“Reggie Warren”
t 1 P.M. the press was circled around my boys flashing their
digital cameras, pulsating their red TV camera into our lives;
but, I’m proud to report,
my compatriots didn’t say one word. Our lawyer, Felicia Allfred, told
us to “keep your damned traps shut, or you’ll end up back in court,” so
we obeyed. However, Mick, Radar and Dante couldn’t resist clowning it
up for the cameras. Dante asked one hot chick for her phone number—about
five times—Mick did his Beavus laugh, and Radar collected business
cards from the media in case they wanted to cover our next filming.
The judge, Superior Court Judge Walter McBride, had sentenced them to three
years probation and ordered them to perform 300 hours of community service
working for an organization that assists the homeless. If they violated their
misdemeanor probation, they could be ordered to serve a four-month jail sentence.
Big deal. We’re going to do a sequel: Big Game Tramp Hunt, Vol. II, in
which we’ll show our daring capture of wild tramps, similar to the old
TV show, Wild Kingdom. We won’t use real bums. We’ll use actors.
Also, we’ve changed our web site. Now we solicit videos from the public.
They send us their homemade fights, and we get them to sign a release and edit
them together with some funky metal head music. Allfred says it’s all
perfectly legal and within our parole stipulation. Shakespeare was right. Life
is a stage.
I, on the other hand, as the brains behind this outfit, was sentenced two
weeks earlier—with the same punishment—but I was given an additional
instruction “not to associate with the other three men.” This smart-assed
judge believed I had some kind of power over my homies. Quite astute of him.
But he wasn’t going to stop our business relationship. Free Enterprise
and Free Speech. Isn’t that what America is about? My lawyer has told
me as long as I write the plans and screenplay, I don’t have to associate
with them. They’ll just carry out my instructions. Hell, that’s
what they’ve always done!
We have sold over 300,000 copies of our video, Tramp Fights, from
our Internet site, and our sales at independent video stores have been out
of sight. We
have enough money to go to court against anybody who wants to fight us. Even
these two bums—Travis and McGrady—who are suing us because we violated
their civil rights. Their money-grubbing Jew lawyers have even put words into
McGrady’s mouth. He’s the one who had the tattoo from the film
put on his forehead that said “Tramp Fights,” and he looked ridiculous
in front of the TV camera, in his suit and his little pussy tie, saying, “I
feel like an object of degradation and loathing. I feel like an aberration.” Where
the hell did that come from? McGrady never got out of eighth grade in Bridgeport,
Connecticut. He slugged a nun, who had put him inside the cloak closet, and
he never returned to school again. What a phony bastard! Our lawyer will tear
him apart on the stand.
“Phil Weinstein”
Billy Travis and Tim McGrady are suing Dacrack Productions for two million
dollars in damages to their characters and persons and for libel to their
good names. The following press release was placed on our web site:
TRAMPFIGHTS.COM FILM MAKERS SUED IN CIVIL COURT BY HOMELESS PLAINTIFFS WILLIAM
H. TRAVIS AND TIMOTHY MCGRADY WHO SEEK DAMAGES FOR EGREGIOUS ACTS ALLEGEDLY
DONE AT THEIR PHYSICAL AND EMOTIONAL EXPENSE
San Diego, CA (November 8, 2002) – William Travis aka “Billy the
Weasel” and Timothy “Tug” McGrady filed a civil suit today
in San Diego Superior Court against Michael Rollins, Ronald Dillan, Dante Fitzmorris,
Reginald Warren and Dacrack Productions, the parties behind www.trampfights.com
and the production and promotion of Tramp Fights, Volume One: The Bum’s
Rush, as well as Designers Tattoo & Body Piercing of San Diego. Plaintiffs
seek damages, including punitive damages, for egregious acts allegedly done
at their physical and emotional expense, for example: tattooing the word “Trampfights” in
bold letters across their forehead and other body parts, burning their hair,
and running into stone walls, crates and other inanimate objects. Mr. Travis
and Mr. McGrady are represented by Phillip Weinstein and Saul Braun with the
San Diego, CA. law firm of Weinstein, Braun and Halliard LLP. The Hon. Daniel
Weston will preside over the matter, William Travis vs. Michael Rollins,
et. al., Case No. HID322516.
