Joyce at any of Steinsky's Saturday night soirees, that's for sure. You know, everybody thought he was a starving artist, but the son of a bitch always had money. He and his wife and his kid ate in one of the best restaurants in Paris every night for ten years. He used to go to Sylvia Beach begging for money, and she'd have to go to her parents sometimes to get it for him. She's the first one to publish ULYSSES, of course. Then he screwed her over later and took it to another publisher -- and that guy made all the money off it.

Joyce also had one of those so-called anonymous patrons who regularly gave him money. Some woman, I hear, but I've never gotten her name. Anyway, Joyce was a great writer, but he got his share of help along the way.

(after pausing for several seconds)
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Well, I guess we all got our share of help along the way. Sylvia sure helped me. A lovely gal, Sylvia. Back when we first got to Paris, I'd gotten to her bookstore, which was also sort of a lending library. Hell, I didn't even have the money sometimes to pay for all the books I wanted to read to help me become a writer, so she would let me check them out for free. I read a lot of the Russian writers at that time -- Tolstoy, Turgenev, and a few others.

Anyway, when you get to Paris, head straight for the Sixth Arrondisement. You can stay in a little hotel I stayed at last year that a French painter friend told me about. It's called the Hotel Perreyve and it's located at 63, rue Madame, where the rue Madame intersects the rue de Fleurus. Miss Mary and I stayed in a wonderful room, Chambre 35.
JIMMY
Who's Miss Mary?
ERNESTO
Christ, I haven't told you about Miss Mary yet, have I. Miss Mary's my fourth -- and final -- wife; I swear. She's off on one of her trips, and I'm off on one of mine. Sort of like a boy's night out, but I'm taking an extended excursion. Anyway, this Room 35 is a corner room that has big French doors and balconies that overlook the rue Madame and the rue de Fleurus.

I got a real kick out of it, because I could stand out on the balcony above the rue de Fleurus and look down on the same street I walked so many times as a young man in the 20s. The hotel is just a couple hundred feet from the Luxembourg Gardens. We were there in April -- April in Paris -- and you could look left into the gardens with all the horse chestnut trees in bloom and then look to the right up the rue de Fleurus towards the place where Steinsky used to live. She lived just around a bend in the road that passes out of your sight from the hotel room. Christ, she continued to live there for more than ten years after I stopped going to her Saturday night gatherings. I heard the landlord booted her out in '38 to make room for a nephew who had just gotten married, and she was madder than hell.

There's a great little restaurant on the way from the Hotel Perreyve to Steinsky's old home called the Restaurant du Luxembourg. It's got Toulouse-Lautrec wallpaper and a great wine selection, considering it's just a little bistro sort of place. I had gotten burned the day before on a beaujolais that was over the hill that I had bought at a corner market, so I was glad that Miss Mary and I were able to enjoy a great, fruity beaujolais to go with our steak frittes. If you're ever at a loss for what to order in France, Jimmy, just ask for a steak frittes -- those great French fried potatoes served with a piece of steak.

ERNESTO LOOKED OUT OVER THE SEA AND REMEMBERED A RECENT TRIP HE TOOK WITH MISS MARY TO SALZBURG; HE HAS A FLASHBACK TO SITTING WITH MISS MARY ON A PARK BENCH NEAR THE SALZACH RIVER AND MOZART'S BIRTHHOUSE THEY HAVE VISITED MINUTES EALIER.
SCENE IS SPRINGTIME IN SALZBURG, WITH SNOW COVERING MOST OF THE MOUNTAINS THAT SURROUND SALZBURG AND THE SALZACH RUNNING SWIFT WITH WATER FROM MELTING SNOW.
CUT TO:
EXT. PARK BENCH, SALZBURG -AFTERNOON
ERNESTO
Christ, all the damned tourists.
MISS MARY
You're a tourist too, Papa, and don't you forget it.
ERNESTO
You know better than that -- you know I'm a traveler, not a tourist. There is a definite distinction and you know it, Pickle.
MISS MARY
Call me that again, Papa.
ERNESTO
Call you what?

MISS MARY
Call me Pickle.
ERNESTO
(putting his arm on her shoulder and kissing her hard on the mouth)
Pickle, my prettiest Pickle, my prettiest Pickle in the entire world and universe. Christ, I think we died and went to heaven, Pickle. We have this lovely view, we just visited the birthplace of that little fart genius who must have been so tormented early in life -- he's sitting on the laps of royalty, literally, before he's 10 and then 20 years later most he encounters are treating him like shit.

And I mean royal shit.The Prince Archbishops who were running this little burg and the surrounding area nearly had him hung -- on more than one occasion.

He wouldn't kiss their asses. He was better than they were and he knew it.

Just like his contemporary Beethoven. You know Mozart met Beethoven when Beethoven was quite young and Mozart said, "You keep an eye on him -- he's going somewhere." Anyway, Beethoven and Goethe, my equivalent, the writer, were walking in a public garden and Goethe gets out of the way of two nobleman, and bows to them obsequiously -- and that's a damned twentyfive dollar word if I ever heard one.

Anyway, Beethoven does neither and tells him, "Goethe, always remember this. There are hundreds of them. There are only two of us."

Herr Mozart has this one piece of music none other than Albert Einstein raved about, saying it has no counterpart in music. I do think I agree with Herr Einstein.

But those tourists we were nearly overrun by: They're like my mother -- my mother who spent a fortune on that damned music room. She loved Mozart for all the wrong reasons.
MISS MARY
(after a huge, loud laugh)
That was a good one, Papa.
ERNESTO
That was a good one, wasn't it? But that is more than a good compliment coming from you, Pickle, my harshest critic.

He kisses her again, this time encircling her with his arms before he pinches the nipple of her left breast.
MISS MARY
(embarrassed)
Papa. You watch yourself. A Prince Archbishop might come strolling by. Then what would you do?
ERNESTO
You wonder what I would do, my sweet-nippled Pickle. I would grap your tit again and tell the son of a bitch this is the finest breast of the finest woman in the world, and if you get an inch closer to it, I'll have your cojones on a tray -- make it a silver one.

Celibate, yeah these guys were celibate. Remember the pretty Mirabell Gardens we visited yesterday, with all the flowers?
MISS MARY
Yes, I remember them, Papa.
ERNESTO
Well those beautiful gardens were built by one Wolf Dietrich for his mistress -- who bore him 10 children.
MISS MARY
Papa, you're kidding me.
(incredulously)
Ten children?
ERNESTO
Yeah, 10 children. Can you believe it? He must have been screwing all the time. Took a little time out between screws to say a mass or two.
MISS MARY
Don't be sacrilegious, Papa.
ERNESTO
I'm not being sacrilegious. He was the one being sacrilegious. Actually, screwing is very religious, as we both know. What he was was hypocritical.
MISS MARY
Yeah, he sounds like a hypocrite to me.
ERNESTO
Speaking of screwing, Miss Mary, why don't we walk back to our hotel and inspect each other?
MISS MARY
Yeah, you're some inspector, alright.
ERNESTO
When I've got my sweet Pickle to inspect, I'm one hell of an inspector.
Ernesto lifts Miss Mary off the ground playfully and carries her several steps before putting her down and encircling her again with his arms before kissing her hard again.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
I'm serious about going back to the hotel, and going to bed, Pickle.
MISS MARY
(grabbing the left cheek of Ernesto's butt hard with her right hand)
I know you're serious.
CUT TO:
EXT. HOTEL FUGGERHOF -LATER

Shot of a large yellow building atop a hill. In foreground shot of Ernesto and Miss Mary climbing the narrow paved road that leads to it.

