Script Analysis: “Hustlers” — Scene By Scene Breakdown

Here is my take on this exercise from a previous series of posts — How To Read A Screenplay:

After a first pass, it’s time to crack open the script for a deeper analysis and you can do that by creating a scene-by-scene breakdown. It is precisely what it sounds like: A list of all the scenes in the script accompanied by a brief description of the events that transpire.

For purposes of this exercise, I have a slightly different take on scene. Here I am looking not just for individual scenes per se, but a scene or set of scenes that comprise one event or a continuous piece of action. Admittedly this is subjective and there is no right or wrong, the point is simply to break down the script into a series of parts which you then can use dig into the script’s structure and themes.

The value of this exercise:

• We pare down the story to its most constituent parts: Scenes.
• By doing this, we consciously explore the structure of the narrative.
• A scene-by-scene breakdown creates a foundation for even deeper analysis of the story.

Today: Hustlers (2019). You can download the script here.

Screenplay by Lorene Scafaria based on a magazine article by Jessica Pressler.

Plot Summary: A crew of savvy former strip club employees who band together to turn the tables on their Wall Street clients.

Hustlers
Scene by Scene Breakdown
By Priya Gopal
GoIntoTheStory.com

P. 1–5: Destiny, the new girl in the Moves Gentleman’s Club, gets ready in the locker room with other girls and then presents herself on stage for the first time. We get to see Justice, the DJ, Mom and others working at the club.

Destiny starts working. She makes her rounds, approaches men and dances for them in the private area and pole-dances on stage. Her work is not glitter and glamor. Clients are rude and at the end of her shift, she gets to keep a small amount of the money she made as she also has to tip the manager and others in the club.

P. 6–7: After her shift ends in the early morning, she goes to her grandmother’s house and sleeps in her childhood bedroom till the late afternoon. Before she leaves the house, Destiny kisses her grandmother and notices her necklace is missing and gives her some cash.

P. 8–10: Destiny sees Ramona taking the stage. There is something about the way she dances and commands the room. The crowd goes wild and throws money at her. Destiny is mesmerized. Later, Destiny goes without any jacket on to the rooftop where Ramona is already smoking a cigarette. She joins her and and Ramona wraps her coat around Destiny to keep her warm. While they talk and bond naturally, Ramona plays with Destiny’s hair. Destiny asks Ramona to show her some moves, Ramona offers her to introduce her to some of her regulars and give her a crash course in this place.

P. 11: Years later, in Destiny’s all-white living room, a young reporter interviews Destiny about Ramona and asks if it was her idea to work together and when things got out of control.

Destiny says that Ramona was always in control.

P 11–13: Back to Moves, in 2007. Ramona teaches Destiny various moves and poses and later introduces her to Diamond. They both learn Destiny how to give a lap-dance.

P. 13–16: In the locker room of Moves. The girls are getting ready and Ramona walks in with Destiny and introduces her to some other girls (Tracy, Star, Liz, Jackie) and we get to know them a little bit better. We also get to know that Tracy’s boyfriend is jealous. Mom comes in with a homemade cake for the girls.

p. 16: Destiny gets a drink at the bar and Ramona pulls her away from there and tells her to stop investing in the club and let the men get fucked up. Ramona teaches Destiny to start men off with a single, then a double, then a triple and then back to a double and back to a single. They must be drunk enough to give their credit card and sober enough to sign the check. Ramona tips the DJ and he gives her a beat to dance on. Ramona and Destiny hit the floor, they are in control.

P. 17–19: In V.O. of Destiny: Ramona tells there are three tiers of Wall Street Guys and you have to figure out who you are dealing with and then play at their level.

We get to see who these men are in their work environment and then we seen them in the club Moves and how the ladies handle them.

The bottom-tier broker don’t do anything dirty to make money and therefore they don’t have them but if they have money, you can milk them. Ramona and Destiny dance for the bottom-tier guy in the club.

The middle-tier guys will get their hands a little dirty but they have limits. These guys don’t do a lot of spending. Ramona steers Destiny away from them in the club because they don’t spend anything.

The top-gier men come straight from their work to the club through the back door and take the private elevator to the one room without cameras and they don’t leave till they spend 10–15 thousand a night.

