A desperate man makes a dangerous choice to better his financial situation. 

SYNOPSIS:

Portrait of a Man Drowning is a story about Mike Cagney is an average man in his late twenties and is disenfranchised living in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Society does not make sense to him, and his inner monologue is constantly critiquing the world around him, and it is making him bitter. He is on the verge of a nervous breakdown. He lives his life outside of New York that he views as a superorganism. He works for a public relations firm that creates and maintains the stories of celebrities. He is a writer that creates stories for celebrities but has no idea how to write his own story. He is drowning in debt and cannot get ahead no matter how hard he works. His only relationships are with his on again off again girlfriend Beth that is relegated to short text messages, and his social circle revolves around chat rooms on webcam sites. In a city of eight million people, he finds himself walking alone on the street. Until one day he finds himself in the living room of a troubled starlet that is represented by his public relations firm that overdoses on heroin. He makes a dangerous choice to let her pass away and rob her. This choice escalates to Mike Cagney killing the starlet’s assistant, evading two detectives, avoiding death by the most powerful businessmen in New York City, and making dangerous deals with the Polish mafia as he tries to get ahead in the city.

The screenplay opens with Mike Cagney sitting on the beach staring at the chaos of the ocean in Atlantic City after a bender. He is watching the waves crash down on the sand. The ocean symbolizes Mike’s life and its hardships. He wants no attempt to live in it. The water does not look pleasant as Mike Cagney stares blankly through it. The casinos loom behind him representing the large man-made complexes specifically made to make one part with their money. Mike feels comfortable gambling in casinos playing games but will not venture out into the ocean to gamble in his own life with the things that matter. Mike takes a bus back to New York City Monday morning to participate in the work week. He is in the turbulent sea of New York City, and his mind is racing. Voiceover is used frequently in the beginning of the screenplay, and this is on purpose. He only feels comfortable communicating to himself. Mike enters his office building, and he continues to feel out of place. He listens to one of his coworkers speaking, and he thinks, “This guy has the ability to repeat exactly what Rebecca says but in his own words. Shit, what were Rebecca’s words? The hell with it, we aren’t saving the world just crowding it with advertisements. Why don’t I ever have anything to say? I guess I’m just not interested in making someone else a lot of money.” After the meeting, his boss gives him his assignment to go to Julie Powers’ house and come up with a new public relations storyline to help sell her new movie Sparkle Fangs, which is a knockoff of Twilight.

Mike gets a few texts from his on again off again girlfriend Beth before he makes it to his railroad apartment in Williamsburg, Brooklyn that he is late on rent. Marek, the landlord, stops by to collect rent, but Mike will not answer the door because he does not have the money. Marek has anger management issues and threatens to take out Mike’s toilet. Mike is bored after browsing social media platforms and webcam sites and decides to go on a date to meet a girl from the internet. The date is not going well and Mike steps out onto the streets of New York City and stumbles around until he ends up at a brothel where he finally truly communicates to someone his thoughts and feelings to the only person that he feels will listen to him without judging him. The prostitute that he has never met before suggests to him to take advantage of opportunities. Later in the night, Mike gets woken up by Julie Powers after he fell asleep at Zuccotti Park during Occupy Wall Street. She wants him to come over to work on her image.

