by Mark Goldblatt.
Newsday, March 20, 1995
THE WOMAN LAY flat on her back in the crosswalk at Lexington Avenueand 33rd Street. She looked to be in her sixties, salt-and-pepper hair,dressed in a smart gray business outfit with low black heels and a matchingpurse. Her legs were crossed. Her arms were limp at her sides. There wasa perfect halo of blood behind her head.
Oh those wacky bicycle messengers - at it again! As the crowd of onlookersgathered around her, I was able to piece together from their comments whathad happened. The woman was standing on the southeast corner, waiting forthe light to change; after it did, she stepped off the curb and into thestreet, heading for the southwest corner.
But then, three steps into the crosswalk, she had been spun to the groundby the southbound messenger - who was speeding up trying to beat the westboundtraffic. As I watched the ambulance crew stabilize the woman's neck, thenload her onto a stretcher, I wondered if the writers of "Double Rush,"the new CBS sitcom about a New York City bicycle messenger service mightfind a way to work this particular scene into a future episode.
Already there has been a storyline in which the owner of the service,played by Robert Pastorelli (Eldin, from "Murphy Brown"), betthe future of the company that one of his messengers could beat the champof a rival company in an all-out race through the streets of Manhattan;another episode featured a contest among Pastorelli's own messengers tosee who could deliver the most packages in one afternoon - the winner gota $250 bonus.
You'd think, with plots like these, the writers might be able to usea scene or two of the kind I witnessed on 33rd Street. But if that onedoesn't appeal to them, I've got lots more.
Last week, for example, I was toting home two heavy sacks of groceries.At the corner of Fifth Avenue and 34th, I stopped several feet from thecurb to wait for the WALK signal; I had just set down the bags when I heardan ear-splitting whistle folowed by the shout, "Outta the way, m------r."
The messenger, utilizing the sharp decline of the avenue to build upspeed, flew up the ramp-edge of the curb, onto the sidewalk before I wasable even to turn my head around. He zoomed by so fast that his curse hadDoppler effect on it; he zoomed by so close that his wooosh lifted thecollar of my shirt. By the time I caught sight of him again, amid a wakeof scattering, scrambling pedestrians, he had already covered half theblock toward 33rd Street. Those scamps! Ya gotta love 'em!
Then, too, there was the time when a messenger, waving a straight razor,chased a homeless man down West 49th Street because the homeless man hadaccidentally nudged the messenger's parked bicycle with his shopping cart.Or the time a messenger darted onto a sidewalk and shot the gap betweenan old woman and her small dog, snagging its leash like the ribbon at theend of a hundred-yard dash, and dragging the dog, on its stomach, for 25feet before the two became disentangled.
Or the time a messenger stuck out his hand and grabbed a young woman'scrotch as he cruised through a crowded crosswalk, calling back, "Nicep---y!" Now that's comedy!
The obvious question, in fact, is why the producers of "DoubleRush" would settle for just a television series? It seems to me thatthe natural vehicle (so to speak) to capture the guys and their zany hijinksis a video game.
I can see it now: The game starts as the player, represented by a luminousblue pedestrian, steps onto a virtual street where he is confronted, atonce, by the menacing yellow glare of a taxi. He feints to the right toavoid the cab - only to discover that the cab is a decoy, just a momentarydistraction from the two-wheeled gremlin about to ride up his spine. Asudden leap forward rescues our hero, but now he faces a new threat: Anothermessenger is turning casual figure-eights inside the upcoming crosswalk,idling until traffic clears.
The player proceeds warily, guiding his figure with deliberation, circlingout wide to avoid the cyclist. It seems too easy. Suddenly, then, the trapreveals itself: He has been forced outside the white lines of the crosswalk,right into the path of an on-coming rental van. He somersaults to the left;the van speeds by, grazing him; our hero is wounded. His blue glow is diminished.
Still, he rights himself. Just one more street to cross, one more gauntletto run, to reach his office (and proceed to the next level). He standscurbside again. The way looks clear. He steps slowly into the intersection.Off in the distance, at the very top of the screen, a city bus comes toan abrupt stop. Our hero freezes . . . but the bus is too far away to dohim harm.
Suddenly, however, the bus launches a pair of missiles in his direction- except that the missiles are not missiles; they are messengers, a pairof them, who moments before were tagging on to the rear bumper of the bus.They are moving fast, unnaturally fast; they are on top of him before hecan react. The game is over. Of course, at this point, the player is freeto press reset, or to slide in another quarter and start over. That isthe joy of virtual reality.
But as the woman lying flat on her back at 33rd Street discovered, outthere in that original reality, the game is played for blood stakes.
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