"THE DOORS" Screenplay by Randall Jahnson and Oliver Stone SHOOTING DRAFT 1991 INT. BLACK SCREEN MORRISON'S VOICE The movie will begin in five moments The mindless voice announced All those unseated will await the next show We filed slowly, languidly into the hall The auditorium was fast and silent As we seated and were darkened The voice continued "The program for this evening is not new You've seen this entertainment Through and through You've seen your birth, your life and death You might recall all the rest Did you have a good world when you died? Enough to base a movie on?" FADE IN: INT. RECORDING STUDIO (LAST SESSION) - LA DEC 1970 - NIGHT A dark silence hovers along the deserted, bunker-like studio. MIKE stands and booms shadow a grand piano... The ENGINEER waits in the booth, lit, alert man, bored, fiddling... ENGINEER Hey Jim, It's your birthday man, whaddaya say we try this another night... Camera moving tentatively along the shadows, discovering the sidelight on a Navy surplus pea jacket thrown on a chair; moving to a candle's orange flutter on pages written with verse... a hand breaking the seal of the bottle of Irish Bushmill's whiskey. VOICE (off) Kill the lights a little more, will ya John? They might drop a bit more... Camera crawling past the FINGERS weaving a new cigarette out of the Marlboro pack. An ashtray full of butts... and an asthmatic horrid cough, filled with phlegm... crawling up the slight paunch in the bright jersey with #66 on it... stitched on the sleeve is the team mascot -- an American Indian in full headdress. ENGINEER (off) Hey man, how come the Doors aren't in on this? Camera revealing JAMES DOUGLAS MORRISON, -- 27, poet, buried in the shadows, curls of cigarette smoke about his haunted sensuous eyes, meditative lips scragged with beard and long greasy hair, not a pretty sight, yet a man full and bold and struggling for survival through his words... beneath the Bushmill moon, he takes the tambourine and shakes it violently in our face JIM No music, No Doors. Let's roll... Is everybody in?... Is Everybody in?... Is everybody in? The ceremony is about to begin... He shakes a TAMBOURINE at the mike and one of his sudden giant Indian YELLS rock through the studio. JIM WAKE UP!!!! HAS THIS DREAM STOPPED!!!! Music riffs from "American Prayer". AUDIENCE SOUNDS ghostly on the track. The ENGINEER reeling backwards from the sudden shift in sound, cursing silent. JIM VOICE Let me tell you about the heartache and the loss of God Wandering wandering in hopeless night Indian's scattered on dawn's highway bleeding ghosts crowd the young childs fragile eggshell mind... (wind sounds) The GRIN on Jim's face magnesium flares out to: EXT. ARIZONA DESERT - DAY (1940'S) The blinding YELLOWNESS of the desert, so barren, so hot it stings to look at. An OLD CHEVROLET winds through the yellow- orange landscape beneath a brooding blue SKY crackling with ELECTRICITY -- the storm coming in in the distance as the MUSIC writhes out at us like a reptile from under a rock -- the beat of RIDERS ON THE STORM. DOORS SONG Riders on the storm (2) Into this house we're born Into this world we're thrown Like a dog without a bone An actor out on loan Riders on the storm CREDITS ROLL, OVER THIS DREAMSCAPE JIM VOICE (continues over imagery) ...me and my mother and father and grandmother and grandfather were driving through the desert at dawn and a truckload of Indian workers had either hit another car or just -- I don't know what happened... Indians were scattered all over the highway bleeding to death. INT. CAR - DAY MOM, DAD, the youngest BABY in the front seat -- pointing at the storm. GRANDMA & GRANDAD in the back with JIM, about 4 and his SISTER, 3 asleep. Mom's a beauty and Dad's an austere handsome military man in civilian clothes, mouthing words -- look, wake them up, a desert storm... but we barely hear A LIGHTNING BOLT shreds the blue sky with a thunderous sound, frightening dawn of creation... Grandma nudging Jim awake. His eyes open -- Just as the car turns the bend -- revealing An overturned TRUCK lying in the road -- dead and wounded INDIANS everywhere... A cop car, ambulance. A terrible accident... The first thing Jim sees... An old INDIAN FACE staring at him... The car pulling alongside, Dad rolling his window down... asking if he can help (SOUNDLESS) A line of wailing INDIAN WOMEN, CHILDREN Mom's scared face... JIM VOICE ...but it was the first time I tasted fear. I musta been about four, like a child is just like a flower, his head is floating in the breeze. Grandma trying to hide Jim's face but he looks back... THE COP WAVING THEM THROUGH The kid looking back through the rear window, terrified -- his first view of death. The bodies, the sense of doom overlaying the land -- a child's worst nightmare. MOM It's just a dream, Jimmy, just a dream SONG (continues) There's a killer on the road His brain is squirming like a toad Take a long holiday Let your children play If you give this man a ride Sweet family will die There's a killer on the road The boy's eyes going back to the Indian MAN looking at him... then to the dying opened body bleeding out its guts on the asphalt... the dying man's face, twisted, moaning, amazing eyes at the point of death -- they settle on Jim MOM It's just a dream Jimmy, just a dream A strange SOUND occurs -- the rattle of an ancient gourd, "shi-chi-chi, shi-chi-chi". Something flying through the air. A bull-roarer, a whirling leather thong, announcing the appearance of a shaman. INTO JIM -- his eyes staring out the back His receding point of view -- the Indians, the overturned truck... JIM VOICE ...The reaction I get now looking back is the soul of the ghosts of those dead Indians -- maybe one or two of them were just running around freaking out and just leaped into my soul -- and they're still there. (wind, music) SONG Girl you gotta love your man (2) Take him by the hand Make him understand The car pulling away across the giant 1940's landscape DISSOLVING TO: EXT. ARIZONA DESERT - DAY (1963) SUBTITLE READS: ARIZONA DESERT, 1963. CREDITS CONTINUE TO ROLL. Panning up the black chino pants to JIM MORRISON, now 20, steel seaman's suitcase in hand, thumbing a ride, the road sign behind him saying "Los angeles 370 miles" SONG The world on you depends Our life will never end Girl you gotta love your man A LARGE LIZARD in the dust cocks its head, blinks, as the boots walk by to the car pulling over. INT. CAR JIM in the backseat packed with HUSBAND, WIFE, CHILDREN, DOG, MOTHER-IN-LAW. Between boy and man, eyes ancient and new. He wears his favorite color: black -- torn black chinos, paint-spotted black t-shirt, a slouch his favorite pose but the eyes and smile can be warm and shy like a little boy, gentle surface, storm in the brain. The HUSBAND, now looking at Jim a little nervously, pushes up the Perry Como on the radio... as it cuts to a sudden news flash: RADIO ...from the Texas School Book Depository. We repeat. President John F. Kennedy was shot a few minutes ago in Dallas! SLOW MOTION: The Husband's face distorting, saying something on the track like: "What! God NO!" but it's subdued, low. Trying other stations. Jim turns to look out his window, as if he already knew. RADIO (2nd VOICE) ...taken to Parkland Memorial Hospital. There's no word on the President's condition. Mrs. Kennedy is... The WIFE'S and HUSBAND'S VOICES seem lost in the background. WIFE & HUSBAND Oh God, Oh God. Not the President for Christ's sake. Oh God -- WHO'S NEXT? On Jim -- staring out the window. "Who's next!" SONG Riders on the storm (4) On the DESERT. DISSOLVE TO: EXT. VENICE BOARDWALK - LOS ANGELES - DAY (1965) SUBTITLE READS: VENICE, CALIFORNIA 1965 CREDITS continue to their conclusion as we segue into the BLUENESS of VENICE, CALIFORNIA, 1965 -- the dawn of a new age. All was possible. Individual SHOTS of the BOARDWALK throbbing with a feast of HIPPIES, head shops, ARTISTS drawing psychedelic murals, POT SMOKERS, MUSCLE BUILDERS, tambourines accompanying the transister radios on the Beach Boys and "I Got You Babe", dogs chasing frisbees, BIKINI BODIES on the beach, LSD sold over the counter... set to the upbeat chords of HELLO I LOVE YOU DOORS SONG Hello I love you Won't you tell me your name? Hello I love you Let me jump in your game She's walking down the street Blind to every eye she meets Do you think you'll be the guy To make the queen of the angels sigh? JIM, in torn black chinos, no shirt, walking real slow past it all, carrying a notebook of his own and a paperback of Baudelaire, his eyes settling on... A YOUNG BEAUTY and her yellow labrador -- a fashionable thin, long, red-haired "20th century fox" in jeans moving through the crowd... He thinks about it -- a fraction of eternity -- and he's off... after her. EXT. VENICE CANAL - DAY She moves along its banks, as if the universe moved to her rhythm, turning once to look back. Jim caught in her eyes. They're alone. Now he's the one seized by doubt. He slows, pretends to take another interest. DOORS SONG She holds her head so high Like a statue in the sky Her arms are wicked And her legs are long When she moves My brain screams out this song EXT. VENICE CANAL - ANOTHER CANAL - DAY As she turns into another street, he resumes following her. She gets to a house, goes in. There's a group of people partying. He stops, watches. DOORS SONG Sidewalk crouches at her feet Like a dog that begs for something sweet Do you hope to make her see you, fool? Do you hope to pluck this dusky jewel? EXT. PAMELA'S HOUSE - VENICE CANAL - THAT EVENING The two story house has a quaint run-down charm. Friends have dropped by, people smoking joints, beers. She's on the upstairs balcony -- talking with a YOUNG MAN (professor type) in his 30's, who passes her a joint. JIM lurks in the shadows of the trees; he's been standing outside watching... The MUSIC shifts to the quieter LOVE STREET. DOORS SONG She lives on Love Street Lingers long on Love Street She has a house and garden I would like to see what happens The YOUNG MAN gestures, and goes back inside the house. She's alone now on the balcony, sitting on a kitchen table... It's now or never. Jim scales the tree alongside the house with the agility of a gymnast. DOORS SONG She has robes and she has monkeys Lazy diamond studded flunkies She has wisdom and knows what to do She has me and she has you The girl's grinding up pot in an old shoebox with a spoon and kitchen strainer. She looks up and sees his crotch three feet from her face, balanced there effortlessly on the railing like a highwire act, opens her mouth in surprise. Jim drops softly to the balcony, a smile of disarming gentleness. JIM Hi... GIRL Wow! Hi... (looking at the tree) You have a problem with doors? JIM Waste of time... His head cocked slightly onto his left shoulder, he drawls, southern gentleman, polite, slow, thoughtful as if he had all the time in the world, as if the guy would never come back. JIM I followed you... from the beach... GIRL (impressed) Wow! You followed me? Why? JIM ...cause... you're the one... He moves. Kisses her swiftly, softly, right on the lips. GIRL (mesmerized, awkward) Wow... neat... (looks back) ...maybe you should meet my old man? JIM Later. You got a name? He looks into her face. Classic American face, freckles, big round eyes soft as rain, long sunset red hair. She feels his intense, starving eyes. He kisses her a second time. The YOUNG MAN coming back with the rolling paper -- sees him. As he hops back on the railing -- swings out into the tree -- looks back once. JIM Mine's Jim. A moment. She must decide. The YOUNG MAN within earshot. GIRL Pam... The ice broken in that instant. Jim smiles. JIM Jim and Pam, Pam and Jim... He vanishes. The Man abreast of Pamela, as if he's seen a vision. YOUNG MAN Who the hell was that? PAMELA (everything's cool) That's Jim. My new friend. INT. UCLA SCREENING ROOM - DAY (1965) On the screen a 16mm black and white student film of a stunning BLOND in black bra, panties, garters dancing in black heels on top of a TV set. panning down to images of goose-stepping Nazis and a Nuremberg rally on the set. Sounds of lovemaking and an Indian peyote ceremony from the track, an Indian holy man incanting... Jim's VOICE comes on the track as well. JIM'S VOICE Nietzche said "all great things must first wear monstrous and terrifying masks in order to inscribe themselves on the hearts of humanity". Listen children -- to the sound of the Nuremberg night. STUDENTS in the audience groan at the pretention of it. Moving to JIM's eyes hidden in his parka hood, peeking through at the screen. A CLOSEUP now of JIM on screen looking straight into the lens as he takes a hit on a hash pipe, and winks. JIM VOICE (on screen) Have you ever seen God? -- a mandala. A symmetrical angel. Felt? Yes. Fucking the Sun. Heard? The music. Voices. Touched? An animal. Your hand Tasted? Rare meat, corn, water and wine STUDENTS (ad lib) SSSSssss... ego trip man, c'mon! RAY MANZAREK, a tall student with powerful voice and manner, thick glasses, long hair sweeping down over his eyes, leans over to Jim. RAY Hey man it's great, don't listen to em, it's non-linear man, it's poetry man, everything Godard stands for. The lights coming on as the last absurdist images flicker off. Hissing and a big Bronx cheer summarize the feelings of the 100 odd STUDENTS crammed into a bunker-like theater. A youngish INSTRUCTOR stirs to the front row from a row of upset FACULTY. Hands shooting up to criticize. INSTRUCTOR This is pretty shocking stuff Mr. Morrison. And I might say indulgent. Naziism and masturbation, when used for shock value, are not art. But to be constructive, let's start with your intention. What was it? STUDENT 1 It was a bore!! That's what! (laughter) TRICK, BONES and JACK, three friends sitting next to Jim, shoot their hands up. TRICK Hey it was better'n a Warhol picture. GIRL 1 No it wasn't. It was worse! TRICK A guy sleeping for seven hours... STUDENT 2 ...is less pretentious! There was no political consciousness. Naziism is... JACK Hey hold on man! You guys are the facists! BONES It takes genitalism to absurdity man, just cause the squares here can't dig it cause the film school's still so square... VOICES Oh c'mon man, give it a break. Boo! Beatniks go home! Take another mushroom... A cacophony of voices, critics, emotions blend out over Jim's quiet eyes. INSTRUCTOR HOLD IT DOWN!!... Mr. Morrison -- what are your feelings? JIM I quit. (walks out) EXT. TURKEY JOINT WEST - NIGHT JIM, BONES, TRICK, JACK approaching the bar. MUSIC of "GLORIA" blasting from the door, CHICKS popping in and out, definitely college crowd circa '65. TRICK (to Jim) Hey man whatdya expect, an Oscar? BONES You can't quit, you gotta voice. People can't dig cause they don't understand yet. JACK If you're an individual, if you're too good, they wanna cut your dick off. Look what happened to Orson Wells. TRICK You quit now, they'll yank your deferment in no time and they'll get you for Vietnam man. Three more months you graduate. BONES Be cool, you never learned fuckin patience Morrison, you want everything at once. NICK They didn't get it. So make your films and fuck what they think. JIM You know what I think? He slows, a dramatic young lion pose, surveying the girls. BONES Yeah whadday you think? JIM You really want to know what I think? The cronies wait, anticipating something inescapably evil to escape his lips. BONES Yeah yeah, whatddaya think? JIM I think we gotta get really ripped! INT. TURKEY JOINT WEST - NIGHT Tall bespectacled RAY MANZAREK is banging out GLORIA on the piano in bad Jerry Lee Lewis style. RAY I tell you bout my baby 'bout five foot four from head to toe She came to my room Just 'bout midnight She makes me feel so good She makes me feel alright Camera moving to reveal JOHN DENSMORE wiry, solid on the drums... moving on to ROBBIE KRIEGER, wispy, ethereal looking, the youngest, flamenco-type moves on his early electric guitar. Also a HARMONICA PLAYER and a BASE. They all seem slightly embarrassed by either the cheap sound system feedback or Ray's warbling, but the crowd couldn't care less -- a German beerhall, they want noise and sex. JIM and his GANG, beers in hand, mouth back the words, beers everywhere shoved to the smokey ceiling, everyone on their feet, nuts with spring fever. Jim eyeing the GIRL next to him. JIM You know what I'd like to do to you? GIRL (waiting, intrigued) No what? JIM You really want to know what I'd like to do to you? GIRL What! The FOOTBALL TEAM TYPES edge over nearby, one of them picking out Jim with a glare. JIM (whispering) Wanna hear the scream of the butterfly... She looks puzzled by the suggestion. FOOTBALL PLAYER Hey Morrison! JIM (eluding the man) Can we have a couple of beers. You're not even an asshole man -- you're a semihole. He evades the football man's grasp, elusive physicality. He hops over tables, heading for the stage. Other KIDS are up on the stage dancing, but Jim goes right up alongside RAY, shaking his hips like Elvis. Ray giving him the mike. Improv time. JIM (singing) She came to my room She came on my floor She came on my bed She came on my face Ooooooh I want to wrap your legs around my head baby baby and her name was Gloria They love it. The place going wild. The girl with the football player wanting him. INT. RAY'S CAR - FREEWAY - NIGHT JIM is insane on beers in the back seat, reaching over the wheel to try to drive the car for RAY who is flailing at him. Jim pulling Ray's hair... JIM (barely comprehensible) HA HA HA HA HA! COME ON, LET'S DRIVE TO MEXICO MAN. TIJUANA. LET'S GET LOST! Jammed into the sedan are TRICK, BONES, ROBBIE, JOHN... RAY & ALL COOL IT JIM, COME ON COOL IT. JIM FREEDOM!!! DON'T YOU KNOW YOU'RE ALL SLAVES! As he winds down the window and starts crawling out of the car. Heavy traffic. Ray weaving to avoid another vehicle. Honking horn. JOHN HE'S GOING OUT! HE'S GOING OUT! TRICK HE'S GONNA JUMP! RAY GET HIM BACK IN! His waist is out the window, John and all grabbing for his heels. EXT. SPEEDING CAR - NIGHT SPECIAL EFFECT: JIM's head six inches from pavement moving at 60 mph through heavy traffic. Screaming, laughing like a maniac. Beeping horns all over the place. JIM DEATH OLD FRIEND!! In the car, madness, raging chaos, the four boys pulling him in. EXT./INT. PAMELA'S HOUSE - VENICE CANAL - THAT NIGHT Night. Shadows. A tree. A figure moving. JIM (SONG) Awake! Shake dreams from your hair, my pretty child my sweet one Choose the day and choose the sign of your day The day's divinity the first thing you see Jim slides her upstairs' door open, crawls in next to her bed. She's asleep with her boyfriend. He touches her toe. She awakes, startled. JIM Come on, come out for a walk, it's a pretty night. PAM You're crazy! EXT. VENICE CANALS - NIGHT JIM and PAMELA moving along the byways. A clear starry California night. JIM (SONG) A vast radiant beach And a cool jewelled moon Couples naked, race down by its quiet side And we laugh like soft mad children There's a crash. They turn bristling. A COYOTE lurks under the sickly light of a streetlamp, pulling its head from an overstuffed garbage can, looking back at them. EXT. VENICE BOARDWALK - NIGHT Fires on the boardwalk. Hippies, Bums, Older People. JIM and PAM move through talking, skipping, touching like children. JIM (SONG) ...smug in the wooly cotton brains of infancy The music and voices are all around us Choose, they croon, the ancient ones The time has come again EXT. VENICE BEACH - NIGHT The two of them race down by its side, slowing to a walk. His [...] loved orphan voice. JIM Can I stay with you tonight? We could talk 'till dawn. I just don't want to be alone. PAM (hesitant) Okay... just talk though. No funny stuff. JIM Okay. I promise. PAM I've been real upset. I lost my car on the freeway yesterday. I left it somewhere and I can't remember where and when I went back it was gone. My sister... JIM I bet you never expected life could be this hard. (strokes her hair affectionately) And you're still so young. She breaks into sobs, seeking his arms. He hugs her. JIM I wonder where we'll be ten years from now? PAM I really don't want to know JIM Come on. JIM (SONG) Choose now, they croon Beneath the moon Beside an ancient lake Enter again the sweet forest Enter the hot dream Come with us Everything is broken up and dances EXT. VENICE BUILDING - NIGHT Their silhouettes mount the fire escape of a jagged old structure overlooking the boardwalk. EXT. VENICE ROOFTOP - NIGHT PAM glancing through Jim's notebooks as they sit on his sleeping bag with a lantern and bunsen burner, overlooking moon, ocean, scudding clouds and a vast forest of television antennas. Fires burn from the beach. In the notebooks, at intervals during the conversation, we see powerful sketches colored in visionary hallucinogenic William Blake mode with writing between. Books are everywhere -- panning Kerouac, Ginsberg, Nietzsche, Rimbaud, Mailer, Artaud, mythological works, shamanistic books, a library of stolen ideas. PAM (reading, looking) These are like beautiful! I never read much poetry in school. I hated it. What's a "shaman"? (mispronounces) JIM He's the medicine man who starts in a peyote trance. And he gets everyone in the tribe going and they share in his vision and it heals them. It's the same in all cultures -- Greeks, Jesus. Some Indians say the first shaman invented sex. He's the one who makes you crazy. PAM Are you a "shaman"? JIM Uh (pause) no. I just write about it. What turns you on? PAM I don't know. Experience. Freedom. Love... Now. Peyote's like love. When it's given it's blessed. When it's sold it's damned. I like peyote. I like acid, it's easier to get. I like the spiritual voyage. The first time I did acid I saw God. I did. I had a friend who was Christ. And he was Judas too. I suddenly knew the secret of everything -- that we're all one, the universe is one. And that everything is beautiful. JIM Is it? I don't know. I think you're alive by confronting death -- by experiencing pain. PAM I think you're alive by recognizing beauty -- seeing truth because when you discover truth you discover what love is... we're all saying the same thing. It's "love me and I'll love you." JIM (looks at her, ironic) It's only thru death that you know life. Jesus, medicine men heal people by sacrificing their own life. PAM Do you love Death? JIM I think life hurts a lot more than death. When you die the pain is over. Pam shivers, a strange thought. PAM Why do I look at you... and see my death? (pause, shrugs) No, that's ridiculous. JIM I bet your dad's a school teacher. PAM How did you know! JIM I don't know. PAM What was your father? JIM Military PAM I bet you moved around a lot. JIM Yeah, about 8 times. PAM How many sisters and brothers? JIM Two. PAM One... she's the pretty one... I love your neck. (she gets in his lap) He runs his fingers thru her hair, kissing her gently. JIM "...but one, the most beautiful one of all dances in a ring of fire and throws off the challenge with a shrug" PAM That's beautiful. Who did you write it for? JIM I wrote it for you. The panties coming off. Rousseau dangling from the Venice moon. He moves a little over excited, nervous, more awkward than we might expect. PAM ...take your time, Jim... there's no hurry, I'm all you have to do tonight... DOORS SONG Well the clock says it's time to close now I guess I'd better go now... As we depart the rooftop. Your fingers weak with minarets Speaking secret alphabets I light another cigarette Learn to forget, learn to forget, learn to forget DISSOLVE TO: Possibly we hear the soft backbeat of MOONLIGHT DRIVE without lyrics. RAY MANZAREK is meditating in yoga posture, longer hair as well, in his post-graduate phase, sandals, colorful hippie shirt. But the meditation is not going well. He's shaking his head at himself, frowning. RAY Om om... No bliss! No bliss! Jim has approached closer, amused, looking down. JIM Hey Ray, try acid man, it's guaranteed. Ray opening his eyes -- his POV -- Jim, slouched, jacket over his shoulder, sun behind him. RAY (surprised) Morrison... Aw shit. Last trip I thought I was going through hell's digestive system. Something painted by Hieronymus Bosch. JIM I never had a bummer on acid. RAY I like naturally high man. JIM Whatever works. Making movies at MGM yet? RAY Well I saw the head of production and I said Godard doesn't use scripts, he improvises with his camera and he said, "great who's Godard?" JIM (laughs) We gotta take the planet back, reinvent the Gods, make new myths. RAY Right on. I thought you went to New York? JIM Never got there. Went out to the desert and uh... got lost y'know. Days. I been living on Trick's rooftop. Got stuck on this chick... RAY Whatcha been doing? JIM Writing. Poems. Songs. RAY Songs? Lemme hear one. JIM I can't sing. RAY So neither can Dylan. "Johnny's in the basement mixing up the medicine, I'm on the pavement thinking about the government". But he's got the words man. That's what they want. JIM (suddenly sings) Let's swim to the moon un hunh Let's climb thru the tide Penetrate the evening That the city sleeps to hide Jim has crouched, digging his hand in the sand. As the grains spill out of his fist he has his eyes closed. Ray pantomimes chords in the keyboard sand. All of a sudden we're in RAY'S POV -- a mystical moment. Jim singing, no sound, then pure song, unadulterated by atmosphere. JIM Let's swim out tonight love It's our turn to try Parked beside the ocean On our moonlight drive Jim stops, shrugs. Ray