Posted on Sunday, July 9, 2006
On HBO's superlative Deadwood, Al Swearengen (memorably played by actor Ian McShane) gets all the best lines...
In life you have to do a lot of things you don't fucking want to do. Many times, that's what the fuck life is... one vile fucking task after another.
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If I bleat when I speak, it's because I've just been fleeced.
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Here's my counter-offer to your counter-offer: go fuck yourself.
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I wouldn't trust a man who wouldn't try to steal a little.
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I'm declaring myself conductor of this meeting as I have the bribe sheet.
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Announcing your plans is a good way to hear god laugh.
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You want a donkey's attention, you bring a fucking pole down between his ears.
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Dan, don't you agree that truth, if only a pinch, must season every falsehood, or else the palate fucking rebels?
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How does Hearst hope to defeat me? Allied as I am with the imbecile, the contemptible, and the promiscuous fucking insane.
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Over time, your quickness with a cocky rejoinder must have gotten you many punches in the face.
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Dan Dority: I'm older, and I'm much less friendly to fuckin' change.
Al: Change ain't lookin' for friends. Change calls the tune we dance to.
And my all time favorite, a dialogue between Swearengen and newspaper editor A.W. Merrick (Jeffrey Jones), after Merrick's presses have been destroyed by local toughs upset by Merrick's publication of a notice that existing gold claims might be thrown out if Deadwood is annexed to the U.S. Swearengen's final line is a kind of mini-soliloquy that sums up his character perfectly:
Al: (Sits, lets out a sigh) Why ain't you up and running again?
Merrick: I'm in despair. The physical damage is repairable, but the psychic wound may be permanent.
Al: (After a pause.) You ever been beaten, Merrick?
Merrick: (Rolls his eyes) Once, when I thought I had the smallpox, Doc Cochran slapped me in the face --
(Al slaps him.)
Merrick: Ah! (He stares at Al, touching his cheek -- he leans forward) Stop it, Al.
Al: Are you dead?
Merrick: Well, (touches cheek) I'm in pain, but no, I'm obviously not dead.
Al: And obviously you didn't fucking die when the Doc slapped you.
Merrick: No.
Al: So including last night, that's three fucking damage incidents that didn't kill you. Pain or damage don't end the world, or despair, or fuckin' beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man -- and give some back.
(Many thanks to HBO's episode guide, the Deadwood Transcripts site, and the quotes thread on Television Without Pity's Deadwood forum for archiving all Al's wisdom for posterity.)
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If you think anything I write here represents the opinions of anybody but myself, you need more help than I can give you. The opinions are all mine, folks. Nobody else's.
If that's too hard to understand... well, I'm sorry. There's only so much I can do. I'm not a therapist, and I'm not a miracle worker. I wish I could help you work through your delusional belief that I'm speaking for anyone else but myself. Honestly, I do. But in the end, that's a monkey you'll have to get off your back on your own. Sorry.
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"In life you have to do a lot of things you don’t fucking want to do. Many times, that’s what the fuck life is… one vile fucking task after another."
I think I'm going to adopt that as my personal credo.
Mr. Lefkowitz,
This is a heavily belated massage, only because I just ran into your blog from awhile back, concerning a certain Robert Isenberg and his "spiritual war" - a fellow who, for reasons of nomenclature alone, I've found very interesting. Your remarks were very well-conceived and I couldn't agree with them more. You can imagine that a name like Robert Isenberg doesn't pop up the much, and I was shocked (while admittedly Googling my own name) to discover one such RI with precisely the opposite politics of my own, loudly rancoring in the wake of his son's horrific death. Whatever this other Robert Isenberg may think of your commentary, I felt pleased and enlightened.
Ciao,
R.I.
I like the line about God laughing when we making plans... how true that is. I swear nothing in my life has gone the way I planned it. So I stopped trying.
The counter-offer line is good, too. :-)
The "god laughs" line is actually a paraphrase of an old Yiddish saying (pardon my abominable spelling of it): "Mensch tracht, Gott lacht". In English that means "Man plans, God laughs."
thanks for complying the wisdom of Mr.Swearengen! The show is amazing and Al, well, Al is the uncle I never had.
My Favorite
Wu( sitting in Al's office after his opium has been stolen)
Al: Now, the---this---this is one of you, huh?
Mr. Wu: (phonically, again – sorry!) Hough, Tong yun n tong yun (karate chop and slit across throat)
Al: Oh, the—this is him dead?
Mr. Wu: Au. Ho…Heyan.
Al: And these two.
Mr. Wu: Bok Gwai Lo…cocksucka!
Al: Yeah, glad I taught you that fuckin’ word. These are whites, huh?
Mr. Wu: uh, white cocksucka! (Pulls out dope bag)
Al: Two white cocksuckers killed him and stole the dope that he was bringing to you.
Mr. Wu: White cocksucka! You, Swe’gen (gestures to the bag and Al)
Al: The dope that you were gonna fuckin’ sell to me?
Mr. Wu: White cocksucka.
Al: These two white cocksuckers? Who the fuck did it?
Mr. Wu: Wu!
Al: Who, you ignorant fuckin’ chink!
Mr. Wu: Wu?!
Al: Who?! Who?! Who stole the fucking dope?!
Mr. Wu: Cocksucka!
Al: Aw, Jesus.
"Tell your God to ready for blood." is another good one.