PARTS UNKNOWN

objectdreams:

a play in three acts written with a predictive text imitator

source: all available transcripts of Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown

—————

Methodology:

1. Get all transcripts of the show Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown from cnn.com.

2. Divide transcripts by character and give them to computer program that uses word sequences in a source text to suggest likely words to continue a sentence, like the predictive text function on a smartphone. The program offers a list of top options and the writer picks one of these.

3. Write Bourdain lines using collection of all lines transcript attributes to BOURDAIN; write Unidentified Male lines using collection of all lines attributed to UNIDENTIFIED MALE; write Unidentified Female lines using collection of all lines attributed to UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE.

4. Arrange lines into play.

5. Write stage directions without machine assistance. Add punctuation.

—————

Act 1

Daytime. A modest kitchen in a distant land. American television personality ANTHONY BOURDAIN hunches over a small, bare table opposite an UNIDENTIFIED MALE and an UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE. Behind them, a cracked window gives onto a vast desert. Bourdain moves his hands animatedly, addressing his hosts with utter confidence.

Bourdain: It’s delicious to be a poet of life. I guess what I’m telling you is, I am famous for my great joys and I would like to eat a big thing of the pig. A big bowl of rice might be worth dying for.

Unidentified Female: We have one food here and it’s very bad for sure. We can get a lot of it for you if you like.

Keep reading