The Contortionist Chicken

Written By Megan Howett

EXT. THE JOKE SHOP - EVENING Soon before closing time, the camera pans through the door of joke shop. INT. THE JOKE SHOP - CONTINUOUS Inside a family is looking around the shop. The father reaches for a rubber chicken from the top shelf, shows it to a child, who stretches it then drops it on the floor. The family leaves. While the camera focuses on the chicken, the shop keeper's feet can be seen walking past to close the door. The chicken's eyes can be seen darting from side to side. The lights are switched off, leaving a dim light from a sign in the window, and the shop keeper disappears. INT. THE JOKE SHOP - MOMENTS LATER The chicken suddenly jumps up and looks around, panicking. She looks up at the top shelf and squawks. She is clearly nervous and distressed as she begins to finds a way to climb back up. On the first shelf, the chicken encounters a territorial jack-in-the-box, who does not want her to cross the shelf. After a short scuffle where the chicken uses her rubber texture and springy limps to jump on the toy and reach the next shelf, she continues up. Her next obstacle is a shelf covered in spilt fun snaps. The chicken bends and stretches to make her way across the shelf without stepping on any of the snaps. However, after clearing the majority of the snaps, she loses her balance and knock over a whole box. They fall in slow motion to the floor, where the bang and crack like shower off machine gun bullets. Footsteps on the stairs from the flat above the shop can be heard. All of the items in the shop freeze as the owner comes through the door and turns on the light. He looks around, and sees the fallen box, tuts, then returns upstairs to bed, turning off the lights on the way. The chicken breathes a sigh of relief then continues her journey. The next shelf is home to a family of whoopee cushions. Unlike the jack-in-the-box, the whoopee cushions are eager to help the chicken reach her nest. They lay themselves out in line, to be used as trampolines. The chicken jumps across the cushions and grasps the edge of

the top shelf. INT. TOP SHELF - LATER The chicken pans around over to the of her eggs happily and pulls herself up onto the shelf and the camera to show her nest. She clucks excitedly and runs nest. She looks around to check the conditioned before sitting down on top of them. She sighs goes to sleep.