ST CECELIA'S PLAYGROUND








David A. Von Behren

TREATMENT

St. Cecelia's Playground is a hip, late-seventies retro drama chronicling the lives of the Cotton brothers Melvin (or "Black Mel" our posh afro-sporting protagonist) and his much lighter skinned twin brother Marquette (or Mark). The film serves as both an inquiry into the economic slavery evident in lower-income Americana as well as a street meditation on the recurring theme, "What's the difference between God and Man?" The answer being that man, flushed with all of his foibles, has the capacity to change, whereas a fixed notion of a deity often tithes emotional incarceration in lieu of individual forgiveness.



THEME: What’s the difference between God and Man?




ACT ONE

1.)
Our story convenes in ATLANTA, GA 1967. Bickering barflies SEYMOUR “SCRUGGSY” SCRUGGS(29) and portly jovial CLEVELAND TUBBS (31) loaf at a bar stool with JERZ LORDS, owner of BOO RADLEY’s, (41) a popular Afro-American Jazz Dig. The bantering comfortably evolves around drink, debauchery and the dulcet soprano voice of BROWN SUAGH (24), performing later that night. Enter BLACK MELVIN, our stories protagonist. Orphaned at a young age, MELVIN COTTON (20) was raised inside ST. CECELIA’s ORPHANAGE in a downtown vector of Atlanta. MELVIN is dressed in camouflage military garb. In two days he will be deported to Vietnam. MELVIN is a jazz phenom and has his SAXAPHONE CASE with him in tow. On the far corner of the bar an OLD MAN jaded by the peril of life ruffles newspapers headlines and mysteriously walks out. MELVIN seems to have some sort of affiliation with the OLD MAN but remains reticent when Cleveland inquires.

In struts sergeant MARK (20) a corrupt, arrogant white Atlanta cop. He is followed into the bar with two of his badged toadies. MARK cracks lewd jokes about lynching and gets into a verbal scuffle with a stoned CLEVELAND TUBBS. JERZ LORDS placates his multi-cultural clientele with free drinks. Sergeant MARK walks to an opposite side of the jazz club.

As the carousing continues MELVIN and SCRUGGSY have a heart to heart about ST. CECELIA’s, the institution they both attended. SCRUGSSY brings up the name FATHER ANTOIN and MELVIN seems distant. He is anxious to leave ATLANTA. Something in the past seems to be bothering him and MELVIN seems anxious to start life anew, even if it is in the war torn tattered republic of Vietnam.

On stage an ILLUMINATED CONE encircles the ANNOUNCER. Claps are heard as GRACIE “BLACK SUGAH” begins to sing. MELVIN momentarily forgets about his mysterious past and stargazes on the angelic countenance and smooth vocal tendencies of GRACIE. A HISPANIC WAITER clears martini glasses from the tables.

After Gracie has sung the ANNOUNCER focuses his attention on MELVIN, informing the raucous audience that MEL is leaving for NAM come two days time. After a little verbal nudge from his cohorts, MELVIN picks up his saxophone and heads towards the stage. His sonorous tunes rivals GRACIE’s in terms of tonality and beauty. The audience remains awed.

Following MEL’s performance clattering and cursing is heard in the back of BOO RADLEYS. Apparently, the HISPANIC WAITER has inadvertently spilled part of a drink on one of the WHITE OFFICERS. IN a fit of rage the WHITE OFFICE overturns the table, pins the HISPANIC WAITER into the floor and endeavors to beat him comatose. When JERZ LORDS endeavors to make PEACE, OFFICER MARK fires several random rounds into the air, informing JERZ that, “even though things thave CHNAGED in this town, things haven’t really CHANGED.”

OFFICER MARK swivels the nozzle of his pistol from JERZ into the forehead of the ANNOUNCER. Without a word the trigger is pulled. The announcer falls over dead. A sick look of shock etched into his face. OFFICER MARK re-cocks his pistol, aiming it in the direction of the battered HISPANIC. As he is about to fire the pistol he is forcefully shoved aside by MELVIN COTTON. AS OFFICER MARK misfires the pistol, the wayward bullet enters into the chest of his fellow OFFICER. The third officer rushes toward MELVIN and MARK, only to be placed in a headlock by CLEVELAND TUBBS. MELVIN and MARK continue wrestle. The gun gets kicked aside and is quickly picked up and emptied by JERZ LORDS.

