The design of a videotape recording for teaching politeness to learners of English as a Second Language is described. The recording attempts a step-by-step analysis of politeness realization markers and acts, especially face-threatening acts, simultaneously mapped onto the paralinguistic features accompanying them. It contains four bank scenes in which visitors request services of a bank teller, a goal-directed transaction that ultimately fails. Two of the scenes focus on an account withdrawal; two pertain to the closing of an account. In each pair of scenes, one teller handles the situation tactfully and one experiences pragmatic failure. Failure is used to de-emphasize the transaction aspect of the scene and point up the interpersonal aspect. Communication acts and problems are analyzed in captions and narrative voice-over. The intent is to suggest alternatives to behavior that leads to pragmatic failure. A transcription of the video scenes and narrative are appended. (MSE)