In which a reporter interviews Johnny (incarcerated philosopher 10)

A jail cell. Johnny sits on the cell cot. The philosopher sits upon the toilet. The interviewer stands at the bars of the cell and points a pen at Johnny.

Reporter: In a recent interview for GQ you mentioned that you are twenty years ahead of your audience.

Johnny: That interview was like twenty years ago.

Reporter: Do you still think you are twenty years ahead of your audience even though you’ve been in jail for the past five years?

Johnny: I haven’t been in jail long; look at this guy on the toilet: that’s the image of jail bird.

Philosopher: I’m not ON the toilet. I’m just sitting on the toilet.

Johnny: He’s a philosopher, as you can tell. A word smith. A really great guy as long as he isn’t correcting your every sentence and mincing your words through an existential meat grinder of vorhandenheight-ness.

Reporter: I don’t speak German; was that German?

Johnny: I don’t speak German much: just zeitgeist and scheiße.

Reporter: How do you spell scheiße, by the way?

Johnny: Haha, that’s funny; how should I know. Just spell it scheizer.

Reporter: Okay, thanks.

Philosopher: I would like him to answer the question.

Reporter: What question?

Philosopher: The question you asked.

Reporter: Did I ask a question?

Philosopher: Do you still think you are twenty years ahead of your audience?

Johnny: Duh. Just look at me. Look at my scarf and my trousers. Look at this trouser leg: look at it!

Philosopher: Twenty years ahead of your audience in what aspect?

Johnny: I love my fans, but they are dumb.

Reporter: Yeah, yeah, in what aspect, Johnny?

Johnny: I just started a company to produce my own movies, so I’m twenty years ahead of my audience in that respect. In business stuff.

Philosopher: Don’t some of your audience members own businesses? Who do you think watches your movies?

Reporter: Yeah, yeah!

Johnny: I don’t know, um, the dumbest people on the earth? The one’s who don’t read your books? Haha.

Philosopher: I’ll take that as a compli-sult.

Reporter: Wow, how do you spell that—what is the definition of compli-sult? Gosh, you guys are scintillating. How do you spell scintillating? I’m getting chills; this interview is going to be my magma orifice!

Johnny: Don’t ask him for definitions of words, or we’ll be here all day; it is his new hobby here in jail: word smithing. He likes to make up new words—like magma orifice, for example.

Philosopher: Johnny insulted me and gave me a compliment, so I word smithed a portmanteau: compli-sult.

Reporter: Wow, that sounds twenty years in the future to me; can you do it, too, Johnny?

Johnny: I don’t need to; just look at my trouser let; look at my boots; my fans worship these boots.

Reporter: But, really, are you twenty years in the future?

Philosopher: I wonder how many of his audience members owned companies twenty years ago. Wouldn’t that put Johnny twenty years behind schedule? Haha!

Reporter: Wow, that is great: yes, yes, I can see it. That is a really great critical question to ask: what if Johnny is twenty years behind the rest of us!

Johnny: I don’t like the sound of this; I don’t like what’s happening. I don’t like these turned tables.

Reporter: There are no tables in here. What are you talking about?

Philosopher: Imagine with me a moment: imagine a world where Johnny produced his own movies for the past twenty years and now, when he’s on the rocks and no one can touch him: he’s his own producer and has been for years, so he’s untouchable, can’t be snubbed, pushed aside, or overlooked.

Johnny: I hate you sometimes, cell mate.

Reporter: Is cell mate a portmanteau?

Philosopher: No, it is a noun and an adjective.

Reporter: Which one is the noun?

Johnny: But you are right; you are right. I should have, you know, taken the harder path and produced my own movies all these years—of course I should have. That’s what I should have done. Oh, man, the grass is always greener when you are looking back at it from twenty years later.

Philosopher: Yes, twenty years gives twenty-twenty vision.

Reporter: Wait, are you guys talking in a code right now? What is this twenty-twenty vision stuff?

Johnny: There is this expression in English—English is a language, okay. And in this language there are expressions. One of them is about looking back at the past and the past being super clear. When things are clear, we say that we can see them with our eyes and our eyes have perfect vision: twenty-twenty vision.

Reporter: Oh, I see! I see! Haha, I said, “I see!” Haha. This whole interview is going to be my magma orifice. But I thought the expression was “hindsight is fifty fifty.”

Johnny: No, no; that’s not the expression.

Philosopher: You should probably have bought a vineyard, too, and begun producing your own wine.

Johnny: You know me so well! I was just thinking that exact thought!

Philosopher: You have the look—the I-need-a-big-glass-of-wine look.

Johnny: It is these reporters; I don’t know what to do! Why do I even have interviews at all?

Reporter: When you say, “these reporters,” do you mean me? You think I am a real reporter? Do I seem like a real reporter?

Philosopher: That’s the look right there: you just did it again.

Reporter: What look? What did he do? I want to see it!

Philosopher: The I-need-a-big-glass-of-wine look.

Reporter: I don’t know that expression either.

Philosopher: It isn’t an expression.

Reporter: Is it a pun?

Philosopher: No.

Reporter: Oh, you did a word smith thing?

Philosopher: No.

Reporter: But where did the phrase “I-need-a-big-glass-of-wine look” come from?

Philosopher: That isn’t a phrase; that is an adjective and a noun.

Johnny: I think I’m going to take a nap now.

Reporter: Um, please don’t get mad at me, but which one is the noun?

Johnny curls up in the fetal position on the cot and begins to cry quietly into his pillow.

The end.