Original subtitles

Good evening.

The game of hockey seems to combine all the best elements of ice skating, polo

and World War II.

However, we have found a method for reducing the fighting and speeding up

the game.

We play over 10 feet of water on melting ice.

It keeps the players quite lively. There are dangers, of course.

Occasionally, a bobbing head is mistaken for the puck.

Tonight's tale is called Memo from Purgatory and is about a young man who

wanted to learn about youth gangs by personal experience.

He discovers that viewing juvenile delinquents at close range can be

extremely dangerous.

And now we are only a few seconds away from a commercial which is as close as I

care to get.

I had finally made it to New York to become a writer.

With $300 I'd saved from working in a lithographing shop, I had quit Ohio

State University and come to find out if the streets of Manhattan really were

paved with gold.

For me.

For Jay Shaw.

I decided to write a novel.

It was to be about juvenile delinquency.

I wanted to see if I could get a new view.

A truthful view.

From the inside.

I was going to join a kid gang.

But not as Jay Shaw.

I was going to become... Phil Beldone.

Delinquent. This is a street in Brooklyn.

In a section called Red Hook.

I had taken a room in this neighborhood.

Seven dollars a week.

I shared it with the roaches.

They say Red Hook is a thousand times worse than Hell's Kitchen.

The police walk their beef in pairs.

But this could just as easily be back of the yards in Chicago, or 105th Street in

Cleveland, or KC, or Pittsburgh, and what happens here happens there.

I had bought myself a gravity knife on Times Square, and I'd practiced long and

hard with it.

I was ready to enter the turf, the territory of gang rule.

I, uh, just moved down the block and I heard around you gotta be a baron to be

any good.

You got a name?

Cowboy?

I heard the one to talk to is called Tiger.

Someone ask you a question, cowboy, you answer.

Hey, now stop.

None of that tumult in my shop.

Such a fake.

My name's Phil Beldon.

Oh.

Well,

you got a tiger here, I talk to myself.

Oh, you talk to me.

Oh, no.

No, that'd be the same thing.

Ha, ha, ha.

Everybody freeze!

Don't push him.

I'm Tiger.

Look, man.

I didn't come here to bop.

I said get to the baron so I'm ready to go through channels.

Now go ahead, cowboy.

But then we'll talk about you going through channels.

Kendall, shut your face.

That's my vice president, man.

I take it badly anything happens to him.

You think how badly he'll take it.

What do you want?

You tell King Kong over here to lay up the blade, huh?

And then you and me, we go someplace and we talk like people.

Are you gonna let this thing dump on you?

Shut up, man.

I don't want no trouble in here.

Okay, Bell, don't.

We got a truce.

Let go of Fish.

I said cool it!

You got a thing coming to you, cowboy.

Take it up with my agent.

Hey, you made an enemy out of candle.

She gives me if I don't cry.

You're something else, man.

I gotta admit that.

It took some real kind of guts to put Fish and Candle down like that.

You worked that blade without a button.

Yeah.

You're about as fast as one of them as anybody we got.

Oh, yeah, well, uh, used to be a pretty enough block where I lived before, you

know.

Where was that?

Manhattan.

West 32nd Street between Amsterdam and Columbus.

Yeah, that's rough turf.

I heard.

So, you want to join the club, huh?

The way they tell it around here, I either join up or I don't walk.

This is rough turf too, man.

We can't afford to have any free agents walking it.

If you own a street, you own it. All of it. No squatters.

You want to join?

Um, what about Candler?

No sweat.

He does like he's told.

He's a baron.

And there's only one president.

And I'm it.

Well, you're winning. How soon?

Wednesday.

What's Wednesday?

Initiation. All right.

What kind of initiation you got?

The best kind.

Right, Cherry?

Might hurt you.

You'll see, friend.

Yeah.

You'll see.

I'll make sure.

Real sure.

Been to the hospital?

How's Danny?

He's sick.

Real sick.

Flyers really did him in.

Yeah, well, I'm going to take care of the flyers.

Up there, up there!

Come on, let's go see your daughter.

Hey, bring him in.

Tell Slack to bring in Delgone.

Come on, let's get this meeting to order.

Clear it.

Turn that thing off, will you?

We're out of business tonight.

Okay, the meeting will come to order.

Flats, take off his blindfold.

The Vice President, Fish, has made a suggestion we skip the formal business

and get right down to the initiation.

What do you think about that?

Tonight,

we are to consider the name of Phil Beldone, who wishes to become a member

of the Barons.

Is there any members who do not wish us to consider this man?

All right.

Will the prospective members step forward?

Okay. You all know this recruit.

What is your name, recruit?

Phil Boldone.

