Daily Dialogue — January 12, 2012
[the inmates are playing cards and betting with cigarettes]
Martini: [rips a cigarette in half] I bet a nickel.
McMurphy: Dime’s the limit, Martini.
Martini: I bet a dime.
[Puts the two halves onto the table]
McMurphy: This is not a dime, Martini. This is a dime.
[shows a whole cigarette]
McMurphy: If you break it in half, you don’t get two nickels, you get shit. Try and smoke it. You understand?
Martini: Yes.
McMurphy: You don’t understand.
— McMurphy (Jack Nicholson), Martini (Danny DeVito), One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975), screenplay by Lawrence Hauben and Bo Goldman, based on a novel by Ken Kesey, stage play by Dale Wasserman
For the actual scene, go here.
The Daily Dialogue theme for the week is card games, suggested by David Proenza. Today’s suggestion by Teddy Pasternak and Sean Z P Harris.
Trivia: This story was based on author Ken Kesey’s experiences while working at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Palo Alto, California.
Dialogue On Dialogue: A tiny moment, but one of many where we get the feeling that McMurphy is sane and doesn’t belong here.
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