My Beautiful Launderette

  Rachel. Yes, I can tell from your face. Does he love her? Yes. Families, I hate families.

  BILQUIS: Please Tania, can you come and help.

  (BILQUIS goes. TANIA follows her.)

  INT. HALL OF NASSER’S HOUSE. DAY

  OMAR is standing in the hall of Nasser’s house as the guests leave their respective rooms and go out into the drive. OMAR stands there. NASSER shouts to him from his bed.

  NASSER: Take my advice. There’s money in muck.

  (TANIA signals and shakes her head.)

  What is it the gora Englishman always needs? Clean clothes!

  EXT. NASSER’S DRIVE. NIGHT

  OMAR has come out of the house and into the drive. A strange sight: SALIM staggering about drunkenly. The ENGLISHMAN, ZAKI and CHERRY try to get him into the car. SALIM screams at ZAKI.

  SALIM: Don’t you owe me money? Why not? You usually owe me money! Here, take this! Borrow it! (And he starts to scatter money about.) Pick it up!

  (ZAKI starts picking it up. He is afraid.)

  CHERRY: (To OMAR) Drive us back, will you. Pick up your own car tomorrow. Salim is not feeling well.

  (As ZAKI bends over, SALIM who is laughing, goes to kick him. BILQUIS stands at the window watching all this.)

  INT. SALIM’S CAR, DRIVING INTO SOUTH LONDON. NIGHT

  OMAR driving SALIM’s car enthusiastically into London. CHERRY and SALIM are in the back. The car comes to a stop at traffic lights.

  On the adjacent pavement outside a chip shop a group of LADS are kicking cans about. The LADS include MOOSE and GENGHIS.

  A lively street of the illuminated shops, amusement arcades and late-night shops of South London.

  MOOSE notices that Pakistanis are in the car. And he indicates to the others.

  The LADS gather round the car and bang on it and shout. From inside the car this noise is terrifying. CHERRY starts to scream.

  SALIM: Drive, you bloody fool, drive!

  (But MOOSE climbs on the bonnet of the car and squashes his arse grotesquely against the windscreen. Faces squash against the other windows.

  Looking out of the side window OMAR sees JOHNNY standing to one side of the car, not really part of the car-climbing and banging.

  Impulsively, unafraid, OMAR gets out of the car.)

  EXT. STREET. NIGHT

  OMAR walks past GENGHIS and MOOSE and the others to the embarrassed JOHNNY. CHERRY is yelling after him from inside the open-doored car.

  The LADS are alert and ready for violence but are confused by OMAR’s obvious friendship with JOHNNY.

  OMAR sticks out his hand and JOHNNY takes it.

  OMAR: It’s me.

  JOHNNY: I know who it is.

  OMAR: How are yer? Working? What you doing now then?

  JOHNNY: Oh, this kinda thing.

  CHERRY: (Yelling from the car) Come on, come on!

  (The lads laugh at her. SALIM is hastily giving MOOSE cigarettes.)

  JOHNNY: What are you now, chauffeur?

  OMAR: No. I’m on to something.

  JOHNNY: What?

  OMAR: I’ll let you know. Still living in the same place?

  JOHNNY: Na, don’t get on with me mum and dad. You?

  OMAR: She died last year, my mother. Jumped on to the railway line.

  JOHNNY: Yeah. I heard. All the trains stopped.

  OMAR: I’m still there. Got the number?

  JOHNNY: (Indicates the LADS) Like me friends?

  (CHERRY starts honking the car horn. The LADS cheer.)

  OMAR: Ring us then.

  JOHNNY: I will. (Indicates car.) Leave ’em there. We can do something. Now. Just us.

  OMAR: Can’t.

  (OMAR touches JOHNNY’s arm and runs back to the car.)

  INT. CAR. NIGHT

  They continue to drive. CHERRY is screaming at OMAR.

  CHERRY: What the hell were you doing?

  (SALIM slaps her.)

  SALIM: He saved our bloody arses! (To OMAR, grabbing him round the neck and pressing his face close to his.) I’m going to see you’re all right!

  INT. PAPA’S ROOM. NIGHT

  OMAR has got home. He creeps into the flat. He goes carefully along the hall, fingertips on familiar wall.

  He goes into Papa’s room. No sign of PAPA. PAPA is on the balcony. Just a shadow.