You ever been a member of any other rival gang or club in any other turf

besides this one?

No. Do you wish to become a member in good standing with the Barons?

Yes.

You understand the initiation has three parts, and you gotta pass all three

parts before you can actually become a full member.

Yeah, I understand All right warm up The first part of the initiation

you got to make it past the row of guys They'll be swinging on you and they've

been working on them buckles Their shop, okay

I'm going to like this.

You're going to pleasure me, boy. Come on. Enough talking. Let's see some

action. Come on. Come on. Come on. Let's see some action. Come

on. Let's go.

Let's go.

He made it.

Foul! I like call foul.

He was supposed to run down the middle and he didn't.

What's the matter, man? You thought because he was too smart for you?

I declare he made it and passed the first part of the initiation.

All in favor say aye.

Yeah.

Who is it?

You don't know me.

I'm Feline.

Are you gonna let me in?

Yeah, sure. I guess so.

You were at the initiation, weren't you?

Did Tiger send you?

Every baron's got a Deb.

Except Tiger, he's president. He can move around as much as he likes.

Oh, so Tiger sent you to be my Deb, huh?

If you want me to be.

Do you want to be?

What's with all the questions? I don't ask you, you don't ask me.

Nobody's got a past.

Look, I don't need a chick that sticks with me because somebody told her to.

I don't do nothing I don't want to do. They could have sent a lot of Debs. I

volunteer.

How do they find out what goes on?

I mean, do you, uh, tell somebody?

I tell Connie.

She runs the Debs. She tells Tiger of Fish.

They'll ask you, too.

Well... What do you say we just tell them what they want to hear?

They don't have to know.

It's all right with me.

You better turn off the light.

They won't... They won't believe me if you don't.

How about a cigarette?

Okay.

You have nothing better to do later. Maybe we could go to a movie.

You're funny.

Like old.

I just want to get acquainted.

I hope the third part of the initiation is as easy to take as the second.

The third part is you rumble with them.

They give you a weapon.

You swing.

A guy like you, you should be careful.

Why do you say that?

Because you're different from the others.

Because you don't seem like you get kicks out of killing somebody else.

If you don't, you get killed yourself.

I was two-thirds of Baron.

But it wasn't the way I thought it would be.

I wasn't ready for the kind of cruelty these kids took as commonplace.

I realized just how vicious they could get on the night I was told to get ready

to complete the third part of my initiation.

All right, let's go. Wait, wait, wait.

Tiger's on the way. Shouldn't we wait for him?

I'm second in command.

I say we roll him.

Hey, hey, hey, what are you doing?

Hey, take it easy.

Hey, your cat's tapped out. He ain't even got a subway token.

That's the way you are, man.

Filthy old creep.

Give me that tire iron.

Oh, please, boys, don't do nothing to me. I ain't done nothing to yous.

Please, fellas.

No, man, run!

I'm gonna kill you.

Knock it off.

Come on, what's the matter with you guys?

This Fink grabbed my arm. Can't I even send you out to pass a guy in his

initiation without you fouling up?

Me?

Hey, listen, man.

This Fink's the one who messed everything up.

Shut up.

What happened?

Nothing. We clobbed some old wet brain.

Cans was gonna hit him with it, with a tire iron.

Then the long-ranger over here gets in the way, and the fleabag runs off.

That right?

That the way it was?

Just about.

I say you don't pass the third part of his initiation.

I say he's a fink. I say we bust him up good.

You know, for ten pounds of dog meat, you talk too much.

Wait.

Whose side you taking in this?

You got something to say?

Yeah. Yeah, I got something to say.

You let this psycho loose, and this club's gonna have more pain than it can

handle. He's got pudding for brains.

Boy, you slob. I oughta... You oughta get hip, baby. That's what you oughta.

Look.

So we find some old sauce on.

And this nitwit bangs him around pretty good.

We don't even get a bean off the guy.

And we leave some stiff for the fuzz to find.

Look, I ain't putting anybody down.

But you start spreading the landscape with bodies, and there better be more in

it than exercise.

What are you talking... You got smarts, Phil.

Maybe we ought to make you our war counselor.

Hey, man.

That's my job.

Pick up your pink slip, hero.

Come on, let's get out of here.

The park's crawling with badgers.

Hey, what's going on?

I'm second in command.

I don't take that.

Go home, man.

Cool off.

I'll see you tomorrow.

Beldon? Beldon?

Shut the door.

Let's take this place apart.

Hey!

Hey, that thing's loaded.

Last night, the barons had a rumble with

their rival gang, the Flyers.

One of the Flyers was killed and another hurt.

On May 27, the barons broke into the Stuyvesant rod and gun shop and

made off with some 15... What's this?

