Two For The Money (part one)

Who enjoyed ‘Wall Street’? Anyone eager to hear about its sports-betting equivalent in laborious detail? Great, let’s crack on.

The action gets underway in an unrealistically deserted park, where a young boy stands, baseball bat aloft under the shade of a tree, preparing to receive a pitch from his old man. We are informed that TFTM is ‘inspired by a true story’ although, as you will see, the melodramatic nature of events suggests liberal artistic interpretation has been utilised. As we zoom in on the youngster, a voiceover, currently en vogue at the start of films, kicks in. ‘That’s me (cut to pops, about to unfurl an underarm lob) and that’s my dad. (The blonde-haired tyke, a leftie, smacks the ball miles) I remember that day. And believe it or not, I remember that hit. I remember it because of the smile that spread over my dad’s face.’ With no one else in the park on what looks like a beautiful autumn day, the long walk to fetch the ball should wipe the inane grin off dad’s face. Next, we see the nipper miss a shot on a basketball court, ‘Yeah, I’d have stood there all day just to sink one. Just to see that smile (this time, we see dad looking pissed off and taking a sip from a can of beer). You see, to Pop, sports were a religion. To me, it was about purity (now, they’re playing American Football, and our young pal, dressed in full regalia, including a helmet, is going deep alongside the family dog, while dad drops back to pass. Needless to say, no one else is anywhere to be seen). Sports was a place where all wrongs could be made right. I though if I filled the house with trophies for him (dad launches it long) he’d stick around. Well, I did. He left before my tenth birthday.’ I don’t want to start on a captious note but it’s a pretty precocious eight- or nine-year old who equates his own sporting success with family stability.

We don’t even get to see whether he catches the long bomb because it’s time to move on a few years, to a big college football game. ‘The Conference Championship has come down to this final play,’ a commentator reports. ‘The Sun Devils trail by four. The ball on the Aztec 15, seven seconds left on the clock.’ The crowd are at fever pitch, while on the sidelines our world-weary young friend has metamorphosed into long-haired, bandana-sporting quarterback Brandon Lang (Matthew McConaughey), who is spitting out water and getting instructions from his coach. ‘Now, settle it down. Pro right tiger. This is your game!’ Brandon arrives at the huddle and wastes no time in revealing his cocky persona. ‘Here we go, men. Last play, it’s fun time. Pro right tiger, wide check, 532 double fly, on two, Scottie. (He gestures to the planned recipient of the pass.) Guaranteed TD. We gotta worry about one thing, men. After we win this game, they’re gonna be putting cameras in your faces. Don’t be giving them any ‘Hi Moms’ and s***, it’s overused. You got to thank somebody? Thank me. See you in the end zone men!’ As he prepares to take the snap, we get another Brandon voiceover. ‘I’d been a quarterback since Pee Wee football. Set high school records, won state championships. This was perfect. (We watch in slow-motion as Brandon walks up to the line, talking ‘smack’ at one of his opponents as he does so.) Bowl game, national TV, there were pro scouts in the stands. And I knew exactly what was gonna happen next.’ The commentator burbles (‘Lang has led the Sun Devils to four fourth-quarter comebacks this season. Can he do it, win their first bowl game in 12 years?) and the play eventually gets going. Lang drops back to pass (‘He’s looking for Ravis on the right side’) but finds one of the opposing defenders (‘Sherman’) in his face and takes off running with the ball. As the commentator goes bananas, Brandon produces a nice little spin move to elude a would-be tackler and dives into the end-zone for the winning touchdown, while about three men tackle him at the same time. Unfortunately, as he dives, we hear the sickening sound of a limb being bent in the wrong direction. I hope Brandon’s not hurt! Voiceover time: ‘My first thought was, I could tape it and play next week (isn’t a Bowl game always the last game of the season?). Then I puked.’ We are treated to an unpleasant shot of Brandon flat on his back in the end zone, with his right leg below the knee, positioned at a 45 degree angle to the rest of his body. He won’t be playing next week.

Brandon is stretchered to an operating theatre. Inside, he asks, ‘When do I play again, Doc? What’s the rehab time?’ ‘I’m not sure son.’ Brandon looks, understandably, very worried, as various medical types bustle around him.

We skip forward once again and voiceover Brandon has yet more plot details to impart. ‘Football wasn’t a sport. It was my life. And I wasn’t gonna give up, no (we look down on a large open-plan office, split into small cubicles). I would play again. In the meantime, I needed a job to hold me over between tryouts. Then one day, and it didn’t take long, six years had passed and I woke up at the bottom.’ You might be thinking something along the lines of ‘A job’s a job, and anything that doesn’t involve trawling through sewage hardly constitutes ‘the bottom’’ but Brandon wasn’t lying, as we discover when we pay a visit to his cubicle. ‘You have reached the Jessica Simpson hotline,’ this shorter-haired Brandon says into a recorder. ‘Jessica’s going to tell you a little bit about Nick’s surprise birthday party and a whole lot more about her rocking new panty line at Wal-Mart. But first, here’s a little fan trivia to win a VIP Gold Package backstage pass to Jessica’s Omnicon Hotel’s Summer Tour.’ However, before Jessica Simpson fans can have their knowledge of the great lady tested, Brandon is interrupted by his boss. ‘Bauer’s sick, I can’t update his betting line. You know anything about sports?’ Brandon gets the job and, for the umpteenth time in just the first five minutes, we are treated to a voiceover explaining exactly what it entails. ‘900 numbers, audio text, the racket had a lot of names. This guy’s gig was sports handicapping. Predicting winners for people who bet. I was supposed to just record his picks. Thing was, I didn’t agree with them.’ Brandon, pen in hand, shakes his head as he examines Bauer’s apparently laughable selections. Considering his own sports star background and his unbridled self-confidence, might he not have suggested something like this would suit him better than recounting Jessica Simpson’s itinerary before now anyway? Back to VO: ‘Living in Las Vegas, it was easy to gauge the temperature of the betting public. The problem with the betting public is they’re usually wrong.’

