WELCOME TO BUTCH JONES P.R.

EXECUTIVE #1: Boy, we’ve sure got a public relations crisis on our hands. I mean, this is bad. It’s bad for our company, it’s bad for business, and it’s bad for us personally.

EXECUTIVE #2: Relax.

EXECUTIVE #1: I can’t relax! What are we going to do?

EXECUTIVE #2: I’ve already made some calls. I’ve got a guy coming in, he specializes in crisis management public relations.

EXECUTIVE #1: Oh, wow. Is he the best in the business? The guy you call to fix your problems when no one else can?

EXECUTIVE #2: Well, more like the guy you call when you’re not as attractive a job as you used to be but you’ve got some money to spend.

EXECUTIVE #1: Oh.

EXECUTIVE #2: Yeah.

[there’s about a 5-second moment of silence]

EXECUTIVE #2: [checks watch] Should be here any second.

BUTCH JONES: [crashes through ceiling, lands on glass coffee table, shattering it] HELLO GENTLEMEN

EXECUTIVE #1: Good god, man, are you okay?

BUTCH: Absolutely, everything is going according to plan. I’m here to teach you a lesson, and I’ve just given you the first lesson in that lesson. Doors are the way to places you’ve already been, and you need to understand that walls can only contain your hopes when the doors are closed. If you make the ceiling your floor, the sky is your carpet and hope is a lamp that provides soft reading light at your desk.

EXECUTIVE #1: You’re bleeding, you know.

BUTCH: The desk is perspicacity.

EXECUTIVE #1: What’s the coffee table that you just shattered?

BUTCH: [smiling, as he does not realize he’s being condescended to] The shattering of complacency! A coffee table is a place for magazines and pleasant conversation, and we must shatter that complacency into a million shards of brilliant light and hope and, uh... light...

EXECUTIVE #2: Why don’t you sit down, Butch. Do you want a towel for the blood?

BUTCH: No thank you, I brought my own! Preparation is winning before you’ve begun the game. [dabs forehead with what appears to be fiberglass insulation from the ceiling cavity]

EXECUTIVE #2: Okay, well, um, if you’re sure you’re alright, then we’d like to discuss why we brought you in today. You see, we’re going through a bit of a public relations crisis.

BUTCH: Then you’ve called the right man! Ever since I left coaching at Tennessee after the 2017 season-

EXECUTIVE #1: Oh, that’s why he looked familiar

BUTCH: I’ve been running Lyle “Butch” Jones PR Services. We’ve dragged a number of companies out of the fire with our careful messaging and enthusiastic approach.

EXECUTIVE #1: Can you provide some examples?

BUTCH: I’d love to! I have a whole PowerPoint pres... en... [clearly realizing he left his presentation materials above the ceiling]

[15 minutes later, after a maintenance man has retrieved the presentation]

BUTCH: -tation detailing our successes to date. [clicks to start presentation]

[a United Airlines logo appears on screen]

BUTCH: This was a tough client. They’d had some real big crises. People getting kicked off planes, roughed up-

EXECUTIVE #1: Gosh, and that was just 2017, think about all the things that have happened since then

EXECUTIVE #2: That’s true, it’s currently 2019, as we all know, so we know of their more recent problems

EXECUTIVE #1: Right, like the in-flight cicada emergence

EXECUTIVE #2: Or when people found out the “peanuts” were just aquarium gravel

BUTCH: They’d been through a lot. But we worked up this great campaign for them: Don’t Get Carried Away, Get Carry The Day: Be Invited To Be United In Harmony And Success.

EXECUTIVE #1: [blank stare]

EXECUTIVE #2: And... this helped?

BUTCH: We believe that it did. Also, people forgot about United’s problems after that JetBlue plane landed in SeaWorld.

EXECUTIVE #1, considering all of the regrets in one’s life: Do... do you have other examples?

BUTCH: I DO! Remember in 2017, when a bunch of nerds got upset at McDonald’s for a botched rollout of a novelty sauce ingredient?

EXECUTIVE #1: I do not remember that.

EXECUTIVE #2: No, that sounds like one of those three-day stories of limited interest that you’ll end up sounding stupid when you try to explain it to your wife and you realize halfway through that you’re just online too much

BUTCH: Right, so, it was a major crisis, could’ve really affected their business, until we came up with this: The Best Sauce Is Dipping Yourself Under The Radar and Flying Low Towards Progress

EXECUTIVE #1: They absolutely did not use that.

BUTCH: We provide a raw first draft, and they hone the message to a final product.

EXECUTIVE #1: And that final product was?

BUTCH: I have not been allowed in a McDonald’s since.

EXECUTIVE #1: Right, well. You’re clearly unqualified for this job - or, as best I can tell, for any other. I’m deeply concerned for your well-being, and you haven’t stopped bleeding for the entirety of our meeting. That said, for some reason we’ve already paid you heavily in advance, so we have no recourse but to see what you can produce for us.

BUTCH: You won’t regret this. Now, what’s the product?

[2 days later, at a press conference]