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The Great Works Project
a puppet play in multiple parts
Series prologue
By Thomas Typewriter
(C) 2019
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FADE IN

INT HOSPITAL ROOM ICU. DAYTIME

A stark room of sterile whites and low artifice machinery, an elderly woman, THE-WOMAN-WHO-LOVED, lies in a hospital unconscious and unresponsive. Various tubes snake out of her face and limbs twisting their way to various beeping, wheezing, and pinging life support machines. Off to the side sits a nightstand covered in get well cards, all with bright cheerfullest pictures of flowers. Pictures of things not allowed into this sterile environment.

OPEN ON A MS OF THE WOMEN-WHO-LOVED FROM THE FOOT OF HER BED, LOOKING TOWARDS HER SLEEPING FACE.

A SOFT KNOCKING at the door.

THE-MAN-WHO-LOVES
(off-screen) “Hi, can I come in.”

From off-screen we hear THE-MAN-WHO-LOVES enter. FOOTSTEPS pad across the room to DRAG A CHAIR next to the bed.

THE-MAN-WHO-LOVES
(off-screen) “Wow that was loud. Sorry about that.”

A male hand, the hand of THE MAN-WHO-LOVES, comes into view, gripping the The-Women-Who-Loved’s hand. He squeezes it.

THE-MAN-WHO-LOVES
(off-screen) “So,how you doing today. (pause) The boys miss you and say hi…”

The man’s voice breaks, pausing, letting the sadness slip.

THE-MAN-WHO-LOVES
(off-screen) “…Sorry. Where was I. I’ve got something I have been working on. Would it be alright if I read it to you.”

INSERT CS OF THE-WOMAN-WHO-LOVED’S HAND SOFTLY SQUEEZING THE-MAN-WHO-LOVED’S HAND.

THE-MAN-WHO-LOVES
(off-screen) “Great.”

We hear the sounds of PAPERS RUSTLING.

THE-MAN-WHO-LOVES
(off-screen) “It’s a new script. Something I might actually finish. You’d like that wouldn’t you.

CUT TO CS OF THE-WOMAN-WHO-LOVED’S HAND SQUEEZING THE-MAN-WHO-LOVES’ HAND, THEN CUT BACK.

THE-MAN-WHO-LOVES
“Good. (pauses) Okay, it goes something like this: Fade In from black. A golden curtain delicately embroidered with threads of pure curiosity, stretches across the screen. A sense of any moment something magical will begin.”

CUT TO XCS OF THE-WOMAN-WHO-LOVED’S FACE. HER EYES CRACK OPEN AND SHE TURNS HER HEAD

CUT TO CS OF THE-WOMAN-WHO-LOVED TURNING HER HEAD AND LOOKING TOWARDS THE CAMERA.

CUT TO THE-WOMAN-WHO-LOVED’S POV OF THE END OF HER BED.
THE BACKGROUND GOES OUT OF FOCUS WHILE THE END OF THE BED REMAINS IN FOCUS. THE BACKGROUND FADES AWAY BEING REPLACED BY A GOLDEN STAGE CURTAIN. IT FILLS THE ENTIRE FRAME.

THE-MAN-WHO-LOVES
(off-screen) “The curtains part revealing a space of not here, not now…”
The golden curtains part.

THE CAMERA PANS INTO THE OPENING.

TRANSITION FROM HOSPITAL ROOM TO NOT HERE, NOT NOW.

NOT HERE, NOT NOW

A hazy void spreads across the frame. From below the frame, A HANDHELD, comes into view.

CS OF THE HANDHELD

A rectangular gaming device, with a small tinted screen and six activity buttons in two rows. The top row of buttons are deep blue and marked “Yes”, “Maybe” and “No”. The bottom row of buttons are deep red and marked “Sun”, “Star” and “Moon”.
From the right and left emerge two HELPING HANDS. They appear as someone reaching into the camera frame to grip and use the handheld. Helping Hands can also be thought of as the puppeteer using their hand as a puppet in the puppet show, interacting with the characters and the story.

From the right side of the screen emerges a right handed Helping Hand wearing pale blue fingernail polish. From the left hand side of the screen emerges a left-handed Helping Hand wearing pinkish finger nail polish.

The Helping Hands grip the handheld and tilt it towards the camera, allowing for a better view of the small viewscreen. One of The Helping Hands reaches to the top of the unit, clicking the power on.

