Post by Bruce "The Beast" Richards on Mar 23, 2007 21:41:27 GMT -5
(The camera fades up on a path in the middle of a forest; snow is still clustered in the trees and on the ground around their trunks. There's a small lodge just up ahead; smoke is billowing out of a small chimney in the top, and the windows are obscured with steam. To the side of the lodge sits Bruce Richards, in his black boots, black hat, and a pair of jeans, a blanket draped over his shoulders, covering his upper body. He's warming his hands by a small cooking fire; a pot rests on top of the grill, being gently licked by the flames. Bruce pulls the pot off the fire, and pours the remnants into his travel mug. He takes a sip and grimaces.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: The first time I tasted coffee it was on a camping trip with my parents. My dad fancied himself kind of an outdoorsman; he was a Queen's Scout, and every trip we made he built a lean-to to sleep in. He thought tents were to be used as a last resort, and that trailers were for spoiled yuppies. (Snorts.) That coming from a St. Albert businessman. Anyhow, every morning he'd start up the cook fire, and before he cooked anything he threw his camp coffee on the fire: coffee grounds and water in a pot. I wanted to try it, so he poured me a small cup. It was horrible. It was gritty and harsh, and I spit my mouthful on the ground and poured the rest of it into the woods. You'd think I'd have sworn off the stuff since then, but I guess I'm a glutton for punishment. I still can't have camp coffee. But I did learn how to make a pretty strong tea from some of Alberta's natural plants. (Takes another sip.) It tastes terrible, but it's still better than that sludge my dad used to make.
(Bruce takes another sip from his travel mug, and begins to poke around in the embers of the fire, stirring the coals up.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: Speaking of being a glutton for punishment, I must have watched that latest Kyle Roberts promo a half dozen times by now. I gotta tell you, it looks pretty sharp: he must have hired the entire Grand MacEwan media studies department to spiff it up. It's not painful because of what it looks like. It's painful because of what he says.
(The red coals are arranged neatly in a little pile, and Bruce begins to make a pyramid of sticks and tinder around it, followed by larger and larger branches and logs.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: So, Kyle is crowing about how he figured out how to cause Bruce to snap. He's got me wrapped around his little finger. He knows exactly how to unleash the Beast. And wow folks, was it ever easy. There's not much to it. All he had to do was attack me, unprovoked, shit all over our friendship, disgrace the memory of D-X, and chicken out of our match two weeks ago. The delicate brain of Kyle Roberts figured all that out by himself. Hope Kryenik, Rees, Ravager, and Simply Beautiful don't catch on. Gosh, they could exploit my greatest weakness eight to ten months from now! (He chuckles, then turns a little grim.) I lost my temper last week. That's what happens when your best friend stabs you in the back. You get a little...testy. I snapped. I got tired of hearing him flap his mouth and not get any comeuppance for it. But has he learned anything from it? No. He just keeps flapping.
(The tinder inside the pyramid slowly catches alight; we hear the snapping and the crackling, and then tiny flames lick through the cracks on the outside. The flames are reflected in Bruce's eyes.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: (Shaking his head.) Kyle Roberts is The New & Improved D-X? You really think that you're D-X, Kyle? You're delusional. If you really cared about D-X, you would have tried to talk about it first; you could have decided to be a (BLEEP)ing MAN about it. But no, like a little boy whose mommy steals his ritalin, you acted before you thought. The New & Improved D-X was a partnership. When we formed back in the Gastown days, it was about two men doing what no one man could do on his own. When we came to the NAPW, we singlehandedly built the tag team division. Hell, we basically were the tag team divison for 2006. We had hit the top and things were going to get even brighter, moving on to bigger things while still keeping our hand in at home. And you destroyed it, because you had lost some of the spotlight. Oh yes. D-X was always Kyle Roberts first, Bruce Richards second. Kyle playing to the crowd, Kyle making the speeches, Kyle soaking up the attention. But then, guess what? I started to get a little of the spotlight. At first it was little. It was even a little silly. People chanting "Charts! Charts! Charts!" when we stepped into the ring, instead of "Smarter than you." Tiffany, a woman who only paid attention to you to tell you where to shove it, all of a sudden fell for the "uncharismatic" Bruce. Bruce Richards wins the BattleBowl, getting the title shot, getting the applause. And you just got pushed to the side, had to share that spotlight just a little. And when you realized that it was an EQUAL partnership, when I started getting a little recognition for all the work I had put in over the years, you started getting worried about the fans.
