Daily Dialogue — June 3, 2013

President Matt Douglas: What are you doing?
President Russell Kramer: I needed a cup of coffee.
President Matt Douglas: Good. Did you get me one?
President Russell Kramer: No.
President Matt Douglas: You cheap bastard!
President Russell Kramer: I only had fifty cents.
President Matt Douglas: Gimme a sip.
President Russell Kramer: Oh, yeah, I’m about to share my coffee with the Washington Love Machine. No dice. You could spit in a Petri dish and start a whole new civilization. You want to lick the lid?
[Matt licks lid]
President Matt Douglas: Decaf. You pussy.

— My Fellow Americans (1996), screenplay by E. Jack Kaplan & Richard Chapman and Peter Tolan, story by E. Jack Kaplan & Richard Chapman

The Daily Dialogue theme for the week is witty banter, suggested by stoneinthesling. Today’s suggestion by Barbara Thomas.

Trivia: All the actors played their opposite political affiliations.

Dialogue On Dialogue: Commentary from Barbara: “Jack Lemmon and James Garner play two former presidents from opposing parties who loathe each other but are forced to work together to uncover a political scandal for which they’ve both been framed, bickering all the while. Lemmon is Russel P. Kramer, Garner is Matt Douglas.

The roles are perfectly cast and the actors have terrific chemistry, something that is out of the writer’s control of course. But my takeaway from this film was to mentally “cast” my works in progress. Writing my dialogue with a certain actor’s voice and mannerisms in mind helps to keep each character distinct.”

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