Ramona introduces Destiny to a top-tier man and they treat him in the champagne room. Money is flowing.

At the end of their shift, Destiny and Ramona have made a lot of money. Destiny marvels at the amount. She sees Ramona stacking her boots with the cash and does the same with the help of Ramona.

In Destiny’s V.O, Ramona wasn’t in it to make friends, it just happened.

P. 20–23: Ramona and Destiny shop in high-end stores and Destiny pays cash a thousand dollars for her purchase. Later, they drive in Ramona’s Escalade to her apartment with a nice walk-in closet filled with Ramona’s stuff like fur coats, heels. Destiny is impressed.

Ramona shows Destiny her homemade bathing suits she designs for her own swim-line. They bond like sisters. Later, her daughter Juliet (9) and Manuela (the nanny) enter the room. They are Ramona’s life.

Destiny and Ramona share the same view, they don’t want to be dependent on anyone. Destiny wants to take care of her grandmother and Ramona wants to take care of Juliet. She would do anything for her kid and describes motherhood as a mental illness.

p. 23: Back Destiny’s living room. The reporter asks Destiny if that’s how she would describe Ramona, ‘Motherhood is a mental illness’. Destiny doesn’t answer and worries how much of her story is going into the article because she doesn’t want to perpetuate the stigma that all strippers are thieves. She underscores she was making an honest living back then.

p. 24–26: We see several scenes in the past with a voice over of Destiny.

In her grandmother’s house, she gives her grandmother a stack of cash.

In Destiny’s new apartment. She got her own place in the city and Ramona helps her arrange the furniture

In Moves, inspired by Ramona she goes back to school and studies in the low hours at the club. A visitor who is into Asian girls is impressed by her handwriting (she doesn’t have a computer to work on). Destiny knows how to hook him and then we see her later doing her homework on a computer in the locker room. Ramona kisses her on her head, she is clearly proud of her.

In Moves, Destiny and Ramona dance for two big shots.

In her voice over, she made more money that year than a brain surgeon.

P. 26: Destiny sits behind the wheel of an Escalade in the show room, next to her is Ramona. She is feeling the steering wheel in her hands and decides this is the car. They turn on the radio and dance to some Britney music in the car while the salesmen look on.

p. 27: Various scenes of the Wall St. guys and the dancers in Moves are intercut.

The guys in their offices, hustling their clients and then at night, the girls in Moves are hustling these men and money is flowing. The girls are securing the bag.

Destiny gets a diamond necklace from Stephen and Tracy sends her boyfriend away and gets back to work.

P 27: Ramona and Destiny hang out at a rooftop pool. There, they meet Johny, a handsome man. There is instant chemistry between him and Destiny but Ramona gets a bad vibe about him.

P. 27: In the midst of Ramona’s and Destiny’s success, Johny and Destiny argue. He wants to know who gave her a certain item.

P 28: V.O. Destiny: she recalls the last great night at the club when Usher came in. Everything was glamorous and cool.

p. 29: News reporter talks to the screen and tells about the worst financial crisis in modern times.

P 29: V.O. Destiny: the crash had put everybody out of business. 
 Destiny is pregnant and worried how she is going to make money. Johnny wants to take care of her and Destiny doesn’t like it she is dependent on him now.

p. 30–32: Destiny walks with her daughter (2) in a store.

V.O. Destiny: she has lost touch with Ramona.

She clearly doesn’t like the situation is in now. Later at home, she has a fight with Johnny. He walks out and leaves her and the crying baby alone. Destiny calls Stephen to talk to him but when she finds out he is married she hangs up the phone and crosses his name from the bottom of a list that is labeled ‘Get Money’. She looks at her baby and starts to panic.

p.32- 33: Destiny has a job interview in a high-end department store but doesn’t get the job because she lacks retail experience. The interviewer suggests she should go back to bartending — that’s how Destiny described her previous dancer jobs.

p. 33-: Destiny is back to living with her grandmother. She and her daughter sleep in her old childhood room.

