26. Promoters to WTS, in a musical manner:
Promote your work
Be useful to the weak and slow
Promote your work
Activity you should not shirk
You’ll stay and waste unless you go
Your prime directive is mach schau
Promote your work
27.
A. Cashew: So let’s bring her out here… let’s hear from her…
B. Wilhelmina Tongol-Schörter – ‘Biltong’!
C. Cashew comes to meet WTS who emerges from the curtain
D. They kiss
E. They hug
F. They go back to the couch/desk
28.
A. Cashew: Wilhelmina. It’s been
B. Audience: Bil-tong! Bil-tong!
C. Cashew: Can I call you Biltong?
D. WTS: No I hate it. I really hate it.
E. Audience: Bil-tong! Bil-tong!
F. WTS: I really hate it. Don’t.
29.
A. Cashew: Wilhemina (Audience: Booo)
B. WTS: Cashew. Thank you for having me.
C. WTS: And thank you for (tear in eye)
D. WTS: Thank you for respecting my right to have an actual name.
E. WTS: Not the word for a strip of dried meat.
F. WTS: When you call me that… word, you’re saying I’m a strip of dried meat.
G. WTS: When I went into show business, a few hours before I was to sing a song on Jiminy Thunders
30.
1. Cashew: You were great on that show
2. WTS: Thank you, thank you Cashew (audience applause)
3. WTS. A few hours before I went on, Jiminy took me aside and said
4. WTS: ‘From now on, your name is Biltong.’
5. WTS (echoing vision of Jiminy): ‘Your real name is too long for these idiots.’
6. Audience: Boos WTS: He called you idiots.
31.
1. Cashew: OK, alright
2. Audience: Boos
3. Cashew: Alright! Alright! She’s my guest, my show. You can…
4. Audience: Boos Cashew: YOU GET YOUR OWN SHOW AND…
5. Cashew: We’re going to go to break, and sort out some shit.
32. ADS
33. ADS
34.
A. Cashew: So we’re back, and some order has been restored.
B. WTS: Thank you Cashew and thank you everyone.
C. Cashew: You did the Thunders show for two years, then your career took a turn.
D. WTS: That’s right Cashew. On Jiminy’s show, I’d developed a character.
E. WTS: Someone I could just retreat to whenever I felt like showbusiness was too much.
F. Cashew: And that was Suzy Sprocket.
35.
A. WTS: Suzy, yes.
B. Cashew: Does Suzy feature much in your life these days?
C. WTS: Oh, no. No, she’s in the past.
D. Cashew: But she did a lot for you once.
E. WTS: Yes, yes indeed. She got me on The Rest of Quiglet.
F. Cashew: I gather there’s a funny story there?
36.
A. WTS: No, no, I was contracted to do the show.
B. WTS: Nothing unusual. It was at the last minute, though.
C. Cashew: Last minute?
D. WTS: Yes, they had cast everyone, including a great actress, I won’t say her name, sadly, she has since died.
E. WTS: She would have benefited from the exposure. Cast her as the maid. Then someone at the network said, ‘Robots’.
F. Cashew: Robots?
37.
A. WTS: It was a moment when everyone suddenly went Robot mad.
B. And Suzy was a robot.
C. Cashew: She was indeed. Let’s look at a clip from the show. Can you set this up for us?
D. WTS: This is from… this is from the last episode of the show, which…
E. WTS: I am really not sure this is the right clip to use.
F. Cashew: Let’s roll it
38.
A. Quiglet is sitting in a chair. Quiglet: Daddy?
B. Daddy: Yes, Quiglet
C. Quiglet: You… are… a… murderer!
D. Daddy: You finally caught on
E. Grace: The robot told me
F. Suzy Sprocket: I have a name
G: Grace (grimly): Robot.
39.
A. Cashew: So things did take a turn on the show, towards the end
B. WTS: They did indeed. The writers were looking at a particular market.
C. WTS: But also, the principles in the show, Grace and Schiegel, really wanted out.
D. WTS: And so did I, to be honest.
E. WTS: It was a very difficult time. Ola Platt. You know, Whimsy? She was the only one who was happy.
F. Cashew: On the upside, you had your first hit record. Let’s have a listen.
40. A: Suzy Sprocket: Those robot school days klik of binary code and data readouts are gone
B: But in my mind I know they will still live on and on eternally klik
C: But how do you thank someone, and what is thanking, who has taken you from small pincer motions to rocket jets?
D: WTS: To anyone who bought that record… I am truly sorry (Audience laughter)
E: Cashew: I bought that record!
F: WTS: I didn’t know! Sometimes I feel we were brainwashed.
41.
A: Cashew: So do you see much of the cast of the Rest of Quiglet?
B: WTS: No. I don’t. But funnily, I saw Schiegel just last week.
C: Cashew: Schiegel, who was one of the mainstays and a surprise star.
D: WTS: Yes, he was a musician, a talented musician, who was discovered on set.
E: Cashew: And as we all know, he married Grace Mannix.
F: Cashew: And you saw him last week.
