"Dating Slump," Scenes 2 and 3

We go to the apartment, "later that night":

SHIRLEY IS WORKING ON A CLAY SCULPTURE.  SHE IS TRYING TO GET DUANE THE CANARY TO SIT STILL.

SHIRLEY

Duane, you turn your back on me once more and I start plucking feathers.  Now, that's better...  Duane, you know I was just kidding, coo, coo, coo.

She's much less threatening onscreen, where she tells the other canary, Eddy, to get out of the way and she'll do him in watercolors next.

Onscreen, they had to add that Carmine was back from New York as the Golden Gloves champion, since we didn't get that information from the missing scene.  And Shirley thinks she's going to the ball game with Carmine, and assumes that his legs are broken when Laverne says he can't go.  On the other hand, after Shirley asked about Carmine's face, there was this in the script:

SHIRLEY

...Is his nose still there?

LAVERNE

He seemed fine, but...

SHIRLEY

(HOLDING UP THE SCULPTURE) Do you think I've captured Duane's beak?

In the script, Shirley "starts to twist the clay in her hands" after Laverne tells her that "love" was Carmine's "exact words."  So then Laverne asks, "Why'd you take Duane's head off?", after Shirley says she's happy for Carmine.

Shirley is more visibly upset onscreen when Carmine comes by, so Laverne offers to tell Carmine that Shirley is in the tub, but Shirley says she can handle this.

This is how it goes in the script:

LAVERNE OPENS THE DOOR.  THERE'S CARMINE WITH A NICE GIRL.

LAVERNE

HI, Carmine.

CARMINE

Hey, good, you're still up.

SHIRLEY

Hello, Carmine, and you must be Miss New York.

 CARMINE

Shirley, Laverne, meet Rhonda.

RHONDA

(READING THE SITUATION) Hi, it's so nice to meet you, but maybe we've come at a bad moment.

LAVERNE

(TRYING TO GET RID OF THEM) Yeah, Shirley has to finish a project for class and I was just getting ready for bed.

RHONDA

I asked Carmine to call first.  We can come back another time.

LAVERNE

That might be better.

SHIRLEY

(EXPANSIVE AND PHONY) Nonsense!  What kind of person would I be if I turned away my dearest friend and his newest acquaintance?  Come in, come in, Rhonda.  Sit down and be comfortable.  Remember, what's mine is yours.

LAVERNE REACTS.

CARMINE

That's my Shirl... Rhonda, if there's anything you want to know about me, just ask Shirl.  She knows me better than anyone.

SHIRLEY

How sweet.

CARMINE

Laverne, let's get something to eat.

LAVERNE

Why?

CARMINE

So they can be alone for a second.  They'll get to know each other better.

LAVERNE

(HEADS FOR KITCHEN)  Okay.  I think I got some farmer cheese left over from this morning.

CARMINE

(TO SHIRLEY) Tell her about how we knew each other since the eighth grade.  (GOES TO LEAVE BUT STOPS)  I told her a lot about you, Shirl.  Tell her about you, Rhonda.  Shirl can tell you about herself too.  You both...

SHIRLEY

(SCREAMS) Carmine!

CARMINE

I'll try the farmer cheese.

CARMINE GOES TO THE KITCHEN.  ANGLE ON SHIRLEY AND RHONDA AND SILENCE.  SHIRLEY HAS THE SCULPTURE IN HER HAND.

SHIRLEY

Well, here we are.

RHONDA

Yeah...  I couldn't help but notice, you sculpt.

SHIRLEY

Oh, I dabble a bit.  But let's not talk about me.  Laverne tells me you two met at the fights.  A bit savage for my tastes.

RHONDA

Oh, I agree.  But my brother was fighting.  I was worried he'd get hurt.

SHIRLEY

I was always worried about Carmine getting hurt.

RHONDA

Well, stop worrying.  Carmine's going to get a regular job, now.

SHIRLEY

Oh.

RHONDA

Yeah, he's gonna become a dancing teacher at Ellen Cooper's Ballroom Basics Studio.  He's very good at it.  Very graceful.

SHIRLEY

I've been telling him to do that for years, and you just mentioned it and...  Lovely, very lovely.  I wonder why he just changed his mind?

RHONDA

Oh, I don't know.

SHIRLEY

I'll bet... Well, tell me about yourself, my dear, do you work?

RHONDA

Oh yes, I'm an information girl for the telephone company.

SHIRLEY

Isn't that fascinating.

RHONDA

You don't like me, do you?

SHIRLEY

(TAKEN ABACK, STAMMERS) What!  Oh, of course, I like you.  I love information girls.  Four-one-one, I know you by heart.

RHONDA

Carmine told me so many nice things about you.  I really hoped we could be friends...  Carmine, I'm really tired from the trip. Let's go.

CARMINE

One second.  I like to empty my plate.

LAVERNE

And our refrigerator.

RHONDA STANDS.  SHIRLEY KNOWS SHE IS WRONG.  SHE BRINGS OVER THE SCULPTURE.

SHIRLEY

Rhonda, I like you.  I guess I just felt that... you see I...

RHONDA

I understand.  I'm sure I'd feel the same way.

SHIRLEY

(NICE) You know I'm really just a beginner at this sculpture thing.

RHONDA

Well, it's a good beginning.  I mean, it looks like modern art.

SHIRLEY

If you want, maybe you'll come to class with me.

RHONDA

I'd like that.

CARMINE AND LAVERNE WALK OVER.

CARMINE

Thanks for the food.  Good night, Laverne, good night, Shirley.  (TO RHONDA) Let's get moving, Angel Face.