P 33–35: Destiny is back at her old job at Moves. She doesn’t know any of the girls, mostly Russians, and they are all drop-dead beautiful. The club has changed and none of regulars are there. Mom is still working there, this time behind the bar and explains the changes. The men don’t spend any money and the girls don’t want to share tips. The managers took the camera out of the champagne room.

Destiny knows she can’t compete with the other girls and can’t work it alone.

p. 35–36: Destiny dances for an aggressive stock broker who wants her to stroke him down under. She is reluctant and he puts three bills of hundred on the coach and offers her some coke. She leans in. Later she cries in the bathroom, she noticed later that the customer gave her three bills of twenties.

p. 36: Destiny’s house, years later. Destiny’s eyes are welling at the thought of that experience and she only tells it the reporter so that she knows where her head was when she saw Ramona.

p. 36: Destiny leaves the bathroom, still shaken, when she catches sight of Ramona. It’s like long lost sisters sees each other again. They meet and Destiny falls into Ramona’s arms.

p. 37: Destiny and Ramona catch up in a diner. Ramona sees the picture of her 2.5 y/o daughter. They missed each other. Destiny is tired and exhausted and cries a bit. She needs to make money to be independent for herself and Lily. 
 In Destiny’s V.O., what happened after the crash as told by Ramona.

p. 38: Ramona looks around and the Moves is almost empty. The girls were crying and Ramona was for the first time very worried.

p. 38–40: Ramona works in a clothing store, she got the job thanks to Mercedes whose boyfriend is about to go to jail. Ramona asks the manager to quit earlier on Fridays so that she can pick up her daughter at school but the manager doesn’t give a shit.

p. 41: Ramona is back at her old job at Moves. She dances but the 20s men pay more attention to the younger girls and ask her to take a break. She goes back to the locker room and helps out crying Annabelle (20s) with a tampon issue. Annabelle tells her family has cut her off because she works here. Ramona plays with her hair and asks her if wants to go fishing.

p. 42–44: Ramona, Mercedes and Annabelle are at the financial district bar seizing up the guys in suits. Ramona explains that since the recession the clubs needs customers and they need to reel them in and she teaches the girls how to do that.

Later, Mercedes, this time in a form-fitting dress, catches a businessman on the hook and right then Ramona and Annabelle join her and get introduced as her co-workers. They play with him and get him drunk and to sniff coke and when the timing is there they suggest to go to a strip club. They steer him to the club where they get a percentage of his spendings. They run up his credit card as far as possible.

p. 45–46: Another night, they try the same game but have no luck. They feel defeated. Mercedes needs money for the lawyer and Annabelle can’t go back home. That’s when Ramona comes with her special recipe.

p. 46–48: In her Escalade, Ramona shows the Mercedes and Annabelle a vile of powder they can use to hook the men. Mercedes and Annabelle are cautious. Ramona is cool and says others are doing the same to stay in the business. 
 Later, Ramona shows Destiny the pills and asks her if she’s in. Like the other girls, Destiny is reluctant in the beginning but Ramona got a point, she knows she can’t be dancing forever and go back to minimum wage.

p.49–51: Mercedes works her game on a short guy. As planned, Annabelle, Destiny and Ramona join them and the girls surround him and go with their hands all over him. While the other girls distract this guy, Ramona puts some powder in his drink. Later, they carry him half-conscious into the champagne room of Moves where he bounces off the couch onto the floor, smiling and drooling with closed eyes. For a moment they are worried but he responds to their question and give them his credit card for another round. Ramona brings the card to Mom who swipes it.

p. 51–52: The girls celebrate in Ramona’s house with champagne. Ramona says their dancing days are over. Destiny wants to pay off her grandmother’s debt. The girls laugh and dance. Annabelle really feels they are her sisters. They kiss and hug like sisters to celebrate their family bond.

p.52: Back to Destiny’s house in the present where she talks to the reporter and excuses her behavior for drugging the men. They were doing it anyway on their way to work. To make it as safe as possible, she suggested to tweak the recipe.

p. 53: Ramona and Destiny tweak the recipe and try it on themselves. They fall asleep and when they are awake, they bake the liquid in the oven and it turns into crystals. They have found the ideal mix. Destiny doesn’t want to use this on strangers. She wants to know the guy, be sure he already uses some stuff and has enough money not to care if he looses some. Ramona agrees.