Where'd you find this? It's in a envelope here.

Here's my name.

Candle.

Real name.

Emil Shasta.

Candle has been my enemy from the first, not because of any intent on my part,

but because his own... ...psychosis keeps betraying him into clumsiness.

He is a real killer.

Hey, Ken. Hey, look at this.

In case of accident, please return to Mrs.

Sarita Shah, 103 Shaker Boulevard, Trenton, Ohio.

Hey, he's a fuzz, huh, Kendall?

He's some kind of spy?

In case of accident.

That's what it says.

In case of accident.

Oh,

yes.

What did your father say when you told him you'd quit high school?

Nothing. He just told me I should go to beautician school.

He read somewhere that beauty operators make $4 an hour.

What happened?

Shut the door.

It must have been Kanda.

Your clothes are all ruined.

You got all the money I saved.

Look, you tell Tiger.

He's your friend.

He is. He can stomp on Kanda.

Felina, I have something to tell you.

What?

What's the matter, Phil?

My name isn't Phil Beldone. It's Jay Shaw.

So?

Lots of guys don't use their right names.

No, Felina.

I'm a writer.

At least I want to be one.

Came here to write a book about gangs, like the Barons.

I had an envelope here full of notes I'd made.

Everything was there.

All the bops and the raids and the initiation.

Character sketches.

Biographies.

The cattle must have found that it's gone.

A rider?

You mean you were taking everything down?

Even me?

Even you.

You think.

You crummy think.

Look, what do you think I am, some kind of bug with six legs that you stick in a

bottle and want to try and crawl up the sides?

It wasn't like that, Feline.

Please try to understand. What's it understand?

You're a square, that's all.

Will you wait a candle and then see those notes?

Man, I hope they stomp on you, but good.

And I thought you was different.

Yeah.

Yeah, sure you were.

I better get my things together.

What's left of them.

You can't stay here anymore, that's for sure.

What did you write about me?

Was it nice?

Of course it was nice.

How could it be anything else? Man, you're some talker.

Feline.

Feline.

As far as you and I are concerned, I want you to know... I don't want to

know. I don't want to know nothing. Just get out of here.

If they come back and find you, I might just get generous and be the only one at

your funeral.

We must now split to enjoy a station break.

I shall remain here on our turf.

And watch for the fuzz.

Our rumble will continue in a moment.

I pity them. The little gang fights they substituted for living.

Their inability to come to grips with... Did you write

that, Shaw?

Did you write that garbage?

Yes. Yes, I wrote it.

You pity us?

Is that right, man? You pity us?

I wanted to write about you.

I wanted to say something true about it. Yeah.

And spill our names to the fuzz.

Get us all busted.

And break up the club.

Right.

No.

No, that isn't the way I was going to do it.

I wasn't going to use your names or the name of the club.

It was going to be fiction. I think you're conning us, man.

I think you're a fink for the cops.

I vote we burn him, Tiger.

Now, wait a minute.

Just take it easy. I was suckered by this guy, too. Just cool it for a

minute.

If this guy's really a writer, and if he's really writing a book about us, he

must have told somebody who's gonna do it, right?

They're gonna know where to look if he turns up squashed. Oh, knock it off,

will ya?

That's all in that... book there.

He didn't tell nobody in New York he was coming down here because he don't know

anyone in New York to tell.

And he hasn't sold nothing yet, so he ain't got an agent.

That's what he said in there.

I still want to know, Bill Doan.

If you wasn't going to use our names, why do you got them here in these pages?

Look, these are preliminary notes.

I was going to change the names when I got into the actual writing.

Man, I should hope so.

I don't know if there's any answer to what these kids have become, but they

can change.

If I needed proof, Feline offers it.

She's changed.

Her tough, swaggering manner is gone, and much of her fear.

She is no longer like the others.

She is something clean and lovely now.

He gave us a phony name.

Why'd he give us a phony name?

Answer the question, Arthur.

It's just that if the book... If the book ever came out...

I didn't want you to think of me as a writer.

I wanted you to remember me as a friend.

Burn him!

All right, cool it.

Burn him!

Hold it down!

Burn him! Burn him! Shut up!

Get back.

Or I'll burn one of you.

Burn him!

Shut up!

Shut up!

I gotta give this a think.

All right.

I've made my decision.

This Beldone, or Shaw, or whoever he is, he's a think and

a creep and a liar.

And we all know it.

But he ain't no cop.

You're a crying slob, buddy.

You got some idea you can come down here and ball all over us like we was basket

cases or something?

Well, we don't need you, man.

And by tomorrow morning, you better be out of this turf and on your way back to

your old lady in Trenton.

Or they're gonna mail you back in an envelope.

