Fern’s Heart of Darkness

Character: Fern McDermott
Tourist

Director: Patricia Benoit

Subway Stories is a series of 10 short films about people braving New York City's subway system
Bonnie’s segment is called Fern’s Heart of Darkness.

PRODUCTION NOTES

An HBO Original Movie, SUBWAY STORIES first premiered on the HBO network on August 17, 1997.

Filmed on location in New York City.The film's opening title card reads: "In 1995, HBO invited New Yorkers to send in their stories of life on the New York City subway. Over 1,000 people responded. The results are..." The closing credits thank the winning contestants whose stories inspired the films: Kathryn Drury, Richard Marin, Jack Satter, Joseph Bulgatz, Kurt Sass, Wayne Chrostowski, Edna McCown, Maurice & Ruth Reece, Nathan Prince.

Her story:
She is on the phone to a friend at the subway, obviously a tourist. She's really conservatively dressed in a pink jacket and a white blouse with embroidering. She is saying "I'm no wuss, everyone gets on the subway" and she writes down the directions her friend is giving her. Then she is walking along with a suitcase and goes past someone scary, so she grabs her mace. And in doing so, she drops the directions. On the subway you can tell she is pretty scared and is looking around at all of the people. Then she drops her mace and when some black guy picks it up for her, she's like "Thankyou, it's my perfume." Then she realises that she's lost her directions and looks pretty worried.
A really dodgy guy leans over and says "you have to get off at this stop." And Bonnie's like "look I think I know what stop I have to get off at.." And then everyone gets off except for her. Then she finally gets off and you can tell she's totally lost. So she goes through this turnstile that says exit. Only thing is, she didn't notice that it said "Only between 6am and 8pm." So she's totally stuck in this really small space and she is freaking out yelling stuff like "fire in the subway. "Then it's just a montage of her emotions and reactions, as she cries and looks at a picture of her dog and says "I'm never leaving you in a kennel again."
And then she tries to fit through the bars and slide underneath as she laughs hysterically.
Then it cuts to her sleeping and she is awoken by the sound of a homeless man trying to get in. So she screams at him and he leaves. Then it's the next morning and some guy comes along and opens the
entrance thing. Bonnie is crying and saying "thank god you're here, I got locked in." And the guard just looks at her as if she's homeless and says, "look you can't sleep here." And Bonnie's like "WHAT?" In a
hurt surprised voice.So anyway she walks up the stairs with her hair everywhere and dirt
all over her clothes and some lady gives her a dirty look. Just like she was doing to everyone else at the start.
K. Bowles.