Adaptation · written by Charlie Kaufman and Donald Kaufman · 2002

Orlean interprets Laroche’s memory as a story of striving for something exceptional rather than ordinary life.

Scene 152 of 202 · ≈ 1 min on screen · Act two

Orlean

Act oneAct twoAct three

Begins 1:19 into a 1:57 film

The story so farBefore scene 152

Unable to find a conventional story in The Orchid Thief, screenwriter Charlie Kaufman turns his own crisis into an increasingly self-referential adaptation.

Scenes 1–9
Charlie inhabits an isolated, self-condemning world while Orlean’s book supplies a distant model of obsession.
Scenes 10–88
Charlie wants to write honestly and make flowers matter, while also longing to be desired and understood.
Scenes 89–105
He leaves his familiar writing room and goes to Florida to search for the story firsthand.
Scenes 106–126
The swamp is ordinary, Orlean’s research fails, and Charlie experiments with increasingly personal versions of the book.
Scenes 127–144
Charlie finds a way to focus the material by putting himself in it, then commits to meeting Orlean.
Just before
Scene 149
Orlean wakes from the dream as the imagined flood and alligator vanish from her hotel room.
Scene 150
Orlean picks up Laroche, who insists that cigarettes are all the supplies he needs.
Scene 151
Laroche tells Orlean how he and his mother kept searching past hopelessness until they found a ghost orchid.
Scene 152
This scene

152INT. OFFICE - DAY

Orlean types at her desk. She turns to us and talks.

ORLEAN

He made it sound like a Bible story, the

hopeful journey through darkness into

light. I never thought many people in

the world were like John, but I was

realizing more and more that Laroche was

an extreme, not an aberration -- most

people in some way or another do strive

for something exceptional, something to

pursue, even at their peril, rather than

abide an ordinary life.