Plaintiffs are both homeless, residing in the County of San Diego. William
Travis, age 47, served in the US Army and Timothy McGrady, age 53, served in
the US Army and is a Vietnam War veteran.
The complaint alleges that Defendants Rollins, Dillan, Fitzmorris and Warren
coerced Plaintiffs without their consent via the lures of money, alcohol and
other enticements to perform inhumane, deplorable acts which were filmed, and
then sold as a videotape under the title of Tramp Fights, Volume One: The
Bum’s
Rush, on the Internet at www.trampfights.com. Their images were used without
their consent to advertise and promote both the website and videotape sales,
in further violation of their civil rights. Designers Tattoo & Body Piercing
allegedly breached their duty to Plantiffs when they performed tattoo services
knowing that the men were intoxicated and unable to provide consent. Plaintiffs
have suffered and continue to suffer great physical harm, mental anguish, embarrassment
and humiliation.
“Deplorable. Exploitive. Criminal. Words cannot fully express the inhumanity
behind the making of the Tramp Fights videotape,” said Phil Weinstein. “The
Defendants coerced fragile, vulnerable human beings into despicable performances
without any regard for their rights or safety. This lawsuit has been filed
on behalf of William Travis and Timothy McGrady to send a clear message that
such egregious behavior, which assaults not only the mind, but the spirit,
will not be tolerated.”
“Our clients were intimidated and forced into extreme behaviors,” stated
Saul Braun, “to their physical and mental detriment by the Defendants.
What was done to them was unconscionable, and we see this lawsuit as sending
a strong message to discourage this type of conduct in the future. Our firm
is proud to stand behind these who served our country and to see to it that
they have their day in court.”
Press Contact: Sybil Delaney, Director of Marketing/Media Relations; Dial:
619.555-8743; email: sdelaney@msa.net
aul
seems to think we don’t stand much of a chance on this case, but
I think we can win it, if we can get a few key witnesses to show up. Bonnie
Valdez, the “super model,” who appears in some soft porn scenes
in the video, told me she would testify for Travis and McGrady. However, she
may be a drug addict, as the filmmakers were exploiting the hell out of all
the participants in their film. This may come back to bite us in the ass if
their lawyer, Felecia “the piranha” Allfred, uses it to cross-examine
her. The real clincher witness is Reggie Warren’s mother, Faith Warren,
who lives in Las Vegas. She is ready to tell the story of her son’s father,
Dylan, a full-blown alkie, who beat the kid often and eventually left the family,
which, in her opinion, “turned young Warren against alcoholics forever.”
What we really need are witnesses who can testify they saw these guys giving
people drugs and alcohol before they signed anything. Nobody so far can testify.
I think we’ll have to go with the physical abuse in the film. They got
McGrady to run into concrete walls and metal signs, for Christsake! He should
have brain damage. I’m going to talk to him and get him to go to our
doctor. If we can’t get some medical testimony out of this, then we don’t
stand a chance. I know this judge, and he’s a big First Amendment freak.
Allfred is going to exploit that with the “reality” phenomenon
on TV. I just know it. I hope we can get a sympathetic jury. Saul seems to
think sympathy these days is about as easy to get as S.A.R.S. People have it,
but they don’t want to admit it in public. Nobody wants to appear weak
these days.
