Staged (2020) s02e02 Episode Script

- I'm embracing this.
- How do you mean?
My shoot dates have
changed again, and location.
What, no South Africa?
- No, Italy now.
- Still nice.
So, I'm embracing the fact
that I have no control over events,
and I am going to welcome the role
that chaos needs to play in my life.
Right, how are you doing that?
The game is happening,
but it's being played far away,
by unknowable strangers.
Out of sight, out of mind.
We should quit.
What?
It's a young man's game, isn't it?
I'm only 50!
We could do other things.
You have zero discernible skills,
beyond pretending.
Is there something else
you were going to do,
- if you hadn't ended up doing this?
- I was going to be a footballer.
- I was!
- Yeah.
Yeah, I could have been
a minister of the church.
Yeah? No, no problem with the cassock?
Not having kilted!
Of course!
When one has welcomed the breeze
to dust one's lower branches,
there's there's no going back.
No, well, you need to do something
to keep the flies off your haggis.
Exactly, yeah.
The priest and the footballer.
Yeah. You might struggle a bit,
at first.
Why?
Well, you know, you're not in
you're not, you don't,
you're not in the
absolute kind of
optimum state of physical peak.
Oh! I will have you know,
I'm a fucking paragon
of human fitness, mate!
- Are you?
- What about you?
You would need a total
spiritual overhaul.
Has this ever happened to you before?
- Once.
- You got recast?
- I did.
- Who by?
- Don't want to say.
- But you know?
I know.
- Well, come on.
- No, can't.
Why not?
Because I am doing something about it.
- What?
- Can you keep a secret?
Evidently.
I am befriending him,
slowly and methodically,
engineering ways for us
to work together,
insinuating my way into his life,
the better to exact my slow
and decisive revenge.
- Hi!
- Hello!
Nina! Hello!
Hi! Oh, God, it's lovely to see you.
Oh, it's lovely to see you, too!
Ah, this is exciting!
It's really exciting.
More Staged!
- More Staged!
- Yay!
- Oh!
- Oh, my word! How have you been?
Yeah, good, I think.
Yeah, great. And you?
I'm fine. Strange, you know?
Yeah, I suppose it is!
Erm, I was offered a play.
Oh, great!
And then, yeah, we weren't allowed
to do the play.
- Right.
- It's difficult.
Sure.
- No, I understand.
- Yeah, and I feel like, sometimes,
you know, I want to kill someone.
- But I won't.
- No, best not.
No.
Cos I should have been an astronaut.
- Was that not an option?
- No.
How are you?
- Good.
- Actually, where are you?
Oh, er, ha-ha!
I'm in Los Angeles.
Er, what are you doing there?
Getting ready to film.
Oh, exciting! What?
What have you been told?
Well, erm, actually, not much.
- "Doing more Staged."
- Uh-huh.
"They want you for Jo again."
Er, "Can you talk to Simon?"
Well, OK, so there's a couple of things
that you should have been told
that it seems you haven't been told.
And what are they?
Er, well, so, it's not a sequel,
- it's a sort of remake
- Oh, OK.
for the American market,
and the most crucial thing,
and I'm sort of a bit sorry
that I've got to be the one
to tell you this,
but we're going to be doing it
without, er, David,
or, and, er, Michael.
Why?
Er, so, er, the producers
don't think that they are
quite big enough names
for the American market.
But I am?
Well, you're not the lead. That's
True!
That is not quite what I sort of
meant, I sort of meant, well,
you sort of are the lead
But you've managed
to keep yourself involved?
Er, well, yeah, cos I sort of
created it last time,
and sort of directed that, er,
that sort of version of it, so
You'll be directing this time?
- Er, n er, no, no, I'm not.
- Why not?
Er, because people don't think
I actually did anything
last time.
I mean, I thought David and
Michael improvised most of it,
- didn't they?
- No, no, no, they didn't, did they?
They didn't do that.
They didn't improvise it, did they?
I-I wrote it, didn't I?
I typed the whole thing.
Look, I've got pieces of blue card,
I wrote I write the thing,
and then I put them on the wall,
and then I write, write,
write, write, write,
and we don't say that they wrote it,
or improvised it, cos they didn't,
did they? We don't say that,
did they? Cos they didn't.
Do David and Michael know?
Wow.
Ah, shit!
Can you move this suitcase?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
Cos I don't think the hallway should
be used as an obstacle course.
No, I've just been feeding the goldfish.
- We never got another one.
- No, you didn't.
- We had two and now we've got one.
- Agreed.
That's how death works.
