Katherine Crawford credited as playing...
Ellen
- Ellen Meredith: Why is it that if a woman wants to accomplish something, even her own parents consider her aggressive, unhappy or neurotic?
- Roger Meredith: Because it's usually true.
- Libby Meredith: I wonder if you have ever thought of me, if I may borrow a word that has been taken over by very young, as "a person"?
- Ellen Meredith: You're my mother!
- Libby Meredith: What a catchall that is.
- Libby Meredith: Only the young are free to choose? To be taken by surprise and find - joy?
- Ellen Meredith: Unfortunately, yes. Older people have made their commitments, they've accepted their responsibilities, they have other compensations.
- Libby Meredith: Such as?
- Ellen Meredith: Peace of mind.
- Roger Meredith: Why couldn't Mark make it or last night?
- Ellen Meredith: You can't sell insurance in the daytime, father. Not when you're third from the bottom. It's all after seven.
- Ellen Meredith: I've been accepted at Harvard - the law school!
- [turns around, walks into the kitchen]
- Ellen Meredith: Didn't you hear me? Mother? I thought that you'd be thrilled. I thought that father was going to be my only problem. I mean, you know how he feels about careers for women.
- Libby Meredith: And Mark? How does he feel?
- Ellen Meredith: Once he got over all that foolishness, thinking that I was emasculating him, then he got excited about the prospect. I mean, marriage should be a partnership. Why shouldn't the woman contribute?
- Libby Meredith: But, she does Ell! As a mother and as a wife! Do you know what that means?
- Ellen Meredith: It doesn't mean slavery.
- Ellen Meredith: It isn't everyday that Harvard accepts a female law student!
- Libby Meredith: [mockingly] My daughter - the attorney.
- Ellen Meredith: Mother, it hurts me to hear you say that I don't know you. You're a beautiful person. I've always admired you and respected you and I've loved you and I've tried to copy you.