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THE COLD OPEN SIDES;

I've transcribed the following from the recent episode 2 ("The Cold Open") sides that have been making the rounds of the web. You can find the original .pdf file at SunsetTalk and The Aaron Sorkin Chronicles. Enjoy!


MACK (CONT'D)
The live, or at least live for some of us, career suicide of Wes Mendell and the hiring now of Matthew Albie and Daniel Moore to take over a show they were fired from or quit, depending on who you talk to, we're talking your calls.

[The next three lines of dialogue are obscured]

I think [obscured] probably self- explanatory for most people, Dave, but thanks just the same. Lena and Toluca Lake, what's on your mind, did you see it live?

During all this we've also been hearing a kind of rhythmic 'clanking'. It's not annoying, it's just there.

And now we've arrived at the source of the clanking. It's a mini-gym that Matt has on one side of his covered deck. MATT's in baggy gym shorts and a loose fitting Cornell tank top. He's worked up a pretty good sweat doing leg-lifts at a nautilus bench and the lifts are coming harder and slow now.

Jeannie gets up from the table with the papers and comes right out--

JEANNIE
(calling)
Matt! Right here. I found it right here. First of all you're supposed to wait until Day 10, this is Day 5, and you're supposed to start with ten reps using 10 pound weights. You've got 20 pounds there and you've done like 41 lifts, I've been listening to the clanking.

MATT
I laugh directly in the face of medical science.

And JEANNIE simply puts her foot on the weight bar--

MATT (CONT'D)
OW.

JEANNIE
(get this through your head)
You've had back surgery. You will rip whatever they did apart. It will hurt. And I'm one of the people who'll have to politely listen to you complain about it.

MATT
I'd prefer it if when I complained you listened out of more than politeness.

JEANNIE
Never gonna happen.

MATT
It doesn't matter, I feel strong. I feel great, I'm having the best morning. Come inside with me. I'm gonna make special juice.

JEANNIE
Special juice?

JEANNIE's following MATT back into the kitchen, where of course the radio show is still playing.

MATT
I've had a recipe for months. I was given it by a for-real physical health guy, I mean just this side of being licenced in the field. You put 12 ounces of fresh orange juice in the blender...
(pouring)
...I don't really know what 12 ounces looks like.

JEANNIE
(patiently)
It's on the side of the blender.

MATT
Hey yeah, look at that.

JEANNIE
What's the powder?

MATT
I don't really know, I've never used it, but we need two heaping tablespoons.

JEANNIE
Would you like me to take you out to breakfast?

MATT
Olympians drink this, Jeannie. Do I have a ripe banana?

JEANNIE
(not having to look)
No.

MATT
Do I have 16 ounces of frozen strawberries?

JEANNIE
No.

MATT
Do I have stawberries that are just very cold?

JEANNIE
No.

MATT
Well lemme ask you this. If I had flaxseed oil or brewer's yeast, where do you think I'd keep it?

JEANNIE
You don't have those things.

MATT
You're sure?

JEANNIE
I've been in your refrigerator, Matt, you've got champagne and ketchup.

MATT
All right, well then the orange juice and the mystery powder.

JEANNIE
I'm getting my pants. Put the top on the blender there, Rocky.

JEANNIE steps into the bedroom, where we catch glimpses of her getting dressed.

MATT
What are you listening to?

JEANNIE
Mack and Dave in the morning. I looked for someplace where they weren't talking about it but there is no place where they're not talking about it. They'll play music in a minute.

DAVE
--once again--

MACK
Dave's gone crazy.

DAVE
Sophisticated humour. You two don't appreciate it because it's sophisticated.

MATT
Yeah, I get this guy confused with P.G. Wodehouse all the time.

MACK
Dorothy in Reseda, you're on the air with Mack and Dave.

MATT's blended the drink and pours it into a glass--

MATT
I don't know what it is, I feel like I slept for 20 hours.

JEANNIE comes out of the bedroom--

JEANNIE
You did.

MATT
What do you mean?

JEANNIE
Actually you slept for 28 hours.

MATT
What are you talking about?

JEANNIE
You slept for 28 hours, Matt.

MATT
What are you talking about?

JEANNIE
You were pretty dosed up with some very powerful painkillers. Danny told me to talke you home and baby-sit you.

