Five Easy Pieces Chicken Salad Sandwich Scene
Script To Screen: "Five Easy Pieces"
The famous 'hold the chicken' scene from Five Easy Pieces (screenplay by Carole Eastman, story by Carole Eastman and Bob Rafelson).
Setup: Bobby (Jack Nicholson) with some traveling companions wants to order a meal at a diner… and he knows exactly what he wants.
INT. ROADSIDE CAFE - DAY All four are seated at a booth. The women have
given their orders and a WAITRESS stands above
Bobby, waiting for his:
BOBBY
(looking at his menu)
I'll have an omelette, no potatoes.
Give me tomatoes instead, and wheat
toast instead of rolls.
The waitress indicates something on the menu with
the butt of her pencil.
WAITRESS
No substitutions.
BOBBY
What does that mean? You don't have
any tomatoes?
WAITRESS
(annoyed)
No. We have tomatoes.
BOBBY
But I can't have any. Is that what
you mean?
WAITRESS
Only what's on the menu...
(again, indicating with
her pencil)
A Number Two: Plain omelette. It
comes with cottage fries and rolls.
BOBBY
I know what it comes with, but
that's not what I want.
WAITRESS
I'll come back when you've made up
your mind...
She starts to move away and Bobby detains her.
BOBBY
Wait, I've made up my mind. I want
a plain omelette, forget the
tomatoes, don't put potatoes on the
plate, and give me a side of wheat
toast and a cup of coffee.
WAITRESS
I'm sorry, we don't have side
orders of toast. I can give you an
English muffin or a coffee roll.
BOBBY
What do you mean, you don't have
side orders of toast? You make
sandwiches, don't you?
WAITRESS
Would you like to talk to the
manager?
PALM
Hey, mack!
BOBBY
(to Palm)
Shut up.
(to the waitress)
You have bread, don't you, and a
toaster of some kind?
WAITRESS
I don't make the rules.
BOBBY
Okay, I'll make it as easy for you
as I can. Give me an omelette,
plain, and a chicken salad sandwich
on wheat toast -- no butter, no
mayonnaise, no lettuce -- and a cup
of coffee.
She begins writing down his order, repeating it
sarcastically:
WAITRESS
One Number Two, and a chicken sal
san -- hold the butter, the mayo,
the lettuce -- and a cup of
coffee... Anything else?
BOBBY
Now all you have to do is hold the
chicken, bring me the toast, charge
me for the sandwich, and you
haven't broken any rules.
WAITRESS
(challenging him)
You want me to hold the chicken.
BOBBY
Yeah. I want you to hold it between
your knees.
The other three laugh, and the waitress points to a
"Right to Refuse" sign above the counter.
WAITRESS
You see that sign, sir?!
Bobby glances over at it, then back to her.
WAITRESS (CONT'D)
You'll all have to leave, I'm not
taking any more of your smartness
and your sarcasm!
He smiles politely at her, then:
BOBBY
You see this sign?
He reaches his arm out and "clears" the table for
her. Here is the scene in the movie:
Nicholson plays the scene almost exactly as written and you can feel the tension rising throughout. Here's some background on the scene from Nicholson and director Bob Rafelson. Turns out Nicholson actually swept a table of all the drinks in a real-life situation. Color me Not Surprised!
I'll see you in comments for a discussion of this terrific scene from Five Easy Pieces.
One of the single best things you can do to learn the craft of screenwriting is to read the script while watching the movie. After all a screenplay is a blueprint to make a movie and it's that magic of what happens between printed page and final print that can inform how you approach writing scenes. That is the purpose of Script to Screen , a weekly series on GITS where we analyze a memorable movie scene and the script pages that inspired it.
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