CUT TO:
INT. HOTEL FUGGERHOF-MOMENTS LATER

After entering the hotel's arched entranceway, Ernesto and Miss Mary are greeted by the Hotel Fuggerhof's gregarious owner, Herta.

HERTA
Good day to the Hemingways. Did you have a nice walk?
MISS MARY
A wonderful walk, thank you.
ERNESTO
A wonderful walk, indeed, Herta. Quite a nice little burg you have here. You and Herr Mozart. I only wish there would have been so much respect for him while he was alive.

They treated him so badly when he was alive and now look at all the money they make off him and his music.

HERTA
Yes, they make money off him, but now he is truly appreciated for what he was. And you know it isn't only recently that he is so respected. His wife Constanza began making money off him and his work shortly after he died. She has been criticized for this.

Would you believe she outlived Mozart by 50 years. Fifty years exactly. She died in 1841 and is buried in a Salzburg cemetary as is Mozart's father Leopold.

So....and the year after Constanza died, the city erected the huge bronze statue of Mozart in the Mozartplatz that you still see today.

So...don't let me keep you. So nice to talk with you again.

MISS MARY
So nice to speak with you again.
ERNESTO
Great to talk with you again, Herta.

Ernesto and Miss Mary climb a beautifully carved wooden staircase to reach the hotel's second floor.

(As they are climbing the staircase)
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Great gal that Herta. Great gal. And that accent reminds me of the Kraut, Marlene. You know after two world wars when I was involved fighting the Germanic tribes, it is more than strange to visit the Germanic countries and find such nice people. I've always liked them, back to my skiing trips I took to Austria in my old Paris days.

MISS MARY
Yes, it's strange, Papa. But people are much nicer in times of peace, that's for sure.

ERNESTO
Yeah, that's for sure, Pickle. Let's get moving.

Follow with camera as Ernesto and Miss Mary enter their room
18.
THE ROOM IS FILLED WITH HAND-PAINTED ANTIQUES, INCLUDING THE BED ITSELF. A HUGE ARMOIR IS FILLED WITH SHIRTS AND PANTS ERNESTO HAS THROWN INTO IT HAPHAZARDLY.

ERNESTO (CONT'D)
OK, Pickle, hop into the sack, we've got work to do.
CUT TO:
INT. HOTEL ROOM -LATER

Ernesto is laying in bed with Miss Mary laying with her head on his chest.
ERNESTO
Am I still good at it, am I still good considering I am an old fart, Pickle?
MISS MARY
You're still good, Papa; how about me?

ERNESTO
You've always been the best, Miss Mary. Christies, like I said before, I think we've died and gone to heaven.
Just look at those beautiful mountains we've got right outside the window. You can't beat that.
Camera shows view past balcony to shot of green-forested mountain.
MISS MARY
Papa, you love me don't you?
ERNESTO
What kind of talk is that? Of course I love you.

MISS MARY
I mean, you've had so many wives and so many women before you met me. I feel like a name at the bottom of a list. You love me more than you loved the others, don't you?

ERNESTO
Of course I do, Pickle. And I don't know what I would have done if you wouldn't have come along. A real savior you were.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
(after he leaned over to kiss each of Miss Mary's nipples)

You know I wouldn't mind being buried in a place like this. Lots of mountains, clean air, clean streams that are great for fishing, snow every winter and spring. Sort of like Idaho.

Guess that is what I would want.

MISS MARY
What would you want, Papa?
ERNESTO
To be buried in Idaho. You remember that Pickle -- that's where I want to be buried, in Idaho. Promise me you will remember.
MISS MARY
I'll remember, Papa, but why on earth are you thinking of something like that at a time like this?
ERNESTO
I guess because we just had the petite morte. So I'm thinking of the grand old morte. Ernesto tickles Miss Mary on her side and they both chuckle.
MISS MARY
Tell me some more about Mozart, Papa. I never knew you were such a fan.
ERNESTO
He had an outstanding memory -- something I have also been fortunate to have because it is such a necessity if you are going to write well.

Yeah, I've got some memory alright, but I don't think it even approaches Wolfgang's. When he was six or seven he attended a lengthy concert.

Afterwards, he went home and wrote down every note from memory.

MISS MARY
You're kidding, Papa.
ERNESTO

No, I swear, Pickle. Every note. He was composing his own symphonies before he was 10, and some are very strange because they are not juvenile -- they have some of the same elements that you find in his works from much later in life.

Because he was such a child prodigy he spent most of his youth traveling to the capitols of Europe with his father Leopold and his sister Nannerl. Some think all this traveling by coach had something to do with his early death at age 35. He was often sickly as a child and all that traveling, and the cold and dirt he had with the travel, couldn't have helped his health.

If you look at a score by Beethoven, you can see how much he struggled with every note. He reworked constantly, which, of course, is how I write.

Well, Mozart was the opposite. Perhaps because of all the traveling he did early in life, when it would be difficult to write as a bumpy coach was moving, he kept all his work in his head.

MISS MARY
What do you mean, Papa?
ERNESTO
He composed the entire work in his head. When he put it to paper, he put it to paper all at once -- no corrections; every note was perfect, just as he had composed it so perfectly in his head.
His astounding facility with all facets of music is why he was such a hit with royalty.

Can you imagine? Here is little six-year old Wolfgang performing on the piano as if he were an adult, and doing tricks on the piano to boot.

He often performed duets with his sister Nannerl.

Many think they if she would have had the attention from Leopold that Wolfgang got, that she too could have been a great composer. But women didn't have that option in those days.

MISS MARY
They don't have that option now.
ERNESTO
What's that Pickle?

MISS MARY
How many women composers do you hear about in our time. Or painters or writers...it's always been easier for a man.

ERNESTO
I suppose so, Pickle, but it was really that way back in Mozart's time. But whatever their gender, once they grew up both were out of fashion.

It was much easier for Wolfgang to earn money as a musical child star than as a serious adult composer and musician. He certainly did struggle, but don't forget he had his share of fame along the way.

When he died in Vienna in 1791, 5,000 people turned out in Prague to mourn for the lost genius whose music they so loved. Some of his greatest successes came in Prague.

There is a shrine to him in Prague called Villa Bertramka. He was very good friends with the couple who owned the villa and whenever he visited Prague, he was their guest.

Two months before he died he visited Prague and the Villa Bertramka with Constanza. There you have that traveling again -- he was constantly traveling throughout his life, and if you think traveling today is difficult, imagine what it was back in his day.

Anyway, one of Mozart's most beautiful works is his Mass in C Minor, which he composed in honor of his marriage to Constanza. He promised her if she would marry him he would compose a mass in her honor, and he kept his word and did it.

Constanza Weber, who was related to the composer Weber, was a singer and she sang the soprano part at the Mass's premiere.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
He wrote two of his greatest symphonies -- the 40th and 4lst, and the other the 39th -- within a three month period. It is astounding, really, when you think of the time composers such as Beethoven and Mahler took for such projects.

If you listen to the power and majesty of the 41st, appropriately called the Jupiter, I think you can see he had something of a premonition that it would be his last symphony.

He completed these works several years before he died, but I really get a sense that he knew they would be his last.

MISS MARY
But Mozart was a prolific composer, wasn't he, Papa?

ERNESTO
Yes, very. He worked on his operas and other works right up until the end. The operas were often his bread and butter -- that's how he earned his living.

