THE SITCOM

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the sitcom

episode 9: "evaru ekkuva close?"

== cold open - budjee mama calling ==

5 panels before the title engine: Bujji Mama's unsolicited

calls

int. boys H.Q - morning

[C.1] Boys H.Q, morning. Suraj's phone rings. He looks at it.

He does not pick up.

[C.2] It stops. Beat. It rings again.

[C.3] He picks up and holds it eleven centimetres from his

ear, which turns out to be correct.

BUJJI mama

(phone)

suraj. AA arch ekkada pettavu.

[C.4] Suraj, patiently:

suraj

Nenu arch pettaledu mama.

BUJJI mama

(phone)

appudu evaru pettaru.

suraj

Meere pettaru.

BUJJI mama

(phone)

sare. (hangs up)

[C.5] Suraj lowers the phone and looks at it for a long

moment.

suraj

Vaadu naaku roju cheysthadu. Naaku matrame.

(He says it as a complaint. It is not a complaint, and

everyone in the room knows it.)

narrator (V.O.)

evaru ekkuva close?

ext. kopitam - evening

[1] kopitam. Saturday evening. The recurring wide, the

fixed bench order - but four, not five. Jay's place on the

bench is empty. Seth ji at the counter, not looking up.

Ravi anna crossing with glasses.

narrator (V.O.)

Saturday. Nobody had anywhere to be, which is

the most dangerous condition this group can

be in.

[2] Suraj holding forth about something. Kicha

half-listening, filming the table out of habit, phone

propped against a glass. Aishwarya on her phone.

[3] And Anudeep - a little apart, lips moving, having a

conversation with nobody.

[4] Kicha clocks it.

KICHA

Rey. Em ayindi. Edo alochisthunnav.

[5]

anudeep

Monday interview kada. Prep avuthunna.

suraj

oh. Aa consulate vaadu general em adugutadu

ra?

anudeep

Basic stuff. Ee questionnaire lo ne undi.

[6] He slides a folded printout onto the table. A visa

mock-interview question sheet. Suraj picks it up like a

menu.

[7] And Aishwarya takes it out of his hand, reads one line,

sits up straight, and becomes a consular officer - flat,

bored, faintly hostile, instantly.

aishwarya

Sare. Mr. Anudeep. Why are you here today?

[8] Anudeep, caught off guard, actually answers it

properly, because he cannot not.

anudeep

I'm here for my F-1 visa interview-

aishwarya

(cutting in, deadpan) Louder. Consulate lo A.C

sound ekkuva.

[9] Suraj and Kicha pile in, because a bit is a bit and

this one has a uniform.

suraj

(as a second officer, sternly) Madam

adigindi. Louder.

KICHA

(a third officer, filming) Idi record

avuthundi sir.

[10] Aishwarya runs the sheet properly for three questions

- funds, university, plans after - and Anudeep answers all

three cleanly, because he has rehearsed all three for six

weeks.

[11] And then she goes off-script. She puts the sheet down.

She leans in. The slyest thing she does all episode:

aishwarya

Sare. Off the record.

aishwarya

Hyderabad lo nee favourite person evaru?

[12] Anudeep opens his mouth. And takes a long pause. Too

long.

[13] Suraj's hand comes up. He has spotted something better

than the game.

suraj

Aagu aagu aagu. Asalu nee favourite eppudu

cheppaledu.

[14] (⭐ The question escapes the visa bit and becomes the

episode. Nobody planned this. Suraj just found a loose

thread and pulled.)

[15] Aishwarya, delighted, turns it into a rule.

aishwarya

Okkokkaru cheppali. Ee group lo - evaru

evariki close?

KICHA

Idi manchi question kaadu ra.

aishwarya

Anduke manchi question.

[16] wide. Four people at a bench. A question on the table

that nobody should have picked up. Kicha's phone, propped

against a glass, red light on.

[17] the round. Fast, and everyone answers exactly in

character.

suraj

Easy. Kicha.

KICHA

(instantly, without looking up) Obviously

Suraj.

