""Clapping For The Wrong Reasons" Screenplay" lyrics - CHILDISH GAMBINO

FADE IN

INT. DONALD'S ROOM. - MORNING
DONALD is woken by a knock on his window from an unknown GIRL

GIRL
Phone

DONALD looks over through the window, sits up, puts on his shirt, and walks out to the phone

DONALD
(Into phone)
Hello?

WOMAN (V.O)
Hello, who's this?

DONALD
(A beat)
You called me

WOMAN (V.O)
This is the Callifax Collection Company. Who am I speaking with?

DONALD
I know who you're looking for; he's not here

WOMAN(V.O)
Do you know where he can be reached?

DONALD
What month is it?

WOMAN (V.O.)
Uh, it is June I believe

DONALD
Then he's probably in the Northern Hemisphere somewhere

CUT TO:

INT. KITCHEN - DAY

DONALD fixes himself some cereal and grabs a bottle of San Pelligrino out of the fridge

When leaving, we see that MISLA, STEFAN, and EMILY are sitting eating cereal, too

EMILY
Fam was just yelling, "Yo, this is Connect Four, not chess"

STEFAN throws up on the floor, and the two girls stop talking and look at him

CUT TO:

EXT. POOL AREA - MORNING

DONALD crosses to FAM, sitting on the edge of the outdoor couch, using his computer

DONALD
Your girl woke me up

FAM
Who?

DONALD
Your girl

FAM
I don't have a girl here. It might be Swank's

DONALD
Anybody coming in today?

FAM
I don't know. Eighty Five might roll through

An airplane flies overhead

DONALD
I love airplanes

FAM
My daddy, he had me on an airplane

DONALD
He had you on an airplane?

FAM
It's like that weird Bill Cosby episode where-

DONALD
-With the Muppets?

FAM
He gave birth to sandwiches

DONALD
-Sandwiches and an orange soda, yeah

FAM
Yeah but that was me on an airplane. It was weird

DONALD
That's like...what's the one with Arnold Schwarzenegger?

FAM
Oh yeah, with Danny Devito?

DONALD
Nah, that's "Twins"

FAM
Classics, regardless

DONALD
The one with the guy where he's pregnant

FAM
"Baby Mama"?

DONALD
Nah, man. It's called uh...fuck!

FAM
"Kindergarten Cop" with Gary Coleman?

DONALD
"Junior."

FAM
"Junior." That's really good

CUT TO:

INT. HOUSE - MORNING

DONALD walks up to a Buddha statue and lights incense, and then inhales from his Pax vaporizer

CUT TO:

INT. PRODUCTION ROOM. - LATE MORNING

DONALD and LUDWIG are sitting and making beats. Donald is playing with his Pax and humming

LUDWIG
You think we're gonna use that uh, that other song you did?

DONALD
Which one?

LUDWIG
The one with the slow 80's sound

DONALD
(Mimicking the sound)
I don't know. Play it

LUDWIG
I don't have it

DONALD plays said beat. They both begin nodding their heads to it

DONALD
I like that. We could something that's like
(Hums another beat sound)
'Cause no one raps over that

Behind them, a knock on the window from outside is heard. It is the same unknown GIRL from before

GIRL
Your brother wants you

DONALD turns to LUDWIG questioningly

DONALD
Do you know her?

LUDWIG shakes his head, and DONALD gets up

CUT TO:

STAIRCASE

DONALD dribbles a basketball up the stairs into STEVE's room, and throws the ball downstairs once he reaches the top

STEVE, SWANK, and MISLA are talking and playing video games

DONALD
Your room is disgusting

SWANK
It's not...that crazy

STEVE
That's debatable

But yo, Misla swears she's seen more vaginas than me. In real life

MISLA
Listen, I am a woman. I am in locker rooms, in like gyms, whatever. I see naked women all the time. Forever, too. Not just since puberty

SWANK
Before puberty have been searching for naked women and I'm here now and that's all I do

STEVE
You gotta point. 'Boutta say man, how many vaginas have you accidentally seen?

SWANK
Wait, me?

STEVE
Both

SWANK
It's never been an accident

MISLA
It's not an accident for me either

DONALD
What??

The others laugh

STEVE
That's even weirder

DONALD
(To STEVE)
You sent your girl down there for this?

STEVE
I didn't send a girl

DONALD
Swank?

SWANK
Not me. I'm looking for new girls

SWANK
You got girls, downstairs?

MISLA
Of course it's not my girl. Why would I bring girls here?

SWANK
Yeah, Misla never brings girls for anybody

STEVE laughs, and MISLA throws something at SWANK

DONALD walks out

STEVE
(To DONALD)
Yo, if that girl's cute, tell her to come upstairs, though

EXT. LAWN. - DAY

MISLA is wearing traditional karate garb, practicing her forms on the grass

She does a short routine and bows

CUT TO:

EXT. POOL AREA - MORNING

LUDWIG is playing on his guitar. He plays for a short while.

