"At fourteen I decided," "I wasn't going to just let thinks happend to me like they did before." "I was going to hit some dignity." "I was going to take job.*" "Hey!" "Little dude from accross the street!" "I know, I know." "You want a dollar." "Thanks, little dude." "I know what you're thinking" "I just got robbed." "But he didn't steal that money from me," "I gave it to him." "I didn't wait for my father to make me go get a job," "I went out and got one myself." "I didn't mind sweeping, but the pedicures had to stop." "Nice job." "Five dollars." "Even at school, I was determined to take on a new attitude." "Welcome back, Boom Boom." "I guess your dreams weren't your ticket out." "Chris!" "A lot of bad things happened to me at Corleone, but the one good thing was becoming friends with Greg." "Hey, man, what you been up to?" "Same old, same old." "Feels like last year all over again." "I'm tired of being pushed around." "I'm tired of people making fun of me." "I'm tired of getting my butt kicked." "I'm not gonna take it anymore." "Are you a Muslim now?" "No." "What are you gonna do?" "I'm gonna run for class president." "Dude, you're not serious." "Why not?" "What have I got to lose?" "And this isn't just for me." "This is for us." "How are we ever going to get any respect?" "Get popular?" "Get a girl?" "Stop getting beat down?" "How are we ever gonna get treated any better if we don't act like we deserve it?" "Besides, give me one good reason why I shouldn't run." "Give me one more reason." "2x02" "Sous-titres :" "Birdyben/Sixe" "So you're really gonna do this?" "Yep." "All I need to do is get 30 names on this petition and I'm in." "I just want to get started before everyone gets tired of people asking them." "Okay, if you're in, I'm with you." "Good, I need you to do something." "What?" "Anything." "I want you to run with me." "I want you to be my vice president." " No." " Yeah." "Oh, man." "This is great." "I can work behind the scenes." "I can influence the judiciary committee." "I can confer with the joint chiefs." " Create policy!" " Greg... it's the eighth grade." "I know, but this is the best thing that's ever happened to me." "That was until he met Seven of Nine at a Trekkie convention." "The question is:" "Where are we going to get 30 signatures?" "Simple." "From guys like us." " You mean geeks." " Yeah." "Because my father had the gout, my mother made sure he got regular checkups to make sure nothing else went wrong." "So what did the doctor say?" "Why don't you have a seat." "The last time he told her to sit down, it was when Jody Watley left Shalamar." "Jody Watley didn't leave Shalamar again, did she?" "Nothing like that." "You know, my gout's been acting up again, and the doctor says I have high blood pressure." "How did you get high blood pressure?" "High blood pressure, or hypertension is a distress to the cardiovascular system that could be caused by a variety of factors, including obesity, excess salt in the diet, alcohol abuse, as well as hereditary factors." "But one of the main causes of hypertension is stress-- like trying to support a family of five" "on a budget for three." "So what is he trying to say, that your family is killing you?" " Yes." " No." "No..." "He just said I need to reduce my stress." "Baby, what do you have to be stressed out about?" "You have a beautiful wife, two good jobs, and three wonderful kids, a nice home in Bed-Stuy..." "You're stressed?" "I mean, I'm the one who should be stressed." "I got to deal with a house in the ghetto, three crazy kids, a man that's never home, and now I got to deal with you and this high blood pressure." "You're stressed." "Calm down." "I'll be okay." "I'm fine." "My father hated seeming weak." "He wouldn't admit to a headache if he had a hatchet in his head." "Julius, you are not fine, okay?" " You're sick." " I'm fine." "No, you're not." "You're sick." " I'm good." " No, you're not." " I'm okay." " No, you're trying to die." "I'm good, okay?" "Everything." "Okay, Mr. I'm Good..." "Well, what are we supposed to do to reduce your stress?" "Well, the doctor says I'm supposed to participate in some stress-reducing