[18] Suraj is visibly moved. Kicha did not say it to be

kind; he said it because it is obvious; and that is somehow

worse and better.

[19] The question comes to Anudeep.

[20] He goes blank. Genuinely. Not coy - blank. Four faces

waiting.

[21] Aishwarya, saving him without meaning to, answers her

own:

aishwarya

Jay.

[22] Beat. Four people at a table.

[23] And all four of them realise, at the same moment, the

same thing.

suraj

…Jay ekkada ra?

KICHA

Jay group lo undi kada.

aishwarya

Jay eppudu undi. Manam marchipotaam.

[24] (⭐ The cruellest small joke in the series and nobody

says it out loud: they forgot the quiet one was in the

group while listing who's closest to whom.)

int./ext. the building - night

[25] the raid. All four of them up the stairs to the

penthouse, at nine on a Saturday night, to wake a

night-shift worker on his one evening of sleep.

[26] Aishwarya knocks, then just opens it, because she has

known him since gully cricket.

aishwarya

Jay. Lechipo.

[27] Jay, surfaced from dead sleep, disoriented, in the

dark, answering the shape at the door on pure reflex:

jay

…yes sir.

[28] Aishwarya, softening for exactly one panel:

aishwarya

Sir kaadu ra. Nenu.

jay

(blinking, placing her) …Aish.

[29] And Anudeep, in the doorway behind everyone, watching

Jay wake up into a room full of people who came to get him

- feels, for one panel, entirely outside it.

narrator (V.O.)

They all have a before.

narrator (V.O.)

Nenu ee flat lo ne modalayyanu.

[30] The question comes back to him. It has been sitting

there since panel 20.

aishwarya

Sare. Anudeep. Ippudu cheppu.

[31] And this time he answers.

anudeep

…Suraj.

ext. kopitam - day

[32] ⭐ suraj ascends. He rises off the bench - or the

floor, or wherever he is - like a man receiving an award he

always knew was his.

suraj

Choosava. Group lo andariki nenu favourite.

KICHA

Adi vaadu okkade annadu ra.

suraj

Andariki.

[33] Aishwarya, watching Suraj crown himself, gets the idea

the whole episode has been walking toward.

aishwarya

Acha. Ala aa.

aishwarya

Ayithe - nee room lo cam on pettu. Individual

ga teesukundam. Prathi okkaru separate ga.

[34] Kicha's head comes up. This is his native language and

somebody else just spoke it.

KICHA

…separate ga enduku?

aishwarya

Andaru unte evaru nijam cheppadu.

[35] (⭐ She has just described Kicha's entire method back

to him without knowing it. He says nothing. The camera was

already running.)

int. boys H.Q - day

[36] wide. The five of them - Jay now among them, wrapped

in a blanket, unimpressed - heading back to the flat to do

the stupidest and most revealing thing they have ever

agreed to.

the confessionals begin. Flat frontal, empty background,

too much headroom, words set as plain subtitle text, no

balloons. The only episode that does this.

[37] ▪️ suraj.

suraj

Kicha ne cause. Time ekkuva vaaditho ne spend

chestamu.

suraj

(beat) Kaani… naaku anipisthundi Anudeep

chala kaalam nunchi ikkade unnattu. Vaadu

rendu nelalu ne ayindi.

[38] ▪️ Same.

suraj

Wish he'd been here longer ra. Anthe.

[39] ▪️ KICHA. Sunglasses on.

KICHA

Obviously Suraj.

KICHA

Inka… (long pause) …andaru cheppali ante

cheppalenu ra.

[40] ▪️ Same. And the one crack.

KICHA

Naaku evaru close ani naaku teliyadu. Nenu

andarini chusthanu. Andulo ne unde le.

[41] ▪️ aishwarya.

aishwarya

Jay. Vaadiki chinnappudu aa forehead scar

padindi - gully cricket. Okka sari kuda daani

gurinchi maatladaledu.

aishwarya

Anduke Jay.