And maths.
I'm worried that the one
that's left behind's
- getting a wee bit depressed.
- Oh, I don't have time for this.
What do you mean?
Well, it's just I sense
that you were segueing into
some tangent about short-term
memory, and I just don't
- I haven't got time to play.
- You love my tangents!
Yeah, sure,
it's just that Lister's coming.
- Today?
- Yeah.
What, right now?
Yeah, for a charity thing.
Like, in the flesh, like,
Zoom doesn't cut it any more?
Yeah.
- Normality beckons, babe.
- Is that safe?
Yeah, I think so,
I mean, we stay a certain
distance apart, and use our own mugs
and don't stick our hands
in the cookie jar at the same time,
and, oh, also, more importantly,
we don't crack our heads open by
tripping over your fucking suitcase.
- Yeah. I'll move it.
- Yeah, that'd be great, thank you.
What would you have done,
if you weren't doing this?
- What is it you think I do?
- Come on. What's
What's, what's the, what's the dream?
Erm
archaeologist.
I never knew that.
- Oh, God, I've done it again!
- What?
You've sucked me in,
you're like a black hole!
Don't be mean to me!
Oh, look, Michael is your
procrastination buddy,
and I am your wife,
and I've got stuff to do,
and you really need to not be here
when that happens.
I've just got a lot of stuff
to process, and feelings
Yeah, it's just the rest of us
just have to get on with it,
but whatever.
I'm just a bit worried that
the goldfish that's left behind
would do anything to have its little
buddy to play round the castle with.
OK, right,
I think that the goldfish left behind
forgot about the other goldfish
within seconds.
Who is it?
It's Nina.
Oh! Hi, Nina!
Hi, Nina.
He'll be with us in a couple of minutes.
OK. Good.
All right?
It's everyone else.
I understand.
Adrian, Nina, Lucy
- Sam?
- Yeah.
- Dame Judy?
- Of course.
- And Simon.
- And Simon, yeah.
Anna
thinks that we should, erm,
should try and stay calm with him.
Why?
Because he's on one side of the line
and we're, we're on the other.
Michael,
we drew the fucking line!
I know. Anna said it better.
- Anna?
- Yeah?
Er, what, er, what was that
Viking saying?
What?
You know, the Viking phrase.
The Viking phrase?
Oh, the
the thrall alone
takes instant vengeance.
What the fuck does that mean?
Yeah, what does that mean?
Actions are too often ruled by emotions.
That seems a little bit hypocritical
coming from the Vikings.
Yeah, what she's saying, we, er,
we should remain civil.
Fuck that!
Burn your bridges.
No, we won't, we won't.
We won't.
It's the only way to get close
enough to do some real damage.
What would the Vikings recommend?
Something with an axe.
Er, right, OK, now,
remember the Vikings, OK?
Just, calm
- just
- Rrrr!
- Calm
- Rrrr!
Shh Yeah, embrace chaos.
- I'm going to be fine.
- Great.
I'm going to be really calm and nice.
OK, here we go.
Just deep breaths, deep
Oh! So that's where you've
been hiding, you cunt!
I said, that's where you've been
hiding, you fucking cu
- He can't hear you he can't hear you.
- fucking
- Thank fuck he can't hear you.
- OK.
OK, David, please
Even just seeing
his punchable little face,
I'm finding it very hard.
I know, I know, I know.
You know he's a twat,
I know he's a twat
Ah, no, he's
but let's just pretend
that this conversation
It's all right, take your
time, take your time, Simon.
Yeah
Yeah, no, don't worry, don't worry.
Oh, we've got all the time in the world!
- Just, just
- Oh, it's so nice to see you, Simon!
just, please, just,
let's just give it a try.
I'm I'm on my best behaviour.
OK. Thank you.
- Hi, sorry!
- Hey!
- Hey!
- Hi!
Hey.
- Simon!
- Hey! Sorry about that.
- All of fucking this.
- How are you, mate?
Yeah, no, good. Sorry.
Er, yeah. Michael. Hello. Hi.
- Er, David. Goodness.
- Nnnng!
Long time, no see. How are you?
Yeah, Nina phoned me.
Right, OK, right.
But, well, let's just have
a little catch-up first, shall we?
- Yeah, that'd be lovely.
- How are you?
Good. I mean, hey,
look, I'm in Los Angeles!
It's So, it's happening.
Staged America?
Yep, looks like it.
That it is exciting.
Yeah, it really is, and, look,
I know I owe you guys
a lot of thanks for that, erm
I know we haven't really had a
chance to talk about it all, but
No, don't be silly.