activities," "like golf." "Golfing." "Where are you going to golf?" " Fishing?" " Where you gonna fish, Lake Brooklyn?" "Hiking?" "Come on, man, where you going, Mount Vernon?" " Hammocking?" " Hammock?" "Where are you going to buy a hammock?" "Regular massages?" "Oh, you ain't getting a massage by nobody." "You better price some hammocks." "Stressed." "Now I got to deal with this..." "In 1984, Michael Jackson became the biggest star on Earth, but to my sister Tonya, he couldn't hold a candle to Billy Ocean." "What are you doing?" "I'm learning the steps from "Caribbean Queen."" "There are no steps to "Caribbean Queen."" "Yes, there are." "First he does like this, then he does like this, then he does like this, and then he does this, and he finishes off with this." "He also does the moonwalk, but I don't know how to do that yet." "Billy Ocean doesn't moonwalk." "That's Michael Jackson's move." "Where do you think Michael got it from?" " Peg Leg Bates." " I know how to moonwalk." "Will you show me how to do it?" "First, let me see what you're doing." "That's not the moonwalk." "You look like you're trying to scrape doo-doo off your shoes." "Shut up!" "Nobody asked you!" "Get out!" "Getting my campaign going was hard." "It's not like my daddy was the class president before me." "Man, only eight signatures?" "I thought at least the nerds would support us." "Even they go for the cool people." "Look at this." "Ms. Marello gave it to me." " What?" " It's a popularity poll." "They took a popularity poll?" "And focus groups." "Basically, it says we can't get on the ballot running together." "What are you talking about?" "We appeal to the same base." "Carol, Warren, Terrence Ping." "But we can't let this stop us." "We have to keep trying." "What are we supposed to do, just get popular?" "Look at him." "He'spopular." "DiPaolo?" "He's as dumb as a rock." "Hey, Chris!" "How do you spell "spell"?" "S-P-E-L-L." "He might be dumb, but people like him." "They said the same thing about Fabio." "Chris... can I speak to you for a moment?" "Sure." "About what?" "I know you're having a tough time getting on that ballot, but I think you have a real chance at becoming class president" " if you really want it." " What do you mean?" "You need to rise above your ghetto mentality." "Ghetto mentality?" "I don't have a ghetto mentality." "You do, Chris." "A psychological ghetto." "You won't get supporters because you don't get out of your comfort zone." "I'm sure all your athlete and dancer friends have signed on, but what now?" "You need to reach out, broaden your appeal." "And how am I supposed to do that?" "I don't know." "But I'm confident you'll figure it out." "And remember, Chris:" "Up with hope, down with dope." "Yes, that's one bedroom at $425 a month." "Rochelle with two "L"s." "All right, thank you." "Where are you going?" "The biggest change for my mother was that she decided to do something she hadn't done in years-- keep a job." "Normally, she would do this." "Come on!" "Let's go!" "Move this ugly car out the way!" "What in the hell are you doing?" "!" "I don't need this mess!" "My man has two jobs!" "Two!" "Now she was doing this." "And who was that on the phone?" "The newspaper." "I took out an ad for a new tenant." "A new tenant?" "Rochelle..." "We had tried renting out the apartment upstairs before, but every time we did, we had a problem." "One lady had a crazy dog." "No, no!" "Ms. Parnell!" "No!" "Then we had Levi, the weed guy." "Levi!" "What-a want?" "You got to leave." "What's wrong, man?" "My kids are high." "The Fong family tried to turn the apartment into a Chinese restaurant." "Mr. Fong!" "Mr. Fong, what is this?" "!" "I'm not getting to the back of the line." "You got to shut this down and get the hell out of here." "And give me a number six." "Number six." "Very good." "What you getting?" "Wait, look." "You don't have to do this." "I'll be okay." "I mean..." "All I need to do..." "Baby, just let me do what I got to do." " Rochelle..." " Now just go lay down." "Go." "Lay down!" "After another checkup, my father was trying to get my mother to let up, but the pressure was on." "Chris, pass the salt." "What, are