Read Resurrection Blues for Free Online

people—it’s just myself I have doubts about.
    Â 
    The crew enters : Phil, cameraman; Sarah, soundwoman.
    Got to run, don’t forget the cats and give Daddy a kiss for me. I’ll call tomorrow. ’Bye!
    Â 
    PHIL, sets camera on the ground: Skip. Good morning, director, what are we shooting?
    Â 
    SARAH: Emily, please could I use your cell phone, I’ve got to call New York.
    Â 
    EMILY: Is it all right, Skip?
    Â 
    SKIP: Why can’t you call from the hotel?
    Â 
    SARAH: Because it’s just after nine and they said I could get my pregnancy report after nine and I can’t wait.
    Â 
    EMILY: Sarah, really! Isn’t that fantastic!
    Â 
    SARAH, jumping up and down: Please!
    Â 
    EMILY, hands her the phone: Here! Can you say who the father is?
    Â 
    SARAH: Well, ah . . . actually, yes. My husband . . .
    Â 
    EMILY: You have a husband?
    Â 
    SARAH: Last Tuesday.
    Â 
    EMILY: How fantastic! Make your call!
    Â 
    Watches with unwilling envy as Sarah goes to a space
and calls.
    PHIL: Listen, I’m trustworthy, can you tell me the secret?—what am I shooting?
    Â 
    EMILY, indicates the cross: That.
    Â 
    PHIL: What am I supposed to do with that?
    Â 
    EMILY: Well, nothing, until they nail a man to it.
    Â 
    Soldiers lower the cross to the ground and start attaching
a footrest . . . as . . .
    Â 
    PHIL: I always knew you were gutsy, but doesn’t this crowd insanity? You’re not serious, are you?
    Â 
    EMILY: I may not be your director in about ten minutes, Phil. To Skip: . . . Which reminds me, do you have a doctor?
    Â 
    SKIP: Oh god, you’re not feeling well?
    Â 
    EMILY: Not for me, for him!—You’ve really gone crazy, haven’t you . . .
    Â 
    SKIP: I am not at all crazy! . . . In all the thousands of paintings and the written accounts of the crucifixion scene I defy anyone to produce a single one that shows a doctor present! I’m sorry but we can’t be twisting the historical record! Great new idea . . . . And furthermore, I will not superimpose American mores on a dignified foreign people. The custom here is to crucify criminals, period! I am not about to condescend to these people with a foreign colonialist mentality!
    Â 
    EMILY: What about a hat?
    SKIP: A hat?
    Â 
    EMILY: If I know mountains it’ll probably be a hundred degrees up here by noon.
    Â 
    SKIP: Yes, but a hat—is that the look we want?—on a cross with a hat? I mean we’re not here to make some kind of a comment . I defy anyone to find a painting where he’s wearing a . . .
    Â 
    EMILY: And what do you plan on giving him?
    Â 
    SKIP: Giving him . . . ?
    Â 
    EMILY: For the pain!
    Â 
    SKIP: If you’re talking light drugs, okay, but we can’t have him staggering up to the cross or something. Especially in like dry states . . . Kansas or whatever.
    Â 
    SARAH, holding the phone: They gave him wine, you know—the Romans . . .
    Â 
    SKIP: Well a little wine, but he can’t look stoned. I mean we’ve got several million born-agains watching. Actually, I was thinking aspirin . . . or Tylenol if he’s allergic . . .
    Â 
    EMILY: Aspirin with nails through his hands and feet? Skip dear, are you out of your fucking head?—I mean I personally am on the verge of disappearing here, but. . . . Look, I don’t know why I’m even talking to you!
    Â 
    SKIP, terror raised a notch: Emily, dear, in all solemnity—if you walk on this one you’d better forget about any more work from us! And probably most if not all the other agencies. Now that’s candid. It’s simply too late to get somebody else, and your career, I can assure you is a wipeout.
    Â 
    EMILY: You are threatening me, Skip.
    Â 
    SKIP: I’m in no way threatening, dear, but if I know Thomson, Weber, Macdean and Abramowitz a lawsuit is not out of the question, and you’ll be total roadkill in the industry!
    Â 
    Enter Felix in uniform,