CAST OF IBM COMPATIBLE

TWO AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION REPRESENTATIVES..LATE 40S

ATTENDANTS..MALES....20S

NUMEROUS CHILDREN

TWO COMPUTER REPAIRMEN.....AGES 30S

DALLAS COWBOY FOOTBALL TEAM

DAVE FRIGBY....VIETNAM VET...AGE 30...FLASHBACK OF AGE 22

GUARD.............AGE 30

REVEREND HIRAM JOSIAH, D.D..T.V. EVANGELIST..AGE 58..FLASHBACK OF AGE 15

ROSIE JOSIAH.........WIFE OF JOSIAH...SAME AGE

FATHER OF JOSIAH.....AGE 50

MOTHER OF JOSIAH.....AGE 49

SISTER OF JOSIAH.....AGE 17

DR. LLOYD.....DOCTOR, 40...FLASHBACK OF AGE 5

OLD MAN

NURSES......VARIOUS AGES

NUMEROUS PATIENTS...ALL AGES

MISS PRIMNETTE..AGE 78 OR 80-OLD MAID..FLASHBACK OF AGE 23 SECRETARY-RECEPTIONIST...AGE 40

SUSIE SHAKEY-PROSTITUTE...... AGE 24...FLASHBACK OF AGE 12 FATHER OF SUSIE SHAKEY......AGE 40

ZACH TAYLOR...BLACK FOOTBALL PLAYER.. AGE 22..FLASHBACK OF AGE 14.

BRET TEMPLETON, PHD...GAY PSYCHOLOGIST.......40, 6

DR. ZAZA.....JEWISH DOCTOR, LATE 40S....FLASHBACK OF AGE 4

JIM... SON OF DR. ZAZA.....AGE 8

ED... SON OF DR. ZAZA.....AGE 10

SCENE I

THE ACTION TAKES PLACE AT THE UNIVERSITY OF LOUISVILLE TEACHING HOSPITAL FOR THE MENTALLY INSANE. PATIENTS AND DOCTORS HAVE FLASH-BACKS THAT GO OUTSIDE THE HOSPITAL.

THE YEAR IS 1985.

DR. LLOYD, A PSYCHIATRIST FROM MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY, BRINGS A MACHINE WITH WHICH HE HOPES TO CURE MENTALLY ILL PATIENTS. DR. LLOYD'S MACHINE TAKES BRAIN WAVES PUTS THEM IN A COMPUTER SO THE DOCTOR CAN CHANGE THE MESSAGES AND CURE THE PATIENTS. HE HAS INCLUDED HIMSELF AND DR. ZAZA IN THE TREATMENT.

AFTER THE BRAIN WAVES ARE RECORDED IN THE COMPUTER, DR. ZAZA'S TWO SONS SWITCH THE BRAIN WAVES AROUND. EACH PATIENT HAS ANOTHER PATIENT'S OR ONE OF THE DOCTOR'S ALTERED BRAIN WAVES.

THE TWO DOCTORS, WORKING FROM OTHER PATIENTS' BODIES TRY TO GET BRAIN WAVES BACK WHERE THEY BELONG. DR. LLOYD AND DR. ZAZA SPEND TIME FIGHTING EACH OTHER AND OTHER PATIENTS BEFORE THEY FIND THE TWO BOYS HAVE A SOLUTION TO THEIR PROBLEMS.

THE PLAY ENDS WITH TWO COUPLES MARRYING. THE MENTAL HOSPITAL BECOMES AN ORPHANAGE.

SCENE ONE

DR. LLOYD, ARROGANT GENTLEMAN DRESSED IN FASHIONABLE GRAY SUIT, HAT, TIE, SHINED SHOES WITH CASE BIGGER THAN A BRIEFCASE IN RIGHT HAND. THE ARTICLE IS HEAVY ENOUGH SO IT THROWS HIM SLIGHTLY OFF BALANCE AS HE ENTERS A MARBLE-FRONTED BUILDING MARKED -

UNIVERSITY OF LOUISVILLE NEUROPSYCHIATRIC HOSPITAL

DEDICATED TO TREATMENT AND RESEARCH OF DISEASES AFFECTING THE CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM.

CRISP WINTER DAY WITH SKIFFS OF SNOW ON THE GROUND. HERE AND THERE ARE REDBIRDS PECKING AT RED BERRIES. ON A BENCH IN FRONT OF THE HOSPITAL, A DEPRESSED, ELDERLY MAN SITS WITH HIS HEAD IN HIS HANDS. HE STARES VACANTLY AT THE GROUND.

DR. LLOYD ENTERS THE MARBLE-WALLED LOBBY. IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ASTUTE LOBBY, THERE IS A STATUE OF SIGMUND FREUD LOOKING GLASSY-EYED OUT INTO THE FOYER. A DISCREET SIGN IN SPITE OF ITS SIMPLICITY, IS VERY PROMINENT. THE SIGN IS ENGRAVED IN INDENTED BLACK LETTERS ON A GOLD BACKGROUND:

ALL PERSONS ENTERING THIS BUILDING ARE SUBJECT TO SEARCH. ALL FIREARMS, SHARP OBJECTS, DRUGS AND ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES WILL BE HELD IN OUR CUSTODY UNTIL YOU LEAVE THE BUILDING. WE CAUTION YOU THAT SOME OF OUR PATIENTS, BECAUSE OF THEIR ILLNESS ARE EXTREMELY DANGEROUS. ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK.

AT THE END OF THE LOBBY THERE IS AN OPEN OFFICE WHERE THREE SECRETARIES ARE BUSILY WORKING WITH SOPHISTICATED ELECTRONIC BUSINESS MACHINES. AT A WINDOW THERE IS A UNIFORMED GUARD.

GUARD:

May I see the contents of your carrying case?

DR. LLOYD PULLS OUT A BUSINESS CARD THAT HAS WRITTEN ON IT IN BLACK SCRIPT:

JAMES D. LLOYD, ESQ. B.S. M.S. PHD. M.D.

MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

CAMBRIDGE, MASS. O2139

GUARD:

Yes, Doctor Lloyd, Doctor Zaza is expecting you in his office.

DR. LLOYD LOOKS DISDAINFULLY AT THE POLICEMAN, AND WITHOUT SAYING ANYTHING, GOES TO A GOLD-FRAMED DIRECTORY. FINDING DR. ZAZA'S NAME, HE GOES TO AN ELEVATOR BUTTON AND PUSHES IT. ENTERING THE OPENING DOORS, HE PUSHES A BUTTON FOR THE SECOND FLOOR OF A SEVEN-STORIED BUILDING.

ELEVATOR OPENS: A THIN, SHORT-NERVOUS MAN, IN A WHITE DOCTOR'S COAT MEETS DR. LLOYD. NERVOUSLY, HE SHAKES DR. LLOYD'S HAND.

DR. ZAZA:

Doctor Lloyd, I am Doctor Zaza, Director Of Patient Treatment. May I take your instrument?

DR. LLOYD:

No, this baby is so sensitive, no one handles it but me.

DR. ZAZA:

Read your write up in the Medical Journal.

DR. LLOYD:

What did you think of it?

DR. ZAZA:

Frankly, we're very skeptical, but we are anxious to try your machine. Give me a briefing.

DR. LLOYD:

Let's run through the procedure. Do you have an IBM compatible computer with a phone modem ready?

DR. ZAZA:

You mean with a hard disk drive on which to store each patient's data with a forty inch colored T.V. as you requested?

DR. LLOYD:

Good. Only a genius like me can understand this procedure, so I'll try to give you only its basic concepts.

DR. ZAZA TRIES NOT TO SHOW HE IS STUNG BY THIS REMARK, AND IMMEDIATELY, HE TAKES THE DUST COVER OFF AN ORDINARY COMPUTER.

DR. ZAZA:

It is all yours. Plug it in.

DR. LLOYD RUNS A CABLE FROM THE PHONE MODEM ON THE COMPUTER TO HIS MACHINE. IT HAS FORTY-SEVEN DIALS AND TWENTY-TWO ELECTRICAL GAGES ALL ON A SURFACE, A LITTLE LARGER THAN A NINETEEN INCH TELEVISION SET. HE HOOKS THE MACHINE TO THE COMPUTER AND TO THE FORTY INCH COLORED T.V.

DR. LLOYD:

May I see charts of the patients we'll use in the experiment?

DR. ZAZA HANDS SIX CHARTS. DR. LLOYD READS CHARTS RAPIDLY.

DR. LLOYD:

One Old Maid, One Vietnam Veteran, a Jewish Queer, crazy preacher, Nigger football player and a whore! You're not giving me much to work with.

DR. ZAZA:

They're human beings like you and me.

DR. LLOYD:

Maybe you but not like me. Let me hook you up to this machine, and I'll show you how it works.

DR. ZAZA:

Will it hurt me?

DR. LLOYD:

No, you're a very well-adjusted person without a violent disposition. There'll be no problems. With each one of the patients, we'll have two orderlies present in case there are problems.

DR. LLOYD BUSILY ADJUSTS HIS EQUIPMENT AND ACTIVATES THE PHONE MODEM. IMMEDIATELY, THE FOLLOWING MESSAGE APPEARS ON THE MONITOR SCREEN.

DR. ZAZA

i     @@@@@@@@@@~~~~~~~~~~~    

DR. LLOYD EXAMINES THE SCREEN. AFTER MUCH STUDYING AND SCRATCHING HIS HEAD WITH FACIAL EXPRESSIONS, HE SAYS:

DR. LLOYD:

There is a pattern in your early childhood I want to examine. A moment and I will put you under hypnosis. We'll examine this blockage.

DR. LLOYD LOOKS AT DR. ZAZA WHO HAS TURNED PALE, AND HIS HANDS ARE SWEATING.

DR. LLOYD:

Are you afraid of what I'll find?

DR. ZAZA:

No, of course not, sir.

DR. LLOYD REMOVES A SMALL GOLD WATCH AND WAVES IT BEFORE DR. ZAZA'S FACE WHO IMMEDIATELY STARTS A FLASH-BACK THAT RECORDS ON THE TV. IT IS WARTIME IN GERMANY. THERE ARE THE SOUNDS OF BIG GUNS IN THE DISTANCE. GERMAN SOLDIERS GOOSE-STEP UP TO A MODEST BRICK HOME. VIOLENTLY, THEY GO IN AND PULL OUT A HUSBAND AND WIFE AND THEIR FIVE YEAR OLD SON.

GERMAN LIEUTENANT:

(SALUTING)

Heil Hitler! Dr. Zaza, you and your family are to be sent to the concentration camp at Austerlitz for internment.

FATHER ZAZA.

I've done nothing to deserve this.

GERMAN LIEUTENANT SLAPPING DOCTOR. BLOOD SPURTS FROM HIS NOSE AND RUNS DOWN OVER HIS FACE.

GERMAN LIEUTENANT.

You are a Jew, and the Fueher says all Jews are traitors to the Fatherland.

FATHER ZAZA:

It is not true.

GERMAN LIEUTENANT:

There is no use arguing, Jewish dog.

AGAIN THE LIEUTENANT HITS DR. FATHER ZAZA AND THIS TIME HE BECOMES UNCONSCIOUS. THEY THROW HIS LIMP BODY IN A TRUCK WITH THE OTHER DEJECTED JEWS. ROUGHLY, THEY PLACE YOUNG ZAZA AND HIS MOTHER INTO THE TRUCK. ALTHOUGH ALL THREE ARE NEATLY DRESSED, WHEN THEY ARE PLACED IN THE TRUCK, THEIR CLOTHES ARE MESSED UP. THE FATHER DOES NOT REGAIN CONSCIOUSNESS, UNTIL THE TRUCK DRIVES INTO THE CONCENTRATION CAMP. A SIGN READS: AUSTERLITZ. WHILE THIS SCENE IS TAKING PLACE, DR. ZAZA GRIMACES WITH FEAR. HIS FOREHEAD IS COVERED WITH SWEAT. DR. LLOYD WORRIEDLY TAKES DR. ZAZA'S PULSE. GUARDS AT THE CONCENTRATION CAMP UNLOAD THE JEWS INTO A CONCRETE BUNKER.

GERMAN LIEUTENANT:

You swine shall be deloused before you shall be given permanent quarters.

THE STEEL DOORS SLAM SHUT. COMING OUT OF THE VENTS IS A GREENISH GAS. THE DOCTOR AND HIS WIFE THROW THEIR BODIES OVER THEIR SON, BEFORE THEY DIE. THE BOY IS STILL ALIVE WHEN THE GUARDS DRAG THEIR DEAD BODIES FROM HIM.

GERMAN LIEUTENANT:

Put him with those who're retainable. One attempt at death is enough.

FADE OUT AS THEY CARRY THE BOY INTO THE OPEN AIR WHERE HE COUGHS AND CRIES. AS DR. ZAZA COMES OUT FROM HYPNOSIS, HE LOOKS DAZED AND DEPRESSED.

DR. LLOYD:

Damn it man, why didn't you tell me?

DR. ZAZA:

Some things are easier each time they are re-lived. You seem to dislike Jews.

DR. LLOYD.

What else may I say other than I'm sorry?

DR. ZAZA.

It was a long time ago.

DR. LLOYD:

Now, you will do the same with me. I'll write my name at the top of my file, and I'll talk you through the procedure.

DR. LLOYD TYPES IN LLOYD UNDER ZAZA AND HOOKS HIMSELF UP TO THE ELECTRODES. AS DR. LLOYD TELLS DR. ZAZA WHAT KNOBS TO TURN, A SIMILAR PATTERN APPEARS ON THE SCREEN.

DR. LLOYD

^^^^^^^^@@@@@@@@~~~~~~~*****8^&^7^*()()=====||||||||||88

DR. LLOYD IS STILL HOOKED UP TO THE ELECTRODES.

DR. LLOYD.

You will notice the machine's language is much the same with some exceptions. You will notice there are no trauma patterns in my waves.

DR. ZAZA:

I can see differences, but they mean nothing to me.

DR. LLOYD:

This manual decodes each symbol. (HE PLACES A THICK BOOK ON THE DESK.) Now, put me under hypnosis, as I did you.

USING THE SAME GOLD WATCH, DR. ZAZA WAVES IT SLOWLY IN FRONT OF DR. LLOYD'S FACE. IMMEDIATELY, THERE IS A PLEASANT SCENE WITH A SMALL BOY LOOKING AT A LUXURIANT CHRISTMAS TREE, UNDER WHICH THERE ARE EXPENSIVE PRESENTS ALL OF WHICH ARE COMPLICATED, ELECTRONIC PRESENTS: TINKER TOYS, ELECTRIC TRAIN, CRYSTAL SET, ELECTRICAL WIRING, RADIO TUBES, ETC. IN THE DISTANCE A CHOIR SINGS, "HOLY NIGHT", AS THE SCENE FADES. AS DR. LLOYD COMES BACK INTO THE PRESENT, THERE IS A PLEASANT SMILE ON HIS FACE.