you trying to kill yourself?" "Where's the skin?" "Baby, I had to take it off." "You just gonna give me naked chicken?" "How you supposed to be reducing my stress, by starving me?" "Now I'm worried about being hungry." "You're worried about everybody else stressing me out;" "you're stressing me out." "What?" "I'm stressing you out?" "I'm bending over backwards trying to make things easy for you and I'm stressing you out." "Okay." "Fine." "That face means "What did I say that for?"" "You know what?" "You can eat what you want to eat, do what you want to do." "You don't have to worry about me stressing you out anymore." "You gonna eat that skin?" "After what Ms. Morello had told me," "I knew there was only one way I was gonna broaden my appeal." "I've been thinking about the popularity poll." "Take a look at this." "I've got it all worked out." "So do I." "You're off the ticket." "Go to commercial before both of us start crying." "I hated having to sacrifice my friendship with Greg to get on the ballot, but I knew it would only happen if I could get the most popular person I could find." "Vice president?" "Yeah." "With me." "We can be like Bobby Jones and Henry Bibby on the Sixers." "Can we be like Kevin McHale and Dennisohnson on the Celtics?" "Okay." " What do I have to do?" " Nothing." "Cool." "Hey, everybody." "I'm... home." "Back at home, my father never had it harder than when my mother let him take it easy." "Hey, baby." "What's going on?" "Nothing." "Nothing at all." "There is nothing going on in this house." "When my mother said nothing was going on, here's what it meant to my father:" "You didn't make me something to eat?" "No, I didn't want to stress you out." "You good?" "Good." "I still got to eat." "After trying to moonwalk like Billy Ocean," "Tonya was moving one step forward and two steps back." "Drew." "What?" "Can you teach me to moonwalk?" "I can't get it." "Why do you like Billy Ocean so much, anyway?" "Because, he's the greatest entertainer in history." "He's not better than Michael Jackson." "Shoot, he's way better than Michael Jackson." "I bet you in the future, 20 years from now, nobody's going to remember who Michael Jackson is." "That's why I'm not going to teach you how to do the Michael Jackson moonwalk." "It's the Billy Ocean moonwalk." "Michael Jackson stole it." "Fine." "Have it your way." "Drew, wait." "Can you help me, please?" "I was just joking." "Play the tape." "Drew was always good at pretty much everything." "We're just glad he never liked Riverdance." "Then after you turn..." "do this." "See?" "Cool." "That's right." "That's not right yet." "Your left foot." "Move your hand like this." "Like this?" "It's like this." "See?" "Good." "I was surprised how well things were going for me, but that wasn't the only surprise I got." "Also securing their position as candidates are Joey Caruso and his new vice presidential running mate," "Greg Wuliger." "What's the matter, McAdoo." "Thought you were the only one who knew how to balance a ticket?" "At school, the heat was on, but at home, my dad was still getting the cold shoulder." "Mama, are you mad at Daddy?" "My parents tried to never fight in front of us, but we always knew what was going on." "So how come we didn't wait for him to eat?" "Because you should eat your food and mind your business, that's why." "Ma." "These vegetables taste funny." "Yeah, and why are they so hard?" "Yeah, and why are they so green?" "That's because they're fresh." "You know, they're not out of a can." "Eat." "I like canned vegetables better." "Almost everything we ate came out of cans." "Bacon and eggs." "Hamburger and fries." "We even had ice cream and birthday cake in a can." " Hey, Dad." " Hey, Dad." "Hey." "All right." "Let's see." "All right." "Now this is what I'm talking about." "He's talking about a heart attack." "Thank you, baby." "Pork chops, steak, fried chicken, gravy, mac and cheese-- this is how to relax." "What's that for?" "If you feel like you're about to keel over and die, you can call the hospital for help, 'cause I don't want to stress you out." "Enjoy." "CHRIS FOR CLASS PRESIDENT" "The only thing I hated