- [last lines]
- Professor Levy: [voiceover] We are all faced throughout our lives with agonizing decisions. Moral choices. Some are on a grand scale. Most of these choices are on lesser points. But! We define ourselves by the choices we have made. We are in fact the sum total of our choices. Events unfold so unpredictably, so unfairly, human happiness does not seem to have been included, in the design of creation. It is only we, with our capacity to love, that give meaning to the indifferent universe. And yet, most human beings seem to have the ability to keep trying, and even to find joy from simple things like their family, their work, and from the hope that future generations might understand more.
- Barbara: You told me it's been platonic for a year. And I say, once the sex goes, it all goes.
- Cliff Stern: It's true. It's true. The last time I was inside a woman was when I visited the Statue of Liberty.
- Professor Levy: You will notice that what we are aiming at when we fall in love is a very strange paradox. The paradox consists of the fact that, when we fall in love, we are seeking to re-find all or some of the people to whom we were attached as children. On the other hand, we ask our beloved to correct all of the wrongs that these early parents or siblings inflicted upon us. So that love contains in it the contradiction: The attempt to return to the past and the attempt to undo the past.
- Clifford Stern: [to his wife] Honey, you're the one who stopped sleeping with me, ok. It'll be a year come April 20th. I remember the date exactly, because it was Hitler's birthday.
- Halley Reed: I wanted to give you this letter back.
- Clifford Stern: It's my one love letter.
- Halley Reed: It's beautiful. I'm just the wrong person.
- Clifford Stern: It's probably just as well. I plagiarized most of it from James Joyce. You probably wondered why all the references to Dublin.
- Clifford Stern: A strange man - defecated on my sister.
- Wendy Stern: Why?
- Clifford Stern: I don't know. Is there any - is there any reason I could give you that would answer that satisfactorily? You know, its just so - human sexuality is just - it's so mysterious.
- Clifford Stern: Show business is, is dog-eat-dog. It's worse than dog-eat-dog. It's dog-doesn't-return-other-dog's-phone-calls. You know, it's just terrible. Which reminds me, I should really check my service. I don't know why, I haven't had a message in seven years! You know, I call up and I hear the girls on the other end giggling.
- Clifford Stern: [on Professor Levy's demise] He left a note. He left a simple little note that said "I've gone out the window." This is a major intellectual and he leaves a note that says "I've gone out the window." He's a role-model. You'd think he'd leave a decent note.
- Judah Rosenthal: And after the awful deed is done, he finds that he's plagued by deep-rooted guilt. Little sparks of his religious background which he'd rejected are suddenly stirred up. He hears his father's voice. He imagines that God is watching his every move. Suddenly, it's not an empty universe at all, but a just and moral one, and he's violated it. Now, he's panic-stricken. He's on the verge of a mental collapse-an inch away from confessing the whole thing to the police. And then one morning, he awakens. The sun is shining, his family is around him and mysteriously, the crisis has lifted. He takes his family on a vacation to Europe and as the months pass, he finds he's not punished. In fact, he prospers. The killing gets attributed to another person-a drifter who has a number of other murders to his credit, so I mean, what the hell? One more doesn't even matter. Now he's scott-free. His life is completely back to normal. Back to his protected world of wealth and privilege.
- Clifford Stern: I know this guy! He won't be able to take his hands off you. He'll get you in a room, you know, and he'll - he'll read you your Miranda rights and he'll tear your clothes off!
- Halley Reed: He's interested in producing something of mine.
- Clifford Stern: Your first child!
- Clifford Stern: Listen, I don't know from suicides. Y'know, where I grew up, in Brooklyn, nobody committed suicide. Y'know, everyone was too unhappy.
- Judah Rosenthal: Maybe I - maybe I did make some questionable moves.
- Ben [as Judah's Conscience]: Only you would know that, Judah.
- Judah Rosenthal: I don't any more, Ben. Sometimes there's worse things than jail.
