Robin Williams (James deMonaco & Gary Nadeau): 'Make your life spectacular', Jack — 1996

The premise of this film is that the Jack character is a rapidly aging child, who is graduating the fifth grade

I don't have very much time these days, so I'll make it quick Like my life. As we come to the end of this phase of our life, we find ourselves trying to remember the good times, and trying to forget the bad times. And we find ourselves thinking about the future. We start to worry, thinking, what am I going to do? Where am I going to be in 10 years? But I say to you, 'Hey, look at me, please, don't worry so much.' Because in the end, none of us have very long on this earth. Life is fleeting. And if you're ever distressed, cast your eyes to the summer sky, when the stars are strung across the velvety night. And when a shooting stars streaks through the blackness, turning night into day. Make a wish. Think of me. Make your life spectacular. I know I did. I made it, Mom. I'm a grownup. Thank you.

Alec Baldwin (by Tina Fey): 'The greatest eulogy of all time', 30 Rock s7e8 - 2012

aired 6 June 2012

Friends. Last night when I sat down to write a speech worthy of my mother's 87 years, I thought I was facing an impossible task until I realised that her constant crushing disapproval was a gift. The greatest gift a mother ever gave a son. My lifelong quest to please that woman is what made me the man I am today.

The man who has been the centrefold of Fortune magazine no fewer than three times.

The man who in 1984 wore a tuxedo so well, he broke up the Gogos.

The man who last night wrote, and today will deliver the greatest eulogy of all time …

[cue music]

Dublin 1852. The ship bobs in the lee tide of the icy Irish Sea, her name … Ariel

[Sentence in Gaelic]

Tracey Jordan: Today we are all Irish!

[Italian accordian and accent] And the plumber says, ‘I don't know, but that's a pretty big-a pizza.’

Kenneth: Life is for the living!

[Playing Danny Boy on the flute]

But there's a truth in the centre of that.

Thank you Kermit, for explaining the afterlife to us. Kermit: Ah, Listen, Jack, thank you for being the man we all aspire to be

Ladies and gentlemen, Sir Paul McCartney and the Harlem Boys choir.

And though the falling snow would erase her footprints, it could never erase our memory of her. I love you, mother. End of eulogy.

Jeremy Strong (by Jesse Armstrong) 'He made life happen', Kendall's funeral for Logan Roy, Succession S4E9 - 2023

aired 23 May 2023, USA

Yeah, I don't know how much I know, but … I knew my father.

Y'know, I've said it, I said it, and it is true what I said, what my uncle said, yeah, my father was a ... a brute. He was, he was tough. But also he built and he acted.

And there are many people out there who will always tell you no. And there are a thousand reasons ... I mean, there always are ... a thousand reasons not to, to not act. But he was never one of those. He had, you kinow, a vitality, of force that could hurt, and it did. But my God, the sheer ... I mean, look at it. The lives and the livings and the things that he made.

And the money. Yeah, the money. The lifeblood, the oxygen of this wonderful civilization that we have built from the mud, the money, the corpuscules of life gushing around this nation, this world filling men and women all around with desire, quickening the ambition to own, and make, and trade, and profit, and build, and improve. I mean, great geysers of life, he willed. Of buildings, he made stand. Of ships, steel holes, amusements, newspapers, shows and films and life bloody complicated life!

He made life happen. He made me and my three siblings, sorry. And yes, he had a terrible force to him and a fierce ambition that could push you to the side, but it was only that, that human thing, the will to be and to be seen and to do.

And now people might want to tend and prune the memory of him. To denigrate that force, that magnificent, awful force of him. But my God, I hope it's in me. Because if we can't match his vim, then God knows the future will be sluggish and grey. Now, there wasn't a room from the grandest state room where his advice was sought to the lowest house where his news played, where he couldn't walk and wasn't comfortable.

He was comfortable with this world and he knew it. He knew it and he liked it. And I say amen to that.

Sarah Snook (by Jesse Armstrong) : 'So goodbye, my dear dear world of a father', Shiv's eulogy to Logan Roy, Succession S4E9 - 2023

to air 22 May 2023

So the way things have gone today, we haven't had a chance to ... and it's okay, Rome, and thank you, Ken. That was, yeah, but we haven't said everything and so I'm just going to ... we will be done soon. Sorry.

