Alan Shaw's Essay

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A Multi-Layered Analysis of Mulholland Dr. (by Alan Shaw)

Scenes: 1 - 5 ► 6 - 10 ► 11 - 15 ► 16 - 20 ► 21 - 25 ► 26 - 30 ► 31 - 37

A SCENE BY SCENE ANALYSIS

Scene 21

This scene begins with Betty and Rita both getting into a yellow cab and heading over to where "D. Selwyn" lives, at 2590 Sierra Bonita. As they get there Rita sees two men with dark glasses on in a car who she thinks are looking for her so she ducks down and Betty tells the cab to drive them around to the back. They get out and go in the back entrance. They come to a board that lists all of the residents of the apartments, and it says that D. Selwyn is in Apt. 12. It also says that L. J. DeRosa is in Apt. 17. So they head to apartment 12. As they are walking there Rita sees another man with dark glasses and so she hides behind some bushes and pulls Betty down with her. Then they see that the person was just a driver for a woman with red hair that looks like yet another image of Aunt Ruth. Just like Aunt Ruth at the beginning of the fantasy, the woman is loading luggage into her car to go on a trip. We see the numbers 2904 nearby her car.

I believe this encounter with an Aunt Ruth doppelganger is significant in that it tells us that Diane still wants her aunt there to guide her. Unfortunately, like the woman in this scene her aunt has already packed and left. In Diane's fantasy the Aunt just went north, and I believe the 2904 near her car is showing that her car is headed to a higher number than the 2590 where Betty is. The higher number in this case would represent the northern direction. Or if we consider that Diane may be coming to terms with her aunt's death, the direction north and the higher number here might represent that Diane understands her aunt to be in heaven.

After seeing that there is no danger, Betty and Ruth proceed on to Apartment 12. There, Diane knocks on the door, although Rita doesn't want her to do so. At first it seems that no one is home, but then the door does open and a woman comes out. Betty asks her if she is Diane, and she says, "Number 17." To this Betty replies, "But it said Number 12?" The woman looks off for a moment like she is thinking about how much to tell them, and then she just says, "I switched apartments with her. She's in 17." At this point Rita looks at the woman as though she recognizes her. And the woman, who we now know must be DeRosa, looks back at Rita like she too recognizes Rita but she disapproves. Because of the disapproval Rita looks down, and Betty looks at her as if she's trying to figure out what's going on. DeRosa says, "It's down at the end, on the left… But she hasn't been around for a few days." To this, Diane says, "Oh. We'll leave her a note." And DeRosa replies, "I'll go with you... She's still got some of my stuff. " To this idea both Betty and Rita look a little uncomfortable, but there doesn't appear to be anything that they can do about it. And then a phone rings inside of DeRosa's apartment. So DeRosa says, "You go ahead, I got to get that." And Betty and Rita proceed on alone.

I've explained in my chronological telling of Diane Selwyn's life story, that I believe DeRosa was a neighbor who switched apartments with Diane out of compassion. I believe she saw Diane get depressed after Rita moved out as Diane's roommate while Diane was living in Apartment 12. The therapist that Diane was seeing may have suggested she get a new apartment to distance herself from the painful memories in #12, or Diane may have just decided this on her own. But either way, DeRosa probably agreed to the switch for Diane's sake only. This then would explain why DeRosa looked at Rita with some disdain. It would also explain why DeRosa wanted to go with them, because as I see it, DeRosa could be reaching out to Betty and trying to protect her from Rita. But Betty/Diane does not want to be protected, so Diane, the dreamer, causes the phone to ring.