MATT stands there a moment, then goes to the kitchen table and picks up a newspaper.

MATT
It's Sunday.

JEANNIE
Yeah.

MATT
I slept through Saturday?

JEANNIE
You woke up a couple of times. Once to ask me if the Yankees won and once to have sex.

MATT
(pause)
Did the Yankees win?

JEANNIE
Yes, that's why you wanted to have sex. Which, by the way, it turns out you're not allowed to do until Day 10 either.

The penny's slowly, very slowly, starting to drop for MATT...

MATT
Hang on, 'cause this is starting to get strange. What did you mean when you said you looked for someplace where they weren't talking about it?

JEANNIE
Well just that everybody's talking about it. We can turn on the Sunday morning news shows if you want. Shelly gave the head's up that Russert's doing it and Stephanopoulos, probably Blitzer and--

MATT
Hang on--

DOROTHY (CALLER)
--and at a time when this whole country--well everybody but the Hollywood liberal limousine elite--but at a time when real Americans were and should have been standing shoulder to shoulder with the President, these two characters were mocking the President and defending Bill Maher. I think Studio 60 stinks, I think it's always stunk, and I think that NBS hiring back these Barbra Streisand-loving, Michael Moore-worshipping jackasses to be in charge of the show is a big ef-you to the real Americans who make up the lion's share of their audience and to the troops and for that this network should pay a high price.

MACK
Alright, strong words from Dorothy in Reseda. It's worth noting by the way that Wes Mendell had been the Executive Producer from the very first show.

HEATHER
20 years ago.

MACK
That's right, so with Matt Albie and Danny Moore, this'll be the first time since its inception that new people are in charge of what you'd really have to say is an American insitution, or certainly an LA institution...

And with that it all comes back to him, and the glass drops from his hand with a CRASH...

JEANNIE
(genuinely)
Ohh...baby. You thought you'd dreamed it, didn't you.

MATT
(pause)
Yeah.

MACK
We'll be taking more calls here at Mack and Dave in the Morning.
(MORE)


[20 pages of script are between this scene and the next.]


HARRIET
Tell me about it.

PA (VO)
Cast to the stage please. Cast to the stage.

HARRIET, SIMON and TOM head out to--

INT. BACKSTAGE - CONTINUOUS

SIMON
Can he even sit in a chair for 14 hours a day?

TOM
Who?

SIMON
Matt. He just had back surgery. Can he sit in a chair?

TOM
It wasn't a big deal, they just moved something around.

SIMON
I had that surgery and it's not a big deal, but you're not supposed to move around for about a week and a half. You're not supposed to ride in a car and you can't sit at a desk for 14 hours.

HARRIET
14 hours in a short day for him and when you had the surgery you didn't miss a show.

SIMON
I'm exceptional in many ways. He on the other hand, I don't think can sit in a chair.

They walk out onto--

INT. STAGE - CONTINUOUS

--where tables have been set up for a read-through. The rest of the cast and a few P.A.'s are already milling around. There's a pecking order here too, with the more junior people standing in the back and knowing to stay quiet.

JEANNIE
It's not gonna be a problem.

SIMON
What?

JEANNIE
Matt's back surgery. He's doing 40 leg-lifts with 30 pound weights.

SIMON
Get the hell outa here.

JEANNIE
He is.

SIMON
I couldn't tie my shoes.

HARRIET
Well you're exceptional in many ways.

[obscured]rides onto the stage--

DANNY
Good morning. I got a change to speak on the phone with each of you yesterday. I think I know what you're all thinking: "They're gonna make some changes, bring in some new blood, am I staying, am I going...".
(pause--then to TOM)
That's what you were thinking, right?

TOM
Not till just now, no.

DANNY
(laughing a little)
Man, well you shoulda been. Don't give me your very best or choose this week to complain about something and you'll make those decisions very easy. Mark Wahlberg's our host this week but Matt's not gonna make his first show about Mark Wahlberg and we all know it. He's also gonna write for the guys he knows, so you people in back, be patient. I'd also become one of the guys he knows. The White Stripes is the musical guest.

SIMON
Dorm intramural flag football, my friend. You know how hard it is to make it to the finals?

TOM
I'd imagine not very.