Brandon seems to have swiftly played Lou Gehrig to Bauer’s Wally Pipp because we next find him striding into a gambling hall, demanding information on the ‘action this weekend’ from some bloke behind the counter called Stu. ‘We’re getting big money on Tampa-Oakland,’ Stu informs him. ‘Everyone’s jumping on Oakland right now.’ ‘Oh, that’s crazy,’ says Brandon, in condescending sing-song tones. Stu is intrigued. ‘That game’s going to be won by coaching,’ Brandon explains. ‘Look, Gruden put that Oakland team together before he came to Tampa, right? (In a transparent bid for authenticity, the screenwriter here uses the exact scenario from the 2003 Super Bowl, right down to using the same teams and the real-life men involved.) He knows every strength and every weakness. He knows Brown only likes to catch the ball over his left shoulder. So he’s gonna have him double-teamed to the defender’s right. He also knows Gannon only throws on a three-step drop. So he’s going to stack the middle of the field with linebackers, take away the short pass. Gannon’s gonna throw three, maybe four INTs Sunday.’ ‘F*** me,’ is Stu’s verbose response. He’s on Oakland in a big way and Brandon has convinced him of the error of his ways. ‘I think I’m gonna save your ass one more time,’ our hero announces. ‘Take Tampa Bay, money line. They’re gonna win this game outright. Bet them, bet them big.’ ‘Thanks B,’ says Stu. It’s ….. voiceover time! ‘Stu did bet them big, and he won ten grand. I was quickly becoming the biggest 900 line in Las Vegas.’

Back in his cubicle, Brandon is tossing a football up and down and taping his latest nuggets. Finished, he hands the tape to his boss and collects his wage packet, with which he quibbles. ‘Steve, I went nine and two in pro football Sunday and hit my third straight Monday night parlay. It’s worth 12 bucks an hour.’ ‘Hey, I don’t make 12 bucks an hour.’ ‘You’re not picking 75 per cent,’ says Brandon, smiling confidently, as if this clinches the argument. Steve thinks otherwise. ‘Well if you’re that good, why don’t you bet your own game? Get rich. Send me a postcard from the Riviera.’ Point well made, Steve. I like a flutter myself every now and again but I’d never phone up some tipster for advice. The real betting experts are languishing on beaches in the Bahamas enjoying the fruits of their success, not wasting their time taping phone messages for the common herd.

Brandon cycles home and finds his brother Denny (James Kirk) with his head under a car bonnet. Him and his pal seem to be souping up some old banger and they rev up the engine to show Brandon their progress. Denny literally howls in delight. Inside, Brandon’s mother is running late and hunting for her ‘lucky crucifix’. She tells Brandon he has a letter from Chicago. ‘You just went there for your tryout last week.’ Brandon’s no mug and could probably have connected he dots on that one by himself but it’s nice of her to keep the audience in the picture. Now, who haven’t we heard from for, what, two minutes? Brandon’s expositional voiceover of course. ‘Another rejection letter. ‘Strength of your knee in question’. Let’s see, I only had two Arena teams left (shot of Brandon lifting some weights). And I guess, well, after that, there was always the CFL.’

Not sure yet whether Brandon is the brash, self-confident type? The upcoming, otherwise completely pointless scene should serve to convince you. Bicycling Brandon pulls up next to an attractive woman, who has the top down on her convertible. The fact the cars all have their headlights on and that there are drops of rain on her bonnet suggest she’s playing a dicey game with the weather. ‘So what do you think?’ Brandon enquires. ‘Should I ride shotgun or do you want to hop on the handlebars? (She laughs in disbelief.) Hey, the packaging is not great but I guarantee you there’s a prize on the inside. What do you say?’ Despite the fact his lines a) aren’t even vaguely amusing and b) don’t really make sense, she laughs and gives him a nice smile before driving off. ‘You’ll be back. I’ll have a life,’ he bellows after her.