p. 54: Ramona cold-calls David, one of her guys from her contacts and sends Annabelle photo to freshen up his memory. Meanwhile, Destiny and Mercedes watch her at work. David responds and calls back.

p. 55: Annabelle meets David in the bar. Later, Mercedes, Destiny and Ramona join her. There is a quick montage of various nights where the girls meet the assholes they met before in 2008. They play their game: they surround the guy, touch and distract him, hand him a drink with the powder in it and the guy drinks it. They drive the guys in Ramona’s Escalade and move him into Moves where their credit cards are being swiped and approved.

p. 56: The girls celebrate in Ramona’s apartment and pop champagne, followed by other scenes.

Destiny gives her grandmother a stack of money and her grandmother is proud of her.

Ramona helps her child with her homework while her nanny cleans after dinner. She is back.

Mercedes hires a high-powered lawyer for Dragon.

Annabelle rearranges furniture in her own place.

p. 56: the four girls try shoes on in a high-end department store while Ramona handles a complaining customer. Ramona could always handle it and treated it like business.

p. 57: Destiny and Ramona discuss business. Which girl handled which man and how many they charged the men.

p. 57: Annabelle and Mercedes try on expensive dresses in a high-end store.

The girls branched out and cultivated a certain level of clientele.

p.57: Annabelle sits next to a handsy architect in an upstairs restaurant. This man wants to fuck in the bathroom and she tries to keep his hands at bay till the other girls have arrived. It’s then that Destiny and Ramona realize they need to be outsourcing.

p. 58: Back to Destiny’s house where she talks to the reporter. Destiny says they put an ad in Craig’s list.

p.58–60: Destiny, Ramona and Mom interview the recruits in a mall food court. There is Georgia, Crystel, Trixie, Angel and Coco who is a junkie and a criminal. Destiny disapproves of Coco.. Later the girls hit the department store and try on stuff.

p. 60: In Ramona’s Escalade on various nights: Destiny and Ramona instruct the girls who are sitting in the back , Mercedes and Georgia in designer dresses, what to do. No drinking, no drugs and once they get the signature they can party. Ramona also hands the girls a vile of powder.

The other nights it’s Annabelle and Angel, and Crystal and Trixie sitting in the back who get the same instruction.

p. 61: in the Champagne room of Moves, on various nights, Georgie and Trixie dance for the stockbroker who gave Destiny three twenties. Angel and Annabelle dance for an alpha. Crystal and Mercedes entertain a corporate man. We see the men loose consciousness and the women taking advantage of that.

Ramona and Destiny sit in the Escalade and keeping track of the money the girls bring in.

P. 62: Destiny and Ramona walk in the club with their girls in formation. They bring in a lot of money for the club and know their worth. They were in charge and no more disposable dancers.

P. 62. Men move a lot of heavy and big furniture to Ramona’s new apartment.

On Christmas morning, it’s full house in Ramona’s apartment. Destiny, her daughter and grandmother, Mom from the club, Annabelle, Mercedes, Manuela and her two daughters are there. They open expensive gifts. Destiny gives her grandmother a pearl necklace and Ramona gets a Gucci bag. Destiny gets a fur coat from Ramona. Ramona is proud of Destiny and says they don’t need anybody else and Destiny agrees. They all have dinner together, share stories and laugh. After dinner, they dance and have a good time. Ramona and Destiny’s grandmother bond like they are old friends.

p. 68: Back to Destiny’s house. Reporter wants to know whose idea it was to start drugging the men. Destiny feels uncomfortable answering this question because the girls were like her sisters.

The reporter understands and says that Ramona said the same. Destiny is surprised she already talked to Ramona and that she’s working a regular job.

