Mulch Ado About Nothing

A pastoral scene. A grassy meadow slopes down toward a
meandering tree-lined stream. Birds twirl and dart in the gentle
breeze. Partway up the slope a woman is beating a man with the
root end of a large weed.
"Ow! Hey! Ow!"
Official Botanist throws the plant aside, shakes her fist
under Door Repair Guy's nose, then takes off down the slope and
into the trees.
He stands and begins to finger-comb the dirt out of his
hair.
"Crazy botanists. I gotta get some survival tips from Chief
O'Brien."
He picks up his baseball cap and has a look at it.
"About due for a fresh uniform, I'd say."
Then he notices the colour of the hand holding the hat.
"Yikes! What happened to you? Gamma particle radiation?"
He catches a scent, then holds his wrist under his nose.
"Sauerbraten?"
He blinks, then starts off down the hill.
Music: recorder and viol.
The Goddess Fortuna turns her wheel, the winds of Time
blowing her loose tresses and rippling robes. The scene whites
out and is replaced by the motto:
}+{----------------------------------------------}+{
) | Crawlspace: the Final frontier. These are the | (
) | voyages of the Door Repair Guy. His mission: | (
[== | to install & maintain proximitie-activated | ==]
[== | Entranceways, to Stake out new rooms & new | ==]
) | service conduits -- to Boldly go where No one | (
) | with a Pass key has gone before. &&&&&&& | (
}+{----------------------------------------------}+{
The motto fades to a scene of the Muses moving through a
courtly dance. Each one carries an emblem representing one of
the planets. We recognize the sceptre of Jupiter, the mirror of
Venus, the bat'telh of Qo'noS. In the corner a putti holds up a
shield emblazoned with the words:
Star Trek: Door Repair Guy
A page steps forward, unfurls a banner over his arm and
draws it toward him so that the embroidered words scroll upward.
Starring
Door Repair Guy as
Himself
Also Starring
Joe Pesci as
The New Mayor
Faye Dunaway as
Social Climber
Christopher Lloyd as
Impractical Scientist
Amanda Plummer as
Official Botanist
Robertson Davies as
Pompous City Councillor
Harold Pinter as
Himself
Jimmy Smits as
Good Cop
Dennis Franz as
Bad Cop
A boy wearing Tudor costume raises a globe above his head
and a girl in ruffles and a lace cap lifts up a model of the USS
Jenolen, produces a long dive-bomber sound and smashes it into
it.
[Commercial:
Caption: "1734. Somewhere in Canada."
Two men are paddling a birchbark canoe along a lake. We
hear a mosquito's buzz.
"Such wilderness, William."
"Today, yes, Jacques. But someday, someday it will be a
great country."
Jacques swipes at the mosquito. "You think so, eh?"
"Absolutely. You see, they shall perfect a game called
hockey, invent the telephone, save England and France -- twice --
and make one incredibly good beer, a true Canadian dark ale."
Buzz! Jacques smacks himself in the face. "Mudder of God!"
"Yes, that's it!"
Guitar riff. Labatt Genuine Mud.]
DRG stumbles through the brook, climbs up the far shore and
stops. In the sylvan glade ahead of him stands a small cluster
of thatched cottages. Villagers in homemade clothes are already
putting aside their farm implements and shading their eyes in his
direction. Someone points. Two kids come tearing out along a
narrow dirt path toward him.
Boy: "Hey! Hey!"
Girl: "Oh! Hey! Oh!"
They come to a screeching halt and stare up at him, each
with one eye screwed shut in the sun.
DRG: "Is this Nepean 6?"
Boy: "Yeah!"
DRG: "How'd you two get here?"
Girl: "Same as you! Playin' with the weed wacker!"
DRG: "Well, just stay away from the automated spike harrow,
will yeh?"
Both: "Aw!"
Cut to Pompous City Councillor hurrying Impractical
Scientist through the village square. They round a corner.
Impractical Scientist, taking off his straw hat:
"By Apollo, lord of the measuring rule!"
He dashes toward Door Repair Guy and catches him in a bone-
crunching bearhug.
DRG: "Ow! Okay! Uncle!"
Impractical Scientist lets go suddenly and DRG's arse
impacts the earth.
"I'll thank you to call me Father from now on!"
"Yeah. Okay. I know. I get it."
He picks himself up. Most of the village is now gathered
round and clammering for news of the other dimension.