At work, Brandon cycles (?) down the aisle and stops at his cubicle, where the phone is ringing. He greets a co-worker and answers it. ‘Congratulations,’ rasps a voice familiar to cinema-goers the world over. ‘You went nine and two last Sunday. This is Walter Abrams (Al Pacino). I don’t know if you know me but I run the biggest sports service in the country and I’m a big fan of yours, Brandon. As a matter of fact, I got a poster of you on my wall.’ Brandon suspects a prank but Walter wants to give him a job and tells him to open his top drawer, wherein lies ‘travel cash and an airline ticket’. ‘I paid someone to put it there, who incidentally told me that the place you’re in reminded him of a Turkish prison (thanks partly to the grimy lighting they’re using, Brandon’s workplace does look hugely uninviting, but I can’t believe Turkish convicts get away with wearing surfer dude gear and cycling to and from their cells). Now, all I’m asking you to do is come up with a number. You write down the number of what you make now, you cross it out. You write what you should be making and then you toss in how much it’s going to take to get you to fly to New York, first class, and come work for me.’ As Brandon gets scribbling, well-informed Walt continues his sales pitch. ‘With your bum knee, a comeback is just a dream. My offer is real.’ Brandon has written down ‘250/week (but hasn’t crossed it out as instructed), 700, 1500’. Walter then takes another call, giving voiceover Brandon an opportunity to mull his options. ‘With mum holding two jobs and Denny wanting to go to college this looked like a chance to make some real money. And besides, I’d never seen New York and New York had never seen me. (We are shown a plane touching down and then Brandon admiring some pretty girls, who are going the opposite way on the conveyor belt walkway at the airport. Of course, you simply never see pretty girls on the conveyor belt walkway at airports except in New York).’

Having been collected at the airport, Brandon asks the driver how long he’s worked for Walter. ‘Long time,’ says the smiling driver. ‘Two weeks!’ Brandon is naturally surprised but is informed that ‘every day with Walter is an adventure’. The driver creases up with laughter and smacks the wheel in delight.

They arrive outside the offices and Brandon takes a look around, before smiling approvingly, even though there’s nothing remarkable about the street or offices whatsoever. Inside, he finds Walter on the telephone, and, as luck would have it, he just happens to be having a telephone conversation which encapsulates his entire personality! ‘All right, double it. Triple it. No, everything’s about money. Listen, this Sunday, my little girl, an angel, turns six. This is not likely to happen again. She loves elephants, your circus has ten, I only need one. Now, my little girl’s happiness is in your hands. (Pause.) I don’t need parenting advice from a guy who doubles as a clown. I need a f***ing elephant. Now, I’m willing to pay. What’ll it take to grease your wheels and get one here this weekend?’ The putative elephant provider hangs up. Walters does likewise, swears and barks out ‘Find Ringling Brothers. Get someone on the phone who understands profit,’ before finally acknowledging Brandon with an enthusiastic ‘Whoa!’. Bizarrely impressed by the pachyderm-related prattling, a grinning Brandon introduces himself. ‘The Marlboro Man here,’ says Walter (he is besuited, Brandon is wearing jeans and a suede jacket). It’s the very definition of love at first sight, as Walter informs Brandon that he’s ‘in great shape,’ although, when Brandon mildly suggests otherwise, Walter is less impressed. ‘Modesty, not a virtue, could be a vice,’ he points out. Brandon sits down as Walter waffles about his ‘rules to success’. ‘Rule number one is: know what you know, know what you don’t know and know that I gotta know everything you know as soon as you know it. Sooner.’ If I had a pound for every time I’ve heard that old chestnut! Walter elicits from Brandon that he has not ‘sold’ before and that he believes in God. ‘Hey, Liz,’ Walter shouts to his secretary. ‘This is me 30 years ago, right? It’s remarkable, the resemblance.’ Liz goes along with it, Brandon laps it up, Walt reaches for a ciggy. ‘I’m not supposed to do this, it’s bad for my condition.’

Returning to business, he asks about Brandon’s work in Vegas. ‘Just the 900 recordings. You know, ten bucks a call.’ Walter is unimpressed. ‘That’s chump change. I mean, we’re going after much bigger fish here. You know, networks don’t talk about it. Government can’t tax it. But sports betting is a two hundred billion dollar a year business.’ Brandon is impressed. Walter witters on about how gamblers ‘have needs, and come Monday morning, after a losing weekend, they got big needs. Gargantuan.’ Walter flicks a switch and a bank of TV screens on the wall start showing sporting events. ‘That’s every football game last Sunday,’ he brags, although there are only four screens, and there are 30-odd teams in the NFL. He goes on to claim Monday Night Football is the most watched game of the week because ‘Monday’s the last chance bettors have to climb out of the hole they got themselves in’. Brandon nods curtly, perhaps aware that this long seminar about sports betting is more for our benefit than his own. ‘Sports betting is illegal in 49 states, including this one,’ Walter smugly continues. ‘But what we do, is not. We are one hundred per cent legal, (Brandon is genuinely, and justifiably, looking quite bored now) like stock brokers. Only instead of touting stocks, we advise people on how to bet. Now, if a client wins by taking our advice, we get a percentage, or we ask for one, which they will gladly give us, because they want to keep getting the advice. But if they lose, we get zip.’ Brandon looks like he’s about to lapse into a catatonic stupor, even though Walter is outlining his business plan as if it’s the greatest idea mankind has ever managed to formulate. Still he rants, ‘So the object here, my dear, tall, athletic, religious friend (!), is to win.’ ‘I can do that,’ says Brandon laconically, Walter takes a contemplative puff on his cigarette. Vocal cords worn out by his interminable lecture, he flicks a switch and the screens now show … Walter presenting his sports betting TV show. ‘Hello. This is Walter Abrams,’ says on-screen Walter. ‘Hello, Walter,’ shouts ‘sitting in office’ Walter excitedly. He’s definitely got a screw loose. ‘That’s my cable show,’ he tells Brandon. On-screen Walter is certainly no impostor because he starts yabbering away in already painfully familiar fashion: ‘Now, after a nice five-day vacation on my yacht, you can see the tan …’. But we cut back to ‘sitting in office’ Walter, who for some reason thinks Brandon might want to highlight this inane show in his TV guide. ‘Airs Saturday and Sunday morning, nationwide. We tape Thursday and Friday … What’s going on with my hair?’ He yells out to Liz his unhappiness regarding the hair situ. ‘I got one part of my head in Cleveland, the other’s in Chicago.’ Walter wants his barber ‘dead’.