- Ben [as Judah's Conscience]: It's a human life. You don't think God sees?
- Judah Rosenthal: God is a luxury I can't afford.
- Clifford Stern: [on Lester] When he tells you he wants to exchange ideas, what he wants is to exchange fluids.
- Cliff Stern: I think I see a cab. If we run quickly we can kick the crutch from that old lady and get it.
- Clifford Stern: While we're waiting for a cab I'll give you your lesson for today. Don't listen to what your teachers tell ya, you know. Don't pay attention. Just, just see what they look like and that's how you'll know what life is really gonna be like.
- Judah Rosenthal: You've seen too many movies. I'm talking about reality. I mean, if you want a happy ending, you should go see a Hollywood movie.
- Judah Rosenthal: I remember my father telling me, "The eyes of God are on us always." The eyes of God. What a phrase to a young boy. What were God's eyes like? Unimaginably penetrating, intense eyes, I assumed. And I wonder if it was just a coincidence I made my specialty ophthalmology.
- Lester: If you play your cards right, you could have my body.
- Halley Reed: Wouldn't you rather leave it to science?
- Lester: I know you don't respect what I do. I understand that. But, you know I got a closet full of Emmys! You realize that, don't you? Alright, okay, you think that's bull shit. Fine. Okay. Fine. I understand.
- Clifford Stern: I don't know. Maybe I could use the money to finish my movie. You know, I do have some debts and things.
- Lester: [into his recorder] Idea for farce: a poor, eh, a poor loser agrees to do the story of a great man's life and in the process comes to learn deep values.
- Aunt May: Are you telling me that you prefer God to the Truth?
- Sol Rosenthal: If necessary, I will always choose God over Truth.
- Halley Reed: My ex-husband and I fell in love at first sight. Maybe I should've taken a second look.
- Clifford Stern: What are you bothering with this guy for? I mean, you know, he's such a pompous bore and your show does such great profiles.
- Halley Reed: Well, listen, I'll tell you, just between you and me, I wanted to do Gabriel García Márquez.
- Clifford Stern: That's perfect!
- Halley Reed: They like to mix it up. They like a little variety. After all, he is an American phenomenon.
- Clifford Stern: Yeah, but so is acid rain.
- Clifford Stern: [after being handed a box of Milk Duds] Great. Now I can get rid of my few remaining teeth.
- Clifford Stern: What is the guy so upset about? You'd think nobody was ever compared to Mussolini before.
- Lester: A bunch of us are getting together to build major studio space for production right here in, you know, the city.
- [Suddenly reaches into his jacket inside pocket and pulls out a portable voice recorder]
- Lester: In fact - I'm sorry, give me one second...
- [Speaks into recorder]
- Lester: Idea for series - a wealthy, high-profile builder who's always trying to realize grandiose dreams, a la Donald Trump, to be shot in New York.
- Lester: Look, I'll be frank with you. You're not my first choice. I'm doing this strictly as a favor to Wendy. Because, you haven't worked in a long time. She's embarrassed!
- Clifford Stern: I work! It's just that nobody's paying me.
- Judah Rosenthal: It's my fault. I instigated it. I prolonged it. Many times I tried to back off, but, I was too weak. But, I promised her nothing. Or, did I? See, I don't even know anymore. In the heat of passion you say things. All I know is after two years of shameful deceit, where I lead this double life, I awakened as if from a dream and realize what I'd been losing.
- Ben: It's called wisdom. It comes to some, suddenly. We realize the difference between what's real and deep and lasting versus the superficial payoff of the moment.
- Judah Rosenthal: You know, I kidded myself about loving her; but, deep down I knew, knowing I needed her selfishly, for pleasure, for adventure, for lust.
- Clifford Stern: My heart says one thing, my head says something else. It's very hard to get your heart and head together in life. Let me teach you that, you know. In my case, they're not even friendly.
- Halley Reed: [on the philosopher Lewis Levy] He was very eloquent on the subject of love, didn't you think?