Impractical Scientist is too pleased to stay mad for long and is
soon waving his arms for quiet.
DRG is saying: ". . . and so the Cardassians and the
Bajorans signed this peace treaty, and then Kai Winn took control
of the Provisional Government and . . ."
Pompous City Councillor: "Yes. yes. This is all very well
and good. But who is Mayor in Nepean?"
"Boyhood Friend is."
The bearded councillor puts a hand over his heart and begins
to stagger backwards.
Impractical Scientist: "Has he taken the transdimensional
weed-wacker out of the Parks and Recreation Department
inventory?"
"Banned them totally. Well, okay, he gave me one."
"And that's how you got here!"
DRG thinks. "I guess. I don't remember."
There's a jostle in the crowd and Social Climber breaks
through, followed by a now demure and observant Official
Botanist.
"Goodness gracious, will you look at--"
Social Climber's eyes fall on his Bajoran ear-ring.
"Oh God, Bratty! Don't tell me you're gay!"
"Mom."
Official Botanist: "Poor men." She tiptoes out from behind
his mother and smiles up at him blandly.
DRG lifts his baseball cap, scratches more earth out of his
scalp, and looks around at the vegetation crowding in on the
village. "I gotta say, there's plenty of work in these parts for
a good plant expert. Think you'll ever find one?"
Official Botanist: "I'd say I'm quite qualified after all
those many dates I spent watching you go into a vegetative state
in front of the game."
The crowd exchange significant looks and move back to give
them more room.
DRG: "I think you must of been watching university of the
nose in the air."
Official Botanist: "Ha. You confuse the morning with the
night."
DRG: "Ha. Nightfall is the lover's morning. Most notorious
lovers sleep in late."
Official Botanist: "Most notorious beer-drinkers as well."
DRG: "Could it simply be that I was drunk with love?"
Official Botanist: "Could it simply be that you were in love
with being drunk?"
DRG: "You seem to have forgotten that the weekend is for
fun."
Official Botanist: "Well, now I know why they call it the
weak end."
Pompous City Councillor to Impractical Scientist: "Oh, dear.
They're not going to start rapping, are they?"
"No, they really like each other. Can't you tell? Okay,
kids! Enough fun for now! You'll have plenty of time to diss
later. Right now I want to talk to the lad about some
inventions."
That scatters the villagers.
DRG: "Have you been working on the weed wacker?"
Impractical Scientist: "Well, off and on. To tell you the
truth there's nobody that interested in getting back. Well,
except your uncle. And Harold Pinter. He didn't even write
_Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead_ you know."
"Who was it?"
"Tom Stoppard."
"I always get those two guys mixed up."
"Come on and I'll show you a fully-automated methane-powered
spike harrow I just completed."
"Cool!"
They head off through the village.
[Commercial:
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That's Titian Magician, complete with fifteen pre-measured colour
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HAIR! That's 1-800 RED-HAIR!"]
A log cabin in the woods. Cut to the interior. The style
is early Grizzly Adams.
Uncle Paving Contractor sits behind his new maple desk,
running his hands over the smooth surface. Rosencrantz and
Guildenstern stand attentively in the corner, nervously awaiting
his verdict.
"I once had a desk like this in my chambers. When I had
chambers. When there *were* chambers."
He makes a fist. Close-up of the fist as he brings it down
on the surface. He's wearing a pinky ring.
Rosencrantz: "He dented it."
Guildenstern: "We French-waxed that for . . . how long?"
Rosencrantz: "I forget."
Paving Contractor stares out the window, deep in memory,
then comes back to the present and turns toward the two.
"Nice work, guys. But I ain't buyin'. It's got a nick."
He points to the newly-made depression with his pointing
finger (in his case not the one closest the thumb).
Rosencrantz: "You made it."
Paving Contractor blinks. "Whaddya mean 'You made it'?
You're the furniture guys. You made it."
Guildenstern: "Yes, of course, we made it. But you made
. . . it."
"It?"
"Yes, you made *it*."
"I don't follow you."
Rosencrantz: "Actually, we follow you."
Paving Contractor: "What is this? Are you messin' with me?
Don't mess with me."
They look nervously at one another.
Guildenstern tries another tack. "Imagine an ideal table.
A table as it exists, as it were, in the mind of God."
Rosencrantz (left behind): "A holy table?"
Paving Contractor looks from one to the other.
Paving Contractor: "A holy table?"
