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FAMOUS PEOPLE • on Creating a Better World • Lines from Scripts • Clever Turns of Phrase |
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EVERYBODY ELSE • Overheard |
Favorite Remarks
Friends & Me: Overheard
I admit it. I am an inveterate eavesdropper.
I can't help it. Or, to be more honest, I've never tried to stop it -- and some of my best material as a writer has come from conversations I've overheard.
Of course, it also means that I often hear people's unfiltered and unvarnished opinions of me. A few examples:
Shackleford is smart, but he ain't ... smart.
--Some kid at school talking about me in the sixth grade. Over the years I've realized this guy had me figured out long before anybody else.
Oh, we love having Shackleford write for us. He may not be the best but he is by far the fastest.
--TV producer Chuck Sellier, talking on the phone while I standing right outside his office.
You have to be careful around him. He can charm the birds right out of the trees.
--A certain young lady of my acquaintence. At the time she said this I took it as a compliment.
You know I'm the one who tamed Lee.
--A former girlfriend talking to my then-current girlfriend, who was as puzzled by this remark as I was.
The next time Shackleford says something about how brilliant he is, I'm going right for his eyes.
--An actress in the graduate program I attended. Certainly the sort of comment that makes you re-appraise yourself (or at the very least stay away from her).
Finally!
--Someone in a worship service as I finished a sermon and stepped down from the podium. (In fairness, it was a half-hour talk.)
A: You saw Holmes & Watson last year, right? I thought that was really good.
B: Nah, I don't like that "Sherlock-Holmes-meets-Tennessee-Williams" crap.
B: Nah, I don't like that "Sherlock-Holmes-meets-Tennessee-Williams" crap.
--Exchange overheard at the urinal in the men's restroom at the Baker Street Irregulars 1991 dinner.
You are evil incarnate. I mean that in a good way.