What are you doing there?

You can't let him go.

He's gotta pay.

You ought to read what the author put in there about you.

I saw it.

He said I was a natural leader.

I mean the other place.

There's another place.

Do you see that?

Where is it? It's on a page. Never mind.

I got it.

I think I have discovered something important about Tiger.

He treats the girls with contempt, bordering at times on cruelty.

He is the only member of the gang without a steady deb, preferring the

much safer non-commitment of the right of choice.

From among all the girls.

Even so, I have seldom seen him with the same girl more than twice.

I am becoming convinced that he is profoundly, perhaps desperately afraid.

Of the opposite sex.

Opening you up ain't enough.

I'm sorry, Tiger.

You ain't started to be sorry, friend.

You got a mother in Trenton?

You can't get to her. I don't have to wise mouth.

You can get to her.

If I split you up, then we gotta dump your body someplace.

And maybe she never finds out.

But if we get you burned out in front of the whole world, man, then not only you

get it, but maybe old lady has something nice happen to her.

Like a heart attack.

Oh, you louse!

You're gonna die a lot more thinking about your mommy, friend Arthur.

Cause I got the best way of all to put you down.

I'm gonna let the flyers do it.

Here's your weapon, killer.

Empty, right?

You're gonna be lead-off man, Arthur.

You're gonna be right out in front when the old troops hit that line.

You're gonna be out there like a big target for every flyer knife and shotgun

and zip and chain.

They're gonna use you for target practice, Arthur.

It's an honor, you know.

We'll send your old lady a medal.

All right.

Candle keeps his weapon to cover the author.

Everybody else, give your peace to your Deb.

They carry two in from the rumble.

And if we get busted by the fuzz, just split.

They ain't gonna shake down a chick on the street.

You know what your dad told me?

You've been doing nothing but holding hands in the movies.

Now, ain't that charming?

You're happy now, ain't you, Feline?

Fish is official war counselor this time not Now you listen to him Go ahead fish

trooper. I want your group to cross the street and wait We'll take the other

side The author goes first and candles gonna cover him from behind Now when we

hit Stay out of the author's way that I want you to split in half and I want you

to come at the Flyers from both sides Any questions?

Yeah What happens to the Flyers?

Don't cool the author who's worried Do I

look worried All right, man

Operator operator give me a please quickly Your friends are all chicken

punk. They ran away left you holding the bag.

Look keep those hands up. I'll use this

Now, I've been held up here four times in the past nine years.

I finally caught me one.

I'm going to make an example of you this whole neighborhood will never forget.

Wait a minute. You don't understand.

I was faking that stick-up so you'd call the police.

I dropped that gun on purpose.

Hello, police?

Police? Look, this is a Ritz shoe repair, 585 3rd Street.

Yeah, I got me a punk kid here trying to hold me up.

That's right, one of those barons.

Thanks, Sergeant.

Look, mister, what are you trying to pull?

Get those hands up! Get them up!

You gave it to me, huh?

Oh, boy, wait till the cops hear that one.

Here we are.

Now, let's get this straight.

You were picked up with a gun pulling a robbery.

Your story is that you're a writer. You're doing some kind of book about

JDs, is that right?

You'd better get that sweater off.

I'm not sure I can get the judge to believe much of this.

You got money for bail or a bondsman in case they slap you with a stiff one?

You don't even care if I'm innocent or not.

You didn't even ask me if I did it.

Listen, what kind of... What kind of a lawyer are you? Look, kid, I'm assigned

by the court to a number of hours of public service down here. They give me

25 or 30 cases in the morning, and I have to familiarize myself with each one

of them.

Now, all I want to know is, have you money for bail or a bondsman?

I had some money, but it was stolen.

What a scent.

Shaw? J. Shaw?

Yeah, here.

Come with me.

Where?

Your girlfriend stood bill for you, Prince Charming. We're getting out.

Phil? Elaine?

Elaine?

Elaine?

How did you get the money?

You paid for it yourself, Arthur.

Remember that money in your room?

We figured you'd come out if she brought your bail.

This time you ain't gonna get away, Arthur.

This time we're going to plant you permanent.

You.

Watch this.

You got any last words, Arthur?

Come on, man.

Words. Well, that's right in your line.

I'm sorry, Feline.

I want you to know I never meant to hurt you. That's enough.

I may break down and cry.

Now it comes man

This evening I am dispensing with the flippant remarks which usually follow

our plays.

There are some stories which do not lend themselves to levity. A memo from

purgatory is certainly one of them. I regard juvenile delinquency as one of

our nation's most serious and pressing problems, and tonight's story was

produced with that thought uppermost in our minds.

Next week we shall present another story. Until then, good night.