42.
A: Cashew: And how was that?
B: WTS: He seemed fine, uh, low-key. He’s making an album.
C: WTS: He and Grace they still seem happy, so – who knew!
D: WTS: Uh… next question.
E: Cashew: And where have you been since the show ended?
F: WTS: Well, It’s been a long time, so where do I start?
43.
A: Cashew: We don’t have long (audience laughter)
B: WTS: I did some movies, did a Bond movie. I was in Pollyanna, as Mrs. Fitz.
C: Cashew: Not a character from the book.
D: WTS: No, they told me she was created with me in mind. If they couldn’t get Ann Margaret. (laughter).
E: Cashew: And now you’ve written a book
F: WTS: I have indeed.
44.
A. Cashew: A lot of people are going to have trouble with this title.
B. WTS: Well maybe it’s not for them.
C. Publicists slap foreheads, groan
D: Publicist A: she just said that? Publicist B: You freakin’ idiot Biltong
E: Cashew: ‘Also sprocket Wilhelmina.’ I’m going to assume it means something.
F: WTS: You know Also sprach Zarathustra?
G: Cashew: Oh, right, of course. So it’s a play on that title.
45.
A. WTS: I knew my fans – my real fans – would get it.
B. WTS: It tells my story – the story, but everyone’s story really.
C. WTS: Suzy was the übermensch, as we now all know. And the themes of the Quiglet show were, uh, the eternal recurrence of the same. As we now all know.
D. WTS: Throughout the show, I was on a tightrope over an abyss. I think that’s clear.
E. WTS: I think we’d all agree.
F. Cashew: You, uh...
46.
A. Publicist A: We could call in a bomb threat. Publicist B: Why did we even try with this one.
B: Cashew: So this book... it’s a great book.
C: WTS: Thank you Cashew. Thank you, I thank you.
D: Cashew: And I believe you’re now going to perform for us not a song but...
E: WTS: No. Not a song. A roundelay.
F: Cashew. A roundelay, which is a kind of a song.
47.
A: WTS: Like a bicycle is a kind of a, a, building.
B: Cashew: Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve had our ups and downs...
C: Cashew: Even in the last few minutes, but please, give it up for
D: Biltong, and her roundelay, They Say Robot
48.
A: WTS: Robot they say
B: They say you have no will, no mind
C:Robot they say
They say just go on tv today
D: Being Biltong is fine you’ll find
E: You’ll be dried meat unto the rind
F. Robot they say!
49.
A: Audience applause
B: Audience on their feet
C: Cashew weeping with joy
D: Book tops bestseller list
E: Wilhelmina Tongol-Schörter Rondelays album (with three dithyrambs)
50.
A: Elyse: Napeel? Napeel?
B: Napeel: Elyse? Really?
C: Elyse: Napeel, it is you! I thought it was you... then I thought... no...
D: Napeel: It is me, Elyse. It’s not that surprising.
E: Elyse: It is to me!
51
A: In a cafe. Napeel: Then you got a second degree? The only degree I’ve ever had was a burn
B: Elyse: You should do more study, Napeel. You were so good at school.
C: Napeel: You don’t know what I was like at school. You were far below me.
D: Elyse: Only three years. I heard the teachers talking about you one day
E: Napeel: Teachers?
F: Elyse: They were talking about a story you’d written.
G: Napeel: Story?
52
A: Elyse: A story about a fairground freak.
B: Napeel: Me?
C: Elyse: No, a story about one. They said you had a rare vision.
D: Napeel: Blank look. Elyse’s voice: Anyway, it’s so strange that I should run into you today.
E: Because look what I just came into town to buy
F: Elyse holding the WTS album.
53
A: Elyse: Remember? She was Suzy Sprocket on that show we watched.
B: Napeel: The Rest of Quiglet? I was only watching a repeat of that the other day.
C: Napeel: I love that show! I still love Schiegel.
D: Elyse: I used to think you looked a little like Quiglet!
E: Napeel: Only in the antlers. But thank you, you’re sweet.
Notes for 3. Wonderland
The lives of Shiegel and Grace ten (?) years after Quiglet.
They live in an idyllic suburb – scenes of walking around doing not much. Obviously life is serene.
Their daughters Amber (11) and Aspic (4), Amber finds out about the Quiglet show from a kid at school who says that her mother’s father killed her mother, can’t process people pretending to be other people, is disturbed. Aspic is always finding the bright side, surreally
Rod Sims calls and wants to reboot the show, he has the rights, cut out the dark stuff at the end, if possible exclude Biltong (‚I’ve been trying to reach her but she’s just trying’). Ola Platt said yes straight away, the first on board.
Shiegel is recording a beach boys style confessional album with Todd Rundgren producing. The lyrics are hard to write because he is constantly being barraged with ideas relevant to today from other media, it used to be ok to be lazy and being lazy worked.
He goes to a meeting with management, and on the way hears on pop radio (?) a song wherein someone has remade the Quiglet theme, he is unsure whether this is homage or theft.
4. Amber at (say) 35