The scuffle between Mark and Melvin continue. Mark accuses Melvin of not knowing who he truly is. The two continue to flagellate the other with their fists. MARK MELVIN on the ground, choking him. He lifts up an empty bottle of JACK DANIELS. MARK attempts to christen MELVIN’s face with the bottle by shattering it over his head. The moment he swings the glass gavel, MELVIN moves and the bottle smashes into the floor. Melvin then maneuvers on top of MARK and quickly presses MARK’s own face into the pool of GLASS SHARDS.

MELVIN gets up. Blood has sopped through his Military garb. He is breathing heavily. BOO RADLEY’s has for the most part completely emptied. He looks at the fallen bodies of OFFICER WARREN and the ANNOUNCER. The HISPANIC WAITER slowly sputters and groans into consciousness.

CLEVELAND TUBBS nods his head. Scruggys bends over and begins to drag the dead bodies near the alleyway door. JERZ LORDS brushes back descending tears from his sockets and begins to vent out a nervous breakdown. LORDS begins to crack open BOTTLES OF BOURBON in rage. TUBBS and SCRUUGSY nod their heads back and forth in shame. MELVIN endeavors to calm JERZ down. Unsuspectingly, a bloody faced MARK bats the inside of his pant cuff, unveiling a knife.

More bottles of Bourbon and other Liquor break. Melvin tries to calm down the proprietor, unaware that MARK is behind him brandishing a KNIFE. Seconds before MARK’s KNIFE slices into MELVIN spine, the battered Spanish waiter screams out a Hispanic warning and MELVIN turns. The slicing knife scrapes the side of MELVIN’s cheek, granting him with a MARK of CAIN welt.

Unable to control himself, JERZ lashes at OFFICER MARK and is immediately stabbed in the stomach. Melvin turns around, launches his entire body in the direction of MARK. The two fall down again and begin to wrestle.

MARK is on top of MELVIN pummeling him several times. MELVIN lifts up his boots and tosses MARK into a barge of TABLES still dim lit with CANDLES. The CANDLES skid off the side of the table and land on the bar, where JERZ LORDS broke bottles of BOURBON in a maniacal rage. The bar soon erupts in flames. MARK gets up and lashes his feral limbs towards MELVIN again.

Innately clumsy, pissed off and stoned, CLEVELAND TUBBS, in an endeavor to do the RIGHT THING, picks up several bottles of whiskey and baptizes the flames. The fire snickers and crackles. The whole bar and half the club is swallowed in flames. The screech of FIRE SIRENS becomes audible.

TUBBS is pushed out the door by SCRUGGSY. Inside the bar OFFICER MARK and MELVIN continue to stab each other with their fists. FLAMES ensnarl the building.

The SOUND OF SIRENs continue to blare. MARK is on top of MELVIN and continues to gash MELVIN’s face into the earth. BOO RADLEY’s is now HADES. Black MELVIN and WHITE MARK have now become a metaphorical nemesis. MELVIN appears to be completely enervated, weak.

Mark launches one final pummel into MELVIN’s face. The bruised MELVIN locates the KNIFE MARK stabbed JERZ LORDS with, beaming in a quivering strip of flame. AS MARK launches one final blow, MELVIN deftly grapples the knife, slicing it on the left cheek, similar to where MELVIN’s face is scarred. The two rivals stumble. TUBBS and SCRUGGSY haul a battered and bleeding Melvin outside BOO RADLEY’s just as the establish soars into flames.

2.) Melvin awakes inside CLEVELAND TUBBS’ bachelor pad. SCRUGGSY doctors Mel’s welts with a BOTTLE OF VODKA. He reads a newspaper Headline about Boo Radleys then reads an obituary for JERZ LORDS. TUBBS makes a point of noting that MEL and Sergeant MARK have the same last name. Disgruntled, MELVIN notes that the spelling of their last name is slightly different.

