To Every Man His Due: A Screenplay

By Ciarán MacMahon

A screenplay thriller set in the Netherlands in the late 80's. An old vendetta among the Irish community gets out of hand and quickly spreads over several towns and cities of this small country. As the body count rises, three detectives try to get to the bottom of things before what they begin to fear might take place does take place...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Nov 11, 2023
• ISBN: 9781446682432

Book preview

Colophon:

Copyright © Ciarán MacMahon October 2023

All Rights Reserved

ISBN: 9781446682432

Although places, events and incidents are mentioned from the period in which the screenplay is set, the story and its characters are pure fiction and any overlap into reality is purely coincidental…

AUTHOR’S NOTE

The screenplay: after a few experiments on the short story and still finding the thought of tackling a novel too daunting, I decided to turn my efforts to writing a screenplay. Ending up with three eventually.

The first, To Everyman His Due", a thriller set in the Netherlands in the late 80’s involving Irish emigrants living in or passing through the Netherlands and not always for the purest of reasons.

I attacked the screenplay format without first really checking on just that: the format, which resulted in the first two screenplays being far too long.

Why not an attempt to rewrite the first two in a shorter form?

Not only was I writing in my spare time from work and private life but I was so full of ideas in this period that I just wanted to get onto the next project which meant that many projects were given a draft or two or three and then left for the next pressing idea.

Which, in turn, resulted in the plays not only being too long but with characters and dialogue not always being developed to the maximum. Too many directives between dialogue and, lastly, not being read by a third party for eventual criticism.

But, as with the short stories and novels, I’ve decided to put them out there into the digital world in their last worked-on drafts.

Despite the shortcomings in some departments there is perhaps enough of a storyline to make them worth a read…

Ciarán MacMahon

[ORIGINAL TITLE: PADDYS, LIKE ELEPHANTS, NEVER FORGET]

SECOND DRAFT

May 24, 1994 /© 1995

Cover drawing by Noel MacMahon (from a design made in the 1950’s)

NB: In preparing the screenplays for the web versions I altered many of the standard screenplay spacings in order to save space.

Some of the obvious and less obvious abbreviations occurring regularly in the script:

INT: interior shot

EXT: exterior shot

VO: voice over (out of shot)

POV: point of view (in shot)

INTRO:

TO EVERY MAN HIS DUE

A revenge assassination, among the Irish community of the Netherlands, goes badly wrong and sparks a chain of events that spreads over different Dutch towns and cities with a Dutch Special Branch detective and two plainclothes detectives trying to get to the bottom of things before what they begin to fear might take place does take place…

ACT ONE

FADE IN:

INT. CAFE/BAR – DAY

It is early afternoon and the bar is very quiet. There are TWO CUSTOMERS sitting at the bar and the BARMAN (TERRY) is busy drying glasses behind the bar. Terry looks up as he hears the café door opening, then back to what he is doing. The two men at the bar look in the direction of the door and nod a slight welcome to the MAN entering. The MAN approaches the bar and stops before Terry. He reaches into his inside pocket and as he's withdrawing a gun...

MAN

Remember '76?

Terry looks up and there is a split second of surprise as he sees the gun being raised towards him. He throws the glass he is drying at the man causing him to turn and stumble. Terry is up and over the bar and a struggle between the two starts. Short but wild. The gun goes off and everybody freezes. The two customers are staring open mouthed as Terry straightens up and the other man slides down knocking over a couple of stools. Terry looks around and on seeing the two customers in stunned silence looking at him...

TERRY

Shit! You can never get away from the past. Come on you two! Out! Out! Move!

They get up from their stools as Terry moves towards them. One of them grabs a last drink from his glass. Terry hustles them out the door...

TERRY

(continuing)

Sorry, no time for explanations! Just no choice! No fucking choice!

He gets them outside and closes the door and latches it. He turns and looks at the man on the floor.

TERRY

Jesus...

He runs behind the bar, grabs his coat and keys and comes back around to the door. The two customers are still standing in amazement outside. Terry looks again at the man on the floor. He bends down and taking the gun shoves it into his coat pocket then gets up and unlatching the door, leaves the bar.

EXT. BAR - DAY

Terry is locking the door and looks at the two customers.

TERRY

Are you two going to stand there all day? Wouldn't it be an idea to call the police? Somebody has to, but I've got other things to do. Sorry lads.

Shoving the keys through the letterbox he mumbles to himself

TERRY

(continuing)

Guess I won’t be needing them again anytime soon.

He turns and is away running down the street. Watched by the two, still stunned, customers.

INT. APARTMENT - DAY

The apartment door opens and Terry enters and closes the door and leans with his back against it catching his breath. He listens a moment to the silence, sighs at the fact there is no one home. He takes a deep breath and starts rushing around the apartment, grabbing things and stuffing them into a travel bag. From a drawer he grabs cash, cheques, passport, driving licence and car keys. He's back at the hall-door about to leave, running through his mind that he has everything. Dropping the bag at the door he goes back to the living-room and starts writing on a piece of paper...