looks at him a long beat. Intense eyes, the manner of a man who knows what he wants and cannot be stopped. RAY Wow!... Y'know man those are hot lyrics -- really hot! JIM (pleased) ...could you write the music for that down, if we went over to your place, could you write that on your organ? RAY Are you kidding! I could fly. You wrote that? You got others? JIM A bunch. It's like I'm taking notes at a rock concert going on inside my head. I actually hear the music -- the spirit of the wine y'know, intoxication. RAY (slaps him on the knee) Man. You got a voice like Chet Baker -- haunted! What the hell happened to you in the desert? Let's get a rock and roll band together man and make a million bucks. JIM ...be great wouldn't it? RAY (walking JIM) It's the perfect time man! Two of the guys outta my band are really into this. I meditate with them. You know them... Robbie and John. We could have it in the can in three weeks. JIM Hey why not, I could write the songs with you guys. RAY The Stones did it outta the London School of Economics for Chrissake. Things are about to explode man. You can feel it in the air. (points out over the ocean) Vietnam's right out there. Sides are being chosen. People wanna fight or fuck, love or kill, everything's gonna flame. The planet's screaming for change, Morrison. Make the myths man!! Jim laughs, loves Ray's ardor as they move along the ocean side. JIM There oughta be great orgies man. Like when Dionysus arrived in Greece, he made all the women mad, leaving their homes and dancing off in the mountains. Great golden copulations in the streets of LA. (looks at a passing girl) Hey, do you know her? RAY What do we call ourselves. "Dionysus"? JIM I got a name. RAY What? JIM The Doors. RAY The Doors? (facial distaste) That's the most ridiculous... (then) ...you mean the doors in your mind? Like the Huxley book. JIM "The Doors of Perception"? Acid... RAY Yeah sure mescaline experiments -- reducing the sugar flow to the brain. Great book. JIM It's from William Blake actually, the line -- "when the doors of perception are cleansed -- things will appear as they truly are..." RAY (finishes) -- infinite". It's great, Jim. JIM So where do we start? How do we start? Where are the girls? RAY Rehearsing. You're moving off the rooftop and in with me and Dorothy. As they walk off, the two of them along the edge of the Pacific. A dog jumping for a frisbee. The music of MOONLIGHT DRIVE now riffs over the real song now. DOORS SONG Let's swim to the moon Let's climb thru the tide Penetrate the evening That the city sleeps to hide... DISSOLVING TO: INT. RAY'S HOUSE - VENICE BEACH - DAY The first heavy strains of BREAK ON THROUGH driving over the DISSOLVE. It sounds bad technically, but it's hot. Random raw screams and shouting. PAM is crosslegged on the floor, clapping to the music, number one fan. JIM & DOORS (live) The day destroys the night Night divides the day Tried to run Tried to hide Break on thru to the other side JIM straining to make it work, jumping around violent, still not in control. Yet searching. JOHN cutting out. JOHN That's really square. Let's hip it up. Jump on your cues. RAY Tighten it up. Stay with the beat Jim. You're dragging. JIM Let's try it again, come on. I'm just getting into it. PAM (on floor) I think it's hot!! ROBBIE (strumming) I still think the lyrics are weird man. JOHN (frustrated) I still think it sounds like the bottom of a fishbowl man. JIM (to Robbie, aggravated) Then you write one man! We need more songs anyway. We all gotta go back and write. They're drained, tired, in a large rehersal/living room 30 feet high, fronted by large glass windows looking out at the beach at Marina. The room is filled with golden, gorgeous setting sunlight. PAMELA goes to the kitchen with DOROTHY, Ray's Japanese fiancee. ROBBIE I been working on something goes like this... A minor. (chords his guitar) "You know that it would be untrue You know that I would be a liar If I was to say to you Girl, we couldn't get much higher" F sharp... chorus "Come on baby, light my fire Try to set the night on fire..." Robbie's voice is tinny but something immediate's in the air, all the radar out. RAY Okay man there's some good changes in there. JIM Got any more lyrics? ROBBIE (gives Jim a page of lyrics) Some. I call it "Light My Fire". I figger if I'm gonna compete with your stuff it's gotta be about earth, fire or snakes. JIM Don't underestimate Death. JOHN Yeah but it sounds like the Byrds man, we're not folk rock man. How 'bout trying it with a Latin beat. ROBBIE I thought we could do the usual verse chorus verse chorus and JOHN We don't need a bridge. ROBBIE Yeah, we could maybe improvise a couple piano and guitar solos over it (kicks in second verse) "The time to hesitate is through" (doesn't have the second line) Du du duh dud dada . . . JIM (spontaneous) "No time to wallow in the mire Try now we can only lose And our love become a funeral pyre Come on baby light my fire" John drumming it, different, more Latin. JIM Pretty good! Pretty neat!! RAY (to John) Nice groove, John. Chaka chaka chaka, then bula burump bula (to Robbie) ...you're right, it could take a coupla long solos, that's wild man, like Butterfield did on "East-West" -- really hip. ROBBIE Y'ever heard Coltrane's "Favorite Things"? JOHN (hitting the drums) Yeah -- maybe stretch it out and put it in 4/4 on bass, 3/4 on guitar and snare. RAY (clicking, excited) Why not! A minor to B minor. Jazz! That then is jazz! But it needs a hook. Something. Give me some space. I need some space. Leave the room guys. Come on! Go! The three excluded Doors head out to the beach like obedient schoolboys while Ray fools with his organ. EXT. VENICE BEACH - DAY As they go out, JIM hugging ROBBIE's head to his shoulder as they feel the excitement of a new song. JOHN (irritated at Ray) Guy's obnoxious, man always bossin' people around! I thought we were equals! JIM Aren't we? (to Robbie) That was great Robbie. Whaddaya thinking about when you play? ROBBIE Don't know. Mostly the fish in my fish tank. JIM (laughs) Hey whadya say we take some of that Tijuana acid and see what kinda trouble we can get into tonight? ROBBIE The chicks always go for you man. I get the dogs. JIM Then we'll start a religion or plan a murder or go to Tijuana. JOHN Whatsamatter with you man, what about Pam, you got the morals of a coyote. JIM Why you wanna sleep with her John, just to bug me? JOHN Hell NO! JIM ...means "hell yes". She likes you man, she really does and y'all should. What's a rock and roll band for man, if you can't party all night and do bad things? RAY (yelling from the house) I GOT IT I GOT IT... GET IN HERE. HURRY. JOHN Sieg Heil! As they head back. INT. RAY'S HOUSE - DAY TIGHT on RAY like a schoolmaster cueing them. RAY Okay here it is. Bach and Rock. Count it off John JOHN (clicking) 1... 2... 1 - 2 - 3 (crack) It goes. The famous organ intro to LIGHT MY FIRE blends over the room like magic, carrying JIM, ROBBIE, JOHN, DOROTHY, PAMELA along over: EXT. SUNSET STRIP (TRAVELLING) - NIGHT (1966) A row of NIGHTCLUBS glisten off the hoods of passing traffic. Marquees announce: THE BYRDS, RED ROOSTER, LOVE, THE HERD, TURTLES, CAPTAIN BEEFHEART. The CLUBS are PANDORA'S BOX, THE TRIP, CIRO'S, BIDO LITO'S, GAZZARRI'S, THE EXPERIENCE... . Headlights and neon intercut with: DOCUMENTARY TYPE SHOTS of TEENAGERS, HIPPIES, LONGHAIRS, running summer rampant, banging tambourines. COPS busting kids against cars on the street as PARENTS go by rolling up their windows. The action was on the street. LIGHT MY FIRE carries over the montage. DOORS SONG You know that it would be untrue etc. JIM VOICE (last session) The music was new black polished chrome and came over the summer like liquid night. EXT. LONDON FOG - NIGHT "THE DOORS -- BAND FROM VENICE" on the marquee... moving down to a motley crew of TEENAGE GIRLS, underage, trying to get past the BOUNCER. The sounds of BREAK ON THROUGH carry past when the doors open and close admitting a SAILOR. GIRL GROUPIE (approaching, to 2nd girl) Is that horny motherfucker in the black pants here tonight? BOUNCER IDs! IDs! Can't get in without an I.D.. GIRL 2 Oh please. I forgot my I.D.. I'm on the list. BOUNCER I forgot my list. INT. LONDON FOG - NIGHT BREAK ON THROUGH blasting out at us from a sleazehole -- half full -- BIKERS, SAILORS, HOOKERS, a baseball game on the TV. A dance floor the size of a bed, the DOORS on a tiny platform above the bar, London newspapers on the wall. JIM & DOORS (live) We chased our pleasures here Dug our treasures there Can you still recall the time we cried BREAK on through to the other side (3) Some groupies have formed a small fan club at the base of the stage, muscling past PAM, but most people ignore them, drinking, arguing, dancing to their own fuckbeats. Possibly this has something to do with the fact that JIM sings with his back to all of them. JOHN looking over furious at RAY who mutters under the music. RAY Turn around Jim! Come on let 'em in. JIM I found an island in your arms A country in your eyes Arms that chained us, eyes that lied (CHORUS) Jim jumps around violently to the front, getting the attention of all. Rubbing his leather pants against the mike stand, leaning against it, not yet comfortable with the extrovert side of himself, eyes closed, but starting to enjoy it. He sings to Pam. INT. BACKSTAGE - THE FOG - THAT NIGHT JERRY, the ex-vice cop manager who runs the joint, can't understand the appeal, talking to JIM and ROBBIE who are packing and hauling their equipment out. DOROTHY is there. PAM (innocently) So Jerry... do we get paid for this? JERRY (ignoring her) What shit, "day destroys the night", "crawl back in your brain", "go insane". What do people wanna pay money to hear that shit. JIM (explains it, gentle) The greater the suffering, the more terrible the events, the greater the pleasure Jerry. They want it, it's catharsis. Like the ancient Greeks. JERRY (amused) We're in Los Angeles punk, how would you know, they like your pants, they're not listenin' to you, what the hell they see in you I... JIM (laughs) But they understand Jerry. All our real desires are unconscious and unseen. . . JERRY (scratching his head) ...you're the weirdest fuckin' guy I ever... JIM You love us? JERRY I love ya. You got two more shows to do. Camera gliding across the small crowded smokey room to RAY and JOHN in conversation with a slick Beverly Hills MANAGER type. MANAGER ...I got some real tight record company connections, just leave it to me man, I'll take you guys all the fuckin' way, you blew my mind out there. RAY Yeah right, but what about the music? MANAGER Hey the music? I love it man, that's why we're talking right? Some of it's a little on the dark side though. Ya know ya oughta get some tunes like Herman's Hermits stuff -- "Mrs. Brown you got a lovely daughter". That shit goes right to the radio man. RAY Uh huh. Well, how 'bout gettin' us some real equipment? MANAGER Listen, I sign you guys to a five year management contract and you got it all. Equipment. Demo. A truck WITH roadies. Three, maybe four percent record deal. Wherever ya want to go babe, trust me, I'll get you there. Whatd'ya say? RAY (exchanging looks with John) We'll have a band meeting. The four of us do everything unanimously or we don't do it. MANAGER The musketeers. I'm touched. But lemme tell you something -- loyalty don't pay the bills. Think about it. Call me tomorrow. He gives Ray a card, leaving, crossing to Jim and PAM talking. JOHN (to Ray) What a sleaze! Man, Jim's gotta start facing the crowd if he's gonna be the front man. RAY He's just getting his confidence. JOHN He never does what we rehearsed. What's the point of... RAY How does it feel? JOHN Great, but... Pam on payphone calling her friends to come. PAM ...make sure you get Barb and Sue Anne to come. And tell them to ask for Jim! The MANAGER on his way out leaning into Jim's face, slyly. MANAGER Jim, how old are you? JIM Ah, twenty one... MANAGER Jesus, you're a gold mine, I'll make it quick and to the point and if you repeat it I'll deny it -- drop these guys, I'll put you with some real musicians, your voice, your looks, that's what'll sell records, we'll make a million bucks. A year. Goodbye. Call me. I'm right. He gives Jim a card and goes. Pam disgusted with the type, Jim laughs, likes the guy. JIM I like a man wears his soul on his face. RAY (coming over) "Whiskey's" next, I can feel it in my bones. ROBBIE I still think the lyrics are weird. INT. LONDON FOG - NIGHT MONTAGE EFFECT -- Jim sings "A Little Game" on the Fog stage. Super over WHISKEY sign. EXT. SUNSET STRIP -- THAT NIGHT CU moving down -- the "LOVE" is on the marquee at the famous WHISKY A GO GO as we move down to see JIM, PAM, and the DOORS. Jim jumps through the TEEMING TRAFFIC (horns, anger) right in front of a COP CAR, crossing to a long line of teenage FANS dying to get into the club. JIM (to Ray, innocently) Jesus Ray, every girl out there wanted to fuck me, I could feel it for the first time! RAY Right on stud. But you better watch out for the guys. JIM (to the band) Guys, I'm serious about the desert, we still gotta deepen man, we gotta take some peyote -- all of us together, we got one more stage to go... ROBBIE I don't know man, fucks up my playing. I been playing music for 10 years man and this is the first time in my whole damned life I ever played it. JIM Are you satisfied? JOHN Will you get off my case! I'm never doing acid again. Too many bad trips man. JIM It's not acid John, it's peyote. It's a bonding ceremony. It's got to be more... more... more... JOHN I'm into TM man. I promised my guru... PAM I want to! I want to! I'm ready. Let's go to the desert... do the peyote, the good peyote. JIM (to girl in line) Who's on now? GIRL 1 (withering look, very hip) "Love". JIM Yeah, Arthur Lee's cool. GIRL 1 They're the best... better'n the Beatles. JIM You mean the Marx Brothers of music, we could blow 'em away. The GIRLS looking at each other like who is this jerk. GIRL 2 And who are you? JIM The Doors... We're up the street at the Fog. Laughter from the GIRLS. GIRL 1 (contempt) The Doors. I heard of you. That's the dumbest name. I wouldn't go to the Fog if you paid me. JIM Oh yeah what would you do for money? PAM Let's go Jim, come on. Meanwhile DENSMORE is hitting up on GIRL 2. JOHN So you don't have a phone number? What do you mean you don't have a phone number? GIRL 2 I don't have a phone number. So give me your number then. JOHN I don't have a phone. Robbie is doing his imitation of a shrimp for ANOTHER GIRL who's laughing. GIRL 1 (intrigued, to Jim) Well, would you leave my name at the door? JIM Well I don't know. What's your name? GIRL 1 Caprice. JIM Caprice? That's the dumbest name I ever heard. A look between Jim and Caprice. Pamela pulling Jim away, gives the girl a look. JIM Hey! I am the Lizard king. I can do Anything! Raise your hands if you understand! Alive, any of you alive -- let's take a poll -- how many of you know you're really alive!! The crowd giggles. Jim climbs a pole, yells. JIM No one? Raise your hands c'mon man... let's go. On the crowd. A few raise their hands, smile. We IRIS in on the Doors suddenly -- a strange sound -- REVERSE IRIS on Jim -- feeling it now. The peyote. JIM's POV -- Pam irising out. This strange sound in his ears -- a rattle of an Indian gourd, similar to what we heard in the car in Arizona when Jim was a boy. Now a distant Indian drum beating. The beginning strains of THE END dribble in. EXT. DESERT - DAY A dented RED CHEVROLET fishtails on a dry mudflat, whipping up dustdevils. They're all LAUGHING (strange noise) -- in a circle somewhere on the edge of a precipice in deep arroyos and magnificent rocks and cacti... A football huddle of faces - RAY, JOHN, ROBBIE, JIM -- the four DOORS... laughing with the first mad impulse of the peyote. PAM is vomiting her brains out as DOROTHY tries to comfort her on the edge of a cliff... Jim panthers up the dune. JIM Everybody having a good time? They hug. She throws up again. JIM ...awright, pretty good, it gets better. Jim holds his head. Feels the ride. JIM WOA!! It's fast. JUMP CUTS: Jim and Pam are touching each other. Face. Shadows. Sand falls from Pam's hand. Jim turns to hawk at a bird. "Hawk! Hawk!" Then Pam is dancing alone on the dune. Abruptly Jim is back in the circle with the Doors in a sense torn between them and Pam. EXTREME CLOSEUPS of their faces, their eyes, the tensions of the trip tearing apart their teeth as they go from the laughing to the dangerous part. JIM When the serpent appears, his head is ten feet long and five feet wide. He has one red eye and one green eye. He's deadly and he's seven miles long. As he moves -- on his scales is written all the history of the world, all people, all actions, all of us our little pictures on the scales, God it's big! -- and it's eating as it moves all the time, devouring, digesting consciousness, power, a monster of energy! John shutters -- as does Robbie and Ray. Jim seems possessed. JIM We must kiss the snake on the tongue, if it senses our fear, it will eat us instantly. But if we kiss it without fear, the snake will take us through the garden and out the gate. To our freedom -we must ride this snake. To the end of time. Pause. He has instilled a flux of fear in the group. JOHN I think I'm fucked up. I'm not thinking right. JIM You're fucked up John. Go with it, confusion is the sound of creation. JOHN You should see your eyes right now, you're death. Look at your eyes -- you're crazy man, you look crazy. You scare me. JIM No no no John John. God is crazy too. God is part insane as well as sane. Not in control all the time. Dionysus was the God of the wine. He made ecstasy but he also made madness. Madness is all right. That's what you want, isn't it, isn't it? Where's that joint? ROBBIE (crying) I get scared thinking of all the choices inside. I could go. I could stay. I can live anywhere. I could die now if I wanted. It's limitless choice... and no one cares. JIM Die Robbie. JOHN What the fuck! PAM (wandering in) I don't know what I am. I'm on the cusp of Sagittarius and Capricorn. Sagittarius is wild and Capricorn domestic and safe, so I don't know which one to be. Jim looking at her, smiles. JIM I love you. DOROTHY (into the same lens) Oh my God, the light, it's so beautiful Ray. Can you see it... it's all one... honey? Ray has his head buried in his hands. RAY I'm in pain man. I want something from the peyote. I feel the universe functioning perfectly but I'm still perfectly locked inside myself. Instead of Oneness, I feel total Isolation. Aloneness. Fear... Pain... Jim, all I feel is pain. JIM Pain makes me feel more alive Ray. Pain is meant to wake us up. People try to hide their pain but they're wrong. JOHN I feel Lust. I want to fuck everything I can, and I know it will never be enough. JIM (whispers) Pam wants you. (normal) You're a good Catholic John, you want it so you can feel guilty about it... Fuck death away John. ROBBIE I feel Fear... so bad I just numb out all my feelings. I'm afraid of my father, I'm afraid of Yahweh... I wish I could play my guitar. JIM Maybe you should kill your father Robbie. He tried to kill you. Kill him! ROBBIE I'm so fucking scared. JIM But you're Alive! It's beautiful! Fear, pain, lust, we've got to know all our feelings before we can come out the other side free men. Don't feel ashamed of yourselves, don't let society destroy your reality. Our freedom's the only thing worth dying for, it's the only thing worth living for! He takes Ray and Robbie's hands, his voice calming them, reform the circle. John hesitant. Not all will enter the gates at evening. JOHN (cold sweats) I'm not gonna make it man. I'm scared Jim, I'm still scared. Blindness is coming on. JIM Then use us John, use our strength, it's us four now, a tribe of warriors, everything we have comes from the same source, the great Creator of Being. Trust him, trust us. Ride the snake. . . I promise you I will be with you till the end of time. Pulling John into the circle, bonding, their four heads sunk to the desert floor, Jim making wild Indian sounds, deep- throated "shoooh... shoooh"... now humming a song from the desert. JIM My wild love went riding... mmmmmm. She rode all the day. She ride to the devil. And ask for him to pay... shooo shoooo The OTHERS join in his chant, the four rising and falling like a collective breath. JIM (ad lib) ...she went to the desert she went to the sea Joseph we did see... Suddenly Jim breaks and rises out of the circle. Ray, Robbie, John, all looking at him. The same need. Pamela, the desperation of her eyes. JIM (to himself) ...I'm lying to you. I am scared. He goes, his boots in the sand. JOHN Jim, where are you going. JIM (looking back) I'll be back. I gotta go alone. Pamela calling from another dune, far away. PAM Jim! Jim... come here, dance... don't go away. His POV -- of her, receding. She screams for him. He's in pain. Cannot help her. A BIRD of prey in the sky. Jim moving across a lunar landscape. SPECIAL EFFECT: The sun is black like night or else white in a black sky. Voices in the distance. "Jim, where are you going?" A mother's voice, a father's voice. DOORS SONG Can you picture what will be So limitless and free Desperately in need of some stranger's hand in a desperate land Lost in a Roman wilderness of pain and all the children are insane: waiting for the summer rain FLASHBACKS INT. CAR - MOVING - DESERT JIM, 4, in the back of a car in the desert -- looking back... At the overturned truck, the bodies in the road... at the older Indian looking at him... finally at the dying Indian... his eyes. INT. MORRISON HOME - DAY Somewhere. The child alone. On the living room floor. Drawing his sketches in a book. MOM's feet moving past -- then DAD'S feet. We may sense a subtle shift in mood when the parents come in -- from the boy's eyes which never leave the sketch he is drawing. EXT. DESERT - DAY An OLD WOMAN is beckoning to him from an opening in the face of the mountain... then she's gone. JIM bounds towards the crevice. INT. ROCK PALACE - DAY He is in an isolated cathedral of rocks. The CRONE, muttering, leaving through another crevice. Suddenly a MOUNTAIN LION is visible, stretched hugely across a rock. It growls ferociously, upset, and suddenly shoots out the back of the cave. Silence. Jim, thunderstruck, gaping. A gallery of ancient INDIAN PETROGLYPHS surround him on all sides. Curious, oblong figures, buffalo, sacred deer and bear, creatures of the hunt; hunters and their weapons, rain clouds, masked deities proclaiming the answers to the Mysteries, the story of Creation. Camera weaving up to see one of the faces of the deities -- staring at him from the wall -- an eagle's face... DOORS SONG There's danger on the edge of town Ride the King's highway Weird scenes inside the gold mine Ride the King's highway west, baby The sound of a rattle -- "shichishichi" -- he realizes he's being watched. By what? He whips his eyes everywhere. A large LIZARD perches on a boulder assesses him calmly, tatters of a former skin clinging to its throat, spits a forked tongue and drills its black pearly eyes into his skull... Now the sound of the Bull-Roarer, whipping the air, announcing the appearance of the shaman. Jim's struck with an overwhelming sense of... awe... ancient mysteries. He turns. The lizard is looking at him. The GHOST of the DEAD INDIAN is also looking at him. We are looking at JIM from its point of view -- a blur of light, some headdress, a sense of skins... music drops back, no lyrics... the voice is old, familiar, possible Spanish descent dialect or huararchi. INDIAN GHOST VOICE ...you are a prince among white men, yet you are a warrior among us. You are ready now. Go out "walk with the pain of the world, travel to the end of the wind" -- and change it for all men as you were born to do. The voice, the pretense, -- the glow too quickly fades -- leaving Jim so alone, not sure what he has heard, yet he knows he has heard, and he knows he has seen -- and once you have seen, it will never be the same again. His eyes. EXT. CAVE - DAY JIM exits the cave. MATCH CUT TO: INT. WHISKY A GO GO - NIGHT EXTREME CLOSE on JIM'S EYES as he continues with THE END. DOORS SONG Ride the snake Ride the snake, to the lake The ancient lake The snake is long, seven miles Ride the snake He's old, and his skin is cold Camera pulling out from his eyes. There's something different tonight. Something in the air. His eyes are open, he's facing outward, gripping the mike for his life, hair falling in his face, dripping sweat, we sense all his soul concentrated in what he has to say. Cliques of GROUPIES have staked claims at the foot of the stage, eyes fucking him as he writhes, spreading his legs. Every twitch, every moment he sucks out the tension on the musical interludes generates a whip of a reaction in his audience. Nobody is moving in the club. The DANCERS are still, the GO GO GIRLS in their white plastic boots and dresses hang motionless in their gilded cages. Even the WAITRESSES have stopped, frozen with their trays, denying something is going to happen. PAMELA, DOROTHY... JERRY from the Fog, also the manager of this place, watches from the balcony, shaking his head, doesn't understand. Panning to two RECORD TYPES with him -- JAC HOLZMAN, distinguished six footer, suit, and PAUL ROTHCHILD, funky, pigtailed, ex-con, early 30s. JIM & DOORS The west is best (2) Get here and we'll do the rest The blue bus is