PAUL IS BORN
A hospital room a few years earlier. CHARLES is filming MONIQUE.
CHARLES
Ready honey? It’s rolling.
MONIQUE
(to the camera) …Okay, good, well, hi. It’s 5:07, um on February 2, 1972, and here we are in the hospital, and, well, we can’t wait for you to be born. It shouldn’t be long now. I’m at seven centimetres… and I’m talking between contractions, so I can’t talk much longer, because they’re every three minutes… the people are very nice here at the hospital… (to CHARLES) I don’t really know what to say… (CHARLES signals to keep talking.) Um… I’m the one that’s been talking to you for months, though we can’t see each other, and I kind of wonder what your expression is when you hear all this. I hope we’ll recognize each other when we finally meet face to face. I hope you’ll be a happy boy, or girl, with us—I don’t know which, but soon you’ll be called something. Boy, I can’t wait! Paul or Pauline, I just wanted to say… to say be brave, because I know it’s not easy being born, but that’s life, isn’t it? It isn’t always easy.
She has a strong contraction, and CHARLES stops filming to help her. A phone rings.
CHOIR B
(birthing-room personnel)
1. Paul’s birth was like a sign.
2. Not a sigh like a dying swan.
3. Push!
4. He would have liked to be a bird though.
5. Or a ballet dancer.
6. Push!
7. It’s not up to us though.
8. It’s not up to us.
9. Almost there. Push again!
10. So, anyway, Paul’s birth was like a sign.
11. A sign like some kind of foreshadowing.
12. Not like… well, we’ve been through that.
13. Almost through.
14. Almost …push again!
Long cries from MONIQUE, still in front of the eye.
15. It’s a boy!
CHARLES is in the same phone booth as KARINE was earlier.
JEAN-PIERRE
(answers the phone) Hello?
CHARLES
Hi, Jean-Pierre, it’s me, Charles.
JEAN-PIERRE
What’s happening?
CHARLES
Paul is born.
JEAN-PIERRE
Wow! Congratulations! (He calls to his wife.) Suzanne, Suzanne! Come here. It’s your brother on the phone! He’s here! The baby’s come! It’s a boy!
SUZANNE arrives, all worked up, a baby in her arms. She stays by the phone through the following conversation.
SUZANNE
Yeah? I knew it! I knew it was going to be a boy! I told you, eh, carrying it low? (into the phone) Congratulations!!!! How’s Mummy?
JEAN-PIERRE
(on the phone) Everything go okay?
CHARLES
Sure.
JEAN-PIERRE
He’s healthy?
CHARLES
Yep.
SUZANNE
What does he weigh?
JEAN-PIERRE
Monique’s okay?
SUZANNE
How long did it take?
CHARLES
Fine, she’s fine.
SUZANNE
Ask him the weight. (baby-talking to her own child) And you, you weighed lots and lots, and it reeeeeaally hurt Mama lots and lots too!
JEAN-PIERRE
They’re both all right then? (to SUZANNE) Shhhh! (to CHARLES) Both all right?
CHARLES
They’re both fine.
JEAN-PIERRE
Who’s he look like?
SUZANNE
(trying to be funny) His mother, I hope!
CHARLES
Doesn’t look like anybody.
JEAN-PIERRE
Eh?
CHARLES
Nobody.
JEAN-PIERRE
Well, that’s normal… at first. You can’t see much at this stage.
CHARLES
I’ve got to tell you something.
JEAN-PIERRE
You sound weird. What is it?
CHARLES
Okay, listen carefully.
JEAN-PIERRE
Now you’re scaring me. What’s going on?
CHARLES
Okay… Paul… is black.
JEAN-PIERRE
what?
SUZANNE
(to JEAN-PIERRE) What’s happened?
CHARLES
He’s black.
JEAN-PIERRE
He’s black…
SUZANNE
What’s black?
JEAN-PIERRE
(to SUZANNE) Shhhh. The baby is. He says the baby’s black.
SUZANNE
WHAT?
JEAN-PIERRE
…How do you mean?
CHARLES
What do you mean, “How do you mean?” He’s black, that’s what. The baby’s black!
SUZANNE
What do you mean, “black”?
JEAN-PIERRE
You mean like sick… kind of like jaundice, only…?
CHARLES
No, Jean-Pierre, no! Not jaundice, for Chrissakes! Black, I told you! Black… as in African, okay? Black. Black.
JEAN-PIERRE
I’m sorry. I really don’t get it… African?
SUZANNE
Ah, right, okay, black like he’s a black?
CHARLES
I talked to the doc a long time, and he says it’s possible. It’s happened before.
SUZANNE
What the hell, they got the wrong baby, that’s all.
JEAN-PIERRE
You sure the hospital gave you the right one?
CHARLES
Hey, Jean-Pierre, I saw him come out! I’m the one that cut the cord! That’s MY SON. She swore he was mine, and I believe her.
JEAN-PIERRE
(to SUZANNE) No, it’s really theirs…
SUZANNE
Is it like… permanent?
CHARLES
There’s an explanation. Everything has an explanation. It has to do with genes. It’s rare though, like sort of “sleeper genes” from some African ancestor way back.
JEAN-PIERRE
“Sleeper genes”… You mean it’ll go away?
CHARLES
What? What do you mean?
JEAN-PIERRE
Well, our Chloe, I mean, she had blue eyes, and it went away. The blue.
CHARLES
No, Jean-Pierre, it doesn’t go away. It’s there for good, okay?
JEAN-PIERRE
Look, I’m really sorry… no, that’s not what I mean, I mean there’s nothing to be sorry about, what I mean is… oh, never mind, it’s not important. Look, it doesn’t change anything, does it? Well, it does actually, but it’s not like a handicap or anything. He’s healthy. That’s what matters, right? Excuse me. I was in a bit of a shock, so yeah, I’ll say anything, I guess. Hey, you want to talk to Suzanne? (SUZANNE signals “no” frantically.)
CHARLES
Listen, I’ve got a bunch of people to call. I just wanted to let you know, the two of you, you know, so you can get used to the idea and accept Paul just as he is.
JEAN-PIERRE
Oh, sure, sure, Charles, definitely! We love him already. Right, Suzanne? My black nephew. I love him already.
CHARLES
His name’s Paul.
JEAN-PIERRE
Right, Paul, I meant to say that.
CHARLES
Bye.
JEAN-PIERRE hangs up in a state of shock, then hugs SUZANNE and their daughter Chloe tightly.
JEAN-PIERRE
(as though he has just escaped something terrible) Boy, am I ever lucky!
MONIQUE
(to the camera) Paul? Would it have been better to hide all the mirrors as though you were some kind of burn victim? Should we have waited till you were more self-aware before we let you see your own reflection?
During what follows, the choir lifts up MARIE 2 and changes her into a ballerina. Under her clothes she is wearing the usual classic ballet outfit (tutu, etc.) worn by young girls… if possible, two small angel wings as well.
MARIE 1 & 2
…I was still quite small when it happened, so I inherited all the attention, appreciation, protection, encouragement and marks of affection for lack of which my brother must have suspended himself in time and in mid-air. Suddenly, it was as though my parents’ lives were given over to celebrating mine, day in, day out. It was in that perpetual state of celebrated existence that I grew up, thinking how exceptional I must be to deserve such tribute.
Finished with the change, she delivers a typical ballet curtsy. It is the end of a childhood ballet recital. The group of funeral-home attendees becomes her family, now watching the performance. Their applause is exaggerated, and they offer her the bouquets of flowers from the previous scene as well as hugs, compliments, etc.