Another small jump and then we're back in with the lead role
character being invented.
HUTCHBACK (CONT'D)
He... His... He didn't manage to
make the transition to
commercial... to totally commercial
film making, so... and he's had
this pet project for twenty-five
years, let's say, that...
DR. NOSTRUM
And is it good, or is it terrible?
HUTCHBACK
No! It's good...
DR. NOSTRUM
Oh, OK.
HUTCHBACK
... it's about how America lost
it's soul. How the, the, the
last... the counter... the reaction
to the counter-culture, from the
eighties onwards, has destroyed the
soul of America. So it's this very
pompous... but it's kind of a bit
like Tom Wolfe, if you roll up
things like Tom Wolfe, er, Bonfire
Of The Vanities and, kind of...
DR. NOSTRUM
So it's kind of like one of those
Orange Film Pitches?
HUTCHBACK
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
DR. NOSTRUM
OK.
HUTCHBACK
He wants to make this very
serious... that's a good way to...
DR. NOSTRUM
Explain it to anyone in Britain.
HUTCHBACK
Yeah.
DR. NOSTRUM
I don't know if they run in
America, they might run in
America... So, but his project is
about (reading notes the Dr. has
been typing) how the reaction to
the counter-culture... no, I've got
this wring now, cos I don't know
anything about this, so, what is it
you were... the words were quite
good. I've recorded them though, I
suppose, so...
HUTCHBACK
His film is about the... how the...
the... the kind of commercial
reaction to the counter-culture of
the sixties led to the...
DR. NOSTRUM
Hold... Hold on!
HUTCHBACK
... death.
DR. NOSTRUM
Hold on, this is how you write, OK?
"The commercial..." what?
HUTCHBACK
The commercial...
DR. NOSTRUM
Or would you rather I just listened
to it over and over again and get
it as you said it?
HUTCHBACK
Yeah.
DR. NOSTRUM
OK. Fine.
HUTCHBACK
I can't remember what I said.
DR. NOSTRUM
No, I can't remember what you said
either. It's OK, his film is about
all this stuff that no one is
interested in...
HUTCHBACK
(laughing at the Dr's
banality)
That no one is interested in...
DR. NOSTRUM
... and he's been trying to pitch
it for twenty-five years.
HUTCHBACK
... and he's been trying to pitch
it for twenty-five years and in the
meantime has been making, kind
of... he has been making movies,
but they've been drying up and the
last ten years he's not made
anything. Cos clearly he was
trading on his reputation.
DR. NOSTRUM
OK.
Hutchback gets distracted by a moth.
HUTCHBACK
It's wierd the way that moths kind
of, when they die... a couple of
days after they're dead, they turn
into dust.
DR. NOSTRUM
See, this is... this to me, that's
how we write. Is that what we would
do is that. You're talking about
the show and then you just go off
on a tangent into something that,
you know, is actually what's going
on in the world. That's what I
like, that's what I think the show
should be.
HUTCHBACK
It's funny, cos I killed a moth
last night...
DR. NOSTRUM
Ah.
HUTCHBACK
... but I couldn't be bothered to
pick it up and I thought I'll leave
it till tomorrow, but then I left
it twenty four hours and it fucking
turned to dust.
DR. NOSTRUM
Yeah, they do. Moth dust.
HUTCHBACK
The other thing... The other thing
I noticed was a spider that had
died...
DR. NOSTRUM
Yeah, they go like that (making a
claw with his hand).
HUTCHBACK
No, no, no...
DR. NOSTRUM
Oh.
HUTCHBACK
... this one was particularly
bizarre because I tried to pick it
up and one of it's legs was stuck
in the carpet...
DR. NOSTRUM
(feeling sorry for it)
Aah.
HUTCHBACK
... so obviously what had happened,
it was walking along, it's leg got
caught...
DR. NOSTRUM
It got caught, and it starved to
death!
HUTCHBACK
(overlapping)
And it starved to death.
DR. NOSTRUM
Fuckin' hell.
HUTCHBACK
What a way to go, eh? Knowing.
DR. NOSTRUM
Knowing what?
HUTCHBACK
Knowing, that you were basically...
DR. NOSTRUM
But it doesn't know anything.