Guildenstern (pauses): "You could put it that way."
"I don't want no holy table. It's the hole in the table
right here which I'm talkin about."
He points again.
Guildenstern: "I'm referring to the ideal plane."
Paving Contractor: "And I'm referring to the ideal plane.
Get this desk outta here and don't bring it back til you get this
dent out with the ideal plane, or whatever. I don't need this
shit."
Rosencrantz: "Yes, that's what we mean."
"What is?"
Rosencrantz points to the dent with his middle finger.
Paving Contractor looks at the digit, grabs a baseball bat
(an earlier Rosencrantz and Guildenstern commission), and comes
around the desk after them. They run for it.
"You're no Joe l'Erario!"
Harold Pinter enters.
Paving Contractor: "The caretaker. About time. Where you
bin hidin out all day? Look at that roof."
"There's a new arrival in the town. Door Repair Guy."
Paving Contractor: "Door Repair Guy? Door Repair Guy?"
He stares out the window with wild eyes.
"Door Repair Guy!"
Harold Pinter: "I've never met Door Repair Guy."
"Huh? How do you think you got here?"
"I put it down to a continuity problem."
"Door Repair Guy! I never thought to see his face again."
He gestures around the room. "What you see here is all that
remains of a promising mayoral career on Nepean 5. On Nepean 5,
twelve months ago, I was a prince with power over thousands.
Now, because of Door Repair Guy, you see me bereft of everything,
including my beloved wife."
"She lives in the town."
"With my brother!"
"Her first husband."
"That good-for-nothing, and his no-good son. Door Repair
Guy. He threw a bat'telh at me. I got witnesses."
"Why don't you take it easy?"
"Take it easy? Take it easy? He tasks me, and I shall have
him, the little schmuck! C'mon!"
Paving Contractor starts for town with his Elsinor Slugger.
Harold Pinter takes a goatskin umbrella out of the umbrella stand
and follows him out the door.
[Commercial
"August 24-27 it's Bajor Days at Bayshore Shopping Mall!"]
Social Climber and Official Botanist are shelling peas.
Social Climber looks out the corner of her eye at the
younger woman.
"Now that Door Repair Guy's in town, I expect you two will
pick up where you left off."
Official Botanist looks at her in astonishment.
"No offense, but your son's a nincompoop!"
"Well, if you say. The Klingon women seemed to think he was
something."
"Huh! He's something, all right. The question is: what?
No offense."
"Well, you should know."
Official Botanist shakes her head in amazement and resumes
shelling. After a moment she stops and exclaims:
"Klingons!"
Social Climber purses her lips. They shell some more peas.
Social Climber: "He always thought you were the best-looking
girl in the Green Belt."
"Hmph."
"But that was years ago."
"Not that long."
"Nearly ten. I'm sure that torch died out long ago."
"Torch!?"
"Oh, never mind me."
"He broke it off."
"He was leaving for that Klingon job. There's nothing worse
than a long distance relationship. I'm sure he was thinking of
your feelings."
"My --!"
"Oh, yes, you know, Curling Club Secretary and Treasurer
said he said to Boyhood Friend that he wished he had an evil twin
to send to Qo'noS so he could stay in Nepean and live on UI with
you."
"What? No way."
"Curling Club Secretary and Treasurer is a reliable source."
"That may be. But you're talking about ancient history."
"I suppose. But I saw that look in his eye."
Official Botanist looks at her sceptically, picks up a
handful of peapods, then looks at her again.
Impractical Scientist activates the automated garage-door
opener and beams as it opens flawlessly.
"Made entirely of vegetable matter."
"Cool."
They go in. The place is a 24th-Century low-tech equivalent
of Da Vinci's studio. DRG notices a large cloth-covered
doorframe in the corner. He goes over and unveils it.
"Hey, an interdimensional gateway! Does it work?"
"No. It needs another like it on the other side."
"Hey! I've got one in my own place! I even left it on!"
"You're not kidding? That means we can return to Nepean 5!"
Impractical Scientist stops short and slips into thought.
DRG: "Don't tell me. You really don't want to go back?"
"I'm of two minds. We've begun to build a life here. Your
mother and I are back together. The location is . . . idyllic.
Best fishing I've seen in a long while. We'll all have to think
about this."
"Maybe people will want to move out here."
"Fine place to raise a family. But do we want suburban
development?"
"Once Uncle Paving Contractor sees this he'll be piping
asphalt through it in no time."