calling us (2) Driver where you taking us? The band has come together fully now. ROBBIE'S fingers sliding across the trembling strings, staring at the ceiling, wandering around the darkened portions of stage left, he feels Jim -- echoes him back with his flamenco-blues guitar. JOHN on drums, reading Jim's moods, throws in the spontaneous and violent riffs that keep it savage. He literally tortures Jim's ears with his drums. And RAY, concentrated with his nodding head like a big flamingo over his keyboard, mixing it up, throwing curves, yet also -- and more delicately -- torturing Jim with the messianic organ sounds that shriek in his ears. There is something of Merlin in Ray -- the alchemist knowing how to play Jim. And JIM -- "that sneaky silent lithe flowing flexing animal" -- ready at last to share both his body and his soul with the world, to live out the words of the Indian prophet... to lead. JIM The killer awoke before dawn He put his boots on He took a face from the ancient gallery And he walked on down the hall Ray looks over up from his board, catches Robby with a 'what's this?' look... They go with it, improvising... Jim clutching the mike tighter, seeking solace in its arms; it all hangs in the air as if he doesn't have any idea what he's going to say next. JIM He went to the room where his sister lived And he paid a visit to his brother And then he went on down the hall... Pamela sensing something is coming... the AUDIENCE... Jerry... the go-go dancers... JIM And he came to a door, And he looked inside "Father?" "Yes, son?" "I want to kill you". FLASH -- A FATHER'S FACE, any face, older, any man... JIM Mother... I want to... FLASH -- A MOTHER'S FACE, any face, older, a woman JIM AAAAAAAGGGGGGGHHHHHHH YOOOOOUUUUUUUUUU!!!!! FUCK YOU ALL NIGHT! The SCREAMS primal, pure Jim -- Indian savagery ripped from the depths of his soul, of his pain -- bouncing off the walls... As the AUDIENCE gasps, shocked, stunned... As the guitar hits a high, horrid reverb, JIM in slightly SLOW MOTION suddenly tightens his backbone as if electrocuted and shoots violently backwards, hitting the floor like a puppet cut from his string -- we sense Jim himself has crossed a barrier now, gone into yet another stage of his performance, a stage from which he can never return. Like the gunfighter who has killed his first man. RAY sees it instantly where it's going, hits the organ! Robbie and John follow. the instruments EXPLODE all at once trying to bury Jim in his primal unmistakeable scream. The CLUB in shock. Tribal taboo broken in one instant. Jerry exploding off the balcony toward the stage... Pamela, extremely moved and impressed, and Dorothy... the go- go girls, as jaded as they come, are stunned tension... the groupies love it. Jim has jumped up now, dancing an Indian war dance around the mike. JIM Come on baby take a chance with us (X3) And meet me in the back of the blue bus Doona blue rog onna blue bus Doona blue yeah! Come on yeah! INT. BACKSTAGE WHISKY HALLWAY - THAT NIGHT JIM is being muscled out the door by JERRY, livid. JERRY NOBODY'S GONNA FUCK THEIR MOTHER ON MY STAGE! YOU'RE OUTTA HERE. You don't ever come back to play, you don't ever come back to drink -- You're DEAD ON THE STRIP! JIM (ranting back at him) Kill the father, fuck the mother, kill the father, fuck the mother -- that's what I'm into! That's what I'm into! Jerry pinning Jim to the wall, JERRY You -- MORRISON! You're fucking filthy twisted perverse punk, get back to your fucking sewer!! JIM (calmly smiling) You have the face of a pig man. Lost in the melee, RAY and JOHN springing Jim back from likely death RAY JERRY JERRY... He was talking about Oedipus! GREEK TRAGEDY!! It's ART!! JERRY FUCK ART!! GET THE FUCK ART OUT!!! Pushing, shoving, scrambling. Past a long-haired JOURNALIST yelling into a payphone. JOURNALIST NEVER SEEN ANYTHING LIKE THE DOORS -- NEVER!! GET A PHOTOGRAPHER DOWN HERE. "ROLLING STONE'S GOTTA SEE THIS!! As they rumble by him, all yelling at once. Into the street. EXT. ALLEY & STAIRCASE OUTSIDE WHISKY - THAT NIGHT The DOORS go sailing out, followed by one of their drums, JOHN and ROBBIE restraining Jim from going back in. JIM TAKE A LONG LOOK OLD MAN. WE ARE THE FUTURE. WE ARE THINGS TO COME. JERRY FUCK YOU... YOU'RE FUCKING DEAD! Wanting to come after Jim but restrained now by the RECORD MOGULS, HOLZMAN and ROTHCHILD. PAUL Come on Jerry, cool it, cool it... he's a kid, it's a song about dying, changing... JAC HOLZMAN pushing past to Ray. Pamela separating Jim visually from Jerry. JOHN (to RAY and ROBBIE) We'll never work again man. The Mafia controls all these clubs. HOLZMAN (to Ray and Robbie) Quite a night! Hi, I'm Jac Holzman. I own Elektra Records. RAY (knows the name) Oh sure, hi. Holzman pauses, a dramatic presence, six foot two, impeccably dressed, he knows the weight of his words. HOLZMAN Listen... I think if you could just put what you did in there on record, we could really have something... and we could make a lot of money... It hangs there. Impossible words. RAY Yeah? John and Robbie sharing looks. HOLZMAN (pointing to ROTHCHILD coming up) Yeah... and Rothchild here was born to be your producer. ROBBIE (recognizing Paul) Hey, the guy that did Butterfield! PAUL Bertold Brecht, cabaret and rock. Give me a fucking break. You guys are amazing! Let's go make a record. JIM (to Ray, pointing back at Jerry) Hey, is that asshole gonna pay us? HOLZMAN (amused) Why don't you go inside and ask him Jim? Strains of LIGHT MY FIRE cross the cut. INT. SUNSET SOUND RECORDING STUDIO - DAY (1966) Four-track TAPE SYSTEM is rolling. DOORS SONG You know that it would be untrue You know that I would be a liar If I was to say to you Girl, we couldn't get much higher Camera moving fast thru the control room, past the ENGINEER (BRUCE BOTNICK), taciturn, 20's, the PRODUCER (PAUL ROTHCHILD) in pig heaven, and the owner JAC HOLZMAN in his blue suit watching. PAUL Hey Bruce, you feel it? BRUCE I'm having big fun. PAUL (to Jac) I got goosebumps Jac. This is history going down here. An album of killer music in six days... six days... unreal! Camera moving fast past a smiling PAM watching, out to the DOORS on the floor, jamming... on to JIM in the vocal booth, headphone to his ears. JIM Come on baby, LIGHT MY FIIIRRRREEEE!!! The song, now fully -- orchestrated, rolling on over the following MONTAGE: JIM (after song) Pretty good! Pretty neat! EXT. GOLDEN GATE PARK - SAN FRANCISCO (DOCUMENTARY FOOTAGE) - DAY (1967) LIGHT MY FIRE continues. DOCUMENTARY FOOTAGE of the "Human Be-In", the "Summer of Love" -- swarming FLOWER CHILDREN, WAR PROTESTORS. A staged 16mm. grainy shot of JIM and PAMELA, RAY and DOROTHY, JOHN, ROBBIE and their TWO NEW GIRLFRIENDS wandering thru the CROWD sharing the spirit. Pam and Jim fool around -- laughing -- tickling each other for the home movie camera shot by Ray... Pam is goofy, makes funny faces, teases him running a flower under his nose, thru his hair, then trips him. He chases her across the lawn. INT. FILLMORE WEST STAGE - SAN FRANCISCO - NIGHT (1967) The CROWD is "beautiful" -- candles, incense sticks, flowers, vibes of peace and love. The instrumental of "Light My Fire" is playing, but only three DOORS are on stage till Jim comes swinging across on a rope like tarzan all the way across the stage -- then drops down, rebounds lithely and hits the mike. JIM (singing) The time to hesitate is through No time to wallow in the mire. JIM swandives into the stoned crowd with the mike at the instrumental section, a colored spotlight flecking him, GIRLS kiss him. The guys want to be him, the girls want him -- and he knows it, teasing and tantalizing them... JIM Try now we can only lose And our love become a funeral pyre Come on baby, light my fire Try to set the night on FIIIIIIIIIRE!!!!! BODYGUARDS running in to pull him out as he's tossed, like a limp god, over the heads of the crowd, rolling like a buoy on a rocking sea, from hand to hand, Dionysus, devoured limb from limb by the "little girls". PAMELA watching from the side curtain. ALABAMA SONG (WHISKY BAR) now kicks in with its comic, Brechtian strain as we: OMIT Sequence omitted from original script. EXT. AIRPORT TARMAC - DAY Screaming FANS chase the DOORS to a commercial airplane, scribbling autographs. One of the GIRLS smacking JIM on the lips as he laughs, her cameras clicking. PAMELA shooting a home movie of it, pushed aside by the crowd, rescued by ROBBIE and the new young manager, BILL SIDDONS... DOORS SONG Oh show me the way to the next whisky bar Oh don't ask why Oh don't ask why EXT. NEW YORK CITY SKYLINE (SEEN FROM PLANE) - DAY The City as seen by: INT. AIRPLANE - DAY JIM'S face pressed to the window, PAMELA next to him hugging each other. JIM (real close, hugging her) I don't mind dying in a plane crash, a smile on my face. PAMELA (cutting his food) As compared to what? JIM I just don't want to go out slow -- brain tumor, botulism. I want to feel what it's like, cause death is only going to happen to you once. PAMELA I don't want to die ever, what a weird thing to say. DOORS SONG For if we don't find the next whisky bar I tell you we must die I tell you I tell you I tell you we must die EXT. CBS - NEW YORK - NIGHT (SUMMER, 1967) A LIMOUSINE pulling up in front of the Ed Sullivan Marquee. The sidewalk is mobbed with FANS, mostly YOUNG GIRLS. DOORS SONG Oh moon of Alabama We now must say goodbye We've lost our good ol mama We must have whiskey oh you know why INT. LIMO - NIGHT JIM looking out at the MOB with the other DOORS and PAMELA. The look on his face is ironic. His POV -- the YOUNG GIRLS' FACES, arms grasping at the windows like tentacles of a poisonous hydra, their faces deformed by SILENT SCREAMS (we hear faint strangled shrieks below the song)... POLICE and SECURITY pressing them back, linking arms to clear a path for the Doors. DOORS SONG Show me the way to the next little girl Oh don't ask why Oh don't ask why The GIRLS crying hysterically as Jim lazily, leopardly, moves across the CROWD, almost like Oswald waiting for the Ruby bullet but with that sweet, pleasant smile on his face, dark glasses concealing... GIRLS (faint) Oh Jimmmmm, pleeeaaase look, I looove youuuuu, Jimmmmmm, pleeeeeaase, Jimmmmm, here, sign miiiine... take a picture Jim?... Jim, Jim, oh please look at me Jim!! Their voices distorting. A GIRLCHILD squeezing thru the cordon with the fatal bullet. In slightly SLOW MOTION, Jim seeing her come... as she glues herself hip to hip, lip to lip with Jim, her hands clawing at his leather pants. It takes TWO COPS to peel her off. Pamela furious. Jim is gracious with everyone, signs patiently, talks, kisses, shakes hands with the boys, lets them touch his hair, his body, poses for a picture, seems to like it. DOORS SONG For if we don't find the next little girl I tell you we must die I tell you I tell you I tell you we must die INT. CBS BACKSTAGE - THAT EVENING The nervous PRODUCER, HERB, leading "MR. SULLIVAN" thru the corridor to the Doors' DRESSING ROOM past several "ACTS" getting ready to go on... animals, tumblers, a soprano wailing... PRODUCER Right this way Mr. Sullivan. They're called "the Doors". They got the number one single in the country -- "Light Your Fire". SULLIVAN "Light Your Fire"? Is that sooo? PRODUCER They look pretty grungy but we're... INT. DOORS DRESSING ROOM - EVENING Bedlam. MAKE-UP ARTISTS pancaking the faces of the DOORS -- the nightmare coming true. RAY in a white suit with too many pinstripes. ROBBIE a spearmint turtleneck, beads, long sideburns, JOHN in red velveteen head to foot with a tie-dye splotch on the front of it. Their hair's being violated enough by a nervous gay black HAIR DESIGNER to make them totally self-conscious and nervous about their first live TV appearance -- all except JIM who remains in his signature black leather with the silver navajo belt and shiny spangles -- watching a portable TV... A GIRL leaving his side, crossing Pamela. Eye contact between them speaks of Pamela's jealousy. JOHN (indignant) You're gonna cut it! HAIRDRESSER (doing John) No, I'm going to worship it. What kind of shampoo are you using? JOHN The kind you get in hotels. HAIRDRESSER Pamper yourself sweetheart, you don't want split ends, you're a celebrity now. (moving to Ray) You have very serious-serious hair, it needs to rebel. I'll give it a tinge of something freaky. RAY I'd rather stay the same color. HAIRDRESSER Scaredy cat. ROBBIE What about me? HAIRDRESSER (a look) Honey, we don't have enough time. TELEVISION INSERT -- images of DETROIT burning, summer of 67. TV NEWSMAN ...here in Detroit, 42 people dead, more than 2000 injured... 1400 buildings burned, 5000 people have just lost their homes as Detroit joins more than 100 cities torn by riots this hot summer! On JIM, as they pancake him, reflective. JIM No wonder "Light My Fire's" number one. HAIRDRESSER (to JIM) What about you handsome? JIM (friendly) The biggest mistakes in my life have been haircuts. PAM Don't wash it. Don't set it. He likes it the way it is... HAIRDRESSER (backing off) All right, be mean... Commotion from the doorway as the PRODUCER leads the lock- jawed MR. SULLIVAN in with everyone bowing and scraping to the Pope. PRODUCER Boys -- meet Mr. Sullivan Mr. Sullivan waves from the doorway. SULLIVAN Hi boys, heard your song "Light That Fire" (Herb corrects) ...think you're great... good luck out there. DOORS (ad lib) Oh thanks Mr. Sullivan. PRODUCER (moving alongside Ray) Well the guys at Network have told us they have a small problem with the lyrics "girl we couldn't get much higher". You can't say "higher" on network so they asked if... you could say, "girl we can't get much better"... can you dig that? A look from the guys. Jim sullen. Tension in the air. Mr. Sullivan waiting. JIM How 'bout, "girl you couldn't bite my wire". Pause. The producer puzzled a beat. It doesn't go down. PRODUCER I don't think Standards and Practices would... Sullivan exiting, waving at no one in particular like Nixon would. SULLIVAN Look, you boys don't forget to smile now. Don't be so sullen out there... JIM Uh well, we're kind of a sullen group, Ed. SIDDONS reassuring the Producer. SIDDONS We'll work it out Herb, promise. Give me five. PRODUCER (not totally convinced, exiting) Groovy! Uh you boys should know Mr. Sullivan is considering you boys for four more shows. You dig? Pause. JOHN Well? JIM What -- are we the Beatles now John? RAY (laughs) It's only a word man. The Stones changed... JIM Hey Ray, why don't you change your name to Sid or Irving Manzarek or something... it's only a word y'know. ROBBIE It's my words. I don't care, let's just jam. Ray's seething tension. Younger brother starting to get out of hand. INT. STUDIO STAGE - THAT NIGHT SULLIVAN stiffly introducing them. SULLIVAN Now here on our stage direct from Los Angeles, California, ladies and gentlemen, The Doors! The lights come up on the DOORS in their ultimate nightmare -- each Door appearing consecutively in a lightspot as Jim sings the ubiquitous "Light My Fire", trapped in this Elvis Presley -- Vegas act, he looks like he couldn't care less. DOORS hang suspended everywhere on the set -- their name spelled out in big block standup letters. Jim has a hard-on in his pants, barely concealed by his tight leathers. PRODUCER (in control booth) What's that?... oh Jesus!... get off it!! Where's he going? Jim misses his marks deliberately, the camera having a hard time following him. JIM & DOORS You know that it would be untrue You know that I would be a liar If I was to say to you Girl, we couldn't get much higher Come on baby light my fire INT. CONTROL BOOTH (SIMULTANEOUS) - THAT NIGHT The PRODUCERS freaking out. PRODUCER (hyperventilating) He said it! He said it! On National TV You can't do that! You can't do that!!! You blew it you little shit! You'll never play Ed Sullivan again. Jim on the monitors, singing through to his freedom, falls on the floor flat, the camera missing him completely. JIM Come on baby, light my fire Try to set the night on FIIIIRRRRRE! INT. HOTEL BEDROOM -- NEW YORK - NIGHT OVERHEAD ANGLE -- JIM lies there in a sweat. PAMELA pulls off him, naked, frustrated, trying to rouse him. PAM (tender) What can I do, what do you want me to do?... Jim? JIM I don't know... I guess I should see a doctor or something... maybe I should go to someone of the straight Jungian philosophy. PAM It happens to other guys too... Jim, quietly pissed, reaches for the whiskey bottle at the side of the bed. JIM It's so scary up there. To be adored. Isn't that irony? Teenage death girls want my dick -- a mere clown -- not my words. I'll never wake up in a good mood again... Lament for my cock, a tongue of knowledge deep in the feathered night, gives life, soar and crucify, I seek to know you... PAM It's not so complicated Jim, it's just sex, y'know. JIM You should marry an insurance salesman. PAM It's the hours man, the pressure, everything's like your last performance, you're setting yourself up. JIM We weren't built to last. PAM Aren't you doing this for you, because you're a poet, not a rock star. Ed Sullivan's not a place for you. JIM You really know what I am Pam? You know what poetry is? Where is the feast they promised us? Where is the wine -- the new wine -- dying on the vine? PAM What are you saying! JIM Y'see -- I lied to you. I really love Fame. PAM (Here we go) Why are you doing this to me? JIM (drinks) 'Cause you're in the room. She tries to take the bottle away. He resists. They struggle. It becomes a fight. PAM And this is gonna help! It's probably the cause. 'Least put some soul in your success asshole! JIM Maybe you're the cause! PAM Right. JIM I mean I don't have this problem with anybody else. PAM (getting the bottle) Give it to me!!! JIM (getting it back) No!!!!! Mommy!!! PAM (gives up, tries to exit) Fuck you man I'm outta here. He grabs her. They lurch, smashing the lamp. WILD CHILD song kicking in. JIM (excited now) Get mad! Yeahhh! Love my girl! Yeah, go fuck the other guys. How many white guys have you fucked Pam? 10, 20? Black guys what? You like Chinese dicks? Mongolian penis? 30? PAM (fighting) ...how many dogs have you fucked! You don't say No to anybody! Drugs, dogs, uglies, you'd fuck a doorknob with butter on it! JIM How could I do that PAM (shouting top of her lungs) You're the first one who couldn't make it with me anyway! You're the only limp dick in the lot!!! Camera running at them from the end of the room. JIM laughs manically as they roll off the bed into a wall. Kicking, hitting hard. DOORS SONG Wild Child full of grace Savior of the human race Your cool face Natural child, terrible child Not your mother or your father's child Your own child, screaming wild JIM HA HA HA!! WILL YOU DIE FOR ME! PAM NO! WILL YOU DIE FOR ME!! JIM I'D DIE FOR ANYBODY. PAM WHAT ABOUT ME! WHAT ABOUT ME! JIM CUNT CUNT CUNT. PAM LIAR LIAR LIAR. YOU PROMISED. YOU PROMISED. JIM I'M SORRY I'M SORRY I'M SORRY. A VOICE across the wall joining in, banging. VOICE SHADDUP WILLYA. I'M TRYING TO SLEEP!!!! JIM THEN MOVE TO MIAMI YOU SLAVE!!! More nagging. By this time the fight has expired of its own volition. JIM (quietly) You were saying? They giggle, start to laugh. Then they cuddle on the floor, in the corner, in this semi-lit New York hotel room. JIM (low) ...will you die for me, Pam, a clown, a despicable clown?... a mere despicable clown? PAM Yes yes yes. JIM ...I need a home. A place to hide. PAM ...with me. Yes... yes... JIM (mumbling) ...how could we make a home?... where there's sanctuary? PAM ...yes, yes, yes. He's hard now. She's guiding him inside her. JIM ...we're in Africa, we're just animals... I wanna stay inside you all night baby... let's fuck death away, now fuck death away... PAM ...yes... INT. PRESS CONFERENCE - HOTEL SUITE NEW YORK - DAY Camera moving in past the buffet, champagne, flowers in the hotel suite overlooking CENTRAL PARK... to the DOORS in armchairs surrounded by an informal group of a DOZEN JOURNALISTS and PRESS PHOTOGRAPHERS... JIM behind dark shades drinking long Hawaiian fruit punches, decked out in snakeskin. JOURNALIST 1 (stiff, Times type) What are your songs about Mr. Morrison? TIME DISSOLVES over the questions and answers. A vaguely dreamy quality. JIM Uh love death travel... revolt. We all write the songs, we're interested in anything about disorder, chaos, especially activity which seems to have no meaning... I think when you make peace with authority, you become authority. JOURNALIST 1 Can you define that a little more? JIM Yeah you can call us erotic politicians I guess. DISSOLVING OVER: JOURNALIST 2 Do you really consider yourself a shaman Mr. Morrison? DISSOLVING OVER: JIM ...a scapegoat maybe -- I take on the audiences' fantasies, obeying their impulses. When the impulses are destructive, I'm destructive. It's kinda like sucking the puss out of a rattlesnake, something like that. JOURNALIST 1 (smiling) ...like a medicine man or witch doctor? RAY (cuts in) Jim said to me once, the history of rock and roll's like Greek drama or caveman stories. The audience comes to see ancient rituals in ancient caves. Their souls in jeopardy. They're not watching any longer, they're participating -- and everything's in play, your life, your death... JOURNALIST 1 (glib) Is that why they scream so much? Gentle laughter. The JOURNALISTS don't get it... panning their looks. The backbeat of CRYSTAL SHIP, dreamy hazy, Warhol- like interview floating over the room like a giant mushroom cloud. DISSOLVING TO: JOURNALIST 3 (more down to earth) Mr. Morrison, how do you feel about being called the "ultimate barbie doll". On Jim -- a beat. A sickly smile spreads. JIM I guess when you say something like that, it's a shortcut to thinking. JOURNALIST 3 Then do you "think" about the dreadful reviews your new poetry book has gotten? Holding up a copy of "The Lords and New Creatures". JIM (softly) I guess they didn't understand. JOURNALIST 3 (having scored) And it's true you financed it's publication? Jim motions him over, whispers something at SIDDONS who goes to fetch a pair of scissors. RAY (angry) Have you bothered to read the poetry ma'm? You keep denying that anything good can come from L.A., I mean isn't that kind of a provincial attitude? That Bob Dylan's the only poet cause he's from the East Coast, but you won't even look past Jim's goddamn looks at the words man! JIM (embarrassed) Hey c'mon Ray, hate should be allowed. JOURNALIST 1 ...but what really are your songs about Mr. Morrison? You preach, "saving the planet", "making a new age" but how does drinking, taking drugs, this boozy sort of apocalyptic stance at the world influence young people in a positive way? JIM I like that -- "boozy apocalyptic" -- you're a word man, but how does your newspaper influence young people to think about Vietnam? Who's sending the soldiers over there to die? The establishment -- right? Your newspaper -- right? That seems to me a lot more dangerous than the stuff we do. DISSOLVING OVER: JOURNALIST 3 Do you believe in drugs Mr. Morrison? SIDDONS comes back in, hands Jim a pair of scissors. JIM (graciously disdainful) Did you know Nietzsche said, "all good consciousness, all evidence of truth comes only from the senses"? Hey you wanna arm wrestle? Come on, you look pretty tough today. C'mon, I'll take you all on. JOURNALIST 3 (ignoring his smile) And alcohol? Is that considered part of the shaman's wisdom? JIM Part of the clown's wisdom -- it's kinda the American way. You know we spend more on alcohol and tobacco than on education. DOUBLE IMAGES on the DISSOLVES. JOURNALIST 3 Are you by any chance in a trance now Mr. Morrison? JIM Do you hurt? JOURNALIST 3 What? JIM What hurts you the most? He cuts his hair with the scissors. A commotion. JOURNALIST 3 What are you doing? DISSOLVING OVER: JIM Uh... got tired of the barbie doll look. It hurt. JOURNALIST 3 Are you serious? JIM (cutting hair blindly) About? Y'know when people are joking, I find they are dead serious and when they're dead serious, I find them funny. They're amazed. The point is made however -- visibly. The anger in his action is so extreme yet so contained -- the cynosure of all eyes as always. Eyes shooting back at JOURNALIST 3... JOURNALIST 4 cuts in from the back of the room altering the mood. JOURNALIST 4 What do your parents think about what you are doing? JIM (pause) Actually, I don't really remember being born. It musta happened during one of my blackouts. Laughter. JOURNALIST 4 with dark hair and demeanor, gypsy- like jewelry on her arm and avant garde clothing, large glasses, is probably a rock magazine writer but seems to like Jim and his work. JOURNALIST 4 But they must've expressed some feeling? JIM (pause) Well, to be honest they're not living anymore so I don't like to talk about that. Flashbulbs hitting his face at that moment. JOURNALIST 4 Could you at least tell us how they died? Jim puts the scissors down, going to a low mysterious voice. JIM Oh, it was a... horrible car crash... in the desert in the fifties, Arizona... ran right into a truckload of Indians... Navajos, they were lying out on the road, all bleeding, and I was with my Grandma and Grandad, we were banged up and all... and I was looking at my Dad and he was lying there... but his throat was severed and there was air coming out. He puts the room in a hush. He has mesmerized them and they're not sure whether to believe it or not. JOURNALIST 4 I'm sorry. JOURNALIST 2 I have the feeling I'm being put on. Jim rises, staggers slightly as he makes his way to