The Four Seasons

Jack:
OK, that's a problem I have. When I get angry, I overanalyze. You know why I do that?

Danny:
[talking about Ginny] I think you should apologize to her.

Claudia Zimmer:
For what? I got excited, I spoke my mind, I said I was sorry and it's over and done with.

Danny:
Well, I don't understand how you can hurt someone as guileless and vulnerable as Ginny.

Claudia Zimmer:
She sure took on a lot of mystical qualities once you saw her swimming naked.

Danny:
How can you say that?

Claudia Zimmer:
I just say what I think.

Danny:
Well, maybe that's the problem! Why do you always say what you think? I mean, do you think your thoughts should just fall down from your brain onto your tongue like a gumball machine?

Claudia Zimmer:
Danny, I'm not going to start watching what I think or what I feel! I'm Italian!

Danny:
[angry] I know you're Italian! I don't want to hear anymore how you're Italian! [opens window and sticks his head out] Hey, out there! This woman is Italian! [faces back to Claudia] You no longer have to announce your ethnic origin in this state. Everyone in Connecticut knows you're Italian! And when we cross the border, I'll take out an ad in the New York Times.

Ginny:
[about Anne] You know, I don't want to talk her down, but she is unreliable. I mean Nick has made three appointments to meet her down at his lawyer's office and she's never shown up. She hasn't even called.

Claudia Zimmer:
Now wait a minute. No offense, Ginny, but twenty-one years ago Nick said he would be there on the other side of the bed every morning and for the last six months he hasn't kept his appointment either!

Jack:
[flustered] Okay, look. Alright, alright. Let's calm down. It's not all that bad. It's just a little embarassing.

Nick:
I don't see what the big problem is. We're all adults. We'll just say hello and uh...

Danny:
Have a nervous breakdown.

Claudia Zimmer:
[approaching Ginny] Ginny, I'm sorry. There is a lot of strain in the situation and I get passionate sometimes.

Ginny:
[crying and sniffling] That's okay. I know you're just trying to be fair to everybody. [Ginny walks away]

Claudia Zimmer:
[to Nick] You're the one I wanted to make cry. [Nick goes after Ginny]

Danny:
[to Claudia] Well, you had to open up your mouth again.

Claudia Zimmer:
Danny, it's over and done with, please.

Danny:
Let's have a nice quiet time... a nice vacation.

Ginny:
I think Danny's upset.

Kate Burroughs:
Oh, he'll be alright.

Ginny:
We've been joking around all night and he hasn't joined in. I think he's hurt. I think maybe we owe him an apology.

Kate Burroughs:
Why, because I laughed at him?

Ginny:
Well... yeah.

Kate Burroughs:
Look, Ginny, when people have been friends as long as we have, it's not such a terrible thing to kid somebody out of a depression. So don't get upset about what you don't understand.

Ginny:
[to the other couples] I've just about had it with you people!

Nick:
What's the matter?

Ginny:
I'll tell you what's the matter... I'm mad! [slight pause]

Nick:
[concerned] Ginny?

Ginny:
I fall in love with this man and all of a sudden in addition to him, I've got four constant companions! I have to work out a new relationship with somebody who is going through the worst period of his life, only I can't do it alone! I've got to do it in front of four other people! And it's not as if my privacy was invaded. You all let me know every single day that I have been intruding on your territory! Let me tell you something: As far as I'm concerned, you are all demanding and unforgiving... every single one of you. Everybody is sweet and warm and civil, but everybody ignores me! I'm like a leper! I'm... I'm a blank spot where Annie used to be."

Danny:
[furiously at Jack] Now, dammit! I just told you my deepest fear! Why can't you listen to what I'm saying instead of how I'm saying it? I mean, do you have any idea -any idea- what it is to be afraid of death? I can't eat my bowl of cereal in the morning because I have an irrational fear of milk. I stand there in hallways afraid to press strange elevator buttons. I almost threw out my jockey shorts because I have this fear of elastic! [Kate begins laughing hysterically]

Ginny:
Don't laugh at him.

Danny:
No. Go on. Go on, laugh. Laugh. Good. I'm a fool, right? Right?

Kate Burroughs:
Oh, Danny. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Now, come on... are you really afraid of your underwear? [she starts laughing again]

Danny:
I'm dying, she's laughing.

Danny:
Let me tell you something, Jack: I'm ten years older than you, right?

Jack:
Yeah.