His on-screen self is informing the viewers about his plans to give away ‘our three-team college and pro parlays absolutely free’. You don’t hear the term ‘parlay’ much in British betting vernacular but it basically means a bet where the winnings from one segment go on to the next bet, so, in this case, I think if all three of the teams win, then you’re in clover. Unlikely, with this snake oil salesman touting them, however. Brandon spots an error in the watertight business model. ‘If all the picks are free, how’d you get the yacht?’ ‘There’s no yacht,’ says Walter. ‘Why give any picks for free?’ Brandon persists, unfamiliar with even the simplest business concepts. ‘Why not charge a fee up front?’ Walter: ‘You make a good point. Next.’ That’s a terrible point, it‘s not even really a point! ! I’m (clearly) no business expert but it’s basic strategy to get people hooked by giving away your product and then starting to charge for it. Brandon wants to know what’s on the second floor. ‘That’s where we print the money.’ Brandon finds this enormously amusing. He’s got no more impertinent questions, which gives Walter a chance to eulogise him further. ‘You and me. This thing’s going to work.’ They’re both looking forward to it. Liz has got the ‘Ringling Brothers’ on the line for Walter. He tells them to wait and asks Brandon if he’s had a manicure. Brandon’s brief glance at his finger nails is answer enough. ‘There’s a girl you gotta meet,’ says Walter, handing Brandon a piece of paper. ‘What’s she like?’ ‘She’s beautiful. You’re gonna like her. (He picks up the phone.) Is this Barnum or Bailey?’ Ho, ho. That’s the way to get your elephant Walt.

For some reason, you need immaculate finger and toe nails to be a true sports betting savant. Brandon sits in a salon with cotton wool around his toes, while a beautician prepares his nails. The gorgeous Toni Morrow (Rene Russo) comes over, introduces herself and takes over on the nails. ‘Nice to meet you,’ says Brandon lasciviously. ‘Walter said you’d stop by,’ she says. Brandon: ‘This was his idea.’ Toni says she knows, in put-upon fashion. It’s obvious to all of us that she’s Walter’s girlfriend or something but not to Brandon. Let’s hope he doesn’t make a fool of himself by asking her out, eh? ‘Does he make all of his employees do this?’ he enquires. Yes, he does. ‘Once. Before they start work.’ Brandon, quite rightly, finds such a policy odd. Toni compliments him on his ‘strong hands’. ‘Do you drink?’ she then asks. Brandon is taken aback by the question. ‘I have a beer every once in a while.’ She wants to know if he smokes. He doesn’t, he says, grinning. ‘What about gambling?’ ‘What about it?’ Toni realises her interrogatory method is somewhat brusque, and apologises, ‘I’m a little bit pressed for time here. I asked, do you bet, are you a bettor?’ ‘No.’ She is surprised and wants to know why not.

Uh oh, Brandon’s had enough of the small talk and leans towards her, while unleashing a line which I must try myself, such is it’s poetic brilliance … ‘Toni, huh?’ To be fair, if you look like Brandon does, simply saying a woman’s name in a suggestive fashion is actually probably going above and beyond what is strictly necessary to win her affections. He demands to know if Toni is at the salon full time. ‘This is my shop. I better be,’ she replies. She returns to the issue of Brandon’s non-gambling. ‘Well, I did once,’ he concedes. ‘I wagered everything I had and I lost…I swore I’d never do it again.’ ‘And you’re sticking to that story?’ He is indeed. ‘I’m not going to start this relationship off by lying, Toni.’ She’s pleased, ‘Walter could definitely use someone with a little resolve in his life.’ Until that remark, Brandon’s lecherous behaviour can be easily forgiven, but surely now her obvious familiarity with Walter will throw up a few red flags. ‘Fraid not. Brandon grabs her hand and asks if she wants ‘dinner with (him) tonight?’ She smiles. ‘He didn’t tell you.’ ‘Tell me what?’ ‘Brandon, Walter and I are married.’ The situation’s crying out for a quick-thinking Brandon to say ‘Oh, yeah, he told me that. Now, would you like to have dinner with me tonight?’ but he actually tops that by pulling a hilarious face, making a funny noise and remarking ‘Oh, bogey.’ They have a good laugh at Walter’s behaviour. ‘I’m gonna kill him when I get home,’ says Toni. Nonetheless, ‘He has a big, bright beautiful spirit though and you will love working for him. But he is held together by meetings. If it has ‘anonymous’ at the end, he goes. He has to. He also has to be very careful who he lets into his life. In most ways, Walter is brilliant. But he can be bulls******, and I can’t. So he sends them to me before he hires them.’ Quick-on-the-draw Brandon works out that this is ‘(his) interview’. He wants feedback. ‘Except for an illegal forward pass, I would say perfect. Congratulations.’ I’d hate to see the other muppets she’s interviewed if Brandon is truly worthy of such rave reviews.

