ENTRE BASTIDORES: THAT "CHICO AND THE MAN" EPISODE IN MEXICO

 

Titus: come on, man, i'm sorry. let me make it up to you.

Late: how? como?

Titus: we travel the jungles of Mexico till we get to the secret find in the clearing.

Late: a hunt?

Titus: not of you. not of man. this is legit.

Late: but how? como?

Titus: we need a tool. not referring to me. follow me.

Late: by the way where's Raul?

Lili Estefan: Raulie, i don't care anymore. 

Daniela di Giacomo: como? the mafia backdoored Raulie, i tried to intervene but when i reached their hideout in the middle of Tijuana it was too late...

Lili: don't look at me. don't ask me to show you around, i'm not from Mexico, i'm from Cuba. i went to Harvard...

Raul De Molina: i look like if Castro let himself go...

the El Gordo y La Flaca intro announcer: yes i'm drunk. they serve sangria at Taco Bell. Three's a Crowd on The CW!!! i chuckle and laugh even when i'm announcing a sad story...

Talia licking the faucet: don't worry, we cats entertain ourselves...

David Lynch: use your imagination, i was the lead singer of the Talking Heads...

Capp: my dream is to be never heard from again.

Trent Reznor: i just realized something, all music is crazy...

xxxHolic: Catholic...

3:30 PM: The Cosby Show on Hallmark Channel.

Rose Nylund: what?

Rudy Huxtable on cord phone: mom is COLD BUSTED.

Rose: that means something different in St. Olaf.

Clair Huxtable: Rudy, shut yo mouth, child. sit yo ass down, Rudy. i'm not gonna have this from my youngest. i already had to sign the waiver saying i wouldn't look directly into Lisa Bonet's beautiful eyes when Lenny was in the room.

Eroxon: get your rocks off.

Michelle Trachtenberg: Notre Dame High School looks like a mall...

Cameron Mathison with Cameron Mathison smile: tonight...

Storybook International "Great Heart": it's a shame the white man has to intrude on this brilliant ancient Native American Indian vision-quest spirit-walk tale. so sad. it's a painful history...

Chipotle: the weird thing is none of our food has the chipotle chile in it...

Ferris Bueller: in the '80s, you tried to get the attention of the girl you liked.

Al Gore: but there was no attention economy... 

Bergman Island: those guest quarters for the wedding guests, those SKINNY TALL rooms with the IHOP roofs, are actually saunas...

Ingmar Bergman: they serve fartinis in there...

Hampus: the Krampus's hamper.

at the Great Western Forum in Los Angeles, Steve Jobs in short shorts and a headband psyches himself up bouncing the basketball on the court.

Steve Jobs: i'm oiling my brain.

Chick Hearn: may fried chicken and potato chips always be served in these stands.

Steve Jobs: doing a deep dive on the dunk.

Steve Jobs does a flying jacknife DUNK on the basket.

Steve Jobs: oh wow...

Melissa Maker holding a chocolate chip cookie by the Mexican microwave: it melts in your hand...

Jennifer Pizarro: A Court of Thorns and Roses, i was born to play this part!!! i was born to act in this faerie-porn stuff!!! bring the Star Trek guy back!!!...

Tom Petty: i should have been in A Clockwork Orange, i already dress like that, those are my clothes...

Egon Schiele: my life got CUT WAY SHORT by the Spanish flu, our covid, but i find solace in that MANY YEARS LATER Aeon Flux will cure my disease in the future...

Late: my upper lip's starting to quake, how much further must we roam the Mexican jungles?

Titus: we need a jungle sword to cut away all this dense brush. the trees here have coconuts heavier than my balls. i know where to fetch a jungle sword: Jackie Fitzgerald's house in the States, she lives in a forest, too...

Titus: this is a vacation from our vacation. it's a good thing, too, my eyebrows were starting to sweat. i was getting palm tree in my shorts. look at the gutter in front of Jackie's house.

Late: can't see a thing, it's night.

Titus: exactly. see that black shadow in the gutter? long penis-shaped black shadow? that's Gunther's jungle sword.

Late: Gunther?

Titus: Jackie's man, He-Man, Conan the Barbarian, Blond Rambo.

Late: but why does he leave his jungle sword outside?

Jackie Fitzgerald: that's my one rule when i fuck any man: no weapons. weapons are so BARBARIC.

with Gunther's jungle sword in tow, the two valiant sun warriors attack the jungle with a preservationist's precision, making sure to reseed any tree they hack down.

finally they reach the center of the clearing where the brush bends.

Titus: DA CAR DA CAR!!! you see the car?!!!

Late squinting his eyes: is that a.........clown car?

Titus: no it's my family car. my wife and kid and me. i'm giving it to you, we even?

Late: i don't know, vato, i don't want to be taking your livelihood like that. you say no hard feelings but i haven't been hard since that night at the Mexican Oscars with Lili Estefan.

Titus: okay vato, adios!!!

a red balloon with a string appears across the sunbaked Mexican sky floating over the vista ever so strategically to catch Titus's small hand and scoop him up by the fingers. Titus flies away as he lets out another one of his trademark banshee-hyena laughs.

Late: wait. it's Late. where are you going?!!! vato, come back!!! we can be amigos, just for one day. DON'T LEAVE ME HERE!!! DON'T ABANDON ME!!! DON'T STRAND ME!!! i have a deep-seated fear of getting ditched, of getting discarded by the system. mental note: discuss this with my psychiatrist Carl Old. i'm stuck here, i'm not gonna drive that car through the forest, there's been enough damage to the Earth Madre, her knees are chapped from indifference.