[Sigh] My father, my father,. We used to play outside his office. And I think because we wanted him to hear, and he would come out and he was so terrifying. He was, oh God, he was so terrifying to us! He'd come out and he'd yell at us to be quiet. This 'silence!' What he was doing in there was so important. We couldn't conceive of what it was. Yknow, presidents and kings and queens and diplomats and prime ministers and world bankers, and I don't know. Yeah.

He kept us outside. But he kept everyone outside. Yeah. When he let you in, when the sun shine, it was warm. Yeah, it was really warm in the light. But it was hard to be, his daughter. I can't not, y'know, he was, it was, oh, he was hard on women. He couldn't fit a whole woman in his head. But he did, okay. You did, okay dad. We're all here and we're doing okay. We're doing okay.

So goodbye my dear dear world of a father.

James Cromwell (written by Jesse Armstrong): 'Sometime he decided not to try anymore', Ewan's speech at Logan's Funeral, Succession S4E9 - 2023

to air 18 May 2023, United States

It is not for me to judge my brother. History will tell that story. I can just give you a couple of instances about him. You probably all know we came across the first time during the war for our safety, but the engines of our ship let go and the rest of the convoy sailed on without us, leaving us adrift.

They told us, they told us children that if we spoke or coughed or moved an inch, that the U-boats would catch the vibrations through the hull and we would die in the drink right there in the hold. Three nights and two days we stayed quiet, a four-year-old and a five-and-a-half-year-old speaking with our eyes. So there's a little sob story.

And once we were over, our uncle who was, so to speak, a character, well, they had a little money and they sent Logan away to a better school. And he hated it. He just hated it. He wasn't, he wasn't well. He was sick. And he mewed and he cried and in the end he got out and came home under his own steam. But when he got back, our little sister, she was a baby, but she was there by then. She ...

He always believed that he brought home the polio with him, which took her. I don't even know if that's true, but our aunt and uncle certainly did nothing to disabuse him of that notion. They let it lie with him.

I loved him, I suppose, and I suppose some of you did too, in whatever way he would let us, and we could manage. But I can't help but say he has wrought the most terrible things. He was a man who has here and there drawn in the edges of the world, now and then darkened the skies a little, closed men's hearts, fed that dark flame in men, the hard mean, hard relenting flame that keeps their hearths warm while another grows cold, their grain stashed while another goes hungry, and even has the temerity to tell that hard -- funny, yes, funny -- but hard joke about the man in the cold.

You can get a little high, a little mighty when you're warm. Oh, yes. He gave away a few million of his billions, but he was not a generous man. He was mean, and he made but a mean estimation of the world, and he fed a certain kind of meagerness in men.

Perhaps he had to, because he had a meagreness about him, and maybe I do about me too. I don't know. I try. I try. I don't know when, but sometime he decided not to try anymore, and it was a terrible shame.

God's speed. My brother. And God bless.

Jack Black (by Mike White): 'We roll tonight to the guitar bite!' Motivational speech to band - 2003

Released 20 November 2003

So get your rest, no late night parties drinking tequila and trying to get lucky. Chances like this do not come along every day. Now you played hard in here, people, and I am proud of every last stinking one of you. So let's just give this everything we got. We may fall on our faces, but if we do, we will fall with dignity! With a guitar in our hands, and rock in our hearts! And in the words of AC/DC: "We roll tonight to the guitar bite, and for those about to rock, I salute you."

Tom Hanks (by Robert Rodat): 'That's my mission', Saving Private Ryan - 1998

Released 24 July 1998, USA

Mike, what’s the pool on me up to right now? What’s it up to? What is it? 300 dollars? Is that it? 300? I’m a schoolteacher. I teach English composition. In this little town called Addley, Pennsylvania. The last 11 years I’ve been at Thomas Alva Edison High School. I was a coach of the baseball team in the springtime. Back home, I tell people what I do for a living and they think, well, now that figures, but over here, it’s a big, a big mystery. So I guess I’ve changed some. Sometimes I wonder if I’ve changed so much, my wife is even gonna recognize me whenever it is I get back to her. And how I’ll ever be able to tell her about days like today. Ah, Ryan… I don’t know anything about Ryan, I don’t care. The man means nothing to me, he’s just a name. But if, you know, if going to Ramelle, and finding him so he can go home, if that earns me the right to get back to my wife, well then, then that’s my mission.