After a short clip of Walter trying to suck in mug punters on his two-bit TV show, we find the sorcerer showing his apprentice around the office. ‘This is the first floor, and it’s all yours. That TV’s satellite and it swivels (how thrilling!). There’s your bedroom. You got a Jacuzzi in there the size of a kiddie pool.’ A Jacuzzi in the bedroom? I’ve simply got to get into this sports betting lark. Brandon flukes a few winners on some obscure phone line and now he’s getting the whole floor of an office block to live in? There’s even a gym in there. Walter has Brandon’s ‘copy’ on a piece of paper, which he puts on Brandon’s desk. He’s ready to talk turkey but Brandon’s still in ecstasy about his new digs. ‘Walter, this is sweet ass,’ he observes. He sits down at his desk. ‘I’m gonna start you on the 900 numbers,’ Walter explains. ‘You make your picks, you record them each day, Monday through Friday, once a day, five times a day on the weekend…Each call is worth twenty-five bucks a shot. We’re doing about three dozen hits a week, that’s nothing. We should triple that.’ Water the Wise gets serious. He has ‘a few words for (Brandon)’. ‘You pitch sucks, no offence,’ he points out. ‘But you got potential, so we got to find a way to bust you out.’ Walter wants to give Brandon ‘a new name’. Brandon, as usual when Walter’s on a roll, doesn’t have much to say for himself. ‘John Anthony. Just came to me,’ Walt announces. Brandon laughs. ‘John Anthony,’ his new mentor continues. ‘The Million Dollar Man.’ Brandon wants to know why he can’t use his own name. ‘He’s still living with his mommy,’ Walter ‘explains’. ‘John Anthony’s living large. He don’t hold back. He’s got a direct line to God. (Ha ha! This little segment about John Anthony is really funny, although on paper I can’t do justice to Pacino’s enunciation.) And for a measly twenty-five bucks a call, he’s gonna let the world’s losers listen in.’

It’s time for Brandon to hone his selling skills and us losers get to listen in on that. ‘This is John Anthony in the Big Apple with my big money picks,’ he intones monotonously and starts banging on about some college football game. In Walter’s office the pair listen to the CD. Walter turns it off. ‘I already hung up,’ he says. Back to square one for the B-man: ‘John Anthony here, ready to make all your betting dreams come true,’ he brags exuberantly. He returns to the office, where Walter again turns it off. ‘I think it’s all right,’ says Brandon. ‘Wrong,’ says Walter and tosses the disc out of the window. Ha ha! Walter wants to know Brandon’s sales pitch. ‘My sales pitch is I’m picking 80 per cent winners.’ Walter puts his head on his desk in disbelief. ‘Stats is not enough. I’m telling you, you need a voice… You’re selling certainty, in an uncertain world.’ Brandon works out in the gym. He then marches over to his Dictaphone device and has another crack. ‘Sit back and relax ‘cause it’s a Scud attack this weekend and I am shelling your bookmaker.’ Apparently pleased with this latest effort he races up to Walter’s office. ‘It’s a start,’ Walter concedes. Brandon was expecting more hyperbolic praise. ‘That’s not what you want, then you need to find somebody else to sell and let me just pick,’ he says. Walter is standing behind his chair and looks in a bad way. After further debate he almost keels over and staggers into his chair while Brandon rushes over concernedly. ‘Should I call somebody?’ he asks, as Walter gets some pills out of his pocket. ‘Not unless they got a spare heart,’ he replies. ‘It’s a small one,’ he wheezes. Brandon wonders if Walter wants some water but instead he reaches for the ciggies. A horrified Brandon helps him light one. ‘What are you doing?’ he asks. ‘Courage wants to laugh,’ Walter says enigmatically.

Brandon cycles around town, while we listen to American football commentators burbling. Brandon laughs as he cycles past an elephant being led along the middle of a (hopefully fairly quiet) road by a pair of men in dinner jackets and bow ties. Pedant alert! We earlier heard Walter say his daughter’s birthday was on Sunday, but the football being played is of the college variety, which is played on a Saturday. Let’s be charitable and say the party was brought forward a day. Nellie probably had a prior engagement on the Sunday. Back in his huge apartment, Brandon follows the football on his TV. I was wrong to be sarcastic early, the TV doesn’t just swivel around a bit, it’s huge and it does a complete 180 degree about-turn so you can actually watch it in different rooms of the flat. Brandon nods at the TV, so presumably his tips are faring well. ‘Brandon!’ he hears Walter shouting. Brandon looks outside the window and sees the trumpeting elephant entertaining the kids. Walter, who is standing on the street, wants to know how the tips are getting on. Brandon writes 0-9 on a bit of paper and shows it to Walter, looking pleased with himself. Walter swears. Oops, Brandon had the paper the wrong way up! He turns it the right way round and he’s 6-0. Walter dances a jig of delight.

At the party, Walter and Toni are strolling along together while Walter extols Brandon’s virtues. ‘This guy is a machine. All he does is work out and pick winners.’ This is only Brandon’s first week on the job and a cannier operator would surely want to see how he does in the longer term but Walter’s smitten, in every sense of the word. ‘Talk about fit, you should see him with his shirt off.’ Toni laughs, then suggests he should ‘enjoy (his) daughter’s birthday’, rather than sharing his homosexual fantasies about Brandon with her. Walter is relentless however, and apparently in the mood for a threesome. ‘You should check him out. I know you want to.’ Toni’s having no truck with such truly abnormal chat. ‘Get out of your head, it’s a bad neighbourhood,’ she warns.

