remember what they did in that book?

{Manhattan Murder Mystery - Woody Allen}


MARCIA
Yeah, it's possible.  He saw you there, he knows you're onto him.  After he ran away, why couldn't you have retrieved the body?

LARRY
You're kidding.  I... We couldn't have gotten her out of that.  We...  I would have wound up with a few toes and a shoulder, maybe, at most.

MARCIA
Well, that's...  Okay, okay, you have the body.  What does he know?  He was probably too scared to be very lucid.  He's an amateur.  

He dumped the body and ran off, and then somehow -- who knows the details, you two dug her out.  Now, you can send him to the chair.

CAROL
Okay, okay, just...

TED
I like this woman, she's lurid.

CAROL
Let me tell you why he's not going to believe us, okay?

LARRY
Yeah, first of all, because I can't, I can't bluff or lie without giggling, so- so...

CAROL
Yeah.  No, because if we really had the body, why tell him?  Why not go straight to the police?

MARCIA
If you tell the cops, you can't shake him down.

                      MEDIUM SHOT on another table in the restaurant.  Two middle-aged men seated there, listening very eagerly, with startled expressions.

TED
Oh, she's wicked.  Oh, I- look -- look how, look how this works out.  You go to the law, what do you gain?  But -- I mean, so-so maybe they, you know, they put him in jail.  What have you got?  You haven't got anything.

LARRY
(voice over)
Right.

TED
But if he wants the evidence, and he's got to pay for it, now...  Okay, now he's nervous, right?

CAROL
Yeah, you know, wait.  There's just so many fallacies in this, I can't even count them.

TED
What?  Name one.

CAROL
Name one?  Okay, the guy looks us straight in the eyes and says, "What body?  What the hell are you talking about?  Prove it."

MARCIA
Well, that's when we keep bluffing.

TED
What?  How?  What do we do?

MARCIA
We produce the body.

LARRY
Yeah, but where are you gonna get it, Madame Tussaud's?

MARCIA
Yeah -- say- say we found someone to corroborate this story.

CAROL
Oh, really.  J-Just...

MARCIA
Someone he trusted.

CAROL
Like who?

MARCIA
Like his lover.  Say she called and said, "Paul, I've just seen Lillian's body.  They want a hundred thousand dollars for it."

TED
Why-why would she do that?

MARCIA
Remember that book you recommended to me?  "Murder in Manhattan"?

LARRY
Oh, yes.  Max Schindler's book.  That's right, the phone call.

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