DR. LLOYD:

Bring in each of your patients, and we'll run them through the same procedure. Bring in two of your strongest orderlies. Sometimes people with mental disorders become violent.

DR. ZAZA:

A moment, while you give me the procedure so I will know what to expect.

DR. LLOYD:

Each person's brain pattern will be put on file. I'il study it tonight and run it back into its owner tomorrow.

DR. ZAZA:

Altered?

DR. LLOYD:

No, I'll run the computer message back into the patient. Next day, I will take another reading before altering the pattern. After the third day, I'll send the altered message back into the patient.

DR. ZAZA:

Zap, no more psychosis.

DR. LLOYD:

Not that simple, but I am batting ninety-per-cent improvement in all but two patients out of thirty.

DR. ZAZA:

And the two failures?

DR. LLOYD:

Advanced syphilis.

DR. ZAZA:

I see. You have already studied the six patients and a brief diagnosis. You want them in any order?

DR. LLOYD:

No, just as you have them there will be fine.

DR. ZAZA PUSHES A BUZZER AND TWO BURLY ATTENDANTS IN WHITE COATS COME IN.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Yes sir?

DR. ZAZA:

Bring in the Reverend Hiram Josiah.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Yes sir, but he's not going to like it.

DR. ZAZA:

Not going to like it?

SECOND ATTENDANT:

He is in the closet having devotions with Miss Shakey.

DR. ZAZA:

You'll have to interrupt him. Dr. Lloyd does not have much time.

THE TWO ATTENDANTS SHAKE THEIR HEADS. THE NUMBER ONE ATTENDANT TAKES OUT A KEY AND UNLOCKS A HEAVY, METAL DOOR, THAT HAS A SCREEN-COVERED WINDOW THROUGH WHICH HE LOOKS TO MAKE SURE THERE IS NOT A PATIENT WAITING TO ESCAPE. THE DOOR SWINGS BACK, AND ENTERING, THE TWO ATTENDANTS ENTER A SHORT CORRIDOR THAT GOES PAST FOUR TREATMENT ROOMS. FROM THE FIRST DOOR ON THE RIGHT, A WOMAN PATIENT SCREAMS LOUDLY AS ATTENDANTS WATCH A DOCTOR TURN A SWITCH THAT ALLOWS AN ELECTRIC CURRENT TO ENTER THE PATIENT'S HEAD. SHE CONVULSES AND LIES STILL.

THEY ADVANCE DOWN THE HALL. A MAN PATIENT IS BEING WRAPPED INTO A SHEET COVERED WITH ICE TO CALM HIM DOWN. IN THE NEXT TWO PADDED CELLS, TWO PATIENTS POUND THE DOORS AND SCREAM INCOHERENT SENTENCES.

AGAIN THE FIRST ATTENDANT TAKES OUT A KEY AND SWINGS OPEN ANOTHER HEAVY DOOR AFTER LOOKING THROUGH THE WINDOW AGAIN. THIS DOOR OPENS INTO A NICELY-FURNISHED LOBBY FROM WHICH CORRIDORS EXTEND FROM EACH SIDE. THERE ARE FOUR PATIENTS ALL DRESSED IN BAGGY PAJAMAS COVERED BY PIN-STRIPPED HOUSECOATS. ON THEIR FEET, THEY WEAR SOFT, CLOTH SHOES. AN OBVIOUS MALE HOMOSEXUAL FOLLOWS A BLACK MAN FROM CHAIR TO CHAIR. A NURSE LOOKS UP FROM THE NURSE'S STATION.

NURSE:

(COLDLY) Yes?

FIRST ATTENDANT:

We need the Reverend.

NURSE:

Can't it wait?

SECOND ATTENDANT:

Doctor's here from M.I.T.

NURSE:

You know where he is?

FIRST ATTENDANT:

At it again, I know.

THE TWO ATTENDANTS WALK OVER TO A DOOR THAT HAS A "LINEN CLOSET" SIGN ON THE DOOR. FROM WITHIN, THERE COMES THE SOUND OF A MALE'S BASS VOICE SINGING: "CLIMB, CLIMB, UP SUNSHINE MOUNTAIN." THE ATTENDANTS ENTER THE DARK CLOSET, SHUT THE DOOR, AND TURN ON A LIGHT. A MALE PATIENT OF ABOUT FORTY HAS A FEMALE PATIENT BACKED AGAINST THE WALL, AND HIS ROBE-COVERED BUTTOCKS IS MOVING RAPIDLY. HE BUSILY ENGAGES IN SEX WITH A SHAPELY FEMALE PATIENT IN HER EARLY TWENTIES. EVEN AFTER THE LIGHT IS TURNED ON, THE TWO CONTINUE IN THEIR MOVEMENTS.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Sorry, Reverend, but Doctor needs you.

REVEREND HIRAM JOSIAH:

The Lord will send lightning down upon you for your unrighteous ways.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Not my idea, but Dr. Zaza wants you.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

And cannot the children of Israel finish driving their members into the enemy of the Lord?

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Afraid not. Dr. Zaza needs you.

FOR A MOMENT, THE REVEREND WITHDRAWS AND EXPOSES A FULL FRONT VIEW OF MISS SHAKEY.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

May the Lord curse you, oh men of iniquity.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Cover yourselves so we can open the door.

THE REVEREND PICKS UP A LARGE, GOLD-PLATED METAL PLATE AND COVERS HIS PUBIC AREA. HE TURNS AND EXPOSES A FRONT VIEW OF HIMSELF.

SECOND ATTENDANT:

Don't give us a hard time. We have to get back.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

The ways of the Lord are hard to understand.

QUICKLY, HE COVERS HIMSELF WITH HIS ROBE, PULLS UP HIS PAJAMAS AND REMOVING THE GOLD PLATE, HE STRAIGHTENS HIS CLOTHING.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

You coming out, Miss Shakey.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

No, maybe the Lord will send me another customer.

THE ATTENDANTS AND THE REVEREND WALK OUT INTO THE HALLWAY. AS THEY LEAVE THE WARD, A HANDSOME, BLACK PATIENT STANDS AND ENTERS THE LINEN CLOSET. HE IS DRESSED THE SAME AS THE OTHER PATIENTS EXCEPT HE HAS A FOOTBALL THIGH PAD TURNED SO IT PROTECTS HIS PUBIC AREA. THE TWO ATTENDANTS HURRY THE REVEREND INTO DR. ZAZA'S TREATMENT ROOM. AS DR. LLOYD ATTACHES ELECTRODES, DR. ZAZA TYPES IN THE PATIENT'S NAME AS HE SPEAKS.

DR. ZAZA:

Reverend Hiram Josiah of the PEOPLES' WAY CHURCH.

DR. LLOYD:

Seems harmless.

DR. ZAZA:

He was until he disrobed one Sunday morning and chased the choir director across the church' stage.

DR. LLOYD:

Was it full of people?

DR. ZAZA:

Yes, it was full of people.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

(HE HOLDS OUT THE GOLD PLATE.)

Give a tenth of what you have to the Lord.

DR. ZAZA:

Not now, Reverend. Give your plate to the Attendant.

THE REVEREND REACHES HIS ARM OUT AND REVEALS AN EXPENSIVE ROLEX WATCH.

DR. ZAZA:

Reverend, please have a seat.

THE REVEREND SITS DOWN WHILE DR. LLOYD ATTACHES THE ELECTRODES. DR. LLOYD PRESSES ENTER BUTTON AND UNDER:

REVEREND HIRAM JOSIAH

***()()9l^^(i79 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^()-----+++$$@@@@#

DR. LLOYD:

Two dollar marks. Unusual.

DR. ZAZA:

What does it mean?

DR. LLOYD:

I will have to study my notes. Let's see what the hypnosis reveals. (HE SWINGS A GOLD WATCH.)

A TEENAGER APPEARS ON THE SCREEN, LYING ON A BED, WITH ONLY HIS SHORTS ON. UP A HALL TO THE LEFT, THERE ARE SOUNDS OF A VIOLENT ARGUMENT. THE YOUTH, HIRAM JOSIAH, REACHES FOR A NEWSPAPER WITH THE HEADLINE, "HILTER'S TROOPS STORM INTO POLAND." AS HE READS, THE ARGUMENT GROWS LOUDER.

MOTHER:

FROM THE KITCHEN

You will not take Hiram out of school in his second year.

FATHER:

Wages are good with so many men gone to war.

MOTHER:

He needs the education.

OLDER SISTER:

You'll not take Hiram out of school. He is too young, and besides, he wants to study to be a preacher.

FATHER:

ADVANCES VIOLENTLY TOWARDS SISTER AND YELLS.

No goddamn daughter of mine is going to tell me what to do.

THE SOUND OF A HEAVY SLAP REACHES HIRAM.

MOTHER:

You'll kill her. Stop beating her.

FATHER:

If you are so goddamned concerned, take that.

THE SOUND OF A HEAVY BLOW AND A MOTHER'S SCREAM.

AS FIGHT CONTINUES, HIRAM GROWS MORE AGITATED. FINALLY, AFTER A FEW MINUTES, HE PICKS UP A HEAVY, OAK CHAIR. WITH DIFFICULTY, HE CARRIES IT INTO THE KITCHEN. HE IS GREETED BY FATHER BEATING BOTH WOMEN WITH HIS CLENCHED FIST. BLOOD IS RUNNING DOWN BOTH WOMEN'S FACES WHILE THEY TRY TO STOP THE ANGRY MAN. QUICKLY, HIRAM LIFTS THE HEAVY CHAIR ABOVE HIS HEAD AND BRINGS IT DOWN OVER HIS FATHER'S HEAD. HIS FATHER TURNS AND WITH A DAZED LOOK IN HIS EYES, HE LOOKS AT HIRAM BEFORE HE FALLS TO THE FLOOR. HIRAM RUNS OUT OF THE HOUSE AND REACHING THE BACKYARD, HE FALLS TO THE GROUND WHERE HE LIES SOBBING. AFTER A MOMENT, HE SPEAKS.

HIRAM:

Oh God, Oh God, I didn't mean to kill him. Let him live and I'll be a preacher for you.

STILL SOBBING, HE LIES ON THE GROUND AS DARKNESS SHUTS OFF THE VIEW OF HIM, BUT STILL HE CONTINUES TO CRY LOUDLY.

DR. LLOYD:

Did he kill him?

DR. ZAZA:

He won't tell me. (SPEAKING TO HIRAM) Did he die?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

All people die.

DR. ZAZA:

But not all sons kill their fathers! Did you kill him?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

The Lord moves in mysterious ways, His wonders to perform. (PICKING UP HIS COLLECTION PLATE, HE WAVES IT.) Give me your dollars so I might buy television time, and Christ's message will change the whole world.

DR. ZAZA:

You better save money for your defense.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Defense?

DR. ZAZA:

Morals charge, indecent exposure. Hard rap to beat with four thousand witnesses in the church and half the nation watching on T.V.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Give a tenth of yourself to God.

DR. ZAZA:

DISGUSTED LOOK ON HIS FACE. TO ATTENDANTS.

Take him away, and bring Miss Shakey.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Even if she is busy?

DR. ZAZA:

(SMILES KINDLY) Even if she is busy.

THEY ESCORT MISS SHAKEY INTO THE TREATMENT ROOM. HER HOUSECOAT REVEALS A GREAT DEAL OF HER FIRM, LARGE, WELL-FORMED BREASTS. HER BREASTS ARE LARGE IN PROPORTION TO THE REST OF HER BODY. SHE SEEMS TO INVITE MALE ATTENTION WITHOUT SPEAKING A THING.

DR. ZAZA:

How are you this morning, Miss Shakey?

SUSIE SHAKEY:

(POUTING) You've interrupted me twice.

DR. ZAZA:

Sorry, this is Dr. Lloyd. He is going to hook you up to this machine for a minute.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

DRAWS BACK IN FRIGHT

Shock treatment?

DR. ZAZA:

No. An experiment we are conducting.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

Will it keep me from wanting men to...? You know what I mean.

DR. ZAZA:

Only if you want to do something else. Remember, you once told me you'd like to continue your training to be a teacher?

SUSIE SHAKEY:

WICKED SMILE

I'd rather teach pricks. GIGGLES

DR. LLOYD:

TO DR. ZAZA

Is this the prostitute?

DR. ZAZA:

Yes, it is.

DR. LLOYD:

What's she doing here?

DR. ZAZA:

She almost bleed to death after she slashed her wrist.

DR. LLOYD:

She doesn't seem to be suicidal.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

There's no man with one long enough to satisfy me. I demand to die. (GIGGLES)

DR. ZAZA:

Perhaps you will find other ways of satisfying yourself.

DR. LLOYD HOOKS ELECTRODES ONTO SUSIE SHAKEY. HIS HANDS LINGER ON HER TOO LONG. AFTER HE FINISHES, HE HAS A HARD TIME GETTING HIS HANDS OFF HER BREAST WHERE THEY HAVE STRAYED. FINALLY HE MANAGES TO PRESS THE ENTER BUTTON ON THE COMPUTER. A SCENE OF A YOUNG GIRL ON A BED FIGHTING A DRUNK MAN FLASHES ON THE T.V. SCREEN. NO ONE NOTICES THE MESSAGE WHICH APPEARS ON THE COMPUTER SCREEN UNDER:

SUSIE SHAKEY:

i9i^X9i^Q~~~~~~~~~^X^X^Xi79^E^@^E^@^E^@@@@@@@^O^E

SUSIE SHAKEY: 12

Father, you can' do this to me. It will kill Mother.

FATHER:

Who gives a damn about your mother. It's you I want.

HE STRUGGLES WITH HER AND AS THE SCENE FADES, THERE IS THE SOUND OF BITTER WEEPING. THE FATHER CONTINUES TO MOVE HIS BODY VIOLENTLY AS HE HAS SEX WITH HIS DAUGHTER.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

(TO DR. ZAZA)

Now you know who taught me. I've tried to satisfy every man since, but they just can't satisfy me.

SHE LAUGHS HYSTERICALLY IN A LOUD SCREAM AS THE FOUR MEN LOOK ASHAMEDLY AWAY.