more than running against Greg was seeing him run with Caruso." "I had kicked him off my team, and now I had to play against him." "Kind of like Shaq and Kobe." "My father found out the only thing harder than dealing with my mother was being left alone." "Who's that?" " Vanessa." " Hey, Vanessa." "Julius said, "Hey." Hey." "Have you seen my other uniform?" "I didn't mess with it;" "I didn't want to stress you out." "No." "No, you wanted me to say it, now, didn't you?" "What's all this?" "That's your stuff." "You did?" "My father never knew when he was starting a war with my mother, and that's why he never won them." " Yes, girl, you know..." " Rochelle?" "Let me call you back." "What?" "Stop it." "Okay?" "I got high blood pressure." "What do you want me to do?" "I don't know, Julius;" "what do you want me to do?" "I don't know, t you running around not talking to me and making me wear dirty clothes and letting me eat by myself ain't helping a thing." "I don't need you to be mad at me." "I was just trying to help you out." "I know." "I'm sorry." "Look, from now on, I'll try to relax." "I'll try to eat better." "Julius, if you are not in this house, this place will fall apart." "And then, the next thing you know, our kids will wind up in the streets." "Drew may wind up in jail, then I'm going to lose my job going to his court cases." "And you know I'm going to do what I have to do to make ends meet." "And if you think I'm going to jail for welfare fraud, you got another thing coming." "So, yes, Julius, we really, really need to think about this." "We need to know what we got to do." "We'll do what we always do:" "deal with it." "I love you." "We'll make it work." "My father never did change his diet." "He didn't do yoga, never took up golfing, didn't even get a hammock." "What he did was find one of the cheapest, medically approved ways of reducing stress:" "earplugs." "I love you so much, baby." "Can I get that massage, now?" "You want a six-iron upside your head?" "Yes!" "What?" "What's wrong, baby?" " I did it, I got it!" " What?" "I can dance like Billy Ocean-- I can do the moonwalk." "Billy Ocean?" "I thought Michael Jackson did the moonwalk." "Michael Jackson stole it." "Look at her." "It's Hammer time." "Yeah, that's my girl." "The hardest thing about winning at any cost is that sometimes that price gets way too high." "I was already paying that price, but I didn't know that Greg was, too." " Hey." " Hey." "What happened?" "You don't want to know." "If I was going to get my friend back," "I knew I had to get out of my comfort zone and do something bold." "I'm sorry." "About what?" "About everything." "I just wanted things to be different." "Sometimes, I think you don't know how it is for me." "You might think I'm different, but I'm not, not really." "I don't get this." "Caruso tore them down." "And when everyone got here tomorrow, they were going to blame you and ruin your campaign." "I wouldn't help, so Caruso kicked me off his ticket." "Hey." "It's okay, leave them." "Not going to make any difference." "What do you mean?" "I'm going to drop out." "I didn't know it would be like this." "I didn't know it would be this hard." "I didn't want to win an election and lose a friend." "No, you have to stay in." " What for?" " "What for?"" "Because you're not just doing this for yourself, you're doing it for us." "You said it yourself." "You're tired of us being pushed around." "You're tired of people always making fun of us." "Remember?" "You're not going to take it anymore." "That's what you said." "Later that year, Oprah ran into Greg at Kmart." "He gave her the same speech, and the rest is history." "I don't want to run without you, and together, we can't win." "Who cares?" "Run with DiPaolo." "Let me be your campaign manager." "Campaign manager?" "Yeah." "We can do this." "I'll manipulate the press corps." "I'll contact the foreign media outlets." "Greg?" "It's the eighth grade." "So are you in?" "Let's do this." "Taking charge wasn't as easy as it sounded, but I was going to run for president, and if nothing else, I finally had some dignity." "RUNNING FOR ASS PRESIDENT" "FRM Team Birdyben/Sixe"