  EXT. BALCONY. NIGHT

  PAPA is swaying on the balcony like a little tree. Papa’s pyjama bottoms have fallen down. And he’s just about maintaining himself vertically. His hair has fallen across his terrible face. A train bangs towards him, rushing out of the darkness. And PAPA sways precariously towards it.

  OMAR: (Screams above the noise) What are you doing?

  PAPA: I want to pee.

  OMAR: Can’t you wait for me to take you?

  PAPA: My prick will drop off before you show up these days.

  OMAR: (Pulling up Papa’s bottoms) You know who I met? Johnny. Johnny.

  PAPA: The boy who came here one day dressed as a fascist with a quarter inch of hair?

  OMAR: He was a friend once. For years.

  PAPA: There were days when he didn’t deserve your admiration so much.

  OMAR: Christ, I’ve known him since I was five.

  PAPA: He went too far. They hate us in England. And all you do is kiss their arses and think of yourself as a little Britisher!

  INT. PAPA’S ROOM. NIGHT

  They are inside the room now, and OMAR shuts the doors.

  OMAR: I’m being promoted. To Uncle’s laundrette.

  (PAPA pulls a pair of socks from his pyjama pockets and thrusts them at OMAR.)

  PAPA: Illustrate your washing methods!

  (OMAR throws the socks across the room.)

  EXT. SOUTH LONDON STREET. DAY

  NASSER and OMAR get out of Nasser’s car and walk over the road to the laundrette. It’s called ‘Churchills’. It’s broad and spacious and in bad condition. It’s situated in an area of run-down second-hand shops, betting shops, grocers with their windows boarded-up, etc.

  NASSER: It’s nothing but a toilet and a youth club now. A finger up my damn arse.

  INT. LAUNDRETTE. DAY

  We are inside the laundrette. Some of the benches in the laundrette are church pews.

  OMAR: Where did you get those?

  NASSER: Church.

  (Three or four rough-lookings KIDS, boys and girls, one of whom isn’t wearing shoes, sitting on the pews. A character by the telephone. The thunderous sound of running-shoes in a spin-drier. The KID coolly opens the spin-drier and takes out his shoes.)

  Punkey, that’s how machines get buggered!

  (The KID puts on his shoes. He offers his hot-dog to another KID, who declines it. So the KID flings it into a spin-drier.

  NASSER moves to throttle him. He gets the KID by the throat. The other KIDS get up. OMAR pulls his eager UNCLE away. The TELEPHONE CHARACTER looks suspiciously at everyone. Then makes his call.)

  TELEPHONE CHARACTER: Hi, baby, it’s number one here, baby. How’s your foot now?

  INT. BACK ROOM OF LAUNDRETTE. DAY

  NASSER stands at the desk going through bills and papers.

  NASSER: (To OMAR) Get started. There’s the broom. Move it!

  OMAR: I don’t only want to sweep up.

  NASSER: What are you now, Labour Party?

  OMAR: I want to be manager of this place. I think I can do it.

  (Pause.) Please let me.

  (NASSER thinks.)

  NASSER: I’m just thinking how to tell your father that four punks drowned you in a washing machine. On the other hand, some water on the brain might clear your thoughts. Okay. Pay me a basic rent. Above that – you keep.

  (He goes quickly, eager to get out. The TELEPHONE CHARACTER is shouting into the phone.)

  TELEPHONE CHARACTER: (Into phone) Was it my fault? But you’re everything to me! More than everything. I prefer you to Janice!

  (The TELEPHONE CHARACTER indicates to NASSER that a washing machine has overflowed all over the floor, wi
th soap suds. NASSER gets out. OMAR looks on.)

  INT. BACK ROOM OF LAUNDRETTE. DAY

  OMAR sitting gloomily in the back room. The door to the main area open. KIDS push each other about. Straight customers are intimidated.

  From Omar’s POV through the laundrette windows, we see SALIM getting out of his car. SALIM walks in through the laundrette, quickly. Comes into the back room, slamming the door behind him.

  SALIM: Get up! (OMAR gets up. SALIM rams the back of a chair under the door handle.) I’ve had trouble here.

  OMAR: Salim, please. I don’t know how to make this place work. I’m afraid I’ve made a fool of myself.

  SALIM: You’ll never make a penny out of this. Your uncle’s given you a dead duck. That’s why I’ve decided to help you financially. (He gives him a piece of paper with an address on it. He also gives him money.) Go to this house near the airport. Pick up some video cassettes and bring them to my flat. That’s all.