INSERT:

JEANETTE,

SORRY FOR DOING THIS TO YOU...

YOU'LL HEAR A LOT OF STORIES AND HAVE LOTS OF QUESTIONS... BUT I HAD NO CHOICE. I ONLY HOPE THAT ONE DAY I'LL BE ABLE TO EXPLAIN OR THAT YOU'LL BE ABLE TO UNDERSTAND... SORRY... LOVE YOU.

XXX TERRY.

He remains staring at the note a moment. Then shakes himself out of it and quickly leaves the room and the apartment.

EXT. BAR – DAY

There is a lot of activity. An ambulance, a couple of police cars, police holding curious passers-bye at bay. A car pulls up, TWO MEN [van DONGEN, van STEEN] get out and the policeman at the café door makes way for them as they pass inside.

INT. BAR - DAY

There are several people in the bar. The usual police activities, ambulance men and detectives. At the back are the two customers from the opening scene and the OWNER of the café talking to an officer. The two men enter and look at the covered body and one of them asks a POLICEMAN

DONGEN

What's the story?

POL. MAN

Shooting. Single shot. Close range. Chest. According to the witnesses, the victim was the assailant but was overpowered by the barman. The gun went off in the struggle. The whole incident took place within a few seconds. That's them at the end of the bar with the owner of the place. A Mr. Klein.

DONGEN

(moving away)

Okay. Thanks.

POL. MAN

Oh! There's no gun.

Dongen and the second detective, van STEEN, stop and look at the policeman a moment then at each other. Dongen nods at the officer who goes back to his activities around the body.

STEEN

We were lucky that you were in the area. When we became aware that the dead man and the man who killed him were both Irish we thought it best to have you involved from the beginning. In case it turns out political. There's around a hundred Irish registered here and up till now we've never had anything more serious than drunkenness.

DONGEN

From my experience of the Irish they're not in to killing unless it's politics. Fighting and knocking the crap out of each other over the price of a drink, yeah, but killing no. My guess is that you were right to come to us. Let’s see what the witnesses have to say for themselves.

They move to the back of the bar. The Officer talking to the witnesses recognises Steen and steps aside.

STEEN

Hello. I'm detective Steen and this is detective Dongen. Special Branch. Now who's the owner and who saw what happened?

OWNER

I'm the Landlord and...

DONGEN

You weren't here when the shooting took place?

OWNER

No, but...

DONGEN

We'll get to you in a second.

Turning to the witnesses.

DONGEN

(continuing)

Can one of you tell me what happened?

The two exchange looks then one of them takes the lead after a nod from his friend.

WITNESS 1

Like I was just explaining to the officer here. There we were in for a couple, having a chat. Terry, that's the barman, was behind the bar doing the glasses, throwing the odd word in here and there. You know? The usual. Anyway, the door opens, this fella walks in, strolls up to the bar. Terry looks up as your man says something like Remember '76? And there he is aiming a gun at Terry! Terry flings the glass he has in his hand at him and is over the bar in a flash and the two of them are fightin' all over the shop. Then there's a bang! For a second or two no one moves. Then Terry straightens up and your man slides away to the ground. Jesus, we've known Terry for years. Nice fella. Fucking never seen him move as fast as he did when he went at your man over the bar. Lightning! A couple of seconds and it was over!

WITNESS 2

Yeah! Quick man! We were just froze! We didn't know what the fuck was happenin'! It was like a film!

DONGEN

What happened after the man was shot? Did this Terry say anything?

WITNESS 2

He looked at us, kinda surprised to see us there and said something like, Can't get away from your past, and then he threw us out sayin', Sorry, but there's no time for explanations. A couple of seconds later he came out himself and locked the door and was gone. Said we'd be better calling the police than standing around like a couple of gobshites! Cheeky bastard! As if seeing someone getting shot happened every day of the fuckin’ week!

DONGEN

Okay, thanks.

Dongen is about to turn to the owner but turns back to the witnesses.

DONGEN

(continuing)

You don't know the dead man?

They shake their heads.

WITNESS 1

No. But from his accent I'd say he was from the South.

DONGEN

The south of Ireland, you mean?

WITNESS 1

Yeah. The Republic.

DONGEN

Okay. You can finish giving your statements to the officer in a minute. So stay put for now.

(turns to the owner)

How long has this Terry being working here?

OWNER

His name is Terry Sullivan. He only works on call up. And then only when he's between contracts. He's been doing it now for a few years.

DONGEN

Between contracts?

OWNER

Engineering. He works different short-term projects for different companies.

DONGEN

Know any reason why something like this should happen?

OWNER

No. Terry's easy going. In all the years I've never seen him causing hassle.

DONGEN

You think he caused this?

OWNER

No, no, no! That's not