TOM : Please! Hello! Hey!

The VAMPIRE turns around. Now we see Tom. He is in his mid-thirties and dressed like a clerk. He would go unnoticed in a crowd.

TOM (VOICE OVER): It all started with a trip to the dry cleaner

The VAMPIRE leaps in sudden motion towards Tom.

TOM (VOICE OVER): I though it was the end.

The picture freezes.

TOM (VOICE OVER): But it wasn’t

He locks eyes with the CLERK.

PITBULL I’d show you my ticket, Alejandro, but we both know it’d be pointless.

An employee takes 6 shirts off a rack and piles them together, they are all black. Reluctantly he begins unbuttoning the shirt he is wearing; his fingers linger covetously over the rich fabric. He shakes out the wrinkles, slides it onto a hangar, and gathers it up with the other 6. And takes them all to the front counter, whereSTORE OWNER and BRAM are standing.

BRAM looks at the shirts critically but doesn’t say anything, he picks up the stack of shirts and tosses down a few bills to cover the price of the cleaning. As STORE OWNER reaches for the money BRAM’s hand grasps his wrist interrupting him.

BRAM – “Tell your people to stop wearing my things.”

STORE OWNER’s gaze (and our own) turn to the blue shirt; inky blackness spreads from the point where BRAM’s hand is touching it.

PETER walks directly toward us. He is wearing a waiter’s uniform: white shirt, black pants, black shoes, and has his clenched fists jammed into his pockets. He is in his early forties, clean-shaven with short black hair. Once a welterweight, he is now a light-heavy, and years on his feet have taken the spring from his step. He turns to enter a store and we hear a bell announcing his arrival.

INT. DRY CLEANER

A fiftyish white man, obviously the OWNER, enters from the rear of the store.

OWNER: Can I help you?

PETER unclenches a fist and hands OWNER a rumpled receipt.

OWNER: We haven’t used these tickets in years. When’d you bring the item in?

PETER: July 26, 2004, (beat) the day after my father’s funeral.

OWNER: I’ll have to hunt around in the back for it – we usually don’t keep things that long. (He looks again at the ticket, then at PETER.) Another funeral?

PETER: You never know.

PETER smiles (but just barely) and points at OWNER.

PETER: But if you come back with my suit you’ve got nothing to worry about.

A dry cleaner store in downtown L.A., the doorbell rings. Enter RUFUS, a scruffy guy in his mid-thirties, slightly out of breath. Rufus wears a shabby trench coat that might have looked Bogart-Style before it has been worn for twenty years and washed maybe twice. His hair is greasy, his glasses were expensive and hip one day, now one glass has a chip in it, and the other one could use some cleaning. To complete the weird outfit, Rufus wears big clown shoes.

Behind the counter stands a tough polish lady, attending a customer, about twenty years old, in a business suit.

Rufus coughs, not because his throat is soar, but because he wants attention. Which hew doesn’t get. So he coughs again, louder. Still no reaction from the lady behind the counter and her customer.

So Rufus opens his coat and puts his right hand out high, in it a brown paper bag, obviously filled up with something. We can now see, what he’s wearing under his coat:

A belt of explosives. Rufus screams.

RUFUS Insha’allah!

The lady behind the counter screams, the guy in the business suit jumps to the side, stumbles, crashes into a display of “Explore L.A.!”-flyers.

Rufus slams his left hand against the brown bag in his right. A loud BOOM! erupts, followed by a silent rain of confetti.

Rufus now turns to the business guy. In his hand he holds now a big pile of papers, loosely held together by a rubber band.

RUFUS Hello Mr. Weinstein, now that I have your attention, may I present you my screenplay, “Suicide Plumber”. It’s an action comedy in the style of “The Great Gatsby” but with a twist.

The business guy stares at Rufus in disbelief.

RUFUS I’ve been working on it for years. Please.

BUSINESS GUY (screaming) I am not Harvey Weinstein, you moron! Do you think Harvey Weinstein picks up his own fucking laundry or what??? I’m his assistant!

RUFUS Oh.

BLAM! With a huge noise, Rufus left leg is torn away, he falls over, watching his clown-shoed limb now blocking the front door. Behind the counter the polish lady is now holding a shotgun.

