Chapter XIII: Amateur Movie Making (3)

185. COUNCIL ROOM. Enrico and Magistrate are waiting (no guns on
anybody in this scene). Countess enters with Rosalie who is
terrified and completely cowed. Enrico goes to her, pinches
her cheek and says:

SP: "WELL, HAVE YOU MADE UP YOUR MIND TO MARRY CONWELL?"

She weakly shakes her head and says she doesn't know what to
do. Enrico smiles and says:

SP: "SO YOU'D RATHER SEE YOUR FATHER KILLED, WOULD YOU?"

She miserably shakes her head and says "No." Enrico pats her
on the shoulder and says: "That's a sensible little girl."

186. HALL OF PALACE. Roland, with two guards and Conwell, comes up
the stairs and they march to the door of council room and
stop. Conwell smiles at Roland and says:

SP: "I DID YOU A GOOD TURN, NOW YOU ARE GOING TO DO ME ONE."

Roland looks at him suspiciously and Conwell still smiling,
says:

SP: "YOU'RE GOING TO BE BEST MAN AT MY WEDDING."

He then throws the door wide open and indicates the wedding
party on the opposite side of the room, with a flourish.
Roland looks in astounded and horrified.

187. COUNCIL ROOM. Enrico, Magistrate, Countess and Rosalie
standing opposite door. They all look at doorway and see
Conwell and Roland. Rosalie stands transfixed with her eyes
wide open.

188. HALL IN PALACE. Roland stands transfixed, looking at
Rosalie. Conwell invites him in with a sinister smile and
enters first, followed by Roland, who is followed by the two
guards.

189. COUNCIL ROOM. Conwell enters, followed by Roland and two
guards. Conwell crosses to Rosalie but Roland stops near door,
with guards back of him almost in doorway. Conwell takes
Rosalie's hand, tells her Roland is to be their best man and,
looking tauntingly at Roland, he leans over and kisses her.
This infuriates Roland so he cannot contain himself. He
suddenly whirls, pushes the two guards in the face. They fall
through the door out into the hall. Roland quickly closes the
door.

190. HALL IN PALACE. The two guards fall through the doorway,
sprawling on the floor.

191. COUNCIL ROOM. Roland closes the door and locks it, turns and
rushes upon the astonished Conwell. Then follows a general
mixup. Roland having to fight Conwell, Enrico and possibly the
Magistrate--or the Magistrate might be an old guy who beats it
out the window as soon as the fight begins. Rosalie tries to
help by picking up a vase or some such object and hitting
Conwell or Enrico, but the Countess stops her and Rosalie
keeps the Countess busy by struggling with all her might.
Conwell must be put out completely and Roland conquers Enrico
and the Magistrate and would be a complete winner but for the
Countess. While she is struggling with Rosalie and the fight
is going on, the guards in the hall struggle to their feet and
begin banging on the door. The Countess hears this and her
object is to get the door open. She is prevented for some time
by Rosalie but just as Roland has finished off Conwell and the
Magistrate and has Enrico down and practically out, the
Countess manages to get the door open and let in the two
guards. They cover Roland and he rises and surrenders. Conwell
and Enrico are pretty far gone but they manage to get up and
Enrico says to the guards:

SP: "TAKE HIM TO THE COURTYARD AND SHOOT HIM!"

The guards rush Roland out--Rosalie collapses.

During this fight we see a long shot of Tom with an American
flag and the marines coming down the street.

A man running to a group of the populace and saying: "The
Americans are coming!" The whole of this group then run out
toward the palace. This group runs to the crowd in front of
the palace and yell: "The Americans are coming!" The crowd
falls back to the other side of the Plaza and the soldiers
guarding the palace look anxiously up and down.

Tom with his marines rushes into the plaza. The crowd falls
back and the soldier guards beat it hot foot. Part of the
marines rush into the palace, led by Tom. The man with the
flag and the rest of them stop outside and guard the palace.

Also, during this fight the officer and his guard of six men
take the King and Councilors out of their cells and lead them
off toward the courtyard, line them up against the wall, tie
their hands behind them, blindfold each one and are just about
to give the order to shoot when Tom rushes into the courtyard
with his marines, who chase the soldiers off and Tom picks up
the King and carries him and shoos them all before him into
the palace, having jerked off their blindfolds.

192. HALLWAY OF PALACE. Just as the two guards bring Roland out of
the Council Room into the hall and start toward the stairs,
Tom runs in at front with his marines. The guards, seeing
them, drop Roland and beat it out the back window. Roland
greets Tom ecstatically, looks at his watch, sees that it is
one-half minute to ten and says:

SP: "TRY AND SAVE THE KING AND COUNCIL!"

Tom wants to know where they are and Roland points down stairs
and back. Roland tells twenty of the marines to come with him
and the rest run down stairs with Tom. Roland leads his little
bunch into the council room.

193. COUNCIL ROOM. Countess is holding up Rosalie, Conwell leaning
against the wall side of her. Magistrate is starting
marriage service. Enrico is sitting on the table holding his
head and watching the ceremony. The door bursts open and in
rushes Roland with six marines. He rushes over and grasps
Rosalie and tells the marines to cover all the others, which
they do.

194. COURTYARD OF PALACE. Officers just finishing blindfolding
King and Councilors. They are all lined up to be shot. Firing
squad is all ready--sixteen in all, now. Officer leaves King
and Councilors and takes place at end of firing squad. He is
just about to raise his sword when Tom runs in from the
Palace, lets out a yell, and followed by his twenty marines
rushes in. The soldiers seeing them, run like mad, chased by
the marines. Tom quickly jerks off blindfolds and shoos the
whole bunch--King and Councilors--into the palace.