“Tim McGrady”
What can I say? I’m a drunk, a freakin’ alcoholic, and a goddamn
homeless Vietnam vet. You can see us downtown, past Market Street, and, like,
we cruise around Balboa Park; past the big statue of El Cid; past the Catholic
church downtown, where I say a prayer for my dear departed wife, Marie; past
the Landing Zone, the safe house for us vets; past the Naval Hospital, where
we wait for the one week in the year when they hold the Veterans’ Stand
Down. That’s when they set-up these here tents and give us all medical
care and a place to sleep inside. The City of San Diego won’t never give
us no place permanent, so we just cruise the streets with shopping carts, with
backpacks, living under bushes, crouching behind doorways, any place we can
bivouac to stay dry and toke on a little bit of grape, hooch or weed. Bottle
of wine, fruit of the vine, when you gonna let me get sober? Let me alone.
Let me go home. Let me go back and start over. Ramblin' around this dirty old
town, singing for nickels and dimes. Times gettin' rough, I ain't got enough,
to buy me a bottle of wine. Remember that song? Tom Paxton. He was one of us.
The day I meet these kid producers, Weasel and me is picking up aluminum
to raise enough for a pony of Tawny Port. We is buzzing pretty good, anyways,
so when these guys gets out of their van—one of these damn deathtrap
SUVs—we don’t think much of it. College kids is all the time coming
up and quizzing us for their damn writing assignments, or their sociology courses.
You know, they always wants to ask us questions about how we got so low down
in life.
But, this Warren character comes right up to me and says, “Good afternoon,
gentlemen. We’re film school graduates. These are my associates, Dante
Fitzmorris, Michael Rollins and Ronald Dillan. My name is Reggie Warren. We
want to make a film about your lives. Have you guys ever heard of reality TV?” he
says, with this college-boy gleam in his eye that I should have seen through
right off.
“Reality? Yeah, I guess we know all about reality. But it ain’t
what people want to see on TV,” I says, and I turn to Weasel and give
him a big grin and wink.
“That’s just it! We want the world to see what you guys have
to go through every day, just to get by. Why, you live in a jungle out here!
Look at it! It’s survival of the fittest.”
His voice is sounding weird at this point, especially since we can hear the
animals over at the zoo. Tall, thin, blond-headed, he looks like some preppy
kid from Malibu Beach, but he sounds like Alfred Hitchcock.
“We want to make a reality movie starring you and your sidekick here.
I’ll bet you guys are vets, am I right?”
We nod.
“I thought so. Guess what, soldiers? We want to let you fight again!
We want to call it the Tramp Fights. Our movie will show those assholes out
there how you people must fight for your survival! You’ll be the hit
of the season. Your faces will be seen by millions of Americans, and we can
finally show them how tough you have it out here in the jungles of the homeless.
The Homeland Homeless fighting for their dinner. You want a steak dinner, boys?”
We looks at each other. “Sounds good to me,” I say, as we had
not eaten in a day-and-a-half.
“Let us tape you two going a few rounds out here. Get the camera, Dante.”
“What the hell? You mean, you want us to fight each other?” asks
Weasel, coming alive for the first time all morning.
“You got it! This will be our first tramp fight. We’re going
to have a lot more to come. We’ll have competitions. You’ll do
stunts. You can do stunts, can’t you, boys? You look like real Hollywood
stunt men. We’ll have women dancing naked. And booze! Radar, bring out
the Bud!”
The short and fat guy then pulls out a case of Budweiser from the back of
the SUV and plops it on the grass in front of us. “Pop a brewski, men!” he
says, and he hands a tall boy to each of us.
Need I say that our fate is sealed with the first whoosh of foam from that
beer? With that case of brew within reach, we became fighters. I am, at first,
going to pull most of my punches with Weasel, until this Warren begins taunting
us. He starts to scream, “No! You’re not fighting! You pussies!
Show America how you have to really fight out here in the jungle! Hit him hard,
asshole!”
That’s when I hits Weasel hard, with my fist, and he goes down hard,
breaking an ankle, as he slips in the wet grass. He’s a fucking college
boy, too. I have about eight beers in me by then, and I am feeling no pain.
