Original subtitles

(theme music playing)

NARRATOR: Man lives in the sunlit world

of what he believes to be reality.

But... there is,

unseen by most, an underworld.

A place that is just as real

but not as brightly lit.

A dark side.

(orchestra playing classical music over radio)

�

Any word from the children?

The camp director called today.

It seems Peter doesn't want to learn how to swim.

You'll have to write him.

Yes.

(gentle laugh, glasses clink)

(sighs) It's wonderful music, that Schubert.

Mmm.

MAN: It's on the program next week at Carnegie Hall.

(music crescendos)

(static crackling) Oh, no, not again.

(static crackles)

Please fix it, Jim.

(music resumes)

(static resumes)

Oh, damn.

(static crackling)

(slaps radio)

There's not even a hum.

I'm afraid it's completely broken.

Should I take it down

to that lecherous handyman in the basement?

No, uh...

I'll buy a new radio.

I'll go by the shop tomorrow.

(doorbell ringing) Coming!

All right, watch it, watch it.

Oh, my.

Your toes, lady, your toes.

Will you watch your feet, please? Oh!

Thank you.

Watch your toes, your toes.

Oh, my...

(sighing)

All right, lady, where do you want it?

Oh, I don't know! It's so big!

How 'bout over there?

Well... Watch your feet.

That's it; all right.

Oh...

It's so big.

But it's so ugly.

Hey, lady, it's only a radio.

A radio's a radio.

Listen, sign here, will you, please?

I'll plug it in while you sign, okay?

Okay, lady, thank you.

Have a good day, huh? Uh-huh.

(switch clicks, radio buzzes, then classical music fades in)

(music blares)

(volume lowers)

(glass breaks in distance)

Oh!

�

Ugly or not, it does have a lovely tone, doesn't it?

(static crackles, frequency oscillating)

(shrill static)

(classical music resumes)

(eerie wind whooshes)

(birds chirping through static and classical music)

(dog barks fiercely)

(music, static, barking stop) Oh, this is madness.

Jim?

Oh, I'm so glad I reached you.

They just delivered the new radio.

Uh, what?

(sighs) It's enormous.

No.

But something strange happened.

I just went to...

Oh.

Oh, of course, darling.

It can wait until tonight.

Bye.

(hangs up receiver)

(clock ticking)

This is the top of the line, Irene.

You just have to know how to tune it, that's all.

(static crackles, then classical music plays)

�

Well, there.

Listen to that Chopin.

Did you pay those bills?

The ones from Saks?

Hmm? Yes.

MAN (over radio): For Christ's sake, Kathy, do you always

have to play the piano when I get home?

KATHY: I play every chance I get.

I'm at the office all day.

MAN: So am I!

Why don't you leave that lousy little job and stay home?

Then you can diddle on the piano

to your small heart's content.

Did you hear that?

(piano playing resumes) What?

On the radio?

The voices, they were fighting.

Must be a play or something.

I don't think it is a play.

KATHY: I thought that you didn't get a raise this year.

Jim, come here.

You have to hear this.

MAN: I wish to God I'd never bought you that damn thing.

KATHY: I wish to God I'd never met you.

(piano playing continues)

(phone ringing)

(phone continues ringing)

(static crackling, buzzing)

(clock chiming)

(door sliding shut, motor whirring)

That's odd, it sounds like the elevator.

(tuning through frequencies, various voices and music play)

MAN: Have you seen my garters? WOMAN: Button me up.

Honey, have you seen my garters?

Just button me up and I'll find your garters.

You know, I wish you wouldn't leave

apple cores in the ashtray-- I hate the smell.

That's truly strange.

Isn't it?

You're like an old woman. Here are your lousy garters.

(tuning radio)

WOMAN (Irish accent): "On the coast of Coromandel

"where the early pumpkins blow,

in the middle of the woods..."

(woman continues in background) My God!

It's the Sweeney's nurse.

"These were all his worldly goods.

Two old chairs..."

(nurse continues in background) Oh, God!

Turn it off!

NURSE: "...without a handle..."

IRENE: Turn it off!

(knob clicks, nurse stops)

What if they can hear us?

That's just some sort of poetry show.

No, it was the Sweeney's nurse.

I've talked with her in the park.

I know her voice very well.

She must've been reading to their little girl.

Don't be silly; calm down.

They live in 17C!

We must be getting other people's apartments.

Can they hear us?