"We'll have to think about this. I'll have a word with a
few people on the Council."
Impractical Scientist leans back against his work table and
crosses his arms.
"Well, I agree with you. That Official Botanist is some
looker."
DRG puts down a homeblown glass retort with a look of
surprise.
"When did I say that?"
"Oh, a while ago. I didn't really notice til recently.
She's turned out to be a fine cut of a woman."
"So you're lookin at my girlfriends now!"
"So she's your girlfriend now?"
"I didn't say that!"
"Well, she sure acts that way."
"She's been after me since I got here."
"That's what I mean."
"That's not what I mean. Look at this bump."
"She just wants your attention."
"This isn't Grade Three."
"Ah. Some things don't change."
"You're a nut."
But you can tell he's thinking.
[Bob:
"Hi and back to Door Repair Guy in just a minute, and hey!
we're on a cruise ship out on the Rideau Canal somewhere between
Smith's Falls and Merrickville and I'm reminded of . . . light
beer. Ha!" Paces the deck with microphone. "Did you know you
can take a holiday vacation cruise with deck chairs and
everything, and shuffleboard, and it's right here in our own back
yard!" Glances over the rail at the top of a baseball cap moving
past. "Well, actually it's in his back yard. But there's a
Recreational Co-ordinator." He charges over to a uniformed
woman. "And you're . . ."
"Holly."
"And what port is home, Holly?"
"Peterborough."
"And have you ever been around the Horn?"
She's dumbfounded.
Bob realizes she's not going to say anything. He does a
fencing move in the direction of a retiree in a deck chair who
looks up in surprise at the mike between her book and her nose.
"How do you like the cruise so far?"
"Who are you?"
"Bob Cowan, CHRO news and current affairs!"
"I don't own a televison machine!"
He looks up at the camera.
"Then I'm Peter Van Dusen! We'll be back to Star Trek: Door
Repair Guy after this."
Shot of the wake and the two shorelines moving slowly to
stern.]
[Commercial: Paramount Marineland:
Everyone loves a holiday,
Watching the whales and the dolphins play,
A friend who cares splashing waves in your hair,
Everyone loves (speeds up to fit in all the syllables)
Paramount Marineland!
(Shot of a Klingon holding a fish over the pool. An orca
rises out of the water for the fish and the Klingon seizes the
whale around the neck and topples with it back into the water,
wrestling fiercely.)]
Paving Contractor stalks through the thatched village with a
baseball bat hidden behind his back. He sees Pompous City
Councillor.
"Hey! Whiskers! Where's that Door Repair loser?"
"I believe I would be remiss were I to direct an adversary
who bears both a grudge and a cudgel toward his whereabouts."
"What? This? I just wanted to recruit him for softball.
Now that he's here we can make a league."
"I'm completely misled. Still I don't know where he is."
"Grrr."
Paving Contractor heads off. Pompous City Councillor spots
Harold Pinter's umbrella.
"If you believe Robinson Crusoe to be the defining metaphor
of the Mulch Dimension you are mistaken. It is The Tempest."
"That would make you Alonso."
"Prospero, if you please."
"Impractical Scientist is Prospero."
"You're Trunculo."
"You're Stephano!"
"You're Ariel!"
"You're Caliban!"
"}:-b!"
">:-p!"
[Commercial:
"Lately the inhabitants of Upper Canada Village have begun
to notice strange visitors in their midst."
Candlestick-maker: "Nobody knows how they get here or where
they go."
Blacksmith: "They *say* they're from the future."
Shot of away team materializing in a circle, then taking
tricorder readings of the surrounding structures preparatory to
fanning out.
One villager to another: "I never noticed *that* before."]
Door Repair Guy trudges up the hillside toward the site of
his earlier beating.
"Can't believe I'm really doing this. She's going to knock
my brains out for sure this time."
He spots Official Botanist gathering specimens into a large
wicker basket with her back toward him. He comes up.
"Good pickin's?"
She turns with a gasp and an armload of wildflowers. She
stands there trying to think of something to say. Clearly she's
as agitated as he is.
DRG: "So . . . ah . . . whatya got there?"
"Ah. Lupinus polyphyllus, Angelica atropurpurea, Solidago
multiradiata, Rudbeckia serotina, and . . . um . . . this is
bastard toadfax."
"Ummm. Quite a variety."