Mike sits alone in Julie Powers’ living room waiting for her to come down. This is the second time that he has tried to talk to her. The first time she was not in the right mental states. Mike believes that she is not in the right mental state this time either. Mike walks up the stairs and finds that Julie is actively overdosing on heroin. He decides at this time to let her pass away and takes what he can grab. Julie’s assistant enters as he is about to leave. The assistant sees that Mike is in the room with Julie Powers dead on the bed. Julie’s assistant attacks Mike and Mike ends up killing him. Mike makes it to his apartment in a complete panic when he gets a phone call from his company when he is in the shower telling him to head over to Julie Powers’ home to interview her in the morning. Julie Powers is found dead in her apartment, and two detectives come into her home to investigate the scene. They interview Mike and an investigator named Rick Kleeper makes Mike give up a tell that he could be the killer of Julie Powers’ assistant. Mike heads back to his apartment and notices that his bag is stolen and he does not have a toilet anymore. He knows that Marek was in his apartment and has stolen what he had taken from Julie Powers that included a massive diamond that is valuable in both price and lore. Mike makes a phone call letting Marek know that he has the rent money. Mike is in a panic. He needs to find a way to talk to Marek and get the money and jewelry back from him. Marek knows this is what he wants, so he sends over one of his workers named Karol. Mike does not have the money and needs to find out where Marek lives. Mike attempts to threaten Karol with a knife, and they get into a fight. Mike ends up hitting Karol with a bat. The delirious Karol takes Mike to Marek’s house. After a brief scuffle, they agree that it would be beneficial to both of them if they would take the diamond necklace, because Marek understands its worth, to the jewelry district in Manhattan to sell it. The George Soros of Portrait of a Man Drowning is a man by the name of Nathan Powers that happens to be Julie Powers’ father. He runs a hedge fund, and also owns one of the biggest movie studios in Hollywood. He tells an interesting story about how he acquired the diamond after his grandfather swallowed it before he was taken to Auschwitz. It is known as The Holocaust Diamond. Nathan Powers sent out a message to all of the jewelers that if anyone should hear of someone trying to sell a diamond that resembles The Holocaust Diamond that he should be informed. Mike and Marek walk into a trap when they try to sell The Holocaust Diamond as they get into a shootout with Nathan Powers and his men. Mike escapes, and Marek is killed. The jewelers explain to Nathan Powers that Marek was the brother of the head of the Polish mafia out of Greenpoint, Brooklyn.

Mike escapes into a sea of cartoon characters in Times Square harassing people for money. Many cartoon characters are from the production company that is owned by Nathan Powers. Mike stores the bag with the diamond in a hotel storage locker close to Times Square. He walks to a subway station stairwell and witnesses a Hispanic man getting out of a Stewart the Monkey suit. Stewart the Monkey is the Mickey Mouse of this story. Mike asks the man, “how do you become Stewart the Monkey.” The man steps into the costume and says, “like this.” Mike says, “and you play the character?” The man says, “it’s a living.” Mike realizes that he has stepped into his own suit and playing a character now outside of himself to survive. He gets out of the subway and gets a phone call from Peter, who works for Krzysztof Bokawski. Krzysztof Bokawski is the head of the Polish mafia and is Marek’s brother. Peter asks for a meeting in a local bar. Krzysztof listens to Mike’s story and makes him an offer. He must still pay the rent, but he must kill Nathan Powers. Mike can keep what he stole from Julie. Mike accepts the offer and leaves the bar.

Mike contacts Nathan Powers and asks him to meet him in Times Square with a half-million dollars. Nathan Powers agrees. While Nathan Powers is waiting for Mike’s arrival on a bench in Times Square, Mike dressed up as Stewart the Monkey stabs him in the back and takes the money. Nathan Powers keels over and dies as Nathan’s security loses Mike in the sea of Stewart the Monkey characters.

Mike walks back to the apartment, and the detectives are there to interview him. The detectives are acting on their hunch that Mike killed Julie Powers and are seconds away from a confession when the detectives are called out of the interrogation room. They get briefed on the Bokawski crime family’s involvement in Nathan Powers’ death and the selling of The Holocaust diamond. They let Mike go and plan to explore the Bokawski angle.

Mike is waiting on the Williamsburg bridge bike path looking at the skyline above the East River. Beth is finally introduced, and she is carrying Mike’s two bags that she picked up from hotel storage. Mike throws Julie Powers’ bag into the calm water knowing that he cannot keep it. The bag includes her jewelry and The Holocaust Diamond, and he keeps the half million dollars. Mike takes Beth’s hand and walks toward Manhattan on the bike path over the Williamsburg Bridge. The water below the bridge is calm as Mike walks over it. He has taken control of his life and learned to be above the chaos of his life, and the risk has paid off for him whether what he did was right or wrong. It does not matter because he finally took part in his own life instead of observing other people’s lives and he got ahead for the first time in his life. Meanwhile, in Brooklyn, Krysztoff Bokawski is in a bar and gets a letter from Mike Cagney with the money for the rent. The detectives walk up to the bar presumably to talk to Krzysztof about his involvement in Julie Powers and Nathan Powers’ death.