- Clifford Stern: I wish I had met him before I got married. It would've saved me a gall bladder operation.
- Aunt May: Remember: History is written by the winners. And if the Nazis had won, the future generations would understand the story of World War ll quite differently.
- Lisa Crosley: So are you in TV too?
- Ben: No. No, I'm a rabbi.
- Lisa Crosley: You don't have to wear an outfit or anything?
- Ben: What choice do you have if the woman is going to tell her? You have to confess the wrong and hope for understanding. Maybe Miriam was responsible in some ways too. You have to discuss it and hope for the best. And maybe you and Miriam can never go back to the old life; but, maybe there's a new one with maturity and understanding; maybe - maybe even a richer one.
- Judah Rosenthal: You know, it's funny, for our entire adult lives, you and I have been having this same conversation in one form or another.
- Ben: Yes, I know. Its a fundamental difference in the way we view the world. You see it as harsh and empty of values and pitiless. And I couldn't go on living if I didn't feel it, with all my heart, a moral structure with real meaning and - forgiveness. And some kind of higher power; otherwise, their's no basis to know how to live.
- Lester: What makes New York such a funny place is that there's so much tension and pain and misery and craziness here. And that's the first part of comedy. But, you got to get some distance from it, you know what I mean? The thing, the thing to remember about comedy is, if it, if it *bends* it's funny, if it breaks, it's not funny. So, you got to get back from the pain. See what I mean?
- Judah Rosenthal: Maybe I did make some questionable moves.
- Ben [as Judah's Conscience]: Only you would know that, Judah.
- Judah Rosenthal: I don't anymore, Ben.
- Ben [as Judah's Conscience]: You fool around with her for your pleasure; then, when you think its enough, you want to sweep her under the rug.
- Judah Rosenthal: There's no other solution, but, Jack's men. I push one button and I can sleep again at nights.
- Ben [as Judah's Conscience]: Could you sleep with that? Is that who you really are?
- Judah Rosenthal: [to Ben - on screen as Judah's conscience] Jack lives in the real world. You live in the kingdom of heaven. I'd managed to keep free of that real world but suddenly it's found me.
- Sol Rosenthal: Whether it's the Old Testament or Shakespeare, murder will out!
- Judah Rosenthal: Who said anything about murder?
- Sol Rosenthal: You did.
- Judah Rosenthal: Did I?
- Lester: How about this? Why don't you come with me down to Barbados. We'll swim, you know. We'll get some sun.
- Halley Reed: Sorry, I freckle.
- Professor Levy: The unique thing that happened to the early Israelites was that they conceived a God that cares. He cares, but, at the same time, he also demands that you behave morally. But, here comes the paradox: what's one of the first things that God asks? That God asks Abraham to sacrifice his only son, his beloved son, to him. In other words, in spite of millennia of efforts, we have not succeeded to create a really and entirely loving image of God. This was beyond our capacity to imagine.
- Jack Rosenthal: You called me because you needed some dirty work done. That's all you ever call for.
- Aunt May: There's this joke about the prizefighter who enters the ring. And his brother turns to the family priest and says "Father, Pray for him." And the priest said "I will. But, if he can punch, it'll help."
- Rabbi: So what are you saying May? You're saying you're challenging the whole moral structure of everything?
- Aunt May: What moral structure? Is that the kind of nonsense you use on your pupils?
- Rabbi: Do you not find human impulses basically decent?
- Aunt May: There's basically nothing!
- Professor Levy: We must always remember, that we, when we are born, we need a great deal of love, in order to persuade us to stay in life. Once we get that love, it usually last. But, the universe is a pretty cold place. It's we who invested with our feelings and, under certain conditions, we feel that the thing isn't worth it any more.
- Clifford Stern: I got 600,000 feet of film on this guy. And he's telling how great life is and everything and now, you know. What am I gonna do? I'll cut it up and make it into guitar picks.
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