Danny:
Alright, I just hope that when you get to be my age, you don't smell the foul breath of death and disintegration hanging over your shoulder the way I find it hanging over mine. I mean, I go to sleep at night on an ache so bad that it simply will not go away. I wake up in the middle of the night sweating, hearing my own bones decay. I have shifted into a state of entropy that's progressing geometrically.

Jack:
Entropy. Geometrically. Danny, you talk like a bad textbook.

Danny:
You think that because I'm quirky I don't hurt? You've got it backwards. I'm quirky because I hurt.

Danny:
Why does everyone think I'm paranoid? Do you discuss this behind my back?

Ginny:
I never met anyone who knew so much about the actuarial tables.

Danny:
You think whenever your brain has a thought, it has to just drop down onto your tongue like a gumball.

Kate Burroughs:
Is this the fun part? Are we having fun yet?

[changing her mind about hiding her new snake from her ex-husband]

Anne Callan:
I'll tell you what - to hell with Nick. Tell him it's a goddamn boa-constrictor.

Kate Burroughs:
[to Jack] I'm saying this in the most loving way, "Sh*t or get off the pot!"

Jack:
Are you mad at me?

Kate Burroughs:
You got it!

Jack:
You picked a helluva time to get irrational.

Kate Burroughs:
Oh, I'm not irrational. Rational people get angry. Irrational people pretend they don't.

Nick:
[to Jack, about Anne] She remembers the day she got her tooth filled. Christ, I can hardly remember the first time I got laid.

Nick:
[to Jack, about Anne's obsessive photography of vegetables] For a year and a half, all we talked about was zucchini. Then for another year it was green peppers - that was a nice change.

Danny:
[the friends are making lunch in cramped quarters on the boat] I haven't used salt or mucus products for three years and I feel just great.

Ginny:
Who eats mucus?

Claudia Zimmer:
[disgusted] He means cheese and milk. Danny, say what you mean, would you please? You're talking to humans here!

Danny:
[when the boat is stuck on a sandbar] We are three-hundred-sixty dollars overbudget. Each. I don't see how we can make a trip to St. Croix unless we have a meeting first.

Jack:
I don't see how we can make a trip to St. Croix unless it floats by.

Danny:
Yeah.

Jack:
You do the work of three people. You're perfect!

Kate Burroughs:
[disgusted] How DARE you call me that!

Jack:
Call you perfect?

Kate Burroughs:
Yeah! That's what I heard, right?

Danny:
In order to cook Chinese food properly, the temperature has to be at 480 degrees. It's a scientific fact.

Jack:
Who said that, Einstein?

Danny:
No, Isaac Newton, inventor of mu shu pork. [Jack doubles over laughing]

Kate Burroughs:
I am sick and tired of all this macho bullshit!

Danny:
[whining about his various health issues] I have shifted into a state of entropy that is progressing geometrically.

Jack:
Entropy. Geometrically. Danny, you talk like a bad textbook.

Danny:
You think that because I'm quirky I don't hurt? You've got it backwards. I'm quirky because I hurt.

Jack:
Why do you think we love this boat so much?

Kate Burroughs:
I don't know.

Jack:
You know why?

Kate Burroughs:
I knew it. He only asked us so that he could tell us his theory. Go ahead, sweetheart. Tell us why we love this boat so much.

Jack:
Because it represents our primeval desire to control water. See? Now, think about it. All our beginnings are wet. Sloshing around in the womb. Baptism. The first life that came out of the warm soup of the ocean. You know?

Danny:
[no interest] Mhmmm...

Kate Burroughs:
Jack loves ideas. And he can do so much with them. I have seen him take one idea at a dinner party and bring the entire conversation to a complete halt.

Claudia Zimmer:
[Nick comes out with clam dish] I love these! I have this insatiable desire to have dominance over the clams.

Jack:
It so happens that Venus rose from the sea on a clam shell. Sexuality was born in wetness.

Claudia Zimmer:
[laughing] It's easier that way!

Jack:
Jeez.

Danny:
I love that woman.

Nick:
[trying to get Lisa out of her depressed mood] You've made some friends at your dorm, right?

Lisa:
Not really. Most of the people here have a peculiar idea of a good time.

Nick:
What do you mean?

Lisa:
They get drunk and piss off the balconies.

Nick:
What about the girls?

Lisa:
I'm talking about the girls.

Nick:
You're kidding me.

Lisa:
You think I'm kidding you? You think it's a joke to have to walk home on a clear night with an umbrella?

Nick:
Are you upset with me for some reason?

