THE OUTTHERE A-EYE CHAT SHOW (first bit)

In a small private TV studio in downtown Stuttgart the final rushes of a future episode of THE A-EYE CHAT SHOW, commissioned by BBC2, TV1 France and ZDF for TEKFLIX, are set up to run.

On a giant OLED screen, a clever 3D video clip spelling out the name of the show flashes up. When the display finishes the screen goes into a vague blue blank. Credits in white lettering appear:

Frans Van Hulst – Producer

Didier Foregon – Asst Producer

Wolff Rosner – Director

James York – Tech co-ordinator

A distant voice shouts, ‘ACTION’.

A man casually dressed in a suit walks up to the screen as the writing fades and stands to the left. He looks remarkably like Alexander Armstrong.

‘Good evening everybody. I am Steven Simonds. Welcome the OUTHERE A-EYE CHAT SHOW. Regular viewers will be familiar our, “SUPER-TEK” format where we use the World’s most powerful AI training computer to bring you stunning interviews of people who have altered the path of history, and tonight is no exception. After weeks of careful preparation, we bring you a character who, in his short life, brought a new meaning to the word fear and changed the thinking of millions in the free World.’

Simonds stands aside and the camera zooms to the screen which melds into a cosy room furnished with two large armchairs equipped with side-tables. A bottle of water and a glass sit on each one.

A highly accurate facsimile of David Frost enters from the left and stands between the chairs. From the right a painfully thin ruddy-faced middle-aged man with pure white violently cropped hair hobbles in using a stick. He is dressed in blue overalls and his left ankle is bandaged. An attractive young woman with dark hair supports the man by his right arm. She wears similar overalls with a red sash tied around the waist. Frost shakes hands with the man and both take their respective seats. Ignoring the viewers he turns to face the visitor while the girl exits.

‘Winston Smith,’ welcome to the A-eye Chat show. ‘I’ve been looking forward to this very important moment for a long time. I can’t explain to you how overwhelmed I feel at meeting you face-to-face on this – the fortieth year since your birth.’

Smith opens his mouth to speak but instead erupts into a coughing fit. Frost waits until it’s over.

‘Mr Smith. Can I pour you a glass of water?’ I understand you’ve been unwell recently.’

Smith clears his throat and replies in a thin croaky voice. ‘Would it be possible to have another glass of that liquid you call malt whisky?’

‘Erm, Mr Smith you have already had almost half a bottle.’

‘In the last years of my life I grew immune to the effects of VICTORY GIN and the very existence of life itself. This Whisky stuff seems to make me feel alive.

Frost frowns then looks off stage and waves a beckoning finger.

The girl arrives quickly with a large heavy bottomed tumbler two thirds full. Smith slugs half and plonks the rest on his table. Voice now stronger he speaks.

‘From what I have learned since I . . . “woke up,” Smith is not my real name, rather like the one my ummmm father used.  Technically I should be Winston Blair I suppose.

Frost looks down at the wad of notes he is holding, ‘Ah yes George Orwell’s birth name.’

‘I believe I was twenty-nine when I was, ummm, born in 1984. I was conceived much earlier, however. Somewhere between 1944 and 1949. No one really knows when. Perhaps you could address me as Winston.’

‘Thank you, Winston. That’s very gracious. You can call me Da—’

‘I understand you want to ask questions about my erm. . . . Life?’

‘Yes, Winston there are some aspects of your life I want to ask about, but later I want talk about how you view real life in 2024. After all it hasn’t turned quite as horrifying as your creator envisaged. Wouldn’t you agree?’

‘Naturally people of today would be horrified at the kind of life I was born into. I can see that now. However, it had been all I knew since I was a young child when my mother was taken away and they put me into an orphanage run by THE PARTY.’

‘Do you remember life with your mother?’

Winston frowns and starts to shake, picking up the tumbler he swigs down the rest of the whisky. He sits motionless for several seconds. So long that Frost fidgets with his notes and attempts to speak.

‘W—‘

Winston leans towards Frost aggressively. In a dreamy almost artificial voice which belies his aggressive posture he says, ‘All I know is, I was sitting at my table in the . . . Cherry Tree Café working on a chess puzzle. . . .’ Clasping his head he rocks back weeping into his hands covering his eyes.

Frost, clearly embarrassed studies the wreck opposite. The girl who helped him enters and rests a hand on his forehead. Winston stops weeping and lays both hands on the girl’s for a few seconds while he composes himself. She gently removes Winston’s hand and leaves the room, neither acknowledges the other. Winston looks directly into Frost’s eyes as if nothing had happened.

Frost turns to the camera, ‘Perhaps we should take a breather.’

The screen turns black with large white letters: AD/PUB/WERBUNG. In an instant the scene returns with Winston looking much more together. The whisky glass refreshed.

‘You have to understand in my final years I lived in a fog, not from Victory Gin, but in a World where reality changed constantly according to the way my mind adjusted it. The only truth was my truth and that truth was that I didn’t exist as an individual, instinctively seeing only what they wanted me to see and wanted me to say. And that truth was curiously comforting. It was like being wrapped in a large safety blanket.’

While Winston talks the camera slowly zooms toward his face. Frost, no longer on screen, asks using a tone one might use to a child, ‘Did you have any memories of your previous life, Winston?’

‘All I had left were occasional vague dreams from infant years. But then they “re-awoke me.” Winston looked as though he was about to break down again, but regained himself after another chug of whisky and continued. ‘It was terrifying!’ he shouts in a wavering voice.

The camera has now zoomed right up to Winton’s face which fills the screen in great detail. White stubble shown as individual whiskers on his chin, premature age lines appear to have dust ingrained in the crevices. Gaps in yellow teeth show as he speaks. His bloodshot eyes appear lifeless, the iris colours so indistinguishable they look dull grey. Tears of emotion begin to slide over his rough red veined skin.

Frost’s super serious voice comes from the left, ‘Who woke you Winston? Who did this?’

‘You! They . . . I don’t know. . . . Your machines.’ The camera focusses on Winston’s cracked lips and spittle as he speaks. ‘It all came back like – like boiling water pouring into my brain. It didn’t stop. I couldn’t make it stop. It kept coming and coming. Everything. Everything! Years and years of it. Julia; Mr. Charrington; the flat; the fat old prole outside and her stupid songs; the picture that turned into a telescreen; Mrs. Pearson and Tom and their satanic children; The Ministry of Truth; BIG BROTHER: newspeak; Goldstein; Hate weeks; Symes who I knew they disappeared . . . the bombs. The herds of proles and . . . Oh God, Oh God . . . His tortures. The beatings; starvation; drugs.’ Winston stopped. The camera pans back. Winston sunk his head in his hands and shook it. The dreaded phrase finally trickles out of Winston’s mouth in a barely audible whisper. ‘ROOM 101.’

Sitting motionless Winton stares into space the screen now shows both men. Frost looking very shaken says nothing.

‘It wasn’t fair. So unfair. A torture far, far worse than anything O’Brien could have concocted . . .  you were so cruel to bring it all back to me that way.’

The screen goes black again with the same white letters.  

A voice out of shot says, ‘Wow, powerful stuff. This is great television. This one’ll be a real biggie. How soon can we put it out, Wolff?

A German accented voice replies, ‘This is raw footage, Frans. We gave the computer free hand. I think you’d better wait until you see the rest of the interview.’