In his office, Walter watches more college football action and studies a sheet of figures. We see that calls to Brandon’s hotline have increased by 82% ‘since previous summary report’. Walter grins maniacally.

In a posh restaurant, Walter, Brandon and Toni have dinner together. ‘I’m gonna have the bruketta,’ Brandon tells the waiter. Walter makes a face at Toni. ‘I think it’s pronounced ‘bruschetta’’ he informs Brandon. ‘They’re little pizzas, except they don’t have cheese in them.’ ‘Bruschetta,’ says Brandon. ‘Perfect,’ says Toni. ‘Who cares?’ says Walter, even though he brought it up in the first place. ‘Anyone who goes 20 for 24 college football, 12 for 14, professional, 175 calls on the 900 number, you can call bruschetta anything you want, son.’ Walter wonders if Brandon’s ever had a ‘thousand pound bottle of wine’. Finding that not to be the case, he shouts over to the steward. Toni tries to rein him in, pointing out that Brandon ‘hardly drinks’. Brandon confirms that he’s ‘good, man’ but Walter wants to celebrate. ‘Toni, come on. Just ‘cause he’s out with a couple of reformed drunks doesn’t mean he can’t enjoy himself.’ Toni denies she was a drunk and Brandon lightens the atmosphere by remarking that he’s never had ‘a twelve dollar bottle of water either’. ‘He thinks we’re fighting,’ says Walt. Brandon says that isn’t the case, gushes about how great everything is and thanks the pair of them. ‘Watch out Walter, he’s a fixer,’ says Toni.

We are now at the coffee and dessert stage of the meal and Toni asks Walter what the doctor told him. She could certainly have picked a more appropriate moment for such a conversation, like when it was just the two of them present for starters, although, in fairness, the way she says ‘come on’ at the end of her question suggests Walter may have been keeping mum. ‘I went yesterday and he seemed very concerned,’ says Walt. ‘Afterwards, he sat me down and looked into my eyes and he said: ‘Walter, who do you like in the Buffalo-Oakland game?’’ Brandon loves it (‘You tell him Buffalo?’) but Toni is pissed off. While she chides Walter and he protests, Brandon notices a beautiful blonde (Alexandria - Jaime King) sit down at a nearby table. She sizes him up.

Walter and Toni continue to squabble about his health. ‘I’m not raising a kid alone Walter.’ ‘In biblical times you’d just move in with my brother Morty anyway,’ he replies. She gives him a disapproving look but now he’s noticed Alexandria as well. She’s sitting with a pair of fat, bearded goons. Walter seeks Brandon’s opinion of her and our man admits that he’s a big fan. ‘She’s looking at you,’ says Walter. Yep, it’s time to wheel out the old, ‘I bet you can’t pull that beautiful girl’ trope. ‘Ten to one on a thousand, you can’t pick her up,’ is Walter’s suggestion. That means Brandon cops ten grand if he manages it, and loses a grand if he doesn’t. When it comes to wagering significant amounts of money on whether his employees can score with women, while his own wife looks on, Walter doesn’t mess around. ‘Why don’t we just go to Atlantic City and open a house account?’ says Toni, indignantly. ‘You know you can’t gamble, Walter, come on,’ she adds. In Toni-land, it seems betting heavily on picking up women is fine, unless you’re a former gambling addict. ‘Who’s gambling?’ says Walter obtusely. ‘I haven’t flipped a coin since the eighties. This is just a challenge.’ An amused Brandon confirms the odds and says he’s ‘gonna go introduce myself,’ while Toni shakes her head disbelievingly. Walter tells him to hold on a sec and heads over there himself. He interrupts the beardie brothers and informs Alexandria that she is ‘drop-dead gorgeous’. He goes on to claim that him and his ‘friends’ have been puzzling over something. ‘Your dates look like they haven’t missed a meal since Christ died. Seriously, you guys are eating like you got a date with the electric chair. What is going on?’ Finally, one of the goons gets up to clock Walter but he backs off and claims he was ‘just joking’. ‘I don’t want to get wounded with a fork.’ The goon is disgruntled but sits back down as Walter returns to his table. ‘What the hell was that?’ asks Toni, who is not best pleased, although I reckon most women would be in a cab home now and on the phone to a divorce lawyer. Years of marriage have clearly inured her to Walter’s predilection for behaving like a total moron. ‘I’ll buy them a bottle of champagne,’ he says soothingly. ‘You’ll pick up their cheque,’ she insists. Toni, don’t worry about placating a pair of goons, try to make clear to your mad-as-a-badger hubby that marching over to a table and insulting the people sitting there is not the way forward in the first place. Alexandria gets up from her table, gives Brandon and Co another look and heads off. ‘Your date’s going to the bathroom,’ Walter points out, a tad redundantly. ‘I don’t think that (Walter’s earlier outburst) helped me out too much, do you?’ says Brandon, patting him on the shoulder. ‘But thanks for the introduction.’ That doesn’t make much sense. Walter claims he was ‘raising the bar a little. John Anthony could close her’. Brandon heads off.

