SETTING: Boardroom full of 1960s toy execs and cigarette smoke.
Davidson (smoking): Ha ha! The kids are eating up these Batman toys!
Perkins (standing, smoking): Biff! Bam! Pow! Cha ching!
Davidson (smoking): Exactly! We’re riding on the money train, boys!
Everyone applauds, smoking.
The Boss enters, smoking.
The Boss (sitting, smoking): I’m afraid the money train has been derailed, gentlemen. The Batman toy line is done for. Looks like the kids are moving on to the next fad.
Davidson (shocked, spilling midday martini, smoking): But! But! We can’t discontinue the line! So far, they’ve bought whatever we’ve put out! Even the most idiotic variant! Scuba Batman: big hit! Beatnik Batman: a killer! Hobo Penguin! The kids were even buying Hobo Penguin!
The Boss (sitting down, smoking): We’ve just had to take back two shipments of Hobo Penguin. And Hippie Catwoman. And LBJ Riddler.
Perkins (glum, smoking): Pow… Boom… Zap… Fizzle…
Davidson (pulling at his hair, smoking): No… It can’t be… Hobo Penguin? No…
The Boss (serious, smoking): ‘fraid so. To keep our heads above water we’re going to have to jump onto new licensing deals and convert whatever stock we have left over. All Belly Dancing Catwomans will be repainted and are now part of the I Dream Of Genie line. Same with Astronaut Alfred; he’ll be Major Nelson
Davidson (on the verge of tears, smoking): I… I just can’t believe it… You can’t be serious! They can’t all be converted!
The Boss (stern, smoking): It’s sink or swim time. We have to do what’s best for the company.
Davidson (pleading, smoking): But how can we make them fit? You can’t jam a square peg inna round hole! What… What will we do with No Teeth Mad Hatter? Or Fidel Castro Robin? Or… Or… What about Alopecia Joker?!
The Boss (deadly serious, smoking): All Alopecia Jokers will now be Uncle Fester.
Davidson (enraged, smoking): Uncle Fester!? That’s, that’s the Addams Family! Bertram handles that line! You can’t hand this over to Bertram! He tried to license My Mother The Car!
Bertram (drinking, smoking): Matchbox was really keen on the deal…
Davidson (in disgust, smoking): Shut up, Bertram! You pile of stinking human slime! Go be a Mega Block; the Legos are talking.
Bertram (smoking): …whimper…
The Boss (smoking): Listen, we can all agree Bertram is a miserable wretch and is probably going to be fired any day now, but even so, he’s handling those conversions. Vampire Catwoman is Morticia, Horny Bruce Wayne is now Gomez Addams. You have to accept this and move on.
Davidson (shouting, smoking more): This is madness! I can’t believe what I’m hearing! Horny Bruce Wayne was MY idea! I won’t let some nerd come along and sully my work!
The Boss (furious, smoking) The Batman line is dead!
Perkins (pitifully, smoking): Ding… Derp… Delusional…
Davidson (hot with anger, smoking): If you let Bertram touch one Gap Toothed Grin Mr. Freeze, I’m going to burn this goddamn building to the ground!
The Boss (smoking): Watch yourself! You’re getting riled, son. This is the Bradley Bunch all over again.
Davidson (fully hysteric, smoking): THE BRADY BUNCH! BRADY! It was going to be the perfect line! That show, you’ll see, is gonna pop bigtime! And it’s a lock with the kids! You got a mom and a dad and a maid, sure, sure, okay, but you also got 6 kids: boys and girls! All different ages! Think of the marketing possibility!
The Boss (disdainful, smoking): And remind us, son, what were we going to do with this family.
Davidson (rasping, smoking): You could sell a line with just the family alone – every week they’re up to their asses in shenanigans – but if you really want to send it over the roof, you have them all turn into cars and trucks. Kids love cars and trucks! Yippy, they’d say, I’ve got my favorite Bobby Brady toy! Golly gosh! And what’s that? Twist his arm here, push his head back there, and, WOWZA, now he’s a Shelby Cobra!
The Boss (disgusted, smoking): Please… enough.
Davidson (screeching, smoking): The friggin maid would turn into an F-8 fighter jet! Think of the sales, you shitferbrains!
The Boss (shouting, smoking): That’s it, you’re fired! Get out!
Davidson (gathering martinis and cartons of cigarettes, smoking in disdain): This industry has lost its sense of innovation! Yer all a bunch of hacks!
The door slams and everyone takes a deep breath, smoking.
Narrator (voice over, smoking): Davidson, humiliated, left the world of toys for a series of dead-end jobs. In the 1980s, the mega-successful toy line, Transformers, was launched and a lawsuit, started by the fired exec, was filed. Davidson’s attorney put forth that the Transformers line was a direct rip-off of his Brady Bunch: Family Machines! pitch from two decades before.
The attorney claimed that Megatron, the leader of the villainous Decepticons, was a blatant steal of the exec’s design for the Jan Brady figure, complete with arm cannon and handgun transformation.
The case was eventually dismissed when it was revealed that Davidson himself had stolen the idea from an earlier unproduced line of Honeymooners figures that would have had Ralph Kramden and friends transforming into municipal vehicles and household appliances. After the trial Davidson died, obscure and forgotten, smoking.
FIN.
