Alan Parker - Bugsy Malone

Copyright

HarperCollins Children’s Books

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd.

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain in Armada by William Collins Sons & Co Ltd in 1976

This edition published by HarperCollins Children’s Books in 2011

Text copyright © Alan Parker 1976

Why You’ll Love This Book copyright © Lauren Child 2011

Alan Parker asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

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Source ISBN: 9780007441228

Ebook Edition © DECEMBER 2012 ISBN: 9780007514830

Version: 2016-11-24

For Lucy, Alexander, Jake and Nathan, who heard it first.

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Why You’ll Love This Book by Lauren Child

1. Roxy

2. Blousey

3. Fat Sam

4. Bugsy (At Last)

5. The Splurge Thickens

6. A Sparkle in his Eye

7. Fizzy

8. No Comment

9. Eight Banana Boozles

10. Smolsky and O’Dreary

11. Dandy Dan

12. Next!

13. Dumb Bums We Ain’t

14. Al Is Is Git. Or Not So Git

15. You’re Aces, Bugsy

16. Looney (Off His Trolley) Bergonzi

17. The Salami

18. The Chase

19. No Rough Stuff

20. Ketchup Without

21. Leroy Smith

22. Goodbye Knuckles

23. Sluggers Gym

24. Poysanally

25. Mr Big

26. Trapped

27. Escape

28. Splurge Inc.

29. We Know You’re In There

30. The Pay Off

Author’s Note

About the Author

By Way of Explanation

About the Publisher

Someone once said that if you can open with a really good first line then you are halfway to writing a really great book. The opening sentence to Bugsy Malone is one of my all-time favourites.

Someone once said that if it was raining brains, Roxy Robinson wouldn’t even get wet.

This is a perfect first line. You know right away that there’s going to be some snappy dialogue and some hardboiled characters. It also has a sort of ‘back in the olden days’ feel to it, and the name Roxy Robinson somehow suggests gangsters and old-time New York. But above all, what this one line tells you is that this is going to be a funny book.

I saw the film of Bugsy Malone when I was about ten. We were in Norfolk for my cousin’s wedding, the weather was dismal and we had a free afternoon with nothing to do so we all went to the cinema. My whole family went, including my cousins, my aunt, uncle, great-aunt, great-uncle and grandmother. We all loved it. Those of us who are still alive still talk about it. We still quote lines from it.

“What’s your name, anyway?”

“Brown.”

“Sounds like a loaf of bread.”

“Blousey Brown.”

“Sounds like a stale loaf of bread.”

Of course Bugsy Malone is a great film, but it’s also a great book. It reads beautifully. The characters – and there are a great many of them – are all described in such a way that in just a few lines you feel you could almost draw them: she had the kind of face that needed a personality behind it. She was built like a Mack truck and her shoulders would have done credit to an all-in wrestler.

The names are pretty descriptive too; Pop, Fizzy, Jelly, Bangles, Tallulah. I meet quite a few Tallulahs these days – goldfish and children – which isn’t surprising because, as characters go, Tallulah isn’t a bad one to be named after. She is sassy and bewitching and snaps out great one-liners: “I’ll go manicure my gloves.”

That’s the thing about this book, the female characters are given good roles too, they aren’t just there to wander in and out of scenes without too much personality. As a child I was always rather fond of Blousey Brown. She might be the romantic interest but she’s no sap, that’s for sure.

Bugsy: Can I give you a lift?

Blousey: You got a car?

Bugsy: Er… no.

Blousey: So how you gonna give me a lift, buster? Stand me on a box?

We don’t get to meet Bugsy until chapter four, it’s a nice way of building him up; we know we’re going to meet him because his name is, after all, the book’s title – somehow not meeting him right away makes him all the more charismatic.

Bugsy Malone is that perfect hero, antihero. He has edge but we know he’s a decent guy. He is just the right side of honest, but every now and then push comes to shove and he has to step over the line. He’s a nice-looking fellow but he’s not vain. He’s got style but it doesn’t have to do with what he is wearing – his suit isn’t great – money is certainly on the tight side but he gets by. One of the things that make Bugsy such an appealing character is that he is aware of his shortcomings but he doesn’t let them hold him back.

The barman fingered the lapels on Bugsy’s crumpled jacket. “I don’t think much of your suit,” he said at last.

“I’ll tell my tailor,” Bugsy answered.

“You’ve got too much mouth.”

“So I’ll tell my dentist.”

Oh, and he’s funny too.

His cool has to do with his confidence. This is not a man who spends too much time thinking about tomorrow. He orders what he wants and hopes he can come up with a way of paying the diner bill by the time he has taken his last slug on his Banana Boozle.

Bugsy is the central character, the lynchpin, everyone’s go-to guy, the only one who can possibly outwit Dandy Dan, the smooth, calculating gangster villain who wages war on Fat Sam and attempts to bring down his little empire. Fat Sam himself is a loveable klutz, not the sharpest knife in the drawer but smart enough to run the slickest joint in town, and bright enough to recognise when he needs to call in the help of someone far brighter than he.

The plot has edge and moves along with great pace but never neglects the detail, far from it; it indulges in the detail, describing scenes with such perfect ease and comic accuracy that you feel you know this world, these people. Descriptive character-building scenes are so often skipped over in action plots and I always think it’s a shame; to me these are the best bits. Funny interactions, flirtatious conversations – the pauses between – are what provide the suspense and make you engage with the characters. But what I like best of all about this book is the dialogue which Alan Parker has a genius for. It’s got such personality; charming, funny, snappy and totally believable.