There is a knock on the door. As SCRUGGSY answers it the room is filled with bullets. SCRUGGSY falls down dead. TUBBS shoves MELVIN towards the window. Looking MELVIN straight into the eyes TUBBS tells MELVIN that, out of the three of them, his job is simply to stay alive. TUBBS then kisses MELVIN on the lips. MELVIN is shocked. TUBBS steps back, smiles and forcefully pushes MELVIN through the glass window. He then turns around, wielding the empty bottle of VODKA like a sword.

MELVIN falls three stories down below. Upon hitting the cement he realizes that he fell straight on top of an OLD LADY walking her SCHANUZER. As MEL attempts to resuscitate the OLD LADY he hears more bullets. The BOTTLE OF VODKA smashes on MELVIN’s left hand. TUBBS is DEAD.

MELVIN takes off running. The Schnauzer chases after MELVIN. When MELVIN finds himself cornered in an alleyway, he picks up the snapping dog and tosses him against the brick wall.

MELVIN finds himself entering a DREAMWORLD. He is cornered on all sides. SILHOUETTES of the PAST encroach him. He finds himself looking at his demons. He sees himself as an ELEVEN year old boy talking to FATHER ANTOIN at CONFESSION.

3.)Melvin awakes in the apartment of GRACE HOLIDAY, the lounge singer who goes by the name of BROWN SUGAH. The two have been making love. GRACE hints that MELVIN should be thankful that she saved him. The two make love and Melvin informs GRACE that he had to leave town, but not before he attends to some unfinished business.

4.) Melvin enters the interior of St. Cecelia’s parish. He enters into the oak confessional booth. Without saying a word, MELVIN grapples FATHER ANTOIN and, inexplicably, begins to pummel him. MELVIN demands that FATHER ANTOIN “If he has sinned.” FATHER ANTOIN damns MELVIN as MELVIN drags the priest into the front of the cathedral, sodomizing him with a crucifix.

As Melvin exits St. CECELIA he spots the HISPANIC WAITER. MELVIN accuses him of starting all this, claiming that if the waiter could just hold a Martini glass straight, none of his friends’ would be dead. Without saying a word, the waiter pulls out MELVIN’s SAXAPHONE. It is polished and bright. MELVIN accepts the gift and when he inquires “what the fuck is going on?” all the waiter can respond is ¡La paz de Dios!

ACT TWO

1.)
In Vietnam MELVIN becomes lonely. He scribbles epistles of timeless love for GRACE. He is placed in truculent SGT. "NO SHIT" MOORE’s infantry. In the infantry MELVIN becomes known as BLACK MEL. His best friend is a Mexican-American street-legal pothead named JESUS DE CIELO (21). A bevy of other soldiers are also present including nerdy pocket-calculator toting Ralph Whickers (17) knife-wielding Jordie Reents (19) ex-hippie Abby Brooks "A.B"(23), semi-portly comic relief Chuck "CHUCKLES" Hungslow and coy, Oscar wildish cross-dresser Thespian Tommie Newman.

BLACK MEL: Your name geez-us, as in JESUS CHRIST what the hell is going on.

JESUS: It looks like Jesus but its pronounced Hey-zeus. Like the other God. The god of all them other gods.

BLACK MEL: So you gonna turn that water into wine first or you gonna raise my black ass up from the dead when I'm shot.

Jesus (toasting a libation): Both.

One night, after a series of battles, BLACK MEL is in his sleeping bag, masturbating, and thinking about GRACE. Tommie thinks of this as a come on, enters BLACK MEL sleeping bag and tries to fool around. MEL rightfully snaps, pins TOMMIE and almost kills him if not for JESUS stepping in between them. Jesus and Mel have a heart to heart in the dense foliage abutting Saigon. Jesus rolls a joint and the two men reminisce of home.

One night SGT. MOORE is chomping down hard on the spittled end of his cigar, contemplating. Chuckles is entertaining the group with anecdotes about the Asian whore "PUSHIE HONDA." SGT. Moore disciplines CHUCKLES and whips into a diatribe. BLACK MEL ignores Moore’s comments and continues scribbling a letter to GRACE. SGT. MOORE confiscates the letter and reads it aloud to the fellow troops. At first the troops laugh, treat the scenario like a locker room. Soon though, the SGT. himself chokes because Black MEL words are so poetically poignant. Sgt. Moore stops just short of the last paragraph and crinkles MELVIN’s epistle into the size of a golf ball.