(static crackling, buzzing)

NURSE: "'...wife?' said the Yonghy-Bonghy-Bo.

"'I'm tired of living singly on this coast

so wild and shingly...'" Hello? Hello?

JIM: Can you hear me?

NURSE: "'If you'll come and be me wife,

quite serene would be me life...'"

I guess they can't hear us.

"'Oranges and lemons,' says the bells of St. Clement's..."

Try something else.

"'You owe me five farthings,'..."

This is crazy!

"...say the bells of St.Martin's.

'When will you pay me?' say the bells of Old Bailey..."

Try something else.

(static crackling)

WOMAN: Have some more sandwiches.

My God, I made enough for an army or a marching band.

(crowd conversing indistinctly) That's Margaret Fuller in 11E.

I knew she was giving a party.

I saw her stocking up in the liquor store.

Isn't this too divine?

Try something else.

(tuning through various voices) See if you can get 18C.

WOMAN: Talk to somebody for Christ's sake, honey.

Talk to somebody!

MAN: I don't want to talk to anyone.

WOMAN: It's not a hat, it's a love affair.

If she catches you standing here not talking to anybody...

"Not a hat, it's a love affair."

(laughing)

Oh, my God!

Isn't this wild?

MAN: Two, no trump. Ooh.

WOMAN: Two, no trump? Are you nuts?

MAN: I don't know who's nuts, but I do know my hand.

Two, no trump.

WOMAN: Oh, sure.

MAN 2: What's this? Tell me.

It's a bounced check, that's what.

Didn't I tell you about this?

Didn't I warn you...

(woman sobbing over radio)

...that one more time, and that would be it?

I can't believe you can be so damned irresponsible!

So selfish and stupid!

(clock ticking)

MAN (over radio): Are you all right, darling?

WOMAN: Yes.

Yes, I'm all right, I guess.

But you know, Charlie,

I don't feel like myself anymore.

Sometimes there are about 15 minutes in a week

when I feel like myself.

I don't want to go to another doctor.

The bills are too much already.

But I just don't feel like myself, Charlie.

I just never feel like myself.

WOMAN 2: Typical.

Leave it to you to find an excuse

for such a thing.

I mean, really, who cares?

Who cares?

(birds chirping outside)

Have a good day at the office, dear.

See you tonight.

(sighs)

Hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm.

(knob clicks, static buzzes and whines)

(tuning through various voices and music)

MAN (over radio): The war. Shrapnel.

WOMAN: Really?

(man laughs)

MAN: No.

No, I got it on a knife fight on the Lower East Side

with my ex-wife.

(man and woman laugh)

WOMAN: She stabbed you?

MAN: In more ways than one.

(woman laughs)

MAN: Say...

Don't pull away.

Come on, come back here.

WOMAN: Come get me.

(man laughs)

(woman laughs)

WOMAN (passionately): Oh! Mmm...

(phone rings)

Oh.

(man sighs with satisfaction)

MAN: Anybody ever told you

you have nice lips?

WOMAN: No. No.

Ah, hello?

MAN: Don't pull away.

Oh, hi.

WOMAN: You want me, don't you?

Lunch? Today?

MAN: Come here. IRENE: I can't.

WOMAN: Come get me. I'm in the midst of something.

(sultry laughter over radio) Well, I'll call you.

Right. Bye.

WOMAN: Mmm.

(woman laughs)

MAN 2: This is it, huh?

This is what it comes to. This!

WOMAN 2: Oh, I'm surprised you care.

Jim, go up to 16C. What?

Hurry! Mr. Osborn is beating his wife.

(blow strikes, glass shatters)

They've been quarreling since 4:00, and now he's hitting her.

Go up there and stop him!

WOMAN 2: Don't you touch me again.

I'll kill you, Frank.

I swear, I'll kill you!

I'll see you dead-- (knob clicks)

IRENE: No.

You don't have to listen to this sort of thing, you know?

It's indecent-- it's like looking into peoples' windows.

I bought the damn radio to give you some pleasure.

I paid a great deal of money for it.

I thought it would make you happy.

I wanted to make you happy.

Look at you.

Don't...

Don't quarrel with me.

All of the others have been quarreling all day long.

They're all worried about money.

Mrs. Hutchinson's

mother is dying of cancer in Florida,

and they don't have enough money to send her to the Mayo Clinic.

At least Mr. Hutchinson says they don't have enough.

And Mr. Hendricks

is being laid off in April,

and Mrs. Hendricks is being just horrid about the whole thing.