SIMON
(to DANNY)
Anyway, he's telling people he can do 40 leg lifts with 30 pound weights. I say he's a liar and I challenge him to a contest of physical supremacy.

TOM
Why don't you guys settle it like the real Athenians over 18 holes at Riviera?

JEANNIE
He's not saying he did 40 reps, he did 40 reps, I saw him. Yesterday morning.

HARRIET
He went to the gym?

JEANNIE
At his house, he bought a machine.

There's a terrible tension felt by some--not all--of the people at the meeting. DANNY, SIMON, TOM and most especially HARRIET. JEANNIE doesn't know what she said to make the joking around stop...

HARRIET
(pause)
And you saw him.

JEANNIE didn't mean to step in it, but she did. She likes HARRIET and she doesn't know what to say...

HARRIET (CONT'D)
I'm sorry, Danny, may I be excused from this meeting?

DANNY
Yeah.

They watch as HARRIET heads off. Then--

JEANNIE
God, Danny, can I go talk to her?

DANNY
No. Sorry. Anybody have any questions?
(pause)
Alright--


[Another jump in the script.]


INT. GREEN ROOM - CONTINUOUS

--where the cast has started to assemble in various stages of dress--some of them wearing Studio 60 bathrobes. They're in their own spaces going over script pages or stretching a little...

JEANNIE steps over to HARRIET...

JEANNIE
(quietly)
It was thoughtless of--

HARRIET
(startled)
Oh.

JEANNIE
Sorry.

HARRIET
I didn't see you.

JEANNIE
It was thoughtless to blurt it out at the meeting and I'm very sorry.
(beat)
We're friends, Harry. I love him to death, but we're friends. And when we're both without somebody, sometimes we wind up with each other. You'll keep your head in the game, right?

HARRIET looks at her, then casually takes a whiskey bottle that's handy nearby and smashes it over JEANNIE's head. The bottle breaks soundlessly and painlessly. It was a candy glass prop and JEANNIE knew it so she didn't flinch.

HARRIET
You're a hard girl to hate, Jeannie. Believe me, I've spent all week trying. Have a good show and we'll drink together at the party.

JEANNIE
Eat 'em up.

HARRIET
Eat 'em up.

MATT and DANNY walk in--


[Another jump.]


Silence...

SIMON
(pause)
Damn, Harry, let's never speak of that moment again.

HARRIET
I can be funny while I'm doing it.

SIMON
No you can't and we're not going to Matt with "The bear said roar."

TOM
Roseanne Barr is releasing an album for children.

JEANNIE
I flat-lined.

This stops them...

HARRIET
What?

JEANNIE
I flat-lined in the focus group.

TOM
(pause)
How do you know?

She holds up the data--

JEANNIE
Ricky and Ron gave me the dial groups. It's all good and they're crazy about everybody. But Commedia dell'Arte flat-lined and that was my only sketch last week.

SIMON
You can't look at it.

JEANNIE
Well...too late.

HARRIET
It's a great character.

JEANNIE
Not according to the people watching it, but the point is I guess that I'm the one who convinced Matt to do it. I pitched it, I wrote the first draft--

TOM
Jeannie--

JEANNIE
--I told him it wasn't gonna be "ha-ha" funny, but it was gonna be funny and he believed me.

TOM
Did it actually flat-line or are you--

JEANNIE hands him the data and TOM starts flipping through...

JEANNIE
My little brother played football at Iowa State. A guy comes back to the huddle and says, "Man, you gotta throw it to me, I'm open." And then they throw it to him and he drops the pass. It's a pretty long time before they let that guy open his damn mouth in the huddle again.

TOM
(reading)
"Didn't get it."

JEANNIE
Yeah.

TOM
"Boring."

JEANNIE
That's a word networks like to hear.

TOM
"Too smart."

JEANNIE
That's another word for boring.

SIMON
Smart as a perjorative.

JEANNIE
Look at the dials.

TOM
She flat-lined.

JEANNIE
In the first 25 seconds.

TOM
Except for one guy in St. Louis and one guy in Atlanta.

JEANNIE
Well I'll have plenty of time to personally perform it for both of them in their living rooms.

SIMON
You can't look at it.

