Exerpts from my failed political suspense screenplay
Fade In Scene 1: Security monitor room, Swami Oasis Casino, Las Vegas
Casino Security Agent
Joe, can you come here a sec? Possible security breach on blackjack table number 36.
Supervisor
Whatta ya have?
Casino Security Agent
Facial biometrics shows that player #3 is a positive match with Frankie Kos, reality-based high roller and known associate of the Townhouse Organization. Or, possibly an overgrown weasel.
Supervisor
Kos, the lounge crooner-turned-international heist mastermind? Smells like he and his boys might be cooking up another casino caper. Keep your eye on him.
Cut to table; Kos, in sunglasses, fake mustache and sharkskin suit, fiddles with chips.
Kos
Hit me.
Dealer
Uh, sir, you’re showing 18. Are you really sure you want to take another card?
Kos
You heard me card jockey! Now can the wisecracks and paint me with a hard 3 before I call the pit boss!
in a secret high tech van along the Strip, Jerry Armstrong is feeding Kos tips via a tiny earpiece.
Armstrong
Oi goi yeah, that’s telling him Frankie. Ixion and Quaoar are in the house of SAGGITARIUS! Goybles. That's definitely a three. Definitely. Definitely. He’s only got a 16, and he wants that 3 all for himself. GLAAAVIN!
Dealer
Jack of clubs, player busts.
Kos
(grabbing dealer’s arm) Not so fast, pal! I’m doubling down on that 28. Come on, negative 7!
Pit Boss
Sir, I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to leave. Nevada law prohibits serving players who are on drugs.
Kos
Had enough, eh? Call off your goons, gumshoe, I know the way to the door. Looks like I’ll be raking in my moral victories over at the Miraggio.
Armstrong
With the Ixion, and the Pisces, in the Drago cluster NOICE LA-A-AADY!
Cue blaring theme music. Title sequence as Kos and Armstrong cruise the Vegas Strip in Kos' gleaming '61 Nash Metropolitan convertible, neon casino lights reflecting in its windshield.
THEME SONG: LUCK AIN'T NO LADY
Sung by Frankie Kos with the Netroots HornsLuck ain't no lady, she's a hard-hearted dame,
It takes 10 million pageviews to play in her game.
Just when you think
she's playing fair,
you'll throw a pairrrrrrr....
of SNAKE EYES.
You post a big stink
now you're the meme
she's killed your dreeeeeam....
so GET WISE!
Beware that bewitching broad who cuts like a knife...
That ain't no lady, she's my-y-y liiiiiife!
*******************
High Roller Suite atop the Sphinxter Hotel and Casino. Kos has assembled the Townhouse crew for a secret mission.
VIC ATRIOS
Hey, what the big idea, Frankie? I thought this caper was strictly small clams. What are all these jamokes and yeggs doing here?
SHECKY GREENWALD
Yeah, what gives? After the last heist Shecky Greenwald works solo, and that's the name of that tune!
STEVIE GILLIARD JR.
Like pipe down, you cats! Sock it to us, Frankie baby.
KOS (getting a neck rub from elderly showgirl Huffy von Huffington)
All in good time, gentlemen. Huffy, be a doll and go freshen up my drink. Me and the boys have some business to discuss.
HUFFY
Anything for you, Frankie dahlink. A double virgin appletini comink right up.
ATRIOS
My question stands, Frankie. What caper is so big that you had to assemble the whole crew?
KOS
Only the biggest heist this stinkin' desert has ever seen.
TOWNHOUSE CREW
Whuuuu-uuuhh???
KOS (dramatically pulling down map)
Gentlemen, I give you... the DNC Grand.
ATRIOS
The Clintoni mob's seedy clip joint? It's the sleaziest casino on the Strip! Nobody goes there but NEA losers, and that's just for 5 cent slots and $1.99 all-you-can-eat buffet!
KOS
Exactly, my dear Victor. And that's why they're desparate, and that's where we come in. Let me ask you boys something - whose show is the biggest draw in Vegas?
GILLIARD JR.
Like, everybody knows it's you, Frankie daddio cat baby!
KOS
You bet your sweet Nehru jacket, Stevie-O. And that's why my agent Jerry just signed us to an exclusive two week contract to play the Big Room at the DNC.
ARMSTRONG
Oi glavin! Frankie is the biggest star in the Zodiac, he brings in the high rollers with the chips and the comps and the laptops HEYYYY LADYYYYYY!
GREENWALD
And so... with all those swingers and high rollers and whales in the audience...
KOS
... it's like taking candy from a baby, baby. The DNC house dick Howie is on the Netroots team, and let's just say the security cameras will be 'experiencing difficulties' during the second act Saturday night. By Monday gentlemen, the DNC Grand will be ours, and we start ringing it in.
GILLIARD JR.
Ring-a-ding-ding, baby!
ATRIOS
Not so fast, Frankie. Why should we believe you now, when you've never planned a single successful heist yet?
