SPICER PLAYED BY WYLIE WATSON IN BRIGHTON ROCK
via Graham Greene’s script from directors John & Roy Boulting’s adaptation
of his novel
Which table was it, Spicer?
The one on the right, with the yellow cloth.
Waitresses off somewhere . . .
They freeze me. They freeze me too.
The dead can’t speak, Ida.
“Eye suicide, Fred”.
How do we make you safe, Spicer?
Spicer, you’ve been gone again.
Spicer, you have a message for me.
You have to disappear, Spicer.
Spicer passed away. Condolences from his old pals.
They’ll like that--shows proper respect.
Spicer was evidence.
Pinkie wanted him out of the way.
Barry Alpert / Silver Spring MD US / 12-16-09 (5:51 PM)
Jack Spicer certainly wasn't in mind when I arrived slightly late for the National Gallery of
Art's screening of Brighton Rock within their British Noir series. I hadn't conceived of
writing during the film, but I became intrigued when I finally determined that characters
within the film were referring to or addressing another character as "Spicer".
Remembering Jack Spicer's own fascination with the radio transmissions to Orpheus
rendered within Jean Cocteau's film, I decided to gather Spicerian material from Brighton
Rock. Just today I stumbled on an analysis by David Chirot of William S. Burroughs'
preference when using literary texts rather than newspapers for his cut-ups, which
synchronistically relates to what I've done:
"[WSB] is reading The Quiet American aboard a ship, and looks up--and there by God IS
A Quiet American ascending the stairs towards him--the novel creating a person who in
real time is encountered by the reader, linked by the title of the book and the description
within it which matches the real figure approaching--
It is such events that break down the systems of control . ."
While it's certain that Jack Spicer didn't see any of the 56 episodes of the animated tv
series Xiaolin Showdown in which a character named "Jack Spicer" appears, I can well
imagine him witnessing Brighton Rock (1947) during his lifetime.
Finally, two synchronicities via Stephen Vincent's earlier post on GeoPoemCaching:
"A particular parking plot for Spicer's poem [finding a choice spot between the East &
West buildings of the NGA enabled the poem]"
"(David Chirot writes a poem at x GPS location and Milwaukee poets go on the search!)"
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