SCRIPTEASE Twin Peaks

This week the Reduced SFX Company presents series one of David Lynch’s weirdness, in shrink-wrapped form…

SCRIPTEASE

TWIN PEAKS: SEASON ONE

OVERALL SYNOPSIS OF SHOW

A cheerleader is murdered in a small Pacific North-western logging town; FBI Agent Dale Cooper is sent to investigate. Because this show was created by David Lynch, he encounters lots and lots of weird shit.

ACT ONE

PETE MARTELL, aka THE GUY WITH THE WEIRD HAIR IN ERASERHEAD, is walking along a beach. He finds a BODY and runs to make a phone call.

PETE: Hello, Sheriff? She’s dead! Wrapped in plastic! And somehow I knew to say ‘she’ even though I never went anywhere near the body and her face is hidden from sight!
SHERIFF HARRY S TRUMAN: That’s okay, Pete, I’ll be right there. Get the coffee on.

THE BODY is identified as a cheerleader named LAURA PALMER. Elsewhere, LAURA’s mum is FREAKING OUT. She does this A LOT. She calls her HUSBAND, LELAND PALMER.

SARAH: Laura isn’t here! I’m freaking out!
LELAND: I’m sure she’s fine, don’t worry! Wait a minute, the Sheriff’s here… um… oh dear…

The SHERIFF delivers the BAD NEWS. There is much SCREAMING and CRYING and the music is VERY EMOTIONAL.

THE VIEWERS: Hmm, this is surprisingly moving and unsettling and unlike anything else on American television circa 1990. We’re not sure what to make of it.
DAVID LYNCH: Wait till you get a load of the dancing dwarf.

ACT TWO

AGENT DALE COOPER drives into TWIN PEAKS.

COOP: Diane, I’m talking to you on my Dictaphone about all sorts of strange things to establish that my character is kooky, off-kilter and possibly suffers from OCD. Also, these are very pretty trees. And I’m hungry. I want some pie. Cherry pie would be nice. Diane, are you transcribing this? Don’t you have anything better to do? I don’t pay you enough.

AGENT COOPER meets up with SHERIFF TRUMAN and they investigate LAURA’S MURDER. After an incident involving FISH in a COFFEE PERCOLATOR, CHERRY PIE is consumed and COOP discovers that there are approximately ELEVENTY BILLION suspects because LAURA PALMER knew everybody in the world.

TRUMAN: So let’s see… Laura worked on the perfume counter at Horne’s Department Store, drove around Twin Peaks delivering meals to shut-ins via the Double R Diner’s Meals on Wheels service, went to cheerleading practice several nights a week, dated Bobby Briggs officially, went out with James Hurley unofficially, mentored Benjamin Horne’s mentally challenged son Johnny, tutored Jocelyn Packard in English and also worked nights at One-Eyed Jack’s, a brothel just over the border into Canada.
COOP: Are we sure she didn’t just die of exhaustion?

ACT THREE

AGENT COOPER falls asleep. In retrospect, this is a BAD IDEA, because his dreams would make HUNTER S THOMPSON’s acid trips look DULL. There is a KILLER named BOB, a LAURA PALMER LOOKALIKE and a DANCING DWARF.

DWARF: !driew s’ti esuaceb sdrawkcab kaeps I
COOP: You’re talking backwards? David Lynch wrote this bit, didn’t he?
DAVID LYNCH: I feel like I know him, but sometimes my arms bend back.
COOP: No worries. You just do what you can to get Twin Peaks discussed all over the world and therefore guaranteed a second season. I’ll just sit here and look puzzled.

The DWARF dances some more. AGENT COOPER wakes up and says he knows who killed LAURA PALMER. This is a HUGE CLIFFHANGER.

THE VIEWERS: Already? That was quick!

The NEXT EPISODE begins.

COOP: Oops. I forgot again.
THE VIEWERS: That was a cheap trick.
DAVID LYNCH: Sorry. Also: PSYCH!

ACT FOUR

We meet some of TWIN PEAKS’ other residents. In amongst the SHADY BUSINESSMEN, DINER WAITRESSES and DAFFY SECRETARIES there is a LADY WITH A LOG.

COOP: Who’s the lady with the log?
TRUMAN: We call her the log lady.
COOP: This show has scintillating dialogue, doesn’t it?
LOG LADY: My log knows who killed Laura Palmer! But it’s not going to tell you!
COOP: That’s very helpful, thank you.
LOG LADY: My log says you need to drag out the hunt for Laura Palmer’s killer for at least another five seasons! If you find out who killed her too soon, you’ll be cancelled!
DAVID LYNCH [ruefully]: Next time I’ll listen to the log.

Elsewhere, AUDREY HORNE is a HOT SCHOOLGIRL with a crush on AGENT COOPER.

AUDREY: I dance by myself to cool jazz and look very sultry. Also, I’m investigating the murder of Laura to help Agent Cooper, and this means I will have to pretend to be a prostitute to infiltrate my father’s brothel.

To audition for the BROTHEL, AUDREY ties a CHERRY STEM in a knot with her TONGUE.

ALL THE MEN IN THE WORLD: Holy crap!
ALL THE WOMEN IN THE WORLD [jealously]: We could totally do that too.
AUDREY: Am I the best thing about this show or what?
DAVID LYNCH: I’m still fond of the dancing dwarf myself.

ACT FIVE

DONNA HAYWARD and JAMES HURLEY realise they have fallen in love, but NOBODY GIVES A DAMN, so let’s move on.

MADDY FERGUSON: Hello! I’m Laura’s identical cousin, in town for her funeral, and I’m not Sheryl Lee wearing a brown wig at all!
COOP: Hmm. Suddenly this show has gone from being moody and weird to being slightly soap-opera-ish. Soon a battered wife will be shooting her abusive husband and there’ll be a fiendish plot to burn down the sawmill.

SHELLEY JOHNSON shoots her husband LEO after he hits her. Meanwhile, a FIENDISH PLOT is hatched to burn down the PACKARD SAWMILL.

COOP AKA KYLE MACLACHLAN: I always thought smalltown USA was a peaceful place and didn’t contain any dark secrets behind its white picket fences. I guess I was wrong.
DAVID LYNCH: But you starred in Blue Velvet! Didn’t you learn anything from that?
KYLE MACLACHLAN: I got to have kinky sex with Isabella Rossellini and you expect me to remember the film’s message?
DAVID LYNCH: Good point.

ACT SIX

TWIN PEAKS reaches its first-season finale. Lots and lots of things happen, such as the MILL BURNING DOWN and LEO returning for revenge. At the BROTHEL, a masked AUDREY is trapped in a room with her HORNY FATHER, which is probably the most MORALLY DUBIOUS cliffhanger to a US TV show EVER. Oh, and AGENT COOPER gets shot. TWIN PEAKS is now officially a SOAP OPERA.

THE VIEWERS: So are we supposed to be this confused about who killed Laura Palmer or what?
DAVID LYNCH: Actually you’re supposed to be drinking damn fine coffee and eating cherry pie at Twin Peaks parties across the land. This isn’t a TV show, it’s a social phenomenon!
THE VIEWERS: Twin Peaks parties? Really?
DAVID LYNCH: Hey, the internet hadn’t taken off back then and that’s what you had to do. These days the words “Dancing Dwarf” would have been a trending topic on Twitter for six months. TV shows today don’t know they’re born.
THE VIEWERS: Who did kill Laura Palmer anyway? You can tell us now, the show’s over!
DAVID LYNCH: Buggered if I know. I didn’t even understand it as I wrote it.