. I was so bored with my own clenched reference book writing voice after three years of EOS, that I gathered up all my favorite surf writing, old and new, fiction and nonfiction, famous and obscure, threw in a couple of cartoons for flavor, and called it 

I was certain that an anthology of this caliber, published at this particular moment in time—everything in the book is prime cut, and the sport itself was blowing up—was at the very least going to be a middling (and royalty-earning) success. Nope. 

 pearled on takeoff and got rolled more or less straight to the remainder bin. Ten years later, the bottom line on my biannual royalty statement is still one hundred yards deep in the red.

The permissions gods punted my ass up and down the field during the production of 

. Any time I had to deal with a cubicle-dweller from a big publishing house, my earnest little surfing-as-cultural-history pitch was politely ignored, and I got charged straight off the rate card. $2,000 to use a chapter from 

 excerpt. But often, when I was able to sidestep the publishers, it was a different story. The piece I coveted most for 

 was an R. Crumb cartoon called "Salty Dog Sam Goes Surfin'," which originally ran in a 1972 issue of SURFER. (Crumb and SURFER cartoonist Rick Griffin were both Zap Comix contributors.) I nervously sent an email to Crumb's agent, explained the project, and said I'd pay whatever Crumb thought was fair. Didn't expect to hear back anytime soon, but the very next day the agent emailed back. The message said, and I quote, "Crumb wants to know if $30 would be too much."

Cutting off a nice blood-red slab of the 

 screenplay was just as easy. My friend Leonard Brady had left his writing gig at SURFER a few years earlier to work for producer John Milius, who wrote the original 

 script. I called Leonard, he talked to John, and three days later a Xerox copy of the screenplay was on my desk. No charge.

, including the little intro I wrote. Thanks again to John and Leonard. And thanks of course to Hollywood immortal Robert Duvall, who so completely owns the part of Col. Kilgore that he floats before me, almost holographically, voice and body, every time I read this piece.

Apocalypse Now writer and former Malibu regular John Milius watched Mickey Dora closely the early ‘60s, and brought some of the dark-haired surfer’s grinning sedition to bear in the creation of Lt. Col. William Kilgore (Robert Duvall), the Apocalypse Now officer who takes surfing fanaticism to thrilling new heights by napalming an enemy village in North Vietnam so that his men can slide a few waves at a nearby pointbreak. Sure, Kilgore is a lunatic. But a very recognizable one. All the craziness done in the name of surf? The damage, the selfishness? Just like the rest of us, multiplied by a million.

Milius had already put his bellicose stamp on a number of box-office hits, including Magnum Force (1973) and Conan the Barbarian (1982) His script for Apocalypse Now (1979) follows Capt. Benjamin Willard (Martin Sheen) as he goes deep into enemy territory to find and assassinate a renegade Army colonel. Willard’s upriver odyssey begins as he and Corporal Lance Johnson, a famous Malibu surfer, arrive on a beach in central Vietnam, just after Kilgore’s airborne troops have destroyed a fishing village. Willard and Johnson watch as Kilgore puts his signature on the carnage by dealing Air Calvary “death cards” on North Vietnamese casualties.

[Note: because the Apocalypse Now screenplay was revised, altered and in some cases improvised throughout the shooting of the film, much of the dialogue in this excerpt is different from that which appears in the movie. "Charlie doesn't surf," for example, was diamond-cut by Duvall himself into the syntactically flawless "Charlie don't surf!"]

KILGORE: (bellowing) Lieutenant! Bomb that tree line back about a hundred yards – give me some room to breathe.

A Liutenant and radio man nod and rush off.

KILGORE: Body cards, you damn fool – cards!

The soldier rushes over and hands him two brand new packages of playing cards wrapped in plastic. Two other soldiers get out of the copter and walk over. They are well-tanned and carry no weapons. They seem more casual about the Colonel than anyone else. The Sergeant walks up, leading Willard and Lance.

) Captain B.L. Willard, sir – 4th Record Group – I carry priority papers from Com-Sec Intelligence, 11 Corp – I believe you understand the nation of my mission.

) Yeah – Na Trang told me to expect you – we’ll see what we can do. Just stay out of my way till this is done, Captain.

He cracks the plastic wrapping sharply – takes out the deck of new cards and fans them. The Colonel strides right past Willard with no further acknowledgment. The others follow.

The Colonel walks through the shell-pocked field of devastation. Soldiers gather around smiling; as Kilgore comes to each V.C. corpse, he drops a playing card on it – carefully picking out which card he uses.

) Six a spades – eight a hearts. Isn’t one worth a Jack in this whole place.

Moving through the corpses, dropping the cards. One of the two tanned soldiers rushes up and whispers something to him. He stops.

