TV show quotes
Now listen...
No, you're right, Roy, I was way out of line. But a policeman's been shot - a brother. And there's some born scum out there laughing about it right now and I want to see him nailed.
Yeah, I understand.
I just want to make sure that the law stands by a man who spent his whole life trying to make it work.
Okay, you call the shots.
[rousting an ex-con] He used a .38 to cut down a cop.
Shot a cop? He can't be all bad.
[Stone begins to boil with anger]
Okay, take it easy.
Now you know what's walking, running, and crawling. You know who's hard up and wo's holding on. I want you on the street with your ear to the pavement, and I want the name of that punk who pulled the trigger. You just call me every hour on the hour.
Or what?
You just be two minutes late and I'll show you "or what."
[Bringing Beverly's "trick book" to Stone] There's gotta be over 200 names in this thing.
Anybody we know?
[Chuckling] I always thought you were a voyeur.
I find out what that means, you can be back driving a black-and-white again.
[to Keller] The hooker and the cop. The whole world spits on us. But they can't get along without us. You know that we work the same lousy hours, see the same lousy people, and then we get the same lousy stares if anyone has to know what we do. Sigh. Somebody's gotta do it, so here we are.
You mean the only twelve nights off I've had all year?
Alright, how about tomorrow? Dodgers again? Huh? We can go out early and grab a couple of hot dogs, watch batting practice.
Mike, Mike. You ever stop to think, maybe I wanna see someone with a face a little prettier than yours once in a while?
Alright. Alright, if I didn't know how much you hated baseball, I could take that personally.
That's the big problem with secrets, Mr. Rankin. Somebody always knows.
[Admiring a Mattisse print on Gilliam's wall] It's framed beautifully. Yeah, they all are.
I have them custom-made to complement each particular piece.
Who does the work for you?
Various people. But why do you ask, Lieutenant? Are you planning on having someone framed?
We belong, Kim, together. Here or someplace like this. Have you ever been to the Tower?
What tower?
Robinson Jeffers' tower. Down the coast, south of here, near Big Sur. It's a fortress against the world.
Who is he?
A poet.
And he built his own home?
Yes. With his own hands. Stone by stone.
What does he write about?
The sea. Nature. Man's failure. Violence. Wildness. The power of passion. Love.
I'd like to read him some day.
I intend for you to.
He said this was gonna be our private tower just like the one the poet built in Big Sur.
Poet?
Robinson Jeffers. He built his own place out of rocks, called it a "Tower Beyond Tragedy."
I'd call him a dreamer. Man hasn't come up with a place that safe yet.
Some men keep trying.
[Lt. Stone shrugs]
Thank you.
A cop's life is like looking down a long hall of mirrors. Every case shows him another part of himself. And if he hates what he's looking at, he can't do his job.
It's not one thing just living here like this and knowing people who do less have more because they are Anglo and watching his father spend his whole life being humiliated by weaker men, watching him die, broken and defeated and losing all respect for him for him because of it. And then when he went to college in San Jose, I changed his name. No more Jaime. Now "James". No more Martinez. Now "Martin".
You did that?
I wanted my son to have a chance at something good now.
But he has had, at least I think so. He has a chance to be a good cop. But he has to accept people for what they are. And he can't do that if he doesn't accept himself first.
A "Wetback"? A "Picker"? A "Mex"? A "Greaser"? This what my son has been called all his life. Is that what he should accept Mr. Stone?
Where's Keller?
I tried reaching him at home like you asked, but...
I know. He's got his own night shift going.
Don't you ever answer the phone?
Not when it's in the refrigerator, no.
[In response to Stone implying that because of work he'll cancel his planned Hawaiian vacation] You know you really are a character. You don't trust anybody with your city, do ya?
My city? What are you talkin' about, "my city"?
You know what I'm talking about; it's the truth. You don't take ten minutes for lunch, how are you gonna go take ten days sittin' under a tree?
I'll tell you what I'm gonna take - I'm gonna take you apart in just ten seconds!
All right, Lieutenant, that's it.
[Pulls a card from his billfold and reads from it]
You have the right to remain silent...
Oh, c'mon! OUT!
[Discussing McFee's transfer from Chino to San Quentin] They sent him to us to straighten him out. How do you unkink a corkscrew?
These quotes come from Wikiquote's The Streets of San Francisco pages and are available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.
