Sixty Minutes

by

Jaron Summers

Don Hewitt: We had a sensational show last week on 60 Minutes. How are we going to top it next Sunday?

Mike Wallace: With a thought-provoking study of how dentists rip off old people when they do implants, starring yours truly.

Lesley Stahl: Nice, very nice, Mike. I have an exposé on the way supermarkets cheat shoppers when they run pickles through scanners.

Wallace: Great!

Hewitt: This is not the stuff ratings are made of. You two ought to spend a little more time on stories instead of traveling together.

Stahl: What are you suggesting, Don?

Steve Kroft: You two are inseparable and insufferable. You make Clinton and Monica look like they’re at a church social.

Wallace: If you’re suggesting what I think you’re suggesting, Kroft, then you’re going to be dealing with my lawyers. The idea that Leslie and I would have sex.

Andy Rooney: I’ve seen the tapes of you two. I got to tell you, Mike, I’m sick of your getting your picture broadcast at the beginning of 60 Minutes and Leslie just mentioning me. The two of you ought to be ashamed of each other.

Stahl: No one has any tapes of anything, Rooney. Do you think anyone in the world cares that you’re upset that a pound of coffee only has 14 ounces of beans in it? Get a life, you little chauvinist pig.

Hewitt: Cool it, Leslie. From day one, you’ve done your best to break up this old boys’ club. And Rooney is right. You and Mike have been getting it on. We have the tapes. They’re sensational. I never knew anyone to work under Mike that well.

Wallace: Where’d you get the tape?

Hewitt: Hidden camera on you two last week while we were doing Dr. Death. Now that show had promise. It had everything--conflict, death, drama. It was dang near as good as a public hanging.

Wallace: Hidden camera? That’s outrageous.

Rooney: Puh-leeze, Mike. You’ve used the hidden camera on everyone but your kids. The way you go after ratings makes me sick.

Hewitt: Hey, we live and die by the ratings. You people know that. The question is, how are we going to top Dr. Death? Let’s focus, boys and girl.

Wallace: What if we show Kevorkian offing an old man and an old woman? That’s it! We find an old couple from the middle of the country--running out of food, can’t afford medical care, just hanging on, living on food stamps. Kevorkian kills them both--a double header!

Stahl: Oh, Mike, what a splendid centerpiece for next week’s show.

Kroft: Let me guess. The two of you are going to do it, right? Mike’ll interview the old woman, Leslie’ll wring a few tears out of the old man. Then Dr. Death comes in and pumps them both full of formaldehyde.

Hewitt: The idea has merit.

Kroft: How about we also do a story about Leslie trying to get Mike off at the nearest Holiday Inn? It would certainly go with this tape of them cavorting naked last week.

Wallace: Gimme that tape.

(A struggle. Mike pulls a gun, shoots Steve through the temple, gets the tape, then clutches his heart and falls.)

Wallace: Call 911. I’m dying.

Hewitt: No can do, Mike. I’m getting it all with my hidden camera that looks like a boutonniere.

Wallace: You’re not going to broadcast this?

Hewitt: Double death. It was your suggestion, Mike.

Stahl: Can I do the intro?

Rooney: Isn’t it about time I got to go first?