SGT. MOORE: If only all of you fuckers knew you were fighting for something you could come home to.



2.)
In Vietnam Sgt. Moore's battalion has one week left. It is a quiet night and crickets are heard chirping oratorios. Black Melvin is playing his saxophone thinking about GRACE. RALPH is showing JORDIE how to fix a radio transmitter. Abby is listening to the DOORS PEOPLE ARE STRANGE. CHUCKELS is fixing a sandwich parodying a little tummy-jiggle dance of pending freedom, discretely pointing his utensil in the direction of TOMMIE (who is brooding over a volume of Oscar Wilde) every time Morrison says the word strange. Jesus is rolling something seedy and green, licking tobacco paper with his tongue. SGT. Moore takes something out of his pocket and examines it.

There is a close-up of BLACK MEL humming into his sax and then there is an inexplicable explosion followed by cursing. The whole entire planet seems to fall into itself, into the dank casket of the earth. There is mass confusion and emotional pell mell. Black Melvin is trapped by shrapnel and to his left he sees the empty sockets and bloody head of SGT. Moore. His saxophone is melted. Black Mel looks around and sees RALPH and JODIE wailing in pain. BLACK MELVIN yelps out for help and CHUCKELS is heard laughing.

CHUCKLES: DEATH. We're dying. HA!!!!!! This is it. This is the point of the movie where the credits begin to roll. Death! HA!!!!!

Chuckles continues to slowly hum People are Strange before being swallowed into a military obituary headline.

"When your strange, faces come out of the rain. When your strange, no one remembers your name."

BLACK Mel yells out. He hears Tommie call MEL Othello saying that he can go fuck his own five-fingered Desdemona, big Black fuck. Apparently Tommie has found a way out.

BLACK MEL begins to hallucinate. It seems like he has been down here for days. He thinks about TUBBS wearing a nuns habit. He thinks about the pensive expression plastered on the lips of the Virgin MARY while he was sodomized FATHER ANTOIN with a crucifix. MEL reaches around his neck and thinks about GRACE. He reaches the scar on his right hand side and thinks about officer MARK. He feels that he is slipping out of his earthly attire.

Black MEL looks next to him, he sees a scarred Jesus. Jesus says that he can help BLACK MELVIN but only if MELVIN says Jesus name.

BLACK MELVIN: Hey-Zeus. Hey-Zeus.

Jesus: NO, say my name. Say my name the way your mother said my name in church. Say my name the way you said my when you were taken away from my mother.

BLACK MEL asks if JESUS has lost it. He asks if JESUS is fucking crazy. Finally, he says JESUS name as a vulgarity and JESUS asks him one question.

JESUS: DO you want to go back home, or do you want to come with me?

BLACK MEL: I just don't want to remain stuck. Shit. Jesus Shit. I been stuck all my life. I've been stuck all my life!

Jesus slowly trudges over to BLACK MELVIN. He loosens the metal detritus and, playing Virgil to BLACK MEL's downtrodden Dante leads Black Melvin out of the wreckage into a DOME OF WHITE LIGHT. The two shadows eventually coalesce into one integer and Balck Melvin is surrounded by rescue workers. Baffled, Black Mel looks around. He sees the bodies of Sgt. Moore, A.B., Chuckles, Jordie and Ralph piled up in a funeral pyre. Then he sees Jesus dead body heaped onto the pyre as well.

Apparently BLACK MEL was buried alive for 72 hours. Jesus' body was exhumed charred and deceased ten hours after the initial blast.

When BLACK MEL feels around his neck, he sees a dog tag. On it is the name JESUS MARTINEZ.

3.) MELVIN wakes up in a psych ward. BLACK MEL is confused. He spends days in a psych ward where he finds Tommie Newman alone one day and immediately begins to pummel him. When Melvin is refrained from TOMMIE it turns out that what Melvin was actually hitting was a picture of the cross.

