by Nick Hornby
9 EXTERIOR: DAVID’S CAR/STREET NEAR JENNY’S HOUSE - DAY
The Bristol is crawling along the road at walking pace.
10 INTERIOR/EXTERIOR: DAVID’S CAR , JENNY’S HOUSE - DAY
DAVID
I suppose cellists must go to a lot of concerts.
JENNY
We don’t go to any concerts. We don’t believe in them.
DAVID
Oh, they’re real.
JENNY
So people say.
DAVID
Smoke?
DAVID reaches across JENNY while driving slowly, opens the glove compartment and takes out a packet of cigarettes.
JENNY
I’d better not. (indicating)
I live just up there.
DAVID pulls over near JENNY’S house.
DAVID
Why don’t we believe in them?
JENNY
He’d say there’s no point to them.
DAVID lights a cigarette.
DAVID
Your father, this is?
JENNY
(darkly)
Oh, yes. They’re just for fun. Apart from school concerts, of course, which are no fun at all, so we go to those. The proper ones don’t help you get on.
DAVID
Which, of course, is what is so wonderful about them. Anyway, you’ll go one day.
JENNY
(heartfelt)
I know, I will. If I get to university, I’m going to read what I want and listen to what I want. And I’m going to look at paintings and watch French films and talk to people who know lots about lots.
DAVID
Good for you.
JENNY
(laughing)
Yes.
DAVID
Which university?
JENNY
Oxford. If I’m lucky. Did you go anywhere?
DAVID
I studied at what I believe they call the University of Life. And I didn’t get a very good degree there.
JENNY smiles.
JENNY
Well . . . Thank you for driving me home.
She gets out of the car and takes the cello. DAVID stares after her for a moment, then drives off.We start to hear . . .
11 INTERIOR: JENNY’S BEDROOM - DAY
. . . Juliette Greco ‘Sous le Ciel de Paris’.The sound of the French music plays as we pan across JENNY’S bedroom to find her singing along, next to her Dansette record player.
Suddenly there’s a thumping noise - someone underneath her is banging on the ceiling impatiently.
JACK (out of sight)
I don’t want to hear French singing. French singing wasn’t on the syllabus, last time I looked.
JENNY sighs and reaches for the volume control. She turns the music down so low that she has to lie down and put her head right next to the Dansette to hear it.
Close on JENNY as she silently mouths the words along with the almost inaudible track.
12 INTERIOR: JENNY’S HOUSE - AFTERNOON
JENNY, her parents and GRAHAM are eating afternoon tea - neat fish-paste sandwiches, Battenberg cake, best china.
MARJORIE
Battenberg?
GRAHAM
Thank you. (As MARJORIE serves, the cake breaks up.) I actually like the crust.
JACK
So where are you applying, Graham?
JENNY looks embarrassed. She knows what’s coming.
GRAHAM
I’m not sure yet.
JACK
When will you be sure? You can’t let the grass grow under your feet, young man.
GRAHAM
I might take a year off.
JENNY winces. JACK looks at him as if he’s just said he’ll take all his clothes off.
JACK
What for?
GRAHAM
(mumbling)
I don’t know. Maybe do some travelling.
JACK
Travelling? What are you, a teddy boy? Close-up of JENNY- she knows what’s coming, and can’t bear it. Beat.
JACK
(nodding at JENNY)
You know she’s going to Oxford, don’t you? If we can get her Latin up to scratch.
JENNY sighs.
So she’s studying English at Oxford while you’ll be the wandering Jew . . .
JENNY looks at him curiously. GRAHAM steels himself to speak.
GRAHAM
Mr Mellor . . . I’m not a teddy boy. I’m an homme serieux. Jeune. No.Yeah. I’m a homme jeune serieux homme.
JENNY winces again. Her father stares at GRAHAM. GRAHAM blushes.
13 EXTERIOR: JENNY’S HOUSE - EVENING
It’s the day of the youth orchestra concert. JENNY, her mother and her father are on their way out of the door. JENNY is in her school uniform, with her hair scrubbed back in a severe ponytail and is carrying her cello. JENNY opens the front door.
MARJORIE
Ooh!