the bar on the way out of the room, smiles right at her, ignoring everybody else in the room. JIM Y'all believe what you want to believe, you will anyway... but it does kinda show you what excites people? (looking directly at her) Fear, pity, horror -- all those good things that count. It's sorta I guess like being on the edge of an orgasm, y'know... that mystery just before you come. When? If? Should I? Will you die for me, eat me, this way, the end... He goes. The room in silence, embarrassed, nervous titters looking at Journalist 4 who flushes deeply as we cut to: INT. PATRICIA'S SOHO LOFT - THAT DAY (RAIN) Rain, rain, rain... pelting the large windows as we glide to JIM fucking JOURNALIST 4 (PATRICIA KENNEALY) madly in the twisted sheets... He gives up, exhausted. The SONG CRYSTAL SHIP backbeats the scene... He wanders around her place. Her place is crammed with books and intellectualabilia, skulls, candles, globes of the world, plants. She puts her glasses back on. PATRICIA You want to do some more cocaine? It'll loosen you up. JIM Great! A new thing. As she goes to a bowl of cocaine, laid alongside a bottle of champagne and a basketful of items all catered by Jim. He's at her bookcase, thumbing through an ancient manuscript. JIM Wow how old is this? INSERT -- the DRAWINGS in the book pertain to Witchcraft. PATRICIA (snorting) 14th Century. I practice the Craft. JIM The Craft? PATRICIA I'm a witch (smiles) A white one. JIM (impressed) Wow! You Patricia? Who would've guessed? Ironic of course when you look at her long dark locks and demeanor. She looks back at him, challenging. PATRICIA The Kennealy's were Celtic cheiftains and pre-Christian shamans when your Druid ancestors the Morrisons were a minor Scottish clan founded by a bastard son of the king of Norway. JIM reappraising her. Her eye contact is very direct. PATRICIA It's a religion, witchcraft. Witches are the protectors of the seasons, the harvests, goddesses of the grain. And when crossed, destroyers. Jim waits. Something in the feeling of the room has shifted. The sound of her razor chopping coke. He snorts -- the first time. PATRICIA You ever try drinking blood? JIM What? PATRICIA It works you know. You drink blood the right time of the moon... they used to dance in the forests naked. I think that's what offended the Puritans and led to the Burnings. They were a sexual threat to their male order like the Bacchae -- five days a year for Dionysus, they used to wander the hills in ancient Greece, the first witches, clans of wild women fucking, looting, eating animals raw, the wine in their blood running hot -- looking for Dionysus... to tear him to pieces -- isn't that wild? Jim is down on his knees crawling around her. She is crawling back. JIM (hooked) Where do you get the blood? Patricia laughs. SUPERIMPOSITION TO: PATRICIA drawing blood from her arm -- wipes it on his mouth. Some of it spills out, tamping the white powder with red stains. Jim watching enthralled, coked out. She hands him the jewelled Moroccan dagger. PATRICIA Blood is the rose of mysterious union, symbol of potency... now you. JIM No... I don't like... cutting myself. PATRICIA (stern) Don't be such a child! If I do it, you have to do it. He extends his arm. The look between them. He closes his eyes like a little boy. She makes the cut. DOORS SONG Before you slip into unconsciousness I'd like to have another kiss Another flashing chance at bliss Another kiss, another kiss SUPERIMPOSITIONS: Candles, incense burn. As Jim and Patricia dance in the loft naked to music, drinking champagne. JUMP CUT: He is chasing her with one of her goat horns between his legs. They wrestle, yell, lusty bacchanale. SUPERIMPOSITIONS TO: They're fucking madly on the wooden floor of the loft, bathed in blood and white powder all over the place, rain pelting the windows, thunder, Orff's "Carmina Burana" cutting in over the Doors' song. PATRICIA (sexy) Come on rock god, fuck me, fuck me good. In slightly ape-like SLOW MOTION, he's wildly thrusting at her like a stallion, then reaches down, yanks out her diaphragm -- holds it to her eyes briefly and throws it across the room into the fireplace. JIM (lips out of sync) I'm gonna burn you down. PATRICIA Come on... Incants him to climax with CELTIC WORDS. Jim is wild, reaching for the Moroccan dagger, holding it to her face as he continues to pump. PATRICIA Cut me! Cut me go on! JIM (knife to her cheek) Nobody'd ever look at you again -- 'cept me. I'd scar you forever. PATRICIA Yeah YEAH! JIM AWRIGHT! AWRIGHT! PATRICIA FUCK ME! FUCK ME!! GO ON FUCK ME!!! DOORS SONG The crystal ship is being filled A thousand girls, a thousand thrills A million ways to spend your time When we get back I'll drop a line The camera shooting up to the ceiling in a tilting dutch angle as the world comes unglued. Jim yelling with release. DISSOLVE TO: INT. PHOTOGRAPHIC STUDIO - NEW YORK - ANOTHER DAY GLORIA STAVERS, beautiful 30ish ex-Vogue model shooting Jim for her layout. It's not going well. He's resisting, the attitude negative to be photographed, compounded by the acid it seems he's on. GLORIA Take off your shirt. JIM (cow noise) Mooooooo!!! GLORIA (taking his shirt off) You remind me of a Russian peasant. I see you standing in a wheat field. The pride, the arrogance. You love to look at yourself don't you. You love yourself. (he's moving, getting into it) ...good... big cat stalking... JUMP CUTS -- photos going off... JIM starting to pout narcistically, Jagger-like, for camera -- a bare-chested pose, long lion's mane of hair streaming down to his shoulders. She's shooting rapidly talking him thru the trip. Her sentences falling on separate cuts of Jim. As we hear the backbeat of PEOPLE ARE STRANGE. GLORIA ...the camera is like a roulette wheel Jim. It becomes whoever you want it to be -- a woman you want to seduce, a man you want to kill, a mother you want to upset, a wife you want to lie to or love, whatever you want it to be, it is... JIM (pausey, paranoid) Where are the Doors. He resists, he goes with it, push pull, prowling her loft on the acid, a bottle of cognac in one hand -- changing from shot to shot like a chameleon, free, wild, vicious, obscene. GLORIA Forget the Doors. It's you they want, Jim. You're the Doors. JIM (scared suddenly) We do everything together. GLORIA You control the audience, like dogs, manipulate them Jim, one picture can control a million people, be anything you want -- growl at them, be ugly, be frightened, be selfish. Be man, woman, whild, animal. Live, die, return again. Anything you want. Everything is permitted. A weird dance ensuing between them -- teasing, enticing. He runs away, writhes along her wall, being photographed inch by moving inch. He crawls to her. She gets down with him on the floor, straddling him, photographing. Then he straddles her as she shoots him from her back. They kiss, flirting. He growls like an animal... dives into her closet... tearing open the doors, flinging away hanging clothes, he finds her white fur coat and puts it on... JUMP CUT -- him as he moves to her full-length MIRROR, contorting himself. She slides up behind him. GLORIA Go on look at yourself, fall in love with yourself. You're your own audience now Jim. They want you. Worship and love and adore you... A pause. She wants him. No longer so cool. GLORIA ...Jim Morrison, the god of Rock and Cock... JIM I am the snake and you are the lute GLORIA Exactly... Our camera dwells on Jim in the mirror, closer, closer -- the image and the reality, which is which anymore -- where does it end? The Great Jim Morrison, The Shaman, then Pamela, Patricia, Gloria, a series of women who face after face fill the ancient gallery, interchangeable masks as PEOPLE ARE STRANGE climaxes and JIM's face SPINS OUT OPTICALLY TO: DOORS SONG People are strange when you're a stranger Faces look ugly when you're alone Women seem wicked when you're unwanted Streets are uneven when you're down LIMBO - MAGAZINE COVERS JIM'S FACE on a series of MAGAZINES twirling -- "SIXTEEN", "GLAMOUR", ROCK MAGAZINES, etc. flowering out into: INT. DOWNTOWN LOFT - NEW YORK - NIGHT (WINTER) Style vampires drink and grope and drug and dance under the staccato blips of strobe lights. Artists and intellectuals, groupies and debutantes, everyone on display, as contrived and replicated as one of the Warhol prints of Elvis or Marilyn and Mao on the walls... FISHEYE POVS -- hearkening back to the acid trip -- as JIM wanders through the dream, drinking, smoking, swallowing pills. PEOPLE look at him, talk to him (AD LIBS) but drugs distort everything and their voices are foreign, incoherent and they disappear. "PEOPLE ARE STRANGE" continuing: DOORS SONG When you're strange Faces come out of the rain When you're strange No one remembers your name When you're strange When you're strange When you're strange INT. ROOM - LIMBO Jim peering into a room somewhere -- one of Warhol's FILMS is playing on a wall -- a man sleeping, eating... A GLIMPSE OF VIETNAM WAR FOOTAGE on a TV monitor -- B-52s dropping bombs. A fat little PR MAN grabbing Jim's arm, leaning in, distorted. PR MAN (cool) You must meet Andy Warhol, Jim. He's more than an artist. Andy is art. Bright people in America wonder -- does Andy imitate life, or does life imitate Andy. The meeting of two kings. Yes, Come. PAMELA is suddenly there, laughing, nuttily introducing a handsome strapping TOM BAKER, a charismatic actor, and a COUNT, suave, urbane, on heroin. Her voice lost in the jabber -- their names sound as if they're in a bottom of a tank. PAMELA seems so impressed with the high life of New York. PAMELA Oh Jim this is Tom... Baker, he's an actor, he was in Andy's movie and this is Count Ruspoli. He lives in Paris, but he's Italian. He's from a very famous family over there. They're seven hundred years old. COUNT (Italian accent) Hi Jim, you are great... I see you at Ondine's with Bobby and Jimmy. It... PR guy stays there, introduces himself to the count. PAM (pawing at Jim) Don't you like the way he talks. Isn't he cool? JIM (annoyed with Pam) Yeah... hey what's your trip? TOM (cutting in) Saw your gig at 'The Scene'. Hot... very hot... You strung out? Here. Try this. (pill, popper, joint, a drink, all at once) JIM Love your movies man. What a great penis... Tom is obviously a major druggie. A popper -- joint trade- off going off. RAY's face leaning in distorted. RAY Come on, we're splitting man. Dorothy's waiting at the door. We'll get a bite at Max's and... JIM You can't leave. Where's your will to be weird man? JOHN DENSMORE appearing with a wasted looking ROBBIE who is giggling, high, and with a NEW GIRLFRIEND in tow. JOHN Get outta here man. This is fucking weird man. The PR MAN is still next to Jim, jumping up and down excitedly waving across the room at nothing in particular. As the PHOTOGRAPHERS try to get Jim and the Doors in a photo opportunity. PR MAN Right this way Jim. Andy's in the bedroom. JIM (to RAY) Don't go, y'see Norman Mailer, I hear he's here? RAY Yeah can we meet him, he's great... just like he is. (enamored) You wanna meet him? JIM (paranoid) I don't know... did he know who you were? RAY Yeah sure, he's cool, come on, he's your hero! JIM Nah... later... A wasted, emaciated Edie Sedgewick type floats into Jim's fractured POV -- introducing a MAN with a crew cut and silk suit. EDIE (echoey voice) Hey Jim, this is Jake Johnson, you remember Jake Johnson -- the astronaut, he's just got back from outer space. JAKE JOHNSON I like the Doors, I like the Doors, I like the Doors. JIM I like outer space. Tom Baker brings a tall, incredible looking BLONDE in black leather towards him. TOM Hey where's my joint? (a roach goes back) There's this chick sings with the Velvet Underground, Andy's band. She says she can drink you under the table. They stare at each other like two cats. Eye level stares that go on and on. She finally hisses in a German accent. NICO I'm Nico. It's boring tonight. Some of us are going downtown to a new club. You want to come? A voice to kill, looks to undress, fully as tall as Jim. TOM (distantly heard) ...elevate your taste in trolls man. JIM (to Nico who reaches for her vodka) Vodka? Race you. NICO Your death... JIM (to Ray and Robbie) Wanna go?... Come on let's go. ROBBIE She looks too freaky to me. NICO Wait just a minute. As she floats away. JIM Come on there's pussy Robbie. ROBBIE (excited) Hey I met this chick Lynne, she wants to be alone. Lynne is there, pretty, nods to Jim. RAY Come on Jim, let's go. JIM (childlike) Don't you guys wanna meet Andy Warhol? JOHN Tell you the truth, I can live without him. He's a freak. Let's get outta here. We got a show tomorrow. JIM Come on man! I thought we were gonna be a band, the four of us -- and party all night, rock and roll! RAY (laughs) I could never keep up with you Jim. I couldn't make the music. Jim's eyes briefly on -- Pamela giggling with the French Count, putting her hand on his arm as she laughs. Innocent, nothing meant but a moment... JIM (desperate mockery, grabs Ray) Don't go. Don't leave! You can't leave. I don't know what will happen. It might be Death. RAY Come on Jim, this isn't our scene, these people are vampires. We gotta stick together man, the four of us. Let's make the myths man. A moment, strange. Slightly SLOW MOTION. Ray tapping Jim's shoulder goodbye... Robbie and John's faces passing on. As if they're parting -- in a symbolic way. Jim blinking in the same SLOW MOTION, looking. Nico is gone -- but Tom is there, across the room, waving. The INDIAN SHAMAN looks like he's standing there in a corner. Jim, ripped, heads for him, but the PR WOMAN cuts him off. Jim forgets he saw the Indian. PR MAN Right here Jim, right here. Andy's waiting. You know what you have in common is uniqueness. Past more faces. The Music has subtly shifted to STRANGE DAYS somewhere along the way. DOORS SONG Strange days have found us Strange days have tracked us down They're going to destroy Our casual joys We shall go on playing or find a new town Past a cache of QUEENS in white leather ogling Jim, one of them coming over boldly, chatting him up (AD LIB dimly heard), them grabbing his crotch and kissing him. Jim rearing back, laughing but wary. Past the RICH LADIES dripping with jewels and faces peeled from Brazilian sleep tanks and Swiss knives. Past a YOUNG MAN dressed in Jim Morrison leather pants with his hair and eye make-up, a warped image of Jim, smiling back at him. JIM (looking for Nico) Nico! INT. BEDROOM - SAME NIGHT A quieter room, drugged out, the PR GUY cheerily leading JIM, stepping over SLEEPING BODIES, over fur coats strewn across the floor... to a MAN with white hair like a circus clown, his back to us, talking with some black-tied EUROPEAN ARISTOCRATS looking so cool. WARHOL Well, it was such a big opening, we just had to go to Philadelphia, y'know, you were supposed to, mmm... PR GUY (butting in) Andy! Andy! ANDY turning at the interruption. He looks like a chic voodoo doll. Holding an incongruous gold telephone in his arms like a teddy bear. Slightly SLOW MO as Warhol's black empty eyes confront Jim -- a pit of nothingness in them, amnesia, death. In Jim's SLOW MOTION reaction we read what he sees. Andy going on with his story, to the group that includes TOM BAKER. ANDY ...but so many people showed up, the paintings were getting crushed, so they took them all down... um, it really looked great y'know... maybe uhhh... (long pause) PR MAN (cutting in) ...the walls. The blank walls. Andy was the art. Should do a show. Just walls. Today it's really about people, not what they do. It's the astronaut that matters, not the voyage, the actor, not the movie -- how do I say, it's the trip, not arriving. Andy is looking at Jim. Jim at Andy. PR MAN (babbling on) ...you know what Andy says, some day everybody's gonna be famous for 15 seconds, but it won't mean anything. BAKER That's too short. I need a coupla hours. They laugh. Andy's eyes hidden, face as white as styrofoam. ANDY We'd just love to have you in our movies Jim, you're so beautiful, you'd be so good, you mmmm, here... this is for you Jim. Andy shows his eyes, gives Jim the gold telephone he's carrying. ANDY Edie gave this to me and said mmmmm, I could talk to God with this. But I don't really have anything to say. So... mmmm now you can talk to God. Oh hi! Vanishes, waving to somebody else. Jim holding the phone. DOORS SONG Strange days have found us And through their strange hours We linger alone Nico reappears waving at him to come quickly. NICO Morrison! EXT. NEW YORK STREET - NIGHT (WINTER) SNOW on the streets... a group of DRUGGIES staggering in the snowbanks, throwing snowballs, stupid giggling, wheezing puffs of cold air... Jim throws the golden telephone into the trash and pees on it. IRIS SHOTS continue -- PAMELA laughing battily with TOM BAKER who's putting the make on her... The COUNT is on heroin. JIM passing a vodka bottle back and forth with NICO hitting a stash of ups. They fall in the snow, mad Russian winter. DOORS SONG Bodies confused Memories misused As we run from the day To a strange night of stone (SONG REPEATS OVER) INT. HOTEL CORRIDOR (REGENCY) - THAT NIGHT BLACK & WHITE IRIS SHOTS continue -- imagistic, disassociative. A LONG CORRIDOR -- COUPLE staggering down the red carpets, champagne bottles in hand. The COUNT gets lost. PAM laughing -- suddenly alone, notices, goes looking for Jim... floating down this endless corridor with white doors and red carpet. INT. ELEVATOR NICO stripping... a superb body... riding the floors... Jim taking an amyl nitrate with her... laughing... Nico with that crazed German laugh... PAMELA pushing the elevator buttons wildly... The elevator opening on her. From Pamela's POV -- Nico down on her knees, her blonde head buried in Jim's leather pants... Jim pinned against the back wall, smiling dopically, eyes barely registering Pam... who screams loud and long, hiding his eyes... not wanting to know... The images faster and more fragmented: Pam beating at Jim wildly. He's laughing. Nico's laughing. The Aristocrats in the hallway are laughing. The world is laughing with its madness. DOORS SONG Strange days have found us Strange days have tracked us down INT. NEW HAVEN CONCERT HALL - NIGHT (1967) An eager rowdy CROWD chants DOORS! DOORS! DOORS! DOORS! to a stage without the Doors. TECHIES are moving amplifiers, running sound checks, stalling time, the MANAGER SIDDONS gauging the crowd, nervous. RICH GIRLS and LOCAL HONCHOS have backstage passes. COPS crawling over the stage, the PROMOTER of the concert trying to get the crowds attention. TECHIE (at mike) Testing one-two-three. Testing. PROMOTER (on mike) Look, the Fire Marshall's not gonna let the show go on. Either you go back to your seats, you go to the aisle, you don't do that -- no show! CROWD (pushing towards stage, no aisles) DOORS! DOORS! DOORS! (turning to) MORRISON! MORRISON! MORRISON! INT. BACKSTAGE CORRIDOR - SAME NIGHT The SOUNDS of the CROWD pound thru the hallway. CAMERA following JIM reading a magazine article, accompanied by PATRICIA KENNEALY -- past the TECHIES, turning to look -- they go into empty SHOWER ROOM. INT. SHOWER ROOM - SAME NIGHT The Crowd NOISE still carries, echoing. JIM leads PATRICIA to a quiet, isolated stall where they can be alone. Tapping the magazine, sincerely moved by what he reads. JIM "Lord Byron"? Really. You think? You like the poems? PATRICIA Like? I loved them! "Mad bad and dangerous to know." That's what they said about him. Your poems should be taken as seriously. JIM These are the kindest words I've ever heard in my life. No one has ever understood. Thank you. (then) Maybe I should always fuck my critics. PATRICIA Y'know I don't even like rockers. They're sleazy. I made up my fuck list the other night -- out of 30 guys there were maybe three of them, y'know. I'm not a groupie. JIM (hotter, grabs her) Let's do it, here, now... with the sound of the crowd. Like Nuremberg, wild German fucking. PATRICIA You like that hunh? Beg! JIM I'm begging! I'm begging you! PATRICIA You wanna fuck me, Morrison, don't ever lie to me again. Ever! JIM About what! PATRICIA Your father. Why do you tell me bullshit like your father's dead? JIM (pissed) What's your problem with fathers! They're dead, both of them, I told you. PATRICIA If he's so dead, then who answered the phone when I called the house? Jim -- a look, struck. PATRICIA (knowing look) You didn't really think you'd get away with that, Morrison. An Admiral in the United States Navy. Who's at the Gulf of Tonkin when Vietnam starts. Your Dad's a Deputy Chief of Operations. JIM What'd he say? That was really stupid. Why didn't you just ask me. PATRICIA Well naturally he wasn't too happy when I called. Your Mom wanted to talk but he shut her off. JIM You're a fuckin' cunt. You could ruin his career if... PATRICIA What, I'm a "fuckin' cunt" because I called the house? Like it's hard to trace your school records. University of Florida, Albuquerque, New Mexico, Arlington, Virginia, Washington, D.C. Brother, sister, it's seven miles long baby -- it's all in the "The End", it's so easy. Fingering his pants, her hand slips inside. Teasing, dominating him. Her dark side radiant. PATRICIA Don't ever try to hide anything from me again. Okay? Go on... tell me. Did he make you cut your hair? Did he hit you, was he a bully? Did he love you? How much? Jim describes a small space between thumb and forefinger. PATRICIA And your mother? Jim makes a little larger space. JIM (pause) I don't want to talk about it. Hate is a very underestimated emotion. His look is right at her. Silence. Patricia knows he won't talk. Through the pause we hear the crowd chanting, bigger and bigger -- "MORRISON MORRISON MORRISON!" She's excited, wanting to make love here, now. He's cooled out, however. PATRICIA It doesn't matter anymore does it. Listen to them. It's you they want now. Not the Doors, not your mother or your father's child... They want you Jim. Jim shakes his head, weary. Suddenly he's scared inside. JIM You're wrong. What they want I can't give... my death -- ripped to pieces -- do you feel their power? (the noise pounding) PATRICIA You have no choice, Jim. I see you up there like Icarus. I see you flying closer and closer to the sun. And your wings are melting... JIM I want to live, Patricia. I don't wanna die. Jim's ironic eyes, to the ceiling. Laden with a power to which he has married himself yet brave, resisting as she pulls his zipper down and goes to her knees in front of him. Shaking his head. JIM Patricia... Patricia... A beefy COP stands there looking at them, COP Whatcha doing there? JIM Uh... nuthin' COP (approaching, suspicious) Okay, outta there both of you. No one's allowed backstage. Let's go. PATRICIA You idiot, don't you know who... JIM Hey, I'm with the band man. It's cool. Take it easy. THE COP has no patience, grabs JIM by the arm and pulls. JIM shoves him off. THE COP pushes back. A shoving match. COP Let's go. NOW! You're both under arrest. JIM (pointing to his crotch, angry) Hey, eat it man! The cop whips out a black can from his belt, sprays Jim. JIM Mace! Shit! (in pain) Patricia screaming at the COP grabs JIM, propelling him violently out the stall of the bathroom. INT. BACKSTAGE CORRIDOR - SAME NIGHT PATRICIA Help! They got Jim!!! JIM Why'd you blind me man? You blinded me! SIDDONS and RAY running up with ROADIES and OTHERS. SIDDONS What the hell happened! (to Jim) Don't touch Jim. Get some water. Don't touch your eyes. JIM (in pain) I BEEN BLINDED MAN. I BEEN MACED. COP (realizing) Hey all he said was... SIDDONS He was WHAT! He's Jim Morrison for chrissake. Jim, Jim -- you okay -- let's get you under the water here. Don't touch, you'll be okay. COP 2 comes up. COP 1 I'm going to have to issue a warrant for his arrest. SIDDONS Are you NUTS! (blocking them) JIM guided back into the shower stall by his entourage, eyes blind as Oedipus, starts to laugh. A black Irish laugh. Ray looking on PATRICIA in the hallway. A beat, senses what happened. RAY Why don't you leave him alone lady, he doesn't need more shit in his life. PATRICIA What do you know what Jim needs? A precise military Drum Beat hits as we launch into "The Unknown Soldier". DOORS SONG ...Hup two -- three -- four... COMPANY HALT! INT. NEW HAVEN STAGE - THAT NIGHT THE DOORS on stage, JIM - eyes masked, facing death at a mock execution, in full black leather armor. DOORS SONG Present arms!... The famous drum roll, tension building. Sudden sound of guitar. Jim crumples to the ground. Blood shooting from his mouth. JIM & DOORS Make a grave for the unknown soldier Nestled in your hollow shoulder The unknown soldier Practice as the news is read Television children dead Bullet strikes the helmet's head It's all over The war is over! The audience is enrapt. Jim suddenly jumps up, looses the blood curdling scream of an aroused demon and the band bangs into Willie Dixon's BACK DOOR MAN. JIM & DOORS OH YEEEEAAAAHHHHHHHHHH! AYYYYYYAAAAAMMMMAAA BACK DOOR MAN. The FANS go wild, to the farthest reaches of the arena, as he grabs his crotch and shakes it at them. INSTAMATICS flashing rapidly as the KIDS press forward at Jim fondling the mike stand, sliding up and down its smooth shaft. JIM & DOORS Well the men don't know But the little girls unnerstan'... Joints sail onto the stage at his feet, ready to be smoked. A TEENAGE BOY & GIRL make a break thru the cordon of COPS at the front of the stage, heading for Jim. The Cops chase them down mid-stage, and wrestle them