Brad Pitt (by Jim Uhls and Chuck Palahniuk): 'The first rule of Fight Club is: you do not talk about Fight Club', Fight Club - 1999

released 15 October 1999, USA

Welcome to Fight Club. The first rule of Fight Club is: you do not talk about Fight Club. The second rule of Fight Club is: you DO NOT talk about Fight Club! Third rule of Fight Club: if someone yells “stop!”, goes limp, or taps out, the fight is over. Fourth rule: only two guys to a fight. Fifth rule: one fight at a time, fellas. Sixth rule: the fights are bare knuckle. No shirt, no shoes, no weapons. Seventh rule: fights will go on as long as they have to. And the eighth and final rule: if this is your first time at Fight Club, you have to fight.

Man, I see in fight club the strongest and smartest men who’ve ever lived. I see all this potential, and I see squandering. God damn it, an entire generation pumping gas, waiting tables; slaves with white collars. Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don’t need. We’re the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War’s a spiritual war… our Great Depression is our lives. We’ve all been raised on television to believe that one day we’d all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won’t. And we’re slowly learning that fact. And we’re very, very pissed off.

Heather Donahue (by Daniel Myrick & Eduardo Sanchez): 'I just want to apologise to Mike's mom', The Blair Witch Project - 1999

released 30 July 1999, USA

I just want to apologize to Josh's mom, and Mike's mom, and my mom. I am so sorry! Because it was my fault. I was the one who brought them here. I was the one that said "keep going south". I was the one who said that we were not lost. It was my fault, because it was my project. Everything had to be my way. And this is where we've ended up and it's all because of me that we're here now - hungry, cold, and hunted. I love you mom, dad. I am so sorry. What is that? I'm scared to close my eyes, I'm scared to open them! I am so scared! I don't know what's out there. We are going to die out here! I am so scared!

Don Hertzfeldt: 'Bill lives and lives, forever', 'It's Such a Beuatiful Day' - 2012

Released 21 May 2016, Japan

He will spend hundreds of years traveling the world, learning all there is to know. He will learn every language. He will read every book. He will know every land. He will spend thousands of years creating stunning works of art. He will learn to meditate to control pain, as wars will be fought and great loves found, and lost, and found, lost, and found, and found, and found, and memories built upon memories until life runs on an endless loop. He will father hundreds of thousands of children, whose own exponential offspring he’ll slowly lose track of through the years, whose millions of beautiful lives will all eventually be swept again from the earth. And still, Bill will continue. He will learn more about life than any being in history. But death will forever be a stranger to him. People will come and go, until names lose all meaning, until people lose all meaning and vanish entirely from the world. And still, Bill will live on. He will befriend the next inhabitants of the earth, beings of light who revere him as a god. And Bill will outlive them all. For millions and millions of years. Exploring, learning, living, until the earth is swallowed beneath his feet. Until the sun is long since gone. Until time loses all meaning, and the moment comes that he knows only the positions of the stars, and sees them whether his eyes are closed or open, until he forgets his name, and the place where he’d once come from. He lives, and he lives, until all of the lights go out.

Edward Norton (by David Benioff): 'F*ck you and this city and everyone in it', 25th Hour rant - 2003