Jack:
I just feel really let down by you. I happen to know that you betrayed your wife dozens of times.

Nick:
[pauses to think] Okay, if I did, that's what I did to her. What did I do to you?

Jack:
You didn't tell either of us.

Nick:
What, every time I have an affair with a hat-check girl, I have to run and tell you?

Jack:
That's who you were having affairs with? Hat-check girls?

Nick:
No! They were all top professionals in their fields. I can't tell you all their names, but two of them were Margaret Thatcher and Indira Gandhi.

Jack:
When you're ready to talk intelligently, then we'll talk. Until then, forget it.

Danny:
I can sculpt a bicuspid that would fool God himself.

Claudia Zimmer:
Danny, how come you're allowed to have all these psychosomatic illnesses but when I throw up into my tote bag at two in the morning, it's just my imagination?

Danny:
[talking about Nick] He's been having affairs all along. Dozens.

Jack:
[disbelief] You're kidding.

Danny:
How could you not know? They even slept at your place once.

Jack:
Where was I?

Danny:
You gave him the key to water your plants and feed the cats while you were away. Didn't you notice the funny expression on the cats' faces?

Jack:
He told you all of this?

Danny:
Most of it... some of it came out when he was under gas.

Danny:
[all are preparing to dive into baguette sandwiches, in Danny's new Mercedes] Don't eat!

Jack:
Why?

Danny:
The crumbs go down into the upholstery. One loaf of french bread and the resale value goes down five-hundred dollars.

Jack:
Can't I just eat the insides [of my sandwich] for a hundred?

Nick:
She might fall down! I can't let Ginny just wander around in the snow like that.

Jack:
Why not?

Nick:
Because she's pregnant.

Jack:
Pregnant? You're forty-three years old! You're gonna start having babies now?

Nick:
Oh, there's some real heartwarming acceptance. I have to check everything with you? As a matter of fact, I told you I wanted to start a new family.

Jack:
With babies?

Nick:
What, with airdales?

Danny:
[to Claudia, discussing the two other couples] These people are vicious. Vicious and ill.

Danny:
[talking about Nick and Ginny] They're making this trip very difficult.

Jack:
They're not even ON this trip! They walk around mooning all the time, making goo-goo eyes... my God, if one of them farts, the other thinks it's Guy Lombardo!

Claudia Zimmer:
Is he still thoughtful?

Kate Burroughs:
[hugging Jack] Yes, Jack is thoughtful.

Claudia Zimmer:
Does he observe good bathroom etiquette?

Kate Burroughs:
Huh?

Claudia Zimmer:
Does he leave the seat up or does he put it down?

Danny:
Wait a minute! I always put the seat down!

Claudia Zimmer:
Yeah, after I yelled at you to do it!

Danny:
Why do you always have to do that? Why couldn't you have just kept quiet?

Claudia Zimmer:
Danny, I say what I feel. I'm Italian!

Danny:
[outraged] I know you're Italian! I know you're Italian! [opens the window and shouts] This woman is Italian! [faces away from window] You no longer have to announce your ethnic origin in this state. Everyone in Connecticut knows that you're Italian!

Danny:
We owe the length, breadth, and depth of this relationship to the two most basic human emotions... fear and panic.

Kate Burroughs:
[calmly, but icily] I'm sorry to have to tell you this.

Kate Burroughs:
What?

Jack:
You're making me angry.

Kate Burroughs:
You're angry? Right now?

Jack:
[again, calmly] I'm enraged.

Kate Burroughs:
How was I supposed to know? Maybe you can stamp your foot next time. Or try this. [shrieking] WWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

Kate Burroughs:
[pretending to speak to an eavesdropping Danny outside hotel room door] Danny dear, please don't take this the wrong way, you know how fond I am of you, but I think your Mercedes sucks!

Kate Burroughs:
Danny, calm down!

Danny:
Please don't tell me to calm down, this is the second time today someone has told me to calm down!

Kate Burroughs:
Well, I'm sorry. It's only my first.

Claudia Zimmer:
[after Jack has exploded and thrown the the moose head into the fireplace] I wonder what other people do on their vacations?

Nick:
To be with friends, sipping wine, this is what it is to be happy.

Jack:
Danny is driving me crazy. He has to be the expert on everything. What's a matter with him?

Kate Burroughs:
He's very needy, that's all.

Jack:
Needy? He's hypochondriacal, stingy, bossy, selfish, compulsive, and paranoid. He's the Muhammad Ali of mental illness.