back to the edge -- throwing them back into the audience. JIM & DOORS When all the good people are trying to sleep I'm out there making my midnight creep Yeah, cause I'm a backdoor man The men don't know But the little girls unnerstan'... Danger fills the air, electric. Jim strutting, Indian like, up to one of the Cops, whipping off his hat and flipping it to the Crowd, which roars with approval. A couple Cops looking at Jim, sensing they're being challenged but not sure how. They shuffle and look offstage for direction. Their apparent impotence brings redoubled jeering from the Kids. RAY, next to his stick of incense on the organ, shares a look with JOHN as they head into the instrumental break in the song. There's something different about Jim -- more demonic, more driven -- a spirit has taken him over. RAY'S POV -- JIM catching his look, but no recognition in those eyes. They're dark pools, like Warhol's eyes. He turns away, taking the mike and off the cuff rapping improvisationally with the backbeat, keeping poetic meter. JIM I wanna tell you 'bout something that happened just a few minutes ago right here in New Haven. This is New Haven isn't it? New Haven, Connecticut, United States of America? The CROWD yells in acknowledgement, one stoned TEENAGER naked from the waist up and ripped on beer, yelling out. HECKLER HEY MORRISON, is the West really the best or are you just stoned on weeeeeedddddd?????? VOICE'S (annoying) "Light My Fire". Sing "Light My Fire". Yeah. Give us Light My Fire!... (giggles) We want Mick Jagger! Take your clothes off Jim. Show it to us! We want the Lizard King! Jim ignores it, sits on the stage, lights a cigarette. Long pause, tension building. Their catcalls for "Light My Fire" die out as Jim faces them down. They wait... not knowing what happens next. JIM (finally) Well I was with this girl backstage, y'know. We got to talking and we wanted some privacy, so we went into this shower stall. We weren't doin' anything y'know jes' standing there and talking. The AUDIENCE laughing, the band continuing to play, John adding emphasis to Jim's words with various shots and rolls. Camera moving over the crowd picking out the KIDS, sensing the anarchy dormant in their faces. JIM ...and then this little man came in there, this little man in a little blue suit and a little blue cap... More COPS turning to face Jim from front stage, getting the point now. RAY sees it coming... JIM (redneck voice) And he said -- "Whatcha doin' there?" I said, "nuthin'" and he said, "Well you better get outta there or..." "Or what" I asked him... The AUDIENCE has now grown deadly silent. Nearly every cop is facing JIM as he uses his dumb Southerner voice. RAY's eyes warning JIM. JIM And he started pushing me and I pushed back and he didn't like that so he reached back there and got out his little can of mace. And sprayed it right in my eyes. And blinded me. Why? Cause I was alone in a room with a lady doing what he would like to be doing if he could ever get it up without a gun. The LIGHTS coming on suddenly, the AUDIENCE seething. Shouts of "Fuck em! Right on!" JIM In the United States of America. Land of the free. Home of the Brave man -- in God We Trust right? TURN OFF THE LIGHTS. CROWD roars. A POLICE LIEUTENANT in his 50's, grey hair, beefy, marches out onto the stage, standing next to Jim, arms akimbo. A SECOND COP joins him. Ray rolling the music out into a silence as Jim sticks the mike in the officer's face, defiantly. JIM Say your thing man! More cops come out, snatch the microphone, as Jim flashes the audience a "touchy aren't they?" shrug. LIEUTENANT Young man you've gone too far. The show's over. You're under arrest. TWO more COPS moving on Jim, pinning both his arms and dragging him off stage. JOHN (scared) They're gonna beat the shit out of him man! RAY moving to intercede with SIDDONS and ROADIES. JIM (resisting) HEY... HEY! HEY! Ray and Siddons are pushed aside by other cops. The crowd is going nuts. Chairs are thrown. Kids rushing onto the stage where the Cops beat them back. ANNE is writing it all down on her notepad. A certain satisfaction and joy at the unfolding of this event. INT. BACKSTAGE STAIRCASE - SAME NIGHT JIM is dragged roughly down a flight of stairs. JIM GET YOUR HANDS OFF ME SLAVE! EXT. ARENA PARKING LOT - SAME NIGHT JIM is wrestled across the lot, pinned to the car and handcuffed, punched and thrown into the car, yelling. Journalists try to intercede, one is also arrested. JIM YOU'RE SLAVES. YOU'RE ALL A BUNCH OF SLAVES. THIS ISN'T HAPPENING TO ME MAN, THIS IS HAPPENING TO YOU!!! INT. HOLDING ROOM - POLICE STATION - THAT NIGHT JIM is spreadeagled against the wall, a dignified, defiant look on his face. COP 1 (coming in) Hey whatcha got here? A boy or a girl? COP 2 (coming closer to Jim) What do you care. You're gonna fuck him anyway... Okay rock star, let's see the backdoor you keep bawling about. (stretching his ass cheeks) Where's the roach powder? COP 1 Ain't he the prettiest long-haired boy y'ever saw? COP 2 (reaching for a can) Turn around rock star. As Jim defiantly does so, Cop 2 looses a big cloud of roach powder into his long hair. COP 2 (backing off) Stand clear, who the hell knows what's living in there? All during this, snickering laughter from the onlooking half- dozen POLICE OFFICERS gathered to watch. Jim waits, then with great claim, in a quiet voice: JIM You finished? You sure you're finished? Haven't you forgotten something -- the consolation prize they gave ya for taking your cock and balls? The guns. Why don't you use em you withered dicks! You shit- eating red-neck chickenshit bastards, I hope this makes your worthless lives... As he's smacked by COP 2, sending him sprawling into the wall... JIM (on the floor, quiet) You better kill me cause I'm gonna come back and fuck everyone of your daughters... EXT. POLICE STATION - THAT NIGHT A SNOWBALL smashes against the glass. COPS coming out with sticks. A RIOT brewing. A HUNDRED TEENAGERS sallying back and forth on the sidewalk, taunting the cops. A dozen of them have already been arrested. KIDS LET JIM GO!!! MORRISON! MORRISON! WE WANT MORRISON! COPS GET OUTTA HERE! GO HOME. GO ON NOW! COPS chase the KIDS with sticks. But just as it looks like it's going to get out of hand, JIM appears at the doors of the station, stepping out between RAY and the DOORS and SIDDONS. He signals his freedom, arms in the air. CROWD MOR-RI-SON! MOR-RI-SON! MOR-RI-SON! Jim waves, does a small pained victory jig in front of the thwarted Gestapo, ribcage and spleen hurting. CROWD JIM JIM JIM JIM JIM JIM... RAY (aside to Robbie) He could go all the way man! In five years he could be in the White House. Another JFK. Robbie's look tells us he thinks Ray is as much caught up in his dreams as Jim. CUT TO: FLASHBULBS hits us full frame as: INT. MUG SHOT - LIMBO A reminder of the reality as the thud of a clanking gate shuts. MORRISON's profile, disheveled hair -- he glares angrily. FLASH! FRONTAL SHOT, slated Police Dept -- New Haven Conn -- 23750 -- 12-10-67. A sullen handsome portrait. INT. RECORDING STUDIO - (LAST SESSION) - LOS ANGELES NIGHT (1970) JIM drinks... an ugly cough. Silence. In this puffy wrack and ruin there is still the ironic tones and sweet delight of the boy amazed and amused by it all. We hear the ghostly CROWD still cheering. JIM I drink so I can talk to assholes. This includes me. Let's just say I was testing the bounds of reality -- that's-all -- I was curious... I kinda always preferred to be hated. Like Erich Von Stroheim in the movies... the man you loved to hate... it's meant to be ironic, courage wants to laugh. Y'know it's essentially a stupid situation. I go out on a stage and I howl for people. In me they see what they want to see -- some say the Lizard King, whatever that means, or some black-clad leather demon whatever that means... but really I think of myself as a sensitive, intelligent human being but with the soul of a clown which always forces me to blow it at the most crucial moment... (pause) a fake hero... a joke the gods played on me... it's okay, I accept the joke... and smile. Death old friend, death and my cock, I can forgive my injuries in the name of wisdom, luxury, romance. Words got me the wound and will get me well. All join now in lament of my cock, a tongue of knowledge in the feathered night. Boys get crazy in the head and suffer. I sacrifice my cock on the alter of silence. The ENGINEER looking at him puzzled. Has Jim lost it? MIKE, his friend, is there in the Engineer's booth, with the Door's SECRETARY, Leticia, and an elegant MYSTERY WOMAN. They're smoking dope, partying. MIKE Hey Jim, how 'bout hitting a strip- joint? It's getting late and we can... JIM Nah, later... The violent backbeat of THE WASP now picking up. JIM Now listen to this I'll tell you about Texas Radio and the big beat soft driven slow and mad like some new language reaching your head with the cold sudden fury of a divine messenger let me tell you about heartache and the loss of God wandering, wandering in hopeless night out here on the perimeter there are no stars out here we is stoned, immaculate... but I tell you this: No eternal reward will forgive us now for wasting the dawn. EXT. LOS ANGELES - DAWN (1968) JIM walks the dawn streets. Classic image -- jeans, boots, jacket, the sun starting to rise on the smog and translucent pink light along Santa Monica Boulevard outside the cheap Alta Cienega Motel where he lives... PEACE FROG shoots us through. DOORS SONG Blood in the streets in the town of New Haven Blood stains the roofs and palm trees of Venice Blood in my love in the terrible summer The bloody red sun of phantastic L.A. Over the SONG, a MONTAGE of the 60's passing to its darker side. DOCUMENTARY IMAGES MARTIN LUTHER KING assassinated, BOBBY KENNEDY gunned down, PEGGY FLEMMING ice skating at the Olympics; A QUAKER burns himself to death protesting the war in Vietnam; B-52 bombs dropped on CAMBODIA; KENT STATE erupts; CHARLES MANSON is arrested. INT. BARNEY'S BEANERY - LOS ANGELES - MONDAY JIM -- drinking in Barney's Bar. HEADLINE READS: "KANSAS COPS SLAM DOORS; CONCERT CANCELLED," 2nd HEADLINE: "DOORS 3RD ALBUM OUT, SALES UP, MAGIC DOWN." Dissolve to CRITIC'S FACE. Back to Jim's face. Superimpositions over it of: NEWS FLASHES LYNDON JOHNSON's dog face on TV withdrawing: NIXON waving as he wins '68; Rowen and Martin's LAUGH IN; COLUMBIA STUDENTS taking over; 3rd HEADLINE: "MORRISON BUSTED IN VEGAS". MARTIN LUTHER KING going down again; NIXON winning; massive ANTI- WAR PROTESTS in Washington; floating space ships in "2001"; B-52s sailing over Vietnam 4th HEADLINE: "DOORS PROVOKE CHICAGO RIOTS" -- again and again, faster, faster. DOORS SONG Blood is the rose of mysterious union! There's blood in the streets & it's up to my knees She came Blood in the streets of Chicago She came Blood on the rise and it's following me Just about the break of day (etc) The river runs red down the legs of the city She came The women are crying red rivers of weeping The MONTAGE collides into an ECU on JIM -- drinking as if to silence the images, the sounds we hear and see on his face. Spirits crying for release. In alcoholic solace. He passes out, head hitting the bar. Jim's English friend, MIKE, walks in, throwing a harsh shaft of LA morning light across the dark bar and JIM's face, bleary eyed, passed out on the counter. He has a drinking paunch. With him are TOM BAKER, "TOM", the actor from the Warhol scene in New York and a huge biker type drinker named DOG, one of Jim's roadmen, a beard fanning his chest, tattoos everywhere. In the front of these three monoliths are about twenty beer bottles, numerous Jack Daniels bottles emptied and a lesbian BARTENDRESS pouring up a breakfast shot of bloody Marys... Mike hands Dog a breakfast in a brown paper bag. MIKE Morning. Pour me breakfast Delores... Delores pouring the bloody mary. As Mike scoffs at Jim passed out. MIKE Whatsa matter with Jimbo? Can't handle it huh (studying the beer bottles for leftovers) TOM Pussy whipped, man... DOG reaching in, dragging Jim's face up by the hair. Sticks Mike's greasy eggs and bacon in front of Jim. DOG Hey Jim, come on babe, eat this. . . one last place to go. Ray's getting it on. Jim is suddenly alert -- an instant and surprising transformation, without hangover, eager eyed. JIM (sparkling) Alive she cried! Right Dog, another cubic centimeter of chance (slaps Dog, notices the eggs, queasy) Ugh, I can't eat this stuff, it'll really make me sick. Gimme a Dos Equis will ya Delores? And a Ramos gin fizz with it. TOM Fuck man did you fade or what, we were on a "death run" up to the 9000 building after the gig, you bet me a grand you'd walk the ledge. JIM (instantly) Let's go... Right now! TOM Then mumbling about "gotta go home, sanctuary," pussy whipped. We were gonna film it! A thousand bucks! (to Delores) Give him a double. JIM A triple, Tom, shem and shaun... TOM ...imagine me and Morrison in a fuckin movie together, can you imagine two powerful two-fisted Irish fucking drinking guys in a movie, in a documentary movie!! MIKE I'll direct the shit out of it, man. Dennis Hopper can do it, I can do it. JIM (drinking the fizz down) ...all of us direct it! In black and white. Call it "Zero." A real road movie! Two of these (points to drink) you feel a lot better. As he pisses on the floor next to the bar stool. DOG Whatcha doing! Oh fuck. DELORES Fuck you Morrison. You're outta here you fuckhead, get out! DOG (lifting Jim out of there) Come on Jimbo, one more place to go. Ray's getting married man, this morning, remember! You're the best man. TOM Fuck Ray -- fuckin Pollock all he cares about's money. Fuckin sell out. You sold out too man. The last album's shit, and lemme tell ya something, people know it. MIKE (defending Jim) Come on Baker, lighten up. JIM That's all right. I like it (that dopey smile) DOG (to Jim) Come on man, toe the line. Boots to the pavement. Let's walk. OMIT Sequence omitted from original script. EXT. SANTA MONICA BOULEVARD - SAME MORNING JIM, loose, wanders right into the traffic, waving to anybody, trying to hitch a ride. DOG and the OTHERS going after him. Jim seen slipping a tablet from his pocket into his mouth. JIM (to no one in particular) I LOVE L.A. -- the best neon. City of Night! City of Light... why are you going to work? You're not slaves, you're free, cars, you're free... TOM catching up to him. TOM Awright shaddup Morrison, just cause you don't gotta work. (going into his pocket) Give me some of your money, asshole, and I'll yell anything you fucking want. MIKE (coming up) What was that speckled motherfucker you just took? Give me some! JIM (yielding, to Tom) You gotta fail to succeed Tom, gotta surrender to the waiting tides. Moving through traffic. Horns honking, incessant insanity. EXT. PACIFIC PALISADES - SAME MORNING RAY and DOROTHY take their vows in front of a HIPPIE PRIEST. ROBBIE and JOHN and their WIVES-TO-BE, and OTHERS from the BAND look on. PAMELA is all decked out in her best, wedding clothes, red satins from Morocco, five-inch clog heels, flowers in her hair. Looking around pissed as: HIPPIE PRIEST (ad lib) Awright, the vibrations are right now, I feel peace and love here today, I feel a grooviness coming on, do you Ray Manzarek take your lady love... (etc.) fill the white wings of death, scatter your ashes forever... JIM slinks up through the trees, alone, quiet, changing faces to face them as SUMMER'S ALMOST GONE plays sinuously. DOORS SONG Summer's almost gone Where will we be When the summer's gone? RAY (aside) Where the fuck you been man? JIM Man, I been here all the time... over there watching. I'm really happy for you Ray you found life... He smiles innocently. Ray, a beat, turns away. Pam coming over, squeezes his hand, sweetly, no fights today, she's his lady. INT. COUNTRY STORE - LAUREL CANYON - THAT DAY JIM, in dark glasses, strongly feeling the effects of the acid, stares at a box of Kellogg's Corn Flakes, unable to relate. Down the aisle PAMELA, in her wedding clothes, is pushing a shopping cart, filled with the feast she's preparing. The Store is a haven for HIPPIES from Laurel Canyon, barefoot RUNAWAYS, BIKERS... PAM Jim, I need some safflower oil. Do you think you can find me a bottle? JIM Safflower oil, sure. PAM And get some Gravy Train for Sage. JIM (obediently) Yes. PAM I'll meet you up front. Jim looking, zombie-like for the food. PEOPLE of course stare at him, knowing who he is. TIMECUT TO: At the CHECK-OUT COUNTER, the food being tallied up, JIM spots his face plastered on the cover of something like the "L.A. FREE PRESS" -- "ROCK'S BAD BOYS GO SOFT -- WHAT'S HAPPENED TO THE REVOLUTION?" PAM Jim you got any cash? Seeking in his pocket -- nothing but a credit card and a rumpled old dollar bill... The faces of the Hippies looking at him. With one of the magic markers on the counter, he draws in his beard on his cover shot. DOORS SONG Morning found us clearly unaware Noon burned gold into our hair At night we swam the laughing sea When summer's gone where will we be EXT. JIM & PAM'S HOUSE - LAUREL CANYON - DAY PAM and JIM and the labrador SAGE trudge up a hill carrying the groceries to their modest little house tucked into a hill of dangling eucaplyptus trees. We sense a community of artists, hippies, Volkswagens. PAM It's only another $95,000 but I could get the best clothes. From India, Morocco Jim, clothes you can't find anywhere, we could get the richest people to come, Miles Davis, Cher, the Stones, it's gonna be the best boutique on La Cienega Jim... why are we walking, how come we don't have a car? JIM ...cause you lost it. It's fun to walk, isn't it. PAM ...that was months ago. We got another car. JIM Which car? PAM The red one with the black interior. Remember it was a shift and I didn't like it. What happened to it? JIM Oh yeah... I wrecked it. PAM Oh Jim! Damn! Where's the Gravy Train? Whatsamatter? What are you on? You promised you wouldn't drink today. JIM No Ma I ain't drinking. PAM You're not gonna drink any more are you Jim. JIM No Ma I ain't. PAM And you're gonna change those stinky leathers you been wearing for three weeks. JIM I don't know 'bout that. PAM What the hell are you on? JIM Uh -- just some low grade acid. It's not heavy. (whispers) Pam, read my mind. PAM Jesus Jim! Goddamit! You PROMISED. I made the duck! People are coming! Ray and Dorothy think we're flaky enough and I... you said you'd wait till after, you're going to peak before me. JIM Hey it's okay, it's okay... come on, we'll trip and then eat our feast. PAM Yeah sure. Putting down the bags at their porch, pausing. He moves to her, kisses her, conciliatory and gentle. JIM Come on baby, y'know it's a good thing for Ray and Dorothy I think women are such noble creatures -- they carry on your name with dignity after you die. (spawning like minnows) PAM What are you saying? You wanna marry me Jim? JIM (elusively) I think women basically have a comic approach to life -- I mean how can they not when they look up in the dark and see a dangling penis, seeking entry. It looks like a face y'know -- little beard "Hi mom" (Pam giggling now) I wanna get inside you. Look around. (humming) "Do the funky chicken, do dah, dah, funky chicken do da da "love my girl" -- She's cracking up now. As he takes the acid out, holds it in front of her like a sacrament. JIM Let's go wild child, let's get out there Romeo and Juliet, Marilyn Monroe and Vincent Van Gogh, Jim and Pam, rock and roll (a poem) ...all the poetry has wolves in it, but one Pam -- the most beautiful one of all -- dances in a ring of fire and throws off the challenge with a shrug As she takes the tablet on her tongue, swallows. PAM (romantic) I like it when you sing to me JIM 'cause I'm the poet and you're my muse Strains of YOU'RE LOST, LITTLE GIRL drift in, setting a more ominous tone. INT. JIM AND PAM'S HOUSE - LAUREL CANYON - THAT DAY The FOOD is laid out, the DUCK cooking... but no one is there as we move across this tastefully decorated house to PAMELA in the living room, rattled, obsessively going through Jim's papers. PEOPLE are knocking at the door. Guests looking through the windows, tapping. A giant poster of Marilyn Monroe frames Pamela. PAM What am I going to do about these papers! Jim, Jim -- you really need someone to organize this stuff. Your handwriting's just like a little kid. Jim is somewhere else -- pulling out the DUCK which is totally charred black. He laughs. PAM My God look at this. I wonder if William Blake was ever this disorganized. RAY and DOROTHY walking in. ROBBIE and JOHN general commotion. Dorothy immediately seeing the duck, runs to it... DOROTHY Oh the duck! JIM (coming over) Get some drinks, man. Over there (getting Pam's attention) Pam! PAM I'm gonna be your editor now, seriously I'm going to organize all your stuff. I'm gonna take out all the fuck words. DOORS SONG You're lost little girl You're lost little girl You're lost, tell me Who are you? PEOPLE are introducing themselves, coming in from all over, like in a shoebox. Hippies. Doors people... now TOM BAKER with MIKE and DOG... Now an aggressive Chuck Berry type BLACK SINGER with John's GIRLFRIEND. Then a TIMOTHY LEARY look- alike appears. CHATTER blending everywhere as we build to a vast confusion at Jim and Pam's party. JIM Let's go wild child, let's get out there Romeo and Juliet, Marilyn Monroe and Vincent Van Gogh, Jim and Pam, rock and roll (a poem) "Clothed in sunlight Restless in wanting Dying of fever Changed shapes of an empire Vast promissory notes of joy How it has changed you How slowly estranged you Solely arranged you Beg you for mercy" As she takes the tablet on her tongue, swallows. JIM (cupping her chin) Pam... Honey, you're trying too hard. PAM I'm not -- I'm not. JIM (soft, reassuring) Yes you are. PAM There's some great poetry here Jim, some wonderful ideas. JIM Yeah but nobody wants to read poetry anymore, nobody cares, it's not like important y'know. Just put it away. Not right now. PAM (lost) But what am I supposed to do? How do I fit in? Who am I supposed to be around all these people? The FRENCH COUNT coming in now, from the Warhol party in New York. They're looking at her, embarrassing as everyone overhears. COUNT Darling Pamela, I brought you a little something. JIM (ignoring it) You're my girl, that's who... PAMELA (laughs insanely) I'm not your girl, don't give me that shit. I know you fuck everything that touches you. Only in life would ANNE O'RIORDAN walk in at this precise moment, a smile on her face. Ray's eyes roll. ANNE Hi Jim... (waiting for the introduction to Pam) JIM (to Pamela) All right so I do. I live my life the way I want. I don't want anyone expecting anything from me -- including you! You don't like it then get the fuck out! (to Anne) Oh hi Anne. You know Pam? She's a little pissed off right now but... RAY Okay Jim let's eat that duck. DOROTHY (calming Pamela) Come on Pam, let's put out the plates... PAMELA (stunned, pushing thru to Anne) Anne O'Riordan. Are you Anne O'Riordan? ANNE You must be Pamela PAMELA (eyeing her up and down through her tears) You actually put your dick in this woman Jim? JIM Well I... sometimes yeah PAMELA (condescending to Anne) I understand... I really do but don't ever think that Jim's gonna love you or take care of you. You're one of a hundred you know Anne uncomfortable, Jim getting pissed. JIM Hey -- don't you know when to stop! PAM Look who's talking ANNE I'd like to think Jim can make up his own mind who he loves and who he doesn't. PAMELA Don't kid yourself sweetheart, Jim's crazy but he's not that crazy. He loves me. ROBBIE Jesus, it's not gonna be one of these dinners is it Jim? How 'bout some turkey? BAKER Love it!! Far out. DOROTHY Yes, let's go into the kitchen. The duck's ready. John's GIRLFRIEND is trying to introduce the BLACK SINGER to Jim. GIRLFRIEND (anxious) Jim, you should meet Chuck Vincent. He came specially to meet you. JIM (deeply surprised) Oh yeah -- Chuck. You're my idol man... since I was 12. The best man... CHUCK VINCENT is suddenly there in Jim's face, bulging eyeballs. CHUCK VINCENT So you the white boy makin' all that money. JIM I still can't hold a candle to you. CHUCK VINCENT Hey everybody Chuck Vincent's here. Yo sho can't boy, I ain't heard much of yor stuff. What I done heard don't show me much. ROBBIE (insulted) So fuck you man... JIM (laughs) Chuck Vincent man! No. He's right... Chuck Vincent's here, everybody, Chuck Vincent. CHUCK Ain't no honkey ever gonna sing the blues, you ain't been there. Where dat turkey at? The charred TURKEY is being carved up. A moment of peace, then: Pamela walks up to Jim with a bowl of sweet potatoes in her arms, an announcement. PAM I just have one thing to say to you -- YOU'VE RUINED ANOTHER THANKSGIVING JIM MORRISON!! JIM It's not Thanksgiving honey. As she throws the sweet potatoes right at him, spraying everybody. Jim laughing nuttily, the Count wiping the potatoes off. Pam rushing now for the turkey to throw, Jim chasing her. PAM (freaking out now) YOU BASTARD! YOU RUINED MY DUCK, YOU KILLED MY DUCK!!! BLOOD BLOOD BLOOD RAZORS RAZORS EVERYWHERE! Throwing the turkey at Jim, smearing everything, everybody. COUNT Pamela, bella, please behave hunh... Va fanculo Jimmy, what the hell did you give her She doesn't want the Count's solace, throws him off. PAM GET OUT!!! PATRICIA leaving now, covered with turkey sauce. PATRICIA See you later. JIM (to the Count) She's working it out, man, it's okay (going to console