  INT. SALIM’S FLAT. EVENING

  The flat is large and beautiful. Some Sindi music playing. SALIM comes out of the bathroom wearing only a towel round his waist. And a plastic shower cap. He is smoking a fat joint.

  CHERRY goes into another room.

  OMAR stands there with the cassettes in his arms. SALIM indicates them.

  SALIM: Put them. Relax. No problems? (SALIM gives him the joint and OMAR takes a hit on it. SALIM points at the walls. Some erotic and some very good paintings.) One of the best collections of recent Indian painting. I patronize many painters. I won’t be a minute. Watch something if you like. (SALIM goes back into the bedroom. OMAR puts one of the cassettes he has brought into the VCR. But there’s nothing on the tape. Just a screenful of static.

  Meanwhile, OMAR makes a call, taking the number off a piece of paper.)

  OMAR: (Into phone) Can I speak to Johnny? D’you know where he’s staying? Are you sure? Just wanted to help him. Please, if you see him, tell him to ring Omo.

  INT. SALIM’S FLAT. EVENING

  Dressed now, and ready to go out, SALIM comes quickly into the room. He picks up the video cassettes and realizes one is being played. SALIM screams savagely at OMAR.

  SALIM: Is that tape playing? (OMAR nods.) What the hell are you doing? (He pulls the tape out of the VCR and examines it.)

  OMAR: Just watching something, Salim.

  SALIM: Not these! Who gave you permission to touch these? (OMAR grabs the tape from SALIM’s hand.)

  OMAR: It’s just a tape!

  SALIM: Not to me!

  OMAR: What are you doing? What business, Salim?

  (SALIM pushes OMAR hard and OMAR crashes backwards across the room. As he gets up quickly to react SALIM is at him, shoving him back down, viciously. He puts his foot on OMAR’s nose.

  CHERRY watches him coolly, leaning against a door jamb.)

  SALIM: Nasser tells me you’re ambitious to do something. But twice you failed your exams. You’ve done nothing with the laundrette and now you bugger me up. You’ve got too much white blood. It’s made you weak like those pale-faced adolescents that call us wog. You know what I do to them? I take out this. (He takes out a pound note. He tears it to pieces.) I say: your English pound is worthless. It’s worthless like you, Omar, are worthless. Your whole great family – rich and powerful over there – is let down by you. (OMAR gets up slowly.)

  Now fuck off.

  OMAR: I’ll do something to you for this.

  SALIM: I’d be truly happy to see you try.

  EXT. OUTSIDE LAUNDRETTE. EVENING

  OMAR, depressed after his humiliation at SALIM’s, drives slowly past the laundrette. Music plays over this. It’s raining and the laundrette looks grim and hopeless.

  OMAR sees GENGHIS and MOOSE. He drives up alongside them.

  OMAR: Seen Johnny?

  GENGHIS: Get back to the jungle, wog boy.

  (MOOSE kicks the side of the car.)

  INT. PAPA’S ROOM. EVENING

  OMAR is cutting PAPA’s long toenails with a large pair of scissors. OMAR’s face is badly bruised. PAPA jerks about, pouring himself a drink. So OMAR has to keep grabbing at his feet. The skin on PAPA’s legs is peeling through lack of vitamins.

  PAPA: Those people are too tough for you. I’ll tell Nasser you’re through with them. (PAPA dials. We hear it ringing in Nasser’s house. He puts the receiver to one side to pick up his drink. He looks at OMAR who wells with anger and humiliation. TANIA answers.)

  TANIA: Hallo.

  (OMAR moves quickly and breaks the connection.)

  PAPA: (Furious) Why do that, you useless fool?

  (OMAR grabs PAPA’s foot and starts on the toe job again. The phone starts to ring. PAPA pulls away and OMAR jabs him with the scissors. And PAPA bleeds. OMAR answers the phone.)

  OMAR: Hallo. (Pause.) Johnny.

  PAPA: (Shouts over) I’ll throw you out of this bloody flat, you’re nothing but a bum liability!

  (But OMAR is smiling into the phone and talking to JOHNNY, a finger in one ear.)

  INT. THE LAUNDRETTE. DAY

  OMAR is showing JOHNNY round the laundrette.

  JOHNNY: I’m dead impressed by all this.

  OMAR: You were the one at school. The one they liked.

  JOHNNY: (Sarcastic) All the Pakis liked me.