Well, it's been mad.
Yes, I bet. So, what, lots of
lots of new opportunities?
I've been run off my feet.
There's just so much work to do!
I couldn't have imagined any of this.
No, well, I mean, you couldn't have
imagined anything at all without us,
could you?
Er, what, I
What David means,
I-I think,
is that we feel, erm,
you know, quite a lot of love,
er, even ownership,
of the project, too.
Yeah, I mean, I did write it.
See, now, David is going to get
a wee bit ticked off
with that kind of
territorial attitude, Simon.
He thinks that we both brought
a lot to the project, too.
We thought we were a team.
Oh, me too.
So we were a little bit hurt
when we heard that we weren't needed.
- Of course.
- But we got past that,
but then,
- when we heard from Nina
- Yeah.
My friend Nina, Nina, who
My friend Nina called me up.
that literally every
other member of the cast
Every other member.
- was coming back except us
- Yeah.
Yes.
I mean, even you
managed to hold on to your role.
Well, I am Simon.
Oh, well, who am I, then?
Fucking Spartacus?
But, er, but you're
you're not an actor.
No, but I but I wrote it.
Ah!
David, David, Vikings!
Vikings, David! Vikings!
- Vikings?
- I could have been a movie star!
OK, OK.
OK, well, let's let's just
Let's just talk about something else
for a minute, OK?
Let's just shake it up.
Erm
Simon! What, what were you going
to be when you were young?
- A director.
- No, I meant
I meant if, er, that didn't work out.
I wanted to be a magician.
- Oh, ha-ha ha-ha!
- Whoa! David!
Ha! David's, erm,
trying to learn some tricks.
- Great!
- Were you, were you any good?
I was, actually. I was I was
I was very good!
Yeah? What's that card?
The seven of diamonds.
Oh, fuck you!
All right, all right.
Is there anything we can do
to help you, Simon?
- Excuse me?
- Help.
No.
No, I don't think so.
No, no, it's not a trick. It's
We We just want to help.
We-we, just, just, just
What can we do? What can we do?
Come on.
What can we do?
I wouldn't say this
if you hadn't just
Two of the actors that we're
considering for David and
and Michael,
they've actually reached out,
to see if you might make some time to
- talk to them.
- About what?
Just to offer some thoughts on your
experience making the show.
We would
be very
happy to.
Really?
We're all on the same side.
Well, then I'll
- I'll set it up.
- Great.
- I really appreciate it.
- No, no, thank you.
That's what we what we needed,
just to, you know A little
little bit of collaboration.
Hey, maybe you could
give a couple of notes
on the roles, too.
Fuck you!
I mean, I will I will put
an axe into your face,
and I will nail your skull
onto the mast of my Viking longship
before I give any actor
another bunch of notes
about how to play David Tennant,
you fucking patronising mollusc!
I think we should just let our
agents talk from here, shouldn't we?
Don't you fucking!
I didn't even know he had an agent!
Seven of fucking diamonds!
Unbelievable.
I called Simon back and apologised.
OK, well done.
Told him we'd speak to
those other actors tomorrow.
Oh, Jesus. OK.
Why do you think we have never
made each other this angry?
Well, because we have a scintilla
of respect for each other.
- Yes.
- Yeah.
Cos we started out as colleagues,
and then we became friends
And then great friends.
Would you say I'm your BEST friend?
No.
- No?
- No, I don't mean it like that.
No, no, no, no. Fine. I just
You know, I thought you might take
a bit longer to think about it, but
No, but, well, am I yours?
- No.
- Well, there we are.
- No, you might have been.
- If what?
If you'd said I was yours.
I've got an older friend.
- I'm old.
- No, I, I mean, I've
I've got a friend
who I've known for longer.
He lives in New York.
OK.
Yeah, I had a friend, once.
Who?
No, I don't see him.
And you're not friends any more?
No.
So, when you go out to New York,
you're going to see him, are you?
Well, that's why I'm going.
He's getting married.
Oh, well, that's lovely for him.
Well, I'm I'm the best man.
It was supposed to happen
earlier this year, but
But it all Yeah.
So, you know,
it'll be nice to be there.
- Well, it'll be nice to be anywhere.
- Yeah.
Anna hasn't been to Sweden in ages.
She's really missing her family.
Well, I'm sure she is, yeah.
Hey!
Erm
Four of diamonds.
Oh!
We should quit.
Magic is harder than it looks.
Oh, God, I hate magic.
Oh, maybe we could ask Simon for help.
Ah-hmmm!