Scenarios III: Stroszek; Nosferatu, Phantom of the Night; Where the Green Ants Dream; Cobra Verde

230 Pages·2019·2.882 MB·English

by  Werner Herzog

Scenarios III
Also by Werner Herzog
Published by the University of Minnesota Press
Of Walking in Ice
Scenarios: Aguirre, the Wrath of God |
Every Man for Himself and God Against All |
Land of Silence and Darkness | Fitzcarraldo
Scenarios II: Signs of Life | Even Dwarfs Started Small |
Fata Morgana | Heart of Glass
Scenarios III
Stroszek
Nosferatu, Phantom of the Night
Where the Green Ants Dream
Cobra Verde
Werner Herzog
Translated by
Krishna Winston
University of Minnesota Press
Minneapolis | London
Stroszek and Nosferatu, Phantom of the Night were originally published in
Germany as Stroszek– Nosferatu. Zwei Filmerzählungen, copyright 1979 by Carl
Hanser Verlag, Munich. Where the Green Ants Dream was originally published
in Germany as Wo die grünen Ameisen träumen, copyright 1984 by Carl Hanser
Verlag, Munich. Cobra Verde was originally published in Germany as Cobra Verde.
Filmerzählung, copyright 1987 by Carl Hanser Verlag, Munich.
All photographs copyright Werner Herzog Film. Courtesy of Werner Herzog Film/
Deutsche Kinemathek.
Translation copyright 2019 by Krishna Winston
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in
a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written
permission of the publisher.
Published by the University of Minnesota Press
111 Third Avenue South, Suite 290
Minneapolis, MN 55401- 2520
http://www.upress.umn.edu
Printed in the United States of America on acid- free paper
The University of Minnesota is an equal- opportunity educator and employer.
25 24 23 22 21 20 19 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Herzog, Werner, author. | Winston, Krishna, translator.
Scenarios III : Stroszek ; Nosferatu, phantom of the night ; Where the green ants dream ;
Cobra verde / Werner Herzog ; translated by Krishna Winston.
Other titles: Drehbücher III. English
Minneapolis : University of Minnesota Press, [2019] | Translation of: Drehbücher III.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019014736 (print) | ISBN 978-1-5179-0781-5 (pb)
Subjects: LCSH: Motion picture plays, German—Translations into English.
Classification: LCC PN1998.3.H477 A25 2019 (print) | DDC 791.43/75—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019014736
Contents
Stroszek
1
Nosferatu, Phantom of the Night
45
Where the Green Ants Dream
99
Cobra Verde
167

Stroszek
Behold! I do not give lectures, or little charity:
When I give, I give myself.
— WALT WHITMAN
Preliminary Remarks
In the screenplay Bruno S. goes by Stroszek as long as his de-
personalized prison identity still clings to him. As the story moves
along, his first name comes more and more to the fore: Bruno.
The crucial feature of this story, also the hardest to describe,
is the constellation of characters. These characters should be al-
lowed to evolve naturally— in a series of situations. When it comes
to Bruno S., the way he evolves will be easiest to predict: approxi-
mately as shown in Lutz Eisholz’s documentary Bruno the Black.
We see him busking in courtyards, commenting on his own paint-
ings, experiencing anger, distrust, and depression in succession.
This film is meant to create a monument to Bruno.
But Scheitz too has enormous potential; it would be a mistake
to label him insane. The French have a nice term for it, para-
phrenic. His contacts with the intelligence service; the mathe-
matical studies with which he reinterprets the world and the
universe, demonstrating that Newton and Einstein were mere
dilettantes; his compositions: all are completely real to him, and
he can hold forth passionately on these things for hours on end.
During the shooting of the Kaspar Hauser film, he engaged in
the most uncanny dialogues with Bruno. Had they been filmed,
1
2 Stroszek
the result would have been a film unlike any the world has ever
seen.
At any rate, the characters in the film should keep their actual
names— at most with slight alterations— because their real iden-
tity plays such an important role. It’s also important that Bruno
usually doesn’t say “I,” referring to himself instead in the third
person as “Bruno” or “Old Bruno.”
As for the other characters, Eva will need a great capacity
for reacting spontaneously, because we can never be sure what
Bruno will do. But she’s an actress who is up to the challenge.
Then Driest and the Prince of Homburg: their faces say it all.
Driest is already well known from The Brutalization of Franz
Blum and the talk show with Romy Schneider. The public hasn’t
seen much of the Prince of Homburg lately; the most likely as-
sociation would be that infamous interview on Second German
Television’s sports program in which he responded to every ques-
tion, from beginning to end, with hostile silence. One sensed that
if the interviewer had asked just one more question he would have
killed him on the spot. The prince received a fairly long prison
sentence after he forced a truck driver on the Autobahn to pull
over when he wouldn’t let him pass, then got out and beat the truck
driver almost to death. His rap sheet includes such subsequent
crimes as breaking into cars, giving false testimony, and, most
recently, pimping. He’s a tough customer, but he insists on hav-
ing a part in the film.
Bud Donohue and Cholo the Indian are real people who work
in Plainfield, Wisconsin. The United States has a number of places
where something like a collective American nightmare can be felt
physically: Wall Street, Las Vegas, San Quentin, Plainfield. The
murders in Plainfield, a forgotten hole in the wall, have become
famous in the annals of crime. Even if you go looking for the town,
you can pass through it before you notice. At most you might de-
scribe it as an intersection of two roads that lead elsewhere.
Since knowledge of the actual people involved makes such a
difference, an attempt will be made on the following pages to de-
scribe them in greater detail.
The film will have a November- ish feel to it.
Stroszek 3
CHARACTERS
Stroszek Bruno S.
Eva prostitute, vagrant
Scheitz Stroszek’s neighbor
Burkhard pimp
Prince of Homburg pimp
Bud Donohue mechanic
Cholo his helper, an Indian
Burhan Yücsel prison inmate
Hoss prisoner pending deportation (looks like Hoss
from the Bonanza family)
Good Boy Beo a type of starling from Borneo, almost as
large as a jackdaw, his speech indistinguish-
able from a human’s
DESCRIPTION OF THE CHARACTERS
Bruno S.: he plays Stroszek. Short, stocky, scruffy. In lieu of a belt
he uses a piece of string to hold up his pants. His fly is usually
open, but he doesn’t notice. Even in winter he goes without socks,
his bare feet in loafers that look as though he fished them out
of the trash. He has small, work- worn hands, the fingernails al-
ways black with dirt. You can tell from looking at him how often
Bruno’s been beaten, and it’s also clear he has spent years behind
bars. He has the look of an abused animal. But behind this exte-
rior lurks a person of deep feeling, as you can tell when he paints
or fools around on the piano. When he’s talking to you, he some-
times grabs you by the middle finger and squeezes. He smokes
a lot. It’s hard to guess his age. His creativity has always been
thwarted. While trying out colors for his paintings one time, he
discovered that blue, yellow, and red, when turned fast on a disk,
produce white. He’d like to publish this discovery. Bruno has a
powerful aura; he projects a compelling, defiant sense of dignity.
He has that rare quality: a glow from within.
Eva (Eva Mattes): she could resemble the character she por-
trayed in Deer Crossing, a role that suits her. She looks rather