Free Man in Paris

by Jackson Pavlik

CHARACTERS:

1 - The star-maker machinery behind the popular song

2 - They just can’t win it

SCENE:

1 storms in through the upstage french door, with both hands. Hard. 

1(under their breath):  shit…

2 peeps in through the now battle-worn French doors, slinks in, and closes the doors quietly. 

1:

We’re done talking. I’ve talk-talk-talked, you’ve talk-talk-talked, each of us have talk-talk-talked enough enough to fill lifetimes!

2:

Yes, but my talk-talk-talking kept you from check-check-check writing.

1 whips around.

1:

Trust me, you’ll never see one of my check-check-checks again. I’ve wasted enough money on you. 

2:

I made you some damn good deals. Two three-record-deals? At Capitol? With that much freedom. Find me another agent who can do that and I’ll eat my hat. Hell, I’d eat your hat if I could fit that swollen sweatband down my throat. 

1:

That's it. You’re fired.

2:

I already quit! Or don’t you remember our very public, very messy spat in the dining room two minutes ago?

A beat. 1 softens and sits on the floor.

1:

I just-- I just don’t think I can do this without you. 

2 joins 1 on the floor. 

2:

Look, I told you I set you up with Jeremy. He’ll be great for you. He promotes this kind of stuff all the time.

1:

I want you to do it!

2:

(pestering) You’ve already fired me.

1 glares. 

2:

Besides I have no idea how to sell, let alone promote a jazz album

1:

It’s not jazz.

2:

Sure it is, you told me yourself

1 bolts to their feet, the wall goes back up.

1:

No I didn’t! I never said that. Never! I may have said that it’s Jazz-FUSION! Because it is. But I never said it was jazz.

2:

Jesus Christ. 

2 takes a breath.

2:

(with the gusto of a young F. Lee Bailey) What are you fusing it with?

1:

What?

2:

What are you fusing it with?

1:

You know stuff that isn’t Jazz.

2:

I fucking got that. 

1:

Like-- Electric stuff.

2:

Okay, like Rock’n’Roll? 

1:

Sort of--

2:

Steely Dan.

1:

What?

2:

It’s been done before. Steely Dan.

1:

Okay, it’s not exactly like that, it's more like Sixties standards with a jazzy edge.

2:

Etta James.

1:

(with increasing frustration) Psychedelia.

2:

The Dead.

1:

Folk.

2:

Joni Mitchell.

1:

Acid Rock.

2:

Zappa.

1:

Krautrock.

2:  

Kraftwerk.

1:

R & B.

2:

Marvin Gaye.

1:

Singer-songwriter.

BOTH:

Ricki Lee Jones’s first album.

2:

and?

1:

Her second.

2:

Which was produced by?

1:

Walter Becker.

2:

Who is one half of the duo…

BOTH:

Steely Dan. 

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