The Abridged Script
FADE IN:
INT. APPLE TOWN HALL MEETING - 2001
ASHTON KUTCHER takes to the stage, wearing OLD MAN STEVE JOBS makeup rejected from the set of Saturday Night Live.
ASHTON KUTCHER
Hello everyone. Today, I'm really excited to announce the iPod, a device that allows you to carry songs in your pocket and listen to them in your ears.
APPLE EMPLOYEE
Mr. Kutcher, are we really going to pretend you invented the MP3 player, rather than simply made it accessible to the mainstream through a simpler interface and larger hard drive? Because the Diamond Rio sitting in my junk drawer would like to have a word.
ASHTON KUTCHER
You're fired. Get out. GET THE FUCK OUT! And get hit by like fifty-seven cars crossing the street!
(pause)
Oh, and one more thing. That's something Steve Jobs said, right? One more thing? Man, I am NAILING this.
INT. REED COLLEGE - 1974
College students walk around, brushing past JAMES WOODS as he thinks about firing his agent for putting him in "THE SOCIAL NETWORK" FOR MAC FANBOYS.
JAMES WOODS
Alright, I see we're doing the entire Steve Jobs biopic-from-the-70's thing. All we have to do is be better than a made-for-TV movie starring "ER"'s Not- George-Clooney and we're in good sha--
ASHTON KUTCHER
Hey everyone, it's me, Ashton Kutcher! You may know me from "That 70's Show", "Punk'd", or "the punchline to any joke at Bruce Willis's expense"!
JAMES WOODS
Oh, We're fucked. Look Ashton, you're super smart, but you really need to apply yourself to something. To underscore this, you should go drop acid with some friends and then find someone who does all of the real work for you.
ASHTON KUTCHER
Sounds good, nothing is more interesting to watch than people reacting to stuff you can't see.
ASHTON, his friend LUKAS HAAS, and his girlfriend AHNA O'REILLY escape the tedium of their boring lives by taking hallucinogenics while we continue watching the tedium of their boring lives.
ASHTON KUTCHER
Wow man, this acid really expands my mind. It seems like this would somehow be central to my eventual forming of Apple Computer, but maybe not.
LUKAS HAAS
We should go to India together. Or maybe we already went to India and we should reminiscence about it. Or maybe we never did and you're hallucinating that we went. Regardless, what matters is that it's completely irrelevant.
INT. ATARI - 1976
ASHTON KUTCHER verbally berates someone making better games than him for not making better games. His boss, DAVID DENMAN, approaches.
ASHTON KUTCHER
Grr, this shitty game is in black and white! People want color! And design! Art! Beauty! Did I mention design?
DAVID DENMAN
Ashton, in case anyone is having trouble figuring out the complex characterization here, let me spell it out: you're really smart, but you're an asshole. Also you hate shoes.
ASHTON KUTCHER
My problem is working with other people. And rather than grow up and act like an adult, I need everyone in my life to continue catering to my antisocial behaviors and giving me what I want. But it's okay, because I make the iPhone one day.
DAVID DENMAN
Fine. But since you're such an insufferable jerk, you can only work in the office at night. I'll pay you $5,000 if you can make this Breakout game use fewer chips.
ASHTON KUTCHER
Since my self-confidence is one of my few defining traits other than my hatred of shoes, let me promise you that I will not only succeed, but make the greatest game about breaking blocks using a smaller block in the history of ever.
ASHTON immediately FAILS, so he calls up his best friend JOSH GAD.
JOSH GAD
Wait, we're not going to have a scene where we meet each other? You just call me in to rescue you from your own bullshit at Atari and poof, I show up?
ASHTON KUTCHER
Why did we even spend all that time at Reed College? Jobs and Wozniak knew each other by then. This isn't so much a biography as a highlight reel.
JOSH GAD
Considering Jobs's love of coherent design and beauty, I think it's safe to say this movie will have him spinning in his grave. Anyway, your game is done, please needlessly screw me out of the money just to illustrate what a rancid twat you are.
ASHTON unveils the new game for DAVID DENMAN, and it's in BLACK AND WHITE FOR FUCK'S SAKE.
Nonetheless, DENMAN is impressed, so much so that we gloss over the fact that GAD's alterations meant that the game couldn't keep score or take coins, making it USELESS to Atari.