We see a few flashbacks seeing the reporter talking to Ramona but we can’t hear what they say. The reporter hoped Destiny could fill in the blank.

p. 70: From Ramona’s Escalade. Ramona and Destiny pull up in front of Moves and see a team of blond copycats leading a man out of their SUV into the club. Ramona declares they don’t need the club any longer. They can have the money all for themselves.

p. 70: Ramona has a brand new Escalade. It is parked outside an upscale hotel. Destiny and Ramona are waiting in it for the girl to deliver them the credit card.

p. 71: Dawn leaves a hotel room and tries not to forget the credit card number. She tries not to get distracted and makes it to Ramona and Destiny with the credit card. Destiny is mad that Dawn is on drugs.

p. 72: Ramona and Destiny are waiting for the girls in Ramona’s apartment. Ramona is upset none showed up. Ramona suggest a few name but Destiny rejects them all for clear reasons and is not willing to work with criminals.

p. 73: Back at Destiny’s house. Destiny explains her logic to the reporter. It doesn’t make sense to change a winning team and bring in new players.

p. 73: Destiny walks into Ramona’s apartment and sees Ramona talking to Dawn, a new girl, and playing with her hair. The girls were getting ready for the night and Ramona had invited Dawn to join them. Destiny hates what Ramona has done and says she had no business sense.

p. 74: Dawns puts too much powder in Victor’s drink.

Ramona and Destiny are in Ramona’s car with Victor’s credit card. Ramona wants to use credit limit, 50 thousand and Destiny disapproves of it and warns her they will never see him again. Ramona doesn’t care.

p. 74: In Ramona’s apartment. Ramona scrolls through her phone and is frustrated. She burned through their regulars. Destiny recalls they were left with unpredictable strangers.

p. 75: At a rich man’s house. A crying Mercedes in Ramona’s bathing suit opens up the door for Destiny. They go to the pool where a man lies naked on the floor near the pool. He’s unconscious and bleeding from his head but he still has a pulse. He proved to Mercedes he could dive off the roof. Georgia took off and Mercedes couldn’t get hold of Ramona. They carry him into Destiny’s car where Annabelle is waiting. She throws up when she sees the man. Destiny orders Annabelle to keep trying to reach Ramona while they drive to the hospital. On their way to the hospital, they see a cop car waiting at the next ligth and right then the man wakes up and Mercedes freaks out and accidentally elbows him into unconsciousness. The girls are afraid the police will notice them but they don’t.

p. 77: Mercedes refuses to carry the man inside and runs away in her bathing suit. Annabelle is a useless help. Destiny drags the naked man out of the car and a security guard sees her and calls for medics who take over while Destiny fake-sobs that it’s her husband. Annabelle is slumped over and Destiny helps her out of the car and calls ‘my sister ..my sister’.

p. 78: Destiny paces outside the hospital, trying to get hold of Ramona, instead, she gets her voice mail. Destiny is angry and frustrated.

p. 78: Destiny, still in her night’s clothes, drives into her driveway, burst into her house, looking for Lily. The house is empty. In the kitchen, she finds a note and she rushes to the neighbor. She bangs on her door and a well-dressed woman, holding Lily in her arms, opens up the door. Lily spend the night there. The neighbor looks at Destiny’s clothes and asks her if she should take the child and Destiny declines the offer.

p. 79: Destiny drives Lily to her school and walks her up to the door. Her five-inch heels and her clothes from last night draws the attention of some parents. Destiny recalls where Ramona was when she needed her.

p. 80: Ramona was bailing Dawn out of jail.

p. 80: Destiny gets in her car in the school lot and answers Ramona’s call. She is angry and says that must never call her again. She hangs up and drives away.

p. 80: Destiny drives to her grandmother’s house. When she enters, she sees her grandmother sitting in her chair and immediately knows she is dead. Destiny braces herself in the doorway.

p. 80: Destiny buries her grandmother, her daughter is sitting next to her. When the priest is speaking, Ramona shows up and sits next to her. She reaches out for Destiny’s hand and she leans into her. Destiny sobs in Ramona’s arms. Ramona is sorry she wasn’t there.

After the burial, Destiny and Ramona are still sitting in the same place and Destiny doesn’t want to go home. Ramona invites her to stay with her daughter at her place and Destiny accepts it.

Ramona is supposed to meet someone and invites Destiny to join her if she feels like it.

p. 81: At Destiny’s house, talking to the reporter. Destiny says she kept thinking that if she could save enough money, she could start clean. Maybe a score so big, she wouldn’t need anybody. 
 The reporter asked if that happened with Doug. Destiny gets defensive and calls Ramona a liar.

