[Quick Summary: While waiting for opening night reviews, a playwright relives his angst getting his play ("The Seven Year Itch") to the stage.]
Though I don't usually read tv scripts, I made an exception for this one because:
1) it's written by renowned playwright and screenwriter George Axelrod,* and
2) it was for live tv (an episode of the "Studio One" show).
Given that it was for live tv, I was impressed that this script used so many cinematic techniques, particularly in the transitions.
For example, in the scene below:
- Camera movement (dissolves) and stage cues (music, sound) indicate the story was moving to a dream sequence.
- Though the script says "dream sequence," it's actually more of a fantasy sequence of the Author character's fears.
- Notice how "tight head shot" to slow dissolve is the equivalent of going into someone's mind space.
MAN: Relax, baby -- you got a smash -- a smash -- all you got to worry about is what to do with the money...
THE MAN MOVES ON...
AUTHOR (muttering again): Atkinson....Kerr...Chapman...the critics are sitting there...destroying me..right now...
THE CAMERA HAS MOVED IN TO A TIGHT HEAD SHOT.
SOUND: RAPID TYPING FROM THREE TYPEWRITERS FADES IN
THE MUSIC BECOMES DREAM...OR RATHER NIGHTMARE IN QUALITY.
SLOW DISSOLVE TO:
THREE DESKS WITH THREE TYPEWRITERS BEHIND WHICH SIT THREE FIENDS. EACH DESK HAS A NAME PLATE: ATKINSON...KERR...AND CHAPMAN....
THE FIENDS ARE TYPING FURIOUSLY AND GIVING OUT WITH DREADFUL GHOULISH LAUGHTER AS THEY SPEAK.
ATKINSON: Tedious....
KERR: Dreary and uninspired....
CHAPMAN: Sets Broadway back fifty years....
ALL THREE LAUGH GHOULISHLY TOGETHER
ATKINSON: Contrived, unoriginal and tasteless..
KERR: Left this reviewer with a distinct feeling of nausea....
CHAPMAN: Stamp out this ugly thing!
ALL LAUGH AND TYPE FURIOUSLY. THE LAUGHTER MINGLES WITH THE MUSIC AS WE DISSOLVE TO:
TIGHT CLOSE SHOT OF THE AUTHOR'S ANGUISHED FACE. HE STRUGGLES TO PULL HIMSELF TOGETHER. HE DRINKS A LITTLE OF HIS DRINK.
WHAT I'VE LEARNED: This script showed me how much can still be done on live tv with just transitions, and without editorial cuts or special effects.
"Studio One: "Confessions of a Nervous Man" (1953)
by George Axelrod
*The Seven Year Itch, Breakfast at Tiffany's, The Manchurian Candidate.
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