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2INT. HALLWAY. DAY.

A gallery of the children’s art, done mostly in crayon, but with beautiful frames and careful lighting. The subject matter includes: spaceships, wild animals, sailboats, motorcycles, and war scenes with tanks and paratroopers.

A stuffed and mounted boar’s head with its teeth bared hangs in the stairwell. A label on it says “Wild Javelina, Andes Mountains.” Under the stairs there is a telephone room the size of a closet. Old messages are tacked to the walls, and the children’s heights are marked on the door frame.

A thirty-three-year-old woman with a scarf around her neck and sunglasses on top of her head talks on a rotary telephone. She is Etheline.

Richie sits on her lap reading an Atlas of the World. Margot sits on a foot-stool reading The Cherry Orchard. Chas stands in the doorway with a slip of blue paper in his hand.

NARRATOR (V.O.)

Etheline Tenenbaum kept the house and

raised the children, and their education

was her highest priority.

Etheline says into the telephone:

ETHELINE

I’ll hold, thank you.

CHAS

I need $187.

ETHELINE

(pause)

Write yourself a check.

Chas hands Etheline the slip of blue paper.

INSERT:

A cheque made out in the amount of $187. Etheline signs it.

CUT TO:

Chas taking back the cheque. Etheline says into the telephone:

ETHELINE (CONT’D)

Bene. Si. Grazie mille.

Etheline hangs up. There is a schedule of activities -- guitar, ballet, yoga, scuba-diving -- written on a chalkboard behind her and divided into columns labelled Chas, Richie and Margot. She changes an Italian lesson from 4:30 to 5:30.