KOS (takes his virgin appletini from Huffy and caresses her bouffant)
Because Jerry worked out my star chart and it says Frankie is due, daddio. The important thing is we keep coordinated, and this plan strictly to ourselves. Gentlemen - to success!
The entire Townhouse crew clinks appletini glasses, and slaps hands together in a team circle
ALL
Netroots Eleven!
**************************************
Backstage at the DNC Grand Main Lounge.
HUFFY
Vow, vhat a crowd! Look - there's Georgie Soros and Johnny Google! They've got more money than Gaia!
KOS
I gotta hand it to you Jerry - you may have severe brain damage, but you sure know how to put keisters in the seats.
ARMSTRONG
Glavin!
ANNOUNCER (over kettle drum)
Ladies and Gentlemen, there will be no photography or recording devices at tonight's show. Now, for the first time ever on the Main Stage, the DNC Grand proudly presents the Chairman of the Blog, El Matador, Ol' Bug Eyes himself... won't you please give a warm welcome to Frankie Kos and the Net Pack!
Fanfare and screams as Kos bounds on stage in white jumpsuit and cape, joined by Stevie Gilliard Jr. in Nehru jacket and Shecky Greenwald in lime leisure suit. They are showered with roses and undergarments.
OPENING SONG: WE'VE GOT THE WORLD BY THE BALLS
TOGETHER
We've got the world by the balls, pissing crazy rainbows,
I feel like a king, ring-a-ding-ding
What a nutty koo koo place, we're zoom-zoom-zoomin' to outer space,
Where there ain't no air, but we don't care,
'Cause baby we're the boss there!
Suddenly, in mid-song, Frankie's mike shorts out and he begins to sing off-key. Confused, the orchestra leader tries to change the key but keeps missing. The audience begins to murmur. The stage footlights burst into a glare.
KOS
Aiiii! I can't see!
Temporarily blinded by the footlights, Kos stumbles backwards, trips over his own rhinestone cape, and plummets into the orchestra pit where he wedges his head in a tuba. As Greenwald struggles to free Kos from his gleaming brass prison, Gilliard does a wild tap dance to distract the audience.
SOROS (to Johnny Google)
What is this, the Josh Marshall Amateur Hour? I've seen better acts at Kevin Drum's Burlesque house.
Audible boos are heard from the crowd. Greenwald yanks Kos from the tuba, and they both careen into Gilliard just as he is doing the splits.
AUDIENCE
Ewwwwwwwwww!
Armstrong runs onstage to help.
ARMSTRONG (whispering)
Yoiboy Frankie, we gotta do something! The audience is asking for their money baaaack! Goy!
Suddenly the microphone starts working again.
KOS
The audience? Screw those guys! I don't feel nothin' for them! They wouldn't know political genius if it bit 'em on the ass!
ARMSTRONG
GLAAAAAAVIN!
The crowd erupts and Kos is pelted with a barrage of tomatoes and vegetables from the all-you-can-eat salad buffet. He and the Net Pack run to backstage safety.
ANNOUNCER
Ladies and Gentlemen, Kos has left the building.
Backstage, Kos and friends wipe tomato juice from their stage outfits with discarded fan underpants. A suave man in a dinner jacket approaches.
PETER DAOU
Terrible sticky wicket out there, Frankie old chap.
KOS
Daou! I thought I smelled one of Marty Peretz's good-for-nothin' two-timing neocon rats!
DAOU
Tsk, Frankie old bean, such language. Speaking of rats, perhaps you should be more concerned with rodents within your own circle.
KOS
Meaning what?
DAOU
Meaning we knew all about your little caper right from the beginning, thanks to a few talkative chaps from your own little Townhouse sewing circle.
KOS
Double crossed by my own boys? Why, I oughta....!
DAOU
Save it for the security guards, Frankie. For now the DNC Grand remains in the steady hands of the Clintoni organization.
NANCY CLINTONI
Take these mugs away boys. Nice work, Daou - I could use a man like you to run the dinner buffet.
DAOU
Yes, ma'am!
NANCY CLINTONI
And here's a key to my personal executive office, in case you ever, er, need anything. Grrrrrrrr.
DAOU
Gulp!
*********************************
Exterior shot of run-down pawn shop off the Strip.
PAWN BROKER (examining ring with jeweler's glass)
Nice quality diamond, but nobody's gonna want that "Townhouse Eleven" inscription. The best I can do is 75 bucks.
KOS
I'll take it.
PAWN BROKER
Say, didn't you used to be somebody?
KOS
Yeah. Somebody.
Kos exits the shop and squeezes into his Nash Metropolitan alongside Jerry and Huffy. They head West down the Strip.
KOS VOICEOVER
That's the way it is in this wacky koo-koo political caper game. One day you're riding a winning streak all the way to Georgie Soros' high roller suite. The next thing you know you're a two bit pawnshop palooka, and the only thing you have to show for it is a dumpy online chatroom full of illiterate lunatics. But baby, I did it my way. And mark my words, Nancy Clintoni - Frankie Kos will be back. And there will be hell to pay, baby. GLAAAVIN!
THEME SONG REPRISE
FIN