OLGA (shouting in polish accent) I told you to never come back in my store!

Rufus blacks out.

In the backseat sits Eric Hannesson. Eric looks like he has been marooned on some terrible island for the past few years. Wild beard, clothes in rags…..a Robinson Crusoe without the tan and having a bad hairday. His pants have been pissed in, his shirt is covered with spots of drying vomit and blood. Eric stares intently at his own hand, clenched between his bony fingers is a wrinkled, torn and yellowing ticket……In gilded lettering the ticket reads: Olympia Dry Cleaners nr. 187

Fluorescent lighting flickers across the powerful, well-worn face of COONS MACDOUGAL, 58.

MAX ZYON— Except for the fact that he is an unmarried, excommunicated Mormon, MAX ZYON, a man in his early 30s, is a typical native from Utah with average height, crew cut blond hair, blue eyes, pale skin and pearly white teeth.

MAX enters B-Hive Dry Cleaners to pick up church attire for his brother’s missionary Homecoming this Sunday. Having missed his brother’s Farewell two years ago and due to his religious indiscretion, MAX’s mother pressured him to dress nicely for the event. At all times MAX carries a messenger bag strapped across his chest that holds his beloved 19th century Swiss brass ear trumpet, inherited from his deceased grandfather, from whom he also inherited his clumsy, Clouseausian hearing. Yet in MAX’s arrogance, he always assumes he hears most things correctly without the trumpet.

MAX: Hello there, I’m here to pick up a suit for Zyon.

ATTENDANT: (an awkward pimply teenage boy with a shaky voice) Is that spelled Z-i-o-n?

MAX: (pointing to the window) Not open? Look buddy, your sign says open, why are you pulling my leg?

ATTENDANT: What? I said, do you spell it Z-i-o-n

MAX: (Speaking loudly as if the ATTENDANT were hard of hearing), No! Not Owen! Not a pick up for Owen, it’s Zyon– Zee-yyyy-oooo-nnnnnn (arms outstretching with each syllable).

ATTENDANT: (muttering to himself, ATTENDANT looks through a rack of clothes and with his back turned to MAX) Your order isn’t ready yet.

MAX: Huh?

ATTENDANT: (a little louder) It’s not ready yet.

MAX: What do you mean you got rid of it?!!

ATTENDANT: It’s not ready yet.

MAX: Catch your drift?

ATTENDANT: What?

MAX: (Rolling his eyes and reaching into his bag, Max grabs his ear trumpet, inserts it in his right ear and leans across the counter). Come again?

ATTENDANT: (confused and uncomfortable at having to lean in so close to MAX’s ear trumpet, he does so and yells) IT’LL BE READY THIS AFTERNOON

MAX: (jumping back at the loud noise) Christ man! You don’t have to yell!!

The inside of a glass door reverses MR. WHITE’S DRY CLEAN. Police sirens. Screams. Gunfire. Business as usual in the big city.

The door swings open. Sleigh bells ANNOUNCE the next hurried customer sweeping in

A GUNMAN MASKED WITH VINYL TIGHTS, blindly waving a gun.

The thief is dressed to the nines. Black tie, white tuxedo but soaked with splashes of red stains, dripping down to white basketball sneakers. Smoke hisses off his suit. If it’s an italian wedding he just held up, maybe it’s marinara sauce. The crook’s head is strangled by pink, glittered pantyhose with dancing blue hippos. Snug on 1 to 3 month tushies perhaps, but fiercely chowing down on 6 feet, 200lbs of grade A hoodlum. Face first.

He labors to suck barely enough oxygen for a mouse. Stumbles toward the counter, drags a glutted canvas bag that paints a red trail down the middle of a sparkling, white vinyl floor.

The nozzle of a pistol RINGS a brass service bell.

The gunman YANKS at the suffocating pantyhose, stretches it out as far as his arms can pull without dislocation. But still, the little leotard won’t let go. It’s like fused to his skin. The nylon PEELS back his face in a horrific Munch Scream. He whimpers, a disfigured pig-child being born. The shimmering tiny tights relent, finally snapping off. They sling shot back across the room, and RING the dangling sleigh bells over the entrance.

DING-DING-DING! DING-A-LING!