He runs into his prey on the stairs by some stained glass windows. ‘You … are beautiful,’ he informs her. She tries to get past him but he asks her to wait. ‘I want to get to know you.’ Alexandria is sceptical. ‘You just want to get in my pants.’ Brandon is momentarily stumped but rebounds with ‘No, no, no. I want to get in your mind and your heart and your soul, and I don’t see you wearing any pants in that equation. Do you?’ The best thing that can be said about that effort is that Brandon didn’t die of shame on the spot for uttering it but, incredibly, he is rewarded with a shy smile. Emboldened, he continues, ‘Let me ask you something’ and whispers into her ear. We cut to them kissing passionately in the back of cab and then having sex. What do you think Brandon whispered? I’m opting for: ‘I’ve got a Jacuzzi in my bed room. you know. Let’s go.’

At the office, Walter tells Brandon he’s ready to leave the 900 numbers behind. ‘We’re going to the second floor.’ He gets Brandon to put his ear to the door, and does the same thing himself. ‘That’s the sound of possibilities.’ As they head in, Walter puts Brandon in the picture. ‘This is where the sales people turn a ten dollar bettor into a thousand dollar bettor before he even knows he made the phone call.’ How philanthropic of them, I’ve no doubt the bettor’s families will be eternally grateful. The office is of the open-plan variety and resembles a trading floor of sorts, full of various chancers spouting sports jargon into their phones (‘I’m asking, do they use AstroTurf or AstroPlay?’). Walter greets Tammy (Carly Pope), introduces her to Brandon and collects the ‘phone sheet’ from her. ‘The losers who need us, the more they bet, the more we win,’ he tells Brandon. Walter doesn’t have the highest opinion of his client base. ‘We take ten per cent of a winning bet, anywhere from five hundred to five hundred thousand. That’s Southie (Kevin Chapman).’ He indicates a dark-haired man, who is busy imploring a client to ‘stop holding back and let’s make some serious money’. Another of the trader-types is advicing whoever he’s got on the phone to ‘bang a cheerleader’ but is also taking a keen interest in Walter and Brandon. An older gent tells Walter he has a client on the phone who is ‘a little miffed at our picks’. Walter ignores him and goes over to a guy sitting in a corner, barking stridently into his phone. ‘Reggie Hawks (Ralph Garman),’ says Walter, putting a paternal hand on his shoulder. ‘Best salesman ever.’ As if on cue, Reggie snaps: ‘I don’t have time for this kind of s***, Jimmy. I know you’re a loser. ‘Cause if you’re such a big winner, you wouldn’t have to pay cash to call me today.’ If it’s the carrot or the stick, Reggie tends to go with the latter.

Having reached the end of the trading floor, Obi-Wan and Luke enter a smart office, which, just like the apartment, is conveniently vacant, and at Brandon’s disposal. I can’t see the rest of the workforce having any problem at all with this neophyte getting his own office within weeks of joining the company. Walter wants to know if Brandon approves. ‘What’s not to like?’ enthuses the tipster supreme. The chap who was closely scrutinising the pair a minute ago barges into the office with some betting news for Walter. ‘Miami-New York point spread just went up to ten.’ Nothing if not tactile, Walter grabs himself some shoulder. ‘What do you think?’ he asks. ‘I think Miami is a lock. I’m gonna keep it on my sheet, are you kidding me?’ Walter does the honours, ‘This is Jerry (Jeremy Piven), my top handicapper. Came to me straight out of grad school.’ Jerry looks 30-ish, what’s a top handicapper got to do to get his own office around here? Brandon eases into his luxuriant chair. ‘Whoa,’ says Jerry. ‘Phone boy makes good. It’s a big jump from 900 numbers. (Ridiculously, as Jerry gives him a bit of friendly grief, Brandon puts on a pair of sunglasses, even though the blinds are down in his office.) Make sure you don’t get a nosebleed up here. He looks like a bleeder.’ If by bleeder, he means the sort of prat who puts his shades on midway through an indoor conversation, then I can only concur. ‘I’m just kidding,’ Jerry continues, deciding to take the high road. ‘Nice meeting you man, I got to get back to work.’ Brandon, apparently eager to piss off his new co-workers, calls out, ‘Say, by the way, tonight’s game? New York wins that outright.’ ‘Really?’ says Jerry, resisting the urge to rip off B’s shades and ram them down his throat. ‘They always play the fish tough and tonight it’s foregone’ the sunglassed sultan smugly summarises. Jerry’s not backing down. ‘I wish I had a pen, because I would absolutely never write that down.’ Not a great comeback, Jer. ‘You know, college is right for you,’ he adds. Brandon laughs. ‘You have to work your way up to pro ball around here,’ Jerry continues, again keeping it civil. ‘(To Walter) Rookie’s got balls. I almost like it, but I don’t. (To Brandon) Good luck.’ Brandon sits in his chair, laughing hyena-style, looking like an utter twit. ‘I get that all day,’ says Walter, as if we’ve just witnessed a fantastic comedy routine rather than generic office banter, and starts pacing around. ‘I got three guys who can pick games. I got twenty who could sell. I never had one who could do both.’ Really? Brandon’s unique in the sports betting sphere? ‘You mean me?’ says the Chosen One, as surprised as the audience. No, Walter means John Anthony. But John Anthony doesn’t exist, Brandon complains. He’s pretty dense sometimes. ‘I’m standing in his office and you’re sitting in his chair,’ says Walter. ‘So you want me to sell?’ Brandon asks. Walter now explains why he values Brandon’s multi-faceted skill set so highly. ‘Big bettors don’t want to talk to middlemen. They wanna talk to the guy giving them the picks. What’s the matter, you got a problem with selling?’ Brandon says he’s OK with it, and Walter decides to enlighten him on ‘a few choice phrases’ which will make the punters feel better about risking their hard-earned on Brandon’s selections: ‘I don’t want your money, I want your bookies f*****g money.’ He makes Brandon repeat it and pronounces his second attempt ‘not bad’. However, the fact Brandon left out the obscenity has not escaped him. ‘What happened to ‘f***’?’ Brandon’s not big on swearing. ‘It’s not a religious thing. I just don’t use it.’ ‘It was all right for Chaucer, six hundred years ago,’ Walter protests. Not really a convincing argument, wasn’t it de rigueur to lob suspected witches in the river six hundred years ago as well? Walter opens the door of the office. ‘I don’t want to embarrass you but I gotta do this.’ ‘I got someone here who has a problem saying ‘f***,’ he yells out. ‘F*** you!’ they all shout back. Brandon laughs like a simpleton.

