Post by spiral on Mar 5, 2019 3:38:59 GMT -5
PLAYBILL
SYNOPSIS
Spiral meets with his agent, Patrick LeRoux, to discuss his forthcoming debut with Valor Pro Wrestling.
CAST OF CHARACTERS
MADS MIKKELSEN as SPIRAL (THE NARRATOR)
ANYA TAYLOR-JOY as MADDI (THE ENTITY)
JEAN DUJARDIN as PATRICK LEROUX
ANYA TAYLOR-JOY as MADDI (THE ENTITY)
JEAN DUJARDIN as PATRICK LEROUX
2
ONE SHELL SQUARE
We'll be fighting in the streets
With our children at our feet
And the morals that they worship will be gone
With our children at our feet
And the morals that they worship will be gone
— The Who, Won't Get Fooled Again
TUESDAY—I’m standing by the window in LeRoux’s office on the thirty-ninth floor of One Shell Square and watching the low-hanging storm clouds churn over the city. Rain is beating the glass in rhythmic waves with the howling wind providing the melody. Then a flash of lightning cracks the sky and a roar of thunder to finishes off the crescendo. Farther down Poydras Street past the hotels and casino I can see the Mississippi, bloated and wild and feeding on the downpour like a starved animal gorging itself on a meal. The muddy water is choppy and fast moving. I wonder, will the current might prove too hostile for the barges being pushed up and down river by diesel tugboats? I stare hoping to see the river reach up with a mighty swell and consume the boats and drag them down into the tenebrous fathoms, consigning them to the sledge of the river bottom. Never to be recovered.
I hear LeRoux call my name but before I turn I catch a faint reflection in the glass looking back at me. It isn’t my face but Maddi’s, The Entity, and she’s giving me a very Spiral-like smile. I walk back to the sitting area where LeRoux is perched on a sofa with an iPad in his lap and a smug look on his freshly shaved face. Today he’s wearing a grey suit with a sky blue shirt and a striped tie. I’m certain it’s Brooks Brothers and his shoes are obviously Donald J. Piliner.
My outfit is much more expensive. See the Brioni navy suit and shirt with matching ascot. See the a black chamois belt perfectly fitted to my waistline. See the Allen Edmonds wingtips, freshly shined. While I was forced to sell my French Quarter condo and my childhood home in the Garden District is up for auction, I at least retained my wardrobe.
His office is a avant-garde monstrosity right out of those airport magazines you see geared toward the modern businessman. You know, the ones with Leer jets on the cover and Top Fifty Extraordinary Adventures for the Man Who Has It All as the lead story. It’s all grey-scale with exposed metal hardware on the desks, tables, and furniture. I almost don’t want to sit down on the other sofa but I do simply to get this over with.
I apologize even though I don’t mean it. We mustn’t forget our manners. I offer a simple smile and say, “I drifted away watching the storm.”
LeRoux sighs and says, “I’m trying to prepare you for this match. It’s important you make an impact right away in order to maximise your ability to garner interests from sponsors.”
“I’ll make my mark,” I tell him while unbuttoning my jacket then cross my right leg over the left. “No matter what happens in that ring, the world will know full well I was there. Win or lose.”
“Win,” he tells me. “You need to win.”
“While I am certainly confident in my abilities, Mr. LeRoux, you’re talking about eleven people in a twenty by twenty ring, all of them trying to do the same thing you want me to do, and the only way to win is toss everyone else out of the ring. You don’t need to out fight someone to win a Battle Royale. You simply need to survive the chaos. I will do my part but don’t pretend like you understand what it takes to stand across from another human and fight for blood.”
He stares at me in silence for a short moment then waves it away with his hand. “You’re right.” His eyes soften and he gives me a bright white smile. “I’ve never gotten into a ring and fought anyone. I’ll leave the outcome in your obviously well-experienced hands. However, there is no harm in preparing, is there?”
He want to bash his head in. “Of course not.”
His eyes drop to his iPad and he swipes his finger across it. On the wall to my left a flat screen television mirrors his screen. He has the Valor Pro Wrestling website loaded and is quickly navigating through the pages. He says, “Here you can see the current rankings for the promotion. Cross Recoba is one of your opponents on Sunday. He is the highest ranked wrestler in the Battle Royale, with four wins and five losses.”
“I crossed paths with Recoba on twitter. He’s a darling. With the right guidance he could go far. Certainly that record is…disappointing but in the world of pro wrestling records take a backseat to ticket sales. Promoters are happy to bury talent in mismatches or saddle them with bad ideas because it might add another cent to the bottom line. He might be worth my time.”
“After that you can see Fallon Lockhart, NovaCaine, and Danny Rizzo—Lockhart has yet to publicly speak about you or the match. Rizzo has a documentary crew following him around. I watched the latest clip. I’ll spare you the boring details. NovaCaine, on the other hand, talked about you and he had some interesting things to say.”
A video maximizes on screen and starts to play. A very angry looking man, overly muscled with scars on his chest is talking into a video camera. Of course he’s half naked because this is a classic wrestling promo and I’m supposed to be intimidated. I’m about to tell LeRoux to turn it off when I hear the man on camera say, “That leaves Spiral the wife killer.” I can feel LeRoux watching as I listen. He’s gauging my reaction. I have none. My face is polished stone but my mind is wondering what NovaCaine would look like if I crushed his skull and gouged out his eyes.
The wrestler in the video calls me the Pale Gibberish King and I’m already bored long before he’s done sweating through his script. LeRoux pauses the video and looks up at me from under his eyebrows. He says, “It would be better if we could limit the public mentioning of your past criminal inquiries.”
“Ha,” I laugh. “And how do you expect me to limit those public mentionings? I don’t care what this man says but he’s right about one thing. I did get that OJ defense team and they cleared me of it all. It’s the most expensive Not Guilty in the history of criminal justice and I paid the bill. If idiots like NovaCaine”—I point my thumb at the screen and say his name with the absurdness it deserves—“want to drag it out in the open, let them. I have nothing to hide. If he happens to fall down real hard in the match, crack his head open, and bleed to death, well…that’s on him, isn’t it?”
He puts the iPad down and says, “It wouldn’t hurt your brand if you did a video like that. A promo to hype the match and tear down your opponents.”
“I don’t think so.”
He holds his hands out real wide. “Why not? What better way to sell yourself to all those fans who will be there that night in Hong Kong?”
“I’ve fought in Hong Kong more than once. They’re a highly repressed people who come to see wrestlers and mixed martial artists tear each other limb from limb because it's the closest thing to satisfaction they will ever have. First it was the British Empire. Now it’s the Chinese Communists. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. Life is hard in a place like Hong Kong. All they want is violence. Not a one cares one bit about what I say before walking into that ring. All they care about is fantasizing about their oppressors getting beaten half to death and if they look like me then all the better. Besides—”
I tilt my head and say, “Isn’t that what Twitter’s for?”
LeRoux sighs and places the iPad down on the glass coffee table between us. He says, “I’m just trying to do my job as your agent to maximize your profitability. If you were willing to play the game it would go a long way.”
“You already did your job, Mr. LeRoux. You acquired me this contract.” I rise from the sofa and button my jacket. “Now it’s my turn to make them smile.”