released 10 January 2003, USA

Fuck the panhandlers grubbing for money and smiling at me behind my back
Fuck the squeegee men dirtying up the clean windshield of my car, get a fucking job
Fuck the Sikhs and the Pakistanis bombing down the avenues in decrepit cabs, curry steaming out their pores stinkin up my day, terrorist in fucking training, slow the fuck DOWN!
Fuck the Chelsea Boys with their waxed chests and pumped-up biceps, going down on each other in my parks and on my piers, jiggling their dicks on my CHANNEL 35!
Fuck the Korean grocers with their pyramids of overpriced fruit and their tulips and roses wrapped in plastic. Ten years in the country, still no speakee English!
Fuck the Russians in Brighton Beach mobster thugs sittin in cafes sippin tea in little glasses, sugar cubes between their teeth, wheelin’ and dealin’ and schemin’, GO BACK TO WHERE YOU FUCKIN CAME FROM!!
Fuck the black-hatted Hasidim strollin up and down 47th street in their dirty gabardine with their dandruff, sellin South African apartheid diamonds.
Fuck the Wall Street brokers, self-styled masters of the universe, Michael Douglas-Gordon Gekko wannabe motherfuckers figuring out new ways to rob hard working people blind. SEND THOSE ENRON ASSHOLES TO JAIL FOR FUCKING LIFE! You think Bush and Cheney didn’t know about that shit?? Give me a fuckin break!
Fuck the Puerto Ricans, twenty in a car swellin up the welfare rolls, paradin’ in the street, and don’t even get me started on the Dominicans, cause they make the Puerto Ricans look good.
Fuck the Benson Hurst Italians with their pomaded hair, their St. Anthony Medallions, swinggin’ their Jason Giambi Louisville Slugger baseball bats trying to audition for “The Sopranos”. Fuckin crack your fuckin head open!
Fuck the uptown brothers, they never pass the ball, they don’t want to play defense, they take five steps on every lay-up to the hoop, and they want to turn around and blame everything on the white man. Slavery ended 137 years ago. Move the fuck on!!
Fuck the corrupt cops with their anus-violating plungers and their 41 shots, standing behind a blue wall of silence. YOU BETRAY OUR TRUST!
Fuck the priests who put their hands down some innocent child’s pants.
FUCK OSAMA BIN LADEN, AL-QAEDA and the backward-ass cave dwelling fundamentalist assholes everywhere! And on the names of innocent thousands murdered, I pray you spend the rest of eternity with your 72 whores roasting in a jet-fueled fire in hell! You towel-headed camel jockeys can kiss my AMERICAN ASS!!
Fuck this whole city and everyone in it, let earthquakes crumble it, let the fires rage, let it burn to fucking ash and then let the waters rise and submerge those whole rat infested place.
No. Fuck you, you had it all and you threw it away, you dumbfuck. Fuck you.

Karl Malden (by Bud Schulberg) : 'It’s making love of a buck, the cushy job more important than the love of man!', On the Waterfront - 1954

Released 22 June 1954, USA

Father Barry – I came down here to keep a promise. I gave Kayo my word that if he stood up to the mob I’d stand up with him. All the way. And now Kayo Dugan is dead. He was one of those fellas who had the gift of standing up but this time they fixed him oh they fixed him for good this time. Unless it was an accident like Big Mac says. Some people think the crucifixion only took place on Calvary. Well they’d better wise up. Taking Joey Doyle’s life to stop him from testifying is a crucifixion. And dropping a sling on Kayo Dugan because he was ready to spill his guts tomorrow – that’s a crucifixion. And every time the mob puts the puts the crusher on a good man, tries to stop him from doing his duty as a citizen? It’s a crucifixion. And anybody who sits around and lets it happen, keeps silent about something he knows has happened, shares the guilt of it just as much as the roman soldier who pierced the flesh of our lord to see if he was dead. Boys this is my church! And if you don’t think Christ is down here on the waterfront you’ve got another guess coming. Every morning when the hiring boss blows his whistle Jesus stands alongside you in the shape-up. He sees why some of you get picked and some of you get passed over. He sees the family men worrying about getting the rent and getting food in the house for the wife and the kids. He sees you selling your souls to the mob for a day’s pay. What does Christ think of the easy money boys who do none of the work and take all of the gravy? And how does he feel about the fellas who wear a hundred-and-fifty dollar suits and diamond rings on your union dues and your kickback money? And how does he, who spoke up without fear against every evil, feel about your silence? You want to know what’s wrong with our waterfront? It’s the love of a lousy buck. It’s making love of a buck, the cushy job more important than the love of man! It’s forgetting that every fella down here is your brother in Christ. But remember Christ is always with you. Christ is in the shape-up, he’s in the hatch, he’s in the union hall, he’s kneeling right here beside Dugan. And he’s saying to all of you: “if you do it to the least of mine you do it to me.” And what they did to Joey and what they did to Dugan they’re doing to you. And you, you, all of you! And only you, only you with God’s help have the power to knock ‘em out for good.

(Barry turns and looks at Kayo Dugan’s body.)

Okay, Kayo?

(Barry looks up at everyone.)

Amen.