As Betty and Rita proceed to number 17, Betty takes Rita's arm as if to signify that she will not let DeRosa come in between them, just as she has been protecting her from other personas. When they knock on the door for Apartment 17, there is no answer at all this time. So Betty walks around to a side window to see if she can open it. One window is unlocked and Betty opens it and then asks Rita to help her in. Reluctantly Rita helps her, and Diane gets in and opens the front door so she and Rita can go in. Once inside they are forced to hold their noses because there is a terrible smell. As they make their way to the bedroom they find a corpse there which they assume to be Diane Selwyn. The dead person was killed by what appeared to be shot gun blasts, which left many holes in the mattress. Rita is extremely distraught, and after DeRosa comes back and looks for them for a little while out in the courtyard and then finally leaves, Betty and Rita run out of the apartment with Rita terrified, silently screaming and hiding her face in her hands.

The dead body was in Diane's bedroom but the hair is a little too long and too dark for it to be Diane's hair. I am convinced that the Diane Selwyn who is dead we see in the fantasy is something of a mixture between Betty and Rita. And although Betty doesn't yet accept this, Rita certainly seems to. And the thought that she is headed for death terrifies her.

Scene 22

In this scene, Rita has her head in a sink as she is trying to cut her hair while she's crying. Betty grabs her hand and says, "I know what you're doing." She takes the scissors out of Rita's hand and puts them on a blue book called "Tout Paris: The Source Guide to The Art of French Decoration." Then she looks Rita in the eyes and says, "I know what you have to do… But let me do it." Rather than cutting her hair, Betty creates a new look for Rita by putting a blonde wig on her. The wig's short blonde bangs transforms Rita into a doppelganger of Betty/Diane.

The issue that the Rita persona feels so desperate about is that she is going to be killed, or more accurately, eliminated. Rita has been worried about this issue throughout the entire fantasy. In fact, the fantasy started with an attempt to assassinate her. And it seems to have become progressively clearer that she is a dangerous persona that has been leading Diane into a self-destructive state. In some ways the Rita persona is the opposite of the Betty persona, and in some ways she is just the natural progression from the one to the other. Since Betty represents Diane's innocence, in some ways Rita represents the darker sexual side of Diane that is willing to be a corrupted commodity that is bought and sold, filled with selfish ambition. In this, Betty and Rita are opposites, and Rita is seen as a force leading to Diane's destruction. In another sense, Rita is just the more womanly and glamorous sexual persona that the girlish Betty persona aspires to grow to become. This is natural because, as indicated by Betty's pinkish sweater that was too small, the Betty persona is a representation of Diane's childhood innocence, it she must inevitably seek to mature in an uncorrupted form of sexual expression. The confusion of the two sides of the Rita cause extremely different reactions from Diane's various personas. Some see her as the negative force in Diane's life that must be eliminated. Coco represents these voices when she says, "If there is trouble - get rid of it." On the other hand, Betty sees a Rita who has no memory of Camilla's negative behavior. In Betty's mind she is uncorrupted and a persona worthy of Betty's love and admiration. However, Betty's view is not a very popular one when it comes to Rita.

All the other personas that Rita has come into contact with want to get rid of her, except Betty. Betty thinks like Diane did at first, that she can embrace Rita/Camilla and become the kind of success at Hollywood that a mature woman like Rita can become. But will Betty's naiveté last if she is exposed to what the real Camilla was like? The Rita persona knows that the reason she is a target has something to do with her Camilla image, and therefore she is looking to change her image before it is too late. That is why we see the French blue book on redecorating, because after all, it offers a discussion on how to transform an image. The book is also a blue object, so it indicates some type of transition from one state to another. However, Rita/Camilla is Spanish, while Betty/Diane is from Canada where the French language and culture is more accessible. So the French book seems to suggest that Betty/Diane would have Rita/Camilla change her ethnic and cultural identity as well as other more external attributes, like the hair that Rita initially was going to cut shorter. Betty and Rita both understand that there needs to be a change in image if Rita is to survive, but when Betty offers to help what she does is focus on using makeup and a wig to create only a cosmetic change, and therefore not making the change permanent. Even though Betty understands why Rita has to change and how to do it, she still wants the same Rita to survive underneath it all, as we shall see in the next scene. But even if the change is only an illusion to some degree, it is a dramatic one. Rita becomes a doppelganger of Betty. The Betty and the Rita personas appear to be merging. And this is happening in more ways than one, because even as Rita is changing to look more like Betty, Betty is also changing. Betty is losing some of her innocence as she is being influenced by what Rita represents. Examples of the changes to Betty include her lying to Coco, her willingness to get sexual with Woody, and even her breaking into Diane's apartment. Apparently, Betty is learning to stop at nothing to achieve her goals.