You know Mozart was the first freelance composer. He had difficulty kissing up to those he needed to kiss up to to get the patronage he needed to have a steady income.

But old Wolfgang wasn't the pauper he so often is said to have been. He owned horses, usually had servants and even liked to gamble a little at billiards.

A strange soul he was, Pickle...the clarity of his music...the depth of his music.
MISS MARY
I know he traveled often as a child, Papa, but he must have loved these mountains when he had time to be here to enjoy them.

ERNEST
I'm sure he did, Pickle. I sure loved them yesterday. Who would have thought you would find something like that so close to a city of this size.
CUT TO:
EXT. BICYCLE PATH - DAY

ERNESTO AND MISS MARY ARE CYCLING ON A GRAVEL PATH THAT RUNS ADJACENT TO THE SALZACH RIVER, ON THE OUTSKIRTS OF SALZBURG. ERNESTO IS IN THE LEAD, WITH MISS MARY CLOSE BEHIND.

TO CAMERA RIGHT IS THE SWIFT-FLOWING SALZACH; IN CALMER SECTIONS, MALLARD DRAKES AND HENS FLOAT ON THE SURFACE. TO CAMERA LEFT ARE DENSE WOODS ALTERNATING WITH SECTIONS OF MEADOWS WITH ALPINE STYLE CHALETS IN THE DISTANCE. THE CHALETS HAVE FLOWER BOXES FILLED WITH BRIGHTLY-COLORED GERANIUMS.

MISS MARY
Don't go so fast, Papa. I can hardly keep up with you.
ERNESTO
I want to get a workout out of this, Pickle. I want to wear off some of that wurst and strudel we've been eating.

The path leads to a small bridge over a rushing stream, a tributary of the Salzach.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Would you have a look at this, Pickle. A sight to behold.

They both get off their bicycles and walk to the edge of the stream. Ernesto leans over and first splashes water on his face before drinking from the stream with his cupped right hand. Miss Mary squats besides him and also washes her face and drinks from the stream.

ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Isn't this grand, Pickle? Isn't this grand?
MISS MARY
Certainly is, Papa. I couldn't ask for anything more.

ERNESTO
Those damned mallards look like they've never been happier. And with waters like these to swim in, I guess they've got a reason to be happy. I'd take that duck's life about now. Give me this river and a day like today and I couldn't ask for much more.
They return to their bicycles and begin to cycle up the path again, as signs show the altitude, and the meters they are climbing.
MISS MARY
We're doing this again before we leave Salzburg this trip. Promise me, Papa.

ERNESTO
I promise, Pickle. We're doing this again.
(stopping suddenly and motioning with his right hand for Miss Mary to stop)

ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Look, Pickle. A chat. A black one. That's what I've been missing -- cats. That's the first damned cat we've seen in Salzburg.

MISS MARY
You're right, Papa. That's what's been missing. We haven't seen any cats.

Ernesto walks towards the cat with his Indian walk, walking on the balls of his feet, very gently, very quietly, bending down as he walks, saying very gently
ERNESTO
Hey Kitty, Hey Kitty. Nice little pussy. Nice little pussy. Come to papa, Come to Papa.

The cat seems confused at first, but does not run off, and stops and stares at Ernesto.

ERNESTO (CONT'D)
That's a good pussy. That's a good pussy. You come to Papa now. Papa loves all chats. Papa loves all chats and chiens. You come to Papa like a good kitty. Papa loves all chats and chiens. Papa loves all chats and chiens.

Miss Mary looks on in amazement as the cat walks up to Ernesto slowly, as he squats and continues to say

ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Come to Papa, come to Papa. Be a good kitty and come to papa. Pussies love Papa. Pussies love papa. All chats and chiens love Papa. All chats and chiens love Papa.

The cat walks up to the squatting Papa and Ernesto pets its head gently, making it purr and meow.
MISS MARY
Papa, I don't believe it. I do not believe it.
ERNESTO
Saint bloody Francis. That's who I am. Saint bloody Francis.
(continuing to talk to the cat he rubs its head)
Nice little pussy. Nice little pussy. All chats and chiens love Papa. All chats and chiens love Papa.

All good chats love Papa. All good chats love Papa.
Ernesto continues to rub the cat's head for more than a minute before it meows and walks off into the grass by the bicycle path, down a hill towards the river.

Ernesto stands up, a broad smile across his face.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
(continuing to talk gently to the cat)
You go off now and do some work. You go off now and do some good work at get some rats. You go off and do some good work and get some ratsies. You go get some ratsies now.
MISS MARY
Papa, you are simply amazing. You are just amazing. I can truly, truly say I have never met a man, or anyone like you. You never cease to amaze me.

And everyone thinks you are such a big bully. What a bully -- what kind of bully could get that wild cat to come up like that? You truly, truly amaze me.

ERNEST0
(as he walks to her, holds her in his arms and kisses her on the neck beneath her left ear)

Well, I truly, truly love you Pickle. It must be the calming Pickle influence.

Write that down -- the calming Pickle influence.

Yes, I do love my chats and chiens. I must admit it. I do love my chats and chiens. Let's sit on this bench for a few minutes, Pickle.
Ernesto takes Miss Mary's hand and leads her to the bench. Facing the river, he sits on the left side of the bench, with Miss Mary to his right. He puts his arm around her and says

ERNESTO
Yeah, I love my animals Pickle. I've got to have my animals.

The Austrians and Germans love their dogs -- they bring them with them to places like restaurants and hotels all the time, but I guess they don't care much for their chats.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
If this were France, we would have seen cats everywhere -- in restaurants, sleeping in houses by the windows.

One time in Cognac, during the war right before I met you, in fact, Pickle, this beautiful villa-hotel I stayed at in the country had a cat that was like a brother to me.

MISS MARY
Oh, Papa.
ERNESTO
I mean it, Pickle, just like a brother, almost like Boise. That was when Martha was trying to run me into the ground, treating me like merde all the time. I needed a good friend -- a real buddy.

This cat came up to me at each meal and would sit in a chair next to me and I would share my meals with it.

I told that chat that I wanted some kind of company. I would have preferred to have been dining with a beautiful woman, I told the cat, but if it had to be the cat, the cat would have to do.

Well, this little black cat we just saw was something. When I was petting it, it was purring just like Boise. Sounded just like Boise.

Now, that is someone I am missing on this trip Pickle.

I sure hope Boise and the Finca are doing alright. As always, it will be good to get home. It will be good to get home to the animals, won't it Pickle?
MISS MARY
Yes, it will be good to get home, Papa. That's always one of the best parts of traveling -- getting home and sleeping in your own bed.
ERNESTO
(after he leaned over and gave her a long kiss on the lips)

Yeah, it will be great to sleep in our bed again. Back home with my sweet pickle.

Speaking of cats, and how much you love them, Pickle, you know how much I love Boise, but back in Key West, I had a cat named Socks that I loved just about as much, I guess.

Yeah, Socks was one balsy cat. That cat was a Hemingway cat alright. What a Hemingway cat. Had Hemingstein written all over it.

And I was needing a good buddy about the time Socks and I were getting close.

Pauline and I were kind of on the rocks. You know I just knew it was just a matter of time. Things just stopped working. It wasn't working anymore.

Well, then I got good old Socks, this cute little calico. Someone gave her to me after they had had her for awhile. Everyone in Key West knew how much I love cats, so whenever a cat needed a good home, they knew they could bring the cat over to Whitehead Street and Papa would give it a good home.