her) Pamela, Pamela... come on baby, it's all right, shhh. HUNGARIAN GYPSY FOLK MUSIC playing madly from the tape deck. John fiddling with it, nervously. PAM BLOOOOOOODDDDDDD! DEEATHHHH! STOP THE BLEEDING JESUS. I'M DYING HELP MEEEEEE! JIM PUSH! PUSH! IT'S A BOY! They struggle, she goes for the carving knife, Dorothy and Ray trying to restrain her. OTHER GUESTS keep talking as if things are quite normal. Pam breaks through Dorothy -- coming after Jim PAM RAAAAZOOOORS!!! RAAAAZZZZZORS AND DUCKKKS! THIS SHAMAN SHIT IS BULLSHIT! FUCK YOU AND YOUR DARK RIDE!! He grabs her wrist just in time, equally insane now -- a comic glow in his face. Jekyll and Hyde. JIM Oh murder? MURDER??? YOU WANNA DO SOME MURDER RAY JIM! COME ON. GET A HOLD OF YOURSELF! TOM, DOG & MIKE (jumping in) MURDER!!! YEAH!... Where's my camera! A ball of people wrestling across the kitchen floor, upsetting the table and the remainder of the dishes, a carving knife at stake in the air... Jim finally wrestling the knife away and holding it over Pam. JIM YOU WANNA KNOW WHAT MURDER IS. YOU WANNA FEEL DEATH... HERE! (forces the knife back into her hand) MURDER ME! FEEL WHAT IT'S LIKE! GO AHEAD. GIMME SOME DEATH!!! (kneels at her feet) She explodes inward, a bloodcurdling SHRIEK. The knife clattering from her hand. PAM YOU YOU YOU!!!! YOU KILLED MY DUCK! YOU KILLED MY DUCK!! Jim laughing insanely. Jumping up and down on the duck. RAY grabbing him, angry. JIM I'M STILL KILLING YOUR DUCK!!! FUCK!!! MURDER DEATH!!! THE DUCK IS DEAD. RAY JIM!! WILL YOU STOP THIS SHIT WILL YOU STOP!! WILL YOU GET SANE!! JIM (explodes out of his grasp) DON'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO!! EVER!! EVER!! A silence. Robbie... John... their women... they start exiting. TOM & MIKE (to RAY) Yeah FUCK OFF MAN! Ray about to lose his temper with Tom, checks it. CHUCK VINCENT (to John's girlfriend) This party's gettin' low rent. Let's go babe. Exiting with the other Doors... Dog picking the duck up from the floor. DOG Hey, fuck him, let's eat this thing. Pamela is sobbing, in a quiet bewildered voice, repeating to herself. PAM What the hell's happened to us Jim? What the hell is happening to us. There's some great poetry... On Jim... saddened. DOORS SONG You're lost little girl (2) You're lost, tell me Who are you? INT. TUNNEL - OUTDOOR THEATRE - NIGHT The backbeat of NOT TO TOUCH THE EARTH as a DOCUMENTARY FILM CREW, moves past us directed by MIKE and DOG and TOM shoot past us, sun guns, nagras ("Rolling! Speed!") then... A mad rush of HANDS and SCREAMS as SHAPES whip by under swinging light-bulbs -- big BLACK BODYGUARDS, six or seven of them, bulling their way thru the grasping faces, as MORRISON appears... camera swinging wildly with him to reveal: EXT. ARENA - (ANY CITY) - NIGHT THOUSANDS OF FANS roaring "DOORS! DOORS! DOORS!" VOICE (loudspeaker) Ladies and Gentlemen, from Los Angeles California -- The DOORS! SIDDONS (in crush) Jim! Your Mom's here with your brother. What do you want me to do with 'em? JIM (shakes his head) HIDE ME!!! HARD CUT TO: Madness. COPS lining the edge of the stage, looking worried. As Jim throws his leather jacket into the cheering crowd and does the ghost dance around the microphone, Indian style, one foot, resurrecting the dead, the power of the circle. The stage is bottom lit, Dantean in look. The Doors casting giant shadows of heroic proportions. DEA AGENTS in suits and short hair take photos from the front of the stage, clipboards in hand. Blocked by a row of cops, it is impossible for Jim to communicate with his audience. JIM & DOORS There's been a slaughter here Don't stop to speak or look around Your gloves and fan are on the ground We're getting out of town we're going on the run And you're the one I want to come Not to touch the earth Not to see the sun Nothing left to do But run, run, run Let's run, let's run... SIDDONS yelling at MIKE, the roadie. SIDDONS Vice Squad says one more "fuck or shit" they're gonna close us down man. MIKE Stick my dick in their ear! Jim ignoring all this, one hand cupped to his ear listening for the sound of the earth, gone into a shaman-like state, weird spiralling chords carrying over the following MONTAGE of hallucinatory insanity. JIM & DOORS House upon the hill Moon is lying still... EXT. JIM & PAM'S HOUSE - LAUREL CANYON - NIGHT A POV up at the house -- into which JIM enters. The lights are on. Sage at the door sniffing. INT. JIM & PAM'S HOUSE - LAUREL CANYON - NIGHT JIM & DOORS Shadows of the trees witnessing the wild breeze Come on baby run with me Run with me, let's run... JIM'S POV entering the bedroom -- PAMELA naked in bed with the COUNT, is snorting heroin. Shadows of the trees and leaves blowing against the walls. Their voices, dim, distant. JIM (ironic) Oh hi... I didn't realize you were entertaining. PAM (stoned) Hi. She sits up on the bed, wobbly. The COUNT, more sophisticated in these things, lights a cigarette from the bedside table, revealing heroin paraphernalia. COUNT Scusi Jimmy, I hope you're cool about this... JIM (very cool) Don't forget your smack on the way out. EXT. ARENA - CONCERT Jim's struggling to break through the barrier of cops. JIM (yelling) The mansion is warm at the top of the hill Rich are the rooms and the comforts there Red are the arms of luxuriant chairs You won't know a thing till you get inside BACK TO: INT. JIM & PAM'S HOUSE - NIGHT The COUNT is gone. JIM, icy cold, grabs PAM by the wrist. JIM I told you about that shit. Or are we talking about death choices here? PAM I'm just doing my thing, just like you said, it's my thing, why can't I have a thing. Ow! You're hurting me! JIM (rising anger) Get up. Hurt? You want to know HURT? Let me introduce you to my good friend hurt. He is on her, throws her from the bed. She runs and hides in the closet, slamming the door behind her. PAM (screaming) NO FUCK YOU! THIS IS MY... JIM (crazed) Ah sanctuary!... a soft place to hide. PAM (inside) ...from you, you pig! As he picks up a can of lighter fluid and douses the closet door and the floor. JIM I'll give you a place to hide forever! We INTERCUT with PAM inside the closet yelling for mercy inside. PAM JIM! He puts a candle to the drenched door/floor. JIM This is the best part of the trip, honey... Inside, PAM feels the first flames licking up, smoke wafting in. JIM leaves the house. Pam kicking wildly at the doors, trying to smash her way out as the FIRE crescendoes. She finally shatters the frail molding and bursts out. EXT. JIM & PAM'S HOUSE - LAUREL CANYON - NIGHT PAM runs out into Laurel Canyon like a terrified doe running from a forest fire. SONG beat NOT TO TOUCH THE EARTH continues. EXT. STREET - LOS ANGELES - NIGHT Jim and Mike driving drunk, fucking TWO BLACK CHICKS. Mike in the back seat. Jim drives the car up onto the grass of a Police Station and plows right into it. EXT. BOULEVARD - LOS ANGELES - NIGHT Knowing who's inside, sufficient be it to see the blue Shelby Mustang plow into a telephone pole on Santa Monica Blvd. JIM & THE DOORS Dead President's corpse in the driver's car The engine runs on glue and tar C'mon along, we're not going very far To the East to meet the Czar... INT. ANNE'S SOHO LOFT - NEW YORK - NIGHT A HIGH PRIESTESS, assisted by a HIGH PRIEST, conducts a Wicca wedding amidst a setting of candles, mixing a few drops of JIM and ANNE's blood into a consecrated cup of wine, from which they drink. They all wear long black robes, the only light from the candles, standing inside a circle in front of a table with altar, incense, chalice. HIGH PRIESTESS (dimly heard) ...we worship the ancient forces of Nature, the Triple Goddess, the Great Mother and the Lord, the Horned One... when the vow is taken INT. LIMO - DAY MOTORCYCLE ESCORTS COPS zoom past the limo windows on the LA STREETS. INT. ANNE'S SOHO LOFT - NEW YORK - RESUME NIGHT The PRIESTESS presses the two cut wrists together, binding them with a red cord. HIGH PRIESTESS ...it is a blending of souls on a karmi and cosmic plane that affects your future incarnations on this planet. Death does not part -- only lack of love -- and the vow is forever in the Goddess' sight. JIM & DOORS (building faster and faster) Run with me, run with me Run with me, let's run Some outlaws live by the side of a lake The minister's daughter's in love with a snake Jim faints. EXT. DOORS OUTDOOR CONCERT - NIGHT JIM, mind totally gone into his trance, spreading his arms like wings, hopping from one foot to the other like a shaman around his microphone, whirling, yelling out great rewards for the tribe. Plentiful antelope, healthy corn. The kids are going wild -- writhing like maenads in his intoxicating embrace. Embers from an enormous BONFIRE drift past the stadium lights into the night. But the KIDS, increasingly frustrated by a barrage of COPS, cannot see their leader and now push against the cops with the very result the authorities seek to repress. JIM & DOORS Who lives in a well by the side of the road Wake up girl! We're almost home We shall see the gates by morning We shall be inside by evening Sun, sun, sun Burn, burn, burn Moon, moon, moon! RAY, gone into his own trance, happening to look up from his keyboard. His eyes widen. His POV -- an INDIAN SHAMAN hovers over the microphone. Cloaked in hides, his face obscured by a horned headdress with colored tails and feathers streaming down his shoulders, rattles in each fist, the BONFIRE glowing... JIM & DOORS I will GET YOU Soon -- soooooooon... SOOOOOOONNNN... The COPS can't hold. TEENAGE SHOCK TROOPS hitting the stage, clambering up. The stage becoming a riot. Cops wading in with sticks. ROADIES and BODYGUARDS yanking the MUSICIANS from their places... JIM (indifferent, to himself) I am the Lizard King I can do anything As DOG hauls the shaman king off in a bearhug, smiling stoned, immaculate. INT. ALTA CIENEGA MOTEL - DAY Start slow CLOSE UP on JIM, he's crying, his head on a pillow, silent, haunted... pull out to see the room, no explanations. A TV GAME SHOW is on, JUDY, 17, and her FRIEND, 16, watching naked, skinny..., piles of murder magazines and books, clothes, and personal items trashed around the thread bare room he calls home. She looks over at him. JUDY Man wow -- watsa matter Jim? It was beautiful... wasn't it? Kim? Wasn't it great? KIM (2nd girl, studying murder magazine) It was all right Jim continues to cry. JIM (gently) Hey it's no big deal. I like to cry when I come. It's close to death... maybe you'd better go home now before your mama gets home. JUDY She is home Jim (whispers to Kim who goes into bathroom, giggling) JIM What? JUDY It's a secret. JIM (innocently) You know you've always been good to me in bed Judy. And it was nice of you to bring your friend. I want to keep seeing both of you but it can't be all the time y'know. It would be a night every few weeks or so. That's just the way I am, I'm not dependable. I can't be a boyfriend. Would you do that? I mean could you handle it? That way? I don't want you to get hurt. JUDY (putting on a tacky dress) I already been hurt enuf' by you Jim, I don't have much to lose do I? JIM ...do you love me? JUDY ...yes JIM ...Well, just think about it awhile. Call me when you get your new number... (Girl 2 comes back in, dressed) Hey that's a really nice outfit you're wearing, you really have good taste in clothes. How long have you two been friends? He's so concerned, so solicitous that both girls crack up laughing. JIM (grins) What? A knock at the door. JIM Come back later! (another knock) Who is it! VOICE (slurred) It's a secret. JIM (recognizes it) Whyn't you come back later. I don't have any clothes on. EXT. ALTA CIENEGA MOTEL ROOM - SAME DAY PAM's mascara is running from her eyes, begging to get in. The BLACK MAID cleaning the adjacent room overheard, unsurprised. PAM Jim, I gotta talk! Let me in please. I gotta talk. JIM Now Pam sweetheart, I'm busy. Pamela listening at the door. She's on the second story of a cheap motel overlooking a boring parking lot on the edge of La Cienega. PAM Jim, I know there's someone in there, I can't believe you're doing this again. You're disgusting. INTERCUTS TO: INT. MOTEL ROOM - SIMULTANEOUS JIM Well you see Pam there's this crazy girl in here, she's just lying on the bed with her legs open and I don't know what to do. PAM FUCK YOU!!! I want to see her. JIM (off) It's your cousin Lizzie, you don't want to see her. Go home. PAM We're all sisters, let me see her. Jim,... I got this wonderful leg of lamb in the oven for supper... and the house is immaculate. Sage is waiting. He wants you to play with him... are you coming... JIM Almost. PAM Jim goddamit answer me!! (no answer, she yells) JIM! I FUCKED HIM TO HURT YOU! HE DOESN'T MEAN ANYTHING TO ME!! PEOPLE in the parking lot looking up. A silence is her only response. She waits, turns away from the closed door as TOUCH ME BABE cuts in: DOORS SONG C'mon, c'mon, c'mon c'mon now Touch me babe Can't you see that I am not afraid INT. RECORDING STUDIO - THAT NIGHT In the VOCAL BOOTH, JIM is chugging on a brown paper bag with whiskey in it, crooning with heart but the voice is warped, weak. JIM What was that promise you made Why don't you tell me what she said What was that promise that she made I'm gonna love you Till the heaven stops the rain I'm gonna love you Till the stars fall from the sky For you and I... VARIOUS PEOPLE are hanging around the studio listening -- a couple of HIPPIE CHICKS, A BURN VICTIM w/ bandages, a CHARLES MANSON TYPE, a Siberian HUSKY, the TIM LEARY type. Paper bags, burgers, bottles, California rose, apple juice, hard- boiled eggs. In the ENGINEERING BOOTH. ROTHCHILD, the producer, is displeased. PAUL (to Botnick the engineer) ...fuckin' neanderthal primadonna is too drunk to see. (cuts the music, to Jim) Cut it... that was beautiful sweetheat, we had a technical problem, we'll take it again from the top babe whenever you're ready. On the floor, the DOORS are depressed. DENSMORE looking at MORRISON, aimlessly, nervously. KRIEGER looking tired and beaten, takes a discreet hit on a joint. Ray scans an art book, patient. DENSMORE What's his fucking problem? JIM (equally false) Paul babe. PAUL Right here baby. JIM Why don't you suck a fart out of my asshole you slave driving facist motherfucker! As he stalks out of the booth. Raging, near-incomprehensible. A small portable TV set is playing the "Dean Martin Show" low on one end of the recording console. Around the room the detritus of the time -- Mailer's "Armies of the Night", The Stone's "Beggar's Banquet", Janis' "Cheap Thrills", Traffic, The Band. PAUL (exasperated) I hear the booze, I hear the smokes Jim, I don't hear the voice and babe I didn't hear the song! JIM So what are we going to tonight Paul! 67 takes! It's stale! RAY (coming in with JOHN) Alright, let's try something else. JIM I wanna sing blues. This stuffs getting too self-conscious. ROBBIE (offended) Cause it's my song man? JIM (simultaneous, incomprehensible) Let's sing "Rock is Dead"! You're all a buncha slaves... "Oh come all ye faithful." PAUL (hot) Shut up Jim! I don't understand! I don't. What are ya doing! I love you like a brother, I do, but why are you fucking this up. It's a perfect radio song for chrissake! No one wants to hear the blues anymore! Think like a singer, you're the only baritone crooner we got left... Sinatra, Elvis, Crosby, you're as good as they are, but WHY ARE YOU FUCKING THIS UP! WHY! Pause. Jim's face darkening. Something he sees on the television. He stops, frozen, sickly. Several BIMBETTES are dancing around a shiny new automobile as strains of LIGHT MY FIRE pop out. JIM Catchy, you sold it to a commercial? Ray, Siddons, Robbie, John, shuffling for a moment. JIM For that? How much did you get for it? RAY Now, Jim... JIM HOW MUCH? SIDDONS It was $50,000. You weren't talking to us that week and we figgered you... JIM You figured? What the fuck is this Ray? RAY It's not like a big deal Jim, the song's already been commercialized, the money was great. Robbie wrote the lyrics and he didn't mind, neither did I, neither did John... we gotta get to TV. JIM What?... are you saying? Are we the Doors? One for all and all for one? Do you know what you're saying to those millions of kids! "Just kidding, not real". That's what you're saying. JOHN Oh come on man, you think just cause you're the lead man in the band you can run the whole show. JIM (building intensity) You think I was kidding Ray? (turning to John) Hey John, those are interesting shoes, you like those shoes? PAMELA, looking drawn and pathetic finds this moment to walk into the studio. JOHN (aggressive) Yeah I do. JIM Good. Then do you want 50 of those shoes? JOHN No. JIM Then what do you need more money for? Pause. Turning to Ray. JIM I'm dying Ray. I wasn't kidding. Maybe you were. But I'll tell you something, it's not about these desires you have man, or money, or these records, it's about breaking through wasn't it? You just lost something man. (to all) We all lost something boys. We lost something. RAY I don't think so Jim. There's a bigger picture here. JIM There sure is. In your fucking face! A small smile flickers Jim's face as he picks up the small TV and like a quarterback, hurls it, spinning end over end from his corner of the Control Room towards Ray and Rothchild and the Doors. They dive for the floor as it smashes to bits into the wall behind the tape machines. JIM (quietly) Just kidding... (turning to Pam) Hi Pam. Just watchin' some TV. He seems pleased to distract his anger into her. She doesn't seem to notice anything unusual going on. The Doors silent, feeling Jim's rage. PAM (pathetic) I wanted you to find us Jim. It meant nothing. JIM I know. I know. PAM You don't have to torture me Jim. Let me make it up to you, please... The others all look away embarrassed. This is certainly a moment the ordinary partner might turn away from Pamela, her tears running, but her pathacy, her inability to deal with pain is precisely what moves Jim the most -- a side of himself in her -- an ultimate weakness she has, he shares. As he goes to her, puts his arms gently around her. JIM It's alright honey, it's gonna be alright. You're my girl and that's the way it's always gonna stay. PAM (snuggles him, zoned) Really...? JIM (ironic, to the others) So, let's keep that money machine rolling. Come on guys... Rothchild looking to Botnick and to Ray. But the real look, the unforgiving one, is from Jim to Ray who feels it. Rothchild douses the lights in the studio. PAUL Right on Jimbo. TIME CUT TO: Overdubb of DOORS SONG SOFT PARADE - Jim's VOICE booming thru the studio. JIM (reciting) When I was back there in seminary school There was a person there Who put forth the proposition That you can petition the Lord with prayer Petition the Lord with prayer Petition the Lord with prayer PETITION THE LORD WITH PRAYER ROTHCHILD looking from his booth across at Jim. His POV -- only JIM is visible. PAUL Where the hell did she go? In the control booth RAY and ROBBIE share a look. The lights have been dimmed in Jim's booth, and he's weaving back and forth a bottle of Ripple in his hand as they kick in with the music. Camera closing now on Jim in the tender section, on the money. JIM & DOORS Can you give me sanctuary I must find a place to hide A place for me to hide... In the darkened booth, PAM is on her knees his pants worked down around his ankles, caressing him, sucking him off. PAM (sotto voice) ...sing to me, Jim, sing to me. JIM & DOORS Can you find me soft asylum I can't make it any more The man is at the door The DOORS sense it. ROTHCHILD knows it, hushed. Magic's suddenly in the air once more as we jump stanzas to: JIM & DOORS Catacombs, nursury bones Winter women Streets and shoes, avenues Leather riders selling shoes (The monk bought lunch) Successful hills are here to stay Everything must be this way Gentle street where people play Welcome to the soft parade But Jim's voice has now gone off key, floating carefree, drifting -- drifting away. ROTHCHILD chuckles, philosophically. The Doors in control booth start leaving. Robbie goes back out to get his personal items. But the OVERDUB still plays over the booth as Jim doesn't realize. We take liberties cutting around on the song. JIM & DOORS All our lives we sweat and save Building for a shallow grave (then) The soft parade has now begun Listen to the engines hum People out to have some fun A cobra on my left Leopard on my right The Doors and ROTHCHILD all exiting, leaving BOTNICK the engineer to clean up some technical things... and of course the two occupants of the darkened booth. JIM SONG (fiercely) Calling on the dogs (5) When all else fails You can whip the horses' eyes And make them sleep And cry. The music stops. Silence. Inside the booth, two shadows breathe deep, huddled on the floor in each other's arms. A whisper out of the dark. PAM I love you. INT. RECORDING STUDIO - LAST SESSION (1970) - NIGHT JIM his head cocked, lost in the memory. JIM (reciting) Why does my mind circle around you? Why do planets wonder what it would be like to be you? All your soft wild promises were words, birds, Endlessly in flight Being drunk is the best disguise As the body is ravaged The spirit grows stronger Pause. He coughs horribly, the phlegm sucking out his chest with a horrid, asthmatic sound which he douses with another cigarette and another shot of whiskey. The Bushmills now two thirds empty. He looks over at the MYSTERY WOMAN now beside him at the microphone. MIKE and the SECRETARY watch. The bored ENGINEER across the darkened midnight room yawns. ENGINEER Let's send out for some pizza Jim. JIM Nah, how 'bout some tacos when we're through? (downs another shot, continues) The world on fire Taxi from Africa The grand hotel he was drunk a big party last night back, going back in all directions sleeping these insane hours I'll never wake up in a good mood again I'm sick of these stinky boots Do you know we are being led to slaughters by placid admirals? And that fat slow generals are getting obscene on young blood? Do you know we are ruled by TV? (pause) SLOW DISSOLVE BEGINS: JIM Oh great Creator of Being Grant us one more hour to perform our art and perfect our lives The moths and atheists are doubly divine in dying We live, we die, and death not ends it Journey we more into the nightmare We're reaching for death on the end of a candle We're trying for something that's already found us... DISSOLVING TO: INT. MIAMI AUDITORIUM - NIGHT (1969) Crammed into every available space of an old SEAPLANE HANGAR with no seats -- standing room only -- a MASS of KIDS swelter in the heat, grumbling, fanning themselves with programs as a warm-up BAND plays. In the wings of the stage, a RADIO DJ/CRITIC is recording on tape. It's the same kid we saw long ago at the Whiskey backstage, pronouncing the arrival of the Doors on the scene. Now he's got a beard, glasses, a more cynical face. RADIO DJ/CRITIC (into microphone) A hot night in Miami January '69 -- every space in the auditorium is consumed... unfortunately the Doors have long since sold out. They've become an act. Morrison "falls" off the stage at least every other performance. "The Soft Parade" album only confirms the plasticity of their approach. Songs like "Touch Me" and "Follow Me Down" are not the Doors we once knew. So the question is: Why am I here? Are funerals entertainment? DENSMORE looks on from the stage wings, withdraws -- to RAY nearby. DENSMORE He ain't gonna show! I know it man. We should fuckin' go on without him. RAY Bill's with him. They're an hour away, he'll get him here. INT. NEW ORLEANS AIRPORT BAR - SAME NIGHT SIDDONS, the manager tugs on MORRISON who's getting soused with DOG, TOM, MIKE, and ROTHCHILD the producer. The P.A. SYSTEM announcing the departure of the Miami flight! SIDDONS Goddamit Jim! We missed one already, we gotta get this one man! Jim slams has shot glass on the bar. He's got a beard for the first time, looking like a tribal elder. JIM More! MIKE Four more all around and up and down! As the WAITRESS takes the order SIDDONS (urgent) NO! CUT EM OFF! CUT EM OFF! JIM Don't be so melodramatic Bill, it's not fun anymore. DOG I can't fly sober. SIDDONS Jim, you don't show for this one, we're dead, the whole group -- no more bookings. JIM I care. PAUL Come on Jim, we'll get fuckin' laid in Miami. SIDDONS We need the work Jim! They're making us post a $10,000 bond just to show up -- we're the only group in rock-n- roll with a fuck clause! (aside to Dog) Get him on the fuckin' plane. That's what I pay you for. DOG (to Bill) You're an awful little guy to be talking like that. JIM (muttering) Chump change, we're working for chump change. SIDDONS Look at you, you're a pathetic fuckin' slob and so are all your friends! JIM I got an idea Bill, you're fired. INTERCUT TO: INT. MIAMI AUDITORIUM - THAT NIGHT The warm-up BAND is applauded and booed. The CROWD resembles a pit of snakes, wriggling on top of each other. Impatient CATCALLS. INT. DRESSING ROOM - NIGHT JOHN Listen to 'em! They're not coming for the music anymore. They're coming to see a fuckin' freak show! RAY You think it's easy for him. He moves left he's got vice squad, on the right narcs -- and the audience just waiting for him to get busted. JOHN He wanted it! Not us. I just don't fuckin' get the point anymore. I never did I guess. Y'ask me he's just become a drunken fuckin' asshole that's what. And he's gonna take us down with him. RAY Compassion was never your forte man. JOHN Don't lecture me Mr. Philosopher, you never felt a