Jersey Bounce: Five Fans Take a Stab At the Finale

INTERIOR: Vesuvio's restaurant. Very late. Carmela alone at a table.

Artie, the restaurateur, and his wife, Charmaine, hovering.

ARTIE: Carm, what can I say?

CARMELA: I just couldn't go back there tonight. At least they didn't touch the bedroom set. My Frette linen . . .

ARTIE: Bleeping feds, right?

CHARMAINE: Artie, your melanzane! (Artie gestures, "Oh right.") So what will you do now?

CARMELA: I don't know. (Welling up.) So much evil in the world, Charmaine.

CHARMAINE: Who's coming for you?

CARMELA: Ro is taking care of Gaby. She's fallen apart. To watch Sil go like that. They said he had no more esophagus.

CHARMAINE: Meadow --

CARMELA: In Vermont with Patsy, studying for her LSATs. That reminds me. I've got to check on A.J. I don't think the doctors are going to bring him out of it this time.

ARTIE: (from the kitchen) Carm, do you know if they got Paulie, too? (To Charmaine) What? Not the Phil thing -- he got what he deserved. Paulie's still got quite a tab.

CARMELA: I don't think he was implicated. (a pause.) I still can't believe it.

CHARMAINE: It'll take time.

CARMELA: Ade, oh Ade.

CHARMAINE: How did they get him?

CARMELA: Christopher. From beyond the grave. Some notes the police found in that dead screenwriter's apartment. In Christopher's hand. And a dog finds her "skeletal remains." All those months, he lied to me, every time I brought up her name. Ran off, my ass. He killed her. He slept with her and he killed her. I will curse him and curse him and . . .

CUT to INT. of a cell. Camera finds hollow-eyed Tony. Camera pans to a TV set tuned to Ebert-Roeper-type movie-review program. Logo of "Cleaver" appears. Camera back on Tony, as one of the commentators is heard.

COMMENTATOR: It's a splatter classic! They spill blood from orifices I didn't know existed! The movie's a hoot! Randy, I gotta give it a thumbs up, too!

FADE-OUT. Over the credits, Billy Joel's "Scenes From an Italian Restaurant."

-- Peter Marks