Yeah, they knew Papa would give the chat a good home.

Back then, Pickle, men weren't known for liking cats.

MISS MARY
They still aren't known for liking cats, Papa. That's why you are so amazing. Some big bully. You let Boise walk all over you, literally.

I've seen you in their writing and that cat is climbing all over you. Pity the person that would disturb you like that when you were working.
ERNESTO
Well, you know it's different with the animals, Pickle. (laughing) For one thing, they can't talk to disturb you.
(laughing again)
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
They can't talk with words, anyway, right, Pickle? That cat I was just with was talking. That cat was talking with Papa.

MISS MARY
I could see, Papa. You two were having a serious dialogue. But tell me more about Socks, Papa.
ERNESTO
Well, as I was saying Pickle, I really needed a friend about the time Socks and I met.

Pauline and I were hitting the skids -- I was just in bad need of a good friend.

So I got this little cat Socks who was afraid of everyone when I first got her.

She used to hide under a sofa on the first floor at the Whitehead Street house and I had to fight like hell to get her to come out for food and water.

Anyway, Socks was a little cat, very small.

So we had a bunch of raccoons that lived in the backyard. Patrick and Gregory had gotten two they kept in a cage under the tree and after they got out, we seemed to have raccoons all over the place.

Well, all the other cats seemed to be afraid of the raccoons. The raccoons had control of the yard until that night when Socks transformed herself from being a scared cat into a ballsy cat.

Maybe all the love and attention I gave her helped with the transformation, who knows?

Anyway, I was out in the backyard one night having a few quiet drinks and I see Socks and these two raccoons having a run-in.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
This raccoon must have been four times the size of Socks, at least, but suddenly socks threw up her tail and her hair stood up and she looked totally different -- I wouldn't have recognized her if I hadn't witnessed the transformation.

Anyway, I swear this raccoon gave me a look of total fright. This raccoon looked at me as if to say, "What did I do to deserve this?" and then ran off in a hurry in the opposite direction from Socks.

The raccoon ran off to the other raccoon and seemed to be telling it in raccoon talk, "Let's get the hell out of here," and they ran off into the night.

I couldn't believe it and I still don't believe it. That was the night Socks became a Hemingway cat. And to think in the beginning that cat wouldn't come out from under the sofa.

Yeah, that's when Old Socks became the Head Cat at Whitehead Street.
Ernesto stands up and stretches.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
We'd better get going, Pickle. What a great day, and that little stray cat just made it a great day. Let's get going and see what else we can run into.

MISS MARY
OK, Papa. Let's get going.
Ernesto and Miss Mary bicycle for about one mile before they come to a clearing, with a path branching off from the main path by the Salzach River. Following the path they encounter a large pasture; in the background are two Alpine A-Frame houses. In the foreground are two large dairy cows grazing in a pasture.
ERNESTO
Look at the size of these cattle, Pickle. Have you noticed how huge all the cattle here are?

MISS MARY
Yes, I've noticed Papa.
ERNESTO
Well, all the hard work they are doing is the reason they are such good looking cattle.

MISS MARY
What do you mean work, Papa?

ERNESTO
An old farmer up in Michigan used to tell me when cattle were busy grazing like that, they were working.

That's their job -- whether they are dairy cattle or cattle being raised for beef. You always want them working -- grazing and filling their stomachs and putting on weight.

You want them working.

(As a stiff breeze blows across the meadow,)
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
What a lovely breeze, Pickle. A lovely breeze and such fresh air. I am so happy that we made this trip.

MISS MARY
Me, too, Papa.
ERNESTO
This fresh air is such a relief from the Tropics. You know I love the Finca and I loved all my years in Key West, but if I didn't have Europe, Idaho, and if I wouldn't have had Bimini with its nice breezes back in my Whitehead Street days, I don't know what I would do.

You've got to have a place to escape to from that oppressive heat. You've got to be able to get out now and then.

Ernesto takes Miss Mary's hand and leads her up the path, closer to the cattle. They stand in silence for about thirty seconds before Miss Mary says
MISS MARY
Papa, let's start back. We can come back another day. Maybe tomorrow.
ERNESTO
Alright, Pickle. Let's get going.
SEVERAL SHOTS OF ERNESTO AND MISS MARY BICYCLING DOWN THE PATH BACK TO SALZBURG CENTRUM. THE PATH IS MOSTLY DOWNHILL, MAKING THE CYCLING MUCH EASIER THAN THE CLIMB. THEY CYCLE AT A VERY CASUAL, SLOW PACE.
Returning to near the beginning of the bicycling path, Ernesto notices the Gasthaus Uberfuhr, located a few yards to the right of the path.
CUT TO:
EXT. GASTHAUS UBERFUHR - MOMENTS LATER

ERNESTO
This is the gasthaus I had noticed before, Pickle. Let's stop and get a bite to eat.
MISS MARY
Sure, Papa.
Ernesto and Miss Mary park their bicycles under a large tree that is surrounded by outdoor tables and chairs.
ERNESTO
Christ almighty, Pickle. A horse chestnut.
MISS MARY
What's that, Papa?
ERNESTO
A horse chestnut tree. You know how much I love horse chestnut trees. They remind me of when I was a young man back in Paris, when my cojones were fresh and new.

MISS MARY
You and your cojones, Papa. You're starting to sound like a bully again.
ERNESTO
Yeah, me and my cojones, Pickle. I carried a horse chestnut in my pocket for months when I really needed some luck with that early writing. Then I switched to a rabbit's foot, and it still wasn't working right.
(excitedly)
Let's sit at that table over there by the fence, so we can look at the mountain.

They sit side by side facing the Untersberg, one of the largest mountains surrounding Salzburg. The mountain has sharp, chiseled features and is seen perfectly from their perspective.

MISS MARY
(as Papa pulls her chair out for her)
This is lovely, Papa.
ERNESTO
Utterly lovely, Pickle. Christ, I can't remember ever having such a view. This is tops, I have got to say. Really tops.

I think that's Gosser Gold that guy is drinking over there. Can't beat it. We'll get a couple. I think I'm having some Weiner Schnitzel mit pommes frittes. How does that sound to you?

MISS MARY
Sounds great, Papa. I'll have the same.

The waiter brings two very cold Gosser Gold beers to their table and sets them on Gosser coasters.
The sun is high in the sky on a cloudless day -- the 3 p.m. sun shines off a mirror attached to a post near the road that runs by the gashaus, at an intersection with a smaller street.
ERNESTO
(he seems startled, and jumps up from his seat))
Christ, Pickle.

MISS MARY
What is it, Papa?
ERNESTO
What the hell was that? Something just hit me on the head. I don't know where it came from.

Ernesto then looks at the base of the horse chestnut tree and sees a pile of chestnuts. On the ground near their table he sees the projectile that had just his head.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
(Picking it up off the ground)
Here's the culprit, Miss Mary. A damned horse chestnut. That's going into my pocket this minute. There's nothing wrong with being a little superstitious, no matter what your age, or what your means.

MISS MARY
You're certainly right about that, Papa...This beer is delicious. I can't remember having a finer beer.
Just then, a honey bee settles on the table between Ernesto and Miss Mary.
ERNESTO
Christ, I feel like we're under attack. A pleasant attack, I would have to say, however.
MISS MARY
That bee's not going to hurt you, Papa. Please don't hurt it.
ERNESTO
I won't hurt it, Pickle. Just for you, I'll be Albert Schweitzer.