MARJORIE and JENNY have seen something on the doorstep, and JENNY stoops to pick it up - a large basket of flowers.
JENNY
They’re for me!
MARJORIE
(curious)
Who are they from?
JENNY opens the card that’s attached to the handle.
JENNY
Gosh. Him.
JACK leans over JENNY and stares at the flowers in disbelief.The bunch of flowers has created in JACK the kind of panic and fear more typically associated with a biochemical attack.
JACK
What’s this?
MARJORIE
(drily, knowing the trouble this will cause)
Jack, I’m afraid Jenny has been sent some flowers from a chap.
JACK
A chap? What kind of chap?
JENNY
(patiently)
He’s wishing me luck for tonight.
JACK
Is that all he’s wishing you? Where does he get the money from?
JENNY
He earns it, I expect.
JACK
Earns it? Why isn’t he at school?
JENNY
Can we just go? Otherwise the good-luck flowers will actually be responsible for me actually missing the concert. Which would be ironic, n’est ce pas?
JACK
I don’t like it.
MARJORIE
Objection noted. Jenny?
JENNY
Noted.
Gesturing at the flowers.
JACK
There’s got to be ten bob’s worth of luck here. That’s a bit much for a schoolgirl, isn’t it? You can’t leave it out. Even I’d burgle a house that had flowers outside. They’ll think we’re made of money.
MARJORIE puts them inside the house, shuts the door.
Thank you, Marjorie.
14 INTERIOR: COFFEE BAR - DAY
JENNY and two school friends, HAT TIE and TINA, are sitting at a table in a typical late-’50s coffee bar, sipping cappuccinos. JENNY is easily the most attractive of the three - and also, we will see, possibly the cleverest. HAT TIE is slower than the other two and a lot frumpier; TINA is pretty and sharp rather than clever. She is also the least middle-class of the three - she’s clearly a scholarship girl. They are all dressed in an unflattering and unambiguous school uniform - no attempts to disguise it with more fashionable accessories.
JENNY is holding a copy of Camus’ The Outsider and smoking pretentiously, and seems to be practising some kind of pout. TINA starts to slurp the froth from her cappuccino with a spoon, inelegantly and noisily. JENNY tuts her disapproval. TINA sighs and puts her spoon down.
JENNY
Camus doesn’t want you to like him. Feeling is bourgeois. Being engagé is bourgeois. He kills someone and he doesn’t feel anything. His mother dies and he doesn’t feel anything.
TINA
I wouldn’t feel anything if my mother died. Does that make me an existentialist?
JENNY
No. That makes you a cow.
&nb
sp; HATTIE
Une vache.
Laughter.
15 EXTERIOR: STREET/COFFEE BAR - DAY
JENNY, HATTIE and TINA emerge from the café, talking.
JENNY
After I’ve been to university I’m going to be French. I’m going to Paris and I’m going to smoke and listen to Jacques Brel. And I won’t speak. Ever. C’est plus chic, comme ça . . .
She breaks off. Parked outside a tobacconist’s booth on the other side of the road is the red Bristol. She looks towards the booth, and DAVID emerges with a copy of the Times and a packet of cigars.
Oh, crikey!
(to Hattie and Tina)
Wait here.
JENNY crosses the road to talk to him while the others watch.
DAVID
Hello.
JENNY
Hello. Thank you.
DAVID
How did it go?
JENNY
Oh, fine. I think. I mean, I didn’t mess my bit up. And no one got thrown out of the orchestra afterwards.
DAVID
Always the mark of a cultural triumph. Listen. I’m glad I ran into you. What are you doing on Friday?
JENNY
Going to school.
DAVID
I meant the evening.
JENNY
(embarrassed)
Oh.Yes. Of course. Nothing.
DAVID
Because I’m going to listen to some Ravel in St John’s, Smith Square. My friends Danny and Helen will be going, too, so it wouldn’t be . . . I’ll tell you what. I’ll come and pick you up, and if your mother and father disapprove, then you can have the tickets and go with one of them. How does that sound?
JENNY doesn’t know what to say. She looks at
DAVID, and his eagerness to please seems to convince her.
JENNY
Thank you. And I’d like to go with you.
DAVID
Seven? And we’ll probably go for a spot of supper afterwards.