DR. LLOYD:

GUILTILY. LOOKS AT SUSIE SHAKEY'S BRAIN WAVE PATTERN. HE POINTS TO THE MARKINGS ~~~~~~~~.

The alterations need to be done here.

DR. ZAZA:

THE ATTENDANTS LEAD SUSIE SHAKEY AWAY.

Would you care for a cup of coffee?

DR. LLOYD:

I think I will. God, it's hot in here.

HE LOOKS AS SUSIE'S GYRATING REAR GOES OUT OF THE DOOR.

She doesn't need a pelvic exam?

DR. ZAZA:

I checked her yesterday.

BOTH DOCTORS ARE COLLECTING THEIR COMPOSURE. AS THEY DRINK THEIR COFFEE, THE ATTENDANTS BRING IN AN OLD LADY IN HER LATE SEVENTIES. SHE IS STILL ATTRACTIVE AND HER BODY IS WELL-FORMED.

DR. ZAZA:

VERY FORMAL

Dr. Lloyd, this is Miss Primnette of the investment firm of Primnette and Primnette.

DR. LLOYD:

IMPRESSED, HE EXTENDS HIS HAND FOR A FORMAL HANDCLASP.

It is a pleasure to meet you, Miss Primnette.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

SHE LOOKS ARROGANTLY THROUGH SPECTACLES SHE CARRIES ON A GOLD CHAIN.

You needn't be afraid of me.

DR. LLOYD:

I am not afraid, just impressed.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

After that prostitute being in here, I am glad you recognize a lady.

DR. LLOYD:

It is a pleasure a few of you still exist.

VERY CAREFULLY, HE ATTACHES HER TO THE ELECTRODES. COMPUTER LANGUAGE SHOWS ON COMPUTER SCREEN UNDER PATIENT'S NAME.

MISS PRIMNETTE: i,,,,GGGGG8i^X(*##@@@^^^EEEE%%%%@@@@@@^^^^^^^^

DR. LLOYD:

See those four commas? Some senility, but everything else is normal. Why are you treating her here?

DR. ZAZA:

She finances this ward.

DR. LLOYD:

It's the best reason in the world.

HE HOOKS UP ELECTRODES AND SWINGS WATCH AS SCENE OF STRICTLY-DRESSED YOUNG LADY IS SITTING AT AN EXPENSIVE DESK STUDYING.

MOTHER:

RICH DOWAGER IN BLUE, SATIN DRESS.

Daughter, you study too much. Certainly you know some handsome, young man who would like to have you for a companion for an occasional evening.

MISS PRIMNETTE: 23

VERY STERNLY

Mother, life is too short for me to waste my time on handsome, young men.

DR. ZAZA:

Is this all?

DR. LLOYD:

It seems to be Miss Primnette's life story.

REMOVES ELECTRODES VERY CAREFULLY.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

Young man, you will not touch me any more than necessary.

DR. LLOYD:

No, of course not.

AFTER THE DOOR CLOSES BEHIND HER.

DR. ZAZA:

Care to do a pelvic exam?

DR. LLOYD:

No, not with a ten foot pole.

BOTH MEN CHUCKLE QUIETLY. THE TWO ATTENDANTS BRING IN THE NEXT PATIENT WITH A STRAIGHT-JACKET FIRMLY ATTACHED.

DR. ZAZA:

Dave, how are you?

DAVE FRIGBY:

If I ever get my hands on you, I'll strangle you.

DR. ZAZA:

This is why you are in restraints.

DR. LLOYD:

Sit down here Mr.---.

DR. ZAZA:

Sorry. Mister Dave Frigby, Vietnam veteran who cracked up while on duty.

DAVE FRIGBY:

You lousy son of a bitch, you promised you wouldn't tell anyone. I'll kill you soon as I get loose.

DR. ZAZA:

Sorry Dave, but Dr. Lloyd is going to try and help you.

DAVE FRIGBY:

TEARS AT HIS RESTRAINTS.

I want out of here, you fucking bastards.

DR. LLOYD:

TO ATTENDANTS.

You are going to have to hold him.

THE ATTENDANTS HOLD THE PATIENT. THEY ATTACH ELECTRODES. UNDER THE PATIENT'S NAME, A TOTAL DIFFERENT PATTERN EMERGES ON COMPUTER SCREEN.

DAVE FRIGBY:

o*****^o78^^^Z^^^@@@@@^O^@@@@^^^^@OOOPP

DR. ZAZA:

This is making me dizzy. I guess it's a case of vertigo.

DR. LLOYD:

(SWINGS A GOLD WATCH.) Very dangerous pattern. Killer.

DR. ZAZA:

I'm afraid he'll never be safe to return to society. (LOOKING AT THE TV SCREEN.) Look at this.

JUNGLE SCENE: DAVE FRIGBY IS DRESSED IN ARMY FATIGUES. HE SNEAKS UP ON VIET CONG AND WITH PIANO WIRE HALF SEVERS HIS HEAD BEFORE HE ADVANCES TO SECOND MAN. VERY QUIETLY AND PROFESSIONALLY, HE KILLS FIVE MEN BEFORE A SIXTH MAN SNEAKS UP ON HIM AND KNOCKS HIM TO THE GROUND WITH HIS RIFLE BUTT. THE PATIENT LIES ON THE JUNGLE FLOOR AS ANTS CRAWL ON HIS HANDS. MARINE HYMN IS PLAYED QUIETLY.

DR. ZAZA:

I figure he lay there a week.

DR. LLOYD:

Concussions?

DR. ZAZA:

He has a slight one on his left temple, but it shouldn't cause this violent behavior. A trauma of some sort.

DR. LLOYD:

I truly hope I can help. I truly do.

DAVE FRIGBY VIOLENTLY TRIES TO TEAR UP CHAIR AS HE STRUGGLES TO BREAK FREE OF THE RESTRAINT. ATTENDANTS STRUGGLE WITH HIM.

DR. ZAZA:

Get him out of here before he breaks something.

TWO ATTENDANTS CARRY HIM OUT AS HE FIGHTS AND SCREAMS OBSCENITIES.

DR. ZAZA:

The Marine Corp awarded him five medals before this happened.

DR. LLOYD:

Tragic. Who's next?

DR. ZAZA:

A Dallas Cowboy, running back.

DR. LLOYD:

You know what football is?

DR. ZAZA:

No.

DR. LLOYD:

It's ten Black men trying to kill one small white man hollering signals. (THEY CHUCKLE.)

DR. LLOYD:

Black?

DR. ZAZA:

Aren't most football players now? This one's had one testicle removed. He has compensated to overcome his fear by wearing protection.

DR. LLOYD:

Protection?

DR. ZAZA:

He wears football thigh pads turned backward.

DR. LLOYD:

Does he ever remove them?

DR. ZAZA:

Yes, when he is in the closet with Miss Shakey.

DR. LLOYD:

At least she is not prejudice.

DR. ZAZA:

Nor picky.

DR. LLOYD:

Is she available for tonight?

DR. ZAZA:

Use this treatment room.

DR. LLOYD:

Might she go to my hotel with me?

DR. ZAZA:

It will mean my job if anything happens.

ZACH TAYLOR IS BEING BROUGHT IN. HE INTERRUPTS DR. ZAZA. THE PATIENT IS A TWENTY-FOUR YEAR OLD BLACK WHO IS IN EXTREMELY GOOD SHAPE, BUT HE SHAKES VERY VIOLENTLY.

DR. ZAZA:

Zach, It's all right. Dr. Lloyd is here to help you.

ZACH TAYLOR:

So I can go back to playin' football?

DR. ZAZA:

Let's hope so. Sit down so we can start the treatment.

DR. LLOYD PLACES THE ELECTRODES IN PLACE. HE PRESSES THE ENTER BUTTON ON THE KEYBOARD AND TYPES ZACH TAYLOR, AS THE MACHINE LANGUAGE COMES ON THE SCREEN.

ZACH TAYLOR:

o9^&&@@@@VVVVV^^^^^^^Opppp^^^^^^@@@@@@@@@@^Y^Y^Y^Y^()

DR. LLOYD:

(HE STUDIES THE MESSAGE.) Concussion?

DR. ZAZA:

It was his winning touchdown at the Super Bowl.

DR. LLOYD:

HE TURNS ON THE TELEVISION.

I'm sure it will be another Dallas Cowboy football game.

A YOUNG, BLACK MALE YOUTH VIOLENTLY RUNS FROM A GANG OF WHITE MEN DRESSED IN WHITE ROBES. THEY CATCH HIM AND THROW HIM TO THE GROUND.

ZACH TAYLOR: 14

HYSTERICALLY. No, No, you cannot do this to me.

KLAN LEADER:

I told you to stay off our football field, Nigger.

ZACH TAYLOR:

There's nothin' you can do about it, white man.

KLAN LEADER MOTIONS TO HIS MEN. FOUR HOLD ZACH WHILE THE FIFTH ONE PULLS HIS TROUSERS DOWN. THE LEADER PULLS OUT A SWITCHBLADE AND ZAPS OUT THE BLADE.

KLAN LEADER:

Have you ever been castrated?

ZACH TAYLOR:

Goddamn it, you can't do this to me.

KLAN LEADER SLASHES VIOLENTLY AND HOLDS UP AN OBJECT DRIPPING BLOOD.

KLAN LEADER:

Damn, only got one. Hold him again.

ZACH CRIES OUT IN PAIN. SOUND OF A POLICE SIREN.

KLAN LEADER:

Let's get out of here.

THEY RUN LEAVING THE UNCONSCIOUS BOY LYING.

DR. LLOYD:

Damn. It's all right, boy. Stop shaking that way.

ZACH TAYLOR:

I ain't no boy, mister. I ain't no boy.

THE ATTENDANTS REMOVE ZACH WHO CLUTCHES HIS CROUCH WITH BOTH HANDS.

DR. LLOYD:

It's a tough one, but I think this treatment will help.

DR. ZAZA:

I will thank you, and the Dallas Cowboys will thank you. Make sure your fly is zipped before we bring in the last one.

DR. LLOYD:

The Jewish Psychologist?

DR. ZAZA:

Yes, and the male prostitute.

DR. LLOYD:

How bad is he?

DR. ZAZA:

He fondled the Chief of Police at a benefit banquet.

DR. LLOYD:

Was this in public?

DR. ZAZA:

He claims he is a sex therapist. He said the Chief of Police was having a nervous breakdown.

DR. LLOYD:

Well, was he?

DR. ZAZA:

He did after he put Brad Templeton in here.

DR. LLOYD:

Did he serve in the military?

DR. ZAZA:

He worked four years as a pecker checker for the U.S. Navy.

DR. LLOYD:

Four years looking at men's peckers? Goddamn, what a job for a homosexual.

DR. ZAZA:

He talks about his job with slobbers running down both sides of his mouth.

DR. LLOYD:

I'll just bet.

THE FLABBY MALE WHO CHASED ZACH TAYLOR IN THE LOBBY COMES IN THE DOOR.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

HE SMOKES A CIGARETTE HELD IN A LONG, PINK HOLDER.

Yes dears, you brought me in so I can play with your long things?

DR. ZAZA:

No. (HE FIRMLY REMOVES BRAD'S HAND FROM HIS FLY.)

DR. LLOYD:

Doctor, sit down here. It is a Doctor; isn't it?

BRAD TEMPLETON:

I have a PhD in Psychology from Harvard.

WIGGLES HIS FINGERS INVITINGLY AT BOTH DOCTORS.

DR. LLOYD:

Let me hook you up to this machine.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Why?

DR. LLOYD:

It's an experiment.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

It won't cure me from being a homosexual, will it?

DR. LLOYD:

I doubt it.

DR. ZAZA:

It may give you enough sense not to try making out with the Chief of Police with half of the city there and the other half watching on television.

AS DR. LLOYD FASTENS ON THE ELECTRODES, BRAD FEELS HIM WITH HIS HAND WHILE DR. LLOYD TRIES TO KEEP AWAY. IT DEVELOPS INTO A COMIC DANCE.

DR. LLOYD:

(MUTTERS) Damn queer.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Don't worry. Try it, honey.

DR. LLOYD IS RED FACED AND FRUSTRATED AS HE PRESSES THE COMPUTER ENTER KEY AND TYPES:

BRAD TEMPLETON.

^^^^^@@@@@@@***&&&&&&&^@^@^^T^^SEX@@@@^MALE

DR. ZAZA:

Good thing for some very prominent men in Louisville that thing can't talk.

DR. LLOYD:

I wish it would shock this bastard's hands.

HE PRIES BRAD'S FINGERS FROM HIS ZIPPER.

DR. ZAZA:

Be careful, Doctor, or you'll undo hours of therapy.

DR. LLOYD:

I'll kill him. I'll destroy him.

DR. ZAZA:

You don't have the right attitude.

DR. LLOYD GRITS HIS TEETH AS HE WAVES THE GOLD WATCH. THE TELEVISION SCREEN COMES TO LIFE WITH TWO LARGE TEENAGERS HOLDING A SMALL BOY DOWN ON A BALE OF HAY. THE THIRD TEENAGER IS MOLESTING THE YOUTH.

BRAD TEMPLETON: 7

Stop it, Cousin Frank, just stop it.

COUSIN FRANK:

It's almost as fun as sticking the heifer calf.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

You're hurting me. Wait for my mother.

COUSIN FRANK:

You tell, and I'll castrate you, personally, myself. Do you hear?

HE CONTINUES IN HIS MANIPULATION WITH HIS HAND. SUDDENLY, HE STOPS.

WOMAN'S VOICE:

Frank, do you hear me. Your father will kill you if you don't get in here for supper.

(TEENAGERS RUN AWAY LEAVING THE SMALL BOY LYING.)

BRAD TEMPLETON:

(SOBBING) They've ruined me. They have ruined me, and I will never be fit for a woman when I grow up.

DR. LLOYD:

Damn! What innocent children won't do to each other.

DR. ZAZA:

HE LOOKS SAD WITH HIS HEAD DOWN.

We've seen people's insides and even though some of it is not pretty, most human beings still function. i wonder why these six are exceptions?

DR. LLOYD:

That is your problem, Doctor, the philosophizing and all, but all I am interested in is this machine and its potential it has for putting people back together.

DR. ZAZA:

It is rather a mechanical approach to the world; wouldn't you say?

DR. LLOYD:

Philosophers have been around a long time. Aristotle, Socrates, Christ, and the whole bunch with all their reasoning have not changed human beings as much as my machine will.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

You don't seem to think much of psychotherapy.

DR. LLOYD:

Have many hours have you spent spilling your guts out to a therapist?

BRAD TEMPLETON:

You know psychologist spend a certain amount of time being analyzed.