The waiter brings their weiner schnitzel and french fries plates, with two salads of mixed green vegetables.

ERNESTO (CONT'D)
I wish we could get salads like this more often back in the states, Pickle. Seems like you have to spend a fortune at a restaurant in Manhattan to get a salad like you get over here with a casual meal.

Many small restaurants like this have their own gardens, or they buy their vegetables from villagers who grow them in those small plots of land you always see on the outskirts of towns.
The bee continues to buzz around the table harmlessly.

MISS MARY
I can't remember a better day, Papa; I mean it.

ERNESTO
Moments like this make it all worthwhile Pickle. Great food, a good drink, you. Great cycling. That cute little cat. I don't know what I would do without these things. I don't know how I'd make it.

You know, Pickle, I am just thinking, maybe we should have gotten that cat.

MISS MARY
No, Papa. That cat belongs where it is. Plus, it would be too difficult to ship it all the way back to the Finca. No, it's better off where it is.

ERNESTO
I suppose so, Pickle. Something about that cat really reminded me of Old Socks.

After pausing several seconds, as he thinks about the stray cat he had just seen and his old cat Socks, Ernesto gets the waiter's attention and points to his empty beer glass and then raises his thumb and finger, indicating two in European fashion as he orders another round.

After they finish their meals, the waiter removes their plates, and they sip their Gosser Gold beers.

MISS MARY
This is truly a remarkable day, Papa. I am so glad that we made this trip and that we have had this day.

ERNESTO
This day is something I will never forget, Pickle. There's no forgetting this day.

AS ERNESTO TAKES MISS MARY'S HAND, CAMERA FIRST ZOOMS INTO CU OF THEIR JOINED HANDS AND THEN ZOOMS OUT TO SHOW THEM AT TABLE WITH UNTERBERG IN BACKGROUND.
THEN CU OF UNTERBERG MOUNTAIN, BEFORE FADE TO SCENE OF ERNESTO AND JIMMY ON THE ROAD TO KEY WEST, WITH CU OF ERNESTO'S FACE,AS HE IS LOST IN THOUGHT OF HIS REMEMBRANCE OF THAT DAY IN SALZBURG

ERNESTO
Well, it's probably about time we got going, Jimmy. I was just thinking about a perfect day. A really perfect day.

JIMMY
Where was it, Ernesto; in Paris?
ERNESTO
No, it wasn't Paris, but it wasn't too far from Paris -- in Salzburg. A great trip Miss Mary and I took not too long ago. One of the best trips of my life, I would have to say.

But I certainly have my share of great memories of Paris. Paris, all through the years, from when I was there in the 20s, when I was in my 20s, to as recent as last year, when Miss Mary and I returned to the Ritz.

That's where I was staying when I first met her, during the War. Hell, those were the days, too.

I had the Kraut Marlene singing to me as I was taking a bath, and that's when Miss Mary and I first met.

JIMMY
You had Marlene Dietrich singing to you in the bathroom?

ERNESTO
Yeah, the Kraut was singing to me and we were drinking only the best champagnes for days, Jimmy, the prestige cuvees.

JIMMY
The whats?
ERNESTO
The prestige cuvees, Jimmy. Those are the best champagnes of each house. The best they have to offer that must come from a particular vintage.

Their regular champagnes are blended from wines made from different years, but the prestige cuvees can come only from one year, from one harvest.

Your prestige cuvees are wines such as Dom Perignon from Moet et Chandon, Roederer Cristal from Roederer, Louise Pommery from Pommery.

You know that woman had one of the most important influences on champagne.

JIMMY
How is that, Ernesto?
ERNESTO
Before Louise Pommery came along in the late 1800s, all champagnes were sweet -- syrupy sweet, you might say.

Anyway, good old Louise came along and changed all that. When her husband died, she took over the job of running the company and realized the world needed a dry champagne that was more suitable for drinking before and with meals, not just afterwards with dessert.

So she came up with the first brut, or dry champagne.

The world loved the dry champagnes, and all the other champagne houses soon followed her lead and came up with their own brut cuvees.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)

Anyway, back in those days when I met Miss Mary, the French were so glad to have us liberate Paris after all those years of German occupation that they were keeping us supplied with the best champagnes -- the prestige cuvees.

Christ, we had more than we could drink. Especially at the Ritz. Damn they were glad to see us ride into town, and with good reason.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
You know I was a war correspondent during the war, and so was Miss Mary. Well, I was a correspondent but let's just say I had a bias towards the French winning the war.

And I damned sure should have had that bias, shouldn't I, since the French were our allies, right, Jimmy? Uncle Sam was fighting the Japanese and Germans in that war, right?

JIMMY
Sure, Ernesto. They were our enemies.

ERNESTO
Well, some of my not so fine war correspondent compatriots decided I was getting more action than they were, or whatever. The bastards went to the U.S. Army and had me brought up before a Court- Martial for fighting rather than writing, for fighting on the side of the French Resistance and for fighting with our U.S. Army troops.

Do you realize how serious that was? I could have landed in the stockade.

ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Anyway, some of my good friends in the U.S.military, such as General Buck Lanham, came to my defense and saved my ass.

My blood boils when I think of those guys who got me into that mess. They were the kind of war correspondents I met in Spain covering the Spanish Civil War in the 1930s who sat on their butts in the safety of their hotel rooms in Madrid and invented all these stories about the horrors of war.

Hell, the only horrors they knew were the horrors of the hangovers they suffered from spending too much time in the hotel bar the night before.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Yeah, but I do have some great memories of Paris. From all through this fine life that I have had the luck to experience.

Yeah, whenever I am feeling black assed, all I have to do is think about Paris, my moveable feast Paris, and it usually perks me up.
JIMMY

(not understanding)
If you're ever feeling what?
ERNESTO
Black assed. You know, when you get down. Maybe you don't ever get that way. I don't know.
JIMMY
I get that way.
ERNESTO
Well, then, we've got something else in common. What do you say we get moving, Jimmy? We can talk more about Paris, and all the rest, once we get to Key West, or on the way.
JIMMY
Let's go.

Through Big Pine Key, Lower Matecumbe Key, Sugarloaf Key, Ernesto and Jimmy sliced through the blue-green water, ocean smells in the air, Jimmy continually amazed by sights he had never seen, the Buick rocketing through the absolute flatness that is the Keys.