(The fire is growing in size now, flickering up through the holes in the grate. Bruce holds his hands up to the flames, rubbing them warmer.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: You say you don't care about the fans? Bullshit. You care a lot. In fact, you care too much. Sure, you never needed their adoration, but you desperately needed their attention[/i]. And since you couldn't make them love you, you did the next best thing. You made them hate you. Sure, they were spitting on you, booing you, and calling you all manner of filth, but at least they were paying attention to you. You had them in the palm of your hand; you could wind them up and watch them explode. And it worked out just fine when you had a partner who didn't say much and let you take the microphone, but when The Beast's star started ascending a little bit, you got scared. You got scared that they were going to ignore you. You were worried that someone better had come along and they would turn their backs on you. You were afraid that they would forget all about you. Just like your dad did. So what did you do? In the midst of your anger and frustration, you did what you couldn't do when you were a kid. You lashed out and destroyed the new object of their affection. And you got them to pay attention to you again. If only your daddy would do the same, huh? Newsflash, Kyle: the audience ISN'T your dad. I'm NOT his new wife. And you're NOT a kid any more. Stop acting like one.
(Bruce stands up from the fire, stretching his arms and back. He takes another sip from his travel mug, and starts walking towards the shack.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: But he did get one thing right. He gave me a chance to change. A chance to evolve. There's been a lot of transformation in the NAPW lately. And I'm not just talking about the return to our roots, or addition of REBEL Pro Wrestling. The NAPW roster has seen its fair share of transformation and change. People are recreating and reinventing themselves left and right, whether the causes are from without or within. Chris Casino, formerly swinging single and independently wealthy, through a series of careless mistakes and a night of drunken abandon, ends up shackled to some stranger and financially destitute. Gee, if only I had warned him that that kind of lifestyle would catch up to him. Big Bad Brian Bruno, a guy that was selfless and easy going, the kind of guy you could see yourself having a beer with on the weekend, driven into violence and living in the depths of madness after the the loss of his family. Billy Kryenik was a crazy mother(BLEEP)er when The DOOMriders first came to town, but after a little rest and recouperation, comes back cleaned up, more focused, more driven. Lloyd Rees, or should I call him LDK now, has changed his look, too, and has somehow become a more pompous ass than ever before. Some people are in the midst of their personal transformations. Nightmare's transformation from dark, tortured soul to dark, tortured, shithead is still in a state of flux. It's like he's given birth to a new self and is suffering post-partum depression. Then, there are those rare people who just never change. Like Ravager. Cold, vicious, and calculating, Bob Ravager is one of the very few touchstones of the NAPW. A go-to guy, hovering around the top of the industry, good for a title run or, in my experience, the butt of a joke.
(Bruce walks over to the cabin door, taking a long sip from his mug. He turns back to the camera.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: So, there's a river of change racing through the NAPW. And yet, I'm standing in the middle of it, watching it all go by, desperately holding on. Not sure of what I need to do. Not sure of who I am any more, who Bruce Richards is, who The Beast is. Thanks to Kyle, I can't be the same guy I used to be. I was the calm, sage, level-headed guy backstage because I needed to balance out Kyle's crazy ideas. Some of which even worked. So, I need to step out of my comfort zone. I need to take a few risks. I need to figure out where I want to be. And that's what this is all about. I've come out here to sweat it all out. (Gestures to the shack.) The sweat lodge. Dozens of American Indian communities, from the Inuit to the Navajo to the Mayans, recognized the need for spiritual and physical purification. They drank potions from bitter herbs, and sat in lodges just like this to get rid of the sicknesses the Europeans gave them, and to preserve their spirits. I drank my potion.
(He puts down his travel mug on a stump.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: I need to get rid of the poison Kyle Roberts put in me.
(He hangs his blanket on a nearby branch.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: I need to embrace the changes I have to make.
(He hangs his hat on a hook at the front of the door.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: I need to figure out who I'm going to become.
