"Sam Spade -- private dick"

[Henchman999]

Note: If you have not seen "The Maltese Falcon"
with Humphrey Bogart stop reading right now. Go
about your business, as you were involved before
checking this post. What you were doing is far more
significant to your life than 'what follows' could ever
be.

I consider the following a poem-by-prose (PBP)

Thanks.
Henchman

"Sam Spade, private dick"

I was adjusting lights when Sam Spade walked up,
and asked if I had ever touched a Maltese Falcon.

"Hey pal, you ever touch a Maltese Falcon?"

I said no.

"No."

But as I continued to adjust the lights, I said I know
avarice.

"But I know avarice."

Sam took a butt from the band of his hat and lit it,
with a match. Sam squinted his eyes. "You ever take
a butt from the band of your hat, and light it ..."

I knew right then Sam would say, " ... with a match?"
So I beat him to it. "With a match?"

'Right, pal, with a match."

I also knew, then, at that time, and I still know, that
avarice is a passion for gain, greed, cupidity. Avarice is
a lusting for possessions-- maybe for a Maltese Falcon.

I tried to imagine the guy who wrote this novel--Dash-
iell Hammett, -- what he had in mind. Maybe he had the
idea that more than one of his characters wanted the
falcon, bad, even though in the movie it would be just
a prop made of Paris plaster.

Wait a minute! In the novel the Falcon must have been
made from real Maltese. Yes, the Maltese would, of course,
been real. I wondered if Sam Spade knew that?

I also wondered if anybody cast in this movie knew what
Maltese was? I had no idea.

"You know what Maltese is, Sam?" I asked. I wasn't sure I
knew how 'Maltese' served as an adjective to the noun
'Falcon' -- like a Silver Falcon or a Gold Falcon or a falcon
made of lead.

I started to get troubled. I knew it wasn't good for a light-
ing technician on a movie set to get troubled, so I tried to
put it behind me.

I heard Huston yelling. "People, act like you REALLY want
that falcon!"

I knew Mary Astor wanted it. Sydney Greenstreet wants
it, bad. So does Peter Lorre? Maybe Gladys George has a
touch of avarice for a plaster of Paris Maltese Falcon. May-
be Jerome Cowan would have wanted it— but he gets killed
early on—maybe about 15 minutes after the movie starts.
Nah! I don't think Jerome Cowan would have ever wanted
the falcon, even if he had lived and if it were made of real
Maltese.

Ward Bond doesn't know anything about it. A moviegoer
would know that by the way he acts, really dumb (Bond
was better in "The Quiet Man").

Sam Spade lit another cigarette-- with a match-- and said,
"Any guy in the movie can touch the falcon, but they bet-
ter not touch me. I don't like to be touched, by men. That's
why I have a private dressing room. I have a loathing of a
man's touch. I'd like to hit Joel Cairo in the mug for brushing
my arm ... "

I interrupted, "Sorry to interrupt you Sam, but Joel's touching
you is in the script-- in the movie, the script ... "

"Sure! it was in the movie, so what?"

I couldn't answer 'so what?'

Sam went on, "And I want to humiliate Lorre more than the
script says for tapping his finger on my arm."

"Sam ... "

"Yeah ... "

"Do the women in the movie know what a bastard you are?"

“ … beats me. Where’s Effie? I wanna bag her."

##
Henchman

 

[HarryHill]

A winner!

Thanks so much for sharing this. 5 stars.

 

[Henchman999]

Harry,

Thank you for the good words.

I had fun writing this and have taken the idea
to other movie classics.

H.

 

[twelveoone]

another line...
we'll always have plaster of Paris