hell yes he does this every year

When the movie called The Sting came out in 1973, I didn't see it -- I was at an in-between age:  not terribly eager to go to a movie with my parents, but not old enough to drive, and no "older group" of teenagers with whom I might hope to be included in a trip to "the show," as they called the movie theater.

The jumpy, skippy, jazzy, dance-y Scott Joplin ragtime music which underscored that film was nearly ubiquitous from 1973 to 1975 (staying power!) -- "The Entertainer", performed by Marvin Hamlisch, was played on the radio and featured on television -- people I knew had the movie soundtrack on a record album.  I learned to play "The Entertainer" and other Joplin songs -- "The Easy Winners," "Pine Apple Rag," "Sunflower Slow Drag" -- on the piano, and I read the paperback book, which was what they call a "novelization."  (In other words, the book didn't come first with the movie subsequently being based on it -- instead, the movie script was written, the movie filmed, and the book was then written based on the movie -- part of a "marketing package"...)

I look at that sequence now, and think, Why didn't I Just See The Darned Movie???  It was like -- I participated in the Phenomenon of The Sting in every way except the "Main Way" which would have been --

SEE THE MOVIE!!

The main logo of the film -- Robert Redford on the left and Paul Newman on the right, wearing hats, and it's a drawing, not a photograph, I think -- with an old-fashioned, stand-up, two-piece telephone next to Robert Redford's right hand....it's as familiar as my own name and address -- stamped in memory.

Finally saw the film about five years later, in a second-run theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts -- on a date with a guy who -- nagged and criticized, now that I recall -- lol....One of these days I have to just
Watch.  That.  Movie.

==================
INT.  A WATERFRONT PROCESSING PLANT - CHICAGO - DAY

Visible beyond the door and interior window of Combs' office is a large room, cluttered with tables, typewriters, clerks and adding machines.

COMBS [on the phone]:  Granger, this is Combs.  Why haven't we heard from ya?  Everybody else is in.

GRANGER:  We had a few problems with the Law this morning.  The Mayor promised the Jaycees to get tough on the rackets again, so he shut everybody down for a couple hours to make it look good.  Nothing serious, it just put us a little behind for the day.

COMBS:  You been making your payoffs, haven't ya?

GRANGER:  Hell yes.  He does this every year.  There's nothing to worry about.

=================== [excerpt, The Sting script, written by David W. WARD]

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