  OMAR: I’ve been through it. With my parents and that. And with people like you. But now there’s some things I want to do. Some pretty big things I’ve got in mind. I need to raise money to make this place good. I want you to help me do that. And I want you to work here with me.

  JOHNNY: What kinda work is it?

  OMAR: Variety. Variety of menial things.

  JOHNNY: Cleaning windows kinda thing, yeah?

  OMAR: Yeah. Sure. And clean out those bastards, will ya?

  (OMAR indicates the sitting KIDS playing about on the benches.)

  JOHNNY: Now?

  OMAR: I’ll want everything done now. That’s the only attitude if you want to do anything big.

  (JOHNNY goes to the KIDS and stands above them. Slowly he removes his watch and puts it in his pocket. This is a strangely threatening gesture. The KIDS rise and walk out one by one. One KID resents this. He pushes JOHNNY suddenly. JOHNNY kicks him hard.)

  EXT. OUTSIDE THE LAUNDRETTE. DAY

  Continuous. The kicked KID shoots across the pavement and crashes into SALIM who is getting out of his car. SALIM pushes away the frantic arms and legs and goes quickly into the laundrette.

  INT. LAUNDRETTE. DAY

  SALIM drags the reluctant OMAR by the arm into the back room of the laundrette. JOHNNY watches them, then follows.

  INT. BACK ROOM OF LAUNDRETTE. DAY

  SALIM lets go of OMAR and grabs a chair to stuff under the door handle as before. OMAR suddenly snatches the chair from him and puts it down slowly. And JOHNNY, taking OMAR’S lead, sticks his big boot in the door as SALIM attempts to slam it.

  SALIM: Christ, Omar, sorry what happened before. Too much to drink. Just go on one little errand for me, eh? (He opens OMAR’s fingers and presses a piece of paper into his hand.) Like before. For me.

  OMAR: For fifty quid as well.

  SALIM: You little bastard.

  (OMAR turns away. JOHNNY turns away too, mocking SALIM, parodying OMAR.)

  All right.

  INT. HOTEL ROOM. DUSK

  OMAR is standing in a hotel room. A modern high building with a view over London. He is with a middle-aged Pakistani who is wearing salwar kamiz. Suitcases on the floor.

  The MAN has a long white beard. Suddenly he peels if off and hands it to OMAR. OMAR is astonished. The MAN laughs uproariously.

  INT. LAUNDRETTE. EVENNG

  JOHNNY is doing a service wash in the laundrette. OMAR comes in quickly, the beard in a plastic bag. He puts the beard on.

  JOHNNY: You fool.

  (OMAR pulls JOHNNY towards the back room.)

  OMAR: I’ve sussed Salim’s game. This is going to finance our whole future.

  INT. BACK ROOM OF LAUNDRETTE. DAY

&n
bsp; JOHNNY and OMAR sitting at the desk. JOHNNY is unpicking the back of the beard with a pair of scissors. The door to the laundrette is closed.

  JOHNNY carefully pulls plastic bags out of the back of the beard. He looks enquiringly at OMAR. OMAR confidently indicates that he should open one of them. OMAR looks doubtfully at him. OMAR pulls the chair closer. JOHNNY snips a corner off the bag. He opens it and tastes the powder on his finger. He nods at OMAR. JOHNNY quickly starts stuffing the bags back in the beard.

  OMAR gets up.

  OMAR: Take them out. You know where to sell this stuff. Yes? Don’t you?

  JOHNNY: I wouldn’t be working for you now if I wanted to go on being a bad boy.

  OMAR: This means more. Real work. Expansion.

  (JOHNNY reluctantly removes the rest of the packets from the back of the beard.)

  We’ll re-sell it fast. Tonight.

  JOHNNY: Salim’ll kill us.

  OMAR: Why should he find out it’s us? Better get this back to him. Come on. I couldn’t be doing any of this without you.

  INT. OUTSIDE SALIM’S FLAT. NIGHT

  OMAR, wearing the beard, is standing outside SALIM’s flat, having rung the bell. CHERRY answers the door. At first she doesn’t recognize him. Then he laughs. And she pulls him in.

  INT. SALIM’S FLAT. NIGHT

  There are ten people sitting in SALIM’s flat. Well-off Pakistani friends who have come round for dinner. They are chatting and drinking. At the other end of the room the table has been laid for dinner.

  SALIM is fixing drinks, and talking to his friends over his shoulder.