Martin Sheen (by Aaron Sorkin): ' What did I ever do to yours except praise his glory and praise his name', The West Wing, S2E22 Two Cathedrals, - 2001

aired 16 May 2001, USA

She bought her first new car and you hit her with a drunk driver. What, was that supposed to be funny? "You can't conceive, nor can I, the appalling strangeness of the mercy of God," says Graham Greene. I don't know who's ass he was kissing there 'cause I think you're just vindictive. What was Josh Lyman? A warning shot? That was my son. What did I ever do to yours except praise his glory and praise his name? There's a tropical storm that’s gaining speed and power. They say we haven't had a storm this bad since you took out the tender ship of mine last year in the North Atlantic last year... 68 crew. Do you know what a tender ship does? Fixes the other ships. Doesn't even carry guns. Floats around and fixes the other ships and delivers that mail. That's all it can do. Gratias tibi ago, domine. Yes, I lied. It was a sin. I've committed many sins. Have I displeased you, you feckless thug? 3.8 million new jobs, that wasn't good? Bailed out Mexico, increased foreign trade, 30 million new acres for conservation, put Mendoza on the bench, we're not fighting a war, I've raised three children...That's not enough to buy me out of the doghouse? Haec credam a deo pio? A deo iusto? A deo scito? Cruciatus in crucem! Tuus in terra servus nuntius fui officium perfeci. Cruciatus in crucem. Eas in crucem! You get Hoynes!

Latin translation: Am I to believe these things from a righteous God, a just God, a wise God? To hell with your punishments! I was your servant, your messenger on the earth; I did my duty.

Michael Douglas (by Stanley Weiser and Oliver Stone): 'Greed, for lack of a better word, is good', Teldar Paper speech, Wall Street - 1987

released 11 December 1987, USA

Well, I appreciate the opportunity you're giving me Mr. Cromwell as the single largest shareholder in Teldar Paper, to speak. Well, ladies and gentlemen we're not here to indulge in fantasy but in political and economic reality. America, America has become a second-rate power. Its trade deficit and its fiscal deficit are at nightmare proportions. Now, in the days of the free market when our country was a top industrial power, there was accountability to the stockholder. The Carnegies, the Mellons, the men that built this great industrial empire, made sure of it because it was their money at stake. Today, management has no stake in the company! All together, these men sitting up here own less than three percent of the company. And where does Mr. Cromwell put his million-dollar salary? Not in Teldar stock; he owns less than one percent. You own the company. That's right, you, the stockholder. And you are all being royally screwed over by these, these bureaucrats, with their luncheons, their hunting and fishing trips, their corporate jets and golden parachutes.

Cromwell : This is an outrage! You're out of line, Gekko!

Teldar Paper, Mr. Cromwell, Teldar Paper has 33 different vice presidents each earning over 200 thousand dollars a year. Now, I have spent the last two months analyzing what all these guys do, and I still can't figure it out. One thing I do know is that our paper company lost 110 million dollars last year, and I'll bet that half of that was spent in all the paperwork going back and forth between all these vice presidents. The new law of evolution in corporate America seems to be survival of the unfittest. Well, in my book you either do it right or you get eliminated. In the last seven deals that I've been involved with, there were 2.5 million stockholders who have made a pretax profit of 12 billion dollars. Thank you. I am not a destroyer of companies. I am a liberator of them! The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms; greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge has marked the upward surge of mankind. And greed, you mark my words, will not only save Teldar Paper, but that other malfunctioning corporation called the USA. Thank you very much.

Jeff Winger (by Matt Warburton): 'The truth is, I'm lying when I say there is no truth', Community S3E22 - 2012

17 May 2012

I have no closing statement because I'm throwing the case. No, no, it's okay. It's fine...don't worry. My client, Shirley Bennett, my friend of three years- she told me it was okay. She said what I want is more important. She's right...right? I mean, guys like me will tell you there's no right or wrong, there's no real truths...and as long as we all believe that, guys like me can never lose. Because the truth is, I'm lying when I say there is no truth. The truth is- the pathetically, stupidly, inconveniently obvious truth is- helping only ourselves is bad and helping each other is good. Now, I just wanted to get out of here, pass Biology and be a lawyer again instead of helping Shirley-that was bad. And my former colleague wanted so badly to keep his rich client happy that he just asked me to roll over in exchange for my old job. So, I guess we all walked in here pretty bad. But now Shirley's gone good. Shirley's helping me. It's that easy: you just stop thinking about what's good for you and start thinking about what's good for someone else...and you can change the whole game with one move. Now if you like this idea, you can make it true by doing something good for everyone here: throw this case out of court. It's dumb. That is all.