HUTCHBACK
... that that's it for you.
DR. NOSTRUM
Oh. Well, I'm not... yeah.
HUTCHBACK
That's it. That's it for you.
Although actually, most adult
insects never eat. A lot of them
never eat. Did you know that.
DR. NOSTRUM
No, I didn't know that.
HUTCHBACK
It's true. That the pupa...
DR. NOSTRUM
How does anyone know that?
HUTCHBACK
(incredulous)
What do you mean how does anyone
know that?
DR. NOSTRUM
I don't know, I mean...
HUTCHBACK
It's called fucking science, that's
how people know it! Jesus Christ!
DR. NOSTRUM
(defensively)
OK.
HUTCHBACK
How does anyone know that? How does
anyone know fucking anything?! Cos
they observe and they, you know,
make records...
DR. NOSTRUM
It just think it seems a pointless
experiments to watch insects...
HUTCHBACK
(overlapping, mocking)
Why? What? Oh, Biology: Pointless!
Biology: fucking get rid of it.
It's absolutely pointless, cos all
you're doing all day is fucking
looking at insects. What is the
point?! (Disbelieving) Fucking
hell. (Breathless pause) And you've
got an 'O' level.
DR. NOSTRUM
Yeah, but... No, actually I don't
know if I did get the 'O' level.
HUTCHBACK
No. I got the 'O' level
DR. NOSTRUM
Oh, you got the 'O' level.
HUTCHBACK
(still disbelieving of the
Dr's stance)
What's the point?? Oh, I love it.
But, um, but, no, let me explain,
cos most...
this is important, this is adding
to your knowledge - Most insects,
they eat in the larval stage...
DR. NOSTRUM
Oh.
HUTCHBACK
... and then they come into the
adult stage and they breed,
although having said that, spiders
obviously do eat. Adult spiders do
eat, cos they're not insects.
DR. NOSTRUM
(not convinced)
Right.
HUTCHBACK
No, but clearly they catch things
and eat them.
DR. NOSTRUM
Well, I've seen that. But as you
point out, they're not insects.
HUTCHBACK
But. Moths. Adult moths don't eat.
I've learnt a lot about moths...
after my infestation. Did I tell
you about our moth infestation?
DR. NOSTRUM
Yeah.
HUTCHBACK
Oh, yes, I did.
DR. NOSTRUM
Several times.
HUTCHBACK
Yeah. But now we're recording it...
DR. NOSTRUM
Yeah, OK, tell me again.
HUTCHBACK
No, I don't need to tell you, but
we had a... there's actually
nothing funny about it, it's
quite... it's just disturbing:
coming back to a house covered in
moth larvae.
DR. NOSTRUM
How many were there? Carpet moths?
HUTCHBACK
Hundreds...
DR. NOSTRUM
(not impressed)
Oh, hundreds, well...
HUTCHBACK
... no, they were on the ceiling,
they were on the ceiling.
DR. NOSTRUM
(hopefully)
There might have been thousands?
HUTCHBACK
No, there weren't thousands, cos it
would have taken me a lot longer to
vacuum them all down... No, because
they...
DR. NOSTRUM
Why were larvae on the ceiling?
HUTCHBACK
No, because these ones, they're
trained to go up...
DR. NOSTRUM
Oh.
HUTCHBACK
To crawl up the...
DR. NOSTRUM
To get out the way of things that
might eat them on the ground I
suppose?
HUTCHBACK
Maybe, but...
DR. NOSTRUM
So they just keep going up?
HUTCHBACK
Well, no, they don't keep going up,
they go up and they look for the
corners.
DR. NOSTRUM
What?
HUTCHBACK
And I'm thinking, "How do they know
what a corner is?"
DR. NOSTRUM
Well...
HUTCHBACK
No...
DR. NOSTRUM
It's a point where you can't get
any further.
HUTCHBACK
But how does a larvae...
DR. NOSTRUM
You can't get any further, that's
the point, isn't it? Without going
like down and around?
HUTCHBACK
Yeah, well, I suppose so. Starts
chuckling) "You can't go any
further." That's how they base
their whole...
DR. NOSTRUM
Probably.
HUTCHBACK
It's just, keep crawling until you
can't go any further.