At her request, the reporter tells what Ramona said about her. She had a tough time growing up and after her father left, her mother dropped her at her grandmother’s house and never came back (flashback of this moment). Destiny cries thinking of that moment and wonders why Ramona would tell the reporter that. The reporter thinks that Ramona wanted her to understand that for her (Destiny) it wasn’t about revenge. You were just trying to make friends.

The reporter reveals she doesn’t feel sorry for those men but Destiny does. Destiny does have a recurring nightmare of a driving car she can’t stop.

Destiny stops the interview and Elizabeth walks out.

p. 83: Elizabeth arrives at home and sits down when the phone rings. It’s Destiny. She tells that Ramona met Doug years ago.

p. 84: Ramona, in her stripping days, gives comfort to Doug who was taken there by his friends to blow off some steam after he experienced a few devastating events in his life. We see footages of his home destroyed by a hurricane and him separating from his wife.

p. 84: Destiny and Dawn are keeping Doug company in a bar. Destiny and Doug talked about their kids and exes and he told why she left. Destiny feels sympathy for him, then Ramona returns with drinks. Doug takes a big sip and Destiny feels guilty.

p. 85: In Doug’s home, he is talking to Elizabeth and recalls the room was round (flashback to champagne room). He couldn’t feel his face.

p. 86: In Ramona’s apartment, Destiny is on the cell listening to a crying Doug who is begging her to credit back his debit card. His mortgage payment was on it. 
 Destiny tries to stay strong and remind him of the good time he had. He is begging her and has no money to pay his mortgage and he has a son to care for. Destiny feels sorry for him. 
 Ramona wants her to hang up and when she doesn’t, she fights her and grabs the phone and says that if they don’t do it, someone else will do it.

p. 86: Doug to Elizabeth in his kitchen. He tells they maxed out his corporate card and he was fired after an investigation by his company. When he got a new job, he was fired again because his name had been reported to an agency that tracks white-collar crime.

p. 87: Destiny sits in the back of a cab and watches the city passing by. She is tired and worried.

She turns her head and then we are in her nightmare. She sits in a car that nobody is driving. She climbs into the front seat and grabs the wheel but it doesn’t work. The brake won’t work.

p. 87: NYC precinct. A detective is about to eat his pizza when he receives a call from Doug that he went to a strip club, was drugged and his credit card ran up. The detective hangs up. Doug calls again and says he has proof.

P 87: Elizabeth interviews this detective and another one. If it weren’t for the tape, they wouldn’t have believed him.

p. 88: In Doug’s apartment, Doug sits with members of the DEA Tactical-Diversion Squad, they listen to his recording. Doug sobs. Dawn says he was a target for their little gang and they gave him something. The scene freezes, and Destiny says in voice over, ‘they never said who it was but she knew’

p. 88: Dawn is dropped in the seat in the interrogation room and immediately wants to tell everything because she doesn’t want to go back.

The scene freezes: in Destiny’s V.O., the cops won’t admit it but she believes this is how it went down.

p. 89: Dawn opens the hotel door for Destiny and Ramona and wears a wire-tap on her bra. Dawn asks them if they brought the drugs and she wants one of them to drug the client. Destiny suspects that Dawn is high but she denies. Destiny gets more suspicious. A man emerges from the bathroom, sees the girls and gets excited. Dawn forces him into a chair and returns to the girls to prepare a scotch. Destiny and Ramona want her to put the drug herself in his drink and she does. They return to the living room and let the man drink his scotch.

p. 90: Ramona speed in her car down the road. Destiny is convinced someone has been following them. The same car was in front of the hotel. Destiny suspects that Dawn had set them up. Ramona thinks she is paranoid.

p. 91: Elizabeth asks the detectives if there was a sting. They don’t comment on that. They said that nobody wanted to talk to them and then they found the article of the architect.

p. 91: At a street vendor one of the detectives see the cover of the Daily News and an article on an architect who failed to pay Moves the bill of 135 thousands he had racked up during four visits to the club.

p. 91: Detective shows the article to the other detective. The detectives show the article to the sergeant. They laugh that he went back three more times after he got drugged.