(He opens the door, steam bellows out, bathing him; he takes a deep breath, and his face becomes calm.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: I need to step through this door and shake hands with the man who's going to be coming back out.
(Bruce steps inside the thick fog, and disappears. The door closes. The fire outside blazes. The camera fades to black.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: The first time I tasted coffee it was on a camping trip with my parents. My dad fancied himself kind of an outdoorsman; he was a Queen's Scout, and every trip we made he built a lean-to to sleep in. He thought tents were to be used as a last resort, and that trailers were for spoiled yuppies. (Snorts.) That coming from a St. Albert businessman. Anyhow, every morning he'd start up the cook fire, and before he cooked anything he threw his camp coffee on the fire: coffee grounds and water in a pot. I wanted to try it, so he poured me a small cup. It was horrible. It was gritty and harsh, and I spit my mouthful on the ground and poured the rest of it into the woods. You'd think I'd have sworn off the stuff since then, but I guess I'm a glutton for punishment. I still can't have camp coffee. But I did learn how to make a pretty strong tea from some of Alberta's natural plants. (Takes another sip.) It tastes terrible, but it's still better than that sludge my dad used to make.
(Bruce takes another sip from his travel mug, and begins to poke around in the embers of the fire, stirring the coals up.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: Speaking of being a glutton for punishment, I must have watched that latest Kyle Roberts promo a half dozen times by now. I gotta tell you, it looks pretty sharp: he must have hired the entire Grand MacEwan media studies department to spiff it up. It's not painful because of what it looks like. It's painful because of what he says.
(The red coals are arranged neatly in a little pile, and Bruce begins to make a pyramid of sticks and tinder around it, followed by larger and larger branches and logs.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: So, Kyle is crowing about how he figured out how to cause Bruce to snap. He's got me wrapped around his little finger. He knows exactly how to unleash the Beast. And wow folks, was it ever easy. There's not much to it. All he had to do was attack me, unprovoked, shit all over our friendship, disgrace the memory of D-X, and chicken out of our match two weeks ago. The delicate brain of Kyle Roberts figured all that out by himself. Hope Kryenik, Rees, Ravager, and Simply Beautiful don't catch on. Gosh, they could exploit my greatest weakness eight to ten months from now! (He chuckles, then turns a little grim.) I lost my temper last week. That's what happens when your best friend stabs you in the back. You get a little...testy. I snapped. I got tired of hearing him flap his mouth and not get any comeuppance for it. But has he learned anything from it? No. He just keeps flapping.
(The tinder inside the pyramid slowly catches alight; we hear the snapping and the crackling, and then tiny flames lick through the cracks on the outside. The flames are reflected in Bruce's eyes.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: (Shaking his head.) Kyle Roberts is The New & Improved D-X? You really think that you're D-X, Kyle? You're delusional. If you really cared about D-X, you would have tried to talk about it first; you could have decided to be a (BLEEP)ing MAN about it. But no, like a little boy whose mommy steals his ritalin, you acted before you thought. The New & Improved D-X was a partnership. When we formed back in the Gastown days, it was about two men doing what no one man could do on his own. When we came to the NAPW, we singlehandedly built the tag team division. Hell, we basically were the tag team divison for 2006. We had hit the top and things were going to get even brighter, moving on to bigger things while still keeping our hand in at home. And you destroyed it, because you had lost some of the spotlight. Oh yes. D-X was always Kyle Roberts first, Bruce Richards second. Kyle playing to the crowd, Kyle making the speeches, Kyle soaking up the attention. But then, guess what? I started to get a little of the spotlight. At first it was little. It was even a little silly. People chanting "Charts! Charts! Charts!" when we stepped into the ring, instead of "Smarter than you." Tiffany, a woman who only paid attention to you to tell you where to shove it, all of a sudden fell for the "uncharismatic" Bruce. Bruce Richards wins the BattleBowl, getting the title shot, getting the applause. And you just got pushed to the side, had to share that spotlight just a little. And when you realized that it was an EQUAL partnership, when I started getting a little recognition for all the work I had put in over the years, you started getting worried about the fans.
