Daily Dialogue — February 25, 2015

At a birthday party.

Peppers: She’s a beauty, ain’t she?
Frank: Yeah, what kind of gun is this?
Peppers: It’s a tranquilizer gun. If any of these little fuckers decide to freak out on the kids, I get to take them down. Ain’t that right? [yank’s on the mule’s reigns] Oh, what? That’s what I thought. Shut up.

Frank cocks the gun.

Peppers: Hey, hey. Careful with that. That’s the most powerful tranq gun on the market. Got her in Mexico.
Frank: Cool.
Peppers: Yeah, it is cool. They say it can puncture the skin of a rhino from…

Frank shoots himself in the neck with the dart.

Peppers: YES! That’s awesome!
Frank: What?
Peppers: You just took one in the jugular, man.
Frank: What? I did.

Feeling his neck.

Peppers: YES!
Frank: Oh, my God. Is this bad? Is this bad?
Peppers: You better pull that shit out, man. That shit is not cool.
Frank: Wait. What? Pull what out?
Peppers: You got a fucking dart in your neck, man.
Frank: [laughing] You’re… you’re crazy, man. I like you, but you’re crazy.

— Old School (2003), screenplay by Todd Phillips & Scot Armstrong, story by Court Crandall and Todd Phillips & Scot Armstrong

The Daily Dialogue theme for next week: Birthday.

Trivia: There were plans to produce a sequel, with the main characters on college spring break. Upon reading the script, Will Ferrell when promoting Semi-Pro (2008), said that he and Vince Vaughn had the same reaction when the story just felt like it was repeating itself.

Dialogue On Dialogue: Here’s how I imagine the process went coming up with this bit. The writers brainstormed things common to a child’s birthday party. They hit on the whole guy-brings-animals thing. That led to tranquilizer gun. And that led to this scene.

If you have a suggestion for this week’s theme, please post in comments.