Original subtitles

Bad news.

That's what I've got.

Bad news.

There is no will.

Or, if there is one, no one

has found it yet.

I called you here for another reason.

A little discussion about

murder.

Marshall wasn't murdered. We all saw the body. He was ripped apart by some

hideous creature.

The hound.

Oh, my God. It must be the hound.

Superficious rot.

She wouldn't say that if you'd seen what was left of him.

It was.

It was.

It was.

Murder, Miss Isabel.

What? Murder, Miss Isabel. Murder, Miss Isabel.

That's what it was.

While I did not find the will, I did

find... Oh, this.

Oh, I'm sorry.

I'm sorry about the knife. It got caught on a thread or something. All right.

All right. All right.

Let's take five, everyone.

Oh.

Stan, a word, would you please?

I'm sorry about the knife. Either I can't get it out of my pocket or can't

on to it once I do, but I'll keep working on it. Good. I'm sure Ms. Dryden

appreciate that. Listen, my friend, your delivery in this scene seems a little

stilted. Uh -huh. I mean a little too stilted.

You're playing a detective, but he's a very caring detective with deep

You know what I mean?

Oh, yeah, yeah. He's a detective with deep emotions.

See, I want you to reach down inside yourself, into your very soul, and

those emotions.

Bear yourself to the audience.

Now, this may be community theater, but it's theater nonetheless, so I want

passion. Passion. Remember.

Your character is a vestige of the old south, a gentleman of culture and

breeding. So when you reach down inside yourself and deliver those painful

emotions, think.

Think.

Orson Welles. Orson Welles. Think. Someone larger than life.

A detective who stalks his prey with civility.

Patois.

A detective with panache.

Now, I realize that neither you nor anyone else here is a professional, but

audience that's going to be sitting out there next week is still going to expect

to be, nay, want to be transported to another realm.

And you can do it, Ben. And we can do it.

But you have to think reality.

Reality. Reality.

Reality.

Reality.

Good.

Let's try it again.

He's terrible.

I've seen kumquats with more talent. Give him all the energy you can. Help

Jane. Help me. Help the show.

I will try.

All right. Same scene. From the top. Right.

From the top.

Places, everyone.

in and out of the rain, he'll help you get in character.

Everyone is gathered in the drawing room as you requested.

Everyone is gathered in the drawing room as you requested.

Oops. Sorry, Doug. I gotta take my broker.

What is going on? We are rehearsing a play, for heaven's sake.

Cliff has one line. He can't remember it. Ben keeps dropping his knife. Now

has to talk to his broker.

All right.

Let's break for lunch.

I want everyone to take care of their personal transactions and be back here

later than 1 .30.

You got a minute?

For what? You know what. We're one week away from opening. None of the scenes

work. Not one.

Don't look at me.

And if you could just rewrite them so that Ben Matlock has fewer lines.

I told you not to give him the part.

Beth, I'm begging you.

Doug, if you take lines away from Hamlet, then it's not Hamlet.

The play hangs on his role.

What am I going to do?

Isn't Billy coming?

No, he's going to stay and work on some lights.

He's really got the theater bug, doesn't he?

He's not the only one, is he, Dad?

I think I'm really getting there now.

I feel like an actor, like I'm bringing things up from my soul.

See, that's Doug. He is a genius.

Yeah, he's good. He's good.

But you know what else it's like?

It's like being a lawyer.

It's not all that different from being an actor.

You're up there in front of an audience.

You know what you want to say, but you also got to know when to say it and how

to say it.

You know that speech you have in the second act about how it was being

Marshall's nurse?

You mean being his nurse wasn't a job, it was a privilege, and none of you

will ever know how much I'll miss him? You see how you're emphasizing the word

ever?

Yeah. Try it this way.

It was a privilege.

And none of you will ever know how much I'll miss it.

You want me to emphasize the word no?

Exactly. See what I mean? Just one little inflection makes all the

Say it that way from now on.

I better check it out with Doug just to make sure.

