Meredith Quotes in Playing by Heart (1998)

Trent: You know I'm not just asking you to dinner as a pre-emptive strike against litigation. I'm asking because...

Meredith: I'll have dinner with you.

Trent: What changed your mind?

Meredith: Anyone who can say 'preemptive strike against litigation' with a straight face deserves a dinner companion.

Meredith: I'll tell you what I don't want. I don't want all this calculated artificiality. This dress, these stupid little bows in my hair, they aren't me. I mean, look at you. You - you don't sit around your house in an Armani suit, do you?

Trent: No. My house is black-tie.

[Fumbling on a date]

Meredith: As you can see I'm not very good at this.

Trent: You're charming.

Meredith: Wow.

Trent: Yeah I know, the flowers are a little much, but I'm late. But only because I had second thoughts about the flowers and threw them away halfway down the block. Then had third thoughts and went back and got them.

Meredith: [on the phone after Mark's funeral] Trent, is it too late to say "I love you"?

Trent: It's early.

Meredith: I have a hard time trusting men.

Trent: I'm not men. I'm not a group. I'm just me.

Meredith: I don't deal with passion well.

Trent: Maybe you don't like that loss of control. You prefer to be the director, telling everyone what to do.

Meredith: It's pretty painfully obvious, isn't it.

Trent: Somewhat painful, yes... You know there's something to find out about me.

Meredith: What's that?

Trent: That I take direction pretty well.

Meredith: Well, That doesn't take long does it?

Trent: What doesn't?

Meredith: I mean, you turn a guy down a-and WHAM. he just metamophoses into an anger ball.

Trent: An 'Anger ball'?

Meredith: See.

Meredith: Look, Trent, you're a nice guy, I don't...

Trent: [groaning] Oh, oh, that's - you know...

[heading for the railing]

Trent: I'm swimming to shore, you can call the Coast Guard.

Meredith: Oh, come on!

Trent: Nice guy? That's - I haven't been dismissed with that since high school!

[pause]

Trent: Does that mean no second date?

Meredith: I'll tell you what this pregnancy's taught me: It's taught me how it feels to look like the back end of a bus and sit around every night with nothing to do!

Meredith: It's hideous! I want it adopted immediately!

Meredith: [to Jos] Don't be so stupid, I've destroyed two of yours already.

Jos Jones: [visiting Meredith in the maternity ward, shortly after she's given birth] How are you feeling?

Meredith: Lousy.

Meredith: [glancing at the newborn baby] Well? Aren't you going to look at it? This is your marvelous child you couldn't bear being destroyed, remember?

Meredith: [while Jos gets up and looks at the baby] It's hideous. I hate it... It gave me hell.

Jos Jones: [looking at the baby, rather indifferently] All new babies look like that. You'll like it when it's a bit older.

Meredith: Oh no. I want it adopted. Now.

Jos Jones: [He sits back down] I've got a rotten headache. Have you got any aspirin or dope or anything?

Meredith: [scoffs] Huh! Not that I couldn't use it myself... How do you feel about adoption, anyway? If I ask the nurses here, they'll plague me with sermons.

Jos Jones: You're a bitch.

Meredith: You're a bastard.

Meredith: [speaking of Lord Paddington] And when he got angry, he would wiggle his ears in the most extraordinary fashion, and he would fight like a demon.

Ollie: Fight like demon...

[to Stan]

Ollie: Wiggle your ears.

Stan: Huh?

Ollie: [sternly] Wiggle your ears!

Stan: [Stan tries to wiggle his ears] I can't wiggle my ears.

Ollie: Of course not; it's another rib.

Meredith: [sheepish] I'm sorry, I wouldn't have made a joke if...

Tom Ripley: [cuts her off] Don't be sorry. I've never been happier. I feel like I've been handed a new life.

Meredith: Dickie?

Tom Ripley: Hello Meredith!

Meredith: Oh my God! I hardly even recognized you.

Tom Ripley: Well, you spotted me so you get the reward.

Old Man Peanut: Poof?

Mal: He's thinking of Farrady. He's been dead for years.

Meredith: Farraday. He was alright. He was a gentle giant.

Mal: He was only 5'4''

Meredith: I fucked him back in the 80's. I'm telling you, he was a gentle giant.

Mal: Did you? I didn't know that.

Old Man Peanut: We do now.

Meredith: He was a very shy man. I liked him.

Old Man Peanut: No, it's not that cunt I'm thinking of. It was that other cunt. Cunt with the ears. Pen and inked something terrible.

Mal: That's Dougie Clark. The Human Stinkbomb.

Old Man Peanut: I've got a bone to pick with that cunt.

Mal: You can't get close enough though, can you?

Meredith: What I choose to do with my nine-and-a-half has fuck all to do with you.

Meredith: With me it's the five Fs. Find 'em, follow 'em, finger 'em, fuck 'em, and forget 'em.

Meredith: Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem.