America's Vice
Scott Fivelson
February 2006
February 2006
Hello. I’m the short-but-dashing investigative reporter Journalismo Interfera, and this...is America’s Vice. Tonight I will be your tour guide through the scary world of illegal drugs.
Who makes them? Who takes them? Who are the tooters? And who are the shooters?
We’ll answer these questions by bringing you, the audience at home, closer to the story than you’ve ever been before. First, by going to the street – yes, the street – to show you a no-holds-barred, live, for-real drug bust. This will not be a simulation. These will not be actors playing parts. You’ll be there, with me, feeling the heat, down and dirty, in the belly of the beast. And then, later, for the rest of the story...well, I’ll get even closer. The secret world of junkies and pushers, next – after this word from L’Oreal.
L’Oreal. Because you’re worth it.
I’ve changed out of my sportcoat and tie, and slicked back my hair. Welcome to the street. Here’s where it all begins when you’re on the trail of illegal drugs. It’s not a pretty place.
The crime. The grime. The very trees – filled with sleaze. In a moment, my small, hand-picked crew and I will follow narcotics officers as they charge through the door and invade the apartment of a known drug dealer.
What’s it like to be here – on the street – in the final seconds before a drug bust goes down? Well, I can’t speak for the narcs, but from where I sit, the adrenalin is flowing, giving my overworked crew and me back our edge, our eye of the tiger – in short, the kind of natural high the scuzzball addicts we’re about to bust will never know. As you can see, the narcotics officers have just drawn their guns.
Here we go.
We’re running up the stairs now.
Now we’re running down the hall.
If you are prone to motion sickness, do not look at the screen.
We have reached the door of the known drug dealer. To our surprise, the door is wide open. Employing a trick of modern reporting, I stick an old hat on the end of a mike boom, out into the doorway. We still meet no resistance, no hail of bullets.
Something is wrong.
The moment we enter the apartment, diving to the floor, it all becomes clear. The room is empty. The TV is on. The show on the screen: America’s Vice. The drug dealer we’re busting? Out the window, long gone. As they say on the street, I have “been made.”
The narcs and I look around, and we agree it’s a bad scene. That is, the scene has lacked drama, conflict; the scene doesn’t work; it doesn’t play.
But just for a moment – using your imagination – think what might have happened.
We crash through the door, and are met by gunfire. An officer goes down. Maybe I catch a slug. Maybe some skinhead throws another chair. But we still make the bust, get a show in the can. I change out of my bloodstained clothes into something a little more comfortable, and I jet over to 20/20, where I show up a minute late to be interviewed and am slapped by Barbara Walters.
It didn’t happen... But it could have. Because anything can happen on the street.
We’ll take an even closer look at the world of drugs...after this word from Cover Girl cosmetics.
America’s look is Cover Girl.
Hi, and welcome back to America’s Vice. Well, we’ve been to the street. We’ve felt the heat, and we’ve heard the beat. But there’s another side to the world of drugs, the “inside” story, the one under the surface. The window you’re looking through?
A porthole.
The metallic walls around me? A one-man submarine.
The most puzzling question of all: Why do I look even shorter than usual?
I have been miniaturized.
Where am I?
As close to the story as you can get. I am inside the arm of an intravenous drug user.
Yes, using my enormous personal income to subsidize the development of technology only postulated in Innerspace and Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, I’ve made it possible – tonight – here – live – for you, the audience at home, to become an accidental tourist in a mainliner’s vein. That red stuff outside the porthole – that’s real blood.
In just a moment, somewhere beyond the Great Barrier, the junkie will put down his cooking spoon, and a needle will invade these tranquil waters. I can feel it... Here it comes!
DIVE! DIVE!
With a deafening whoosh, our ship is suddenly borne along at fantastic speed by the pounding wave apparently directly behind us.
There’s too much pressure on the hull!
I’m hearing the beat, and feeling the heat. This is what reporting is about...
(N-O-I-S-E.)
(Silence.)
(Due to technical difficulties, the remainder of America’s Vice will not be seen tonight. Here’s the part of the story you don’t see: the rescue operation – and the resuscitation. But following the emergency rescue of your drowning host from the arm of the intravenous drug user, and a subsequent cold-turkey period at the Betty Ford treatment center, Journalismo Interfera will be back with future specials, on a variety of issues of the day, but with one thing in common: You’ll get a good look at America’s vice. Good night.)
Scott Fivelson is a screenwriter, fiction writer, and author whose stories and satirical pieces have appeared in Chicago Magazine, the Chicago Tribune, Playboy, Los Angeles Magazine, the Los Angeles Times, the L.A. Weekly, and other publications.