What about me? I know you only have this one line, but can you give me any tips?

Well, Cliff, just try to remember.

Tell Jeff I looked over the files last night.

He's to go ahead and approve the Stevenson loan, but under no

he to move on the Conklin loan until he and I talk.

No, it'll have to be tomorrow.

I'll be here rehearsing until at least 10.

Hang on. Gotta go.

Put it under my desk. Okay, bye.

Doug?

Hi.

Want to go get some lunch?

No, I brought a sandwich. I thought I'd stay in my office and get some paperwork

done.

Couldn't help but notice how chummy you seem to be getting with Jane Dryden

these days.

I am the director. I was just giving her direction.

Does your wife know how hands -on you tend to be when directing beautiful

women?

Brenda, don't.

Let's have dinner.

I can't. Sure you can.

Go to my place.

You know where that is by now, don't you?

Got the top.

You're the one who started it.

Six o 'clock.

Tell your wife you won't be home.

What would you like for me to?

Six o 'clock.

Then, open the window.

looked out, dropped the knife down the rain spout,

knowing that even if someone like

me were to find it, the rain would wash it

clean of blood and fingerprints.

You are wrong, Mr. Angeline.

I saw the body.

And I cannot believe, no, I refuse to believe that one human being could do

to another.

It was the hounds.

I knew it.

They've come back.

And where are they now, Vanessa?

Out in the yard?

Actually, speaking of whereabouts...

for God's sake.

We're one week away from opening. You've yet to get through a scene without

fluffing your lines.

Linda's winking at me.

I have something behind my contact lens.

Well, don't just stand there. Stay in character.

Improvise. Turn away. Pace. Use your brain.

You've distracted him. You've broken everyone's concentration.

You should know better than that.

Are you sure you want to... speak to

me like that?

Well, take it again.

I love the clean fragrance in the air.

After the rain has stopped and justice has been

done.

He's horrible.

I told you that during auditions.

But did you listen?

No.

I thought we should have a name.

Someone people would come to see.

Curtain, please, Billy.

All right, let's break for dinner.

Back at seven sharp, we'll run the whole thing through from the top.

Oh, Ben, a word, would you please?

Out in the lobby.

That last scene felt good.

Now, that's what I wanted to talk to you about, Ben. I'm getting the hang of

this, Doug. Ben. The handle on my character. Ben. Reaching down into my

like you said. Ben. I really thought I played the truth of the moment just now.

Ben, I've got to replace you.

If actors would just play the...

How's that?

I've got to replace you.

You're firing me?

Ben, I made a mistake.

I never should have cast you in this role.

But I'm getting better every day.

No, it's more than just that. A director has to consider the entire cast. If it

doesn't mesh, then changes have to be made. We're not

meshing? That's right.

Well, how do you know it's my fault we're not meshing?

Maybe if you fired somebody else, we'd match.

Ben, I'm trying to be nice about this.

How do you know it's my fault we're not meshing? Ben, I thought I could turn you

into an actor. After all, you've been performing in front of judges and juries

for years. I was just saying that at lunch. Ben, I was wrong.

You're not an actor, never were, never will be.

But you can't find somebody to replace me at the last minute like this.

In this world, unemployed actors are only slightly less numerous than

I'll do your lines tonight at the rehearsal.

You don't have to come back.

Sorry it didn't work out.

It's a broken heart for every light on Broadway, Ben.

Keep your chin up.

You might get another break.

Okay, boys and girls, from the top.

Miss Yarnell, you're supposed to be backstage.

Everybody's waiting for you.

Miss Yarnell.

Yoo -hoo.

Hey, Glenda was murdered?

Was she ever.

Strangled. Right in her own dressing room.

I was the one who found her.

I'm glad I don't do that every day.

Police have any idea who did it? I don't think so.

They sealed off her dressing room and questioned us, sent us home. I'm sure

forensics will be in there all night.

I heard the coroner say that Glenda only had one of her contacts and apparently

the other one was still in the case.

