Truman Returns

Truman stepped out the doors of Seahaven, the artificial town he has called home all his life, populated with actors he believed were real citizens, real family and real friends. He walked down a dark corridor looking for the exit to the real world. His heart raced with excitement at the prospect of experiencing freedom and free will in shaping his own destiny, having real relationships and unscripted conversations with people, and getting the chance to discover his true past. But that excitement was tinged with fear about the uncertainty of what awaits him in the ‘real’ world. The trauma of finding out that everything that he experienced in his life in Seahaven was in fact a scripted reality show shook all his beliefs to the core. He was truly stepping into the unknown. But what drove him most was the thought of being able to see Sylvia again. The thought of being able to be with her again after all those years gave him hope to face this uncertainty. Nothing else mattered.

He stepped out the giant dome only to be greeted by massive cheers from large crowds, as well as police barricades and television crew. It was one of the biggest television and news events in history and thousands of fans gathered with signs and posters. Every major news organization gathered in front of the dome with cameras and microphones in hope of getting the first quotes from Truman on the day of his freedom. Everything felt so surreal to Truman; he had never seen this many people in his life, let alone the media frenzy and the deafening noise. The police helped him push through the massive crowd, but he has no idea where he is going. Paranoia started to grip him, his heart raced and he had trouble breathing. Then his legs gave way and he fainted.

“…….plenty of rest and fluids. He’s under tremendous stress and trauma and it won’t be easy.”

“I understand doctor. I’ll help him through this. Thank you so much.”

The voices echoed in Truman’s head as he slowly regains consciousness.

“Can u hear me Truman?”

“Sylvia…?”

He recognized her voice instantly. He opened his eye one eyelid at the time, and was greeted by the sight of the only woman he had ever loved, staring back at him with eyes filled with tears.

“How was Fiji?” he joked, remembering that that was the excuse given for her disappearance from Seahaven. She sobbed and laughed, and embraced him. The whole thing still felt surreal to him, but at that very moment this new reality was everything he had dreamt about.

A year has passed since the escape from Seahaven. Truman and Sylvia got married, but they did not get the fairytale ending they wanted. Truman was a reluctant celebrity, and as the former star of the biggest show in television history, he was recognized everywhere he went. It was tremendously hard to settle down and have kids with the amount of attention he was getting from the media and tabloids, as well as fanatical fans of the show. And it was a worldwide phenomenon. Sylvia and Truman did their best to navigate through all the attention, while trying to rehabilitate Truman to adjust to life in the ‘real’ world. Sylvia too was subjected to intense scrutiny from paparazzi as well as threats from hardcore Truman Show fans who saw her responsible for setting Truman on his path to finding the truth about Seahaven, thus ending the show.

But all this attention took a toll on Truman, and on their marriage. Having been sheltered from the real world all his life, Truman discovered that the real world can be a cold and lonely place. He saw the dark side of human nature that was not present in the sterile but friendly world of Seahaven. In Seahaven, he has to deal with actors who pretended to be his friends or family, but in the real world he had to deal with a different kind of ‘fakeness’-people who treated him differently because he was a celebrity. It was hard to deal with everyday people who have watched him grown up from a baby to an adult and who know every single detail of his upbringing. The stress, pressure and paranoia got to Truman, and eventually led to a split with Sylvia. Truman sank into depression.

Then came Christmas day, half a year after the split with Sylvia. Truman laid drunk and depressed on the bed in the house where he and Sylvia once shared. He was broke and unemployed; the degree he earned from studying in Seahaven was useless in the real world. Then the lights went off.

“Great. Just Great!” he mumbled. He got up and slowly walked towards the table to search the pile of mail for the power bill. Then he came across a yellow envelope only addressed to a Truman Burbank. Curious, he tore open the envelope and skimmed through the letter. It was a proposal from a television company for him to do a reality tv series about his life, but unlike the Truman Show, there were no actors.

“Unbelievable. Just unbelievable.” And he threw the letter to the floor and went back to drinking on his bed. Then he got back up, picked up the letter, and made a phone call. He decided to do it.

The advertisements were all over the television, radio and newspapers. The hype machine was in full force. Truman was going back on the air. The whole world was talking about it; in cafes, school classrooms, pubs and even in the newsrooms. Millions of viewers stayed home in anticipation for the first live 3 hour episode of ‘Truman Burbank’. Cheers greeted the first sight of Truman on the screen.

Millions sat or stood transfixed to the television as they watched Truman interacting with real world. It was the Truman they knew and loved; only the characters were different. It was more a comedy than a drama as they laughed at Truman’s humorous antics in the cotemporary world as the cameras followed him. Then he led the cameramen to the residence of super producer Christof, the creator of the original Truman show, a producer who had unbelievable recognition and clout with the government that he could even be allowed to do a show as unethical as the Truman Show. The cameramen were caught by surprise by Truman’s actions. This was not planned to happen. Truman knocked on the door.

The door opened and there stood Christof.

“I saw you on tv. I knew you were coming.”

The tension was so high even the cameramen felt uncomfortable. Truman stepped in front of Christof and whispered words that could not be picked up by the camera microphones. The world watched uncomfortably at the first meeting between the Truman and his ‘creator’, between ‘father’ and ‘son’.

They stood face to face.

Bang!

Truman fell to the ground. Christof shouted for Truman. He fell onto the porch steps, blood oozing from his belly, and his right hand clutching a pistol. The world audience gasped in horror as the show cut to an advertisement.

2 years has passed since the Truman tragedy that shook the world. The fallout from the tragedy was huge. People began to question the morality of making and even watching a show like the original Truman Show. The world decided never again would they allow producers to play god. But eventually people started to forget about Truman and moved on.

And Christof admitted the error of his ways, but was vilified by many. He became recluse in his mansion ever since.

One day his phone rang.

“Hello?”

There was no reply at the other end. Just the sound of cars in the background which suggests it was from a payphone.

Christof smiled. He knew who was on the other end. He swore never to ‘play god’ again, but the irony of ‘giving’ life to someone, then ‘taking’ it didn’t escape him. He smiled again and shook his head, looked out the widow and prayed that he was okay and hope he finally forgave him.