ACT THREE: KEY WEST
Ernesto and Jimmy continued motoring down the Overseas Highway, nearing Key West, before Ernesto pulled off onto a narrow road, the loud sound of gravel crunching beneath the big Buick's tires.
ERNESTO
Before we get into Key West proper, there is a place I've got to show you Jimmy. You won't find a quieter, nicer spot anywhere in the world. You have to be careful though, because the old rumrunners like the quiet, too. They like it so they can bring their hooch in from Cuba without the sheriff or the revenue boys finding out.
Ernesto drove slowly, very slowly, pointing out the mangrove trees and various birds they saw, including great blue herons and white egrets.
Stopping the car and turning to Jimmy, Ernesto says
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
I can really get into some fixes sometimes, Jimmy. I can be a handful, I tell you. Well, after I've gotten into trouble in Key West, had it out with some asshole turista at Sloppy Joe's, or whatever, I like to come here and take it easy. Have some peace and quiet.
JIMMY
It's quite a spot, Ernesto. Very peaceful.
ERNESTO
Muy tranquilla, Jimmy. Muy damned tranquilla.
Ernesto drove off slowly, continuing on the gravel road, away from the Overseas Highway. Ernesto is constantly surveying the land, like a hunter looking for deer.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Oh, Shit, Jimmy. Oh, Shit.
JIMMY
What is it, Ernesto?
ERNESTO
Remember those rumrunners I was telling you about?
JIMMY
Yeah, I remember.
ERNESTO
Well, look over there to the left, under that big mangrove tree.
JIMMY
I don't see anything, Ernesto.
ERNESTO
You've got to look carefully, Jimmy. Look hard under that mangrove tree. They've got natural camouflage. That's why their unloading there.
JIMMY
Unloading?
ERNESTO
Unloading hooch. Booze. Rum from Cuba, probably. They aren't importing goddamned horsefeed, I'll tell you that much. They'll load it into a panel truck or something so you can't see what's inside. Shit. See that little guy with the big floppy straw hat. He's got a big, thick moustache. He's the boss. Pierre Puigpelat.
JIMMY
Pierre Puigpelat. What kind of fucking name is that?
ERNESTO
Cajun. He's a Cajun from the sticks in Louisiana. He's used to operating in difficult terrain. I hope they haven't seen us, but they've probably got a boy on lookout. He's a mean son of a bitch, Jimmy. He'll kill a man in a second. The sheriff and the revenue boys don't just want him for rumrunning. He's wanted for murder. He isn't going to like us catching him in the act. Dammit, I should have headed straight into Key West.

Oy Veh, Hemingway. Oy Veh, Hemingway. That's what my Jewish lawyer likes to say sometimes because I can get into so much trouble all the time. Shit. I'm turning around as quietly as I can and we're getting the hell out of here.
JIMMY
Let's get the fuck out of here, Ernesto.
ERNESTO
OK, we'll get the fuck out of here and get the hell out of here. Let's just get moving.
Ernesto swings the big Buick around and starts off slowly down the gravel road. He has his eyes fixed on the rear view mirror, looking for Puigpelat and the rest of the bad guys.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
So far, so good, Jimmy. No sign of them. Maybe they didn't see us. If they did, they'll be after us. I gar-own-tee you, they will be. That's how that mean Cajun son of a bitch would say it. I gar-own-tee you.
Ernesto continues driving slowly, his eyes fixed on the rear view mirror. He does a double take looking into the mirror and says
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Shit. They've seen us Jimmy, and they're after us. Oy Veh, Hemingway, Oy Veh, Hemingway. Hold on, Jimmy. I'm speeding up and this road is liable to get pretty damned bumpy.
JIMMY
Don't worry about me holding on, Ernesto. Just haul ass, Man. Haul ass.

(putting the pedal to the metal as he floors the accelerator and the big Buick's rear tires peel out in the gravel, making a big cloud of smoke)
ERNESTO
I'm hauling ass, Jimmy, I'm hauling ass.
The Buick's tires squeal as Ernesto hits the pavement of the Overseas Highway, and roars off towards Key West town, Pierre Puigpelat and the bad guys behind them. After looking in his rear view mirror again, Ernesto says
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Jesus, those guys are driving a tank. Do you know what that is, Jimmy? That's a Ford Tudor. Big son of a bitch, damned near all steel. Built like a tank, or a ship. I'm sure he's got a big V-8 under the hood, but I've got one too, and I had my mechanic in Key West put me a big four barrel carburetor on, so we can haul ass allright.

A big car chase ensues: Director's choice of Action. You have a big-assed V-8 Buick Ernesto and Jimmy are in, chased by a big-assed V-8 Ford Tudor to play with (note: Director or Producer might choose to have Ernesto and Dean in another type of car for this scene, and for the driving from Fort Lauderdale to Key West, such as a Caddy convertible, but it would be best to have Pierre Puigpelat and the bad guys riding in a big Ford Tudor, as this is the make and model of car Dean collided with Sept. 30, 1955, when he was killed on a lonely highway near Paso Robles, California, when he was driving his Porsche Spyder "Lil Bastard" to a race to break it in before the race -- if the car would not have arrived late to the car dealership, Dean would not have been driving it on the highway in the first place, and the accident would not have happened. Also, it is important that Jimmy is using the 12-gauge Boss shotgun, as this is the gun Hemingway used in his suicide in Idaho in 1961, when he was in very bad physical and mental shape).
After he has the Buick motoring at more than 100 miles per hour, Ernesto looks into his rear view mirror and says
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Shit, Jimmy. They're keeping up with us. That son of a bitch has that Ford souped up. He's got to have it souped up. Hold on again, I'm going to try to lose these guys for good.
Ernesto pushes the accelerator completely to the floor, but the big Ford Tudor stays right on the big Buick's tail. Suddenly, there is the sound of multiple gun shots.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Shit, Jimmy. Those bastards are shooting at us. Damn, I guess they didn't like us seeing them. You know how to use a shotgun, Jimmy?
JIMMY
Of course, I do, Ernesto. I'm from Indiana, remember.
ERNESTO
Well, reach behind you on the floor by the backseat and get that gun case that's on top of the pile. That's my favorite shotgun, a 12-gauge Boss. You've got 12-gauge slugs inside the case. I'll drive, and you shoot. Aim for a tire before those sons of bitches hit one of us.
Jimmy loads the shotgun and fires at the Ford Tudor. On his second shot, he hits the front right tire, and the car veers off the road onto the shoulder.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Damn, Jimmy. Great shooting. You look like Coop shooting skeet. Damned great shot.
Jimmy doesn't say anything, but just grins proudly.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Those boys won't mess with us now, Jimmy. Puigpelat won't step foot in Key West. We don't have to worry about them anymore. We just have to be careful when we head north, back to Fort Lauderdale. Maybe we'll leave at night. Yeah, that's it -- we'll leave at night.
JIMMY
Sounds good to me, Ernesto.
ERNESTO
We're heading straight for Sloppy Joe's, Jimmy. After all that, I need a drink.
JIMMY

Yeah, I could use a drink about now, too. A stiff fucking drink.

IN BACKGROUND IS TIMELESS BLUES TUNE SUCH AS BOB DYLAN'S "MEET ME IN THE MORNING" OR JOHN LEE HOOKER'S "BABY, PLEASE DON'T GO."

EXT. SLOPPY JOE'S BAR, DUVAL STREET - DAY
Ernesto parallel parks the huge Buick on a side street off Duval Street. He first looks carefully at the rear of the Buick, and after the inspection says
ERNESTO
Good, Jimmy. No sign of bullet holes. I don't think they hit us, the sons of bitches.
Parked near the Buick is an Indian motorcycle.
JIMMY
(very excited)
Look at that Indian. I used to have one of them.
ERNESTO
We used to get a kick riding the BMWs we captured from the Krauts during the war. Sometimes we'd leave the damned sidecars on. You'll still see Frenchmen driving those things: the spoils of war, I suppose. They'll probably still be running 20 years from now.

OK, Jimmy, now we can do whatever we damned well please. This is my town we're in now, and nobody is going to mess with us. Like I said, Puigpelat and the boys shouldn't be a problem now. Nobody is going to mess with us in Key West town. That's what I always liked about Key West -- within reasonable, or even unreasonable, limits, you can pretty much do what you want. Just don't get in the next fellow's way. That's a pretty good rule for any place, come to think of it.

