[joe-frank-list] 'Night, Part 1'

russellbell at gmail.com russellbell at gmail.com
Tue Jul 20 06:20:25 PDT 2021


	Kevin cleans and maintains pools with Dave, the boss, who
listens to weather radio and surf reports while Kevin works.
	3:40: Joe says that cataclysm isn't remote, describes the
danger of earthquakes, fires, floods, storms from the sea.
	5:00: Joe tells of the aftermath of the flooding of Marble
Creek.  (It sounds like Malibu to me, but I don't know of a Marble
Creek there.)
	5:50: Joe tells of burglaries in the neighborhood, that they
seem to be done by neighbors, possibly because people are living
beyond their means.
	7:40: Kevin drives a Toyota Landcruiser with a rollbar.  He's
a fast driver, has driven drunk and stoned, rolled a previous truck.
	10: Kevin works at the Marble Inn (can't find evidence of this
place) on the weekends.  He plays darts in the back for money after
hours.  He snorts cocaine when it shows up.  One night a man is shot
in the parking lot.  Kevin encounters the man who shot him, drives him
off.  The guy drops his gun while running away.  Kevin picks it up,
notes that a gun not registered or connected to him could be useful
some day.  (Apparently the man who dropped it was Anton Chekhov.)
	13:10: Saturday morning Kevin grinds meat for burgers,
prepares the other ingredients.
	14: One night after work he sees sheriff's deputies chase a
speeder in a Jaguar.  The Jaguar crashes into a bench.  The deputies
shoot him a dozen times.
	15:50: One night the Inn catches on fire from the fat in the
burger meat, burns to the ground.
	16:20: Kevin's father, a pilot with Pacific Airlines
(fictional - the airline of this name is Vietnamese, started in 1991),
gets him a job as a line technician at the airport.  (Some of this
story sounds like Hollywood Burbank airport, some like Van Nuys
airport.  The cities of Burbank, Glendale, and Pasadena own the
former.  It's mostly commercial traffic.  The private traffic Joe
describes sounds like Van Nuys airport, but it's even less likely to
have military planes.  It would have that little Beechcraft Joe says
NASA has there.  I think Joe conflated the 2 for dramatic purposes.)
Kevin likes the job, the action that happens, including the C-5 and
SR-71.  (I think this is a mistake: the SR-71 flies out of
Wright-Patterson AFB in Dayton; I don't think the runway at Burbank is
long enough for it, and the security certainly isn't high enough.
Lockheed built it and they're based in Burbank, and used to operate
the Hollywood Burbank airport, but that's all coincidental.  A C-5
could land and take off on Burbank's longest runway, but I don't know
why it would.)
	20:20: Kevin crashes the airport's station wagon, keeps his
job anyway.
	22:20: Kevin explores a DC-3 with luxurious appointments,
including a waterbed; it had a collection of porn videos.
	23:20: A nearby strip club, the Fabian, has a pictures night,
popular with horny old men.  Kevin attends, but doesn't take pictures.
The club also has peep shows.
	25:10: Joe describes a brothel, the Circus of Love, on La
Cienega.  Kevin gets a sauna and a massage, passes on the sex.  He
sees the same woman week after week; eventually, they talk.  Her name
is Donna.
	26:30: Donna was born in Springfield, Ohio.  She was a sickly
child.  Her father owned a bookstore.  Her sister is 9 years older.
Her father is cruel.  Racing down a hill on the back of a bicycle, her
sister tells her to stick her foot in the wheel; she does, breaks it;
her father does nothing for her.  The man who lent her father the
money to open the bookstore takes Donna to a physician.  (Joe mentions
the Maryland Hotel in Chicago on Rush Street, which is real.)
	She gets pregnant, marries Jim.  Jim beats her late in the
pregnancy, damaging the baby, which dies after a few weeks.  She
divorces Jim, works at a mobile home manufacturer.  She takes a job
emceeing a drag show.  She learns how to be a woman from them.  Her
boss at the manufacturer attacks her on a business trip; she files a
complaint, but they do nothing, so she quits and takes a job at a TV
factory.
	Donna's father passes out while driving; the accident kills
her mother.
	36:20: A famous stripper, Pearl, comes to the club, takes a
shine to Donna, hires her as her assistant.  Their first gig is at the
Silver Slipper in Washington.  (I don't remember it, can't find a
reference to it.)  They become lovers.  The next club is lacking one
of its dancers, so Donna fills in.  The crowd boos her for her small
breasts; she sasses them back, which impresses the owner.  A group of
old men form a fan club for her.
	40: Pearl gives Donna a silicone treatment to enlarge her
breasts for her birthday.  A few years later they go bad; it turns out
that it was industrial silicone; she gets a mastectomy.  She leaves
Pearl, creates a fresh act.  Porn films drive down the prices
strippers can get; the clubs are dirty and roach-filled.
	43;10: A guy gets shot next to her at the bar of a club she's
working.  The bartender drags the body behind the bar, tells the cops
he knows nothing, then throws the body in the alley after they leave.
	46: Turner joins the Army as a buck private, rises to become a
pilot, is a captain when he goes to Vietnam.  He flies Birddogs
(Cessna O-1, a small single-engine prop plane
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cessna_O-1_Bird_Dog) to spot the enemy,
particularly to help artillery aim at them.
	49:20: After discharge, Turner visits an Army buddy in Red
Bank, New Jersey, who deals drugs.  Turner sells a pound of marijuana
for him; they get busted.  Turner gets 2 months in county jail.  He
has to fight with a would-be rapist, Hinckins (sp?).
	52:40: Turner gets out in March, drives to Sonora, California,
where his widowed mother lives.  He moves to the Stanislaus river,
lives in a tent, shops in town every 2 weeks.  He walks around the
forest, swims, gets to know the animals - communes with nature.  After
6 months he rents a cabin and enrolls in Columbia junior college (now
Columbia community college), takes jobs as a bartender and dealing
cards.  He sees all the players as losers.  One, Hardy, sings 'Jesus
blood never failed me yet'.  (Gavin Bryars, whose music Joe used in a
few shows, captured this from an actual homeless person.  It's an
interesting story.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus%27_Blood_Never_Failed_Me_Yet)

	http://jfwiki.org/index.php?title=Night_(Part_1)

	JoeFrank.com identifies this show as 'Night',
http://www.joefrank.com/shop/night .

russell bell


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