After Old Moses’s opening monologue giving us the film’s framing device of potentially suicidal Hudsucker Industries President Norville Barnes on the edge of his balcony on New Years Eve 1958, the credits roll and we find ourselves in the first real scene of the film: a parallel narrative of a young Norville Barnes having nothing but potential, and an old Waring Hudsucker, having everything but realizing he has nothing left to live for.