CUT TO:

INT. SLOPPY JAR'S BAR, A HUGE ROOM WITH A VERY HIGH CEILING AND A VERY LONG BAR -MOMENTS LATER
Ernesto strolled into Sloppy Joe's just as he had at Kim's Alley Bar, walking his Indian walk, Jimmy following behind, looking shy.
ERNESTO
Two Kronenbourgs, Skinner.
SKINNER
(Ernesto's fondness for Skinner, a tall, well-built black man, rivaled his friendship for Sloppy Joe Russell, the bar's owner)

Mr. Hemingway, you just left. I didn't expect to see you back here for a long time.
ERNESTO
I changed my plans, Skinner. Meet my friend Jimmy.
SKINNER
How do you do, Jimmy?
JIMMY
(with reticence)
Hi.
ERNESTO
(after Skinner placed the Kronenbourgs with glasses in front of Ernesto and Jimmy, and walked away, giving them their privacy, Ernesto leans towards Jimmy and says, softly)
This is Key West, Jimmy. This is the South, but then again, it isn't the South. It's Key West, and if you want to have a black man as a friend, then you can damned well have a black man for a friend. I would consider Skinner a friend of mine. He's the best bartender I've ever seen, except for the one I told you about at the Lilas in Paris.

As far as what we're drinking, I called them before this last trip and had them order it special. This is the brand of Alsation beer you'll find in Paris. And they say the French don't make good beer. Shit, they don't know what they're talking about.

OK, Jimmy, tell me something about yourself.
(after a pause)
I'm listening.
JIMMY
There's not a lot to tell. My mother died when I was a kid
(Jimmy looks around nervously before drinking half the beer from the bottle in one drink)

I wasn't raise by my father. I was raised by my aunt and uncle.
ERNESTO
How did you get into acting?
JIMMY
I don't know. I just did. I really learned how to act once I got to New York...
(Jimmy stops abruptly and takes another look drink from his Kronenbourg)
ERNESTO
Boy, you are the quiet type. You're as quiet as I am talkative. I bet the women love you for that. The handsome, mysterious type.
(Jimmy does not answer)
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
How old are you, Jimmy?
JIMMY
Twenty four.
ERNESTO
You ever been married?
JIMMY
No.
ERNESTO
Are you planning on it?

JIMMY
Maybe.
ERNESTO
Marriage is a hell of a commitment. That's the one thing I've learned over the years. Miss Mary's taught me that. She thought I was having a fling one time and she told me "I know what you're up to Papa. You think you can go out and carry on and then dump me like all the rest. Well, it's not going to happen. I'm not like the other women you've had as wives. You've met your match."
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
I guess I did meet my match with Miss Mary.
JIMMY
Where did you meet her, Ernesto?
ERNESTO
I already told you, Jimmy, across the pond during the war.
JIMMY
That's right, you already told me.

ERNESTO
You know where I met Martha Gellhorn, my third wife?
JIMMY
Where?
ERNESTO
Right here in Key West; she was visiting with her mother and younger brother. I left Pauline for Martha at the time of the Spanish Civil War. She was also a writer, and we went over there to cover it. Christ, we were fighting and arguing in no time. I'd have to say that was the most unsuccessful of all my marriages.

Miss Mary seems to be about the best of them all, right now.
(seeming ashamed to be making such comparisons)
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Christ, you can't judge them like that, like you're looking at pieces of fruit. Hadley was so devoted to my writing, Miss Mary certainly is, and I suppose Pauline was for the most part, although I wondered sometimes. It's like a book I've worked on for years that's never been published. I have the female protagonist burn the manuscript of her writer husband that he's been killing himself to grind out. And God knows women can do things like that to you.

But poor Pauline, she went a few years ago, in 51. Died of cancer. She's the only one who's gone now. All the rest remain.

CAMERA PANS BAR AS ERNESTO REMAINED SILENT FOR A MINUTE OR MORE, AS IF PAYING HOMAGE TO THE DECEASED PAULINE; JIMMY DOES NOT SAY ANYTHING, BUT THIS TIME NOT BECAUSE OF RETICENCE, BUT IN RESPECT FOR THE DECEASED PAULINE.

CUT TO:CU OF ERNESTO

ERNESTO
(with his spirits seemingly lifted again, Ernesto leans toward Jimmy secretively before lowering his voice again and saying)
Speaking of women, Jimmy, you know what I do when I'm really busting my ass on a project, really wrapped up in it 100 percent?
JIMMY
(interestedly)
What?
ERNESTO
I abstain.
JIMMY
From sex, you mean?

ERNESTO
Yeah, from sex. Go right off it. Tell them we got to wait. Tell them there will be no mingling for the moment. Tell them we have to momentarily cease gathering roses. Tell them I've got a headache. Tell them anything, but try to save it all for the writing. I swear by it. I think it works, really, because I think both things come from the same place. That shows you how much I think about this art and writing business -- putting it on that plateau. Any man with cojones and blood flowing in his veins knows what I'm talking about.
JIMMY
I don't think sex is all that it is cracked up to be.
ERNESTO
What do you mean?
JIMMY
My work is more important. My acting is more important. Like when I did HAMLET. The words, the inspiration. What a masterpiece. Have you seen Olivier's film version?
ERNESTO
Yes, I have. Very fine.
JIMMY
And at the end, just before Hamlet dies, when Olivier utters his last line, a bead of sweat runs down his face, as if it were a tear. Unbelievable.
ERNESTO
That's serendipity, Jimmy.
JIMMY
What?
ERNESTO
It's like when you're writing, and everything clicks. Everything seems perfect. It's truly magical. My painter friends tell me the same thing happens when they're painting and everything is going well. You just really get lost in it and it becomes magical.
JIMMY
(nodding his head in agreement)
Yes. That happened to me with Hamlet. I got as much, or more from that than I have sometimes with sex.
ERNESTO
Don't carry it too far, Jimmy.
JIMMY
What?
ERNESTO
Don't carry it too far, now. But I know what you mean. That's why I put off the sex when I'm working sometimes. I know some prizefighters who do the same thing -- at least, that's what their handlers are trying to get them to do.
JIMMY
(settling in at the bar, becoming more comfortable, beginning to feel the effects of the Kronenbourg)
What were you telling me before, Ernesto, about your refereeing fights here in Key West?
ERNESTO
Back in the 30s we used to have Friday night fights every two weeks about a half-mile from here in a vacant lot at Thomas and Petronia Streets. Quite conveniently, there was a liquor store located next door; I'd usually buy a case or two of beer for the boys and myself that we'd drink during the fights.

But these were real professional fights, no amateur stuff. These guys were real pros and got paid for their work. Ringside seats cost three bucks and general admission to grandstands they put up cost a buck and a quarter. We'd get a couple hundred people out there and the fighters would make twenty five or thirty bucks a fight. That was good money during the Depression, when fifteen dollars a week was considered fair wages in Key West.

(suddenly, Ernesto began to laugh loudly)
JIMMY
What are you laughing about?
ERNESTO
I'm thinking about the time that the fighter named Geech took the punch at me and the sheriff wanted to have him arrested. I already told you about that, didn't I?
JIMMY
Yeah, you already told me.
ERNESTO
He was trying to stop the fight by throwing in the towel, but I kept throwing it out because I thought the fighter he was the corner man for still had some life left in him. He sure had some nerve to come at me like he did, considering the size difference between us.

Anyway, we had some good times with our sparring. We would get in some good workouts -- really work up a good sweat. I'd always pay them something for their efforts, and I gave them tips, like how to protect yourself using your elbows to guard your midsection, so you're not open to your opponent's blows.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)

One Christmas, Pauline and I had a big party and we had a few celebrities on hand, including Gene Tunney, the great prizefighter. Well, my Key West sparring partners all certainly got a big kick out of that. We put on an exhibition for Tunney out in the yard, in fact.

