Prompt Images
There have been many parody screen adaptations to Sorkin’s work, but nothing adapted for the stage… until now.
Opening scene of Aaron Sorkin’s adaptation of To Kill A Mockingbird. Curtain up on white front porch of a Southern Alabama home in the 1930s. A mailman drops the mail in the home’s box, while a milk man passes after dropping off the day’s delivery. A couple of children jumping rope skip by the house and exit stage left. The surrounding setting alludes to the Longleaf pines that are common to the area. A model-T honks its horn in the distance. A dog barks. Somewhere, Norman Rockwell smiles.
Spotlight, from the back of the theater, follows a small girl, Jean Louise, “Scout” Finch, around 10 years old, trying to catch up with a Mr. Cunningham, farmer in his 40s, as he walks down the aisle towards the orchestra pit downstage center.
As Scout engages Mr. Cunningham, the farmer keeps his focus forward while carrying a large sack of hickory-nuts.
Their pace is brisk.
SCOUT
(Trying to keep up)
Morn’n, Mr. Cunningham! Whatcha got in the sack?
MR. CUNNINGHAM
Morning, Scout! Your father around?
SCOUT
If he wasn’t, he ought a be charged with child-neglect.
MR. CUNNINGHAM
Fair point. Well, your father is an important man, I’d imagine his mornings are busy make’n decisions.
SCOUT
He’s probably fuss’n over wingtips.
MR. CUNNINGHAM
Wingtips?
SCOUT
Shoes, not airplanes. I can call him for you.
Scout starts stomping and yelling at the end of the aisle, where the first row of seating meets the orchestra pit.
SCOUT
Attica! Attica! Attica!
MR. CUNNINGHAM
You call your father by his first name?
Scout ceases stomping and yelling and turns her focus back to Mr. Cunningham, who has now given Scout his undivided attention.
SCOUT
Attica is a town in New York that is currently building a maximum-security prison with state-of-the-art security measures and protocols.
Atticus is the name of my father, a lawyer in Maycomb, Alabama, who is currently building some kind of court sanctioned suite ensemble with state-of-the-art fashion accessories.
MR. CUNNINGHAM
I’m confused.
SCOUT
Intellectually or sexually?
MR. CUNNINGHAM
Pardon?
SCOUT
You’ll have to ask the governor for that. And yes, I call my father by his first name. If I called him by his surname, Jem might show up instead. Atticus!!
Jem Finch, Scout’s older brother by four years, enters from the same aisle used by Scout and Cunningham.
His pace is brisk.
JEM
Fuck me with a paddle stick!
SCOUT
Morning, Jem.
(To Cunningham)
See what I mean?
JEM
Mr. Cunningham.
Mr. Cunningham nods.
JEM
I triple booked three matches this morning and I’m short $10.
SCOUT
Excuse me, Mr. Cunningham, my older brother Jem was recently thawed after being frozen in ice for several thousand years and still hasn’t acclimated to modern day Southern etiquette.
JEM
Apologies, but this morning has been ‘bout as fun as a snipe hunt.
SCOUT
You need money.
JEM
I need money.
SCOUT
10 bucks?
JEM
25… 10 for the matches I triple booked, and 15 because the Tide didn’t cover against Vandy. But two shakes of lamb’s tail, I’ll win it all back and then some.
SCOUT
Who ya got your docket this morning?
JEM
Wilson Fowler, Jeremiah Cook, one of the Parrish sisters, and some newbies.
SCOUT
Here’s 30. Put 5 on Bama this week to cover.
JEM
You got inside information?
SCOUT
Yeah, Kentucky is dogshit.
JEM
You ain’t lyin’.
JEM exits back up the aisle.
Scout turns her attention back on Mr. Cunningham, who looks bewildered, and is now more so clutching the sack of hickory-nuts.
Scout beckons Mr. Cunningham to follow her, right to left across the orchestra pit, towards the stairs leading up to the main stage.
Their pace is brisk.
SCOUT
Apologies, Mr. Cunningham, but in an effort to make ends meet, Jem has started hustling chess games along with betting on college football. Neither of which are legal nor a good long-term financial solution.
MR. CUNNINGHAM
I’m aware of that.
SCOUT
But we’re in a Depression, he’s a natural, and I know Bama football. Hard times call for exceptional solutions with hard currency—this ain’t no stock market speculation dealing in imaginary margins on borrowed money.
MR. CUNNINGHAM
I see.
Scout stops and turns at Mr. Cunningham, who stops downstage center.
SCOUT
Do ya now? Wanna know what I see?
MR. CUNNINGHAM
What?
SCOUT
I see the storm clouds of unintended consequences brought about by the Treaty of Versailles—and even though the Germans deserved every one of those Treaty’s stipulations served piping hot into their collective shizerholes…
Scout steps onto a turned-over crate to get eye-level with Mr. Cunningham.
The package of reparations conceived by the Allies were myopically austere. It gave us a world economic system that was so dependent on the United States banking system, that when we crashed, the Germans crashed, and the only thing that has seemed to have cleared from this rubble, is an emboldened bitter fascist that seems hell-bent on dragging us all into another great big fat fuckturd that’ll one day be called World War II. That’s what I see.
Their silence is broken by the opening and slamming of the porch door as Atticus enters upstage right. Atticus walks down porch steps to downstage center. Mr.Cunningham joins him as they continue toward the downstage-left stairs.
Their pace is brisk.
MR. CUNNINGHAM
Here are some hickory-nuts, Mr. Finch, part of my entailment.
ATTICUS
Thank you, Walter. The collard greens—
MR. CUNNINGHAM
Have a good morning.
Mr. Cunningham exits right, crosses in front of the orchestra pit.
Atticus continues up the aisle.
Scout hops off her crate and catches up to him.
Their pace is brisk.
ATTICUS
Scout, I don’t think you should talk about world politics and finance with Mr. Cunningham.
SCOUT
Why the heck not? You think my analysis is premature don’t ya?
That I’m taken by the Nazis! That I’m buying the bullshit of this charismatic fascist Hitler? Oh yeah right. That’ll be the day. Jean Louis Finch—Southern Representative of the Nazi Youth from the great state of Alabama!
Atticus stops midway in the aisle. Scout stops and turns to him.
ATTICUS
I never said or insinuated anything close to that. A lot of that was psychological projection, which you’ll have to take time to process on your own.
SCOUT
Fine.
ATTICUS
Your analysis is spot-on. You’re the best at what you do, and you know that.
SCOUT
So why you getting your tighty-whities in a bunch about me talk’n politics with a farmer that don’t even have a 3rd grade educationnnnnn…. ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh…I see what ya mean.
ATTICUS
Precisely. You’re embarrassing him.
They continue up the aisle and exit.
Lights up on Jem in a clubhouse, located downstage center.
He’s playing six (6) simultaneous chess games with different older men and women from town.
He paddles a red ball tied to a string as he crosses back and forth from stage right to stage left. The other adults are immersed in their game, staring at their respective boards. One man goes to make a move.
JEM
You don’t want to trade Queens with me Fowler!
The man freezes. He changes his mind and goes back to staring at the board. Jem does not even look in his direction, he continues paddling with one hand, as he looks into the afternoon Alabama sky.
Lights down on Jem and the clubhouse.
END SCENE ONE.
RELATED