fuckin thing in your life. I loved that man. I loved what he was. Robbie strums his guitar, breaks the tension in the room. A lick of "Five to One". ROBBIE It ain't the old Jim that's for sure. I think he's living for everybody else man and somewhere along the way he's lost his own self. RAY (almost to himself) The wine man, the ancient wine. The ancient wine. ROBBIE What? RAY Something he once told us. About Dionysos. When the madness took over... INTERCUT TO: OMIT Sequence omitted from original script. INT. AIRPLANE - THAT NIGHT The STEWARDESS, uptight, tries a smile at JIM, TOM, MIKE all belted in one row. STEWARDESS My name is Rita Hager and if... JIM If your name is Rita, then yor ol man must be ol man Rita!! (guffaws) TOM, MIKE & DOG (chorusing) That ol man Riva, he just keep rolling along! STEWARDESS Excuse me sir, my father is not my old man. A BABY, with her MOTHER, stares at Jim fascinated. He lifts his dark glasses, winks back at her. TIMECUT TO: The STEWARDESS slips the oxygen mask over her face. STEWARDESS In the event of a decrease of pressure, pull the oxygen mask to your... TOM Ma ol lady had one of those but she calls it a diaphragm when I'm eating her out! DOG Nah, it's a douche bag on a dixie cup. STEWARDESS I'm sorry sir, but you're embarrassing me. MIKE Great tits. SIDDONS Come on guys, cool it! Other PASSENGERS looking over. TIME CUT TO: In flight. Dog squeezes from the lavatory and drops a small bar of soap in Jim's drink. They laugh, push, yell. Jim is smoking a cigar. JIM (teasing to Rothchild in the row behind him) C'mon Paul, you can get us some heroin man. PAUL (suddenly serious) No I can't and I won't. JIM Why not? PAUL Cause I don't want to participate in anything that would accomplish your goal? JIM (wry) Oh and what is my goal Paul? Death? PAUL "Death old friend". JIM (laughing) Wrong. I just want the pure beauty of absolute zero and sing the blues man -- do nuthin, go nowhere, just be. TOM With that waistline Jimbo you got no choice. JIM (laughs, goodnatured) What's wrong with being a large mammal, a big beast like a tank. I feel great! DOG Yeah. What's wrong with being fat. TOM You mean "Crawling King Flab"? Rock is cock babe and your rock is dyin'. JIM Rock is death! There is no longer belief. Hey, I'll write poetry and direct movies. TOM And what are you offering? Sex? You can't get it up. Salvation? You can't even save yourself. Come on Jim, you're not gonna be remembered. JIM Miss?... STEWARDESS What do you need? JIM Some love. MIKE They'll still be talking about Jim when you're a walk on Baker. I'll make you a deal. When you do something, I'll criticize it. TOM I think you both should take your heads out of the toilet bowl. After "Soft Parade" You need an album sweetheart. MIKE You should take it outta your ass. JIM The first two novels come along they love you, next few they slam but if you stay around long enough, one day they say, "hey he's part of the national psyche". STEWARDESS What are you drinking? MIKE Screwdrives-her. (lifts her skirt) STEWARDESS (to Siddons) I'm going to have to call the captain if you can't control these people. I guarantee that. TOM (a cruel sarcasm Jim seems to enjoy) ...if you live long enough, don't kid yourself Jimbo -- you're all alone out there, Jimbo, cept for me, cause you're too wacked out man, they're scared, you're too fuckin crazy. JIM (feigning innocence) I wasn't mad, Tom. I was only interested in freedom. TOM (the devil) Bullshit! You're bored, you're not free. You tested all the limits, fame, fucking, money, -- whatcha gonna do now Jimbo! When the music's over, when you're too fat and ugly to get on a stage, whatcha gonna do for act three -- puke on Heaven's door? JIM Listen you two bit fuckin actor, you underestimate the audience. You think they all want a better job, a house, two cars, money, that's what you think but you know what they really want, Tom, in their lives, what they really want -- TOM Tell me. JIM (a whisper) ...something sacred, that's what they want, something sacred. Tom spews the contents of his mouth all over Jim in response. Jim throws his sandwich back at Tom... then another drink goes... JIM Fuck you ignorant devil's asshole slave! TOM No you. Something sacred. My cock is sacred. Suck on that! JIM I don't eat shrimp. A full fledged food fight in progress. Dog, Tom, Jim, Mike pushing and shoving. A drink spills over an innocent PASSENGER. DOG Incoming! The STEWARDESS coming up with the CAPTAIN. CAPTAIN ALL RIGHT!! If you young men don't change your attitude right now, when we get to Miami you're going to be arrested. JIM Yes, sir. (reflexively) TOM (saluting) YESSIR -- you asshole. EXT. MIAMI AIRPORT - SAME NIGHT PLANE taxiing up. TWO POLICE CARS, red lights revolving, are waiting. INT. PLANE - SAME NIGHT PILOT escorting FOUR FBI AGENTS aboard. CAPTAIN As captain of this ship I'm placing all four of you under arrest. The FBI will... MIKE For what! What'd we do! TOM Read me my rights, motherfuckers... motherfuckin bulls! JIM stunned in his drunkenness. SIDDONS and ROTHCHILD protesting AD LIBS. INT. MIAMI AUDITORIUM - THAT NIGHT The CROWD is heckling a long-haired HIPPIE in a leather hat who cradles a live, snow-white LAMB telling him to "GET OFF", screaming AD LIB for the "DOORS, DOORS, DOORS!! JIM JIM JIM!!" HIPPIE Look at this thing! Look at this beautiful little living thing!! How can you eat it!! How can you eat its flesh??? CATCALLS. Angry fists pound the edge of the proscenium. Bodies push and pack against each other. If Hieronymus Bosch had painted a rock concert, this would be it. HIPPIE LOVE ANIMALS, DON'T EAT THEM!!!! (Boos!!) INT. BACKSTAGE - THAT NIGHT Excitement. EVERYBODY moving fast... ...as JIM, dark sunglasses and beard, surrounded by TWO FBI AGENTS and his BODYGUARDS move toward the stage, two hours late. SIDDONS with him arguing AD LIB with RAY and the PROMOTER, a southern sleazeball with long muttonchops and velvet shirt and beads. A mess -- the CROWD chanting DOORS! DOORS! DOORS! DOORS! SIDDONS (screaming at promoter) What the FUCK happened to the SEATS!! (grabs him) What's the FUCKING IDEA man! THERE'S NO SEATS! PROMOTER I took 'em out! What's wrong with that! We stuffed an extra five thou in there. (pissed at Jim) Where the fuck you been! SIDDONS That wasn't THE FUCKING IDEA MAN!! We're gonna sue you!... We're pulling the plug. PROMOTER So sue me! You're playing or you ain't leaving here with your equipment sonny! SIDDONS (to Ray) We're not playing. Meanwhile, JOHN arguing with RAY and JIM who sways, drunk. The FBI agents get lost in the background. JOHN I'm not going out there man! RAY JOHN, C'MON!! JOHN Look at him! I'm not going out there 'till I get some sorta guarantee he's gonna stay in line. I've had it with this shit. JIM Whatsa matter, scared Johnny boy? JOHN (going physically for Jim) YOU'RE A FUCKIN ASSHOLE MAN!! RAY JOHN!! STOP IT!! COME ON!! Jim laughing, throws his arm around ROBBIE for support, ROBBIE patient with him. John yelling as they approach the curtains and the lights and the first monster realization of the THOUSAND MOUTHS waiting in the pit of hell. JOHN You're pushing death Morrison. Everybody thinks we're drug addicts cause of you Morrison. JIM We the Beatles yet? JOHN (held by Ray) We took drugs to EXPAND MINDS ASSHOLE, not ESCAPE. I'M NOT GOING OUT THERE WITH YOU. JIM Hey John y'ever eaten human flesh? When we get to New York, I know this chick... RAY (taking John aside) Come on man. JOHN I'm not going out there! RAY We'll talk tomorrow, we'll settle it. Just do it tonight man and... As JIM brings up a tiny vial with a lubricating head on it, holds it to Robbie's lips playfully. They're in the shadows. JIM ...just a touch Robbie, it's the funkiest stuff, you'll play like an orgasm tonight... ROBBIE No man come on, I don't want any. JIM ...just a little lick, come on trust me... for old times, the four of us, let's get together one more time,... the Doors man... Please. For me. Something so sincere in Jim's eyes. Robbie takes the fatal lick. Jim smiles manically as the NUREMBERG SOUNDS of the CROWD drown them out. ROBBIE You said you love pain man, but you run from it every chance you get. INT. STAGE - SAME NIGHT The DOORS come out finally. The noise is overwhelming. Acid, light, noise. Wagnerian Gods, Hitler... JIM spreading his arms like Icarus set to fly. The ROARS redouble, their FEET stomping out: CROWD (insane) DOORS DOORS DOORS DOORS... Joints are thrown by the dozen on the stage at Jim's feet. He is a god now as he bends regally, picks one up. COPS everywhere looking as... He lights it. The CROWD going nuts as the DOORS go into the ominous introductory strains of FIVE TO ONE trying to get the onus off Jim and the show on the road. The Audience knows the song, go into a primal FOOT STOMP with it. Bras are thrown on stage. Kids writhe madly in the primal Doors dance. People with SPARKLERS running through the hangar. CAMERA FLASHBULBS popping throughout the show... get Jim on film while you can. Jim, drunk, high, smoking the jay, won't go into the lyrics right off, forcing the Doors to circle the beat again. He jerks his hand back from the mike as if it were a hot wire. JIM ARE YOU READY!!!! (beat) ARE YOU REAAAAAAADYYYYYYYYY!! The Crowd explodes once more. As a COP heads upstage to get Jim for the joint -- he cooly flicks it back into the crowd, avoiding disaster. Perfect timing as the Cop looks around, suddenly distracted by: The Crowd yelling something. An INSANE TEENAGER stands on the railing of a balcony above the auditorium, poised to swan dive some 18 feet into the crowd. Which he now does, arms held out like wings. The Crowd yells, parting to allow his bulk to smack the floor. Pause. Cops rushing to the spot. The KID suddenly stands up, unhurt, with a stoned out look on his face. TEENAGER Wow! Then splits at a full run thru the crowd chased by the perplexed Cops. Everybody surging back towards the stage as JIM looses one of his primal SCREAMS. JIM YAAAAAOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWW... Love my girl! (song) Five to one One in five No one here gets out alive You gets your baby I'll get mine Gonna make it, baby If we try He slobbers, drunk, slouches, stumbles, regains his balance. The Crowd loves it, but Ray senses something wrong. Robbie starts to feel the effects of the acid Jim gave him -- his eyes registering fear. JIM & DOORS The old get old The young get stronger May take a week And it may take longer They got the guns But we got the numbers Gonna win yeah -- WE'RE TAKING OVER!! During the instrumental break, Jim picks up one of the roses from the floor, pokes it at John on the drums, who whacks it to death on his skins. Jim starts to whirl the mike cord like a slingshot or bolo, in an ever-widening arc... ...it flies off and smashes into the head of the PROMOTER at the edge of the stage arguing with SIDDONS. The man is staggered, weaving, Siddons helping him to a FIRST AID TEAM. JIM YAAAAAAOOOOOOWWWWWWW!!! The crazy VEGETERIAN HIPPIE runs out on stage to give Jim the white lamb to make this political point. Jim holds the lamb in his arms. It's purring, gentle. DOG chases the HIPPIE off as he gives the microphone back to Jim and takes the lamb from him... he staggers over to ROBBIE and goes down to his knees, pretending to give him head on his frantic stoned guitar solo. JIM & DOORS Your ballroom days are over baby Night is drawing near Shadows of the evening Crawl across the years You walk across the floor With a flower in your hand Tryin to tell me no one understands PHOTOGRAPHERS flashing cameras. BAKER urging him on from the wings as he passes out. A GIRL runs onto the stage, dumps a bottle of champagne on Jim's head. Jim takes his shirt off, soaking wet. The CROWD is also stripping in the heat, shirts, blouses, screaming so much now they are obviously way past listening to any song. It has become a view of the future -- the NAKED GIRL and BOY dancing stark naked drugged out in the middle of it all, the FAT GIRL prowling naked on the edge of the stage before she's arrested, the FIGHTS in the Crowd, fists, blood, a black man chased and beaten, the sense of Altamont here, the hippie flower trip gone to shit -- it's all come down here tonight, the end of an era. JIM & DOORS Trade in your hours for a handful of dimes Gonna make it baby -- in our prime Get together one more time Get together He stops singing suddenly, squinting out into the madness. The arena echoes with the uncomprehending chant of the Mob... MOB ...one more time Get together one more time Get together one more time SPECIAL EFFECT -- the INDIAN GHOST is leaving Jim's body -- spectrally moving off him, hovering there in the air, its eyes -- the face of a dying Indian on an Arizona highway -- then gone. A moment, only three, four beats. An optical illusion? Maybe. Or is it saying, 'now you are just a white man'... maybe not. As it drifts off in a cloud, into the vast audience's EYEBALL. JIM YOU'RE ALL A BUNCHA FUCKIN SLAVES!!! The instruments continue to vamp but there's a hush to the CROWD. JIM Lettin people tell you what you're gonna do! Lettin people push you around! How long you think it's gonna last! How long you gonna let them push you around!! He waits. INTERCUTS of the FACES in the crowd. VOICES (ignoring Jim) "Light My Fire"! Play "Light My Fire"!! Come on Jim... (some boos sprinkled in) Take your clothes off man! Get wild! Fuck me baby. Fuck me girl, suck my cock honey around the world! Mexican whore suck my prick! Keeper of the royal sperm man! CELEBRATE THE LIZARD MAN, DRAIN IT MOTHERFUCKER!! JIM C'MON GET IT ALL OUT! ALL THE LITTLE HATREDS, Everything inside you... LET ME HAVE IT! CROWD FUCK YOU! JIM THAT'S THE ONE LITTLE WORD I WANTED TO HEAR! THAT'S THE VERY LITTLE WORD! THE WHOLE WORLD HATES ME! THE WHOLE FUCKING WORLD HATES ME! VOICE (girl) SAVE US... SAVE US, JIM... JIM! EEEE... I TOUCHED HIM. JIM Maybe you love it, maybe you love gettin your faces pressed into the shit of the world! You'd all eat shit wouldn't ya!! Adolph Hitler is ALIVE AND WELL HERE IN MIAMI!! YOU'RE ALL A BUNCHA SLAVES!! The Crowd BOOS back at him, surging suddenly with hatred for Jim. Intercut the Crowd -- feel this hatred. JIM WHAT ARE YA GONNA DO ABOUT IT! WHAT ARE YA GONNA DO ABOUT IT! WHAT ARE YA GONNA DO ABOUT IT! The Band has petered out by this point but out of nowhere, ROBBIE, zonked on his version of LSD, starts up with "TOUCH ME BABE." JIM & DOORS (going with it) Come on, come on, come on and FUCK me babe! Can't you see that I am not afraid (cuts the music) HEY WAIT A MINUTE... (music cuts off raggedly) Miami Beach Florida hunh? I was BORN and RAISED not far from here... went to Florida State... (cheers) Then I GOT SMART. I went to California where you can let your hair grow long and walk down the street without people calling you a FREAK... They're trying to CHANGE THE WORLD out there in California. VOICES Yeah, STOP THE WAR MAN, PEACEEE... WE LOVE YA JIM. JIM NO I'm not talkin' 'bout NO REVOLUTION. I'm not talkin 'bout no DEMONSTRATION. I'm talking 'bout HAVING SOME FUN. I'm talkin' 'bout DANCIN. I'm talkin 'bout LOVE. I'm talkin' 'bout some LOVE. LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE... LOVE!!!! Grab your friend -- and LOVE him. Come oooooaaaannnnn. Yeah! Jim pulling his shirt off -- barechested -- waving it like a toreador in front of his leather crotch. VOICES (cheers, giggles) "Light My Fire"! Come on Jim -- play "Light My Fire"! The audience seems to be paying no attention to what he is doing or saying, which drives him to deeper rage. JIM Ain't nobody gonna love my ass? Come on... I need ya. There's so many of ya out there and nobody's gonna love me! C'mon -- what'cha come here for anyway? You didn't come here for music. You didn't come here to see a good band. You came here for THIS didn't ya... He saunters to the edge of the stage. Hisses at them. He clasps his crotch, leering at a cute LITTLE GIRL in the front row, shaking it at her. Her BOYFRIEND, pissed at Jim, runs for the stage. Jim unzips his leathers. JIM I'm lonely out here -- Ya wanna SEE IT... COME ON SWEETHEART... I need it, I NEED IT, need ya, need ya, NEED YA, COME OOOOOAAAANNNNNNN... Chaos, confusion now erupt in the crowd! The BOYFRIEND is running at JIM as the BODYGUARDS throw him back into the crowd. Jim flicking his shirt over his crotch, back and forth like a drunken matador. The Doors look at each other, don't know what's going to happen. JIM Didja see it! You wanna see it AGAIN??? The crowd roars its approval. Confusion reigns. Drunken CATCALLS. Things, bras, cans thrown at the stage. VOICES (ad lib) Take it off! Take it all off! JIM What if I pull it out fer ya!! And SHAKE IT AROUND!!! Will that do it for you! Would ya, would ya, would ya!! Now watch -- I'm gonna show it to ya! He feigns opening his belt and exposing himself, flipping his shirt back and forth over the crotch in a mock striptease. JIM There it was! Ya see it? Ya see it?... Ya wanna see it again? A flock of TEENAGE GIRLS are sure they've seen it, hysterical. TEENAGE GIRL I saw it!... Yes, yes! Jim! Jim! TEENAGE GIRL 2 Where? I didn't see it. JIM (roaring out his commands) COME ON UP HERE AND LOVE MY ASS! I WANNA SEE SOME ACTION OUT THERE! I WANNA SEE SOME ACTION OUT THERE! I WANNA SEE SOME ACTION OUT THERE! I WANNA SEE SOME ACTION OUT THERE! I WANT YOU TO LOVE MY ASS! I WANT SOME LOVE... LOVE... LOVE... LOVE C'MON, C'MON... NO LIMITS, NO LAWS YOU WANNA FUCK? COME ON! COME ON UP HERE!!!!! He looks like he's really gonna tear it all off now. A flash of boxer shorts. RAY moving. SIDDONS moving. DOG getting to him first, wrapping him in a bearhug from behind, lifting him holding his pants up. VINCE THE ROADIE DON'T DO IT MAN. DON'T DO IT! RAY HEY JIM. JIM C'MON! C'MON! NO LIMITS, NO LAWS! NO LIMITS, NO LAWS! NO LIMITS, NO LAWS! The place is in PANDEMONIUM now. GIRLS jumping on stage and dancing with Jim still in Vince the Roadie's bearhug. Another RIOT... COPS fighting the TEENAGERS off the stage, now wobbling under the weight. PROMOTER (pissed, head bandaged) GET OFF THE FUCKING STAGE! GET OFF THE FUCKING STAGE!! (stiffarms Jim off the stage) RAY starts playing BREAK ON THROUGH trying to keep things normal. JIM now out there in the arena in a CONGA LINE, doing his rain dance, hands on hips, the TEENAGERS forming a long snake behind him. The huge speaker columns teeter and fall. A corner of the STAGE now COLLAPSES from the weight, PEOPLE spilling on the floor, screams. The power console tips over next to DENSMORE. He bails. Manzarek and Krieger follow. The PROMOTER is yelling at SIDDONS about his insurance contract as the COPS and FBI AGENTS close in, looking for Jim. COPS Where's the guy with the penis! Who is out there leading his naked drunken FLOCK, hundreds of them in a phallic Pied Piper dance thru the darkened seaplane hanger. From BREAK ON THROUGH PART TWO: JIM ET AL & DOORS You know the day destroys the night Night divides the day Try to run, try to hide BREAK ON THROUGH TO THE OTHER SIDE BREAK ON THROUGH TO THE OTHER SIDE BREAK ON THROUGH TO THE OTHER SIDE Dead cats! Dead rats! Did you see what they were at Dead cat in a top hat! Sucking on a young man's blood Fat cat in a top hat Thinks he's an aristocrat Thinks he can kill and slaughter Thinks he can shoot my daughter Dead cats! Dead rats! Think you're an aristocrat Crap, that's crap Ray watching from the corner of the stage, littered with bras, bottles, shirts, shoes, socks, panties, hats, broken equipment, debris -- the end of the dream. The Doors as a live band are dead. DISSOLVING TO: INT. MIAMI COURTROOM - DAY (1970) The "Charges" are being read by the JUDGE, distant, not of this world. The court is lit in southern gothic daylight, ghostly chiaroscuro, all colors bled. Camera moving along the sweaty white faces of the six older JURORS, all of them straight "silent majority"... past the PROSECUTOR, his shadow cutting the jury box... onto JIM bearded, smoking 2 packs a day, a deep racking cough, sitting with his elder ATTORNEY... RAY, ROBBIE, JOHN, PAMELA, OTHERS in support are there in background. The trial is going down like a morphine dream, Jim featured in diopter close-up. JUDGE VOICE ...you are charged under four counts with lewd behavior, simulated masturbation, public drunkenness, profanity, and public exposure. A blues riff goes by -- brief, ghostly from RUNNING BLUE. JIM SONG Poor Otis dead and gone Left me here to sing his song Pretty little girl with the red dress on Poor Otis dead and gone JIM (V.O.) I can't believe this is happening I can't believe all these people are sniffing each other & backing away, teeth grinning, hair raised, growling, here in the slaughtered wind This is it No more fun the death of all joy has come The PRESS SECTION is full as Jim's older LAWYER argues in front of the JURY, a distant voice. LAWYER Your Honor, I would like to bring to the Court's attention the contemporary Broadway musical "Hair" in which cast members disrobe and appear naked on the stage. JUDGE (pounds his gavel) Inadmissable evidence. JIM VOICE OVER I had a vision of America Seen from the air 28,000 ft. & going fast A one-armed man in a Texas parking labyrinth A burnt tree like a giant primeval bird in an empty lot in Fresno SUPERIMPOSITION: LAWYER Your Honor... any difference from the Miami nightclubs where comedians frequently incorporate profanity into their acts JUDGE (gavel) Inadmissable evidence. JIM VOICE OVER Miles & miles of hotel corridors & elevators, filled with citizens Motel Money Murder, Madness Change the mood from glad to sadness Play the ghost song baby The backbeat of WHEN THE MUSIC'S OVER starts, into its spiralling descent. SUPERIMPOSITION: LAWYER (distant) ...there has not been one shred of evidence: 300 photographs and not one shows a thing; not reliable testimony, nothing but hysterical heresay The PRESS is bored, their numbers reduced. The spectators have changed from kids to OLDER PEOPLE intent on preserving their way of life. A TAPE is playing of Jim's devil voice at the concert, cursing: "Come on up here. No limits! No laws", etc... (screams, obscenity) JIM & DOORS (SONG) When the music's over (3) Turn out the lights (3) For the music is your special friend Dance on fire as it intends Music is your only friend Until the end (2) SUPERIMPOSITION TO: LAWYER ...this is a major First Amendment violation by the Police and Politicians of Miami. Every witness they've brought has admitted under oath to not actually seeing the client's genitals -- except one who... The PRESS section is now down to about THREE bored FACES, one of them PATRICIA KENNEALY who looks pregnant. JIM smiles at her. JIM & DOORS Cancel my subscription to the Resurrection Send my credentials to the house of detention I got some friends inside EXT. ORANGE BOWL - MIAMI - DOCUMENTARY FOOTAGE (DAY) ANITA BRYANT & JACKIE GLEASON at the NATIONAL DECENCY RALLY. A large CROWD in the vicinity of 100,000. NIXON addressing them. JIM & DOORS SONG (OVER) The face in the mirror won't stop The girl in the window won't stop A feast of friends alive she cried Waiting for me Outside! MONTAGE -- NEWSPAPER HEADLINES SPIN OUT: JIMMI HENDRIX OVERDOSES IN LONDON. JANIS JOPLIN OVERDOSES IN LOS ANGELES. A ROLLING STONE WANTED POSTER ON JIM -- "In the County of Dade/Dead -- Did He Or Didn't He?". JIM & DOORS SONG (OVER) Before I sink into the big sleep I want to hear The scream of the butterfly Come back baby Back into my arms INT. HOTEL ROOM - MIAMI BEACH - DAY The MUSIC continuing into a long backbeat without lyrics -- emphasizing the downward spiralling theme... JIM ...Well, you gonna get rid of it? Fucked up people y'know, crazies, unwanted Indians just throw it in the river. Pause. PATRICIA -- four and a half months pregnant, stares. A glary window onto a balcony overlooking the sea with Florida palms and a strip of beach. A room in a highrise hotel. Jim's mess is everywhere. PATRICIA I can't fucking believe you just said that! JIM Patricia, wouldn't it be better to have a kid with someone who wanted to be its father? PATRICIA It'd be a fucking genius, that's what it'd be! You and me. The child would be a god, goddess! JIM It'd be a monster. A look. She's stunned, ugly wrath gathering. He tries to soothe her. JIM I got this trial dragging on me, Patricia. I couldn't support the kid -- I can't afford it and I don't want the responsibility right now. PATRICIA You're a COWARD!! A LITTLE BOY!! The only way you can't afford it is emotionally. You forgot your vows man. They were forever in the goddess' sight. Death doesn't part, only love Jim! JIM Come on Patricia, I was stoned... it seemed like the fun thing at the time. She pulls a dagger with a skull's head on it, goes for him. PATRICIA I'm gonna cut your balls off Morrison! JIM (that smile) You want 'em? PATRICIA (beat) FUCK YOU. I'm gonna have the kid. JIM Then it'll be your kid. If you want the abortion I'll pay for it and I'll come up to New York to be with you when you have it. PATRICIA No you won't. JIM Yes I will. PATRICIA Bullshit Morrison (release him, stalks) You know who you are... (pause) NO. What difference does it make. You know, you never pretended. I did. I don't even like kids particularly, (laughs to herself) but I don't want the other thing either. I guess what I really want is to throw myself off this fucking balcony (Hurls the knife out off the balcony) Well now that you've fucked the future, Morrison, have you fucked everything?... (cruelly) Have you looked at yourself in