Lisa As Screenwriter
From a cut chapter:
Then, along with the daily love letters and emails she started sending me transcripts of conversations, or supposed conversations, with her Ala-non buddies, multi-page, dialog-heavy scenes written in basic screenplay format (I noticed that Lisa tends to overwrite stage direction, put in stuff that couldn’t make it to the screen), fervent expressions of sympathy for poor Lisa’s plight as victim of a drug and alcohol-deranged mind, mine, along with horrific anecdotes from folks who actually had been such victims, to which Lisa lent her own knowing, compassionate ear. Here’s a little excerpt from one, from an email dated
Following is a transcript of a conversation I had with “F” after the close of an AA meeting… I have gone to Al-Anon meetings for seven days straight. At the start of the meeting I introduce myself. “Hi, my name is Lisa (all, in unison, “Hi Lisa”).
In case you missed the subtext of the above opening: Lisa had been to at least one AA meeting, since she knows the beginning ritual. I think this was her point here.
“I’m visiting from
A reminder to maybe put in perspective Lisa’s dedication to helping me with my addictions: Through it all, she never stopped offering me a sundown drink (a choice of rum or Chilean red wine), or refilling my glass, or buying me codeine on her solo Golfito runs. Also: That when Lisa herself drinks she’s apt to engage in “dumb and out of control” behaviors like promiscuity (which she admitted to in one of her blurts) somehow did not find its way into any of her AA scenes.
During (the) response period, a man who I’ll identify as “F” (“Hi, my name is F____ and I’m an alcoholic”…others introduce themselves as an “addict and an alcoholic”)
Lisa has already used words “addict” or “alcoholic” nine times in setting up her scene, her little nonfiction scene, which purports to explain the root of my delusions. Possibly her background in perception management is evidenced here.
I approached F after the meeting because what he said resonated with me.
Me: Hi, F? My boyfriend is always thinking that I’m going to go off with another man, and he can’t let go of our past problems.
F: You’re just like my girlfriend. I was exactly the same way. That’s why she’s not my girlfriend anymore, for 2 months now.
Me: I used to think it was a problem with him or our relationship but now I realize that it’s the alcohol and these other chemicals he pumps into his system that cloud his thinking, it’s like he can’t think straight.
F: That’s what the booze did to me. I was worrying about things that weren’t there.
Me: He imagines I go off with other men when he’s not looking.
F: You sound exactly like my ex-girlfriend. I drove her crazy, and she finally had to leave me, and I love her and I miss her but she said she can’t be with me.
Me: I think 90% of our problem is the chemicals; he’s self-medicating himself out of depression.
F: That’s pretty common.
Me: But now he’s mad at me because I reached out to my girlfriends. He thinks I’ve “outed” him.
F: Oh man, I did the same thing. Exactly the same thing.
My critique of this scene, which is as clearly made up as any crapola Bob Woodwared ever concocted, is that the writing is too on-the-nose, i.e., it’s sledge-hammering, i.e., all text, no subtext. (Actually there is subtext: the subtext of the scene as written is that it’s made up.)
Writing advice, in the form of an observation: Lisa should have at least worked in some differences between my delusional behavior and “F”s (she has “F” use the word “exactly” three times in agreeing with whatever crapola she says about me), let the reader do some of the work in coming to the conclusion that I’m delusional. (What’s with this “F” shit anyway? People at AA meetings use their first names, not the initial of it: Maybe Lisa didn’t go to any AA meetings after all.)
As with every one of Lisa’s other gaslighting maneuvers, the modifier transparent comes to mind here.