She was lying in the middle of the room.

You know, you'd think that if she was putting in her contacts, she would have

been found over by the sink where her lens case was.

There was a struggle, and that's how she wound up in the middle of the room.

Yeah, I guess. I don't know.

Somehow, it just didn't look right to me.

I bet if you'd been there, you would have thought it was odd.

Unfortunately, I wasn't.

Oh, Dad.

So sorry you got fired.

Replaced. Oh, replaced.

Now, don't let this get you down. You are still one of the best lawyers in

country.

Was I really that bad?

You stunk.

Even I could tell that, and I'm just a stage manager.

Hello?

What? You're kidding.

Well, I don't know.

Okay, okay. I'll be there in a few minutes.

Who was that?

Doug Michaels is being held for murder.

Glenda's murder?

Wants me to be his lawyer.

Don't do it, Ben. Whatever you do, don't take his case. Why not?

Because he did it.

I heard him and Glenda talking backstage when I was up on a ladder fixing the

light. Sounded like they'd been tiptoeing through the cabbage patch with

other, only Doug wanted to break it off and she didn't.

So we killed her.

I said he did, didn't I?

Were you and Glenda having an affair?

No, we were not. We just slept together a few times, that's all.

How many times?

Half a dozen or so.

A few weeks ago, my wife went away for the weekend.

Glenda asked me to come over and coach her on some of her themes.

Well, we had some wine, and then we had some more wine, and finally one thing

led to another.

It was just a moment in discretion to me, but not to Glenda. She became

obsessed. She wouldn't let go. She said if I didn't continue seeing her, she'd

tell my wife and ruin my marriage. I couldn't let that happen. I love Flora.

So you cheated on her?

Precisely. It does have an odd ring to it, doesn't it?

It gives you motive.

And fibers from your tie were found on Glenda's neck.

My tie was on the desk in my office, which I never bothered to lock. Anyone

could have stolen it and used it to kill her.

Well, the police found your tie, Doug, in the wastebasket with some trash on

of it. They think you were hiding it until you left the theater.

It is so Kafkaesque. I can't believe it.

Kafka what?

Esque. It's surreal. It's nightmarish.

Who knew about you and Glenda?

I guess everybody in the cast who saw her slap me knew something was going on.

Someone in the cast must have framed me.

That's what you're thinking, isn't it?

Could be.

Ben.

I'm asking you what you're thinking.

Yeah, it could be somebody in the cast, I guess.

You're mad at me, aren't you?

No. That's why you're so quiet.

You're sulking just because I removed you from that silly play. I'm not

You're sulking. I know sulking when I see it. I'm a director, for God's sake.

see sulking every day of my life. It's what actors do best.

You see, that proves I'm not sulking.

I'm no actor, according to you.

Look, I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings.

I didn't mean to. I was just being brutally frank.

Please don't hold that against me.

I need you, Ben.

I could go to Britain for the rest of my life here.

You've got to help me.

Well, for one thing, I'm expensive.

Fine, I'm rich. What else?

I want my part back.

Oh, in the play.

Uh -huh.

You're thinking it over?

He's thinking it over.

Everyone is gathered in the drawing room as you requested.

Everyone is gathered in the drawing room as you requested.

Everyone is gathered... Cliff, Cliff, for heaven's sake.

I'm just trying to get it right, you know.

The bank president said Glenda worked here for 11 years, made it through two

mergers, and got promoted three times.

This is odd.

Jane Dryden, the woman who plays Miss Isabel, she works here?

Who? She's a teller. We passed her on the way in.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Everyone... She used to be a loan officer.

Would you look at this?

She was bumped to a teller last January.

Ho, ho.

She took a 50 % cut in pay.

Wonder why she just didn't quit.

Everyone is gathered in the drawing room as you requested.

Everyone is gathered in the drawing room as you requested. No, everyone is

gathered in the drawing room as you requested.

I like it here. It's a nice place to work.

But your salary was practically cut in half.