There’s simply no escaping these two jokers, we now join them out on the busy streets of New York. I wonder what topics of earth-shattering import they are discussing? Brandon: ‘Look at that, a lot of brunettes.’ Walter: ‘They’re everywhere.’ I can imagine Bush and Cheney indulging in that kind of highbrow chat. Brandon wants to know where they’re off to. ‘We’re gonna continue your education.’

They knock on a door and a woman answers. ‘Is this the meeting?’ asks Walter. They’ve come to the right place. We skip forward to find Brandon sitting down and listening to some bloke relating his failings to the group. It’s a gamblers anonymous meeting. ‘You’d think with two mortgages out, the repo guy staking out my car, my job on the line and my wife threatening to leave that I’d stop, instead of staying in the chase, doubling down.’ ‘It’s a disease Leon,’ says the woman who let Scooby and Scrappy Doo in a minute ago. A few other members of the group offer sympathetic words before Leon sits down, to a round of applause.

Without waiting for an invitation, Walter gets up, stubs out his cigarette and announces, ‘My name is Walter and I’m new to this group.’ Everyone sweetly says hello. They’re always so friendly and supportive, these addict types. I’m far from a compulsive gambler but I’m sorely tempted to pop down to a meeting regardless. Walter embarks on a long, grandstanding speech. He’s been coming to ‘these meetings’ for 18 years and this is his ‘936th consecutive meeting’. The kindly gambling nuts predictably lavish him with praise. Walter hasn’t had a bet in all that time and relates to Leon’s tale. He informs Leon that ‘gambling is not your problem’. Leon wants to know more. ‘I don’t know how to say this without sounding a little rude, but you’re a lemon, Leon. Like a bad car, there is something inherently defective in you.’ He goes on to claim everyone else in the room, himself included, suffers from this defect. ‘Most gamblers, when they go to gamble, they go to win. When we go to gamble, we go to lose, subconsciously. Me, I never feel better or more alive than when they’re raking the chips away, not bringing them in and everybody here knows what I’m talking about. Even when we win, it’s just a matter of time before we give it all back.’ Blah, blah, blah, when ‘we’ lose big time, we realise we’re still alive, and ‘we f*** s*** up all the time on purpose’, in order to remind ourselves that we’re alive, is the gist of the rest of Walter’s rant. He eventually sits down, to stony silence. Brandon starts clapping and a few of the ‘lemons’, Leon included, join in. However, a youngish guy with sideburns brings a halt to the back-slapping by picking this opportune moment to realise ‘You’re the guy I see on TV every weekend selling betting picks’. What on earth is a gambling addict watching programmes like that for, is he trying to test his own resolve? I doubt many alcoholics regularly set their videos for ‘Floyd on Wine’. ‘So what?’ says Walter, unable to see why his presence here may not be welcome. He’s got another fan though. ‘This guy peddles a tout service on TV,’ a balding man with a goatee informs the gathering. Walter is characteristically unapologetic. ‘You read the charter buddy? We all left our jobs at the door…What, you gonna throw an ex-alcoholic bartender out of an AA meeting?…That’s bogus, man.’ You’d have to be a pretty masochistic ex-alcoholic to take a job as a bartender, that’s for sure. The reformed gamblers are not swayed. ‘Didn’t you come in with this jerk?’ sideburns asks Brandon. Walter realises it’s time to leave but tries to give his card to baldy on the way out. ‘We’re topping 80 per cent this season,’ he remarks. You have to admire his chutzpah. Brandon leads him away as Walter shouts out ‘You never know when you’re going to get a relapse.’ The angry mob hurl abuse at him.

Out on the street, Brandon asks ‘what the f***’ Walter was up to. ‘What did you say?’ ‘That was b******t.’ Walter is thrilled that his amoral behaviour has forced Brandon to resort to profanity. ‘That’s great man! I mean, it was all worth it, just from that one word…Man, I’m proud of you.’ Keep swearing B-Lang and it’ll be plain sailing for you when Walt fills out his employee evaluation report.