STROMILE TROTTER barely 20, handsome, self-made millionaire from the better hood. DESIGNER RUNNERS self-autographed with a Sharpie, reveal his many aliases.

“CORSAIR JORDAN” “MAN OF STEAL” “DUNKIN’ DONUT DUNKER” “AKA- CRACK HEAD ROB FROM DA HOOD”

Detroit is his own all-he-can-slurp oyster bar– thanks partly to a magnetic personality, but mostly supported by a one-time booming investment, his .357 Magnum. A big mane of hair fluctuates with major Einstein static head, but this criminal mind’s only relativity to genius is a pre-game-double-knot shoestring theory– and even that Mamma says is “one missed lace hole away from a purse snatch plan that POOF! Goes foolproof to fool proof”.

The canvas bag is hauled onto the counter. FUMES RISE OUT then– stacks of RED-SPLOTCHED BILLS spill onto the counter.

A HAND slides down the front of his bulging tuxedo pants.

The hand retrieves 1-2-3 more stacks of red-dyed C-notes that rain on the counter. Tuxedo blazer, shirt, pants, and air Jordans topple the pile.

Behind the service counter, curtains part- TREY BIGG. He’s big, black, and his bulging pecks are straining his white

MR. WHITE’S DRY CLEAN t-shirt.

He scans the room. The hippo tights swing his tiny tin bells. The crimson streak splits his clean floor. The mountain of cash and clothes drip a pool of red dye on his counter.

Trey Bigg flexes beefy biceps, a tattoo ripples-

“CLEAN MACHINE”

He likes to get medieval on tough stains and beat em out… old school. Right now though, he’s snarling at another motto that hangs over his head.

“CUSTOMER IS ALWAYS RIGHT”

Stromile stands dumb with electrified head, stripped down to sox and tighty-whities. His revolver is stuffed halfway down his fruit-of-the-loom’s, and point straight to a red blotched crotch. A wad of red moolah, a POCKET SIZED PHOTO, and a LAUNDRY TICKET stick out of rubber waistband. Stromile draws the laundry ticket out of his shorts, casually hands it to-a big, black, bleach bomb, foaming at the mouth. And ready to explode.

TREY BIGG They call me… MISTER BIG!

STROMILE Terrible.

TREY BIGG No sir. Totally Denzel.

STROMILE Mr. Poitier is turning in his grave.

TREY BIGG Sid ain’t dead. But he should be. Cause…

TOGETHER That was a killer performance!

Trey reaches under the counter. Dumps 60lbs of neatly stacked, crisp, green American money on the counter.

TREY BIGG Where you been Stromile Trotter? Pickup’s been clean jean for a month.

STROMILE Paternity test results came in.

TREY BIGG Congratulations bro!

Stromile flashes a FAMILY PICTURE- FRAZZLED Stromile and a PRETTY BLOND cradle a NEWBORN BABY in a pink dress. Trey matches the pink hippo tights on the baby with the ones hanging over the front door.

TREY BIGG Oh, shit. that’s awful.

STROMILE That’s actually one of the better ones. Mr. Photo-Sock finally got me to stop crying.

TREY BIGG No. I mean- shit. That’s DADDY, awful.

STROMILE Oh. No, I’m good.

TREY BIGG C’mon man.

STROMILE No. Really.

TREY BIGG Don’t try to douche a situation that stinks.

STROMILE I’m fine It’s like Mr. Photo-Sock says. Every picture has a negative AND a positive. He’s like the Patch Adams of photography.

(singing/sockhopping) No mourning in the morning, just laughter from hereafter, and just yuckkity-yuck-yuck… if you forgot– the Morning After!

Stromile strains a smile. We move close to his

Unblinking eye. That struggles to hide the abortion of its living soul.

It slowly and sadly moistens. A solitary tear finally overflows out the corner, slaloms down his cheek until a TONGUE catches it near lip.

STROMILE Yumm. Happy tears taste like syrup.

Trey spreads his python arms wide.

Stromile tries to hold back the dam. But all traces of manhood disappear and he melts into the big man’s chest. Trey’s monstrous hands thoughtfully use 100 dollar bills to wipe away Stromile’s river of tears.

TREY BIGG Oh-so-sorry, daddy-o.