Educating Rita
1983
Dr Frank Bryant: Did you know that Macbeth was a maggoty apple? Not many people know that!
(Frank has just been officially reprimanded for being drunk while giving a lecture) Dr Frank Bryant: Sod them, eh, Rita! Sod them! Rita: Will they sack you? Dr Frank Bryant: Good God no. That would involve making a decision. Pissed is all right. To get the sack, it would have to be rape on a grand scale. And not just with students, either. That would only amount to a slight misdemeanour. No, for dismissal it would have to be nothing less than buggering the Bursar.
(Rita discovers Frank packing all his books into crates) Rita: Have they sacked you? Dr Frank Bryant: I made rather a night of it last night so they're giving me a holiday. Two years in Australia. Rita: Did you bugger the Bursar? Dr Frank Bryant: Metaphorically.
Rita: Christ! My customer! She only come in for a demi-wave, she'll come out looking like a flippin' muppet!
Collins: Doctor Bryant, I don't think you're listening to me. Dr Frank Bryant: Mr Collins, I don't think you're saying anything to me. Collins: Doctor, are you drunk? Dr Frank Bryant: Drunk? Of course I'm drunk. You don't really expect me to teach this when I'm sober. Collins: (angrily bundling his books together) Then you won't mind if I leave your tutorial. Dr Frank Bryant: Why should I mind?
(first words to Rita as she opens the door of her flat) Trish: Wouldn't you just *die* without Mahler?
(Rita is being nosy about Frank's marriage) Dr Frank Bryant: We split up, Rita, because of poetry. Rita: You what? Dr Frank Bryant: One day, my wife explained to me that, for the past fifteen years, my output as a poet had dealt entirely with the part of our lives in which we discovered each other. Rita: Are you a poet? Dr Frank Bryant: Was. And so, to give me something new to write about, she left me. A very noble woman, my wife - she left me for the good of literature. And remarkably it worked. Rita: What, you wrote a lot of good stuff, did ya? Dr Frank Bryant: No. I stopped writing altogether.
(Trish has just tried to kill herself; Rita goes to visit her in hospital) Rita: Why? Trish: Darling, why not? Rita: Oh, Trish, don't. Come on, it's all right, don't cry. You're still here. Trish: That's why I'm crying - it didn't work. It didn't bloody work. Rita: Trish. Look, you didn't really mean to kill yourself. You were just... Trish: Just what, darling? Poor Susan. You think you've got everything, don't you? Rita: Trish, you have. Trish: Oh yes. When I listen to poetry and music, then I can live. You see, darling, the rest of the time it's just me. And that's not enough.
Rita's Mother: There must be better songs to sing than this...
Rita's Father: Say, Denny. Denny, I'm sorry for you, lad. If she was a wife of mine I'd drown her. Rita: If I was a wife of yours I'd drown meself.