Inside the Psych ward MELVIN is called JESUS de Cielo (since that was the dog tag he was wearing) He begins to have long sessions with his sexy counselor VICTORIA MEADOWS. He tells VICTORIA about his friends who died in ATLANTA before his departure. He tells VICTORIA about his friends who died with him in NAM. He tells her how he feels that he is nothing more that a character in a novel where weird shit keeps on happening and everyone who he loves or cares for dies.

Slowly he begins to reveal more intimate details to Victoria. He tells her being rapped by FATHER ANTOIN at a young age. He tells her about his mother, LADY GREGORY, who ran a brothel. When VICTORIA inquires whether JESUS is aware of any other family members MELVIN’s face remains silent. Rubbing a finger down his facial SCAR MELVIN tells VICTORIA that he once had a brother.

On the day of their last session VICTORIA and MELVIN kiss. VICTORIA (still calling Melvin Jesus) implores him not to go back to Atlanta, fearing that his life may be stake. MELVIN tells VICTORIA not to worry. That even Jesus was met with a pretty big reception when he re-entered Jerusalem. The two make love on her therapist couch. Melvin thinks about the playground at St. Cecelia’s.



4.)
Back in Atlanta MELVIN has usurped the identity on his savior’s dog tag, JESUS DE CIELO. The city has become even more segregated and oppressed

Slowly Jesus begins to become an alcoholic. He is 27 years old. He sports a full afro, wears vinyl jackets, walks with a limp, drinks forties of STROHS LAGER out of brown paper bags. There are dilapidated scenes of MELVIN's old neighborhood. We see the rundown WHITE ONLY water fountain. We see the ruins of the CHURCH. The neighborhood is in financial decay. Only St. Cecelia’s seems cleaned up. They have a new fence. New playground equipment. It is no longer solely an orphanage but a parochial school.

Walking past St. Cecelia, drunk, Mel notices a young girl of six in pigtail and a catholic skirt running across the street. He feels some esoteric, bloodline connection with the girl. Across the street he sees GRACE. Though seven years older her skin is still refulgent and smooth. The young girl leaps into Grace’s arms. Melvin begins to walk he sees SARGANT MARK, doff his police hat and place his solicitous arm around the two of them. They are obviously a family.

JESUS is stunned. A car beeps. MARK looks at JESUS and tells him to get out of the middle of the street.

JESUS limps over a cemetery and finds FATHER ANTOINS grave. Without giving a second thought, JESUS (Melvin) unzips and urinates, pouring out the rest of his beer and then smashing the bottle on the FATHER's grave. Melvin then begins to cry. He damns God. He damns his father. He rips off the JESUS dog tag and tosses it into the ground.

Feeling all alone, JESUS saunters past his old haunt. He hears the sound of a jazz trumpet. Turning the corner he sees a portly man in a wheelchair with no feet. The man is wearing a derby cap and is blowing smooth jazz tunes. There is a BOTTLE OF VODKA next to his wheelchair. It is TUBBS.

TUBBS immediately recognizes MELVIN. He is excited to see him. MELVIN tells TUBBS that his name is really JESUS. TUBBS becomes disconcerted. He claims that he took bullets and became paralyzed so that MELVIN could be free. MELVIN insists that his name is JESUS. TEARS begins to drip down TUBBS fine chin and he tells MELVIN that it served him right that OFFICER MARK married GRACE, even if she was pregnant with you-know-who’s child. MELVIN becomes silent. Slowly he continues to walk without looking back. TUBBS throws his trumpet in despair.

TUBBS: I wait all these years for use to come back and use don’t even know whose use is. Fuck you then, Melvin, Jesus, whatever use names bees, fuck use.

MELVIN continues to walk. He gets another forty and walks past a boarded up and dilapidated BOO RADLEYS. Sitting down at an abandoned BUS STOP outside, he hears a voice. The old man who MELVIN saw seven years inside the jazz club is seated next to him, reminiscing about JERZ LORDS fine establishment.