DR. NOSTRUM
Yeah. That's probably what it is.
HUTCHBACK
No, but I don't think they even
have that basic... I don't think
they even have that.
DR. NOSTRUM
Well, they've got something.
HUTCHBACK
(overlapping)
I bet they're just purely working
from gravity?
And they know which way's up and
which way's down and that's
probably about it.
DR. NOSTRUM
So, why... Well, anyway...
HUTCHBACK
Anyway.
DR. NOSTRUM
... they all end up in the corner,
so presumably, some people spend
their lives worrying about that?
Another pointless scientific
experiment, but anyway...
HUTCHBACK
Why have they gone for the corners?
DR. NOSTRUM
So? Are...
HUTCHBACK
We know that they go for the
corners so they can probably...
DR. NOSTRUM
... are there many corners in
nature?
HUTCHBACK
That's a very interesting point.
DR. NOSTRUM
There aren't really.
HUTCHBACK
You do get them, presumably, in
certain rock formations, (drifting
off in thought) but not in their
natural habitat I would have
thought.
DR. NOSTRUM
Do you think so? I wouldn't have
thought you get corners anywhere.
HUTCHBACK
You do in rocks.
DR. NOSTRUM
Well, not many.
HUTCHBACK
Not many...
DR. NOSTRUM
You know, so...
HUTCHBACK
... occasionally you get a corner.
The Hutchback has made it back to the kitchen.
HUTCHBACK (CONT'D)
OK. Do you want a large...?
DR. NOSTRUM
Tea. Yes, I'd like a tea. So,
somehow, moths have, moth larvae
have adapted to the human thing...
HUTCHBACK
Yes, of course.
DR. NOSTRUM
... by learning about corners.
HUTCHBACK
Yes.
DR. NOSTRUM
Any corner? It has to be a corner
up, rather than down or across? So
that's... That's how it happens
then, they just keep going up. What
they do is they go across, until
they can't go across anymore, then
they go along, till they can't go
along, and then they go up! That's
it! That's how it works. That must
be how it works, that's just three
things that have to be programmed.
HUTCHBACK
I wonder what their actual
perception of a corner is?
DR. NOSTRUM
No, but that would be... If you
were just programming a computer to
look for a corner that's how you
would do it.
It would just be "you go until you
can't go anymore and what you never
ever do, is you never go back on
yourself." And that means you would
always end up in a corner, right?
Like writing.
HUTCHBACK
But, you'd have thought it would be
better for them to go behind stuff?
DR. NOSTRUM
Well, they would...
HUTCHBACK
But it's harder.
DR. NOSTRUM
No, but they would go behind
stuff...
HUTCHBACK
No. That's harder.
DR. NOSTRUM
No it isn't. Because if you can get
behind it you're still moving, so
it's the same programming. It's the
same...
HUTCHBACK
No, say you've got, like, something
there (points to a picture on the
wall) along a wall, it's safer
behind something...
DR. NOSTRUM
But...
HUTCHBACK
... than exposed...
DR. NOSTRUM
... but they would be...
HUTCHBACK
... in a corner.
DR. NOSTRUM
... but they would be behind it.
HUTCHBACK
I can't believe what we're talking
about.
DR. NOSTRUM
Well, we'll just leave it. But I
would suggest that they would be
behind something. It's just natural
selection. So, the ones that manage
to make it behind something are
more likely to survive...
HUTCHBACK
(overlapping)
Are more likely to live.
DR. NOSTRUM
... thus, those ones...
HUTCHBACK
But, there aren't that many
corners...
DR. NOSTRUM
Behind things.
HUTCHBACK
... at the top that are behind
things.
DR. NOSTRUM
No.
HUTCHBACK
Because there's nothing, there's
just ceiling...
DR. NOSTRUM
That's true.
HUTCHBACK
So it would be better being in a
bottom corner...
DR. NOSTRUM
That's what I would have thought.
I'm surprised they were on the
ceiling. Why do you think they were
on the ceiling?
HUTCHBACK
They're fucking stupid, that's why,
they're fucking moth larvae.
DR. NOSTRUM
Biology. That's why we rule the
world and they don't.
HUTCHBACK
Yep. (Pause) So, where were we?
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