Auster Collected Screenplays

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ISBN: 978-0-571-31724-0
Verlag: Faber & Faber
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 512 Seiten

This collection of Paul Auster screenplays brings together the film work of a writer whose novels have earned him the reputation as 'one of America's most spectacularly inventive writers.' (Times Literary Supplement) Auster has also brought this sense of restless invention to the art of screenwriting, producing Smoke, Blue in the Face, Lulu on the Bridge and The Inner Life of Martin Frost. The prize-winning Smoke tells the story of a novelist, a cigar store manager, and a black teenager who unexpectedly cross paths and end up changing each other's lives in indelible ways. Set in contemporary Brooklyn, Smoke directly inspired Blue in the Face, a largely improvised comedy shot in a total of six days.Lulu on the Bridge is both a thriller and a fairy tale: when jazz musician Izzy Maurer is accidentally hit by a bullet during a performance in a New York club, he is led on a journey into the strange and sometimes frightening labyrinth of his soul. The Inner Life of Martin Frost follows the mysterious and unsettling experiences that befall writer Martin Frost when he borrows a friend's country house and sets out to write a story about elusive and impossible love. The volume also contains production notes, as well as interviews with Paul Auster about his work in film.

Paul Auster was the bestselling author of 4 3 2 1, Sunset Park, The Book of Illusions, Moon Palace and The New York Trilogy. He and Spencer Ostrander collaborated on Bloodbath Nation. In 2006, he was awarded the Prince of Asturias Prize for Literature. His other honours include the Prix Medicis Étranger for Leviathan, the Independent Spirit Award for the Screenplay of Smoke, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Burning Boy, and the Carlos Fuentes Prize for his body of work. His novel 4 3 2 1 was shortlisted for the 2017 Man Booker Prize. He was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and was a Commandeur de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. His work was translated into more than forty languages. His final novel, Baumgartner, was published in November 2023. He died on 30 April 2024.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Auster, Paul

Leseproben

1. EXT: DAY. ELEVATED SUBWAY TRAIN

2. INT: DAY. THE BROOKLYN CIGAR CO.

SUMMER 1990.

() ().

TOMMY

I’ll tell you why they’re not going anywhere.

JERRY

Yeah? And why is that?

TOMMY

Management. Those guys are walking around with their heads up their asses.

DENNIS

They made some great deals, Tommy. Hernandez, Carter. Without those two, there never woulda been no World Series.

TOMMY

That was four years ago. I’m talking about now. () Look who they got rid of. Mitchell. Backman. McDowell. Dykstra. Aguillera. Mookie. Mookie Wilson, for Chrissakes. ()

JERRY

()

And Nolan Ryan. Don’t forget him.

DENNIS

()

Yeah. And Amos Otis.

TOMMY

()

Okay, joke about it. I don’t give a shit.

JERRY

Jesus, Tommy, it ain’t science, you know. You got your good trades and your bad trades. That’s how it works.

TOMMY

They didn’t have to do a thing, that’s all I’m saying. The team was good, the best fucking team in baseball. But then they had to screw it up. () They traded their birthright for a mess of porridge. () A mess of porridge.

AUGGIE

How’d you do out there, Jimmy?

JIMMY

Good, Auggie. Real good. () All finished.

AUGGIE

()

It’ll never be finished.

JIMMY

()

Huh?

AUGGIE

That’s how it is with sidewalks. People come, people go, and they all drop shit on the ground. As soon as you clean up one spot and move on to the next, the first spot is dirty again.

JIMMY

()

I just do what you tell me, Auggie. You tell me to sweep, so I sweep.

JERRY

()

Hey, Jimmy. You got the time?

JIMMY

()

Huh?

JERRY

You still have that watch Auggie gave you?

JIMMY

()

Tick-tock, tick-tock.

JERRY

So what’s the time?

JIMMY

()

Twelve-eleven. () Twelve-twelve. () Twelve-twelve.

YOUNG MAN

()

Ninety-two dollars?

AUGGIE

They don’t come cheap, son. These little honeys are works of art. Rolled by hand in a tropical climate, most likely by an eighteen-year-old girl in a thin cotton dress with no underwear on. Little beads of sweat forming in her naked cleavage. The smooth, delicate fingers nimbly turning out one masterpiece after another …

YOUNG MAN

()

And how much are these?

AUGGIE

Seventy-eight dollars. The girl who rolled these was probably wearing panties.

YOUNG MAN

()

And these?

AUGGIE

Fifty-six. That girl had on a corset.

YOUNG MAN

()

And these?

AUGGIE

Forty-four. They’re on special this week from the Canary Islands. A real bargain.

YOUNG MAN

I think I’ll take them.

AUGGIE

A good choice. You wouldn’t want to celebrate the birth of your firstborn with a box of stinkers, would you? Remember to keep them in the refrigerator until you hand them out.

YOUNG MAN

The refrigerator?

AUGGIE

It’ll keep them fresh. If they get too dry, they’ll break. And you don’t want that to happen, do you? () Tobacco is a plant, and it needs the same loving care you’d give an orchid.

YOUNG MAN

Thanks for the tip.

AUGGIE

Any time. And congratulations to you and your wife. Just remember, though, in the immortal words of Rudyard Kipling: ‘A woman is just a woman, but a cigar is a smoke.’

YOUNG MAN

()

What does that mean?

AUGGIE

Damned if I know. But it has a nice ring to it, don’t it?

PAUL

Hey, Auggie. How’s it going?

AUGGIE

Hey, man. Good to see you. What’ll it be today?

PAUL

Two tins of Schimmelpennincks. And throw in a lighter while you’re at it.

AUGGIE

()

The boys and I were just having a philosophical discussion about women and cigars. Some interesting connections there, don’t you think?

PAUL

()

Definitely. () I suppose it all goes back to Queen Elizabeth.

AUGGIE

The Queen of England?

PAUL

Not Elizabeth the Second, Elizabeth the First. () Did you ever hear of Sir Walter Raleigh?

TOMMY

Sure. He’s the guy who threw his cloak down over the puddle.

JERRY

I used to smoke Raleigh cigarettes. They came with a free gift coupon in every pack.

PAUL

That’s’ the man. Well, Raleigh was the person who introduced tobacco in England, and since he was a favorite of the Queen’s – Queen Bess, he used to call her – smoking caught on as a fashion at court. I’m sure Old Bess must have shared a stogie or two with Sir Walter. Once, he made a bet with her that he could measure the weight of smoke.

DENNIS

You mean, weigh smoke?

PAUL

Exactly. Weigh...