JENNY
(flat disbelief)
Supper.
DAVID
If you want to.
JENNY
The trouble is, we’ll probably have eaten.
DAVID
Well, if you’d like supper, then, perhaps on Friday you could . . . not eat?
JENNY
(embarrassed again)
Oh.Yes. Of course.
JENNY smiles and rejoins her friends on the other side of the road. TINA and HATTIE are standing there almost with their mouths open, amazed. She doesn’t say anything and starts to walk on. TINA and HATTIE run to catch up.
TINA
(shrieking)
A spot of supper?
JENNY
You’ve heard of supper?
HAT TIE
We’ve heard of it. But we’ve never eaten it.
They walk off, giggling.
You’re going to have to tell us everything. Otherwise it’s not fair . . .
16 INTERIOR: JENNY’S HOUSE - EVENING
JENNY is dressed up for her evening out. She looks good, but also stiff, uncomfortable - she’s not herself in her dress, which looks too old for her. Her father is sitting at the dining table, shouting.
JACK
I won’t allow it!
JENNY
(coolly)
Fine. He’s more than happy for you to take me.
JACK
(uncertainly)
Fine. I will.
JENNY
Good.
MARJORIE comes into the room.
JACK
Where is it?
JENNY
St John’s, Smith Square.
JACK
Where’s that?
JENNY
I don’t know. I’m sure we could find out.
MARJORIE
It’s in Westminster. Just around the corner from the Abbey.
JACK looks at her as if she’d just given directions to the nearest opium den.
JACK
How d’you know that?
MARJORIE
I had a life before we were married, you know.
JENNY
He soon put a stop to that.
JACK
Well, there we are.
JENNY
Where are we?
JACK
Near Westminster Abbey. I’m not going all the way over there.
JENNY
The trouble is, that’s where St John’s, Smith Square is.
JACK
There must be something on locally. Where’s the paper?
MARJORIE
Jack, she wants to see someone who can play. She doesn’t want to see Sheila Kirkland scratching away. I’ll take her.
JACK
And how do you suppose to get there? RAF helicopter?
The doorbell rings.
JENNY
That’s him.
JACK
Oh, bloody hell.
MARJORIE
Jack!
JENNY starts towards the door, and then turns.
JENNY
Oh, and by the way . . . David’s a Jew.
A wandering Jew. So watch yourself.
She goes to the door.
JACK
(panic-stricken and shouting)
What does she mean by that? I’ve never said anything like that! It’s just an expression. I’ve got nothing against the Jews . . .
JENNY comes back in with DAVID, who seems intimidatingly exotic. He has obviously heard JACK’S last line.
DAVID
( pleasantly)
I’m glad to hear it. Hello. David.
He offers his hand.
JACK
I didn’t mean I’ve got nothing against you . . . Actually, I did mean that, but . . .
DAVID’S hand is still extended - in his confusion and embarrassment, JACK hasn’t yet taken it. He does so now and shakes it for way too long.
I’m sorry. What I’m saying is that you’re not the sort of, of person I’d be against, if I were the sort of person who was against . . . people . . . Oh, dear. I’m Jack, and this is Marjorie.
DAVID
(deadpan)
You didn’t tell me you had a sister, Jenny.
General confusion, until David chuckles naughtily. MARJORIE giggles, and then offers her hand.
You’re a lucky man, Jack.
JACK
I suppose I am, yes.
They all sit down.
DAVID
(looking around approvingly)
This is lovely.
MARJORIE smiles.
MARJORIE
Thank you.
JACK
I’m sorry, David. Would you like a drink?
DAVID
I’d love one, Jack, but we’re running a little late. If Jenny’s ready, perhaps we’ll shoot off.
JENNY looks at her father and takes a calculated gamble.
JENNY
Actually, David, Dad has something he has to tell you.
JACK
No, no, nothing . . . It was more of a question, really. A point of reference. What’s the best way to get to St John’s, Smith Square from here?
DAVID
Oh, it’s a pretty straight run, really. Up to Hammersmith, take the A4 through Kensington and you’re there.
JACK
Simple as that.
DAVID
Simple as that.
JACK smiles broadly.