Well, the bank was going through a merger and making cutbacks right and

was either take a lower -paying job or be let go.

I wasn't thrilled about making less money, but at least I still have health

insurance.

Glenda demoted you, didn't she?

Yes, but Glenda gave me this job.

She was my friend.

Thank you, sir.

Have a nice day.

You know, it never seemed that way back at the theater.

I mean, I didn't even know you two worked together, let alone that you were

friends. Oh, well, we've known each other almost eight years.

The play was her idea.

I never would have done it without her.

Morning, darling.

Morning.

Well, we should let you get back to work. Thanks a lot, Jane.

Sure. Oh, I'll see you tomorrow. Bye. Bye.

Thanks.

Everyone has gathered.

Did that make sense to you?

Yeah,

I guess it did. I'm trying to learn this line.

Oh,

you know what?

I'm going to take my dad out to dinner because I think he's been so wrapped up

in the stage manager job. He hasn't had a decent meal in weeks.

I bet.

Do you want to come?

What? Oh, no, thanks. The dad wants me to take a look around Glenda's place.

He's home studying his lines.

Oh, good.

Good. Everyone is gathered.

Hello, Beth.

Leanne, what are you doing here?

My dad decided to be Doug's lawyer.

So I heard.

Thought I'd look over Glenda's things, help him figure out who really killed

her.

The police gave me a key. How'd you get in?

Oh, well... You broke in.

Glenda borrowed some things of mine. I just wanted them back.

What kinds of things?

This doesn't concern you or your father.

Why would Glenda borrow a photo album from you? Is that a scrapbook?

It's none of your business.

I can call the police and make it their business. Is that what you want?

Glenda Yarnell was my mother.

No kidding.

Her mother?

Said she was adopted 25 years ago by a couple in New York. Started looking for

her birth mother almost as soon as they told her the truth. And she found Glenda

about a year ago.

She call her?

No, she said she was too afraid of being rejected to contact her directly.

What'd she do?

She's a writer, and she found out how active Glenda was in the theater down

here, so she sent the director one of her plays and used that as a way to ease

her way into her mom's life.

Had she eased her way in by the time Glenda died?

No, Beth said that she never told Glenda who she really was.

Huh. Never worked up the nerve.

Knowing that even if someone like me were to find it,

the rain would wash away the blood and the fingerprints.

Maybe she lied.

Maybe she talked to her and it didn't go well. Maybe she wound up resenting

Glenda so much that she killed her.

Well, I don't know, Dad. She was stealing a photo album. She wanted

remember her real mom by.

I don't know why she'd do that if she was the one that killed her.

On the other hand, she said she was waiting around the theater just like

everybody else on the night that Glenda died.

And I don't remember seeing her until after the police arrived.

I better check this out with Cliff, see what he remembers. Do that tomorrow.

Stay here and run lines with me.

Oh, I better check this out with Cliff, Dad.

As I'm sure most, if not all, of you know, Ben Matlock has agreed to defend

and I, in turn, have reconsidered the hasty decision I made on the eve of

Glenda's tragic death and have returned him to the role of Monroe Angeline.

I'd like to apologize to all of you for the gigantic mess.

I've created.

Mostly, I apologize to my beautiful wife, Flora.

Though I don't deserve it, she's declared her intention to stay by my

And true for that she is, she's also come to our rescue and will assume the

of Vanessa.

I love you, darling.

In any case, opening night looms ahead.

We'll spend the next few days and nights rehearsing as never before. So...

Let's get started. Places, everyone, from the top. Right.

From the top.

Everyone is gathered.

Everyone is gathered in the drawing room. Did you see Jane? Did you talk to

Oh, yeah, I did. She said that she didn't remember seeing Beth that night

after the police got here, either.

We might as well talk to the whole cast and see if anyone remembers seeing her.

Do you think we should confront Beth again right away?

No, Miss Isabel.

I'm afraid human beings are quite capable of such horrors.

A fact which you know all too well, don't you?

