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Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep in Ironweed (1987)

Tom Waits: Rudy

Ironweed

Tom Waits credited as playing...

Rudy

Photos9

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Quotes16

  • Rudy: Doc says I got cancer. First thing I ever got.
  • Rudy: You know somebody that's buried up there?
  • Francis Phelan: Yeah, a little kid.
  • Rudy: Little kid? What'd he do, die young?
  • Francis Phelan: Pretty young, yeah.
  • Rudy: What happened?
  • Francis Phelan: He fell.
  • Rudy: Fell where?
  • Francis Phelan: On the floor.
  • Rudy: Fell on the floor? I fall on the floor about twice a day. I ain't dead yet.
  • Francis Phelan: That's what you think.
  • Francis Phelan: [regarding Sandra] She a bum, or just a plain drunk?
  • Rudy: She's been a bum all her life.
  • Francis Phelan: [chuckles] No, nobody... 'been a bum all her life'. She had to be somethin' else before she was a bum.
  • Rudy: You know why people call you a bum? Because it makes them feel better when they say it.
  • Francis Phelan: Well, the truth can't hurt you. If you're a bum, you're a bum.
  • Rudy: I'm gonna wine myself to death.
  • Rudy: Say, do you wanna be buried under a stone like that?
  • Francis Phelan: I never knew no bum buried under a gravestone.
  • Rudy: I don't need me no stone. Just so's we don't have to die alone.
  • Francis Phelan: Got a jug?
  • Rudy: I got a dollar. The nurse up and - up and gave me a dollar.
  • Francis Phelan: We're in business.
  • Rudy: Work where?
  • Francis Phelan: Up at the cemetery, shovelin' dirt. A fella told me they was hirin'.
  • Rudy: Well, are they payin' money or - are they givein' you a free grave when you croak?
  • Francis Phelan: Well, if it ain't money - forget it. I ain't shovelin' my own goddamn grave.
  • Francis Phelan: Go by the mission and see if anybody knows where Helen is.
  • Rudy: What is Helen's name?
  • Francis Phelan: Helen!
  • Rudy: I just like to know where I'm headin', that's all.
  • Francis Phelan: You ain't known where you been headin' for 20 years.
  • Rudy: Well, you got a point there.
  • Rudy: Hi, Sandra. It's me, Rudy. Are you dead or just drunk?
  • [to Francis]
  • Rudy: She's just drunk. She can't hold it no more. She's a goddamn Eskimo.
  • Francis Phelan: Whether she's an Eskimo or whether she ain't, she's going to freeze out here. Dogs will come along and eat her ass off.
  • Francis Phelan: Is she a bum? Or, just a plain drunk?
  • Rudy: She's been a bum all her life.
  • Francis Phelan: No, Nobody's been a bum all their life. She had to be somethin' else before she was a bum.
  • Rudy: Well, she's a whore, you know, there in Alaska.
  • Francis Phelan: What about before that?
  • Rudy: Well, I don't know. I guess maybe she was just a little kid.
  • Francis Phelan: Well, that's somethin'. A little kid is somethin'. It ain't a bum and it ain't a whore.
  • Rudy: You don't tell me nothin' that's true, man.
  • Francis Phelan: Every lousy goddamn thing you can think of is true.
  • Rudy: I look like a goddamn bum.
  • Francis Phelan: You are a bum.
  • Rudy: Do you know why - do you know why people call you a bum? Because it makes 'em feel better when they say it.
  • Francis Phelan: Oh, the truth can't hurt you. If you're a bum, you're a bum.
  • Rudy: I'm a restless person. I'm a traveler, really.
  • [singing]
  • Rudy: On the Big Rock Candy Mountain. You never change your socks, Little streams of alcohol, Come a-trickling down the rocks...
  • Francis Phelan: Hey! Hey. Wake up you crazy Kraut.
  • Rudy: Is that you, Frannie?
  • Francis Phelan: No. It's Buffalo Bill. I'm lookin' for the Indians.

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