[42] ▪️ Same. And then, unprompted, the thing she does not

have to say:

aishwarya

Mana kotha addition - Anudeep. Vaadu

eppatinuncho unna feeling untundi ra.

aishwarya

(beat) Adi manchi feeling.

[43] ▪️ jay. Looks directly into the lens, which nobody

else does.

jay

Actually naaku andaru istam.

jay

(pause) Emo… nenu Anudeep tho time spend

cheyyali anukunta.

[44] ▪️ Same.

jay

Endukante vaadu ekkuva undadu emo. Vaaditho

matladite… noise untundi anta kaadu.

[45] ▪️ anudeep. Sitting slightly too straight. Trying to

answer a question that he thinks has a correct answer.

anudeep

Well… Suraj close. Kaani college lo antha

close kaadu.

[46] ▪️ Same.

anudeep

Ee group lo andaru close ye. Kaani antha

close kaadu. Andaru close, yet not so close

ani cheppali.

anudeep

(beat) Emo. Grateful ga undi.

[47] ▪️ Same. He sits with what he just said. He does not

take it back. He does not say the sentence - for the first

time, in a confessional built for exactly that sentence, it

does not come.

[48] (⭐ The refrain is absent from his answer, and the

absence should be felt by anyone who has read this far. He

had the perfect frame for it - alone, to camera, explaining

himself - and he chose "grateful" instead.)

[49] the tally - cut as five stills with a line drawn from

each to their answer.

Suraj to Kicha. Kicha to Suraj. Aishwarya to Jay. Jay to

Anudeep. Anudeep to Suraj.

[50] Hold on it, no dialogue. The chain does not close into

a loop - and every arrow except one points somewhere;

Anudeep is named by Jay, and mentioned by Suraj, and

mentioned by Aishwarya, and he named Suraj.

[51] The second, quieter diagram - the mentions. Anudeep is

in four of the five answers. He is the answer to one.

narrator (V.O.)

Nobody was closest to him. Everybody had

something to say about him.

[52] And nobody in the room can see the diagram. Only the

camera can. Only Kicha will.

[53] The second the camera goes off, the entire weight of

it evaporates, because they are twenty-two and it is

Saturday and something has shifted in the room's chemistry.

[54]

suraj

Naaku aakali ga undi.

KICHA

Ippude aaru emotional vishayalu cheppamu ra.

suraj

Adi ipoyindi. Ippudu aakali.

[55] And it turns, instantly, into the loudest argument of

the episode - about where to eat.

aishwarya

Biryani vaddu, ninna thinnamu.

KICHA

Ninna Shadab. Ee roju vere chotu.

jay

(blanket still on, fully awake now, fully in

it) Naaku emaina parledu.

suraj

"Emaina parledu" ante emi kaadu ra.

[56] wide. Five people leaving the flat arguing about

dinner, the confessional lights still warm, the whole

excavation of who-loves-whom completely forgotten inside

ninety seconds.

[57] Later. Very late. The flat empty, everyone gone to

their beds or their homes.

[58] Kicha alone at the table. The camera on a stack of

books. His laptop open. He plugs the camera in.

[59] He watches it back. All five. His own face flat-lit in

the screen glow as he watches the others say things they

will not remember saying.

[60] He watches Anudeep's twice.

[61] He opens his notes. He types something. We do not read

it.

[62] He looks at the footage for a long moment - the five

stills, side by side, the chain that doesn't close.

[63] ⭐ And he says it, to nobody, quietly:

KICHA

Ah. Idi chala interesting ra.

KICHA

(beat) Idi… kastha expect chesa.

[64] He closes the laptop.

wide, pull back. A dark flat. One laptop, shut. One small

red light going off. And a man sitting alone at a table

where, four hours ago, five people accidentally told the

truth and then went to get dinner.

narrator (V.O.)

He kept all five.

narrator (V.O.)

He'd known, more or less, what each of them

would say.

narrator (V.O.)

He hadn't known it would be worth keeping

until he watched it back.

You have reached the end of the text.