DR. ZAZA:

It looks like if you're ever allowed to practice again, you will be subjected to a lot more.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

You mean I will have to have therapy?

DR. ZAZA:

The judge is hard on homosexuals.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

What are their charges?

DR. ZAZA:

You were soliciting sex.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Most men and women do it every day.

DR. ZAZA:

They don't from the Chief of Police at a benefit ball. (RISING) If you gentlemen will excuse me, I am expecting my two sons.

BRAD TEMPLETON IS ESCORTED OUT. DR. ZAZA GOES INTO HIS OFFICE WHERE THERE IS THE SOUND OF BOYS TALKING. DR. LLOYD MOVES OVER TO THE COMPUTER SCREEN TO STUDY THE DATA COLLECTED.

DR. ZAZA ENTERS OFFICE WHERE HIS SONS, ED -EIGHT, JIM-TEN ARE WHISPERING NOISILY. THEY LOOK UP AND SMILE WHEN THEIR FATHER ENTERS.

DR. ZAZA:

Boys, how was school today?

JIM:

It was hell.

DR. ZAZA:

Jim, I would rather you did not use that word.

JIM:

It describes how it was.

ED:

Mine was that way, also.

DR. ZAZA:

Your mother called and told me you would be by. So what's up?

JIM:

We saw a neat game we want for our computer.

DR. ZAZA:

It has to be strictly educational.

ED:

Aw Dad, you really didn't believe that sales pitch the salesman gave us, did you?

DR. ZAZA:

I am a pretty trusting person who believes what people tell me. How much is this game?

JIM:

It's only fifty bucks.

ED:

And it will be good to develop eye-hand coordination.

DR. ZAZA:

What person told you that?

JIM:

The salesman.

ED:

And it's real neat, you know. It's like a wolf, you know. A wolf-like thing chases dots around, and the player tries to avoid being eaten. Dad, it's all green, blue and red. When you get safely home, the whole screen lights up like the Fourth of July.

JIM:

It's real neat.

DR. ZAZA:

You two try a little baseball for eye-hand coordination.

JIM:

Ah Dad, it's to cold for us to play baseball.

DR. ZAZA:

Do your homework on that thousand dollar machine I bought you, Einstein.

JIM:

There's no use arguing?

DR. ZAZA:

No use arguing. Tell your mother I will be late getting home. I'm on a special project.

JIM:

Is the M.I.T. man here?

DR. ZAZA:

HE STEPS TO DOOR.

Dr. Lloyd, I want you to meet my con artists, Jim and Ed. They are both enthralled with M.I.T.

DR. LLOYD:

I'll be looking for them in a few years. (THE BOYS LOOK AT THE COMPUTER SCREEN.) Are you interested in computers?

JIM:

Yes sir, but Dad won't let us buy the equipment we need.

DR. LLOYD:

He seems like a progressive man who would go for computers.

DR. ZAZA:

Not wolves chasing sheep.

DR. LLOYD:

They are video games?

DR. ZAZA:

Yes, and they are expensive video games.

DR. LLOYD:

I understand your objection. Say, do you have Miss Shakey's chart?

DR. ZAZA:

It is right here on my desk. You boys go on home, and I will see you in the morning. (HE CLOSES OFFICE DOOR AFTER DR. LLOYD ENTERS.)

JIM:

HE LOOKS AT THE COMPUTER MONITOR.

Dad's name is on this, and so is Dr. Lloyd's.

ED:

Why wouldn't Dad let us buy the video game? Hey, look at all this machine language after their names. Gee, I wonder what all those commands represent? Bet it's because Dad's Jewish reason why he won't give us fifty bucks.

JIM:

Probably. They're awfully tight with their money. Mother says he had a difficult time in Germany during the war. i guess it was those Nazis and everything.

ED:

HE PLAYS WITH THE COMPUTER KEYBOARD.

Hey, watch this. It moves things around just like ours does.

SHOT OF KEYBOARD. ED PRESSES KEYS, DIFFERENT PARTS OF THE MESSAGES ARE LIT UP. HE LEAVES NAMES ALONE, BUT MOVES MACHINE LANGUAGE AROUND.

JIM:

Say, this looks like something important. We better get out of here.

ED:

I put them all back where they were. Real neat machine. Wish Dad would have bought us a hard disk, instead of us having to use those floppy disks.

JIM:

They cost twice as much. Besides, it does everything we want it to do. Ed, come on. We must get out.

ED:

GOES TOWARDS DOOR WITH JIM.

Wonder if I got everything back the way it was. Come on Jim, I'll race you to the elevator. (BOYS RUN)

DR. LLOYD LOOKS AT MISS SHAKEY'S CHART WHILE DR. ZAZA SITS BACK IN HIS CHAIR AND RELAXES.

DR. LLOYD:

Did she mention any venereal diseases at any time?

DR. ZAZA:

Are you checking her out for tonight?

DR. LLOYD:

I wish I could. No, I want to make sure we are not wasting our time.

DR. ZAZA:

She checks out clean. We've run blood tests.

DR. LLOYD:

How about the other patients?

DR. ZAZA:

They all check out clean.

DR. LLOYD:

Do you have some more time?

DR. ZAZA:

I have made arrangements to give you as much time as you need.

DR. LLOYD:

I was going to go over these messages. Guess I'll wait until after we collect the second ones, though. I would like to observe the patients on the ward.

DR. ZAZA:

There is a closed circuit television in the conference room. If we walk in the ward, everyone will be on their best or worst behavior.

DR. LLOYD PRESSES THE KEYS THAT SAVES MESSAGES ON THE COMPUTER. HE SHUTS IT OFF.

DR. ZAZA:

HE HANDS DR. LLOYD THE KEY.

You better lock it up.

DR. LLOYD:

That's a good idea.

THEY ENTER THE ELEGANTLY FURNISHED CONFERENCE ROOM. DR. ZAZA TURNS ON THE CLOSED-CIRCUIT TELEVISION.

DR. LLOYD:

HE WATCHES PATIENTS SITTING IN LOUNGE WATCHING TELEVISION.

Do they know you can watch them?

DR. ZAZA:

The staff does, but the patients don't. I should not be that positive. Everyone of them suspects everything. We have disguised the cameras.

HE PRESSES SWITCH AND PICKS UP INSIDE OF MISS SHAKEY'S ROOM. SHE IS PULLING ON PINK PANTIES AS SHE ADMIRES HERSELF IN THE MIRROR.

DR. LLOYD:

Nice bod. Look at those tits. God, if that wouldn't make you hot, nothing would. It is a wonder she doesn't have a man in there with her.

DR. ZAZA:

It is against hospital rules. We should lock the linen closet, but they would find somewhere else.

DR. LLOYD:

It is probably better therapy than we can give them. Real nice. Real nice. I wonder if you could check me in?

DR. ZAZA:

You better be thinking about how you are going to modify these people's behavior.

DR. LLOYD:

I've figured it all out, but I would like to leave her alone.

DR. ZAZA:

Are you married?

DR. LLOYD:

I divorced her last year. She started running around on me. She said she could not compete with my machines.

DR. ZAZA:

Do they keep you pretty busy?

DR. LLOYD:

It is a day and night affair once I get on a project. I sometimes forget to eat. Say, switch that thing before I break in on your patient.

DR. ZAZA:

Let's see, Brad Templeton should be in the lounge. (SWITCHES) No, let's try his room. Odd. How about the linen closet?

BRAD TEMPLETON IS WITH A MALE PATIENT. THEY FEEL AROUND ON EACH OTHER. BRAD GOES TO HIS KNEES IN FRONT OF MALE PATIENT. FADE OUT.

DR. LLOYD:

Does he do oral sex?

DR. ZAZA:

Anyway he can get it. He is a good psychologist if we can get him to leave male patients alone. Some of them don't mind, but some come unglued when he starts messing with them. I used to send him patients, but he alienates men.

DR. LLOYD:

Can he treat women?

DR. ZAZA:

He tries, but sometimes he gets abusive in his language.

DR. LLOYD:

Compensating his feelings. Many homos do when a women interests them. Instead of getting involved, they become hostile and chase her away.

DR. ZAZA:

I guess I'll try to work through his boyhood experience.

DR. LLOYD:

You won't need to after I get through altering his brain waves. Say, check through the others, and let's go eat.

DR. ZAZA:

Sounds good.

DR. ZAZA TURNS DIALS. MISS PRIMNETTE, SEDATELY DRESSED, IS BUSILY GOING OVER HER BOOKS IN HER ROOM.

DR. ZAZA:

She has close to a billion dollars. On days she does not know her own name, she still knows where every penny she owns is.

DR. LLOYD:

It is a pity she does not have Shakey's body to go with all her money.

DR. ZAZA:

It seldom happens.

DR. LLOYD:

Worse luck. Change channels.

IN THE LOUNGE, ZACH TAYLOR IS WATCHING TELEVISION. HE IS QUIET, DEPRESSED AND HIS ATTENTION WANDERS AS HE LOOKS AT THE CLOCK.

DR. ZAZA:

If we can't make a football player out of him, there sits a million dollar garbage collector. After the big boys get through with them, a football player isn't worth much these days.

DR. LLOYD:

Most of them aren't worth a plugged nickel without a diploma. Collegiate football is producing few scholars.

DR. ZAZA:

They're lucky if they can read and write. I always hate to look in on Dave. Will you look at this?

INSIDE THE PADDED CELL, DAVE SITS WITH HIS HEAD IN HIS HANDS. EVEN THOUGH A TELEVISION IN A CAGE IS ON THE WALL, HE MOROSELY STARES AT THE FLOOR. OCCASIONALLY, HE GETS UP AND SLAMS HIS FIST INTO THE PADDED WALL BEFORE HE SINKS BACK INTO HIS CATATONIC SLOUCH.

DR. ZAZA:

He'll be lucky if he gets out of an institution. He will probably be kept in a V.A. Hospital the rest of his life. They'll try drug therapy until he burns out and becomes a zombie.

DR. LLOYD:

You are forgetting what my machine can do. Please give me a chance.

DR. ZAZA:

Does the change happen instantly?

DR. LLOYD:

Almost. Say, how about shutting this off and going to eat? (BOTH MEN WALK OUT.)

NEXT MORNING, BOTH DOCTORS ARE IN THE TREATMENT ROOM AGAIN WAITING FOR THEIR FIRST PATIENT. THE TWO ATTENDANTS BRING IN MISS PRIMNETTE.

DR. LLOYD:

(TO ATTENDANTS) I had planned on you bringing patients in the same order you brought them yesterday.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Some people lay in bed until after six in the morning.

DR. ZAZA:

(RISING) Good morning Miss Primnette. You are as beautiful as ever.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

You are most gallant, Doctor. I am considerably worried about this procedure. Are you sure there is no chance of ill effects?

DR. ZAZA:

I hope not, since I am going through the same treatment you are.

MISS PRIMNETTE

You have made me feel much better, Doctor. Surely you would not subject yourself to an unsafe procedure. Since I am not use to her type of behavior, I certainly hope your treatment will help Miss Shakey.

DR. ZAZA:

We shall transfer her to a state hospital if it doesn't. Since she is young and suicidal, she will be invaluable for our research.

DR. LLOYD:

Miss Primnette, I am ready for you.

HE ATTACHES THE ELECTRODES.

DR. ZAZA:

I'll operate the computer.

TURNING THE COMPUTER ON, DR. ZAZA TYPES PRIMNETTE AND PRESSES THE ENTER KEY. INSTANTLY, MISS PRIMNETTE BECOMES MUCH YOUNGER LOOKING.

DR. LLOYD:

Do you feel all right? (HE PATS HER GENTLY ON HER SHOULDER.)

MISS PRIMNETTE:

SHE SPEAKS IN A HUSKY, SEXY VOICE.

Let's go someplace, darling, and make love until our heads fall off. (SHE SLIPS HER GOWN DOWN EXPOSING HER SHRIVELED BREAST.) Come on, don't be bashful with me, Doctors. It won't hurt for both of you to enjoy me at one time.

SHE BEGINS TO FINISH UNDRESSING.

DR. ZAZA:

Good God!

SECOND ATTENDANT:

May I bring my girl friend in for a treatment? We've been going steady for a year, and she has yet to kiss me.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

I am so hot this morning I can't stand it. (SPEAKS TO ATTENDANTS) Since these men are no count for me, take me back to the ward where there are some real men. That Black has the longest thing you ever saw.

DR. ZAZA:

Do you think we should continue with this?

DR. LLOYD:

I told you the patient acts strange for a few minutes afterwards. Believe me, this is as safe as any treatment in existence.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

SHE SPEAKS TO THE ATTENDANTS.

Put your mouth on my tit, you handsome thing. I haven't had a man since yesterday afternoon.

DR. ZAZA:

(TO ATTENDANTS) Do it, and you can pick up your severance pay.

MISS PRIMNETTE

I've got freckles on my, but I'm pretty. Come on, aren't any of you going to love me? Doctors are supposed to always ravish their female patients. (SHE DISROBES.)

DR. ZAZA:

Take her to her room, and see that a female aide watches her until she comes to herself. And don't let her near any male patients.

MISS PRIMNETTE THROWS HER CLOTHES OFF FASTER THAN THE MEN CAN PUT THEM ON HER. THERE IS COMPLETE BEDLAM BEFORE DR. ZAZA PICKS UP A SHEET AND THROWS IT AROUND HER. BODILY, THE ATTENDANTS CARRY HER TOWARDS THE WARD.

DR. ZAZA:

HE SPEAKS INTO THE INTERCOM.

When the Attendants have settled Miss Primnette down, have them bring Mr. Frigby.

DR. LLOYD:

I don't see how we can hurt him.

DR. ZAZA:

Nothing would surprise me today.

THE TWO ATTENDANTS BRING IN MR. FRIGBY WHO IS MORE VIOLENT THAN THE PREVIOUS DAY. EVEN IN HIS STRAIGHT-JACKET, HE IS ABLE TO TURN OVER A BOTTLE FILLED WITH SURGICAL INSTRUMENTS.

DR. ZAZA:

Calm down immediately, Mr. Frigby. You know we do not condone such behavior in this hospital. Do you want me to put you on electric shock treatment?

DAVE FRIGBY:

(CALMS DOWN) No sir. The shock room is close to me; it must hurt.

DR. ZAZA:

It is a last resort, but when patients cannot control themselves, we do resort to it as a treatment. Now sit in the chair so Dr. Lloyd can help you.

THE ELECTRODES ARE ATTACHED. DR. ZAZA PUSHES BUTTONS. DAVE FRIGBY RELAXES AND BECOMES NERVOUS.