ZOOM IN TO A CLOSER SHOT OF THE HANDHELD’S SCREEN.

The screen flashes to life. The title screen scrolls up from the bottom of the view-screen. It has a retro 8-bit monochrome title reading “The Great Works Project” and under that reads “press any button”. We see The Right-Held Hand press a button and the screen changes…

TRANSITION FROM NOT HERE, NOT NOW TO THE GAMETIME

THE GAMETIME – STAGE START INTERSTITIAL

The words “a walking about” scroll up from the bottom of the screen, pausing a moment in the center, then continue upward disappearing out of frame.

PAN IN SO THE VIEWSCREEN FILLS THE FRAME BECOMING THE NEW FRAME OR REALITY OF EXPERIENCE.

The stage title “00-01” scrolls up from the bottom of the frame, pausing in the center, then continuing upward. It scrolls out of sight off the top of the screen

THE GAMETIME – STAGE 00-01 CHOICE HALL

A pixel art version of THE OUTER ONE appears at the end of a hallway. The hallway extends out beyond the right hand side of the screen.

The Outer One moves right, CHIPTUNE MUSIC playing in the background. He moves right, down the hallway to the first open area. Choice Hall splits into two paths. The first is a continuation of the horizontal hallway. The second is a vertical passage made up from a series of alternating platforms. The Outer One jumps up to the vertical passage and climbs upward by jumping from alternating platform to alternating platform.

At the top of the vertical passage, is a small room. In the room is a large safe. The Outer One walks over to the safe and a pop-up game prompt “Press Yes” appears. It disappears as off-screen the Helping Hands press yes. A small screen pops up on the screen showing some text and a T9 keypad. It reads “Enter the combination to open the safe.” We see the cursor moving over the keypad to type in the combination of L-U-G-H-N-U-A-D.

Being a T9 style keypad, it should appear as twelve buttons arrainged in a grid three across by four tall. This is what they should read:
“1,.?!” “2ABC” “3DEF”
“4GHI” “5JKL” “6MNO”
“7PQRS” “8TUV” “9WXYZ”
“<-” “0” “->”
Also please note that since the keypad is a T9 style input, that the Outer One will need to press each button cycling through the characters until the correct letter is shown. To bring up L for example, 5 is pressed four times showing 5, then J then K, then L. The buttons to either side of 0 are used to move the cursor.

The keypad pop-up screen disappears, with the sound of A SAFE OPENING sound effect, once the last letter of combination is selected.
The safe door opens and golden coins bounce out and into the Outer One. Each coin bears a distinct symbol on it starting with a saw blade. The coins then cycle through a wand, a castle, a quill, a light bulb, a shield, and a harp before ending with a sword on the last coin. Once the Outer One has obtained the last coin they pulse, like a video game character getting a power-up. Their clothing and hair change to colors of silver and gold.

The Outer One jumps down the vertical corridor returning to the junction area. They return to traveling to the right down the horizontal hallway. They pass four doors on raised stairwells, each with a name written in the archway over the door: Fail, Find, Go, Murmur. The Outer One continues past the four doors to the end of the hallway.
At the end of the hallway, there is a small gap in the floor leading to a hallway under the main hallway. The Outer One jumps down. The under-hallway is dark and gloomy with occasional torches and dark purple spider webs.

They walk down the hallway coming to a fifth door, boarded, covered and abandoned. The name over the door, “QUINT” hangs at an angle. The Outer One punches and kicks the boards off the door. Bits and pieces fly off to the right. They then approach the door, standing in front of it.

A DOOR UNLOCKING sound plays leading to a door opening animation.

CUT TO DOOR ANIMATION. THE OUTER ONE TURNS AND WAVES TO THE CAMERA. THE DOOR THEN SPINS AND GROWS FILLING THE SCREEN, AT WHICH POINT IT SHRINKS TO A POINT OF WHITE THAT DISAPPEARS. AS IT SHRINKS, THE SCREEN IS WIPED TO BLACK. THE BACKGROUND AND OUTER ONE DISAPPEAR REPLACED BY BLACK.

The stage title “01-01” scrolls up from the bottom of the frame, pausing in the center, then continuing upward. It scrolls out of sight off the top of the screen

FADE OUT