RHONDA WAVES AND EXITS TO A SHOCKED LAVERNE AND SHIRLEY.

CARMINE (CONT'D)

She really wants you to like her.

LAVERNE

Oh, we do.  We do.

CARMINE EXITS.

The only parts of that that made it onscreen were Carmine being glad the girls were still up, him becoming a dance instructor (at Marjorie Ward's Ballroom Basic and Advanced Dance Studio), and him calling Rhonda "Angel Face."  (Which I believe was not capitalized in previous scripts.)  Even the food Laverne offers is different in the filmed version.

In the script, Laverne just calls the now absent Rhonda a floozy and a bimbo, rather than the string of insults she offers on camera.  And Shirley's reaction, and Laverne's response to that, are different in the script:

SHIRLEY

Don't be ridiculous.  She seemed like a nice girl.

LAVERNE

Of course, that's part of the act.  To get at his money, she'd even be nice.

SHIRLEY

Carmine has no money.  I think she's a terrific girl and probably the best thing that could have happened to him.

LAVERNE

Yeah, I think so, too.

The part about Shirley asking why Laverne said those things about Rhonda, and Laverne replying that she wanted to be on Shirley's side, were kept.  The stuff about Rhonda's height and age were added and then there's a little time skip.

In the script, Shirley has the clay ball in her hand as she and Laverne walk into the bedroom.  The next scene is "continuous action," so the girls aren't dressed for bed as they are onscreen.

THE GIRLS ENTER.  SHIRLEY PUTS DOWN CLAY AND TURNS DOWN HER BED.

LAVERNE

Shirl, honest, how do you feel about Carmine's having a girl friend?  [Yes, there's a space in "girlfriend."]

SHIRLEY

Well, actually seeing him standing there with another girl... made me sick.

The transitional dialogue onscreen is Laverne's "Come on, Shirl."  In both versions she says that Shirley never loved Carmine in the sense of " 'I love you' love."  This was left out, after Shirley says she always thought she'd be the one to find someone first:

LAVERNE

Yeah, that would have been better.

SHIRLEY

I think they're right for each other.  I'm really happy for him.

They omitted the following, after Laverne says Shirley passed up a lot of dates because she had "good ole Carmine":

SHIRLEY

Carmine had nothing to do with my saying no.  I only go on dates when there is obviously a chance for a meaningful relationship.

LAVERNE

Those guys come along about twice a year...  if you're lucky.

SHIRLEY

It's worth waiting.

LAVERNE

Shirl, you can't always tell about a guy right away.  It can't always be love at first sight.  Some guys grow on you.  You expect bells right away.

SHIRLEY

You wait for bells - you get bells.

LAVERNE

You don't understand the secret of dating.  if you don't mingle you stay single.

SHIRLEY

You mean, I'm, all of a sudden, supposed to just lower my standards?

In the script, Howie Ratskin slept outside their door all night, rather than the three nights in a row of the filmed version.  Also, they added him writing "I love you, Laverne" all over his sister's face.

Also in the script, Laverne says of sitting at home without a date, "You start moping, staring at the walls.  You talk back to the television.  You fall apart," while onscreen she resorted to strip solitaire.

Shirley's speech about defying loneliness was added.  In the script, she picks up the clay and says she has her hobbies.  Then she "slaps the clay into Laverne's hand."  So after Shirley exits, "Laverne throws clay at bathroom door."  Shirley says, "I heard that hostility."  Laverne predicting Shirley will do some pretty weird things was added, as a segue to Shirley taking apart the telephone in the next scene.

Thoughts:

• I prefer the opening of this scene onscreen because, one, Shirley is less hostile, and two, it includes Eddy as well as Duane.  (I'm going to assume "One Flew Over Milwaukee" was filmed by then, since it aired two weeks after this script.)
• There's definitely more about Shirley's sculpting in the script, while onscreen she forgets about it once Laverne starts sharing the news about Carmine.
• There's a tense, brittle, almost Bette Davis in All About Eve quality to Shirley in the way she interacts with Rhonda in the script.  I can picture Davis on "What kind of person would I be if I turned away my dearest friend and his newest acquaintance?"  A bit of this comes through onscreen, but much less.
• On the other hand, Rhonda reads the situation and yet must know how it hurts Shirley to hear that Rhonda got him to quit boxing for dance instruction.  So that has a slightly Anne Baxter in All About Eve feel.  (I guess in this scenario, Carmine is Gary Merrill, and Laverne is Thelma Ritter and/or Celeste Holm.)
• Onscreen, both Carmine and Rhonda are oblivious to what Shirley feels.  Well, he's pretty clueless in the script, too.
• I have never heard of farmer cheese before.  It looks like it's similar to ricotta.
• So Carmine and Shirley met in the eighth grade?  We know that canonically they dated all through high school, but I was never clear if they knew each other as far back as the Core Four all do.  This script suggests he's a relative newcomer to that group.
• If they had kept Rhonda working for the phone company, that might've explained Shirley dismantling the phone, which is not actually in the script.  (But now I guess it's subtext.)
• Wow, Rhonda just straight out says she can tell Shirley doesn't like her!  That's a bit much, but it does give an extra layer to the scene.
• Oh, Shirl, it made you sick?  Arm-pat.
• We get additional insights into the girls' different dating philosophies.
• And, yes, what a missed Hello Moment, both from a humor standpoint and a shipping moment, Laverne's "It can't always be love at first sight.  Some guys grow on you" could've been.
• This is one of those scenes that doesn't quite work in the script but I nonetheless find fascinating, in an alternative universe sort of way.