195. COUNCIL ROOM. Colonel Bird and two marines run in. Rosalie
rushes to her father's arms and Roland tells Bird to look
after her and to go into the hall, which they do. He tells
two of the marines to guard Conwell and the Countess and
Magistrate. He then grabs Enrico, tells the other six marines
to follow, and drags Enrico out into the hall, followed by six
marines.

196. HALLWAY IN PALACE. Colonel Bird and Rosalie are waiting.
Roland drags Enrico out, followed by six marines. They start
toward the front. At this moment the King and Council come up
the stairs headed by Tom. Roland grabs the King in his other
hand, calls Tom and tells him to bring the King along; hands
him over to Tom. Tells the marines to herd along the Council,
and they all go toward front of hall.

197. FRONT OF THE PALACE. People waiting. American soldiers there.
Roland and Tom drag the King and Enrico out on the porch,
followed by Bird and Marines. The people become silent, not
knowing what has happened.

CLOSE UP OF ROLAND STARTING SPEECH. He raises his hand while Tom
holds the King. He points at the King, then turns and says:

SP: "MY FRIENDS, FOR TEN YEARS YOUR BEAUTIFUL COUNTRY HAS BEEN
RULED BY THIS COMIC OPERA KING, WHO HAS NOT DRAWN A SOBER
BREATH SINCE HE ASCENDED THE THRONE."

Tom holds up the King, to whom Roland points--the King weakly
protesting. Roland turns front and speaks again, pointing at
Enrico:

SP: "LAST NIGHT THE KING WAS DETHRONED BY THE MOST CORRUPT AND
CONTEMPTIBLE GRAFTER THE COUNTRY HAS EVER KNOWN--ENRICO DE
CASTANET!"

He points at Enrico, who grits his teeth and wants to pounce
on Roland, but is restrained by guns of marines at his back.
Roland looks triumphantly at Enrico, then front, and says:

SP: "THE FIRST ACT OF THIS TYRANT, ON ASSUMING POWER, WAS TO RAISE
THE ALREADY EXORBITANT TAXES!"

The people nod their heads "yes" and shake their fists at
Enrico. Roland points to Enrico and says, "Look at him." He
then turns to the King and says "Look at him." Then he turns
to the people and says:

SP: "IS EITHER OF THESE WRETCHES FIT TO RULE THIS BEAUTIFUL
COUNTRY?"

The people shake their heads yelling "No, no," and to-helling
both the King and Enrico.

CLOSE UP OF ROLAND listening to this demonstration, turning first
to the King and then to Enrico, as if to say "Ah, you see,"
and then front again and says:

SP: "IN AMERICA WE CHOOSE OUR OWN RULERS AND DETERMINE OURSELVES
WHAT OUR TAXES ARE TO BE."

LONG SHOT OF THE CROWD--Hearing this, turning to each other and
expressing their approval of the idea, one or two yelling out
exclamations of approval.

CLOSE UP OF ROLAND--Smiling, looking again at the men on his right
and left and again speaking front:

SP: "WHY NOT CHANGE THIS GOVERNMENT INTO A _DEMOCRACY_ LIKE
AMERICA AND ALL THE _CIVILIZED_ COUNTRIES OF THE WORLD?"

LONG SHOT OF THE CROWD, yelling approval, waving their hats and
hands and (fade out).

T: AND SO A NEW REPUBLIC WAS BORN. THEY TRIED TO MAKE ROLAND
PRESIDENT, BUT THERE WAS ONLY ONE JOB HE WANTED.

198. FADE IN JUDGE'S COURT. Roland is sitting on the bench all
dolled up in a judge's rig. Beside him stands Tom in a
policeman's uniform. He indicates to Tom to bring in the
prisoners. Tom tells an officer to open the door.

CLOSE UP OF DOOR AT SIDE OF ROOM. Officer opens door and the King
and four Councilors and Enrico file past the camera going to
the front of the Judge's bench.

LONG SHOT OF COURTROOM, showing prisoners, Judge and Tom.

CLOSE UP OF ROLAND looking over the prisoners and saying:

SP: "YOU ARE ALL SENTENCED TO ONE YEAR IN PRISON--THIS COUNTRY MUST
BE MADE SAFE FOR DEMOCRACY AND INSURANCE."

The prisoners all look at each other in dismay. Tom steps
down, starts to jerk Enrico roughly toward the door. Roland
raises his hand and speaks:

SP: "TREAT THEM GENTLY, CHIEF. THEIR POLICIES DON'T EXPIRE FOR
ELEVEN MONTHS!"

Then Tom takes them very gently and leads them out of the
room. As they go out, Roland says:

SP: "WE'LL CALL THAT A DAY. COURT IS ADJOURNED!"

He leaves by door at back.

199. GARDEN. Rosalie waiting. Roland comes to her. (Fade out.)

Transcriber Notes:

Passages in italics were indicated by _underscores_.

Passages in bold were indicated by =equal signs=.

Small caps were replaced with ALL CAPS.

Throughout the dialogues, there were words used to mimic accents of the speakers. Those words were retained as-is.

The illustrations have been moved so that they do not break up paragraphs and so that they are next to the text they illustrate, and the table of illustrations is changed to reflect those moves.

Errors in punctuations and inconsistent hyphenation were not corrected unless otherwise noted.

In the list of Illustrations, "CREPE" was replaced with "CRÊPE".

On page 6, "ConstanceTalmadge" was replaced with "Constance Talmadge".

In the illustration on page 20, "CREPE" was replaced with "CRÊPE" and crepe was replaced with "crêpe".

On page 59, "ORCHID'S" was replaced with "ORCHIDS".

On page 69, a double quotation mark was added before "WHAT DAT LORD HOWE-GREENE"

On page 81, one title has no text.

On page 104, "(same as 158)" was replaced with "(same as 154)".

On page 104, "king's" was replaced with "King's".