I am into my “Vietnam Vet mode,” PTSS, and crazy as a muthahumpa. “Look
at this shit!” I say, and I points to my pal’s swelling ankle. “That’s
just a broken ankle. Hell, boy, can’t you take any pain?” With
that, I takes a flying run at the broadside of their freakin’ SUV and
hits it, full on, with my head. I bounces back off of the fender like a bull
that just hit him his first iron matador. Then, I spots me the axe they have
inside the van. I stumble over, pick it up, and march over to Weasel, who’s
moaning on his ass in the grass. “Let me show you how we take care of
little anklie wanklies in the jungle!” I scream, and the camera keeps
rolling.
“That’s great, dude! You’re over the top! Did you get it,
Dante? We’ve got ourselves a winner here, boys! Tramp Fights will get
us into Hollywood in no time!” Warren yells, and I just sits down in
the grass and grins, thinking of that big, T-bone steak to come.
“Felecia
Allfred”
A Defense lawyer’s job is to defend the client. Sometimes, people ask
me if I am influenced by the morality of the clients I represent. No, an advocate
must never think in terms of absolutes. The law is not absolute. It is flexible
and never immutable. Therefore, when those young producers’ parents came
into my office after their sons had been arrested for felonies committed in
San Diego, I did not hesitate. I went to work. Those young men are now off
on a misdemeanor charge, and I have given them advice to continue their business.
I will also represent them in their civil case, and I have a wonderful line
of reasoning to defend their interests. They paid for the services of these
homeless men and women, didn’t they? They also got them to sign releases
for the use of their images on film. So, the issues are the fighting and bodily
injury. And, what about the issue of the incapacity of the plaintiffs to determine
right from wrong when they signed the releases? Simple. These two homeless
men were constantly inebriated. Therefore, their normal state of consciousness
was one of incapacity. It’s similar to the recent Supreme Court ruling
that said “the person to be executed can be forced to take anti-psychotic
medication so that he or she can be in his or her right mind when he or she
is being put on trial.” The court says, also, that the killer’s “normal
state” was his or her insanity, when he/she killed the victim. Well,
these two plaintiffs—Travis and McGrady—were also normally drunk
on a daily basis. Therefore, how could they be incapacitated?
And what about the fighting? Boxing is a professional sport, isn’t it?
Well, TV recently sponsored Celebrity Boxing, and the first show had aging
celebrities fighting it out: CARD 1: Danny Bonaduce ("Danny Partridge")
versus Barry Williams ("Greg Brady"), CARD 2: Robert Van Winkle (Vanilla
Ice) versus Todd Bridges (Willis on "Diff'rent Strokes"), and CARD
3: Tonya Harding versus Paula Jones. All of these people signed releases, and
all of these people put their lives in danger. How is this any different from
what my clients had these plaintiffs do? These were two aging veterans, one
47, the other 57. They were trying to do something to gain fame. My clients
put them in the public eye, didn’t they? They, in effect, ipso facto,
became celebrities.
My clients are merely young, plucky entrepreneurs, and they will use their
money to invest in an independent feature film they wish to make about the “apolitically
correct” world of America, where bums do battle it out in the streets,
and courageous women lawyers do represent the persecuted, and these young filmmakers
are simply attempting to expose the inconsistencies of our system. Besides,
they tell me their giant feature film will be bigger than Jackass: The
Movie,
and I can have a part in it!
“Sidney Appelbaum”
I read about the case in the papers. Actors in their production were harassing
these young filmmakers, recent graduates of the U.C.L.A. and U.S.C. film schools.
I must admit, as a Hollywood producer, there have been many times I have wanted
to bring my talent to court! Some of these multi-million dollar liberal folks
can put a production into hot water just by what they say in front of the media.
They have no concept of what it means to make money these days and to keep
out of the government’s business. We must answer to a higher power than
the peace politics of the liberal left! We must answer to the vox populae!
