The Matinee Much as I love King Kong (1933 version and 2005 version), one thing has always troubled me. If Kong had not broken loose, what would Carl Denham's Broadway show have been like? In neither version does there seem to be very much beyond the (admittedly hugely impressive) star attraction. The show that we see takes place in the evening so I wonder whether there might already have been a matinee performance where things went a little more smoothly. This is a five-minute sketch about two couples driving home from that matinee show. FRED
What time did we leave the theatre? JOE
About half past four. MAISIE
It was four thirty-five. I checked my watch as we reached the sidewalk. FRED
And what time did we go in? ANNETTE
We were quite late. We only just made it. JOE
The show started at three. We must have gone in about quarter to three. MAISIE
I didn’t check my watch going in but I think it must have been about quarter to three, yes. FRED
So we were in that building for less than an hour. We spent less than an hour in that theatre. JOE
Fifty minutes, give or take. FRED
And that includes - that includes! - the hat-check, and finding our seats, and leaving our seats and getting our hats and coats back. All that in fifty minutes, right? MAISIE
That’s right. FRED
So how long was the actual show? How long were we ‘entertained’? JOE
I would say no more than fifteen minutes. Twenty tops. No more than twenty. ANNETTE
It felt like about ten minutes to me. FRED
And what did we pay for those tickets? I’ll tell you what we paid. Six bucks a head. Twenty four dollars this afternoon cost us, plus the travel. And for what? I mean, what was there to that show? You had the orchestra playing a bit. MAISIE
That’s just an overture. Every show has an overture. You can’t really count that. FRED
But we are counting it. That’s part of the fifteen minutes. Then what? The guy comes out and gives us a little spiel about how he went on an expedition. ANNETTE
We knew all that already anyway. That was all in the papers. JOE
Then they pulled back the curtains and showed us the big monkey. ANNETTE
You know, it’s not a monkey. It’s an ape. JOE
What’s the difference? ANNETTE
I don’t know. But it was in the papers. It’s not a monkey, it’s an ape. I think it’s maybe too big to be a monkey. JOE
It’s too big to be an ape! FRED
Look, we’re getting off the point here. The big gorilla is shackled, then you have those coloured dancers. MAISIE
They weren’t really coloured. You could tell. They were blacked up. JOE
Minstrels are always blacked up white folks. It’s part of the act. MAISIE
Yes, but when I see minstrels I expect a proper show. Proper make-up, with the eyes and the mouths, and top hats and tailcoats and sequinned vests. ANNETTE
And proper coloured songs, like ‘Swannee’. MAISIE
Not fur coats and feathers and lots of drumming. That’s not a minstrel show. FRED
We’re getting away from the point again, folks. How long was the dancing? Two, three minutes? ANNETTE
Not much more. FRED
Then the monkey - sorry, the ape - stands up and they have the girl in the white dress and she screams a bit. JOE
And? FRED
And that was it! Did you see anything else after that? The curtain comes down and the guy from the start says “Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen.” Yes, thank you for your six bucks a head. ANNETTE
Well, what more could they have done? FRED
I don’t know. We were there to see the ape. Couldn’t they have had it perform in some way? You go to the circus and the monkeys do tricks. They ride bicycles and stuff. It’s great. MAISIE
You would need a really big bicycle. Where would they find a bicycle big enough? FRED
You would make one! Like they made those big chains. It’s a prop. It’s setting. That’s what they do in shows. MAISIE
They could have got the ape to do a dance. I’ve seen dancing bears. An ape could dance. JOE
I’ve seen boxing kangaroos. They could get the ape to box. ANNETTE
Who would it box with? JOE
What about a dinosaur? They said in the papers that there were dinosaurs on the island where they found the ape. If they had brought one of those back, they could have had the ape fighting the dinosaur. On stage. MAISIE
On a bicycle. JOE
No, not on a bicycle. Just a proper fight, like a wrestling match or a boxing match. I’d pay to see it. Big hairy ape against a giant fire-breathing reptile. People would line up from here to Tokyo to see something like that. ANNETTE
I don’t think dinosaurs breathe fire. Not even in Japan. MAISIE
A friend of mine was in London a few years ago when they had a dinosaur there. They brought it over from South America. She said it was very slow moving. I don’t think that would make a very good wrestler. JOE
There are different types of dinosaurs. Some of them must be good at wrestling. Or it could fight, I don’t know, another ape maybe. ANNETTE
Where would you get that? There aren’t any other apes this big. That’s the point, I think. JOE
Well maybe you could make one, like a machine, a robot. FRED
Now that I would happily pay six bucks to see. A giant ape fighting with a giant mechanical robot ape. That would be entertaining. That would be a full-length show. But this? This wasn’t a show. This was a look. Look, here’s a giant ape. And? And what is it going to do? Nothing, nada, zero. It’s going to sit there looking dumb while some blacked up fake coloureds dance in front of it and a girl screams. That’ll be six bucks each please, thank you and goodnight. Fifteen minutes including the overture? It’s a scandal. ANNETTE
All right, how long would be reasonable? How long should the show have been? FRED
There’s so much you could have done. For what we paid, I would expect at least three hours. MAISIE
Three hours! ANNETTE
Who would pay to watch an ape for three hours? Who can sit still that long? FRED
But it wouldn’t be just the ape, that’s the point. You wouldn’t even have the ape for the first hour or so. You would build up to it very gradually. Have some vaudeville, maybe a cine-newsreel. Then you could have your minstrels - although not too much - and then you would have a couple of hours of the ape fighting things and killing things and throwing things around. Stick a few dinosaurs in there. It would be terrific. ANNETTE
It all sounds very dangerous. What if the ape got loose? What if it escaped? FRED
The heck with it, I almost wish it had escaped. Now that would have been entertaining. That would have been worth six bucks. MAISIE
You know, that’s the third army truck that has gone past us in the opposite direction, full of soldiers. I think there must be some sort of parade going on this evening. FRED
Yes, well - I hope it’s more entertaining than what we saw. (c) MJ Simpson 2006. This script may be freely reproduced provided that it is reproduced in its entirety and that MJ Simpson is credited as the author. | 