Scene 23

In this scene we find Betty in bed by herself with her pink pajamas on as Rita comes in to say good night. Betty immediately asks Rita to take off the blonde wig she still has on. Rita has nothing else on except a red towel that she has wrapped around herself, apparently after taking a shower. Rita had been planning on sleeping on the couch, but Betty convinces her that they should share the bed. As Rita comes over to the bed, she takes the wig off and looks at herself in the mirror fixing her hair. There are a bunch of hats hanging around the mirror, one of which is a cowboy hat. Then Rita comes over to the side of the bed and takes off her towel. She is totally nude as she gets under the covers. The sheets of the bed are blue.

I think it is best to make some comments at this point in the scene. Right before this scene we saw that Rita has begun trying to become more like Betty in order to protect herself. This is a switch from the real life situation where Diane has been trying to become more like Camilla in order to be more successful in Hollywood. However that strategy led to obsession and corruption in Diane's life, which caused her to grow homicidal when Camilla begins to leave Diane behind. The reverse strategy must be understood to be in the context of the real life Diane whose mind is coming up with this fantasy. Diane understands that she has gone too far with her obsession over Rita/Camilla, and so she is trying to reform the Rita persona back toward the innocence of Betty. However, there are obvious questions about how successful that approach can be when the Betty persona is clearly still so obsessed with the Rita/Camilla persona that she cannot let it go altogether. In fact, in this scene, the Betty persona is asking the Rita persona to take off the wig and get in bed so she can get back together with the Rita persona who looks like Camilla whom she loves so much.

Another interesting issue to note in this scene so far is that there is a cowboy hat over the mirror in the bedroom. This is where we get our first indication that the Cowboy has some relationship to Diane's bedroom. We shall see another example of this issue before the end of the fantasy, and it apparently indicates that the Cowboy, like Mr. Roque and the Castigliane brothers, plays the role of some type of John for Diane. The last thing we should note here is that the blue bed sheets indicate that some type of transition will be occurring in this scene.

Once Rita has entered the bed with Betty, she looks at her lovingly. Betty who has invited Rita into her bed keeps her eyes off of Rita's eyes. Then Rita says, "Thank you Betty." And Betty replies, "It's nothing. I shouldn't have let you sleep on the couch last night." Then Rita explains that Betty misunderstood, "No, I mean thank you for everything." To which Betty answers, "You're welcome." Clearly Betty's mind is on the fact that Rita is in bed with her, while Rita's mind was initially on all of the ways that Betty has helped her. To me, this is first indication that it is Betty, not Rita, who is the most focused on the issue of the two of them being in bed together and what that means.

After looking at Betty for a little while, Rita says to her, "Good night sweet Betty." Then Rita leans over and kisses Betty on the forehead. Immediately Betty moves her face over to attempt to kiss Rita on the lips, and then she hesitates. It is as though she realizes that Rita's kiss on the forehead wasn't necessarily an attempt to make out with Betty, it may have just been another attempt of Rita's to show her overwhelming gratitude to Betty. But as they look each other in the eyes, it is now clear that Betty wants to go much further and Rita is willing. Betty says, "Good night," as their lips come even closer together. Then Betty goes ahead and kisses Rita. Rita responds and they begin to make out. As their passion grows, Rita takes off Betty's top. There is some more kissing, and then Betty says, "Have you ever done this before?" "I don't know," Rita responds, "Have you?" The kissing continues as Betty says, "I want to with you." They continue to make out, caressing each other now, and increasing the passion still further. Finally, Betty says in a heated whisper, "I'm in love with you." And after more passionate kissing she says again, "I'm in love with you." As they continue to make love, and the scene begins to fade, Rita is silent. She never claims to feel a reciprocal love for Betty.

