Withnail & I 2: Beer and Loving in Penrith (2)

Part 2 of my sequel to 'Withnail & I'.  Marwood, now nearly 60 and working in a supermarket, has just found out from a newspaper obituary that Withnail's Uncle Monty has died.  He decides to enquire about the funeral and pays a visit to Danny ('Headhunter to his friends!')...

FADE UP:

12. EXT. SEAFRONT ESPLANADE - DAY

LONG SHOT of Margate seafront.

CUT TO:

12.1 EXT. ROW OF SHOPS - DAY

One of the shops is called ‘The Bong Hole’. It’s window is filled with an assortment of bongs, fancy dress masks, jokes, adult toys, etc.

MARWOOD drives into shot and parks in front of it. He gets out and heads for the door. He has clearly come straight from work and has his Hi-Viz on. He is carrying the newspaper.

CUT TO:

13. INT. THE BONG HOLE - DAY

A New Age Aladdin’s Cave - wall-to-ceiling jokes, mannequins, wind chimes, dream-catchers, incense burners, fancy dress costumes, hemp leaf-themed clothing, assorted drug paraphernalia.  There is a huge glass cabinet/counter filled with different sorts of bongs and hookahs, etc. The top is crammed with boxes of skins, lighters, grinders, a rack of joke noses, amputated fingers, turds.  Everything you might expect to see in the shop of a substance-focused drop-out collector-hippy!  Ambient music is playing quietly on a CD player.

DANNY is sitting on a stool behind the counter.  He is now bald, except for a top knot, and his head is covered in exotic tattoos: mandalas, yin-yangs, runes, Celtic symbols.  He is wearing a purple satin kaftan with a white tippet, blue-lens round-frame glasses, and has his beard forked.  On a shelf behind him - beside a row of books on assorted esoterica - a kettle is heating on a small Primus stove. He is staring at a large crystal ball on the counter in front of him. 

He looks up in alarm as the door opens and MARWOOD enters.

MARWOOD

Danny.

DANNY

Alright, man.  You gave me the fear for a moment there, wearing that fuzz-coat. I thought I was having an acid flashback to the Beanfield.

MARWOOD

Calm down. It’s not a bust.

DANNY

Not that you’d find anything, of course. Take a lot of searching. They’d need more than fuckin' dogs.

MARWOOD

I’ve just finished work.

MARWOOD looks around at a few of the novelties.

DANNY

That’s a four-letter word that shouldn’t be voiced too freely among friends. You still at the supermarket?

MARWOOD

Yeah.

DANNY

I’ll be paying the dumpsters a visit sometime. After hours, of course.

MARWOOD

You won’t get in. They’ve fenced it off now. There’s a guard dog, too.

DANNY

Then I shall bring some of my funny bones along. I’m just brewing up. Would you like some tea?

MARWOOD

What kind of tea?

DANNY holds up a camomile tea bag.

DANNY

Kosher herbs, man. Nothing too colourful during business hours.

DANNY ties the bag in a mug and pours boiling water from the kettle.

MARWOOD

I’m good, thanks.

DANNY

I made a very special pot in a job I had once. Horrible place, it was. Full of shirts and haircuts. Women with staplers and photocopied diet sheets. You get the picture.

MARWOOD

What were you doing working in an office?

DANNY

Oh ye of quick judgment. I was the cleaner, actually. It was rather a strange phase in my life, I will admit. Anyway, I didn’t last long. The manager said I had the wrong attitude. Probably ‘cos I wore flip-flops and stank of weed a lot.

MARWOOD

That might have had something to do with it.

DANNY

He said to me one day ‘Have you ever considered the concepts of shoes or deodorant?’ I couldn’t help myself. I dumped my bucket over his fuckin’ Brylcreemed head. I’d just mopped the toilets, too. Before I left, I slipped some cubes in the canteen tea urn.

MARWOOD (CHUCKLING)

That was a bit bloody stupid, wasn’t it? You could have killed someone.

DANNY

The thought had crossed my mind. It was a very mild concoction, though. It wouldn’t have opened the doors of perception. Maybe just made them creak a little, shall we say. I do, however, happen to have something right now that will blow them clean off their fuckin’ hinges, if you’re feeling that way inclined.

MARWOOD

Thanks, Danny. No. I just want the usual. And I wondered if I could use your phone, too.

DANNY

Both under-the-counter jobs, then. Quite literally with this.

DANNY reaches down behind the counter and gets an old dial landline phone.

DANNY (CONT’D)

I tend not to use it much. Cables have ears, you know. Who knows who’s listening in? There’s been a van parked outside a lot recently. It says plumbing and heating on the side, but then again it would.

MARWOOD

You’re hardly Pablo Escobar, Danny. I wouldn’t worry.

DANNY

More like Pablo Picasso, I prefer to think. Observing a broken and distorted world through Blue Period tints.

MARWOOD

Thanks.  Just a quick call.

MARWOOD checks his newspaper again.

DANNY

I was going to ask what’s in the news, but I see you’ve got a Murdoch rag. Might as well use my crystal ball.

MARWOOD

It’s yesterday’s from the library. I get it for the crossword. But I saw something in it today. You remember Withnail, don’t you. From Camden days.

