Here’s another fun bit I got to produce on the summer replacement show NEXT with host Nora Young and producer Alison Moss.
We hired actor Andrew Gillies (Orphan Black) to do these bits. I’d worked with Andrew before on my adaptation of Tom Godwin‘s The Cold Equations. Andrew had played the captain of the Stardust for us. Now he played a Scotsman trying to tune up Nora’s brain.
I’ve pasted the script below, with the actual produced bits at the bottom of each one.
Part One
NORA: It’s easy to spruce up your body… okay, well maybe not easy, but you do have the option of going to the gym and hiring a personal trainer. But what about your brain? What if you could give your brain a tune-up too?
SFX: WOOSH! INTO NORA’S BRAIN
SFX: GRINDING, SQUEALING GEARS OF A BRAIN OUT OF WHACK
McSCOTT: (THICK SCOTTISH BROGUE) Och! Listen to that.
NORA: What? What is it?
SFX: OBNOXIOUS WHIRRING
McSCOTT: It’s nae wonder you cannae do arithmetic in a brain like this. Your neural net… it’s all gummed up. Och, and that basil ganglia. (BLOWS ON SOMETHING) Tsk tsk.
NORA: Oh my.
McSCOTT: But dinnae you worry, lass, I’ve seen worse.
NORA: You have?
McSCOTT: Aye. This monkey once. Couldn’t count to two if its life depended on it.
NORA: What did you do?
McSCOTT: Lipid soluble molecules past the blood brain barrier. Before you knew it that monkey could count to five. Nae… you leave it to me, lass…
SFX: Power Tool Roars to Life
McSCOTT: You’ll be doin’ math in nae time.
SFX: EVERYTHING OUT WITH A WOOSH
Part Two
SFX: POWER TOOL SHUTTING OFF
SFX: BRAIN ONLY SLIGHTLY OUT OF WHACK
McSCOTT: That should do it. Tell me, lass: are ya feelin’ at all perspicacious?
NORA: Excuse me?
McSCOTT: Peripatetic? Cogitative? Erudite, scholarly? The least bit sagacious?
NORA: I’m sorry?
McSCOTT: Are ya feelin’ any smarter, lass.
NORA: Uhhh…
McSCOTT: I’m guessin’ that’s a “nae,” then. Nae worries, got a few more tricks up me sleeve yet…
SFX: SWOOSH OUT
Part Three
SFX: BRAIN HOPELESSLY OUT OF WHACK
McSCOTT: Och! It’s nae use.
NORA: No?
McSCOTT: I kin make ya smarter…
NORA: Uh huh?
McSCOTT: But… but not without changin’ the fundamental chemistry of your brain.
NORA: I see.
McSCOTT: But if you dinnae mind me sayin’ so…
NORA: Uh huh?
McSCOTT: I think you’re just fine the way you are…
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