And that woman who plays the Chopin

is having an affair with the handyman.

And Mr. Osborn is beating Mrs. Osborn...

So don't listen to it!

Turn it off. It's not your business.

Don't! Don't yell!

Life is too awful.

It's... too sordid and awful.

WOMAN (over radio): Who? Tell me, who is it this time?

WOMAN 2 (British accent): With the handyman, if you can believe that.

WOMAN: No! You're not telling true.

WOMAN 2: That filthy, driveling, stump of a man.

And she's doing it with him every chance she gets.

Like rabbits, I tell you.

WOMAN: (gasps) Oh, my God!

WOMAN 2: I can hear them all day.

(classical music plays over radio)

Well?

There's nothing wrong that I can see.

But what about the interference?

You hear anything now?

(classical music playing over radio)

Sounds perfect to me.

But I told you... Look, lady, like I said before--

there's nothing wrong that I can see.

I mean, you just got to talk nice to it, that's all.

MAN: Don't you think that people should have manners?

He says that to me.

And do you know what the most awful part of it was?

Jack Melville overheard the whole thing.

(laughter)

(laughs)

Um... Irene?

Are you with us?

Oh.

Oh, yes. I...

just, um,

wandered off for a moment.

Well, listen,

good people, we really

do have to be on our way.

Thanks so much.

It was really a lovely dinner, Irene.

Oh, did you really think so?

Thank you.

It's always nice to see you, Jack.

Good night, Clare.

Good night.

I'll walk you out.

WOMAN: I just don't feel like myself, Charlie.

I just never feel like myself.

MAN: Oh, for Christ's sake, Kathy,

do you always have to play the piano when I get home?

HANDYMAN: So, um, anybody ever tell you you got pretty eyes?

KATHY: Yes.

(laughs): My husband.

(handyman laughs)

JIM: Irene?

What's gotten into you?

What do you mean?

What do I mean?

You barely said ten words all night.

You just sat, staring into space,

or staring at Clare.

It's just rude, that's all.

I've never seen you like this.

They seem to be such nice people.

Why don't you treat them better?

I work with him, Irene.

I see him every day.

But you never really know, do you?

Know what?

The truth.

What they really are.

They have such nice open faces,

but who knows what horrible things

they do to one another...

alone... in secret.

You're talking nonsense.

And I don't like it.

Not one bit.

(clock ticking)

Hello, darling.

Everything okay?

Perfect.

Couldn't be better.

Well, that's a good thing.

I just paid the bill for that radio.

Cost $400.

It's a good deal more than I can afford.

I bought that radio 'cause I...

I thought you'd enjoy it.

That's the last extravagance

we're gonna be able to indulge in this year.

(knob clicks)

(classical music playing over radio)

Listen to it, Jim.

Isn't the music beautiful?

I noticed you haven't paid your clothing bills yet.

I saw them on your dressing table.

Why'd you tell me you had paid them when you hadn't?

Why'd you lie to me?

I just didn't want to worry you, Jim.

I'll be able

to pay for everything with this month's allowance.

Last month, remember, I had to pay

for those slipcovers and that party.

You've got to learn

to handle the money that I give you

a little more intelligently, Irene.

You've got to understand,

we don't have as much money this year as we did last.

I had a very sobering talk with Mitchell today.

I worry about money a great deal,

and I've worked awfully hard

to give you and the children a comfortable life,

and I don't want to see all of my energies

and all of my youth wasted in slipcovers and radios

and fur coats and God--

Jim, please, they'll hear us.

Who?

The radio.

I'm sick... I'm sick to death of that radio!

The radio can't hear us.

Nobody can hear us, and who cares if they can hear us?!

Who cares?!

Please, Jim, you sound just like them-- just like them.

Like them?!

Like them?!

Since when are you so goddamn Christly?

What turned you into a convent girl overnight?

What makes you think you're so much better than them?

You stole your mother's jewelry

before they probated her will.

You never gave your sister a cent of that money

that was intended for her, not even when she needed it.

JIM (over radio): Where was all your virtue and your piety then?

IRENE (over radio): Jim, you know there were reasons for this.

JIM: Reasons?!

I've heard your reasons, and I'm-I'm just sick of 'em!

I don't want to hear your reasons anymore!

Irene, you look at me!

Look at me! Irene, look at me!

NARRATOR: The dark side is always there.

Waiting for us to enter.

Waiting to enter us.

Until next time, try to enjoy the daylight.