Scene 24

As the scene fades back in with Betty and Rita in bed together, we notice that they are holding hands. The camera moves up to where we see Betty's head behind Rita's head. The camera is positioned so that we see the left half of Betty's face in the background out of focus but on top of the right half of Rita's face. Their features are lined up almost perfectly. The perspective makes it appear that the two faces have merged together into one face, in a technique reminiscent of a similar shot from Ingmar Bergman's "Persona." Then suddenly, with her eyes still closed, Rita says softly, "Silencio. Silencio. Silencio." Then she says, "No hay banda. No hay banda. No hay orchestra." As she is saying this, her eyes open in a trance-like state. Then her voice gets louder as she goes back to repeating, "Silencio," over and over again. This wakes up Betty. Rita seems to be talking in her sleep, so Betty says, "Rita. Rita. Rita wake up." "Huh… No," Rita replies, her eyes still looking up entranced, and not looking at Betty. "It's okay," Betty says. "No, it's not okay," Rita replies, still not looking at Betty. Betty then asks, "What's wrong?" Rita answers, "Go with me somewhere," still not looking at Betty. Betty says, "It's 2 o'clock. It's 2 o'clock in the morning." Finally, Rita turns and faces her, and then she says emphatically, "Go with me somewhere." Betty relents, "Sure… Now?" There is a wild look in Rita's eyes as she says, "Right Now!"

I believe it is important to note that this scene begins with the image of the two of them merged together, and then Rita enters into some type of trance that creates a tension that interferes with the image of their merged personas. It was Betty who invited Rita to bed. It was Betty who professed love for Rita. Rita has not been the force primarily behind the merging of their personas, but yet here she is the one who begins to challenge it. Ever since Betty meets with Rita in the fantasy, there is a type of energy between them that seems directed toward their ultimate union. Yet Betty makes statements about the depth and sincerity of this union that we never hear from Rita. The same probably can be said about the relationship between Diane and Camilla before their breakup. So, as this scene comes to an end, we have found that even after one of the implicit goals of the fantasy has been reached, namely the merging of the Betty and Rita personas, some unresolved tension still exist. Although it is still unclear why, the tension must have something to do with the Spanish words Rita was chanting. Translated, what Rita said was, "Silence," "There is no band," and, "There is no orchestra." And, whereas Betty pushed for the merger between the two of them, it turns out to be Rita who demands that the issues involved with the tension be addressed, even at 2 o'clock in the morning.

Scene 25

In this scene we first see Betty and Rita outside on a street corner flagging down a cab. They are not on the beautiful street where Aunt Ruth lived anymore. And the cab that picks them up isn't yellow this time. It is much darker. And Betty isn't wearing pink, or even light blue, anymore. In fact, her blouse is red for the first time. Rita has on her blonde wig, and she is wearing all black. In fact, Rita's dress is reminiscent of the all black dress she wore at the beginning of the fantasy, although it is a different style. The cab ride to Club Silencio is a gritty affair. Betty and Rita sit silently and they seem sad. They see the lights and buildings of the city from strange angles, they see unfinished areas of the city, and most of all everything is dark and not very Oz-like any more. When they finally arrive at the front of the club, the camera shot is from far off in an empty parking lot, and we zoom in on them as they enter the door. The camera focuses in on blue lights just inside the door as they step out of view.

