Daily Dialogue — November 26, 2016

“Whoo! The Chief put his hand up! He put his hand up! Nurse Ratchett, would you please turn the television on?”

— One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975), screenplay by Lawrence Hauben and Bo Goldman, novel by Ken Kesey

The Daily Dialogue theme for the week: Enthusiasm.

Trivia: A portion of the original NBC Radio broadcast of Game 2 of the 1963 World Series was used for the scene where the orderlies are listening to the game on the radio. Hall of Fame baseball announcer Ernie Harwell can be heard on the broadcast.

Dialogue On Dialogue: McMurphy needs one vote to get Nurse Ratched to agree to turn on the World Series for the inmates. Unfortunately that vote needs to come from one of the patients who has up to this point demonstrated little ability to understand communication, let alone respond to it, lost in their own worlds. Then McMurphy makes his way to the Chief…

Ratched shuts down McMurphy on a technicality, so he does this:

This is more than just a dramatic and fun scene. It is a microcosm of McMurphy’s spirit and enthusiasm, the One standing up against the System. As he says later on, “At least I tried,” his influence in the ward an existential act against authority.