p. 92: The detectives talk to Elizabeth and say out of context it looks like he made the story up.

p. 92: Annabelle sits with Peter, the architect in an upscale bar. Ramona, Destiny and Mercedes join them. Detective, in voice over, says it’s scary.

p. 92: Detectives talk to Elizabeth. They all got so spooked that none of them went to the club anymore.

p. 93: Destiny puts the Daily News in front of Ramona, open to the architect article. Ramona doesn’t care and continues doing her nails but Destiny is scared.

p. 93: Ramona walks down the street to the ATM and draws some money. When she turns, she is surrounded by cops who have drawn their guns. She surrenders, puts her fists in the air and opens them up. The money flies away.

p. 93: Mercedes visits her boyfriend in prison. She wears a giant engagement ring. When she walks out of the prison gate, cops wait for her. She is confused.

P. 94: Annabelle receives a text from Destiny that says: ‘Run’. Cops kick in her door and she tries to climb out of the fire escape but she fails. They put her in hand-cuffs while she throws up.

P. 94: Destiny walks out of the door with her hands in the air, surrendering to police and they take her to the precinct. The neighbor holds Lily in her arms.

Later, Destiny joins Ramona, Annabelle and Mercedes in jail. Annabelle vomits. The detective wants to know who the ringleader is.

p. 95: Two detectives sit Ramon in an interrogation room. She has her phone on her and says that she’s texting Tony. They didn’t do anything wrong.

p. 95: Two detectives interrogate Destiny who is afraid. They urge her to think about her daughter and how it would be for her growing up without a mother.

p. 95: Ramona and Destiny walk down the steps of the precinct. Destiny looks beaten but Ramona is plotting their way out and thinking if they know any lawyer from the club. Destiny reveals she took the deal. Destiny cries and Ramona gets angry at her for taking the deal. Destiny did it for Lily. Ramona is shaken. She hugs Destiny and they both cry on each shoulders. Ramona says ‘Motherhood is a mental illness’. They both know this is their goodbye and Ramona walks away from her.

p. 97: We are in Elizabeth’s home. She’s pregnant and with Destiny on the phone while a baby shower is going on in the background.

Scene is intercut with Destiny’s home. Destiny tells she is moving back to queens and starting over. She says that hurt people hurt people and she wants to know if Elizabeth talked to Ramona lately. She wants to know that Ramona said about her the one time Elizabeth spoke to her.

p. 98: Clothing store office where Ramona works. She talks to Elizabeth and sits in the manager’s chair. Ramona has her big bag open on the desk. She carries all her valuable stuff with her in that bag. In it is also a photo of little Destiny. Ramona looks lovingly at her photo and her eyes well up. She wishes they had known each other earlier in life so that they could have been there for each other and maybe their lives would have been different. Ramona can’t talk to Destiny but she still carries her with her.

p. 98: Destiny listens to the phone and tears fall.

p. 100: Destiny and Ramona’s friendship in reverse. We see various shots. Starting from looking at each other in jail Destiny wrapped in Ramona’s fur coat, their head on top of each other.

p. 100: Destiny nods when Elizabeth tells her over the phone to give Ramona a call.

p. 101: Destiny pleads guilty to conspiracy, grand larceny and attempted assault in exchange for zero jail time. Outside the courthouse she hides under her purse from the press.

Ramona served five years probation. Outside the courthouse she flips off cameras.

Annabelle and Mercedes were sentenced to weekends in prison and were on five years of probation.

p. 101: the Moves club is packed with men watching women dance.

In Ramona’s V.O.: everyone is just hustling

p. 101: In Ramona’s office, Ramona to the interviewer: the whole country is a strip club. People toss the money, and people dance.

p. 101: In Ramona’s apartment- flashback: the girls celebrating their first big score.

Writing Exercise: I encourage you to read the script, but short of that, if you’ve seen the movie, go through this scene-by-scene breakdown. What stands out to you about it from a structural standpoint?

To download a PDF of the breakdown for Hustlers, go here.

To read the New York magazine article the movie was based on, go here.

Kudos to Priya Gopal for doing the scene-by-scene breakdown.

To see 100+ screenplay scene-by-scene breakdowns, go here.