By hailing a cab from a street corner, by using a cab that is not yellow, and by viewing the city from grim and unflattering points of view, we become aware that something fundamental has changed. Betty's innocence is not so obvious in her red and black outfit and Rita does not look as lost in her sleeveless black gown. Clearly, reality is beginning to force its way into Diane's fantasy, even before they get inside of Club Silencio.

Inside Club Silencio is a grand theater with a large stage and tall red curtains. The seats and some of the walls of the theater are also red. As Betty and Rita walk down the aisle to their seats, a performance begins. A man dressed in a black suit with a silver shirt and tie walks on stage, saying, "No hay banda." These are some of the same words that came from Rita. As he speaks, he motions with his hand and a wand appears. Clearly the man is a magician. He goes on to say in English, "There is no band!" Then in French he says, "Il n'y a pas d'orchestre" (There is no orchestra). Then using English again he says, "This is all a tape recording." Now in Spanish, "No hay banda." Then in English, "And yet… we hear a band."

All the red in this theatre indicates that there will probably be sexual themes addressed during the performance. Also, the fact that we see the Magician freely moving between English, Spanish and French, tells us that he has something to do with the merger between Betty and Rita, in the same way that the "Tout Paris" book raised those issues. We should also be aware of the fact that the nature of a magician is very similar to that of a wizard, and so, as I've mentioned before, we should be looking for parallels between this magician and the great wizard who lived in Oz.

The magician continues to speak with using all three languages. In English he says, "If we want to hear a clarinet… Listen." We hear the sound of a clarinet, although we see no one playing a clarinet. Then in French the magician says, "Un trombone a coulisse" (A slide trombone). And we hear the sound of a slide trombone playing. Next he says in Spanish, "Un trombone con sordina" (A muted trombone). And we hear the sound of a muted trombone playing. And now in French, "J'aime le son du trombone en sourdine" (I love the sound of a muted trombone). He throws his wand into the audience in excitement as he says in French, "Je le sens!" (I feel it). Now using English again, he says, "A muted… trumpet." We hear the sound of a muted trumpet as a trumpet player walks onto stage from behind the curtains. He looks like he is playing the notes we hear, but at some point he throws up his hands while still holding the trumpet, and yet the music continues. So we know that he was never really playing. "It's all recorded," the magician reemphasizes. "No hay banda! It is all … a tape," he goes on to say. Then the magician throws out his left hand to the left and a trumpet note sounds. Then he throws out his right hand to the right and a trumpet note sounds. Again, he does this with the left hand, and then he says, "Il n'y a pas d'orchestre. It is … an illusion." At this point he is standing close to and below a box seat in the balcony section and we notice for the first time that a woman with blue hair is in that seat. Then the magician says emphatically, "Listen!" As he puts he stretches his hands up, we hear thunder and see the flashes of apparent lightning. Then Betty starts shaking in her seat like she is out of control. She has a terrified look on her face and Rita tries to help her by putting her arms around her. But nothing helps. And when we see the face of the magician, there is a strained expression on his face as his body is tense and his hands stay stretched upward. Then, if we do what the magician told us to do and listen very carefully, we hear a grunt noise as he suddenly gets a relieved expression on his face and all the tension ends. At this same moment, the thundering stops and Betty is released from her spasm of shaking. After this, what can only be described as an evil grin comes over the magician's face and he crosses his arms over his chest like a body in a casket as blue smoke comes up from the ground and covers him. Then he vanishes.

The magician's performance was anything but subtle. He emphasized again and again that something was not what it seemed. The message was clearly a warning that you must not believe in appearances. It may sound like a clarinet, but it is not a clarinet. It may sound like a trombone or a trumpet, but it isn't one of those either. It is only a tape, a recording, an illusion. Don't believe in it. But what is the thing that should not be believed? The easy answer would be that it is the fantasy itself which should not be believed, or perhaps it is the Hollywood enterprise which is deceitful. And although these are both certainly part of the answer, they are peripheral to the central truth to which the magician is hinting. The key clue to his revelation is that the false thing should not be believed whether it is speaking in English, in Spanish or in French. Two scenes before this one, we saw the blue French book symbolically point out that an effort was being made to hide Rita's ethnic identity. Rita is Spanish, and now she is trying to use Betty's connections to English and French culture in an attempt to remake herself so as to hide the fact that she still represents the Spanish Camilla who is so hated in Diane's mind. But the magician is revealing that the change is not going to work, because it is just a change in image and not in substance. The Rita persona cannot escape the fact that she is only inside of Diane's fantasy because Diane is obsessed with Camilla. And that fact leads to some very dark consequences.

