I am the guy most of you probably hate- I'm 23. I don't look like a punk. In fact, I'm conservative as hell. I didn't even like Green Day until American Idiot came out, and the album grew on me. Eventually, it became my favorite album, and now I've got back to buy all other Green Day works, and love them all. But, none as much as "American Idiot". I can't get enough of it, and I can't describe what the album means to me. I'm in the process of writing a theatrical version of the album. Here is my interpretation of "Are We the Waiting?" I actually had a more polished version, but I think it's on my external hard drive. I wrote this a while ago, but just thought about sharing it, so I registered here. Here you go:
---
Scene opens with a young man named Tom driving his 78 Oldsmobile toward a new city, where his new life will hopefully kick off to a fresh, new start. It is eleven thirty at night though, and after five hours of driving in the darkness, his mind begins to wander. Seven hundred miles to go... as he passes the last of three exits to different parts of the same city...
"Starry nights, city lights coming down over me, skyscrapers... star gazers in my head..."
Everything looks the same at night on the freeway, the life vein of the country... a steady flow of white blood cells flowing toward him on his left, and the endless stream of red ones that he is a part of in front of him. Is everyone going to the same place? Is everyone as lost as he is? All four windows are down, and the summer air seems to have reached an equilibrium with the temperature of his body. His thoughts are sent toward heaven by the slow, subsonic speed of the green, incandescently illuminated back light of the car's gauges.
"This dirty town.. is burning down in my dreams.... lost and found, city bound in my dreams.."
The big block v8 hammers out a steady, reassuring rhythm. That the Oldsmobile's body and soul is strong and pure is the only thing certain to him. Her steady 2100 rpm heartbeat is the only comfort he has. The bumps in the road and the wind against the car grow less and less apparent, until they are unnoticeable.
He is lost in reflection. Is he even moving any more? He lets go of the wheel, and the flow of traffic is uninterrupted. His light blue, sun bleached Olds, with the beige vinyl roof cover, flows hypnotically onward.
His emotions climax and he finds himself climbing out his window and onto the hood of his car. Traffic is still moving, but everyone is out of their cars, lost in the same midnight reflection as he is. Their prayers, thoughts, wonders and worries all mingle together above their heads in a fog that only magnifies the star light. Have the heavens descended, or has the road risen? Are we the waiting? They all wonder together...
"Forget me not's, and second thoughts live in isolation...heads or tails? Fairy tales in my mind..."
The speed of the car has not changed, yet the road is no longer moving beneath the car's wheels. The odometer no longer spins. Mile markers continue to slowly come and go, but they are all marking the same mile. How could everyone be this lost..? Has nobody direction? Has society lied to him...? Where is the transition...? Are we the waiting...?
"This rage and love, the story of my life... The Jesus of suburbia is a lie." He wishes it weren't true.
Broken and with more uncertainty than ever, he climbs back behind the wheel of the car. Again, his odometer turns, the wind returns, and the steady feel of the road, as interpreted by the car's thirty year old suspension, wheels, and frame once again return to his body. Are we the waiting? Are we...?
Everything- the road, the car, his fellow motorists, and above all else- his doubt, all seem to reverberate his worst fears: We are! We are!
He continues sending his thoughts skyward, but no answers come back to him. He drives on.
J.D.: Look, uh... Janitor...
[the Janitor rolls his eyes]
J.D.: ...I'm gonna be straight with you: I saw your penis, and I noticed a possible melanoma that you should really have checked out.
Janitor: When did you see my penis?
J.D.: Last night, when you were showering.
Janitor: Where were you?
J.D.: Oh, I was outside, in the bushes.
[the Janitor takes a second to process this answer]
Janitor: Uhhh...
J.D.: Look, it was just a coincidence, man - I mean, i-i-if you had looked out the window, you'd have seen my penis, you know!
Janitor: What? Why?
J.D.: Because I had it out while I was looking at yours!
Turk: Who are these guys?
J.D.: These are the last eight guys in the hospital that don't realize I suck at basketball. So here's what gonna happen: I finally mastered my running hook shot so when we go to pick teams I'm gonna hit that shot. Then you say I'll pick that guy at which point Carla is gonna page me and I'll say "*Crap*, I've gotta go." And you'll go "*Damn*, we just lost the best player out here." And then there will be eight guys in the hospital who think I'm good at sports and word will spread.
Turk: When do you find time to see your patients?
J.D.: Between these thoughts.