INT. ASHTON KUTCHER'S PARENTS' GARAGE - 1976
ASHTON and GAD quit their jobs and promise to sell eighty billion computers.
JOSH GAD
This is a huge mistake, Ashton! There's no way people are going to ever want personal computers! Eh? Eh, audience? Pretty nice dramatic irony since in 2013 everyone's got computers in their pockets, right?
ASHTON KUTCHER
Really? Steve fucking Wozniak as the sourpuss stick-in-the-mud who doesn't believe in the potential of computers? If this movie were any further up Steve Jobs's ass, it could surgically remove his cancer.
JOSH GAD
So what should we call ourselves? Maybe we could brainstorm while you eat some fruit and then you can stop chewing and stare at what you're eating while the music swells and we push zoom on the fruit as you have a revelatio--
ASHTON KUTCHER
Apple. We'll call ourselves Apple. I got it out of thin air. That's the awesome origin story.
ASHTON and JOSH enlist the help of VICTOR RASUK, EDDIE HASSEL, and, hey, LUKAS HAAS is back!
Together they make a bunch of computers that are not wanted by anyone really, so they also recruit RON ELDARD to help them make ones that are.
ASHTON KUTCHER
I've been making hundreds of phone calls to promote Apple, but we've been getting a terrible reception!
LUKAS HAAS
You must have AT&T, har har har.
ASHTON KUTCHER
What the fuck are you even doing here Lukas? Everyone else serves a purpose, but you're just dead weight!
LUKAS HAAS
Alright, I know this is supposed to illustrate what a tyrannical jerk Steve Jobs was, but honestly I am kind of dead weight. I'm pretty sure I'm only working here because we dropped acid together.
Suddenly DERMOT MULRONEY pulls up with a SMALL ANIMAL attached to his head.
DERMOT MULRONEY
Is this Apple Computer? Because I have $90,000 to invest, and something tells me one day you'll be responsible for millions of kids dropping their parents' phones while playing Angry Birds; I want to get in on the ground floor.
ASHTON KUTCHER
$90,000 won't cut it, we need $250,000. I know that I look like an insane person saying this after being hung up on by hundreds of people, but if you agree then it'll show me as a shrewd businessman instead of a lunatic.
DERMOT MULRONEY
I agree.
SHREWD BUSINESSMAN ASHTON KUTCHER builds computers even more COMPUTERY than before. His girlfriend AHNA O'REILLY approaches.
AHNA O'REILLY
Ashton, I'm pregnant. And it's yours. And I'm naming her Lisa, which would also be a great name for a computer that people want as much as you want a daughter.
ASHTON KUTCHER
Grr! Fuck! Rage! Fruit! I don't have time for this, I'm busy revolutionizing machines that will be used largely to play solitaire on until Facebook is invented! Get out. GET THE FUCK OUT!
ASHTON makes comical noises that are MAYBE CRYING? LUKAS HAAS comforts AHNA.
LUKAS HAAS
It's not your fault, Ahna. He's changed.
AHNA O'REILLY
He has? He seems like the same guy who told his Atari co-worker to choke on a bag of dicks for making Asteroids, are you sure?
LUKAS HAAS
Totally. He wears glasses and suits now, and has a slightly less filthy beard.
INT. APPLE HEADQUARTERS - 1980
APPLE employees work on the new LISA COMPUTER, whose defining visionary feature seems to be a KEYBOARD THAT MOVES AROUND SLIGHTLY.
ASHTON walks into the building in a distractingly weird way. Not so much like STEVE JOBS as much as it is UNLIKE ASHTON KUTCHER, which makes it ACTING.
ASHTON KUTCHER
Look, there's only one way to beat IBM. Design. Innovation. Art. Beauty. And Design. To support our effort of building machines that people truly want, we should hire someone with experience in marketing, the art of selling people things they don't want. Hire the guy from Pepsi, Matthew Modine.
MATTHEW MODINE
(sucks)
J.K. SIMMONS
Ashton, your love of beauty and design has turned the Lisa into a financial disaster. We're moving you to the Macintosh project, which your love of beauty and design can turn into a financial disaster.
ASHTON KUTCHER
Okay. My first order of business is to take all of the hardware out of the Lisa and put it in the Macintosh, then design the exact user interface that was deemed too costly for the Lisa.
