HALLIWELL   My mother died when I was a boy. She was stung on the tongue by a wasp. One minute we were sitting down to breakfast, ten minutes later she was dead.

ORTON   That still leaves your dad.

HALLIWELL   Put his head in the gas oven when I was eighteen. Came down one morning, found him lying there. I switched the gas off, shaved, made a cup of tea and called the ambulance. In that order.

ORTON   I understand. My dad always took a back seat.
Halliwell gets out a pile of manuscripts.

HALLIWELL   My novels.
Orton looks at them.
Anybody can act.
Orton is obviously impressed. He looks at Halliwell’s books as he helps to put them on the shelves.

ORTON   All these books. I’ll never catch up.

HALLIWELL   I’m a cultivated person. You’ll find it rubs off. Dictionary.
He hands Orton the big two-volume Oxford dictionary.
Can you spell?

ORTON   Yes. (Pauses.) But not accurately.
It is a conscious joke and they both laugh. Orton gets some records and puts them on the lower shelves. Confidingly:
I don’t understand Shakespeare.

HALLIWELL   We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.
He gets the TV set going and they settle down in front of it, as the Coronation service starts. After a while Halliwell gets up and draws the curtains.
Improves the contrast.
They watch for a while then Halliwell puts his hand on Orton’s knee.

ORTON   This is a new experience for me. (Pause.)

HALLIWELL   Yes?

ORTON   Television. I’ve never seen it before.
Halliwell goes on playing with Orton, the scene played largely on Orton’s face with the Coronation service over.

HALLIWELL   Do you like it?

ORTON   This?

HALLIWELL   Television.
Orton grins. Halliwell eases Orton’s trousers down and off, with Orton still seemingly glued to the screen, though lifting his legs to enable Halliwell to get his trousers off. Halliwell now has his arm around Orton, who is sitting there in sweater, underpants, socks, but no trousers.

ORTON   It’s the beginning of a new era.
They get up. Halliwell goes into the bathroom. Orton gets into bed. Halliwell is in the bathroom. The music is the build-up to the beginning of Zadok the Priest. Halliwell gets into bed and they kiss. Cut to them lying happily in bed, Orton cradled in Halliwell’s arms as the congregation on television in Westminster Abbey are heard singing ‘All People that on Earth Do Dwell’.

INT. LEONIE ORTON’S HOUSE, LEICESTER. THE PRESENT.

Leonie, her husband George Barnett, Lahr, Anthea (now pregnant).

The tape recorder is on. A child plays under the table.

LEONIE   Are you up here helping John?

ANTHEA   Holding his hand.

LAHR   Did Kenneth ever come up?
Leonie shakes her head.
Did you like him?
George pulls a slight face.