When the witnesses, among others, recount an event to detectives, they
go back and forth between the past and present tenses?
The present is like a different grammatical case, a nonexistent tense
where we have to imagine the sentence preceded by "Picture this: ..."
I was re-thinking this during '99 episode Truth Will Out, during guest
star Elizabeth Ashley's testimony (she was also on SVU that year),
although virtually every episode of every detective show has this
writing technique.
Ashley's doing a southern-twangy version of her American accent, which
she insists is not natural to her.
Title of episode refers not only to revelation of Ashley character's
fib, but to ongoing secret torrid romance between F and Stivers --
(snore...) huh? Where were we? Oh yes...
And also to perceived threat of Bayliss' "outing" a police officer
(showing that Bayliss is not only "not gay," but also not prejudiced
against short overweight African American guys). For bar scene Bayliss
reassumes the "nighted color," another 'nother last gasp of the
Shakespearean references on the show, but without the leather jacket --
apparently too controversial.
One more point: would somebody please stomp on Gee's toupee before it
crawls off his head altogether? Now that is a crime.
Bob A
"Aside from that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you enjoy the play?"
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