JESUS shares his forty with the old man who goes by the name of DRUNK HAROLD (54). Melvin says that his name is Jesus but that none of his friends’ know him. DRUNK HAROLD disparages JESUS, telling him that he never did know who he was—even growing up. Slowly, JESUS becomes aware that the old man knows something. It turns out that DRAUNK HAROLD is MELVIN’s father.

HAROLD tells MELVIN all about his mother, LADY GREGORY.. DRUNK HAROLD explains that actually, his LADY GREGORY was carrying twins fathered by different males, at the same time. A genetic possibility but one that is rarely heard of. MELVIN is Harold’s son. When MELVIN inquires about his brother, HAROLD runs his finger down the side of his cheek. MELVIN remains silent.

The father and son roll a joint. MELVIN begins to ask his newly found father for advice. DRUNK HAROLD offers insight, tells a drunk and stoned MELVIN that sometimes in life, you gotta go back to the place where shit happens and fix everything.

MELVIN thinks about this and smiles. He gets up and avails a revolver from the inside of his pants. Without saying a word BLACK MEL shoots DRUNK HAROLD.

“Looks like god the son finally get gonna come back after all, Tubbs.” He says.




ACT THREE

1.)
BLACK MEL is lurking outside of St. Cecelia's Playground. There is a catholic sister and a small class size playing duck duck goose. The school has cleaned up considerably but it is still located in a shady part of town.

Without saying a word BLACK MELVIN leaps over the fence. He whips out his gun and presses it against the nun's heads. When the nun asks who he is, MELVIN says that his name is JESUS and that he has come back from the dead to take what was rightfully his. MELVIN forces the classroom out from the playground and back inside the school. They enter the sanctuary. BLACK MEL is crazy. A locomotive stream of vulgarities erupts from his lips. He forces the kids down in front of the statue of Virgin Mary. He tells them to pray. Pray that there is a god and that God cares enough about your ass to let you live. Pray for verification.

Melvin bolts the students in the sanctuary. Slowly Melvin escorts each student to the confessional booth. He asks then the question, "What's the difference between God and man?" He tosses the children down and fetches another one. The last student he interrogates is MELODY (7) the daughter BLACK MEL conceived with GRACE before he left for Vietnam. The daughter MELVIN has never met.

Outside MELVIN hears the sharp whirl of police sirens begin to escalate. He looks at his daughter.

MELODY: IF you is, Jesus than why you black?

MELVIN looks at his daughter. He removes his nozzle and points it sharply onto his daughters temple. MELODY tells MELVIN that her dad is a police man. MELVIN (JESUS) tells MELODY that his dad is a God. The two look at each other. MELVIN kisses his daughter on the forehead and tells her to kneel down in front of him and pray. As soon as Melody closes her eyes, MELVIN puts the nozzle of the gun into his own mouth. He closes his eyes and is about to pull the trigger before he hears the sound of a saxophone, humming in the direction of the playground. It is a sweet dulcet sound. MELVIN drops the gun and picks up his daughter. They walk down a corridor and look into the playground. Near the jungle gym, both Melvin sees the Hispanic waiter, humming into a saxophone. The waiter is shrouded in a corona of LIGHT. The sound of jazz is beautiful and sweet and hovers above the shrill of the police sirens. MELVIN turns to his daughter and tells him that she needs to know who she is as a person, before she knows or accepts anything else in life. He asks his daughter if she sees the man playing the saxophone and she innocently nods. MELVIN tells his daughter that that’s what an angel sounds like. He picks her up and together the two walk in the direction of the white light. The moment the door to the playground closes—Bullets are heard thundering across the playground.

2.) There is a close-up of MELVIN’s body lying dead in the middle of the playground. The HARD LIGHTS of police vehicles reflect shades of red and blue. MARK steps up, steam hovering above the top of his rifle. He looks at his BROTHER and feels the fissure on his own cheek. The moment MELVIN COTTON-BLACK MELVIN-JESUS DE CEILO’s body is escorted away in a black shroud a sound is heard. The office looks behind him to see his daughter, MELODY, inexplicable groping a shiny brass saxophone. MELODY blows in the horn, erupting flat notes and sour chords. Slowly Melody, is learning to play.