Camilla, whom Rita is a link to in Diane's mind, is the one who actually got the part for The Sylvia North Story in real life by turning on fake passion with which everyone was impressed. Camilla is the sensual seductress that has convinced some people that she is a great actress when in fact Diane sees that Camilla's sexual image is beating out better actresses because image is more important than substance in Hollywood. And it is Camilla who has made people like Diane and Adam fall in love with her because of her seductiveness even when it is clear that she is running around with other people at the same time. So if seduction is simply a performance to Camilla, then love must be an illusion. When Betty expressed her love for Rita, what was her response? Silence. Silencio. No matter how much the innocent persona of Diane tried to believe in the Rita persona, the truth is that the Rita persona is a lie.

The truth is that Camilla was never devoted to Diane the way Betty was devoted to Rita. Camilla's primary focus had always been on her career, she never cared about Diane's career. But Camilla did enjoy seeing how much Diane revered her. She enjoyed having Diane see her get big parts. She enjoyed having Diane see her seduce her leading men as their leading lady. And she enjoyed having Diane see her seduce the recently divorced director named Adam. And then when Adam fell in love with her like so many others did, Camilla wanted Diane there to see Adam fawn all over her and then announce their engagement. Camilla did enjoy having sex with Diane, but unfortunately for Diane, she could get that thrill from so many other fans of hers, men and woman. She never really needed Diane, she just needed an audience. Diane was simply Camilla's favorite member of her audience, and even that distinction could not last. By the end of the dinner party at Adam's house, it appeared that Camilla had found another favorite devotee.

The magician, like the wizard in Oz, ultimately revealed that it was all a fraud. Because Diane believed in the hype of Hollywood she was not prepared for the fact that it is filled with self-promoting Camillas, so she walked right into the trap of the first one that took an interest in her. "Somewhere over the rainbow" for Dorothy was Oz, and she found out that it wasn't the promised land that she had seen in her dreams. For Diane, the place that she had dreamed of was Hollywood, and it also failed to be that land of her dreams. But, unlike Dorothy, Diane could not go home, and the magician makes this all too clear. When the lady with blue hair shows up, and he shouts, "Listen," another sad truth confronts Betty/Diane. The innocence of Betty was not what it seemed either as indicated by the lightning that seemed to be electrocuting her when the magician's arms were raised. And what caused that innocence to be illusive? Well, when we "listen" carefully, we hear what sounds like a man grunting at the end of Betty's paralyzing shaking. At the same time we hear that grunt, we see the magician appear to have released some tension he was feeling while Betty was shaking. With the context of the magician being relieved by the grunt after her body and his body are tense at the same time, it is simple to deduce that this incident was a symbol of sexual intercourse. A man of power, having sex with the Betty persona, destroyed her innocence. Again we see the echo of the Beatrice Cenci story, and sadly it tells us that Betty, unlike Dorothy, has no wonderful home to which she can return.

As the magician makes his exit after revealing how terrible Diane's situation really was, blue lights continue to flood the theatre for a little while symbolizing that a transition is occurring. In my view, the transition has to do with the Betty persona absorbing the truth of what she has just seen. As the blue lights fade out, we see that the blue haired woman is still there to serve as a guide, I believe, into yet another terrible truth. I have described above how the blue haired woman bears witness as a symbol of death, and death by assassination. She sits in the seat of Abraham Lincoln, who had the same mole as she does on his cheek, and he suffered a terrible death that symbolically reverberates throughout many of Lynches films. Like the magician, the blue haired woman is yet another witness to the loss of Diane's innocence because she is being shown that she actually was successful in her assassination attempt against Camilla, although the first scene in the fantasy tried to repress this truth.

