A Good Plan

Finkie, last friend standing. Everyone else grew up and left town. Time to reinvent. Best friends #'s 1,4 and 6 - to Toronto, #3 - to Florida, #5 - to Boston, #7 - to New York and #8, the born-again insane religious zealot, there's always one in every gang - to Israel. The party, the way we were, over. Harry and Finkie, leftovers on the plate of adolescence.

St. Claire, a wonderful wasteland for a gang of two, where Harry sells belts, stupid-pieces-of-leather-that-hold-up-your-pants, and Finkie, the film school drop-out, shoots Fellini-esque videos of bar mitzvahs, sweet sixteens and weddings. At least that's what he calls it, Fellini-esque.

Consider the Simpkin bar mitzvah where Finkie shot thirty-five minutes of the dwarf aunt dancing the hora.

"A dwarf in a hora! Satyricon revisited!"

"And Simpkin punched you in the nose when he saw it."

"But paid me for dropping assault and battery charges."

Consider the Cohen wedding with twenty-two minutes of close-ups of the father-of-the-bride's bad toupée.

"Rug-head Cohen in the Temple of Jews. Hailed by Rolling Stone as comedy of the year."

"You were the only who laughed, Finkie...Okay, I thought it was hysterical too. But your client refused to pay you."

"Did I tell you he's also suing me?"

But the pièce de résistance was the Schlein Sweet Sixteen.

"I don't blame the father for trying to run you over with his car. You took a bush-shot of his daughter at her own Sweet Sixteen!"

"A bouquet of pubes! Cinema verité! When it happens, Harry, it just happens.

"Just happens? Just happens?! You shot that from under the table."

"It's not my fault the chick doesn't use Neat."

It was never Finkie's fault.

Not when he dropped out of film school.

"The profs were all dick-heads."

Not when he walked off the set of the first cinematographer job he got on a real film.

"The director was a dick-head."

Not even when he broke up with his girlfriend on her twenty-first birthday.

"She was a dick-head."

"But she loved you, Finkie. She actually loved you."

"That's why she was such a dick-head."

Dick-heads, dick-heads. In the world according to Finkie, everyone was a dick-head.

And that became his new mantra. Before long, the only job that Finkie could get was working as a shipper in his Uncle Hershie's boot factory. Then one week he didn't get paid for overtime.

"A little tight with the cash flow, now. The bank is squeezing my balls." Hershie explained. "I'll make it up to you later, but family's gotta bite the bullet first."

"So you bite the bullet, Uncle Hershie! You're the big boss driving a Mercedes, not me."

"Who taught you to open up such a mouth? Not my sister. Understand this big-mouth. I keep you as a favor to your mother, my sister. If you're not happy, leave."

So he did. Anyhow, Finkie had better plans.

"Fuck all these dick-heads!" he told Harry. "We're going to write a killer Feldman spec script, go down to L.A. and make it big, like Stevie Dash. Now he's directing big budget movies, making millions."

Yeah, but Stevie Dash meant business. He was money from day one.

"It's all good, man, it's all good."

And it was. The law of attraction in motion.

And Stevie Dash had a way with people.

"Be well, man, be well."

And sometimes he meant it.

Write a Feldman spec script. Really nail it. Go down to L.A. Get an agent. Score writing jobs on a sitcom. Makes lots of money, lots of it, then create new series . The plan was sound, but was Finkie?

Still, Harry thought,"Why not?"