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Show 169 "Knockout show!" Suskind sat and scooped peanuts, shook them in his closed hand as though they were dice. "We're gonna have rich assholes cutting each other's throats! Tagging nine-five to eleven!" he told Hunt. "Our boy, Reuben - has a great routine!" Suskind ate peanuts, coughed, in the direction of Cletus Marion. "Tell the man from Phoenix your routine!" he said. "Irwin: It's not like I'm getting a Tony for it or anything." Cletus Marion said. "He tells them the show took four years! He tells them he was blocked! He tells them he went through a breakdown -these rich jerks love, I'm telling you, they love falling apart; they love to point at something on the wall, tell their friends: 'This was painted by an artist who's fucking brain was on fire!' They love shit like that! So Reuben tells them breakdown . . . lockup, straight-jacket." Suskind laughed. He held a hand up to the model. "Don't say it! Don't! I'm going to remember it myself!" And he put a hand over his heart: "And I knew," he began melodramatically; "I knew then, - locked up, my arms strapped to my side - knew I was on some critical threshold . . . either to a life of immobility . . . or to a new freedom!" He laughed, took another fistful of peanuts, shook them. "You must understand," Cletus Marion said to Hunt, "that my version is of course more authentic." "I'd like just to stroll over," Hunt broke in, "and take a look at how the show's ..." "Not possible!" Suskind insisted. "I got strict instructions: Stay away 'til tonight. They've got wiring problems up the bazoogie that they've gotta |