DAVE FRIGBY:

Why am I in this straight-jacket? Hi, I'm a Dallas Cowboy football player. No one treats a Dallas Cowboy this way. And what have you white men done to my skin.

DR. ZAZA:

Done to your skin?

DAVE FRIGBY:

You turned it white.

DR. ZAZA:

(ASIDE TO DR. LLOYD) Is he going paranoid?

DR. LLOYD:

I told you, sometimes there is confusion for a few minutes afterwards. Don't worry about it. If anything goes wrong, it's my ass that'll get kicked.

DAVE FRIGBY:

You white trash ruined me. if you white men don't change me back to black like I was when I came in here, I'll sue this hospital until it goes broke. All they sent me here for was cause the Cowboys just signed me to a million dollar contract before I got hurt. (WILD LOOK COMES ON FRIGBY'S FACE.) Let me get my arms free. You whites are goin' to castrate this Nigger while you got me all tied up like a pig in a poke.

DR. LLOYD:

(TO ATTENDANTS) Put him back to his cell, and call me if he doesn't come out of it after we get through here.

ATTENDANTS LEAVE WITH FRIGBY TRYING TO PUT HIS BOUND HANDS DOWN OVER HIS CROUCH. SWEAT IS POURING DOWN HIS FACE, AND HE IS SHAKING VIOLENTLY.

DR. ZAZA:

Can you explain this?

DR. LLOYD;

Explain what?

DR. ZAZA:

The fact two patients took on two other personalities after your treatment.

DR. LLOYD:

Transformation of symptomatic occurrences is not a common occurrence, but it is not at all unusual for one patient to take over the symptoms of another patient. It gives them an escape by letting them escape from their own miseries and take on another's troubles. Christians have been doing this for centuries by letting Christ's personality come in them.

DR. ZAZA:

Christians? Why is it when psychiatrist don't know what they're talking about, they always start delving in the metaphysics? When was the last time you went to church?

DR. LLOYD:

Why does it matter?

DR. ZAZA:

It matters because when I want to hear some holy words, I want them to come out of a person who has at least a passing knowledge of what he is talking about.

DR. LLOYD:

Do you go to synagogue?

DR. ZAZA:

Often enough so I have a passing knowledge about what is going on in the field of religion.

DR. LLOYD:

I try to catch my messages when I am fishing or playing golf.

DR. ZAZA:

Probably, all you ever catch is a cold.

DR. LLOYD:

How did we get off on this subject?.

DR. ZAZA:

We did when you brought Christian thought into our dilemma.

DR. LLOYD:

Did it offend you because you are Jewish?

DR. ZAZA:

No, because you have not shown any indications you are religious until things started going wrong. Somehow, it does not seem right is all. We had better get ready for the next patient, if they can separate them from those two prostitutes.

DR. LLOYD:

This ia a hell of a way to run a hospital.

DR. ZAZA:

The results are what counts.

THE ATTENDANTS BRING IN MISS SHAKEY WHO IS CLEARLY AGITATED.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

That old biddy has nerve enough to try turning tricks. I hope when I get her age, I have sense enough to keep my clothes on. You ever see such dried up tits in your life?

DR. ZAZA:

What happened?

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Miss Primnette got loose and did a striptease in the lounge.

DR. ZAZA:

She will cut off all our funds if she remembers any of this.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

I will sue you if she takes all my Johns from me.

DR. ZAZA:

Do you charge other patients?

SUSIE SHAKEY:

You think I am doing this for free? I've never seen any of you doctors work for nothing.

DR. LLOYD:

Sit down, Miss Shakey, so we can finish our work before noon.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

No doctor is going to tell me what to do. Besides, wouldn't you rather play with these than those silly dials, darling? (DISROBES)

DR. ZAZA:

Heaven help us!

DR. LLOYD:

Now look who is getting all religious and everything.

DR. ZAZA:

SLIGHTLY ANGRY TO ATTENDANTS,

Sit her down so we can get on with this.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Come on Susie, be a nice girl. Do as you are told.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

You don't nice girl me. Next time we stop in the empty treatment room, I'll charge you double.

DR. ZAZA:

Et tu?

SUSIE SHAKEY SITS DOWN AND ELECTRODES ARE ATTACHED. SHE IS STILL NUDE. DR. ZAZA PRESSES KEY. PATIENT IMMEDIATELY GRABS UP HER CLOTHES AND PULLS THEM ON.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

Dr. Zaza, I will speak to your superiors, if you continue to let your patients behave in such a manner. Imagine letting me sit here naked with four men looking on. I am so ashamed.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Ashamed after what you did to me this morning?

SUSIE SHAKEY:

I simply refuse to be embarrassed about something I know nothing about. You young men take me back to my room immediately. I do not want to see any more of loose living in our ward.

DR. ZAZA:

What do you mean loose living?

SUSIE SHAKEY:

You know very well what I mean. That prostitute carrying on her business before all the patients, and that queer chasing around after the men. (TURNING TO THE TWO ATTENDANTS) And you two are the worse offenders. Imagine taking that woman in the treatment rooms as if no one knew what was going on. It's shameful, that is what it is, shameful. Come, take me back to my room, immediately.

DR. ZAZA:

What a change.

DR. LLOYD:

I can't say I like the metamorphose. It is like turning a butterfly into a caterpillar.

DR. ZAZA:

Are you sure these transformations won't be permanent.

DR. LLOYD:

This never happened at M.I.T. Let's hope it is not permanent. Still, we must go through with it.

DR. ZAZA:

Must go through with it? You never told me about this.

DR. LLOYD:

If the brain command is left in the computer, the patient suffers memory loss.

DR. ZAZA:

God help the Jews!

DR. LLOYD:

And us poor sinners.

DR. ZAZA:

And she who is funding this project.

ATTENDANTS BRING IN REVEREND HIRAM JOSIAH. HE STILL CARRIES HIS GOLD COLLECTION PLATE.

DR. ZAZA:

Good morning, sir. You look like something is wrong.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Miss Shakey slapped him.

DR. ZAZA:

Slapped him? What for?

FIRST ATTENDANT:

She said he insulted her.

REVEREND HIRAM JOSIAH:

All I did was offer her five for a lay this afternoon when this is over.

DR. ZAZA:

Perhaps it will be best if you do not bother the female patients anymore.

REVEREND HIRAM JOSIAH:

What do you mean not bother the female patients? Earlier, she couldn't wait for me to take my pants off. Have you ever tried to make love with pajamas on?

DR. LLOYD:

Everyone of us have our crosses to bear.

REVEREND HIRAM JOSIAH:

I will tolerate no mockery from unbelievers.

DR. ZAZA:

This is the first time I have detected anger in your voice.

REVEREND HIRAM JOSIAH:

Even the Lord Jesus Christ grew angry at the money changers.

DR. ZAZA:

Sit down and let's get this over with.

REVEREND HIRAM JOSIAH:

Give a tenth of your oxen, your wages and your ass to the Lord. (SITS DOWN) But not a tenth of Miss Shakey.

DR. LLOYD PLACES THE ELECTRODES. DR. ZAZA PRESSES THE BUTTONS.

REVEREND HIRAM JOSIAH:

HE MAINTAINS A PEACEFUL LOOK ON HIS FACE, BUT HE IS NERVOUS.

There is so much responsibility to running a teaching hospital. (TO DR. LLOYD) Are you sure this procedure is valid?

DR. LLOYD:

HE IS SURPRISED.

The American Medical Association took five years to approve it.

REVEREND HIRAM JOSIAH:

A.M.A. approved Zomax.

DR. LLOYD:

Zomax? What was it?

REVEREND HIRAM JOSIAH:

Zomax is a pain killer that killed people.

DR. LLOYD:

I had forgotten about that. All right, Reverend, you are ready to go back.

REVEREND HIRAM JOSIAH:

You will address me as Doctor after this. (LEAVES WITH BOTH ATTENDANTS LEADING HIM.)

DR. LLOYD:

I didn't realize he had a Doctor's degree.

DR. ZAZA:

He received his Honorary Doctor of Divinity from a diploma mill. It gives him prestige.

DR. LLOYD:

Only one more patient and then us.

DR. ZAZA:

Are you first, or am I first?

DR. LLOYD:

The way this is going, you better go first so you will have time to recover if it affects me the way it has the rest.

THE ATTENDANTS BRING IN BRAD TEMPLETON. HE IS TRYING TO GET HIS HANDS ON BOTH OF THEM. THE SECOND ATTENDANT HAS HIS ZIPPER DOWN AND IS EMBARRASSINGLY TRYING TO GET IT BACK UP.

DR. ZAZA:

Dr. Templeton, at least there is no change in you.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

What are you doing to the troops? It's as if you are playing musical chairs to see who will get whose personality.

DR. LLOYD:

It is only temporary. Seems to be a role changed caused by subliminal desires to be somebody else.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Who will I be? My, it will have to be one of you doctors since everyone else is taken up. I could never stand Kosher food. If you don't mind, Dr. Lloyd, I'll be you.

DR. LLOYD:

Nonsense. Sit down. Let's get this over with.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Am I a convicted killer going to the electric chair? No shaved head and slit trouser leg? And will you fry my brain? Oh, I have a second thought! It will be nice to be a psychiatrist instead of a psychologist.

DR. LLOYD:

Why?

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Patients pay you better.

DR. LLOYD:

You have to roam at night and see about ill patients.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Oh I shan't mind since night is the best time to find drunks who want my services.

IT IS THE SAME PROCEDURE WITH ELECTRODES AND PRESSING KEYS.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

It is indeed a marvelous machine I have invented. Imagine, I have found the cure for the most dreaded disease of mankind, mental illness. Next, science shall triumph over the common cold. This should give me a niche with Freud, Addler and Jung.

DR. ZAZA:

(TO DR. LLOYD)

He seems to be your alter ego.

DR. LLOYD:

You are next. I can't wait to see who you will perform like.

DR. ZAZA:

It had better be like me, Dr. Zaza.

DR. LLOYD:

Let's hope you will.

AS BRAD TEMPLETON IS LED OUT, DR. LLOYD PERFORMS THE PROCEDURE ON DR. ZAZA.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

FIRST ATTENDANT'S VOICE THROUGH DOOR.

Dr. Templeton, you must be critically sick - not one pass.

DR. LLOYD:

Well, this is it. Are you feeling OK?

DR. ZAZA:

HE PICKS UP THE REVEREND HIRAM JOSIAH'S GOLD OFFERING PLATE.

Praise the Lord's name by giving a tenth of your possession.

DR. LLOYD:

Christ Man, you also?

DR. ZAZA:

Praise His Holy Name. Let the Lord have it.

DR. LLOYD:

HE SHAKES HIS HEAD AND ASKS:

Who would have thought it?

DR. LLOYD PRESSES A BUTTON. A BEAUTIFUL NURSE COMES IN.

I am afraid Dr. Zaza is not feeling well. Would you take him to his office so he can recover?

NURSE:

What is going on in here? You have a whole ward upset.

DR. LLOYD:

That bad? Be a good girl and lock off the north end. Separate the patients until this wears off. (NURSE TURNS TO LEAVE) After you have seen to Dr. Zaza.

NURSE:

SHE GOES TO THE TELEPHONE AND DIALS THE WARD.

Jane, Dr. Lloyd requests the north end locked. All these loonies he has created, place them in that section. Yes, those he has treated. You say Mr. Taylor is tearing the place up? He is throwing furniture? Get the attendants to put him in a room by himself. My, my, and he was such a nice, young man.

DR. LLOYD:

We have no more time for gossip, Nurse.

NURSE:

SHE IGNORES DR. LLOYD AND TAKES DR. ZAZA BY HIS ARM.

Come on, sweetie, let the nurse take care of you.

SHE LEADS DR. ZAZA TO HIS OFFICE. HE IMMEDIATELY THROWS DOWN HIS GOLD COLLECTION PLATE, THROWS NURSE ONTO COUCH AND STARTS UNDRESSING HER. HE KISSES HER PASSIONATELY.

NURSE

Dr. Zaza, I have waited years for this moment. If only you knew how much I love you. Here, let me help you with your zipper.

DR. ZAZA AND THE NURSE ARE ON THE COUCH WHEN SCENE SHIFTS BACK TO DR. LLOYD. HE ATTACHES ELECTRODES AND TALKS TO HIMSELF.

DR. LLOYD:

These people are so unstable. I never dreamed it would it would happen like this. Damn, I'll be glad to go back to M.I.T. and lock myself in my lab again. People are so unpredictable.

HE TYPES HIS NAME ON THE SCREEN AND PUSHES KEY. LIGHTS DIM WHEN HE STANDS UP. WHEN ATTENDANTS COME INTO THE ROOM, HE STARTS FONDLING THEM WITH BOTH HANDS.

SCENE TWO

BOTH DOCTORS, REVEREND JOSIAH, SUSIE SHAKEY, MISS PRIMNETTE, DAVE FRIGBY, BRAD TEMPLETON, AND ZACK TAYLOR ARE LOCKED IN THE NORTH WING OF THE WARD. ZACH TAYLOR IS IN A STRAIGHT JACKET. RADIO AND TELEVISION SETS ARE BLARING. MISS PRIMNETTE IS IN THE HALL DOING STRIPTEASE TO, "I AM A YELLOW SUBMARINE" WHILE ALL THE MEN PATIENTS WATCH. REVEREND JOSIAH AND BRAD TEMPLETON SIT OFF BY THEMSELVES WATCHING THE OTHERS.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

You put us in a hell of a mess with all your technology.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

It's not over.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

(ANGRILY) I'll cuss God Almighty, damn, just once, and yell the hell it's not over with. Will you look at that fool preacher making a spectacle of himself screwing around with little Miss Shakey?

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Well, it's not as bad as watching yourself try to jack off every man on the ward.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

It serves you right for thinking you can help people with a computer. People are not machines you can manipulate like a car or a tank or something. People need understanding and love if they are going to improve.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Basically, your theory is right, you Jewish fag.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

It is you who's a fag. Your basic desire must have been queer all the way. Shit, you wish to be gay.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

(ANGRILY) I told you someone must have fucked the messages up.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Which explanation was that? Your third one or your fourth one. Hell of a note, a man with all your degrees does not think to check the monitor before pressing buttons. You imbecile jackass with so many degrees after your tail.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Why you doubled visioned killer of Christ! I'll be a son of a bitch if I take this off you. (HE STANDS UP AND SWINGS.)

REVEREND JOSIAH:

HE CATCHES FIST IN NOSE. BLOOD SPURTS.

Is this the kind of game you want to play? (HE STRIKES BACK.)