"Well. Uh. You know. These are just terrestrial
varieties. We have whole ecosystems here from places we've never
seen. Apparently your dad is not the only one to hit on the
transdimensional weed wacker. The Mulch Dimension seems to be a
repository for cuttings from all over the universe. Over that
hill every growing thing is blue. No chlorophyll at all. I
haven't figured it out yet."
"You will."
She smiles suddenly, then bites her lips.
"So-o-o-o, I guess you made it big in the door business if
you're working in Starfleet."
"Well, up and down. I've gotta make up with the Door
Fek'lhr before I get any more Klingon work."
She puts her hand on his arm, surprising even herself. She
says:
"You will."
The camera comes around so that the sunlight's in their
hair. They tingle. Their eyes widen. Suddenly:
"I love you!"
"I love you!"
"Ha!" Paving Contractor leaps out from behind a towering
elm with the baseball bat poised over his head. "I've got your
number now, you little twerp!"
Official Botanist: "Run for it!"
Door Repair Guy boots it down the hill with Paving
Contractor in hot pursuit.
[Commercial:
"It's Back-to-School Time at Shoppers' Drug Mart! Come in
this week for Waterworld drinkin' bottles, only 49 cents; loose-
leaf, three million sheet pack, $1.49; and Laurentian coloured
pencils Shades of Grey 24-pencil pack, just $1.29!"]
Shot of DS9.
Cut to corridor in the Habitat Ring. The camera moves
toward the police-taped entrance to Door Repair Guy's quarters.
Two security guards with coffee cups move into the shot and
slouch against the wall on either side of the door.
Good Cop: "Another sixteen hours of this stakeout and I'll
be ready for an excursion fare to Elba II."
Bad Cop: "Yeah, well, say hi to Garth. I'll lay you five to
one this fugitive is pushing up the bastard toadfax somewhere
where no one has gone before."
Good Cop: "I'll lay you five to one whoever programmed that
replicator came from a planet where they don't drink coffee."
Thump.
Bad Cop: "Did you hear that?"
Bump. Bang. Crash.
They draw their phasers and crouch against the wall with
both hands on their weapons. Good Cop hits his comm badge and
shouts, "This is Unit 54! We've got a B&E at 04-451! Yeah, the
door factory!"
Smash! Crash!
They nod to each other, Bad Cop reaches up and taps the door
control, and they pour through the opening door.
"Security! Freeze! I said Freeze! Look out, he's got a
bat!"
We see Paving Contractor swinging wildly while the two cops
dodge around the room. Good Cop finally brings him down with a
tackle to the gut. Bad Cop straddles the two and bellows:
"Get outta the way! Get outta the way! I'll fry him! I'll
fry him!"
Jump cut.
"I'll fry him!"
Good Cop gets the bat away from Paving Contractor and holds
an open palm up to Bad Cop's phaser.
"I got him! Just back off!"
Jump cut.
"Just back off!"
Bad Cop lowers his weapon with a look of disgust, then
immediately points it toward the corner of the room.
"Freeze! Put'em up!"
Camera zooms in on DRG putting his hands up behind the
recliner rocker.
Paving Contractor: "Let me outta here!"
Odo approaches the holding cell.
"Please, you're disturbing the other residents."
Odo nods toward the comatose DRG on the other side of the
cell.
"Where's my lawyer? I know my rights! You gotta charge me
or spring me!"
"There's the small matter of one hundred and forty-seven
counts of kidnapping."
"You'll never lay that one on me! When I get outta here--"
Odo taps the white noise control and walks off. Paving
Contractor continues his tirade in pantomine, during which DRG
wakes up, produces a harmonica, and begins to play in pantomine.
The last we see, Paving Contractor is chasing him around the
cell, trying to lay a beating on him, also in pantomine.
------------
Written by Douglas A. McLeod ai919
------------
Notes on Mulch Ado About Nothing:
Return to the Green Belt, and more Shakespeare!
The Labatt, Upper Canada Village and Marineland commercials are verbatim up until the punchlines. The back to school ad places this episode in August 1995.
Titian Magician!
Peter Van Dusen was on CBC Ottawa in the 1990s, before he moved to TVO.
UI. The Canadian government renamed unemployment insurance Employment Insurance in 1996. They did not however take the logical next step of renaming fire insurance Not On Fire Insurance.
Emoticons, or as we used to call them, smileys.
They rediscovered the jump cut on NYPD Blue.
Now I think a third Nepean episode is called for, but I never got back to it.