A Prairie Home Companion

[from trailer]

Garrison Keillor:
We come from people who brought us up to believe that life is a struggle, and if you should feel really happy, be patient: this will pass.

[from trailer]

Dusty:
Why do they call it PMS? Because Mad Cow was already taken.

Lola Johnson:
This isn't really going to be your last show, is it?

Garrison Keillor:
Every show is your last show. That's my philosophy.

Rhonda Johnson:
Thank you, Plato.

Al, Stage Manager:
About that obscene song you sang last week...

Dusty:
"I'll give you my moonshine if you show me your jugs?"

Yolanda Johnson:
How about just a moment of silence?

Garrison Keillor:
Silence on the radio... I don't know how that works.

Dusty:
[singing] I used to work in Chicago, at a convenience store. / I used to work in Chicago. I did but I don't anymore. / A lady walked in with some porcelain skin and I asked her what she came in for. / "Liquor," she said, and lick her I did, and I don't work there anymore.

Garrison Keillor:
The penguin joke. Two penguins standing on an ice floe. And the first penguin says, "You look like you're wearing a tuxedo." And the second penguin says, "What makes you think I'm not?"

Dangerous Woman:
Is there more?

Garrison Keillor:
No.

Dangerous Woman:
That's the joke?

Garrison Keillor:
Uh huh.

Dangerous Woman:
Why is that funny?

Garrison Keillor:
I guess it's funny because people laugh at it.

Dangerous Woman:
I'm not laughing.

Garrison Keillor:
You're an angel.

Lola Johnson:
What if you die some day?

Garrison Keillor:
I will die.

Lola Johnson:
Don't you want people to remember you?

Garrison Keillor:
I don't want them to be told to remember me.

Dangerous Woman:
When I used to listen to them, it was like they were all my really good friends.

Axeman:
But something else happened, right?

Dangerous Woman:
Right.

Axeman:
Well, I'm that something else.

Guy Noir:
A lot of good people up there on the stage. A lot of them. I mean, I'm a man of the world like yourself. But these folks put their lives into this.

Axeman:
Now they can put their lives into something else. That's the beauty of the world. There's always something to put your life into, isn't there? It's like the scripture tells us, you have to lose your life before you can find it.

Axeman:
The plaster around the proscenium is beautiful. We should really be taping this.

Guy Noir:
It's a live radio show.

Axeman:
Videotape, for historical purposes.

Dusty:
Hey, uh... hey, Lefty. What did the elephant say to the naked man?

Lefty:
What'd he say?

Dusty:
It's cute, but can you really breathe through that thing?

Guy Noir:
The show had been on the air since Jesus was in the 3rd grade.

Molly:
[to Garrison] The show's running 6 minutes short, Lola is going to sing a song, and your barn doors are open.

Guy Noir:
And her hair! It was what God had in mind when he said "Let there be..."

Al, Stage Manager:
Hair, right?

Yolanda Johnson:
Isn't that a Carter Family song?

Lola Johnson:
Who?

Yolanda Johnson:
The Carter Family. Like us, only famous.

Jearlyn Steele:
[singing] Why do you work so hard to get what you don't even want?

Yolanda Johnson:
Duct tape will not make an honest man out of you.

Lola Johnson:
[singing] She shot that bastard in the heart, And ruined his nice suit!

Guy Noir:
She had a Mount Rushmore t-shirt on, and those guys never looked so good. Especially Jefferson and Lincoln. Kind of bloated but happy.

Dangerous Woman:
The death of an old man is not a tragedy. Forgive him his shortcomings, and thank him for all his love and care.

Dusty, Lefty:
[singing] Bad jokes, Lord, I love 'em. / Bad jokes, can't get enough of em. / O-o-o-whee, / Bad jokes for me.

Dusty:
[singing] When God created woman / He gave her not two breasts but three. / When the middle one got in the way, / God performed surgery. / Woman stood before God / With the middle breast in hand / Said,"What do we do with the useless boob?" / And God created man.

Dangerous Woman:
Do you believe in the fullness of time and the spirit, Mr. Noir? Most people don't, you know. It would be good, Mr. Noir, if you would open your heart to the fullness of time and the spirit, which upholds and sustains us through all this world amen.

Lefty:
The blind man's seeing eye dog pissed on the blind man's shoe. The blind man said "Here Rover, here's a piece of beef for you." His wife said "Don't reward him, you can't just let that pass." The blind man said "I gotta find his mouth so I can kick him in the ass."

Dusty:
Did you hear about the Viagra shipment that got stolen?

Lefty:
No. Who do they think did it?

Dusty:
Well, they don't know, but they're on the look out for hardened criminals.

Lefty:
Did you know that diarrhea was hereditary?

Dusty:
No, I didn't.

Lefty:
Yeah, it runs in your genes.

Lefty:
What do you get when you cross holy water with castor oil?

Dusty:
I don't know, Lefty. What do you get?

Lefty:
A religious movement.

[first lines]

Radio Announcer:
Market reports today, barrows and gilts uh two hundred twenty to two hundred sixty pounds, they're lower at forty dollars uh sows are steady three hundred five hundred pounds thirty four to thirty seven dollars going over to feeder cattle, beef steers - one hundred twenty to one hundred fifty dollars and two hundred to three hundred [fade out]

Rhonda Johnson:
Hey, that was a terrific eulogy you gave old man Soderbergh at his memorial service.

Garrison Keillor:
Thank you.

Guy Noir:
Too bad the old coot couldn't have been there to hear it.

Yolanda Johnson:
Yeah... and to have missed it by just a few days.

Rhonda Johnson:
Oh, it's big. It's movin' like monkeys.

Guy Noir:
They got old, babe. They started thinking about ease and comfort. Then I figure, they saw a brochure about an island with palm trees and an azure sky and miles of sand, and they thought: ''Hey! Ah! Ah! We don't have to suffer through these miserable Minnesota winters. We don't have to freeze our butts off waiting for our bus to come, our bus has come. It's here. We'll leave the business to the kids and we'll head for paradise and to hell with it.'' Only trouble is, the kids had already gone down to paradise ahead of them. So then, a big corporation down in Texas offered then a gazillion dollars for it. Texans. Sure. They talk funny and their eyes don't focus and their flesh is rotting and falling of, but hey. You know. So what? Yeah, nobody's perfect and, Uh... Money is money, so the Soderbergs took the dough. End of story. Do you have any tweezers?