(The fire is growing in size now, flickering up through the holes in the grate. Bruce holds his hands up to the flames, rubbing them warmer.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: You say you don't care about the fans? Bullshit. You care a lot. In fact, you care too much. Sure, you never needed their adoration, but you desperately needed their attention[/i]. And since you couldn't make them love you, you did the next best thing. You made them hate you. Sure, they were spitting on you, booing you, and calling you all manner of filth, but at least they were paying attention to you. You had them in the palm of your hand; you could wind them up and watch them explode. And it worked out just fine when you had a partner who didn't say much and let you take the microphone, but when The Beast's star started ascending a little bit, you got scared. You got scared that they were going to ignore you. You were worried that someone better had come along and they would turn their backs on you. You were afraid that they would forget all about you. Just like your dad did. So what did you do? In the midst of your anger and frustration, you did what you couldn't do when you were a kid. You lashed out and destroyed the new object of their affection. And you got them to pay attention to you again. If only your daddy would do the same, huh? Newsflash, Kyle: the audience ISN'T your dad. I'm NOT his new wife. And you're NOT a kid any more. Stop acting like one.
(Bruce stands up from the fire, stretching his arms and back. He takes another sip from his travel mug, and starts walking towards the shack.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: But he did get one thing right. He gave me a chance to change. A chance to evolve. There's been a lot of transformation in the NAPW lately. And I'm not just talking about the return to our roots, or addition of REBEL Pro Wrestling. The NAPW roster has seen its fair share of transformation and change. People are recreating and reinventing themselves left and right, whether the causes are from without or within. Chris Casino, formerly swinging single and independently wealthy, through a series of careless mistakes and a night of drunken abandon, ends up shackled to some stranger and financially destitute. Gee, if only I had warned him that that kind of lifestyle would catch up to him. Big Bad Brian Bruno, a guy that was selfless and easy going, the kind of guy you could see yourself having a beer with on the weekend, driven into violence and living in the depths of madness after the the loss of his family. Billy Kryenik was a crazy mother(BLEEP)er when The DOOMriders first came to town, but after a little rest and recouperation, comes back cleaned up, more focused, more driven. Lloyd Rees, or should I call him LDK now, has changed his look, too, and has somehow become a more pompous ass than ever before. Some people are in the midst of their personal transformations. Nightmare's transformation from dark, tortured soul to dark, tortured, shithead is still in a state of flux. It's like he's given birth to a new self and is suffering post-partum depression. Then, there are those rare people who just never change. Like Ravager. Cold, vicious, and calculating, Bob Ravager is one of the very few touchstones of the NAPW. A go-to guy, hovering around the top of the industry, good for a title run or, in my experience, the butt of a joke.
(Bruce walks over to the cabin door, taking a long sip from his mug. He turns back to the camera.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: So, there's a river of change racing through the NAPW. And yet, I'm standing in the middle of it, watching it all go by, desperately holding on. Not sure of what I need to do. Not sure of who I am any more, who Bruce Richards is, who The Beast is. Thanks to Kyle, I can't be the same guy I used to be. I was the calm, sage, level-headed guy backstage because I needed to balance out Kyle's crazy ideas. Some of which even worked. So, I need to step out of my comfort zone. I need to take a few risks. I need to figure out where I want to be. And that's what this is all about. I've come out here to sweat it all out. (Gestures to the shack.) The sweat lodge. Dozens of American Indian communities, from the Inuit to the Navajo to the Mayans, recognized the need for spiritual and physical purification. They drank potions from bitter herbs, and sat in lodges just like this to get rid of the sicknesses the Europeans gave them, and to preserve their spirits. I drank my potion.
(He puts down his travel mug on a stump.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: I need to get rid of the poison Kyle Roberts put in me.
(He hangs his blanket on a nearby branch.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: I need to embrace the changes I have to make.
(He hangs his hat on a hook at the front of the door.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: I need to figure out who I'm going to become.
(He opens the door, steam bellows out, bathing him; he takes a deep breath, and his face becomes calm.)
BRUCE RICHARDS: I need to step through this door and shake hands with the man who's going to be coming back out.
(Bruce steps inside the thick fog, and disappears. The door closes. The fire outside blazes. The camera fades to black.)