the mirror. Your stomach... JIM (hurt, near tears) Please don't say those things to me, Patricia. She suddenly grasps him, clutching, hunger, lust. PATRICIA Fuck me one last time, you worthless piece of shit. JIM & DOORS ...the scream of the butterfly Come back baby Back into my arms On Jim's face. EXT. MIAMI COURTROOM - DAY TWO HUNDRED PERSONS are gathered on the lawn outside, banners decrying the Doors. A MIDDLE AGED SPEAKER, clean cut, squarely dressed, expresses his outrage. SPEAKER (bullhorn) ...endorsed by President Richard Nixon! (cheers) The immoral conduct of degenerates such as Jim Morrison is an unacceptable insult to this country and the principles for which it stands... JIM & DOORS (OVER) We're getting tired of hanging around Waiting around with our heads to the ground I hear the gentle sound Very near yet very far Very soft, yeah, very clear Come today, come today JIM Well uh, it's designed to wear you down y'know... when that rap sheet says the "United States of America versus You" it takes you down day by day, specially when no one really gives a shit about, y'know, the First Amendment that's on trial here... Nobody says anything about that, it's just uh did you take your pants off y'know, I mean that's not what it's about, it's about freedom, that's what it's about... but who cares, right? Freedom exists in a schoolbook. REPORTER 1 (disinterested) ...but the promoters are cancelling your shows, will this affect the way you play? JIM Well, I can only open doors, M'am. I can't drag people thru 'em. I'm no savior. REPORTER 2 But you've called yourself a shaman? JIM (beat, pained) Did I? Well, I'll tell ya, my words stand a far better chance of being around a hundred years from now than my waistline. As he goes into the courtroom, a dolled up REPORTER 1, the local anchor-lady turns to her camera. ANCHORLADY The question that will be answered today: Did Jim Morrison or did he not take off his pants last March? This is... INT. COURTROOM - THAT DAY The judge passing sentence, distant, hazy under song. Darkened shadows across the floor, silhouettes... the world bleak and white... JUDGE James Douglas Morrison, I hereby sentence you to sixty days of hard labor in the Dade County Jail and for public exposure I am sentencing you to six months of the same, after which you are to serve two years and four months of probationary time. [...] SECRETARY (overlapping) I booked you round trip to New York for Thursday, Pamela's called six times, Patricia, Kathy, Judy, Gayle is pregnant, she says but... you gotta get straight, honey, go to sleep, get a massage, go to the dentist, get a haircut honey, you gotta cool out... JOHN Probably a bath too... OFFICE BOY (reading a rock magazine) Jesus Jim, this guy really despises you. JOHN ...didn't invite us to Woodstock. Twenty other groups but not... SIDDONS What's heavy is the radio stations pulling us from their playlists. The big cities -- Philly, Cinci, Chicago, Detroit -- it's insane! Record sales suck! RAY (with irony, reading something) "The band you love to hate". LAWYER (2nd Lawyer if necessary) We can drag this appeal out for years, we can keep you out of jail. JIM (drinking) You're drinking with number three. SIDDONS Max firmly believes the FBI's behind it. We're subpoenaing their records -- they had memos on you in Phoenix and they got you extradicted to Miami illegally without a felony... MIKE A new image -- Jim Morrison as "Renaissance Man" -- We bring you back slow, quiet, the beard, elder of the tribe. OFFICE BOY (reading from review) ...like Lennon said "you either grow with the music or it grows without you." ROBBIE Hey, it was fun. All the voices merging into one: VOICES First Hendrix now Janis Robbie flew to Hawaii legalities pending dispositions book in Toronto interview with PBS renew your diverse license psychic predictions nine paternity suits fifty thousand dollar bond recoup our losses Pamela's shopping spree with your credit card Morrison Hotel some-body from film school mountain of coke in the broom closet Jac Holzman eight thirty in the morning remix perform schedule Paul Rothchild taxes Texas teenyboppers tomorrow. Jim, during this, picking up the TV remote, flicking on the images. The VOICES blending with TV VOICES as he swithes the channels. The camera moving in on Jim, the VOICES fading. All we see is Jim. All we hear and see is the TV: TELEVISION Chicago Seven in it's tenth day... Bobby Seale gagged and chained... (click) L.A. shootout with Black Panthers... (click) Charles Manson indicted for murder of actress Sharon Tate... (click) U. S. ground troops in Laos and Cambodia... (click) Indians still occupying Alcatraz Island... (click) For the My Lai massacre testified 120 villagers shot by American soldiers in a trench... The SONG climaxes into an inner scream of madness. JIM & DOORS (CONCLUDE) For the music is your special friend Dance on fire as it intends Music is your only friend Until the end (3) (SCREAM!) Silence on Jim. JIM (mildly) I think I'm having a nervous breakdown. The sound of wind, the backbeat of LA WOMAN flooding in. EXT. CHATEAU MARMONT HOTEL - LOS ANGELES - NIGHT JIM dangles out on the narrow ledge that circumscribes the 20th floor rooftop -- wind blowing thru his wild hair, the card zooming by like racer lights on Sunset below. The song LA WOMAN continues born from this renewed feeling of danger. JIM & DOORS Well I just got into town 'bout an hour ago Took a look around, see which way the wind blow Where the little girls in their Hollywood bungalows PAM screaming for him to come back from the edge as TOM BAKER and MIKE and DOG and a CAMERAMAN film in 16mm. PAM JIM! PLEASE GODDAMIT!! COME BACK IN PLEASE!! JIM yelling back, as he drinks from a pint of whiskey, enjoying himself enormously. JIM Whatcha worried about? I like it out here. He feigns a fall. PAM NOOOOOO!! RAY and SIDDONS arrive, terrified, looking for him. JIM (laughing at Pam) Life on the edge baby. Come get me if you love me baby. PAM PLEASE GODDAMIT JIM MORRISON I'M NOT GONNA KILL MYSELF FOR YOU. GET IN HERE. Jim cracking up with laughter. BAKER, drunk and the FILM CREW love it, swishpanning with a cheap sungun. MIKE (dancing) We got it man! Keep going. Great get a two shot. BAKER GO ON GET OUT THERE PAM. Pam is sufficiently cracked on her own set of drugs to start climbing out onto the ledge, skirts blowing in the wind. PAM JIM MORRISON GODDAMIT I LOVE YOU I WANT YOU I NEED YOU. Jim moving further along the ledge. JIM (raw) YOUR WHOLE LIFE'S BULLSHIT! YOU LOVE ME THEN COME AND GET ME. JIM & DOORS (OVER) LA Woman (X2) LA Woman Sunday afternoon (X3) Drive thru your suburbs Into your blues (X2) Into your blue-blue Blues Into your blues Siddons and Ray terrified. Is this the night it's finally going to end in a suicide plunge? Ray trying to stop Pam, too late. RAY Pam!! Oh shit... get the ambulances man... Pam's moving shakily along the ledge, cracked on downers. Jim watching her come, amazed at her risk. RAY (yelling down) JIM! HELP HER. She's gonna fall. TOM Jump! He watches, does nothing. JIM Come on baby, come on. RAY (trying another tack) Jim we gotta finish "LA Woman". JIM Don't have an ending Ray. Reaches his hand out. She is closer. But shaky. RAY (white) They're both gonna die... ARE YOU HAPPY YOU COCKSUCKERS!! Ray goes after Tom Baker and the Film Crew. A scuffle. Yelling, shouting, but down below in the intimacy of the ledge, blowing out on the edge, the wind and the world and death. Two crazy children linked on this gothic balcony of the Chateau reach their hands out for each other. JIM Come on baby, come on PAM (quoting him) "...but one, the most beautiful one of all -- dances in a ring of fire -- " JIM (raw singing) "I see your hair is burning. If they say I never loved you, you know they are a liar!" PAM "...and throws off the challenge with a shrug" JIM All the poetry has wolves in it Pam!!! She has never been so concentrated, inching closer to him. Her heels overhanging oblivion. PAM I don't wanna die with you Jim Morrison, I don't wanna die! JIM & DOORS Never saw a woman So alone (X2) So alone -- lone lone JIM C'mon Pam, this is it! We'll do it right here! Right now! You and me! Ray, Tom, Siddons, Mike, Dog, they all watch in horror, sensing it will happen. They have even stopped filming. Inches... inches. He dodges her touch, confused... to the last possible second. Then SHE'S THERE -- in his arms. Her arms latch around him and she hugs him with all her wiry soul. PAM Jim -- let's go, let's leave this town! You and me! Never come back. JIM (demonic) We can. Right now. Just one more step... PAM No Jim. I want to LIVE with you. I want to LIVE with you. The two lovers huddled together on the ledge. He slips his head down on her lap, looking up into her eyes with the strangest tears in his eyes. JIM (a poem) There was preserved in her the fresh miracle of surprise... clothed in sunlight restless in wanting dying of fever married to doubt how it has changed you how slowly estranged you solely arranged you beg for your mercy -- OR -- ...but all will pass lie down in green grass and smile and muse and gaze upon her smooth resemblance to the mating-Queen who it seems is in love with the horseman Tomorrow we enter the tomb of my birth I want to be ready. On her face -- moved. Pause. LA WOMAN floods in on his smile, an upbeat surge. Upstairs, the ONLOOKERS relax. HOTEL MANAGEMENT and COPS are now rushing up in background. JIM & DOORS Mr. Mojo Rising Mr. Mojo Risin' (X2) DISSOLVE TO: EXT. DOORS OFFICE - SANTA MONICA BL. - L.A. - DAY (1970) There's music rocking from the inside. Cables and baffles run from the second story down to the rehearsal room on the first. JIM & DOORS Keep on risin' Got to keep on risin' Risin' Risin' (X8) INT. DOORS OFFICE - DAY The SECRETARIES and STAFF dance to the SOUND rocking thru the floor. JIM & DOORS Well I just got into town about an hour ago Took a look around, see which way the wind blow Camera moving thru the offices, past the OFFICE BOY, past SIDDONS, past the PUBLICIST, etc -- a farewell to the band. INT. BASEMENT - RECORDING STUDIO - DAY We see RAY, ROBBIE, JOHN, BOTNICK, a BASS and 2nd RHYTHM GUITARIST, WIVES, GIRLFRIENDS but no Jim. They're really driving, the music soars. PAMELA'S hair shaking as she swings to the beat. JIM & DOORS With a little girl in a Hollywood bungalow Are you a lucky lady in the City of Light? Or just another lost angel -- City of Night? INT. TOILET - RECORDING STUDIO - SAME DAY Wires run into a tiny toilet revealing JIM with headphones to his ears barking into a dangling mike, one leg propped on a toilet seat, in a groove. A new, strange, unparalleled beauty in his voice, hoarser but wiser, haunted by experience yet joyful as youth, Jim is ironically, at his best. JIM & DOORS LA Woman (X2) LA Woman / Sunday Afternoon (X3) Drive thru your suburbs Into your blues (X2) Into your blue-blue blues EXT. LOS ANGELES FREEWAY - DAY MONTAGE: Moving, moving, moving -- all the POVS from fast- moving CARS travelling with the pace of L.A. Song of freedom, of escape -- the STRIP, the cars, the freeway, the BILLBOARDS... farewell L.A. INT. NEW YORK HOSPITAL ROOM - DAY Camera creeping towards ANNE O'RIORDAN as she waits, alone on a white table for the doctor to arrive. Jim never showed up after all. But on we go. JIM & DOORS I see your hair is burning Hills are filled with fire If they say I never lov'd you You know they are a liar (etc) Never saw a woman So alone (X2) So alone lone lone So alone EXT. RAY'S HOUSE - VENICE - DAY JIM drives up in his beaten GTO MUSTANG, top down, bags all over the place, hops out. Carrying his bulk with grace, knocks and rings. RIDERS ON THE STORM starting to play over. INT. RAY'S HOUSE - DAY DOROTHY opens the door. Jim a stack of presents under his arm. JIM Eek Dorothy! You cut your hair! DOROTHY We're trying to have another baby. JIM (moving past her) What -- was your hair getting in the way? (she smacks him lightly) Where are the kids? EXT. RAY YARD - DAY He spots them, crossing to the YARD where a CHILDREN'S BIRTHDAY is in progress -- TWO DOZEN KIDS, a CLOWN acting out for them. A few parents and friends -- ROBBIE and LYNNE, their kid, JOHN and his RECENT LADY, their kid... When the KIDS spot JIM they light up. JIM Hey -- am I late or is this the cool remnant of a dream? KIDS (rushing to him) Eee! Jim! It's Uncle Jim... Come on... what did you bring me Jim... JIM (picks up Robin) How's my girl! And how's my boy! They stick a ludicrous printed birthday hat on his head. A bearded Santa Claus now engulfed with kids, though puffy, body gone, a literal physical wreck, yet a gentle pathos about him and still a charisma that the children react to without thinking. He gives out the presents all over. JIM (ad libs) For you... Pancho gets this one... Melanie -- yours... Hey Dorothy don't grab now... open that one, that's yours... keep your paws off that now... As RAY and ROBBIE and JOHN and the others circle him. JIM (to Robin, a 5 year old) ...and to you, princess, from your Royal servant, James Douglas Morrison (bows) As ROBIN, the cutest of them all, a bow in her hair, takes the package, opens it. RAY You wanna hear the new mixes on "LA WOMAN?"... JIM No, I gotta plane to catch. JOHN Won't take long man, it's the best one since "Days". ROBBIE We added rain to "Riders", come on. Jim cocks his head, listening to it playing from an inner room, his eyes on ROBIN opening the gift -- a beautiful, ANTIQUE DOLL of an 19th century poet -- rock star, stuffed, velour jacket, white fluffy lace collar, it could be Byron or it could be Jim Morrison -- in fact the hair is perfectly weaved to resemble Jim in his young lion phase -- an ironic gift, meant from the heart. It stops everybody -- they all look. A haunted quality to the doll. KID Ugh! What's that! ROBIN (to Jim) It's you. JIM Forever young... She kisses him. ROBIN Oh it's beautiful... Thank you Uncle Jim. INT. RAY'S WORK SPACE - DAY Off the patio windows of the birthday party, sounds and sunshine pouring in. The Clown running around, laughter. The music plays -- BRUCE at the mixing board. JIM & DOORS Riders on the Storm (x2) Into this house we're born Into this world we're thrown Like a dog without a bone An actor out on loan Riders on the storm Where we and Jim came in, I guess. Jim drinks from a cognac bottle straight, foot tapping, enjoying it, knows it's good -- but other things are calling. This is history. JIM I gotta admit -- that ain't bad for four guys who weren't even talking that day. Slapping shoulders, shaking hands. JOHN You really gonna live in Paris man? JIM Yeah John, be anonymous, write a book: "Observations of an American While on Trial in Miami". ROBBIE I still think we got a couple of great blues albums in us man. JIM I'm pinned man. Everything I do they got a category for it, y'know. Freedom's gone. JOHN Hey, I'm gonna miss you Jim. I'm gonna miss the feeling of playing music with you. JIM You can always whip the horses' eyes. You, John, miss me? JOHN More than you think asshole. (turn away, repressing -- the emotions) ROBBIE (walking him to the garden) Well far as I'm concerned, Jim, I made music with Dionysus man. We had some moments on stage like no one will ever fucking know. JIM (making light) Yeah, yeah -- and you lay off those drugs Rob. We're gonna play again some day. ROBBIE Jim -- "do not go gently into that good night. Rage rage against the dying of the light". (he winks goodbye) The kids running up to grab JIM, pulls him back to the party. GIRLS Come 'ere Uncle Jim, we're playing blind man's bluff... TIME CUT TO: EXT. GARDEN - LATER DAY JIM, a bearded Santa Claus with the birthday hat on his head, surrounded by the GIRLS and BOYS and DOROTHY shooting a home movie. They're eating birthday cake but UNCLE JIM is drinking straight from the cognac bottle -- a strange sight. JIM (to Robin) So what are you gonna be when you grow up? ROBIN I wanna be your wife He laughs, looks at Dorothy who's shooting him with the Super 8. JIM I don't know, can I afford you? Pam kinda wiped me out with her dress store y'know... ROBIN I'll make my own dresses and you'll see, I'll be the best wife. DOROTHY (nodding) You'll never be alone Jim. JIM (to Dorothy) You know I've never been happier. Not as much of a rush as I used to be in y'know... this is the strangest life I've ever known. His eyes on a LITTLE BOY who's walking into the party, sitting down with the others, ignored, isolated, a birthday cap on his head. Clothes belong to the 1940's and the face seems familiar. Jim is not sure, woozy from the cognac. As he fades. We saw the Boy many years ago in the backseat of the car in the Arizona desert. Jim's head falling gently into his folded arms on the table, the cognac bottle at his elbow, merlin hat on, beard, the kids laughing, pulling his ears and nose -- he doesn't wake up. TIME CUT TO: As Ray comes over now, rouses him gently. RAY Gotta plane to catch man? Jim coming awake in that instant alert way of his, but obviously hung over. JIM O?... splittling headache from which the future is made. Puzzling remark, He gets up, shaky, exits, kids tearing at him. Goodbyes. EXT. RAY'S HOUSE - VENICE - TWILIGHT The beach is behind them, the last of the frisbee players and dogs, the skaters go by, as we continue to hear RIDERS from within. RAY Is Pam really there in Paris waiting? JIM (ironic, head hurts) Sure. The Count's there so where else would she be? Gotta try to start over, without all the hassles, y'know. I think we can. RAY I never knew what you saw in that nightmare chick man. JIM Well she is kinda flakey -- like me. I mean she's just so vulnerable about everything. It makes me sad man. (pause) But she's always kinda believed in something about me y'know -- her little picture of me as the unsung poet -- and it's a fantasy I kinda dig y'know, 'stead of the one I live. RAY I don't know man, I don't wanna sound like your old man but you're only 27, you're living like you gotta get it all in, you gotta slow down man, you did it, you broke thru to the other side. JIM We didn't break thru Ray, we just pushed things a little. When you really break thru, there's nothing left. No music, no Doors, no God, nothing -- only a will to power. RAY I don't believe that. You were an American prince, man -- with overbred genes -- (Jim scoffs, laughs) No! What could've been Jim? You could've been President. (Jim cracks up) No man! What could've been Jim? We stood here on this beach on the edge of the Pacific that crazy summer day in '65 -- and we knew, you and I, we knew we were at the edge of the mind. we were there, man. One planet, one globe, one mind. Consciousness, we raised it, we were there. Jim, not the sentimental type, climbs in his car, amused. JIM And now what? RAY Now? (smiles, lethally sweet) You've made me into Ishmael. I am the last survivor of the Pequod. And I exist only to tell the story of Ahab who fought the black whale. JIM (loves it, laughs) It was white Ray. You gotta stop harpin' on that day. I was so ripped I can hardly remember it. Ignites engine. Ray leans in, lightening up. RAY Hey, what was that poem you once wrote about two chicks on the pier? JIM Come on man, I gotta fly. RAY Come on. Just once. JIM (VOICE OVER, pulling out the car) In that year we had a great Visitation of energy Back in those days Everything was simpler and more confused One summer night, going to the pier I ran into two young girls The blonde was called Freedom The dark one Enterprise We talked And they told me this story. As he departs, waving. RAY (OVER) What was the story? His point of view -- Jim receding into the sun in his mustang -- making a shakey, screeching curve at the bend of the beach. And he's gone. An ominous ROAR of an AIRPLANE above RAY. -- flying away. EXT. LOS ANGELES - TWILIGHT The PLANE flies off into the setting ball of red sun. INT. RECORDING SESSION (LAST SESSION) - L.A. - DEC. The bearded POET hunches in his chair, exhausted, clutching the paper, finished. Pause. He downs a final shot, grunts to the Indian Ghostman sitting there on a stool watching him in the corner of the studio. The Ghostman laughs (but nothing comes out of his mouth). His wrinkled eyes are happy, feathered ponytail, he nods... pleased. MORRISON Well, didja get all that? GHOSTMAN You done good, Jim, go now -- rest The ENGINEER, exhausted, doesn't feel anything funny. ENGINEER Yeah, I got it Jim. The poets face brightens. A small but ever-so-sweet smile of triumph hikes up the corners of his mouth. JIM Aw right. Let's get some tacos! He stands, sways, than moves out of view. The empty bottle of whiskey, its sands run out, is left behind. As we FADE OUT, a hardy, mischievous Morrison laugh and a ripple of sensuous MUSIC carry us into the lilting, lamenting strains of AN AMERICAN PRAYER -- THE END without lyrics for now as we cut to: INT. PARIS BEDROOM - NEAR DAWN (NIGHT) (1971) PAMELA is agitated in her sleep -- waking as she feels him watching. Is that him? At the door? A SHADOW -- leaves. Footsteps moving down the narrow Parisian corridor with the creaky floor. PAM Jim... that you? Looks at the time. Somewhere near dawn. The sounds of a bath being drawn. Nightmare or sleep? She tries to fade back to sleep but the MUSIC and the WHISPERING prod her, pull her awake... DISSOLVE: SAME FACE -- AN HOUR LATER. Putting her robe on, the slippers, the light... moving. She is much more ravaged looking than before. INT. BATHROOM - DAWN She finds him now... His face floating upwards, angelic eyes, the beard is now gone, a little smile on his face. He must be playing another joke. Although she really knows as she says the words: PAM Jim! It was you. I always know when it's you. (moving closer) Come on baby get out of the tub... mama'll dry you off... (pause) Jim Morrison, now you stop joking you hear me, cut it out! His face. At peace, as she sobs, the MUSIC cresting to Jim's lyrics. PAM ...was it all right Jim, did you enjoy it when it came my baby? Just like you said it'd be? JIM (OVER) They are waiting to take us into the severed garden do you know how pale and wanton thrillful comes death at a strange hour? Unannounced unplanned for like a scaring overfriendly guest you've brought to bed? Death makes angels of us all? And gives us wings where we had shoulders smooth as raven's claws... DISSOLVE TO: EXT. PERE LACHAISE CEMETERY - PARIS - DAY His face etching into a perfect Alexandrine bust of physical beauty. The camera moving to reveal, a wintry day, leaves blowing, the wild cats everywhere in the empty cemetery, the crumbling tombs, the flowers fresh and dead around Jim's tomb, the graffiti, wine bottles, Wilde, Bizet, Piaf, Chopin, Morrison... JIM (OVER) No more money, no more fancy dress this other kingdom seems by far the best until its other jaw reveals incest and loose obedience to a vegetable law. I will not go I prefer a feast of friends to the giant family... The MUSIC rolling up on: INT. CORRIDOR & STAGE - LIMBO Smoke. Some lights. The distant cheers of a CROWD. In slightly SLOW MOTION, a FIGURE moves down a corridor into a blinding light of stage and smoke. THREE OTHER SHADOWS are there waiting -- as the GHOST moves to the microphone in altered motion. The AUDIENCE is out there somewhere in the dark -- we sense they too have become ghosts, as all of us will one day. The MUSIC continuing up to roll from AMERICAN PRAYER -- THE END -- snatches we annotate. GHOST ANNOUNCER Ladies and Gentlemen, from Los Angeles California -- The Doors! (ghostly applause) JIM & THE DOORS (snatches) ...have you seen the warm progress under the stars? Have you forgotten the keys to the kingdom? Have you been born yet and are you alive? Where is the feast we were promised? Let's reinvent the gods, the myths of the ages! We need great golden copulations Camera closing past the DOORS to JIM alone, circling the mike with his dance -- the INDIAN GHOSTMAN jigging, shaman- like, off to the side -- now levitating above the stage, all crazy, gawky dancing. JIM Well, I'll tell you a story of whiskey, mystics and men And about the believers and how the whole thing began First there were women and children obeying the moon Then daylight brought wisdom and sickness too soon... the moon is a dry blood beast We have assembled inside this ancient and insane theatre to propagate our lust for life and flee the swarming wisdom of the streets we live we die and death not ends it (screams in agony) FATHER HAVE MERCY!!! Ending with a solitary sing-song croak. JIM Bird of prey, bird of prey Flying high, flying high in the summer sky Bird of prey, bird of prey flying high, flying high gently pass by Bird of prey, bird of prey flying high, flying high Take me on your flight (pause then) I will come again down from the wild mountains THE SUBTITLE READS "JIM IS SAID TO HAVE DIED OF 'HEART FAILURE'. PAMELA JOINED HIM THREE YEARS LATER"... HER ASHES WERE BURIED NEXT TO HIM." BLACK SCREEN WITH CREDITS ...Let's lighten it up with some good old rock and roll. As we hear Jim and the Doors running loose on ROADHOUSE BLUES" JIM & DOORS ALRITE YEAH YEAH YOU GOTTA ROLL, ROLL, ROLL YOU GOTTA THRILL MY SOUL -- ALRITE ROLL, ROLL, ROLL, ROLL, A THRILL MY SOUL A-GOT-A-BEEPA, GONCHA CHUCHNA HOCA CONK, A DONTA EATCHA COONA NEECHA BOP-A- LOOLA, LECHOW, BOMPA KECHOW YESOW CONK, YEAH RITE ASHEN LADY (X2) GIVE UP YOUR VOWS (X2) SAVE OUR CITY (X2) RIGHT NOW (X2) WELL I WOKE UP THIS MORNING I GOT MYSELF A BEER (X2) THE FUTURE'S UNCERTAIN THE END IS ALWAYS NEAR LET IT ROLL BABY ROLL (X3) ALL NITE LONG THE END