Speaking of sparring, my blood boils when I think of an incident that happened back in 36 when I was living here in Key West and my mail came to Box 406, Key West, Florida. That goddamned newspaper columnist Bob Considine must have been hard up for copy and wrote that I had been "cooled in a brawl when last in New York" and that I had put my good friend Tom Heeney, a great prizefighter, on the floor during a sparring session in Key West.

Well, I told that son of a bitch, Jimmy. I wrote him that it would take a better man than me to put Tom Heeney on the floor, even if he were sixty, and that I have had several fights in my time, none of which was of my own seeking, and I have never been cooled in any of them, and if your write everything you hear around the bars, you want to be pretty careful not to write libel.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
That bastard still makes my blood boil. I told you Jimmy, that you've got to be a bullshitter to be a writer, and I certainly have problems shooting off my mouth sometimes, but my expressing myself in that letter was not one of those times.

My mouth and my temper have gotten me into trouble on more than one occasion, but they've also come to my rescue. The words can help you get something off your chest, whether you're speaking, or writing. And like I told you, they say I was babbling in the crib when I was a baby.
As Ernesto had been telling Jimmy about boxing, Skinner had placed two Kronenbourgs and two fresh glasses in front of them.

ERNESTO (CONT'D)
The proof of a good bartender, Jimmy, is someone who is very attentive, but who's not in the way or eavesdropping when he shouldn't be. If I want to have a conversation with Skinner, he's one of the best conversationalists in the world. If I'm with someone else like I am today with you, he knows when to stay clear. Like I said, I consider him a good friend.
JIMMY
Shit, Ernesto.
ERNESTO
(alarmed)
What is it?
JIMMY
I almost forgot. I want to hear what you've got to say about DEATH IN THE AFTERNOON. I loved reading that book -- I've got bullfight posters all over my house.
ERNESTO
Gees, I wish we were in Spain now, Jimmy, watching people who know what they're doing working on some good bulls. You know, that book has some real ins and outs. People who have never read it assume it's solely about bullfighting. Since you read it, you know otherwise.
JIMMY
I learned a lot about art from that book.
ERNESTO
You were supposed do. There's probably more about art and artists -- literary and visual -- in that book than in anything else I've ever written.
JIMMY
I memorized some lines from it.
(looking up at the bar's high ceiling as he worked to remember)
One is "Bullfighting is the only art in which the artist is in danger of death and in which the degree of brilliance in the performance is left to the fighter's honor."
JIMMY (CONT'D)
Something else is "Suppose a painter's canvas disappeared with him and a writer's books were automatically destroyed at his death and only existed in the memory of those that had read them. That is what happens in bullfighting."
JIMMY (CONT'D)
Just think about the great acting performances of the past that we have no record of -- going all the way back to the Greeks at places like Delphi. At least we have film now -- there will be a record.
ERNESTO
That's right, Jimmy. Like Olivier in HAMLET. And your work.
JIMMY
Yeah, my work. How old were you when DEATH IN THE AFTERNOON was published?
ERNESTO
Thirty three.
JIMMY
God -- that's how old Christ was when he died.
ERNESTO
I don't think I ever thought about that, Jimmy. I know one thing for sure, though.
JIMMY
What's that?
ERNESTO
Where I finished the damned thing.
JIMMY
Where was that?
ERNESTO
We're there now -- right here in Key West. A couple of blocks away at 907 Whitehead Street, just after we moved in; I told you how hard the glossary was to write. I wrote the book because I had never seen another book on bullfighting like it, in Spanish, or English. Some of the best compliments I have ever gotten from anyone on any of my writing -- best in the sense of most appreciated because I appreciate the knowledge of the people who gave them -- came with that book, from Spaniards. There was much respect from them because they were so surprised a foreigner could write so well about such an important part of their life and culture.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
The damned glossary runs 85 pages -- Christ, that was a bitch to write. Trying to keep the damned facts straight on something I had only learned about as an adult. It's not as if I were writing about baseball or football, something I had grown up with.
JIMMY
Ernesto, what did you mean exactly by "the degree of brilliance in the performance is left to the fighter's honor"?
ERNESTO
Some matadors cheat, especially when they reach the stage of the kill. They cheat by making it appear they are in more danger than they really are -- making it seem they are more vulnerable to the bull's horn than they are.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
The old, most skillful manner of executing the kill is called recibiendo, in which the matatdor kills the bull in front, awaiting the bull's charge, with the muleta -- you know the scarlet cloth -- held low in the left hand, and the sword in the right hand. The right forearm is across the chest, pointing toward the bull; as the animal approaches, the matador uses the muleta to swing the bull left before he executes the kill by thrusting the sword into the bull, high up on his back, so that the matador's chest comes within inches of the bull's horn.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
As I said in the book, in all the bullfights I have seen, more than 1,000, I have seen the recibiendo executed only three times. Of course, there are other honorable ways to kill besides the recibiendo, but there are many more ways for a matador to cheat. One of the most popular is by simply keeping the body away from the bull's horns by pulling back the left shoulder and awaiting the bull's charge with the right arm forward with the sword so that the matador never really exposes himself to the bull.

Then, to cheat further, many cowardly matadors insert the sword into the bull at a point that is the lowest down on the bull's body they can manage; not only does it bring the sword closer to the vital organs of the chest cavity of the bull that ensures a quicker death than entrance high up on the bull, but the matador has kept himself far from danger by leaving his body unexposed. I have been at bullfights where the matadors have killed in this fashion and the crowds went wild with applause; obviously they were not aficionados -- they knew nothing of true talent, or they would not have applauded such cowardice.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Another easier method of killing the bull is by not inserting the sword totally into the animal. This is not like killing the bull low on his body, though, because brave matadors employ it. It is called half estocades, in which the sword is only inserted halfway into the animal, and was first practiced by a famous matador named Lagartijo.

But this practice has taken some of the emotion from the bullfight -- only when the blade is fully inserted into the bull do the man and bull unite in a flash that is the emotional, aesthetic and artistic climax of the fight.
JIMMY
That's what you said in DEATH IN THE AFTERNOON.
ERNESTO
That's what I said, Jimmy.
JIMMY
(excited by their common interest in bullfighting)
Who, in your opinion, was the best matador ever?
ERNESTO
The wide held belief in Spain is that a man named Joselito was the greatest bullfighter of all time. Of course, there are problems with memory -- as I was saying, once the event is finished, the artistic happening is over, and people's memories do very funny things when they remember matadors and how great they were or were not.

The day before he died, in May, 1920, Joselito was jeered by the crowd -- in essence, they told him to go to hell. The next day he was gored in the abdomen so that his intestines came out -- he tried to hold them inside with both hands, but could not. After he died on the operating table, the press, casual spectators and true aficionados all began to regard him as the greatest bullfighter of all time.

As an actor, Jimmy, you should appreciate that a bullfight is like a play in three acts. The first act, with the picadors on horses, is the trial; the second act, accomplished by the banderilleros, who jab the banderillas into the bull, is the sentencing, and the third act, of course, accomplished by the matador, is the execution.
ERNESTO (CONT'D)
Before I attended a bullfight, I really didn't think I would like it. I thought I would be very repulsed by the whole thing, but it was just the opposite. Yeah, it was