Never mind.

I love the clean fragrance in the air.

After the rain has stopped and justice has been done.

I think he's gotten much better, don't you?

Bravo! Bravo!

Curtain, please, Billy.

Excellent, one and all.

Ben, you were superb.

You don't think he said that in his car on his lawyer, do you?

No, Dad.

Well, this is it.

Opening night.

I want everybody to grab a light dinner, be back here at 6 .30, get back into

costume and makeup, 7 .45, green room, 8 o 'clock.

Curtain up!

One other thing.

It appears that Glenda's death has generated a great deal of national as

local interest in our little production.

Critics from two weekly news magazines have indicated they'll be out there

tonight as well as reviewers from the Daily Papers. So, on your toes.

But most of all, have fun.

How many critics

did he say would be out there?

Just about a dozen or so. You want to get a bite?

Hey, Ann. Yeah? I'm going to go sign some checks before dinner.

But before I do, I figured you'd want to see this.

What's that?

Remember when I told you Beth wasn't around the night Billy found Glenda's

Yeah. But I know where she was.

This reminded me.

Your phone bill?

For my cellular phone.

I let her borrow it that night so she could make an emergency call to New

She wanted some privacy, so she went off in a corner by herself.

See?

That's the charge.

She was on the phone for 27 minutes.

I wonder why she didn't tell me about that.

I was upset that night.

It just slipped my mind.

I remembered a day or two later.

Why didn't you tell me about it then?

I guess I just didn't feel like it.

Oh.

Thank you, Carl.

You bet.

Break the leg tonight.

You too.

What do you think of that, Dad?

Dad?

Dad?

Dad? Yeah?

Well, Beth Samuel has an alibi for the time of the murder.

She's about the only one around here who does.

I mean, anybody could have slipped off for five minutes and killed Glenda, even

the janitor.

Yeah.

Is it hot in here?

No.

You all right?

Yeah.

You look a little pale.

Why are you perspiring so much? I'm just hot.

It must be your costume.

Are you nervous, Dad?

No.

Oh, you are.

Ben Matlock, the famous lawyer who thinks nothing of giving...

press conferences that are seen by millions of people on national

actually nervous about doing some inconsequential little play.

I'm not nervous.

Want to get some dinner?

No. Why not?

I had a big lunch.

If I eat anything now, I'll throw up.

It's going to be okay.

Everybody gets nervous before they go on. It's natural.

Actually, it's good for you. It keeps you on your toes.

There are going to be critics out there.

You're going to be just fine.

I'll tell Doug I can't do it.

I'm too busy preparing for his case. Like you said, a lot of people don't

alibis. I got a lot of work to do. I'll just pretend to put my understudy on.

Dad, this isn't Broadway. It's Willow Springs, Georgia.

You don't have an understudy.

Bad news.

That's what I have.

I have bad news.

There is no will.

Or if there is, no one has found it yet.

I called you here for another reason. A little

discussion about murder.

Marshall wasn't murdered. We all saw the body.

He was ripped apart by some hideous creature.

The hounds.

Oh, my God, it must be the hounds.

Superstitious rot.

You wouldn't say that if you'd seen what was left of him.

It was.

It

was.

Miss Isabel, that's what it was.

Oh, God, it was.

Dead.

Murder, Miss Isabel, that's what it was.

And while I did not find the will, I did

find...

This is what killed

your stepfather, Miss Isabel.

And the creature that wielded it was all too human, I assure you.

You mean you know who killed Marshall?

I prefer to let the facts speak for themselves. And if you will come with me

the library.

They shall speak volumes, I assure you.

There, you're in the next scene.

You've got a show to put on, Ben. Come on.

Now.

Miss Dryden, I understand the deceased, Linda Yarnell, was your immediate

superior in the bank where you worked.

Yes, she was.

And I hear that she demoted you from loan officer to bank teller last

Is that right?

Well, it wasn't really a demotion. Our bank had just merged, and the new owners

insisted on cutbacks. It was either accept a lower -paying job or be let go.