BRAD TEMPLETON:

(HE DUCKS.) Take that one in your fat belly. (POW)

REVEREND JOSIAH:

If that whore chaser hadn't let himself get so out of shape, you wouldn't be doing this to me. (THE HAYMAKER GATHERS WIND.)

BRAD TEMPLETON:

You blame someone else when you lose. That queer bastard hasn't taken too good care of his body, either.

THEY GRAPPLE AND FALL TO THE FLOOR WITH BRAD TEMPLETON ON TOP. THE TWO ATTENDANTS COME RUNNING.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Here, let's stop at once. Reverend, you should be ashamed of yourself brawling like a common drunk.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

I tell you a million times, I am not the Reverend.

SECOND ATTENDANT:

HE STRUGGLES TO KEEP THE TWO MEN APART.

Who the fuck's this gentleman I'm holding?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

I am Dr. Zaza. Can you not recognize me, you imbecile?

FIRST ATTENDANT:

And, who is this gentleman I am holding?

THE TWO COMBATANTS KEEP TRYING TO HIT EACH OTHER. DURING ALL THIS, THE OTHER PATIENTS SCOOT THEIR CHAIRS CLOSER SO THEY CAN WATCH MISS PRIMNETTE.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

I am Dr. Lloyd.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Then who is that sitting up there making such a spectacle out of himself?

BRAD TEMPLETON:

It's Brad Templeton. His mind is in my body.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

It's Reverend Josiah's mind in my body.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

And that was not Dr. Zaza who spent two hours on the couch with his nurse?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

How disgusting. Without the door locked?

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Without the door locked.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

And you criticized me.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

At least my body is not being used by a damned homosexual. You will be lucky if you escape without catching AIDS.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

BREAKS AWAY AND SLUGS REVEREND JOSIAH IN HIS FAT GUT AS ATTENDANT HOLDS HIM.

You Jewish cobra, it would have been better had Hilter's boys killed you.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

And, why could you not have electrocuted yourself with your toys?

FIRST ATTENDANT:

I'm putting you both into straight-jackets until you calm down.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

When this is all over, you will regret putting a doctor in restraints.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

HE PUTS A STRAIGHT-JACKET ON THE REVEREND WHILE HE KEEPS A HAMMER-LOCK ON HIS ARM.

At least you will be in one piece.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

I will sue this mother fucking place.

SECOND ATTENDANT:

HE PUTS A STRAIGHT-JACKET ON TEMPLETON.

Will you sue as Brad Templeton or Dr. Lloyd?

BRAD TEMPLETON:

As both myself and Brad Templeton.

SECOND ATTENDANT:

When it's over, you might be wealthy. Remember, your malpractice insurance may pay.

REVEREND JOSIAH AND BRAD TEMPLETON ARE EACH IN STRAIGHT-JACKETS AS THEY SIT BACK AND TALK TO THE ATTENDANTS.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

First, explain to us what happened.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

This son of a bitching imbecile of a Doctor mixed up everybody's brain signals and popped them in the wrong person.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

I'm not taking this abuse.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

You'll have to take it.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

We will lock you in a padded cell if you don't shut up.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Why can't you let us go back to the treatment room and try to straighten this thing out?

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Don't you remember me telling you the computer you were using was totaled by Dr. Lloyd?

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Brad Templeton did it.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Aren't you Brad Templeton?

BRAD TEMPLETON:

He's in my body.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

He's in Who's Who?

BRAD TEMPLETON:

He is in Dr. Lloyd's.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Let's get this straight. You're saying Dr. Lloyd's mind is in Brad Templeton's body, and that Brad Templeton's mind is in Dr. Lloyd's body?

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Do you not believe us?

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Dr. Zaza's mind is in the Reverend's body, while the Reverend's mind is in Dr. Zaza's body?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Do you not believe us?

SECOND ATTENDANT:

Would you believe such a story from one of your patients?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

No. And did my body make love to my nurse? I would never have dreamed she would be receptive to me.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

She enjoyed it.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

If only we knew what other's are thinking. We worked together for ten years, and there was not a single caress between me and that poor, tortured woman. To think, she lusted after me for so long.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

You're an egotistical, bastard. Why don't you tell her, 'I have missed so much all these years'?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

I'll say what I say, and you say what you mean.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

You are a nasty peckerwood this morning.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Who's nasty?

HE STANDS UP AND SHOVES THE CHAIR BRAD TEMPLETON IS SITTING IN WITH HIS SHOULDER.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

(HE STANDS UP) Watch who you are shoving, creep.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Are you gentlemen ready to spend a few goddamn days in a padded cell? Why don't you do something fucking constructive like figuring out how you are going to straighten this mess out?

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Did you say the computer's been damaged?

SECOND ATTENDANT:

It'll still turn on, but we can't get into program.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Does the modem still work? We might phone the messages out into another computer.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

The technicians are working on it, but they don't want to risk garbling up the messages. Do you have an assistant at M.I.T.?

BRAD TEMPLETON:

No one's smart enough to learn my procedure.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

You egotistical bastard.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Watch who you are calling a bastard. Go jack off. Not everyone will take this kind of name calling. I happen to think a great deal of both of my parents.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

They should be ashamed to have produced an idiot.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

Who are you calling them idiots?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

I am calling you an idiot. Does that make sense to you, idiot?

BRAD TEMPLETON:

HE IS STANDING UP. HE BUTTS REVEREND JOSIAH IN THE BELLY WITH HIS HEAD.

Take that.

AN ALARM SOUNDS. FIVE EXTRA ATTENDANTS RUSH IN. THEY RUSH THE TWO DOCTORS INTO A ROOM FIXED UP FOR A PADDED CELL.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

HE LOCKS THE DOOR.

You spend your time figuring out how you are going to get the right brain in the right body.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

When will you let us out of this baggage room?

FIRST ATTENDANT:

When your mission is complete.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

We will be in here forever. This jackass can't figure out how to untie his shoes.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

You look out who is calling who a jackass.

THE TWO DOCTORS START PUSHING ONE ANOTHER DOWN WITH THEIR SHOULDERS.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Let them fight it out, and then perhaps they will do their job.

SECOND ATTENDANT:

Perhaps they will not hurt each other if we zip off their straight-jackets, instead of their pants.

THE STRAIGHT-JACKETS ARE REMOVED.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

HITS THE FIRST ATTENDANT IN THE NOSE.

This is for putting a doctor in this fucking thing.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

HE HITS SECOND ATTENDANT IN NOSE.

This is for putting a doctor in jail.

A FREE-FOR-ALL DEVELOPS. ALL FOUR MEN HITS THE ONE WHO IS CLOSEST. THE ATTENDANTS ARE MUSCULAR, YOUNG MEN WHO SOON TIRE THE OLDER MEN. THE OTHER PATIENTS TAKE TURNS WATCHING THROUGH THE GLASS PANEL.

DR. LLOYD:

Did you see the way I hit him? Uh, look at my goddamn face. My poor face. No one will let me get near them if I ever get into my own body again.

DR. ZAZA:

PUSHING WAY TO GLASS.

Does this look like a preacher's face? It will take me a month to heal up enough to face an audience again.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

I declare from what I hear about your last appearance, no one will gaze at your face, anyway.

DR. ZAZA:

It is a dammed lie. I was merely showing a graphic illustration of what adultery is.

DR. LLOYD:

I was only showing the chief of police what it is like to be summoned.

ZACH TAYLOR:

I'm tied up in this straight-jacket, or I would punch your nose for what you are doing to me.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

It is odd, you were never violent before the new treatment. In fact, you were my gentlest patient.

SHE MOVES OVER TO FONDLE ZACH.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Keep your hands off me, you fucking bitch.

DR. ZAZA:

The Lord tells us in the Good Book, 'we should do unto others as we should have them do unto us'.

ZACH TAYLOR:

You old screw bag, you do what the Lord wants you to do, and I will do what He wants me to do. Being pawed over by a eighty year old tittie isn't in my Bible.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

SHE SLAPS ZACH HARD.

How dare you call me an eighty year old tittie.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

SHE SEDATELY STANDS ASIDE.

She's not a day over seventy-eight.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

I'm still a virgin who has never had a man.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

You are a fuckin' whore.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

Who're you calling a whore?

SHE SLAPS MISS PRIMNETTE HARD. A FIGHT BREAKS OUT BETWEEN THE TWO LADIES. THE TWO ATTENDANTS COME OUT AND PUT STRAIGHT-JACKETS ON THE TWO. THEY PUT THEM IN THE PADDED CELL WITH BRAD TEMPLETON AND THE REVEREND JOSIAH WHERE THEY CONTINUE TO FIGHT BY PUSHING EACH OTHER.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

It's disgusting for two ladies to lower themselves and behave like men.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

It's worse than barnyard animals wallowing around their manure.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

PAUSES. It's disgusting.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

We might as well put Templeton and Josiah, again, in their straight-jackets.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

We are Dr. Zaza and DR. Lloyd.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Whatever, you are going back into your straight-jackets.

TEMPLETON AND JOSIAH STICK THEIR ARMS INTO THE JACKETS.

DR. ZAZA:

STANDING ON THE OUTSIDE, DR. ZAZA SAYS TO DR. LLOYD.

Just what do you think you are doing with your hands, you dick licker?

DR. LLOYD:

Who are you calling a dick licker?

DR. ZAZA:

I am calling you a dick licker. For the last time, get your hands off me.

DR. LLOYD:

Just what do you plan to do about it?

DR. ZAZA:

I plan to do this.

(HE PUNCHES DR. LLOYD IN NOSE.)

DR. LLOYD:

You take this, hypocrite.

HE PUNCHES DR. ZAZA IN THE NOSE AFTER WHICH A VIOLENT FIGHT BREAKS OUT.

DR. ZAZA:

Yes, you take this, you queer.

DR. LLOYD:

Take this, you whoremonger.

DR. ZAZA:

I'll return it, you Satan Sodomite.

DR. LLOYD:

You're fucking with adultery.

DR. ZAZA:

Go to the devils.

THE TWO SWEATING ATTENDANTS PUT STRAIGHT-JACKETS ON THE TWO MEN AND PLACE THEM INTO THE PADDED CELL WITH BRAD TEMPLETON, THE REV. JOSIAH, SUSIE SHAPELY AND MISS PRIMNETTE. THEY CONTINUE TO FIGHT WITH THEIR SHOULDERS AND FEET. IT IS BEDLAM AS OPPONENTS HIT AND PUMMEL EACH OTHER. ZACH AND FRIGBY ARE LEFT OUTSIDE THE PADDED CELL TO WATCH WITH THE TWO ATTENDANTS.

DAVE FRIGBY:

It'll sure feel fine to get back into my own body.

ZACH TAYLOR:

White's better than black. How do you put up with your stink?

DAVE FRIGBY:

What do you mean stink, white man? No wonder you always fighting and throwing things around you having to live in this body. Likes to frighten me to death things you did over in Vietnam.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Do you think facing those rushing football players is amusement? It's no wonder you make my body shake all the time. Maybe you're just a scared nigger. What you doing with just one nut on your body?

DAVE FRIGBY:

You notice that, white man? Reason there only one is a white man didn't want me playing football with them white boys. Say us niggers so strong, if they let us play, pretty soon, white boys won't be allowed to play no ball at all.

ZACH TAYLOR:

About right, ain't it? Seems like you black boys have just about taken over the whole goddamned world.

DAVE FRIGBY:

We's goddamned good.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Just that those white men afraid of you and let you play.

DAVE FRIGBY:

White boys are too fuckin' weak.

ZACH TAYLOR:

What do you mean, 'White boys too weak'?

DAVE FRIGBY:

'Bout the way it is. White mamas let their baby dudes play with themselves too much.

ZACH TAYLOR:

What do you mean, 'White mamas let their babies play with themselves too much'?

DAVE FRIGBY:

Just what I say.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Does not.

DAVE FRIGBY:

Does.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Does not.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

It's something to see a black man taking up for the white race.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Doctors fucked us all up is reason this is happening. Always wondered what it would be like to be black.

DAVE FRIGBY:

Now you know. Pretty good, ain't it?

ZACH TAYLOR:

I prefer my own body.

DAVE FRIGBY:

You should be proud to be black. Way us people is goin', we're goin' be sitting in that White House real soon making you white people kneel down to us.

ZACH TAYLOR:

The only way you going to get into the White House is to steal your way in sometime when you're out riding in one of them big Cadillacs, you people are always driving around in.

DAVE FRIGBY:

You just watch us white man--

ZACH TAYLOR:

HE INTERRUPTS.

You don't seem to recall things have turned around here. I am black and you are white.

DAVE FRIGBY:

Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf? Only temporary, white man, and then we go back to being ourselves. You just watch us, white man. Us Niggers are goin' to take over the goddamned world one of these days. Civil Rights is how we is gona' to do it. Yes suh, them Civil Rights is goin' to put us Niggers right into the White House. Washington. I should put in uh-K.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Goddamn, how do you figure it?

DAVE FRIGBY:

Equal Opportunity. E.E.O., that is what is goin' to do it.

ZACH TAYLOR:

How do you multiply?

DAVE FRIGBY:

Divide how many years this U. S. been ruled by white folks.

ZACH TAYLOR:

It has been since it was, and still is back in 1776.

DAVE FRIGBY:

Well, accordin' to my calculations, white man, it's just about time we Blacks has our E.E.O. and gets us some black man in that big mansion up in Washington D.C. of these U.S. of A.

ZACH TAYLOR:

You'll have all us eating chittlins and plowing our fifty acres with a mule.

DAVE FRIGBY:

You just about right, white man. You spray all them insecticides around on us Nigger's turnip greens until we just about dead. Cirrhosis of the liver.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Caused by all that Mogan David wine you Black's put away.

DAVE FRIGBY:

That goddamn Mogan David don't do screw but wash them worms right down the slop jar. Man, you ain't know what is good until you have some hog jowls, red beans, turnip greens and Mogan David to wash it all down with. Why once we Blacks get into that White House, we have you white folks big and strong like Martin Luther King, Jr.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Then who'll play quarterback?

DAVE FRIGBY:

Man, what ass wrong with you? We ain't a goin' to need no quarterback.

ZACH TAYLOR:

You're not going to need one? Who in hell's heard of such a thing?

DAVE FRIGBY:

We'll simply have halfbacks which can walk right through the middle. Line won't need of passin' that ball with big strong white boys blocking for us Black Dallus Cowboys.

ZACH TAYLOR:

I guess you'll have us collecting garbage and all that shit if you get your votes.