J.K. SIMMONS
Fine. The fact that nobody else sees what's going on here will make it easier to accept the notion that you're surrounded by idiots and will make it easier to perpetuate the narrative that you single-handedly save the company in 1997.
ASHTON invents the Graphical User Interface and mouse, so XEROX can go FUCK ITSELF. Unfortunately, another company has released a similar interface, severely hurting APPLE'S REVENUE.
ASHTON KUTCHER
(on phone)
Now look here, founder of another company! You stole our GUI idea to put in your operating system, which may or may not be our primary competitor! No, don't speak, not a word now! Just know that, whatever your company is, and whoever you are, I will sue you, and we'll never mention you ever again from this point on!
(hangs up)
ASHTON, his life in the toilet, contemplates doing his WEIRD CRY again but thinks better of it. JOSH GAD visits him in his office.
JOSH GAD
Ashton, I just wanted to let you know I'm leaving the company. It's imperative that I remain a beloved geek icon but leave before Apple invents any of the shit people care about.
(leaves forever)
(comes back in 1983)
(leaves forever)
J.K. SIMMONS
Ashton, the Macintosh isn't selling. And the Lisa didn't sell either. So far it seems like all of the people around you who questioned your decisions were right, which severely undercuts the intention to show Steve Jobs as the messianic genius who invented the microchip. What should we do?
ASHTON KUTCHER
Blame Matthew Modine, he priced the Macintosh too high in response to me driving up its cost. If there's one thing Apple will never, EVER stand for, it's needlessly marking up our products over comparable units from our competitors.
MATTHEW MODINE
(fucking sucks)
J.K. SIMMONS
I just don't see any way around it, Ashton. You're fired.
ASHTON KUTCHER
Et tu, Mulroney?
DURMOT MULRONEY
The rodent on my head and I both vote to oust you, Ashton. We're sorry. If it makes you feel better, pick up a Newton prototype on your way out.
INT. APPLE HEADQUARTERS - 1996
SEVEN YEARS later, ASHTON is happily married with children, and has reunited with his estranged daughter.
ASHTON KUTCHER
Holy crap, Apple really was the worst thing that ever happened to me. Apparently I stopped being such a detestable shitstain and got my personal life together the instant I left.
DURMOT MULRONEY
Ashton, we want you to come back to Apple.
ASHTON KUTCHER
YES PLEASE! Family, you're fired, get out. GET THE FUCK OUT!
ASHTON tours the new PALO ALTO office with his WEIRD WALK. He meets GILLES MATTHEY.
GILLES MATTHEY
I've kept your spirit alive since you left, sir. I've designed a new computer, except, get this, it's BLUE. There's an ORANGE one too, did your cock just explode or what?
ASHTON KUTCHER
You and me are soulmates, Gilles. Hang on a second, let me just pause this portable CD player. Fuck, it's so difficult to pause, what a horrible piece of shit!
GILLES MATTHEY
A bit on the nose, don't you think? Maybe we should have a more subtle version where you walk around constantly while talking on a telephone with an eighty-foot cord so we can hint Jobs invents the cell phone too.
ASHTON KUTCHER
Dude, we've literally been doing those scenes the entire movie. Soulmates. You and me, we're going to make Apple cool again.
GILLES MATTHEY
No computer was ever "cool," Ashton. You're thinking of motorcycles.
ASHTON KUTCHER fixes APPLE, ignoring that it wasn't until his departure that the Macintosh line actually sold at all.
With APPLE now cemented in position #2 of the Top Only Two Personal Computer Companies, ASHTON records the audio for the company's new "Think Different(ly)" campaign.
ASHTON KUTCHER
"Here's to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The bored screenwriters. The sitcom actors. The director of 'Swing Vote.'"
(pause)
"You can hate them, love them, hate them, flame them on IMDB, remake your own time travel movies that starred them, or hate them. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see ineptitude."
(pause)
"Because the people who are crazy enough to make a movie about the guy from the early days of the personal computer who DIDN'T go on to become the richest man in the world and founder of a $30 billion charity, are the ones who do."
(pause)
How was that?
SOUND BOOTH GUY
Uh. Great. You do know Richard Dreyfuss is going going to read it in the real ad, right?
ASHTON KUTCHER
You read for a part, you feel good about it, you feel confident, then they cast Richard Dreyfuss.
Everyone gets tired of watching a MOVIE ABOUT STEVE JOBS, so it just stops abruptly.
END