Leonardo DiCaprio (by Terence Winter): 'There is no nobility in poverty', The Wolf of Wall Street - 2013

Release date 17 Decemnber 2013, USA

See those little black boxes? They are called telephones. I’m gonna let you in on a little secret about these telephones. They’re not gonna dial themselves! Okay? Without you, they’re just worthless hunk of plastic.

Like a loaded M16 without a trained Marine to pull the trigger. And in the case of the telephone, it’s up to each and every one of you, my highly trained Strattonites, my killers. My killers who will not take no for an answer! My fucking warriors who’ll not hang up the phone, until their client either buys or fucking dies! Let me tell you something. . I’ve been a rich man, and I’ve been poor man. And I choose rich every fucking time. Cause, At least as a rich man, when I have to face my problems, I show up in the back of a limo wearing a $2000 suit …and $40,000 gold fuckin’ watch! Now, if anyone here thinks I’m superficial or materialistic. Go get a job at fucking McDonald’s, because that’s where you fucking belong! But, before you depart this room full of winners, I want you to take a good look at the person next to you, go on. Because sometime in the not-so-distant future, you’re pullin’ up to a red light in your beat-up old fucking Pinto, and that person’s gonna pull up right alongside you in a brand new Porsche, with their beautiful wife by his side, whose got big voluptuous tits. And who will you be next to? Some disgusting wilder beast with three days of razor-stubble in a sleeveless moo-moo, crammed in next to you with a carload full of groceries from the fucking Price Club! That’s who you’re gonna be sitting next to. So, you listen to me and you listen well. Are you behind, on your credit card bills? Good. Pick up the phone and start dialing. Is your landlord ready to evict you? Good. Pick up the phone and start dialing. Does your girlfriend think you’re a fucking loser? Good. Pick up the phone and start dialing! I want you to deal with your problems, by becoming rich! All you have to do today …is pick up that phone, and speak the words that I have taught you. And I’ll make you richer than the most powerful CEO of the United States of fucking America. I want you to go out there, and I want you to RAM Steve Madden stock down your clients’ throats. Till they fucking choke on it till they choke on it and buy 100,000 shares! That’s what I want you to do. You’ll be ferocious! You’ll be relentless! You’ll be telephone fucking terrorists! Now, let’s knock this Motherfucker out of the park!

Jeremy Strong (by Jesse Armstrong): 'My father is a malignant presence, a bully, and a liar', Succession S2E10 - 2019

to air., 13 October 2019, USA

Good morning. I have an announcement to make...about wrongdoing at Waystar Royco in advance of the upcoming shareholder meeting. I have been asked to explain my own role in the managing of illegality at the firm and associated cover ups. And it has been suggested I would be a suitable figure to absorb the anger and concern. But...the truth is that my father is a malignant presence...a bully, and a liar...and he was fully personally aware of these events for many years and made efforts to hide and cover up. He had a twisted sense of loyalty to bad actors like Lester McClintock, and a disregard for the safety of migrant workers, non-union and union workers and for vulnerable performers and guests. My father keeps a watchful eye over every inch of his whole empire, and the notion that he would have allowed millions of dollars in settlements and compensation to be paid without his explicit approval... is utterly fanciful. I have with me, today, copies of records... that show his personal sign off. How much those of us who executed his wishes bear responsibility is for another day. But I think...this is the day his reign ends. I'll be providing the documents and can answer any questions you may have in the coming days. Thank you very much.