DAVE FRIGBY:

And sittin' around down by the courthouse shinin' shoes to pick up a few cents to feed yo' family with. White boy, things a gonna' to change 'round heah right quick jes' soon as us Black owners gets into power.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Guess only way us po' white trash goin' survive yo' uppity Niggers is to stain ourselves black so's we can fool yo' Black people.

DAVE FRIGBY:

Yeah. 'Bout right.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Well, if it's right, way I figure is that we'll jus use ol' Doc Lloyd's machine and transfer all us white people into Niggers. Then we'll still be in charge.

DAVE FRIGBY:

Oh no you won't, white boy, 'cause when we gets in charge, we's goin' eliminate all yo' white people right swift.

THE OTHER PATIENTS HAVE BEEN BATTLING UP TO THIS TIME, BUT NOW THEY STOP AND LOOK SCARED AT WHAT DAVE FRIGBY SAID.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

It looks like they are fixing to start another Austerlitz to eliminate all us Jews now. It won't be the first or second time.

BRET TEMPLETON:

It looks that way. Wonder if my machine could change whites into blacks quick enough to save the world?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Now you are figuring how to manipulate your failures into success. Way with all you scientific people, you try to manipulate the world. (HE FARTS)

BRET TEMPLETON:

Didn't we save it?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Saved it from whom?

BRET TEMPLETON:

From Hitler, that's who.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

How?

BRET TEMPLETON:

By dropping the atomic bomb, that's how.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Seems like that was on Japan after Germany already surrendered.

BRET TEMPLETON:

The bomb saved our men's lives.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Nearly everyone of them are dead now.

BRET TEMPLETON:

It kept us from having another, goddamned, big war.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Do you recall Korea and Vietnam?

BRET TEMPLETON:

Those were collective police actions.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

A collect multitude of men lost their butts in that police action. Besides, development of atomic energy may have set off a chain reaction that may finalize civilization as we know it now.

BRET TEMPLETON:

Today, don't give me little, green men and mutants with horns branching from their foreheads. Scientist are changing the world with their new technologies. Soon, universities will be through teaching crud like Chaucer and Shakespeare.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

And the Bible?

BRET TEMPLETON:

And especially the Bible. It is nothing but a bunch of fucking nonsense about morals which should have been thrown out with the Middle Ages.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Even the Sermon on the Mount? - and the Beatitudes. You would cleanse the human race of ethical teaching found in the "Love thy neighbor as thyself?"

BRET TEMPLETON:

Are you sure you did not receive some of the Reverend's brain as well as his body?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Watch what you say.

DR. ZAZA'S BODY COMES HURLING THROUGH THE AIR AND HITS BRET TEMPLETON A SOUNDING WHACK THAT PUTS BOTH MEN ON THE FLOOR. THE FIGHT IS ON AGAIN. ONLY ZACH TAYLOR AND DAVE FRIGBY ARE LEFT OUTSIDE THE PADDED CELL.

DAVE FRIGBY:

Seems like us two ones who should be in there.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Why is this the case?

DAVE FRIGBY:

Race riots, Night Riders, Ku Klux Klan and all those bigoted things you white people have tried to lay on us.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Do you not realize, white man, that our roles have been reversed? Do you suppose many white women would want to marry me? Do you think I might be greeted in high white society?

DAVE FRIGBY:

Goddamned, still you think like black man. Why you think they'd ostracize you?

ZACH TAYLOR:

You don't realize, man. It's not our mind and thinking white society judges a man by.

DAVE FRIGBY:

What is it then? Think they'd accept me in white society, me a disguised black man in a white man's body?

ZACH TAYLOR:

You've my fingerprints and my voice. Your skin's white. You could walk into any phase of white society your education and social abilities would qualify you to attend. Did you learn something where you adventured college?

DAVE FRIGBY:

Assholes red-shirted me. I had to study. Earned a Master's Degree in mathematics.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Smart Nigger, aren't you?

DAVE FRIGBY:

Who you calling a Nigger? Man, you blacker than the black beans of one Cajun.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Who you call black, Nigger?

DAVE FRIGBY:

Say suh, I like this being able to call you a Nigger. Why, I just may become one of those high society mathematic teachers and leave you holding the bag.

ZACH TAYLOR:

To be mentally ill and black, there's not a chance. I guess I'll have to do like all them other Niggers and sue. Maybe I can at least get enough to buy me a bag of rags to roll up on some street corner.

DAVE FRIGBY:

It's is no concern of mine, Black badger. Say, you Niggers can go to Hell now, and I don't give a damn. Man, you and yo' race, ain't ha tall my business.

ZACH TAYLOR:

You figured out how you going to convince a school board how Zach Taylor got a white body?

DAVE FRIGBY:

Say, how much education you got, man?

ZACH TAYLOR:

Got a G.E.D. in the Marine Corp.

DAVE FRIGBY:

Shut up. Black is lovely. No way I'm goin' to let you stay in my body. Besides, college education counts for a lot more than a dumb white Marine that cracked up from combat.

ZACK TAYLOR:

Who cracked up? You calling me crazy? I won't take that off no black man. (HE BUTtS DAVE FRIGBY IN THE STOMACH.)

DAVE FRIGBY:

Say, I can't hit no man in a straight-jacket.

ZACK TAYLOR:

You better come off your high ethical horse and defend yourself. (THEY FIGHT.)

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Let's herd Zach Taylor in, and then, we'll put a straight-jacket on Dave.

ZACK TAYLOR:

I am Dave Frigby in Zack Taylor's body. (HE KICKS SECOND ATTENDANT IN THE SHINS.)

SECOND ATTENDANT:

You better watch it, man. It would be hard to explain to your mama how her son turned into a Black man. Say, this could cause all kinds of problems trying to prove whose name should be on the death certificate.

DAVE FRIGBY:

Put your damned straight-jacket on me, and I'll go peacefully.

THERE IS A GENERAL FREE-FOR-ALL UNTIL EVERYONE IS EXHAUSTED AND SINKS TO THE THICK MAT COVERING THE FLOOR.

DR. ZAZA:

We are acting like a bunch of children. The Bible says for us to turn the other cheek.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

These words were first spoken out of the mouth of a Jew.

DR. ZAZA:

And I am supposed to be his mouthpiece here on earth. What has happened to the Church of God? Here I am whoring and chasing other women. What a shameful example I have been setting for others to follow.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

Does it mean you are through chasing women?

DR. ZAZA:

No. Those were merely pious words uttered on the spur of the moment while the weakness of the flesh was upon me.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

Thank God, there is still one man left on us.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

You get V.D., Reverend, and you bought that body.

DR. ZAZA:

The miseries of the flesh are worth all the pleasures a woman has to offer.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

Preach and holler, Brother. I remember how you filled me with the Holy Ghost every time we screwed in that closet together. Oh Brother, I can hardly wait for you to ball love to me in your new body.

DR. ZAZA:

Say Brother, does it feel as good circumcised as it did before?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Why can't you remain chaste until we get this thing straightened out? You are fornicating with my body.

MISS PRIMNETTE

Fornication is the most beautiful word in the Bible. GIve me fornication, Reverend. You give me fornication as usual. It's spite that Black had to trade his long, black Peter for that skinny, little white one that can't persuade me to go, "Uh, Uh"!

DR. ZAZA:

We need to have an orgy to get our minds rid of Modernism and Satanism. We ought to have the Texas Giant Orgasm up and down the goal floor.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

Preach it, Brother. Soon, I'll melt in flames.

DR. ZAZA:

Simple, just like Paul and Silas, we might have a regular meeting chance, way beyond locked doors.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

We'll have a old time holy roller meeting on this floor.

DR. ZAZA:

Won't you go with me to the promise land?

HE ROLLS TOWARD SUSIE SHAKEY.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

All of you are wrong, big Brother. I'm not this type of girl.

DAVE FRIGBY:

Come at me. Sister. You're the first white goddess I so much enjoyed.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

Do you wish an eighty-year old woman's body?

MISS PRIMNETTE:

I thought it's seventy-eight.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

Age stopped for Leap Year.

DR. ZAZA:

HE ROLLS TOWARD SUSIE SHAKEY AND SINGS.

Go on, Sister, let you go with me to that Promise Land. We'll climb up Sunshine Mountain where heavenly breezes blow, as I stick my rod in your sparkling fountain.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

It isn't what we whores call it.

SUSIE SHAKEY

DR. ZAZA ROLLS CLOSER TO TOUCH HER BUTTOCKS.

You must be ashamed of yourself, Doctor. Do you suppose you could live on your own after deflowering a eighty-year old virgin.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

Is it not seventy-eight?

DR. ZAZA:

I might have you deflowered.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Why didn't I check your blood test better? My fucking, aching prostrate if she has V.D.

BRAD TEMPLETON:

I desire to spend one night with her.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Then why don't you?

BRAD TEMPLETON:

I can't pull down my pants.

DR. ZAZA:

This is not too good a reason.

DR. LLOYD:

If I might find a willing male in this iniquity den, I'd find a way to get his pants down even with a straight-jacket hindering me.

DR. ZAZA:

How?

DR. LLOYD:

I'll use my teeth.

THE ONES IN THE PADDED CELL DOZE AND SLEEP. AFTERWARDS, SUSIE SHAKEY SCOOTS HER BODY TOWARD DAVE FRIGBY. HE WIGGLES TOWARD HER. THERE ARE GENERAL RUBBING OF BODIES AS VARIOUS PATIENTS MOVE TOWARD OTHERS. SUSIE SHAKEY HAS ALL BUT TWO MALE PATIENTS MOVE TOWARD HER. REVEREND JOSIAH STAYS BY HIMSELF. DR. LLOYD SQUIRMS AFTER THE WIGGLING MEN.

THE SCENE SHIFTS TO THE TREATMENT ROOM. THERE ARE TWO TECHNICIANS REPAIRING THE BROKEN COMPUTER. THEIR NAMES ARE GREEN LETTERS ON THEIR BACKS UNDER THE IBM LOGO. THEY'RE DRESSED IN WHITE GOWNS WITH MASKS, AND THEY'VE RIGGED UP AN OPERATING ROOM LIGHT. THE NURSES ARE WATCHING.

FIRST TECHNICIAN:

HE IS A BURLY FOOTBALL TYPE.

Slot A moves into the B slot and wraps around the C slot.

SECOND TECHNICIAN:

HE IS AN EINSTEIN TYPE WEARING THICK GLASSES.

No, can't you see slot C is the one reserved for the phone modem? Stop putting the mouse in it. Damn, man, where did you intern?

FIRST TECHNICIAN:

I played football at Texas Tech.

SECOND TECHNICIAN:

You did? (HE NODS) It's why you're ignorant. It may have been best if you attended a better school.

HE TAKES OVER THE JOB AND ATTEMPTS TO HOOK THE DELICATE WIRES TOGETHER. THERE IS A SPARK AND A SIZZLING SOUND.

FIRST TECHNICIAN:

Idiot. Where'd you take your training?

SECOND TECHNICIAN:

I have no formal training. I took my educational job under H. Ross Perot.

FIRST TECHNICIAN:

He's nothing but a high-rolling financier.

SECOND TECHNICIAN:

So, it isn't an American dream to be a multi-millionaire in high technology?

FIRST TECHNICIAN:

There must be someone in the lower echelon who does the work. Why didn't you tell IBM you knew nothing about computers?

SECOND TECHNICIAN:

I know a lot about computers.

FIRST TECHNICIAN:

What did you say?

SECOND TECHNICIAN:

This cord plugs into the wall socket. The on and off switch is activated by snapping the switch into the on position.

FIRST TECHNICIAN:

With this we're tampering with brain waves of eight innocent women and men?

SECOND TECHNICIAN:

Does it matter? Six of them are mental patients. Two of them are just high technologists who are attempting to put theirs and the others brains back in place.

FIRST TECHNICIAN:

Can you not say the word, Psychiatrist?

SECOND TECHNICIAN:

I cannot spell it.

BOTH TECHNICIANS PLAY WITH OVER-SIZED SCREWDRIVERS. THEY TRY TO FIX THE CRASHED COMPUTER. ALL THEY SUCCEED IN DOING IS WRAPPING CORDS AROUND THEMSELVES AND THE MACHINES.

FIRST TECHNICIAN:

It's enough. We're doing nothing but risking to fry the brains of the ones in this machine.

SECOND TECHNICIAN:

Wait a minute. We're wrong. We've placed slot D in slot B. This is causing a malfunction in the computer board.

FIRST TECHNICIAN:

What will you do about it?

SECOND TECHNICIAN:

HE STUDIES THE COMPUTER MANUAL.

Place A in B and turn C to activate Endlin with MS.DOS on Com.Com Press switch B. Turn on the activating switch.

HE FLICKS THE SWITCH. A HUGE PUFF OF SMOKE TRAPS THE TWO TECHNICIANS. AFTER THE SMOKE CLEARS, NURSES CARRY THE TECHNICIANS AWAY ON STRETCHERS.

THE SCENE SWITCHES BACK TO THE PADDED ROOM. FAINT LIGHT OF DAWN SEEPS THROUGH THE BARRED WINDOWS. EVERYONE, EXCEPT THE REVEREND JOSIAH'S BODY IS HUDDLED TOGETHER IN VARIOUS, GROTESQUE POSITIONS. THEY SPENT THE NIGHT TRYING TO PERFORM SEXUAL ACTS IN STRAIGHTJACKETS. WHEN THE SCENE GETS CLEARER, WE SEE THAT SUSIE SHAKEY AND DAVE FRIGBY ARE ENGAGED IN A VIOLENT ACT OF KISSING. DR. ZAZA AND ZACH TAYLOR TRY TO EMBRACE HER. THERE IS A SCENE OF TOTAL CHAOS. THE BODIES STRUGGLE IN GROTESQUE SEXUAL POSITION. EDGING THE PILE OF BODIES, DR. LLOYD AND MISS PRIMNETTE ARE ENGAGED IN A FRENZIED SEX SCENE. ONLY THEIR STRAIGHTJACKETS KEEP THEM APART.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

(MUTTERS) It's disgraceful; simply disgraceful.

DR. LLOYD:

HE LIFTS HIS HEAD.

One might think you are a Christian Puritan.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Do you not think a Jew is capable of having pure thoughts?

DR. ZAZA:

No. He is not unless he has been washed in the blood of Jesus.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

What you are doing with my body is a disgrace.

DR. ZAZA:

The Lord directs me in my activities - Jehovah be Blessed, Lord God of Hosts.

HE TRIES TO SEPARATE DAVE FRIGBY FROM SUSIE SHAKEY.

DAVE FRIGBY:

(TO SUSIE) It is a strange situation. I love you.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

You could not love me.