The soldier points at Lance. Kilgore strides over to the young man, who almost instinctively moves closer to Willard.

LANCE: Gunner’s Mate, Third Class – L. Johnson, sir.

KILGORE: It's an honor to meet you, Lance. I’ve admired your noseriding for years – I like your cutback, too. I think you have the best cutback there is.

KILGORE: You can cut out the “sir,” Lance. I’m Bill Kilgore – I’m a goofyfoot.

His entire top-priority mission has been put in the background

KILGORE (O. S.): This is Mike from San Diego, and Johnny from Malibu – they’re good solid surfers. None of us are anywhere near your class, though.

Lance blushes, sort of mumbling "Thanks."

WILLARD: My orders are from Com-Sec Intel – B.L. Willard, 4th Recon . . .

KILGORE: Just hold up a second, Captain – I’ll get to you soon enough. We’ve got things to do here.

Willard eats it, for now. Kilgore puts his hand on Lance’s shoulder and continues flipping the cards indiscriminately on the bodies as they talk.

) . . . We do a lot of surfing around here. Like to finish up operations early and fly down to Vung Tau for the evening glass. Have you ever surfed the point at Vung Tau? I like the beachbreaks around Na Trang a lot – good lefts.

He passes a twisted gun emplacement with about five bodies – sprinkles cards all over them.

) . . . we keep three boards in my Command Huey at all times You never can tell when you’re gonna run into something good. I got a guy in Cam Ran Bay that can predict a swell two days in advance. We try to work it in.

He stops at a particularly wild-looking Viet Cong who has died with his mouth agape – staring wild-eyed in horror at the sky. Kilgore pauses.

) Hell, that’s an Ace if I ever saw one.

We SEE the Colonel the others walk off – the dead Viet Cong and card are in the immediate f.g. The card has the shield of the CAV printed beautifully, and above it the motto: DEATH FROM ABOVE.

KILGORE: Where’ve you been riding, Lance?

LANCE: I haven’t surfed since I got here.

KILGORE: That’s terrible – we’ll change that. I’d like to see you work – I’ve always liked your cutback; got a hell of a left turn, too.

Later that day, Willard talks to Kilgore about getting started on his search for Col. Kurtz.

) I got to get into the Nung River, here or here.

KILGORE: That village you’re pointing to is kinda hairy.

 – they got some pretty heavy ordnance, boy – I’ve lost a few recon ships in there.

WILLARD: So? I heard you had a good bunch of killers here.

KILGORE: And I don’t intend to get some of them chewed up just to get your boat put in the mouth of the goddamn Nung River. You say you don’t know Kurtz?

KILGORE: You talk like him – I don’t mind taking casualties, Captain, but I like to keep my ratio ten to one in this unit – ten Cong to one.

WILLARD: You’ll find enough Cong up there.

) What’s the name of that goddamn village – Vin Drin Dop or Lop; damn gook names all sound the same.

) Mike, you know anything about this point at Vin Drin Dop?

MIKE: It’s a really long left slide, breaks on the short side of the point – catches a south swell.

Willard looks at Lance – then at Kilgore.

KILGORE: Why the hell didn’t you tell me about that place – a good left. (

) There aren’t any good lefts slides in this whole shitty country. It’s all goddamn beachbreak.

MIKE: It’s hairy, though. That’s where we lost McDonnel – they shot the hell out of us. It’s Charlie’s Point.

Kilgore gazes out across the parked helicopters.

WILLARD: We could go in tomorrow at dawn – there’s always offshore wind in the morning.

KILGORE: I’m talking about going surfing, son. Hunting up Cong, and going surfin’. I’m talking about a left slide six-to-eight feet. (

) Hell, we’ll pick your boat up and lay it down like a baby, right where you want it. This is the Cav, boy – airmobile. I can take that point and hold it as long as I like – and you can get anywhere you want up-river that suits you, Captain. Hell, a six-foot left.

) You take a gunship back to division. Mike, take Lance with you – let him pick out a board, and bring me my Yater Spoon – the 8’ 6”.

TOM: I don’t know, sir. It’s – it’s . . .

TOM: Well, I mean it’s hairy in there. It’s Charlie’s Point. Kilgore turns and looks to Willard, exasperated.

Kilgore’s helicopter squadron moves on the fishing village at daybreak the following morning, Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries” blaring from loudspeakers, and the area is blasted with machine-gun and mortar fire, grenades, and napalm. As the village and nearby jungle burn, Kilgore, Willard and Lance fly overhead in the command copter.

KILGORE: We’ll move in another company and then we’ll own it. (

"SMELLS LIKE VICTORY" - EXCERPT FROM THE APOCALYPSE NOW SCRIPT

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