| 2.09 GALILEO SAM Write this: "Good morning. Eleven months ago a 12-hundred pound spacecraft blasted off from Cape Canaveral, Florida. Eighteen hours ago..." Is it eighteen hours ago? We're on the air at noon eastern. C.J. Yeah. SAM "Eighteen hours ago it landed on the planet Mars. You, me, and 60,000 of your fellow students across the country along with astroscientists and engineers from the Jet Propulsion Lab in Southern California, NASA Houston, and right here, at the White House, are going to be the first to see what it sees, and to chronicle an extraordinary voyage of an unmanned ship called Galileo V." BARTLET (taps C.J. on the arm) He said it right. LEO You wanna mock people or you wanna let me talk to Toby? JOSH I wanna mock people. DONNA Philately’s fun, Josh. JOSH I’m sorry – what’s fun? DONNA Philately – stamp collecting. JOSH Okay, be careful how you say that… DONNA The process by which a stamp is chosen begins with the American people. JOSH Well that’s always our first mistake DONNA About 50000 proposals are submitted each year to the Citizen Stamp Advisory Committee, the acronym for which is – JOSH Dork Squad. DONNA C-SAC JOSH I think we can take ‘em DONNA That’s the same thing we said about the British JOSH We took the British DONNA You understand what I’m saying. JOSH Hardly ever. JOSH We think if we hit the ground hard enough we can go to the center of the planet and find water? TOBY Yeah JOSH That’s not a theory of physics pretty much disproved by Wyle E. Coyote? MARGARET I think I was freaking her out LEO Wouldn’t surprise me. NADIA You look handsome, Leo. LEO Thank you. You look good, too. NADIA You get more handsome every year. And you’re having your suits handmade now. LEO Nadia, are you hitting on me? (Sam is staring over a balcony, holding a champagne flute, as Mallory walks up behind him.) MALLORY: Hey, Sam. (Pause as she walks closer to him.) How are you? SAM: I am good. MALLORY: Good. (Sam looks for somewhere to set down his glass and finally settles for tossing it gently over his shoulder) SAM: And you? MALLORY: Good. SAM: Excellent. (Beat.) Can I just say that I was the one who was in trouble, I was the one under seige, it was my picture in the paper, and I don't see why I need to call you and explain myself. MALLORY: It was a picture of you and a call girl. SAM: Like there aren't any pictures of you and a call girl. MALLORY: No, there aren't any pictures of me and a call girl. SAM: It's a crime. MALLORY : Y'know, if you'd just picked up the phone - SAM: Yeah, yeah. Who's your boyfriend? MALLORY: Sam - SAM: What's his name? MALLORY : His name's Richard Anderchuck. SAM: There's a hockey player named Richard Anderchuck. MALLORY: Well, unless there are two of them. SAM: You're dating Richard Anderchuck? MALLORY: Yes, and we're having quite a lot of sex. SAM: I'd think you'd almost have to. MALLORY: What does that mean? SAM: What do you and Richard Anderchuck talk about? MALLORY: He happens to be terribly bright. SAM: Well, good, 'cause he's a really bad hockey player. MALLORY: He's had injury problems this year. JOSH (On phone): Is she there? SAM: Mallory? Yeah, she's here, she snuck up on me from behind...You'd think women would make more noise with their big high heels but they don't, they've got this stealth thing going that we really should be clever enough - (Mallory knocks on the window of the car, Sam stands to watch her as she walks around toward him.) JOSH: What was that? SAM: Nothin'. JOSH: She's there. SAM: Yeah. JOSH: How's she look? SAM: She looks good. JOSH: Can you describe what she's wearing? SAM: Yeah, 'cause she's standing right in front of me. JOSH: So you wanna get off the phone. SAM: Yeah. JOSH: Okay. (Hangs up.) SAM: You're a pain in the ass. MALLORY: Yes. SAM: Anyway. I'm sorry about the picture. MALLORY: Don't worry about it tonight. SAM: You're not pissed? MALLORY: I"m totally pissed. I'm saying don't worry about it tonight. CJ Depending on who those men were, a story about me being good in bed. TOBY Good in bed? CJ Yes. TOBY Why? CJ Because I am. TOBY Okay. C.J. We have, at our disposal, a captive audience of schoolchildren. Some of them don’t go to the black board and raise their hand ‘cause they think they’re gonna be wrong. I think you should say to these kids you think you get it wrong sometimes, you should come down here and see how the big boys do it. I think you should tell them you haven’t given up hope, and that it may turn up, but in the meantime, you want NASA to put its best people in the room, and you want them to start building Galileo VI. Some of them will laugh, and most of them won’t care, but for some, they might honestly see that it’s about going to the blackboard and raising your hand. (beat) And that’s the broader theme. |