Timeline

07:34:49

"I'll tell you what the goddamn problem is," Robert Doniger said, glaring at the visitors. "The problem is to bring the past alive. To make it real."

There were two young men and a young woman, all slouching on the couch in his office. They were dressed entirely in black, wearing those pinch-shoulder jackets that looked like they'd shrunk in the wash. The men had long hair and the woman had a buzz cut. These were the media people that Kramer had hired. But Doniger noticed that today Kramer was sitting opposite them, subtly divorcing herself from them. He wondered if she had already seen their material.

It made Doniger irritable. He didn't like media people anyway. And this was his second meeting with the breed today. He'd had the PR dipshits in the morning, now these dipshits.

"The problem," he said, "is that I have thirty executives coming to hear my presentation tomorrow. The title of my presentation is `The Promise of the Past,' and I have no compelling visuals to show them."

"Got it," one of the young men said crisply. "That was exactly our starting point here, Mr. Doniger. The client wants to bring the past alive. That's what we set out to do. With Ms. Kramer's help, we asked your own observers to generate sample videos for us. And we believe this material will have the compelling quality-"

"Let's see it," Doniger said.

"Yes, sir. Perhaps if we lowered the lights-"

"Leave the lights as they are."

"Yes, Mr. Doniger." The video screen on the wall came up blue as it glowed to life. While they were waiting for the image, the young man said, "The reason we like this first one is because it is a famous historical event that lasts only two minutes from start to finish. As you know, many historical events occurred very slowly, especially to modern sensibilities. This one was quick. Unfortunately, it occurred on a somewhat rainy day."

The screen showed a gray, gloomy image, overhanging clouds. The camera panned to show some sort of gathering, shot over the heads of a large crowd. A tall man was climbing up onto a plain, unpainted wood platform.

"What's this? A hanging?"

"No," the media kid said. "That's Abraham Lincoln, about to deliver the Gettysburg Address."

"It is? Jesus, he looks like hell. He looks like a corpse. His clothes are all wrinkled. His arms stick out of his sleeves."

"Yes, sir, but-"

"And is that his voice? It's squeaky."

"Yes, Mr. Doniger, no one's ever heard Lincoln's voice before, but that is his actual-"

"Are you out of your fucking minds?"

"No, Mr. Doniger-"

"Oh, for Christ's sake, I can't use this," Doniger said. "No one wants Abraham Lincoln to sound like Betty Boop. What else have you got?"

"It's right here, Mr. Doniger." Unruffled, the young man changed the tapes, saying, "For the second video, we adopted a different premise. We wanted a good action sequence, but again, a famous event that everybody would know. So this is Christmas Day, 1778, on the Delaware River, where-"

"I can't see shit," Doniger said.

"Yes, I'm afraid it is a bit dark. It's a night crossing. But we thought George Washington crossing the Delaware would be a good-"

"George Washington? Where is George Washington?"

"He's right there," the kid said, pointing to the screen.

"Where?"

"There."

"He's that guy huddled in the back of the boat?"

"That's correct, and-"

"No, no, no," Doniger said. "He has to be standing in the bow, like a general."

"I know that's the way the paintings portray him, but it's not what actually happened. Here you see the real George Washington as he actually crossed the-"

"He looks seasick," Doniger said. "You want me to show a video of George Washington looking seasick?"

"But this is reality."

"Fuck reality," Doniger said, throwing one of their videotapes across the room. "What's the matter with you people? I don't care about reality. I want something intriguing, something sexy. You're showing me a walking corpse and a drowned rat."

"Well, we can go back to the drawing board-"

"My talk is tomorrow," Doniger said. "I have three major executives coming here. And I have already told them they would see something very special." He threw up his hands. "Jesus Christ."

Kramer cleared her throat. "What about using stills?"

"Stills?"

"Yes, Bob. You could take single frames from these videos, and that might be quite effective," Kramer said.

"Uh-huh, yes, that would work," the media woman said, head bobbing.

Doniger said, "Lincoln would still look wrinkled."

"We'll take the wrinkles out with Photoshop."

Doniger considered that. "Maybe," he said finally.

"Anyway," Kramer said, "you don't want to show them too much. Less is more."

"All right," Doniger said. "Make the stills up, and show them to me in an hour."

The media people filed out. Doniger was alone with Kramer. He went behind his desk, shuffled through his presentation. Then he said, "Do you think it should be `The Promise of the Past,' or `The Future of the Past'?"

"'The Promise of the Past,' " Kramer said. "Definitely `The Promise.'"