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    The Borgia Apocalypse: The Screenplay
    The Borgia Apocalypse: The Screenplay
    The Borgia Apocalypse: The Screenplay
    Ebook110 pages1 hour

    The Borgia Apocalypse: The Screenplay

    By Neil Jordan

    4/5

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    About this ebook

    From Academy Award-winning screenwriter Neil Jordan comes THE BORGIA APOCALYPSE, the epic conclusion to Showtime’s acclaimed TV series THE BORGIAS, which was cancelled after its third season. Fans left wanting more can now read the screenplay for the two-hour finale and see how Jordan planned to bring the family to a suitably apocalyptic end.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherInkWell Publishing
    Release dateAug 12, 2013
    ISBN9781301294091
    The Borgia Apocalypse: The Screenplay
    Author

    Neil Jordan

    Neil Jordan is the author of several critically-acclaimed novels including Mistaken, The Dream of a Beast, Sunrise with Sea Monster, Shade, and Night in Tunisia, a collection of short stories which won the Guardian Fiction Prize. He has written, directed and produced a large number of Academy Award-winning films including The Crying Game, Michael Collins, Interview with a Vampire, The End of the Affair, and Ondine. He was the Creator and Executive Producer of the Emmy-nominated Showtime series The Borgias. He lives in Dublin.

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    Reviews for The Borgia Apocalypse

    4/5

    9 ratings4 reviews

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    • 1/5
      Disappoint does not cut it with this screenplay. I loved The Borgias , Lucrezia killing her Father and her Brother! You go from “ your touch is the only one that soothes me” to murder. God is in the room with us to murder , we know this story is not a strictly true historical account , therefore as a viewer I see Cesare getting stronger and Lucrezia at his side. Yes it is incest, yes it is wrong but I think the love the have for one another transcends our 22nd century sensibilities.
    • 5/5
      So glad to have an ending for this story, no less dramatic than the 3 seasons of the TV show. I was not disappointed in it as were some of the other reviewers.
    • 5/5
      Satisfied with the ending of this. Wish I could have seen it played out in the series or a movie.
    • 1/5
      I read quite a few terrible reviews before I finally picked up this screenplay, but I chose to ignore them because I enjoyed the Showtime series while it was on. In hindsight, however, I definitely should've just taken the advice and boycotted this one. That being said (and I admit this reluctantly), I think that given the limitations that the writer had to work with that this effort was doomed from the beginning. To be fair, I do think that if the series HAD been permitted to continue that Neil Jordan could've concluded the show in a much more suitable fashion....he just needed the proper time to write and more importantly stage the story. Even though the series was never very committed to historical accuracy, it was at least entertaining....this mess is neither of those. Since Jordan's hand was forced, what we received instead is a bizarre short story that seems to have nothing really to do with either the story line that the show was following or the actual Borgia family (and it's AWFUL). If you were a fan of the show, do yourself a favor and skip this.

      1 person found this helpful

    Book preview

    The Borgia Apocalypse - Neil Jordan

    INTRODUCTION

    I first wrote about the Borgias as an historical film. It was the second historical subject I had attempted – the first was Michael Collins, the film I made for Warner Brothers about the Irish guerrilla leader and the Irish War of Independence. On Michael Collins, I experienced the dilemma of the historical screenplay – the mass of material that has to be encapsulated within a two-hour time frame. So when Dreamworks suggested that I develop a Borgia project as a cable series for Showtime, I saw it as a unique opportunity to write a 40-hour film, about power, religion and sex in the Renaissance period. It would be as lurid and dramatic as any Jacobean drama, but over four seasons, long enough to do justice to the complexity of the times and the family.

    Halfway through the shooting of the third season, I received word that the new regime at Showtime might not want to continue with the fourth. The series was expensive to produce, since we always did our utmost to do justice to the architecture, design and costume of the period, however free we allowed ourselves to be with the actual events. The ratings were steady, if not spectacular, but there was a large network of avid fans, who followed the machinations of the family, their loves, their losses, their tragedies with absolute devotion. As a compromise I proposed a two-hour film, which would bring the story of the family to a satisfactory and apocalyptic conclusion. For a variety of reasons, mainly cost, Showtime decided not to proceed with the two-hour film.

    I am presenting this screenplay as an ebook to show those fans how the story they love so much would have concluded. Screenplays are not novels, not really even plays, they are like architectural sketches for an unconstructed city. But they do tell a story, through dialogue, and one of the great pleasures of writing The Borgias was the realisation that cable viewers and fans actually care about dialogue in a way that a cinema audience no longer does. This was a totally unexpected blessing to me as a writer, since I could return to the basic pleasure of words, and let the characters be defined, and refined, through the words they spoke.

    So here we have the words. We don’t have the pictures, the costumes, the actors, but the fans at least can read how I would have concluded the story. And since the most avid fan of the series was myself, I should state that I am available to direct this, should Showtime ever change their minds.

    Neil Jordan

    INT. ALPHONSO’S PALACE. DAWN.

    A pair of white-slippered feet walk up the magnificent staircase.

    A servant girl comes down, with a pile of bloodied blankets in her hands.

    She steps back and bows, in confusion.

    SERVANT GIRL

    Holiness...

    It is the Pope of Rome.

    INT. LUCREZIA’S BEDROOM. DAWN.

    The dead and bloodied body of Alphonso on the bed. The Pope enters, in the deep background.

    He looks at the scene, shocked. He takes Alphonso’s dead wrist in his hand.

    Then he falls to his knees, begins the prayer of Last Rites.

    ALEXANDER

    Requiscat in pacem...

    And we hear a voice, O.S.

    CESARE (O.S.)

    Back the cart into the stable gates. We can’t leave a trace of-

    And as he enters, with Rufio, the Pope raises his head.

    ALEXANDER

    What is this?

    He gestures to the bed.

    ALEXANDER (CONT’D)

    This outrage? This crime? This unholy mess?

    CESARE

    I can explain, Father –

    Alexander looks down at the body. The blood everywhere. The wound.

    ALEXANDER

    No. No-one can explain this.

    Cesare turns to Rufio.

    CESARE

    Leave us –

    Alexander stands.

    ALEXANDER

    Are you to become your brother? Who in the end could not be trusted with a public whipping?

    CESARE

    Father, he assaulted me –

    And Alexander hits him, open palmed, across the face.

    ALEXANDER

    And you, what? Did him to death? Our son in law? Under our protection? In the palace we provided for his safety?

    CESARE

    I will clean up this mess, father –

    ALEXANDER

    Oh yes, you will. Another body will be fished from the Tiber. Another drunkard arraigned for some night- time brawl. You will wash this palace clean of blood. And you will recall your manservant...

    CESARE

    Micheletto?

    ALEXANDER

    Who alone could be trusted with such matters.

    CESARE

    He doesn’t speak to me. Of late.

    ALEXANDER

    Well then. Get him to speak to me...

    INT. THE BORGIA VILLA. DAWN.

    Lucrezia, in a bath. She is being bathed by her mother, Vanozza.

    LUCREZIA

    Take me out of here, mother.

    VANOZZA

    You would leave me here alone?

    LUCREZIA

    I am afraid of him now. The one I

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