You sure you weren't demoted because you were accused of misappropriating funds?

How dare you?

You know that accusation was investigated and proven false.

Who spearheaded that investigation?

I don't know. Somebody from the bank.

Was it the deceased?

I said I don't know.

You mean the fact that she demoted you one week after you were accused is a

coincidence? Yes.

Was she punishing you?

No, I just told you. I'd done nothing wrong.

You did a lot of personal chores for her in the month before she was murdered,

didn't you?

What do you mean?

Oh, I mean things like taking her car to the car wash at lunch and clothes to

the dry cleaners and buying her groceries for her, you know. At least

to Mr.

Selby, Mrs.

Gideon, and Mr.

Evans. That's what they tell me. They're ready to testify that you've done

business in their establishments.

Since January on behalf of Glenda Yarnell.

Cart car wash, dry cleaners, groceries.

Remember? I did favors for Glenda from time to time, yes.

According to them, you did those favors practically every day. Were they favors

or were they blackmail payments?

They were favors.

Glenda didn't force you to be what amounted to her...

personal slave in return for keeping it a secret that you were an embezzler?

No. You're reaching, Mr. Matlock.

Why would she do all these things for somebody who practically fired her?

reaching, Mr. Matlock. And now you're pressing your luck.

You have to do any typing as a bank teller.

I use a keyboard to enter information into the computer, if that's what you

mean. Don't those long fingernails get in your way?

Not really.

I noticed those fingernails an opening night of the play that we're both in.

It's called The Last Cry of the Hounds.

I play Monroe Angeli, the lead.

Get on with it, Mr. Madlock.

Are they your fingernails, or are they artificial?

They're artificial.

Acrylic.

I noticed those fingernails opening, and it hit me that you weren't wearing long

fingernails during rehearsal, were you?

No. I had them put on for the play.

It seemed to me that the character I play would have long nails.

Or did you have them put on to hide what happened to your real nails?

No. I was trying to get into character, something you probably wouldn't

understand.

The reason I mention the nails is the police just got done taking apart the

pipes under the sink in Glenda Yarnell's dressing room.

You know what they found.

Two fingernails.

Your fingernails. That is ridiculous.

You tore them off during the struggle with Glenda Yarnell, didn't you? Boy,

must have hurt.

You ripped off two fingernails trying to pull Doug's red tie around her neck,

and she is trying to pull it off. That's not true.

The struggle took place over the sink, because that's where Glenda put on her

contact lenses.

She put up a pretty good fight. But you won, but ripped off two fingernails in

the process, and then washed them down the drain.

No!

I tore off a fingernail one time.

Boy, that hurt.

Did you ever tear off a fingernail, Mr. Madlock?

And then to make doubly sure that no one would ever find them, you dragged the

body to the middle of the room, away from the sink, so that nobody would even

tempted to look there. Sound about right?

That is not true.

Yes, it is.

The lady who did your nails, Mrs.

McCallum, she's here.

And she's ready to testify that you had ripped off two fingernails and your

fingers were bruised and discolored when you came in to have those acrylic nails

put on.

When the police run a DNA test on those nails and whatever tissue they find on

them, I'm sure that'll not clinch it.

Since the day Glenda caught you with your hand in the till,

You were her servant.

She wasn't a nice woman.

She probably was abusive to you.

I guess that's the way you figured, the only way you could end it.

Murder, Mrs. Appel.

What it was.

We find the defendant not guilty.

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Court is adjourned.

Ben! Ben! You were wonderful. You got reviewed in this week's magazine.

What'd they say? Right there. You were a hit, Ben. They loved you.

But the biggest surprise of all was the performance of real -life attorney

Benjamin Matlock.

whose overwrought delivery, robot -like gestures, and

unremittingly awkward stage presence almost single -handedly made The

Last Cry of the Hounds the best piece of camp theater since Mel Brooks'

Springtime for Hitler.

See what I mean? You were so bad, you were good.