However, these four young men seemed like they were likely candidates for
The First Apple Productions, so I had my people ring them up in San Diego,
and we arranged a power lunch meeting at The Grill on the Alley in the Hills.
I opened up the meeting with the facts: Jackass: the Movie has made over 70
mil on a very low budget. The Osbournes have created a cult following worth
more than just the TV show in residuals and merchandising. So, what I proposed
to the lads was to produce a feature that combined the best of both worlds.
Why not At Home with the Homeless? It was their chance to show how America’s
homeless really live. It wouldn’t be any of that liberal crap about the
dispossessed who are downtrodden, forgotten heroes, exploited by Capitalist
greed. We show them for what they are: degenerates, addicts and criminals,
ready to do anything for a few bucks, and ready to rob their own grandmother
if they could get another drink!
They loved it! They said they had been thinking about the same kind of film,
but they didn’t have the money and power to get it done. I explained
that we had to take some legal measures to protect the big money interests,
and we had to show the commitment to the big money, so we could get the full
backing for the big merchandising push after the film is finally under production.
To do this, I told them, they would have to play the roles of the bums, themselves.
This would keep the lawyers off our backs, and, we could also do wonders with
make-up these days, especially with a big budget!
That’s when I began to brainstorm ideas with them. The kids were spectacular,
as I knew they would be! I kept the drinks coming, and I knew they were impressed
with the waiters in their white coats and with the whole Hollywood schmooz of big money.
“We need to counteract the liberal establishment, my boys,” I
told them, and that’s when this leader of the group, Reginald Warren,
chimed in, “We can have a kind of homeless Fight Club going down. We
can be the heroes who fight all comers: college frat boys, local gang bangers,
international gangs, you name it! We should get Jackie Chan to direct! That’s
it, dudes! Homeless Fighters from Hell!”
I told him he was really onto something, and he was. The money merchandising
possibilities were there too. “However, we need some up-front capital
to show these big guys we mean business,” I said.
“Money? From us?” he asked, a bit of truculence in his voice.
“It takes money to make money in this production, boys,” I told
them. “I’m putting up fifty mil, and we need at least six from
you to show them we mean business,” I pointed out. “They will then
give us the big bundle, so we can make your feature and our fortune.”
“I understand, Mister Applebaum,” said Warren, with his eyes
actually misting up with real tears. “This is what we’ve been waiting
for. We knew we had to have some up-front money to make a feature, and that’s
why we shot Tramp Fights. Now we have it, and I am proud to give it to you
for our production!”
With that, we arranged to have his bank transfer the money to my account
in the morning, and we could begin shooting the script next week.
“Tim
McGrady”
We lost our civil case to those young filmmakers. Our lawyers turned out
to be crooks, if you want to know the truth. One of them, Mister Weinstein,
tells me I had to say on the stand that I got brain damage from doing the stunts
in the movie. To hell with him! I refuse to lie on the stand, with Old Glory
flying right there and all. Long story short, we lost the case.
As my Daddy used to say, “Sometimes you need to lose the battle to
win the war,” and he was at the Battle of the Bulge, in the big one.
I guess what we did next would have made Daddy proud, not to mention my Marie.
She would sure be bustin’ her drawers with pride right now. See, losing
that case sobered us up. Turns out, when you sober up, you can uncover the
real identity of folks you never knew was there.
Take my pal, Weasel, for instance. Turns out, he sobers up, and he tells
me he used to be an actor! “No shit, Red Rider,” I says, “you?”
“That’s correct,” says Travis, a sparkle in his eye that
looked like some hero in a western flick. “I played in a lot of horror
films as vampires, ghouls and all kinds of monsters. I was one of the most
featured actors in the horror genre they had. I played in all the Halloween features. Guess who I was?” Damn, if the boy doesn’t pull out a
white mask and put it in front of his face. “Michael Myers!” I
shouts.
