Note: this treatment is registered with the Writer's Guild of America .
The Naked Proof
"Gray is all theory, Green is life's glowing tree." --Goethe
The
Naked Proof is a feature length dramatic comedy about pregnancy,
confusion, and the meaning of life. A sharp-witted, philosophical
burlesque-inspired in part by the playful screwball comedies of the
'30s and '40s- The Naked Truth pits together opposing natures and
revels in the universal hilarity of life's colliding worlds.
I. The
story centers on Henry Rawitscher, an erudite 34 year-old Philosophy
student at the University of Washington. Once a promising young
doctoral candidate, Henry has finally worked himself into a corner. His
attempt to complete a vast and complex dissertation-literally about the
meaning of life-is closing in on its first decade, with no end in
sight. Meanwhile, his overly analytical "relationship" with a younger
Associate Professor of Art History, Gina, seems to be going nowhere. At
a birthday party for his friend Paul, Henry explains his ethical stance
on free love, only to have Gina call him on his self-serving
"commitment to non-commitment" She tells him his fate will catch up to
him, and leaves him, drunk and alone.
Walking
home that night, Henry meets his fate in the form of a fantastical
woman 7 1/2 months Pregnant, who literally comes out of nowhere to
crash into Henry on her bicycle. When she vanishes as abruptly as she
arrives, Henry assumes her a figment of his drunken imagination. The
following day, inspired by the encounter, he gives a lecture on the
possibility of knowing something that has no meaning, offering as an
example how we may explain the nature of light to a blind person,
turning off the classroom lights and lecturing dramatically in the dark
to underscore his point. His audience is no more impressed than his
Thesis Advisor, Vince-the head of the Philosophy Department-who,
following class, informs Henry that his final request for an extension
on his dissertation has been denied: He must complete his opus by
month's end, or lose his position and stipend.
II.
Stung into action, Henry tries to buckle down and complete his
dissertation. Yet even as he tries to focus his intellectual energies,
he is inevitably disturbed by the increasingly inescapable presence of
this strange pregnant woman. Arriving home, he finds her attempting to
break into his apartment. Seduced by her charm more than her need, he
invites her in for the night, only to have her vanish the next morning.
She appears again the following day in the library, whereupon she lures
Henry to a surreal LaMaze class at which he faints. He awakens at home,
alone again, and growing confused: What is the meaning of this woman?
Is she even real? Or is she merely an outgrowth of his troubled mind?
As the days go on, Henry's confusion mounts as Miriam's presence begins
to accrete a deeper meaning. Even as she embroils him in all manner of
random acts-car-thefts, dangerous interior re-decorating schemes,
midnite trips to the convenience store-she begins to refer to him as
her lover, her husband, the father of her child. She moves into his
apartment, and her irrational insistence grows and becomes downright
demanding. She interrupts him during class, drags him to a birth clinic
and forces him to grapple with her pregnancy. Later, she shoos him out
of his own house in order to host a Cinco-de-Mayo party, and he ends up
at a bar, where he explains his strange situation to a sympathetic
fellow husband. Together, they return to his home to investigate this
strange woman, only to find her again vanished without a trace.
Finally, the next morning, hung-over and exhausted, Henry accosts
Miriam. An irrational lovers quarrel ensues, and Henry loses his
temper, demanding that she be gone by the time he returns from an all
important conference later that day. He leaves in a rage to join Gina
at the conference, but as he watches his fellow academics socialize and
compete, he begins to grow slowly disgusted with his life, with
himself. He wanders out of the conference, and has a profound vision of
what life could be. Inspired, he leaves Gina and runs back to ask
Miriam to reconsider, only to find her already gone.
III.
And yet, even after she leaves, Henry cannot seem to let her go. Even
as he locks himself away to complete his dissertation, thoughts of her
invade his mind, distracting him; confusing him, refusing to let him
be. Finally, for one last time, she appears naked in his bathtub,
seducing him, insisting he is her husband, the father, her true love.
As he bends to kiss her, he realizes how real she has become to him,
how true her love for him feels, and how much he in turn loves her. He
wakes up to find that this kiss was just a dream, but that he now knows
what he must do to realize the dream in reality.
In the
end, Henry finally capitulates, assuming responsibility for this
apparition, this impossible ideal. In a final, desperate, hilarious
act, Henry walks out on his own dissertation review, and races at the
last minute to the Hospital, to join Miriam for her birth and commit to
the unknowable-resolving life's most profound existential question, as
the film ends and a new life begins.
For a .doc version of the above treatment, click here . |
