It should be no surprise with Madison’s stories that she has a… uh… healthy libido. But what got her so charged up in “The Six Shooter”? Was it really the cornbread?
When adapting the scripts, I don’t set out with any agenda in mind. I didn’t start writing intending to go down that path, so to speak. For “The Six Shooter” the real challenge came in choosing which script to adapt. Britt Ponset is a lone hero in the series, so where could Madison fit in? With most of his adventures being the “wanderer of the Western territories” well, you may have noticed, Madison does not like to ride horses. Then I ran across this episode set at Ma Benson’s boarding house. It was a perfect fit to put Madison in as a one of her boarders. And of course, Madison wouldn’t be out with the posse since they only wanted the men of the town. Great!
So after I choose an episode, I format it into my writing program starting with line one. Again, no agenda here aside from where Madison fit into the setting. I knew I wanted to keep the descriptive monologues done by Britt (aka Jimmy Stewart). I really think those monologues give this particular western its distinction.
Madison and Britt get off on a rather rocky start with her not letting him into the house. That was from the original script. Ma Benson was so scared she didn’t want to open the door. But Madison can be a bit… abrasive, so that didn’t really impress the otherwise cool and collected Britt Ponset. And her getting his name wrong was pretty disrespectful. So from then on out, there were jabs and verbal punches between the two.
Then came the epic monologue describing Ma Benson’s meal. If you didn’t listen to that and get hungry, you may be dead inside. Now, a trait I like to give Madison is her eating. She has had more than one occasion to talk with her mouth full of food. As Britt points out, she’s not much with the manners. And I think that comes from a lifetime of demanding — and getting — what she wants when she wants it. Plus, I like to keep movement in scenes. Activity going on so there isn’t just “talking heads” of dialogue. Actually, the original script did a great job of that in the first scene as Ma Benson prepares the meal while telling Britt about Stacy Gault. So I kept that extra activity going with Madison stuffing her face.
Then in comes “The Stranger.” When Britt convinces Ma to take him in as a boarder, in the original script she takes him upstairs to a room. But the scene of her in the hallway is a complete add-on. In the OG, she comes back downstairs to tell Britt and Seth about what she saw through the key hole. So I decided to write that scene. Of course adding Madison. That’s what lead to the sexy stuff. What do you think you’d see peering through someone’s key hole in a private room? He’s getting ready for bed. Taking off his shirt… And then the bit about Ma peeking through key holes of all of her boarders, and having seen Madison in her personal moment… well from then on out we were all about the sexy stuff. With the original script even having Britt say the line to The Stranger “put your clothes on” yeah… we had to go there!
So was it the shirtless stranger, the yellow leather gloves, or the cornbread? Or maybe the posse full of sexy cowboys. Perhaps you can recall Madison’s first Western, “Gunsmoke.” She wasn’t all too happy about being paired off with the local banker for the sake of Marshal Dillon’s plan. But then at the end she sees Pedro and the episode finishes with her hurrying off to become better acquainted. Maybe Madison just has a thing for cowboys. 🤠 😉
-Chrisi (aka Madison)