Seems Billy hit the skids from playing too much horror. The genre spent itself
out in the nineties, and he got too close to his booze. The money runs out,
eventually, when you spend it all on women, fast cars and all the other material
crap America says we live for, and that’s when Billy Travis becomes a
real monster. That’s when he becomes the Weasel of Balboa Park.
Staying sober got us thinking. It’s really dangerous for two alkies
to start thinking hard, you know, like it must mess with the world’s
axis or something. Our plan came out to stare us right in the face.
“Billy ‘The Weasel’ Travis”
I suppose being able to act never really leaves you. It’s a very ingrained
talent, once you learn how. When Tug McGrady and I first hooked up, I used
to do a lot of routines on him, and he just thought I was another whacked-out
vet. Like the time I came through the bushes at him in my vampire outfit that
I picked up at a costume store. I didn’t scare that bastard one bit!
He says, “I suppose now you’re gonna want to suck my blood instead
of this here hooch.” I could never scare him. We did a lot of crazy stuff
together. Like the time we decided we wanted to become astronauts, and we got
all screwed-up on wine and went over to the Laundromat on Sixth Avenue. We
decided to see if we could withstand the centrifugal force test, so we hopped
inside one of the big dryers and started spinning around in it—drunk
as hell—seeing if we could become astronauts. Of course, they called
the fuzz on us, and we left before they came.
That day, after we lost the case with those kid producers, we stayed sober.
And, four days later, we were still sober. About that time, Tug says to me, “I
think I have us a plan. Let’s go talk to our new lawyers.”
We walked on over to their law offices on Main, and we sat down in Bernstein’s
office. McGrady says, “I gotta plan to get revenge on these punks.”
Bernstein looks interested, and I am sure as hell paying attention now.
“We are gonna con those assholes out of their money,” he said,
and that’s how our plan began.
I was to play the biggest role of my life, up to that point, and it was not
a horror part. I was going to become a Hollywood producer! Bernstein almost
broke his leather swivel chair, he was laughing so hard. He’d never heard
of my acting career, and he loved McGrady’s plan to get back the money.
He gave us the legal advice we needed to make certain the bank transaction
was carried off, and he also gave us the front money to fool these idiots into
believing they were being bankrolled by a big production company.
Our plan was to get these guys to act in our production and to have them
do things on film that could be later used in court to prove how they broke
their probation orders. And, boy, did we get proof! We took pictures of them
soliciting prostitutes, buying crack for addicts, and even paying a 450 pound
homeless woman to fight a skinny homeless guy named Leonard. They filmed it,
but they never got this Leonard’s permission to use him in the film.
We got our own film of them asking Leonard to sign the release, but he refuses.
But, they still put the scene in their film! That’s just what these punks
did in our little movie, but nobody got them on film doing it. Now we had all
the evidence we needed to show the court and to prove these guys were a bunch
of crooks.
When we took the tape to court, Judge McBride was very happy to see us. Felecia
Allfred tried to claim entrapment, but we weren’t law officers, so the
judge shut her down fast. “Besides,” the judge asked her, “weren’t
you playing a part in this film?”
We were allowed to keep an easy million out of this case, and Tug and I are
straight and sober these days. It’s like what we say at the A. A. meetings, “We’re
still sober and crazy!” We’ve even been into acting again. Ozzy
Osbourne invited us to do a bit part on his show. His kids are all down with
the horror bit, and McGrady is still a kind of a cult hero from the Tramp
Fights,
which was allowed to stay in circulation, on stipulation that the four producers
never make another film with the homeless. I played Michael Myers on Ozzy’s
show, and my partner even ran headfirst into the Osbourne’s living room
bar, and so did Ozzy! But they were both stone sober. Tug turns around to the
TV camera and says, “Marie, this one’s for you!” You gotta
love him!
[END]
© 2004 Jim Musgrave - Contributor's
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