Jonathan Banks (by Sam Catlin and Peter Gould) : 'No more half measures, Walter', Breaking Bad S3E12 - 2010

to air 6 June 2010

Walt, you got a good thing going here, we all do. You wanna risk it all on one junkie? Now I realize you two have a history, but this kid's been on the bubble for a while now. It's a long time coming. Walt: What is? Mike: *laughs* Ummm...I used to be a beat cop long time ago. And I'd get called out on domestic disputes all the time, hundreds probably over the years. But there was this one guy, this one piece of shit I will never forget: Gordy. He looked like Bo Svenson, you remember him? Walking Tall? You don't remember? Walt: No. Mike: Anyway. Big boy. 270, 280, but his wife. Or whatever, she was his lady. Was real small, like a bird, wrists like little branches. Anyway, my partner and I get called out there every weekend and one of us would pull her aside and say, "Come on, tonight's the night we press charges." And this wasn't one of those deep down he really loves me setups, we got a lot of those, but not this. This girl was scared. She wasn't gonna cross him, no way, no how. Nothing we could do, but pass her off to the EMTs, put him in the car, drive him downtown, throw him in the drunk tank. He sleeps it off, next morning out he goes, back home. And one night, my partner's out sick and it's just me. And the call comes in and it's the usual crap, broke her nose in the shower kind of thing. So I cuff him, put him in the car and away we go. Only that night, we're driving into town and this sideways asshole is in my backseat humming Danny Boy and it just rubbed me wrong. So instead of left, I go right out into nowhere. And I kneel him down and I put my revolver in his mouth and I told him, this is it. This is how it ends. And he's crying, going to the bathroom all over himself, swearing to God he's gonna leave her alone, screaming. As much as you can with a gun in your mouth. And I told him be quiet because I needed to think about what I was gonna do here. He goes still. Then real quiet, like a dog waiting for dinner scraps. Then we just stood there for a while. Me acting like I was thinking things over, and Prince Charming kneeling in the dirt with shit in his pants. And after a few minutes I took the gun out of his mouth and I say, "So help me if you ever touch her again I will such and such and such and such and blah blah blah blah blah." Walt: It was just a warning? Mike: Of course. Just trying to do the right thing. But two weeks later he killed her, of course. Caved her head in with the base of a Waring blender. We got there there was so much blood you could taste the metal. Hm. The moral of the story is, I chose a half measure. When I should've gone all the way. I'll never make that mistake again. No more half measures, Walter.

Jon Hamm (by Matthew Weiner): 'It’s not called the wheel. It’s called the carousel', Mad Men S1E13 - 2008

to air, 18 October 2007, USA

Well, technology is a glittering lure. But, uh, there is the rare occasion when the public can be engaged on a level beyond flash, if they have a sentimental bond with the product.

My first job, I was in-house at a fur company, with this old-pro copywriter, a Greek named Teddy. Teddy told me the most important idea in advertising is new. Creates an itch. You simply put your product in there as a kind of calamine lotion. But he also talked about a deeper bond with the product. Nostalgia. It’s delicate, but potent. Sweetheart.

Teddy told me that in Greek, “nostalgia” literally means “the pain from an old wound”. It’s a twinge in your heart far more powerful than memory alone. This device isn’t a spaceship, it’s a time machine.

It goes backwards, forwards, takes us to a place where we ache to go again. It’s not called the wheel. It’s called the carousel. It lets us travel the way a child travels. Round and around, and back home again, to a place where we know we are loved.

Robert Wisdom (by Richard Price): 'That small, wrinkled-ass paper bag allowed the corner boys to have their drink in peace', The Wire S3E02 - 2004

to air, 25 September 2004, USA

Somewhere back in the dawn of time this district had itself a civic dilemma of epic proportions. The city council had just passed a law that forbid alcoholic consumption in public places, on the streets and on the corners. But the corner is, and it was, and it always will be the poor man's lounge. It's where a man wants to be on a hot summer's night. It's cheaper than a bar, catch a nice breeze, watch the girls go by. But the law's the law and the western cops rollin' by, what were they gonna do? If they arrested every dude out there for tipping back a high life there'd be no other time for any other kind of police work. And if they looked the other way? They'd open themselves to all kinds of flaunting, all kinds of disrespect. Now, this is before my time when it happened but, somewheres back in the 50's or 60's, there was a small moment of goddamn genius by some nameless smokehound who comes out the cut-rate one day and on his way to the corner, he slips that just-bought pint of Elderberry into a paper bag. A great moment of civic compromise; that small wrinkled-ass paper bag allowed the corner boys to have their drink in peace and gave us permission to go and do police work. The kind of police work that's actually worth the effort, that's worth actually taking a bullet for. Dozerman, he got shot last night trying to buy three vials; three! There's never been a paper bag for drugs...until now.