CUT TO:

EXT. POOL - MORNING

DONALD is leaning over the side to talk to EMILY who is swimming

DONALD
What did you think of track seven?

EMILY
I don't know. It was okay. I don't know about the second one though. It wasn't scary enough

DONALD
What do you mean scary? It wasn't scary enough?

EMILY
You're not scary

DONALD
I'm pretty scary. I can be scary when I wanna

EMILY
Try

DONALD pushes EMILY's head underwater

DONALD
Totally scary

She comes back up and spits water on him

DONALD
Totally missed

EMILY splashes him

DONALD
Alright

DONALD pauses, and backs up, off screen

He runs, and jumps into the water. EMILY screams

DONALD
My phone's in my pocket!

CUT TO:

INT. HOUSE (FRONT DOOR) - DAY

An unknown person walks in and steps out of his shoes

He kicks them off onto a sea of other shoes

CUT TO:

INT. PRODUCTION ROOM - DAY

DONALD is demoing a song to a few others. They are listening along and the power goes out

DONALD
Oh shit

TRINIDAD JAMES
That was tight

DONALD
The power went out

STEFAN
It was too turnt up

CUT TO:

INT. REC. ROOM - DAY

CHANCE and TRINIDAD JAMES are playing a quiet game of Connect Four

CHANCE
(In a funny voice)
This decision is pivotal

CHANCE places a piece into the game, and TRINIDAD JAMES does the same, back and forth

TRINIDAD JAMES
Thanks

CHANCE
God damnit, did I just tweak? I just did it

TRINIDAD JAMES places his winning piece, and CHANCE observes

CHANCE
God damnit!

CHANCE screams and walks away. TRINIDAD JAMES laughs

CUT TO:

EXT. LAWN. - DAY

CHANCE and DONALD are having a push-up contest

STEVE and TRINIDAD JAMES are watching

CHANCE
You're old, Donald

DONALD
You're homeless. I can do this all day. I feel great. I'm getting an erection. Oh man, I'm so hard

STEVE
Stained. I can see it

TRINIDAD JAMES
I feel like Chance's hat might pop off

CHANCE
These are hat on pushups.

DONALD
Go all the way down when someone makes you do pushups

CHANCE falls over, exhausted

DONALD screams at CHANCE in victory

CUT TO:

EXT. PATIO - DAY

Donald is DJing Kyle's song "Fruitsnacks", STEFAN is dancing behind him

STEFAN waves at the mysterious GIRL

DONALD stops DJing and turns to STEFAN, who is still dancing even with the absence of music

DONALD
Do you know her?

STEFAN
No

DONALD
Then why'd you wave?

STEFAN
I'm a gentleman

CUT TO:

INT. LEMON TREE GARDEN - AFTERNOON

DONALD is sitting against a tree and holding the lemons that DANIELLE picks and hands to him

DANIELLE
I've had the most strangely reoccurring dreams over the last week. And uh, it's like of my wedding, but nothing is going right. Everything's a disaster. My guests are all there, it's all of my real life friends. They all look gorgeous. They're all like fully done up in their gowns that they're probably going to wear to the wedding, my family is there. But suddenly I realize I should've been married by now, and I'm not married, I'm not in my wedding dress. I'm all alone, in this giant area where I see my guests being served their cocktail appetizers off of paper plates. Everyone seems to be having a great time, but they're eating off of paper plates. But I am wearing cargo pants. Army cargo pants

DONALD
Like Old Navy?

DANIELLE
Yeah, exactly. Like Old Navy cargo pants. I don't own Old Navy cargo pants. I'm not even sure where that came from in my head, but I'm wearing that with a T shirt and I'm supposed to be getting married. My hair's not done, my makeup's not done. And my mom comes in and asks me, "Why aren't you getting ready for your wedding?" And I'm like "Oh, I will be, I will be" but suddenly I'm smoking a cigarette, I even don't know why I'm smoking a cigarette, but in my mind I also that I'm three or four weeks pregnant. Horrible, right? So I tell my mom, "Mom, you don't know this, but I'm three or four weeks pregnant" and she says not "Put down the cigarette", she says, "Maybe you should get into your wedding dress". It's all very, very weird. I'm not sure what it means at all

DONALD
I think we have too many lemons

DANIELLE
One more?

DONALD
Yeah

DANIELLE
And these two

DONALD
Yeah, some of them. That'll be enough

DANIELLE
We can make guacamole

CUT TO:

INT. PIANO ROOM / EXT. POOL - DUSK

STEFAN is playing the piano. His music transitions to:

The legs of an unknown person balancing and walking along the edge of the pool

CUT TO:

A MONTAGE:

A group of people are dancing around speakers. Assumingly, music is playing, but the events of that scene are muted, and replaced by the dialogue of...

