Script 2.0

Re-worked script add-ins to original [in previous posts]:

Smith: So yeah, I’ve conducted many an operation for Medicorp… pretty much bullied and lied my way across political life consistently. I’ve done more to lower the tone of political life, even public life than anything else, and that was all of course done with Medicorp’s connivance and authority. Yet I have to bear the ultimate responsibility for it.

Smith: I mean, don’t get me wrong I’m happy to take criticism, I mean I was hired to generate slavish media support for Medicorp. Get a vote of confidence into public voters. The image making department did well. Job done.

Smith: Even now, it’s still all party gamesmanship. Even when the cabinet meet at Medicorp Headquarters it can get pretty heated. Politics is about passionate things, when you bring Media into the equation, well it becomes a tirade of lies, impressions and spin.

Smith: Do I think this is what the British people want?

Smith: Well, what they  wanted was change of some sort, no doubt about that. It wasn’t a bad outcome at first but now I’m thinking it wasn’t the best moves.

Smith: I am the man responsible for what’s changed, they way I conducted my operations, the way I created particular impressions and painted a convincing picture across public life.

Smith: It is a culture that I have created where Medicorp will stop at nothing. I mean these guys are now the guys meant to be keeping our country safe; they are the political establishment. It’s become, simply, way too cosy between the Media and politicians. The way it is though, they’ll always need each other, always.

Smith: I hate what it’s becoming, the relations between the media and politics has become way too close, and now Medicorp have taken over, they’ll forever be intertwined.

Smith: If by spin, people mean communication, then its existed since man because the world revolves around people speaking to each other and communicating their thoughts and ideas and feelings and even passions- that’s kind of what makes the world go around

Smith: I mean since the explosion of social networks, it’s almost like we’re in a global electronic virtual village square where people find that within these networks, with their own sort of people and you know, they talk to each other and they challenge each other and they feed each other information that they are getting from different places, so you can create your own media landscape. Now, that is a scary thought for the communicator because you’re there thinking here’s what I want to say, sell to the public, here’s how I’m going to push it to the public but they’re out there creating their own media landscape and you’ve got to fight your way into it. But once there, yes you’ve got the public in the palm of your hand.

Smith: When you’re the communicator, or the strategist and you’re clear in your own mind what it is you want, what you’re trying to say, what you’re trying to do… What you’re doing is painting a picture over time, you’re not necessarily going to connect with people from day 1, it’s about communicating and connecting over time, so I’m talking about painting a picture over time [one that will get the public on your side] and every time you communicate that little bit more, you’re adding another stroke of paint, you’re getting the desired response you want from the public.

Smith: I could create a landscape from almost saying right here’s what we want to say, here’s how we’re going to say it, here’s the outlets we’re going to go to, which newspapers we want it printed in, go to the broadcasters we need to work on and here’s the speeches we’re going to make, and you can plan it all out, you can plan the impact you make and what impact you want in response.

Smith: I mean the public are much more reasonable than the media, often on a day to day basis, they will regurgitate what’s going on through the media at that time. So we can feed information to the newspapers and broadcasters and the public will believe it and circulate the information we’ve created and plotted into the public domain. I keep to the same approach every time because as soon as decide to keep changing the approach, no one will believe you, no one.

Smith: Don’t tell me what I think, I’m paid to tell the public what they need to think. You have to work at the public, you can’t tell them what to do, you’ve got to make it seem like they’ve come to it themselves [well of course they haven’t, it’s an illusion]. I communicate what the nation needs, what I tell them they need. The common sense checklist goes out of the window.

Smith: I know how the Media operates, I started off as a journalist, building my contacts, networks you know make it a little easier when I made the move into communications and strategy. Once upon a time there was a belief system. My experience, most people go into it, they kind of believe something, they have a strong set of beliefs that draws you in.

Smith: Have to face up to the influences I’ve had upon the way the world works. Giving impressions that always true, using weasel words, or phrases that stretch the truth, I mean one of my operations early on was the Medicorp campaign slogan: ‘Nothing acts faster than Medicorp’. It gave an impression, even though all the parties all operate under the same regulations, so in fact they’re actually acting all the same.

Smith: Many a times, I’ve sat there with 2 phones, in a middle of a mis-managed frenzy.

Smith: Medicorp govern with fear and favour, that’s how it works and how it’s always worked.

Smith: Building communications is what I do, building relationships with the public bases on some truth. Feeding the public, their staple diet of information that they desire and demand.

Smith: I was drawn in by the belief system, once you’re in, it has a fierce grip on you. It’s like a bizarre symbiotic relationship which is difficult to get out of.

Smith: I’m consumed with it taking over my life, I worked, I work so hard for it and for what? You make enemies, you become careless of the views and feelings of others, you become obsessed with getting the public in the palm of your hand, you have to relocate to Medicorp’s employee housing.

Smith: There’s 2 faces of communication. 1, presenting the public with a particular constructed impression. The 2^nd, the other, betrays the actual reality.

Smith: The credibility of the government lies in the hands of the Media, and now they have the control, the power, the ability to do whatever they choose to do.

Smith: I’m a brilliant liar, to do what I have done. Having to have the capacity to look someone in the eye, and just say the opposite is the truth. You become dillusional, brainwashed. Reality just becomes a blur.




Really happy with the extra work I did with the new script as it isn't as obvious, blunt and the term spin-doctor isn't mentioned anywhere, also it still reads like a stylized noir-esque private detective [which was the style of VO I was going for].