DAVE FRIGBY:

Why do you speak this way?

SUSIE SHAKEY:

(WHISPERS) I'm eighty years old.

DAVE FRIGBY:

And I'm black.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

It is only in your mind, Dave.

DAVE FRIGBY:

My name is Zach Taylor.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

It doesn't matter to me if you are black or white, Dave Frigby or Zach Taylor. For the first time in my life, I am in love. Always before, it was stocks and bonds, corporate and incorporate business, lawyers and financiers. There was no time for anything called love.

(SHE NESTLES CLOSER.)

DAVE FRIGBY:

But this is all an illusion that will disappear. When Dr. Lloyd puts us into our true identities, you will no longer be a millionaires. I will no longer be a famous Dallas Cowboy.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

Then, what will you be, Dave?

DAVE FRIGBY:

(DAVE FRIGBY TO ZACH TAYLOR)

You have my mind, Zach. What will I be?

ZACH TAYLOR:

You'll probably be a maniac who will have to be kept in a strait-jacket the rest of your life. Wasn't that what you were before?

SUSIE SHAKEY:

Now you are not a maniac, Dave. Can you not change?

ZACH TAYLOR:

HE LISTENS

I'll ask my doctor. (REVEREND JOSIAH HAS MOVED CLOSER TO HEAR WHAT IS BEING SAID.) Dr. Zaza, is there any chance my mind can be healed?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Why are you asking me this?

ZACH TAYLOR:

I am in love with Miss Shakey.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

The only way you can change, Dave, is for the mind in Zach Taylor to change.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Don't go messin' with me, man.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Why is it you don't want to be healed?

ZACH TAYLOR:

I get well, they ship me back to the Marine Corp.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Why do you not want to be there?

ZACH TAYLOR:

My nut will get blown off in Vietnam?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

It's been over for a long time, Dave. Don't you remember my telling you?

ZACH TAYLOR:

DAVE AND SUSIE LISTEN INTENTLY.

You lie to me.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

HE SPEAKS LOUDLY SO EVEN THE TWO ATTENDANTS CAN HEAR.

Am I lying?

ALL:

No Dave, he's telling the truth.

ZACH TAYLOR:

And I've been a raving maniac all this time to keep from being sent back to Vietnam. Is the war over?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Since April 1975.

ZACH TAYLOR:

Now, what date is it?

REVEREND JOSIAH:

January 1985.

ZACH TAYLOR:

I'll say what I please. For ten lousy years you and those bastards at the Marine Corp hospital have let me stay in this fuckin' straitjacket without telling me the war is over? (BURSTS OUT CRYING.) Ten years you have let me stay in this stinking strait-jacket. I've wasted all but one year of my twenties.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

We didn't know what was wrong with you.

ZACH TAYLOR:

I feared. I feared while laying in that stinking strait-jacket to be kept from going to Vietnam. I truly am ashamed. I'm a coward.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Marines never are afraid.

ZACH TAYLOR:

They aren't on the outside. On the inside, they are like a bowl of jello. I volunteered for special missions in hopes they would at least wound me so I could come home.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Of what are the Marines afraid, Dave?

ZACH TAYLOR:

They fear the same things other people fear.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

What are these, Dave?

ZACH TAYLOR:

They are fears of having their nuts blown away, fears of being killed and of being a coward.

DAVE FRIGBY:

They afraid of the same things scare us colored folks. Ain't hardly no difference in us at all, Dave, hardly no difference t'll.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

Why are you fearing, Zach?

DAVE FRIGBY:

At getting my other nut smashed off in a football game. (CRYING) That's what I am 'fraid about, white man. Man got only one nut left to his name ain't but half a man. Every time I get out catch a pass, every time I get my hands on that ball at all, I 'fraid I goin' to lose that one remaining nut.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

(PROBING) And why were you afraid for your nut, Zach?

DAVE FRIGBY:

Doc, only way us Niggers have a chance of being anything is through our children.

REVEREND JOSIAH:

What about the afterlife?

DR. ZAZA:

Glory be to Jesus, Zach. There is a heaven in which we shall reign victoriously with Jesus. There is no need to be scared of things in this life. Bye and bye, we will have our watermelon in the sky on some sweet morning in Glory land. Hallelujah, Brother, hallelujah!

BRET TEMPLETON

Then you would not be afraid of losing your nuts, Reverand? Perhaps if we cut your nuts out, you would not chase women across the church stage, and you could go home.

DR. ZAZA:

(SWEAT POURS DOWN HIS FOREHEAD.) Say, a man's nuts are his most valuable possession. No one is going to take mine out with my permission.

REVERAND JOSIAH

Even if they cause you to be locked up in a mental hospital the rest of your life? Why are they that valuable to you?

DR. ZAZA:

There is always that possibility of one last heir being in your loins.

REVERAND JOSIAH

Then you expect a child every time you go to bat.

DR. ZAZA:

Would you think I would risk the damnation of Hell fire of making love without planning on starting a baby. That is the first commandment God gave to Adam: "Go and be fruitful".

REVERAND JOSIAH

You always do what God tells you?

DR. ZAZA:

Always.

REVERAND JOSIAH

How about, "Thou shalt not commit adultery"?

DR. ZAZA:

I am not a religious fanatic like some of those Southern Fundamentalist.

REVERAND JOSIAH

Why do you obey one commandment and not the other?

DR. ZAZA:

Go forth and multiply takes precedence over all other commandments.

REVERAND JOSIAH

Why?

DR. ZAZA:

Because it was given first. God wants us to fill the earth up with our children so He can have more subjects.

REVERAND JOSIAH

How many children do you and your wife have?

DR. ZAZA:

An even dozen, Brother. An even dozen.

REVERAND JOSIAH

Do you not consider that enough to carry out the Lord's demand of you?

DR. ZAZA:

My wife does, but I don't. She wanted me to risk losing my immortal soul by thwarting the Lord's will by using rubbers.

REVERAND JOSIAH

And so you started chasing other women, Reverand?

DR. ZAZA:

I was driven by my wife to this sinful life. Like the first Adam, I also was driven out of the Garden of Eden by a woman.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

You hypocrite you. You viper. You wolf in sheep's clothing, you told me that you were in the linen closet with me for recreational sex and all the time you were trying to make a baby. If I was not tied down, I would kill you.

REVERAND JOSIAH

You did not want a baby?

MISS PRIMNETTE:

By that viper? Who would want a baby by that hypocrite?

DR. LLOYD

(Snuggles up to Miss Primnette.) I love you.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

And I love you, My Darling.

REVERAND JOSIAH

But I though you were homosexual, Bret.

DR. LLOYD

That was until last night.

REVERAND JOSIAH

What happened last night?

DR. LLOYD

I realized that all the time I have been looking for a father figure. Every male was a father figure I wanted to please by satisfying his sexual needs. Last night for the first time I realized that what I really needed was a mother figure.

BRET TEMPLETON

(Aside) A queer would have to get my body. You are healed now?

DR. LLOYD

I am healed.

BRET TEMPLETON

Thank God, I might be spared AIDS after all.

DR. ZAZA:

Thank God, this man has been healed of homosexuality, but how do you plan to procreate your seed in an eighty year old body?

SUSIE SHAKEY:

Seventy-eight.

DR. LLOYD

It is strictly platonic. When our minds are switched into our real bodies, I will merely be her companion.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

Honey, if you get any of my money, you are going to have to shake your rear end to get it. (Everyone laughs)

(First Attendant escorts a woman in who looks like Tammy Baker. Plump, pretty with mascara running down her face, she has a sweet, squeaky voice.)

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Reverand, your wife is here to see you.

DR. ZAZA:

Darling, why did you come here?

ROSE JOSIAH:

I could not stay away from my Honey-pie any longer. But you are not Hiram. What is going on here?

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Here, I am going to let you go in and see your husband. Perhaps you are the catharsis which will make this bunch of loonitics come to their senses.

ROSE JOSIAH:

What has happened to my Honey-pie? Hiram, do not try and play your dreadful tricks on me. I have come here all the way from Fort Worth to see you. (Weeps black mascara.) You are not going to go on anymore of these dreadful crusade meetings. The only reason you go is so that you can chase after some other woman. (Weeps louder.)

Dr. Zaza:

Then you know?

ROSE JOSIAH:

Of course I know. Do you think that I could miss you running across the screen of my television set.

DR. ZAZA:

I told you not to watch the 700 Club anymore.

ROSE JOSIAH:

Do you think that I could miss seeing my Honey- pie on national television? By the way, Honey-pie, where did you get such a huge sexual organ?

DR. ZAZA:

I bought it at one of those sex novelty shops.

ROSE JOSIAH:

And after you promised me that you would not go into one of those dreadful places anymore. (Giggles through her tears.) Honey-pie, did you buy me anything?

(Goes up to the Reverand Josiah and holds him close. The Reverand nearly suffocates in her large bosom.)

REVERAND JOSIAH

I beg your pardon, Madam, but there has been a terrible accident here, and I am not your husband.

ROSE JOSIAH:

Not my husband? Hiram, you have pulled some of the cruelest jokes on me, and I forgave you because you are a man of God, but this time I cannot forgive you. (Weeping violently causing black mascara to flow down on the Reverand.)

(Dr. Zaza puts his arm tenderly around Rose and presses her bosom with his hand.)

MISS PRIMNETTE:

I wonder if he sings about climbing Sunshine Mountain when he finds her everlasting spring to fill with the Holy Ghost?

ROSE JOSIAH:

To an eighty year old woman you sang our song? You could not do this to me.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

Seventy-eight.

ROSE JOSIAH:

(Looking at Susie.) Hiram, you couldn't have done it with this floozy. (Slaps the Reverand soundly.)

REVERAND JOSIAH

Madam, if I were not a Doctor and a gentleman, I would thrash you soundly. (Blood runs from his nose over his straight-jacket.)

ROSE JOSIAH:

Don't you dare pull that phony mail-order diploma on me, Hiram. Everyone in Fort Worth knows that you did good to finish high school.

DR. ZAZA:

But after I struck Father with a chair, there was no way for me to attend Theological school.

REVERAND JOSIAH

Did you kill him?

DR. ZAZA:

No, but they had to put a silver plate in his skull where the chair leg broke through. He was a vegetable after that, but he did not strike Mother and Sister again.

REVERAND JOSIAH

Perhaps your mind will begin to heal now that you have told what happened.

DR. ZAZA:

I feel better already. (Sidles up to Rose and hugs her.)

ROSE JOSIAH:

Take that you Beast. (Strikes Dr. Zaza a hard right with a fist which makes a noise like a prize fighter hitting a punching bag.)

REVERAND JOSIAH

Oh, look what she has done to my face, and I have to read a paper to the A.M.A. next month.

BRET TEMPLETON

What about?

REVERAND JOSIAH

The results of this treatment.

BRET TEMPLETON

You will get me kicked out of the A.M.A. if you do.

REVERAND JOSIAH

It cannot be helped.

BRET TEMPLETON

Perhaps a miracle will happen.

DR. ZAZA:

But you are an atheist who does not believe in miracles, Doctor. It is me, a worker of the Lord who believes in miracles.

BRET TEMPLETON

Reverand, you had better pray for one if you ever hope to get back into your own body.

ROSE JOSIAH:

(Looking straight at her husband.) Hiram, what is going on here? I demand an explanation. Every time you go on the road, you get yourself in trouble. (Wipes mascara from her face with a white handkerchief which turns black.)

(Reverand Josiah ducks and does a fancy boxer's step trying to get out of her way.)

REVERAND JOSIAH

Madam, I keep trying to tell you that I am Dr. Zaza, a prominent psychiatrist who is trying to cure your husband so that he will not be sent to prison.

ROSE JOSIAH:

Be sent to prison for showing his beautiful body in hopes of saving souls for Christ?

REVERAND JOSIAH

I cannot see how chasing the choir leader without any clothes on could save anyone.

ROSE JOSIAH:

The Lord works in mysterious ways to work wonders.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

The Reverand doesn't have much to work miracles with.

SUSIE SHAKEY:

It wasn't your body he used.

(Rose Josiah throws an upper cut which knocks the Reverand cold.)

FIRST ATTENDANT:

Now you are going into a straight-jacket with the rest of these idiots.

(Both attendants grab her arms and place her in restraints.)

ROSE JOSIAH:

(Mascara blackens jacket as tears gush.) You two seem to be the only sane ones in here, can you tell me what is going on?

FIRST ATTENDANT:

All we know is that there was a mix up in the treatment room, and these people have adopted each others personalities.

ROSE JOSIAH:

Then he is not my husband?

FIRST ATTENDANT:

He has your husband's body, Mam, but somehow he has Dr. Zaza's mind.

ROSE JOSIAH:

That poor man. (Rushes to Dr. Zaza causing the Reverand Josiah to cringe.) Hiram, can you ever forgive me?

DR. ZAZA:

Of course I can, Rose, if you can forgive me.

ROSE JOSIAH:

I will have to find out what you are to be forgiven for first. Can you forgive me for hitting you, Dr. Zaza?

REVERAND JOSIAH

But I am a Jew.

ROSE JOSIAH:

But you must have some Christian blood in you.

REVERAND JOSIAH

Lady, you have let it all out through my nose.

ROSE JOSIAH:

I am so ashamed for the way I have acted.

DR. ZAZA:

While you have a contrite heart, I will tell you that I had sexual relations with Miss Shakey.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

And he was wonderful.

ROSE JOSIAH:

Who could be jealous of an eighty year old woman?

SUSIE SHAKEY:

Seventy-eight.

ROSE JOSIAH:

I see it all now, you had sexual relations with that whore, Hiram, didn't you? Oh, how could you do this to me after I've borne you twelve children.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

It has not hurt your figure.

Rose Josiah; You are so kind, but I have stretch marks all over my middle.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

They can remove those; I have to have myself tightened all the time.

ROSE JOSIAH:

After twelve children, you could handle a watermelon.

DR. ZAZA:

Ask me, I know.

(Rose Josiah breaks into tears again. There seems to be an endless amount of mascara to blacken her tears. Miss Primnette and Susie Shakey come close to comfort Rose.)

SUSIE SHAKEY:

He is a monster; all men are beast.

Dave Frigby:

How about me?

SUSIE SHAKEY:

(Goes to him.) My darling, I have hurt you in order to comfort this poor woman.

MISS PRIMNETTE:

My poor Rose, he spoke of nothing else but you while we were in the linen closet.

FIRST ATTENDANT:

All I ever heard him do was sing.

ROSE JOSIAH:

Yes, I have heard he sang, 'Climb up Sun