Going Off Script

THE MAVERICK WEARS PRADA
Screenplay by
Maureen Dowd
Revised third draft
© Oct. 29, 2008

Inspired by the success of former boyfriend Aaron Sorkin's guest turn as a columnist, Maureen Dowd tries her hand at screenwriting, complete in Final Draft style with courier font and everything. The title of course, connects the Meryl Streep movie about fashion writing with Sarah Palin's recently revealed shopping spree.

But first, let's meet the players:

	NICOLLE WALLACE, a slender, preppie-looking blonde wearing a string of pearls...She is a top McCain adviser under STEVE SCHMIDT who has been seconded to SARAH PALIN. Nicolle Wallace née Devenish is a White House Communications Director and current McCain campaign spokesperson.
	TRACEY SCHMITT, another blonde sorority type in pearls, also a Bush person who became a McCain person who was then sent over to manage PALIN as her press secretary. Formerly the spokeswoman for the Republican National Committee. (photo courtesy of Mediabistro)

And now for some highlights:

NICOLLE

Steve’s freaking out. You know how he is about message discipline, much less completely losing a candidate. He’s got enough on his plate scaring the nursing-home Jews in Florida and painting Obama as a Palestinian Marxist Madrassa Child.

Steve Schmidt (no relation to Tracey) is McCain's senior campaign strategist, previously described by Maureen as "a Rove protégé, nicknamed “The Bullet” for his bald pate."

NICOLLE

She’s probably at The Weekly Standard, plotting her shining city on the tundra with Fred Barnes and Bill Kristol. I can’t believe Barnes called me a coward because I tried to update that $30 Wasilla beehive that made her look like the girlfriend in an Elvis movie and upgrade her from pleather to leather.

Palin's rise to national prominence is often traced back to some kaffeeklatsches she had with the two prominent neocons during shoreleave from a Weekly Standard Alaska cruise.

NICOLLE

Look, Tracey, maybe Sarah doesn’t know who Berlusconi is, but she does know who Valentino is. She saw those labels. She knew we were being sartorial socialists and spreading the wealth to Neiman’s and Saks. She liked being pampered like a movie star. We should have learned from W. If you can keep a war off budget, why can’t you keep a wardrobe off budget? I told the press if someone wants to throw me under the bus, my personal belief is that the most graceful thing to do is lie there.

Silvio Berlusconi is the prime minister of Italy and his name only sounds like a famous designer. We also get in this quote the Alliteration Alert® of "sartorial socialists" and the war/wardrobe Dowdversion®. Some nice really tight scriptwriting from Dowd. And the thrown under the bus metaphor is real.

NICOLLE

I’ll be glad when this blind date from hell is over and I can get away from the dysfunctional Palin clan and back to walking my dog, Lily, in Central Park with my pinko liberal friends. I knew Katie would be brutal, but thank God I arranged that interview because now I can go back to my gig as a political analyst at CBS.

In the revolving door world of the punditocracy, Wallace was political analyst for the CBS Evening News until May 2008.

TRACEY

You betcha!

And scene.