JEANNIE
It's not the fault of the focus data, Simon, you gotta catch the ball when you ask for it.

SIMON You make more than your share of catches around here.

JEANNIE
Dammit!

And JEANNIE whips around and smacks her hand against a wall, but what she hits is a metal electrical box and

THUNK--

--the power goes out...

JEANNIE (CONT'D)
(quietly)
Sorry.

HARRIET
I don't know what to tell you guys. Either God's a little sweet on me today, He doesn't like Simon at all or He disapproves of Jeannie sleeping with my ex-boyfriend.

TOM
(to JEANNIE)
She's kidding.


[Another break.]


DANNY
Yeah it's time.

MATT
You know what, a hundred years ago Garry Marshall re-wrote an episode of Happy Days or something, kept their names on it and they won an Emmy--they've been eating lunch of it ever since.

DANNY
I think Ricky and Ron were about 10 when Happy Days was on, but I get the idea. Use 'em anyway.

MATT
Why?

DANNY
'Cause you're gonna burn out.

MATT
I'm not.

DANNY
Then do it 'cause I'm smarter than you and I'm asking you nicely.

MATT
The drop-off, you think inside 10 percent, 90 percent retention or better--

DANNY
Don't worry about it.

JEANNIE knocks at the door, she's in a Studio 60 bathrobe--

JEANNIE
Excuse me.

DANNY
You should be downstairs.

JEANNIE
No. Matt. You gotta take it down off the board.

MATT
Noooo.

JEANNIE
Matt--

DANNY
What are you talking about?

MATT
She saw the focus data on Commedia dell'Arte.

DANNY
Oh man, this is exactly why--

JEANNIE
You can't keep it in the show, Matt, there were three sketches that got bigger laughs at dress, which isn't saying much because Commedia got no laughs at dress.

MATT
That just means it's not that kind of funny.

JEANNIE
Or it could mean it's not funny at all and I'm dragging the show down.

DANNY
Can we have this conversation moving?

They head out into--

INT. CORRIDOR - CONTINUOUS

JEANNIE
I flat-lined. "Boring" was a word that was used to describe it.

DANNY
Some people just don't get Moliere parodies.

MATT
He's right, even though Moliere was a French playwright from a different century who had nothing to do with Italian Commedia dell'Arte.

JEANNIE
Matt--

MATT
It's an acquired taste, Jeannie. But once you acquire it it's like barrel-smoked whiskey.

DANNY
What's that?

MATT
I don't know, I may have just made it up.

JEANNIE
Look--

MATT
How could you think Moliere was even remotely connected to--

JEANNIE
(stopping them)
Idiot boys!

They stop...

DANNY
She's talking to us.

MATT
Yeah.

JEANNIE
I flat-lined. Nobody liked it.

MATT
That's not true. One guy in St. Louis and one guy in Atlanta.

JEANNIE
Could you please be serious.

MATT
Look at me. The network's doing another dial group tonight because, well, because they just can't help themselves. They're doing it during the live show so we'll have the results roughly the same time we have the ratings. The focus group is made up entirely of people who saw last week's show. The two people who liked it last week, is going to go up to three. If it doesn't, I'm going to give you $10,000 cash. Is that serious enough?

JEANNIE
(pause)
What?

MATT
If the two doesn't go to three I give you $10,000. If it does, you have to wear a t-shirt at the wrap party that days "Matt is My Hero and Danny Thinks Moliere was Italian." I'm having wardrobe make the shirt right now.

MATT heads off and JEANNIE takes a step to go after him--

JEANNIE
Matt--

--but DANNY grabs her arms without moving. He gets to be a director now, which he loves.

DANNY
(simply and directly)
Commit to it. No comedian you admire has ever been afraid of silence. You're gonna feel a strong instinct to make it bigger. Resist that instinct with everything you've got.

JEANNIE nods that she understands...

DANNY (CONT'D)
And don't forget to breathe before you go out there.

CUT TO:

INT. HARRIET'S DRESSING ROOM - NIGHT

SIMON and HARRIET are looking over cue cards with TOM as MATT steps in.

MATT
Hey, you know what worked at dress? The Lincoln, Missouri joke.

SIMON
Yeah.

MATT
The school play, that whole run. And it was all yours, I didn't even touch it.