DANNY (WITH A FLOURISH)

How could I forget…

DANNY rummages behind the counter and pulls up a tatty, rolled-up poster. He unfurls it. It shows a gaudy image from a B-movie, circa late ‘70s, titled ‘Vampire Zombie Sex Cult’. A cartoon graphic WITHNAIL is depicted on it as a vampire lord with huge Nosferatu claws (raised ‘I’m gonna be a STAAAR!’-style) wearing dark glasses and a black cape, looming menacingly over screaming, running crowds of women.  The name given is ‘Douglas Wayne’.

DANNY (CONT’D)

…the great Douglas Wayne?

MARWOOD

I didn’t realise you were a fan.

DANNY

I carried on being his pharmacist after you left. Then one day he was gone, too. Still owed me a tenner for some mogs, so I squatted the gaff for a bit. Me and the rodents. Quite freaked me when I next saw him on the screen at the Hackney Empire. I’ve got his entire collection on VHS somewhere. They’ll be worth something in time. He’ll be minted himself now, I wouldn’t doubt.

MARWOOD

Quite probably.

DANNY

Quite a star in his own way.

MARWOOD

It’s what he always wanted.

DANNY

Not seen him in anything for about ten years, mind. (sits up suddenly) Has he died, then?

MARWOOD

He hasn’t. His uncle has.

DANNY

Fat lemon, had an old Roller?

MARWOOD

That’s him. Monty. Did you know him, then?

DANNY

In passing. He come ‘round a few times with crates of wine. Like Red Cross parcels, they were. Emergency supplies. Heard he had an ‘ouse in Chelsea. I think Douglas moved in with him, ‘cos he never come again after I took over. Pity, really.

MARWOOD

Pity?

DANNY

He had a decent line in Chateau Margaux’s. A nice antidote to all the coke.

MARWOOD

He had an indecent line in a few things, too.

MARWOOD dials a number from the paper and waits a moment.

MARWOOD (INTO PHONE)

Yes, hello… I’ve just seen the death notice for Montague Withnail in The Times. (beat) Yes. It says to ring you for details of the funeral. (to DANNY) Got a pen? (into phone) Yes, go ahead. (pause as he writes) Okay, got it. Thank you very much. I was wondering… do you happen to know which family members will be attending? (beat) I see. Okay, thank you.  Goodbye.

MARWOOD hangs up and hands the phone back to DANNY.

MARWOOD

Thanks. It’s tomorrow week. Highgate Cemetery.

DANNY

Highgate? That’s a very illustrious neighbourhood. Karl Marx is in there.

MARWOOD

I know. I doubt they’d make the best bed-fellows, somehow.

DANNY

Lots of weird stuff connected to that place. People claim to have seen all sorts of things. Ghosts riding bikes. Were-dogs walking their children. Satanic rituals. Course, it could just be that it’s a perfect venue for a trip. I’d imagine you’d see just about anything you wanted. Marx in a naked wrestling match with Gabriele Rossetti might be interesting. They could exchange views on the art and poetry of class conflict while they were slapping the shit out of one another.

MARWOOD hands DANNY a £20 note and DANNY slips a baggie into the newspaper.

MARWOOD

I’ll try not to hold onto that image.

DANNY

So, are you thinking of going, then?

MARWOOD

I dunno, really.  Maybe not such a good idea. Leave it in the past, where it belongs. Never go back, as they say.

DANNY

The past is a foreign country, man.

MARWOOD

We did things differently, that’s for sure.

DANNY

And we’ll go back to doing them differently. When all the computers come crashing down in a couple of months.

MARWOOD

You really think that will happen?

DANNY

I hope it does. And what better time for it than at the start of a new thousand years. Perfect opportunity for a reset. Draw a line. You can imagine the refugees from that, though. Whole fuckin’ world.

MARWOOD

It’s a contradiction though, surely.  Going back to doing things differently.

DANNY

But with the benefit of the knowledge that only experience can bring. It’s like drugs, man. You try them all ‘til you find the one that gives the best trip. You can only reach perfection by making mistakes. I should know.

MARWOOD

You and me both. It wasn’t really a perfect time though, was it. All the wars and poverty. And Thatcher. Things always look better with hindsight.

DANNY looks into his crystal ball.

DANNY

If the evidence in here is anything to go by, foresight’s not much cop, either. But anyway… if you were thinking of going, could you get me his autograph?

MARWOOD

You really want one?

DANNY

Actually, I was thinking more in terms of about fifty. If he’s feeling generous. There’s still fans about who’d pay for them.

MARWOOD (GRINNING)

I might have guessed you’d have an angle on it.

DANNY

Times are hard, man. And things won’t get any better, in spite of Tony Blair. And they’re all the same, too. Politicians. Just in it for what they can get. It’s the only game in town, really. It’s like the great man said: ‘Nothing has any value unless it has a use.’ Something along those lines.

MARWOOD

I can’t even be sure he’ll be there.

DANNY

There’ll be a substantial will, I’d imagine.

MARWOOD

Most likely, knowing Monty.

DANNY

Then he will be there. So maybe you could also ask him for my tenner, too. I can work out the compound interest.

MARWOOD grins. He turns to leave the shop.

MARWOOD

I’ll think on it. I’ll let you know.

MARWOOD goes out. DANNY sips his tea and goes back to looking in his crystal ball. His eyes widen.

FADE OUT.

 

(to be continued)  https://www.abctales.com/story/harryc/withnail-i-2-beer-and-loving-penrith-3