But the tragic revelations are not over. Out comes Cookie with a red suit on, serving as the MC now that the magician is gone. In Spanish, he announces the following, "Senoras and senores, el Club Silencio les presenta… La Llorona de Los Angeles, Rebekah del Rio." This translates to, "Ladies and gentleman, the Club Silencio presents… The Crying Lady of Los Angeles, Rebekah del Rio." As Rebekah del Rio comes out, we see that she has on a dress that is a mixture of red and black. Her eye shadow is a mixture of red and yellow, with black eyeliner. Her earrings are red and she has a black tear painted on her cheek under her eye. When she gets to the microphone, she begins singing the Spanish version of "Crying," written by Roy Orbison.

I think it is clear with all of Rebekah del Rio's red and black motifs that she is representing the new red and black state of Betty's new wardrobe. Now that the magician and the blue haired lady have revealed that Betty's innocence has been lost, the fact that she is no longer in pink makes sense. But what her new state means is only explained by Rebekah del Rio. As Cookie introduced her, he called her "The Crying Lady of Los Angeles." There is in fact a legend about a lady by that name. She was jilted by her husband who ran off with another woman and left her with their two children. She could not bear losing him. So, because she believed the children to be the reason he left her, or out of revenge against him, or out of pure madness, she drowned the two children, and then she killed herself in the same way. This is who Betty/Diane is becoming like as the grief at her breakup with Camilla, a woman who jilted her, is starting to take hold of her. The song, "Crying," gives voice to her grief. The following are the English lyrics of the song:

Crying:
I was alright for a while
I could smile for a while
But I saw you last night
You held my hand so tight
As you stopped to say hello
You wished me well
You, you couldn't tell
That I've been crying over you
Crying over you
Crying over you
And you said "So long"
Left me standing all alone,
Alone and crying, crying, crying, crying

It's hard to understand
But the touch of your hand
Can start me crying

I thought that I was over you
But it's true, so true
I love you even more
Than I did before
But darling, what can I do?
For you don't love me
And I'll always be crying over you,
Crying over you

Yes, now you're gone
And from this moment on,
I'll be crying, crying, crying, crying
Yeah, crying, crying over you
Lyrics and Music by Roy Orbison and Joe Melson
Sung by Rebekah del Rio

Both Betty and Rita are transfixed by Rebekah del Rio's singing. A tear falls down Rita's cheek. Betty is also in tears. Then Rita puts her head on Betty's shoulder, crying even more now. Betty also is getting more distraught. And then, all of a sudden, Rebekah del Rio stops singing, but the music and the words of the song continue, proving that once again it was all an illusion. Rebekah del Rio then falls to the ground, either dead or unconscious. Betty and Rita are still sad but no longer touching as Cookie and another man carry Rebekah del Rio off stage. At this point, Betty looks into her purse and takes out a blue box. Then the singing stops. Betty and Rita look at each other, and they are both afraid.

Diane never got over Camilla, even though she became aware of Camilla's narcissistic and corrupt nature. And like the Crying Lady, once Diane was jilted, her love led her into a murderous rage. Most of Diane's personas have agreed to eliminate the Rita persona. The question is will Betty continue to protect her? Somehow the answer is connected to the blue box. Perhaps when it is open they will find out what is deep inside of Diane's soul. If Diane has managed to hold on to the Betty persona's innocence and love, then certainly Rita still has a fighting chance. However, if all that is in that box is Diane's guilt and her hatred, then how can even the Betty persona survive? And without Betty, all hope for the Rita persona is lost.

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