INT. MOVIE ROOM. - NIGHT

DONALD and FLYING LOTUS are exchanging verses they've written

FLYING LOTUS

Investing time on writing lies, slightly truth without a clue
I met my higher self, pissing off the roofs of drunken goofs
He said "keep the mic smelly like a rotten tooth"
And all your fears forgotten when the Cap is in the booth
I'm an angel in an agony of flame
Feathers growing at the mention of my name, reinvention of my shame
I'm a slave to the darkness of my innermost cave
And all these words I hold tighter than a glowstick at a rave, nigga
Dance around the camp fire, buttnaked, blowing trees
Could give a single fuck if somebody sees, I'm free
Red "V" bleed out a scarlet letter, kill a king
And I'll sitting ready for whatever weather the seasons sing
Picking up expensive habits, chasing after little rabbits
Hope they lead me to a place of magic
Sad at all the times I never thought I had it
Losing all these memories, and y'all doubt it matters...
Patterns

DONALD
Mouth to a Pellegrino, bottle color of envy
Who the fuck is Gambino, I hand a waitress a benji
To act like she never met me, I'm saying though
They want the game changed when your shit on the radio
Fruit was so hanging low, I didn't even bother
She tryna land Obama's, man she get it from her mama
I don't blame her, I tame her, give her something to visualize
On my couch watching DVR'd "American Dad"
Man those new Celine bags are so to die for
I'm in that Porsche on Prozac, them suicide doors
Watch her walk as the death becomes her
'Cause Mrs. Tarantino kill bills, no wonder
My heaven is the present, so maybe this is it.
Pray to God every night to make me believe he exists
Drink a fifth of vodka, I don't need no sponsor,
Heard a preacher holler, make him hold these souls

And that's when like the hook...

FLYING LOTUS
Yeah that's tight. I like that

You know you got a little...

He points to DONALD's nose, and DONALD touches it to find blood dripping

DONALD
Oh shit

FLYING LOTUS
Yeah

DONALD gets up, and runs to the bathroom

FLYING LOTUS(CONT'D)
Wow

CUT TO:

INT. BATHROOM - NIGHT

DONALD examines his nose in the mirror, surprised by the bleeding

He looks for the source of all the blood, and notices and obstruction in his nasal passage- it's a string

Nauseated and scared, he pulls the long, blood soaked string while gagging and coughing. Finally, he dislodges the string and what is attached at the end, a golden tooth

He places it next to the sink and washes his hands, as the sound of the running water transitions into a similar sound of the shower water as DONALD now sits in the shower

He is still, and his back is to us

CUT TO:

EXT. POOL AREA - NIGHT

DONALD and FAM are sitting next to a bonfire, eating s'mores and swapping childhood stories

FAM
I remember being seventeen, being scared as hell. Getting prank calls, like crazy stuff. Just like senior year in high school. Had a lot of girls, it's crazy. So, this one girl, she was super crazy, she would call my phone from a blocked number, and it was her. But then I started getting like the crazy death threats. Started as a joke, then they knew exactly what kind of car I was driving, where I liked to hang out. Then they started shooting in the area, so I couldn't sleep at home anymore. Went and got a gun from my friend. Started sleeping on the street for a week. The scariest thing about it all though, is having a gun knowing you might have to use it. scarier than than killing somebody is thinking about killing somebody. Sometimes you can't explain why things happen. Those seven days, man, just couldn't handle it. Just couldn't handle it. You just get to that point like why did I get here? Sometimes they just do

DONALD
When I was like five or six, we were living in Decatur, in the projects. On Commerce Drive. It's nice now, but like we were living there and I remember my mom's friend. Like a friend of the family. This kid like... Something happened, I didn't understand it but he had to stay with us for a couple of day. I didn't really understand it. But we didn't have any space. So he had to sleep in my bed. I remember in the morning waking up and he was like "Let's rub butts". I was like "okay" like whatever I did it. And I didn't really get it. And then I turned, when we turned he kissed me

FAM
He kissed you?

DONALD
Yeah. Like you said, I don't know why it happened. I don't know why it happened

FAM
Did anybody like know about this?

DONALD
Nah, just him

FAM
That's wild

DONALD
It's crazy

FAM
Like I said, sometimes you just can't explain things

DONALD
I'm gonna go inside

FAM
Alright, I gonna stay out here, man

DONALD begins to walk inside as we...

CUT TO:

HALLWAY

DONALD is walking to his room, as the GIRL passes him in the opposite direction

He turns, quizzically

DONALD
Who are you?

She doesn't respond, or even look at him, and keeps walking. Donald continues walking to his room

CUT TO:

INT. DONALD'S ROOM. - NIGHT

He is flying face up, eyes closed. The phone rings and he opens his eyes

He leans over and picks up the phone

WOMAN (V.O.)
Hello, who's this?

DONALD immediately hangs up, looks down for a moment, and takes off his sweatshirt and shirt

He lies down and falls back asleep

FADE OUT