Peter McGowan Quotes in How to Kill Your Neighbor's Dog (2000)

Larry: You're lucky. You got Melanie. There are men who'd die for her.

Peter McGowan: Yeah, die for her, or have her kill you. Either way, you're dead.

Larry: Still having trouble satiating, are we?

Peter McGowan: I think the doorbell's heard my wife shout "I'm coming" more than I have these days.

[Larry is dressed as a priest]

Peter McGowan: Can I have a valediction, father?

Larry: Say four Goly Fuck You's and keep drinking.

Peter McGowan: Are you drunk or something?

Larry: What time is it?

Peter McGowan: Four.

Larry: Yep.

Debra Salhany: So, how did you meet your wife?

Peter McGowan: She was a lap dancer, I had a pocket full of singles... No, she was a dancer. For a brief period, she gave acting a try. She came in for an audition, and the rest as they say is histrionics.

Debra Salhany: So, you employed the casting couch?

Peter McGowan: Hey, whatever works. You know that, Deborah.

Edna: You look just like my son-in-law.

Peter McGowan: I am your son-in-law, Edna.

Edna: My son-in-law's name is Peter.

Peter McGowan: No. I said your name was Edna. My name is Peter.

Edna: You just said your name was Edna... Edna's a funny name for a man. Been teased over the years?

Peter McGowan: Mercilessly. "Pete."

Peter McGowan: Hollywood doesn't want writers, so much as secretaries with a flare for dialogue. If you want to be happy in Hollywood, be a cinematographer. Nobody knows what you're doing, so they can't screw with you.

[Peter is smoking]

Melanie McGowan: You know, you're going to have to cut that out when the baby comes.

Peter McGowan: What? Are you expecting it tonight?

Melanie McGowan: Maybe you should see a therapist about your anxiety.

Peter McGowan: That's exactly what I'm afraid of. What if he cures me? Then, I'll have nothing to write about. Nobody wants to know about how happy you are.

Melanie McGowan: Oh, I don't think you ever have to worry about an over-abundance of happiness, dear.

[after a prostate exam]

Peter McGowan: Now I know what a Muppet feels like.

Peter McGowan: Do you ever think that if you attack an artist long enough, that you'll succeed in having him censor himself?

Debra Salhany: Thanks for sticking around, Peter.

Peter McGowan: Thanks for letting me be sticky, Debbie.

Peter McGowan: Seems to me only the intelligent people are choosing not to reproduce.

Peter McGowan: "Oh, what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to conceive." *That* is Sir Walter Scott.

Melanie McGowan: Oh, really? I seem to remember that quote a bit differently.

Peter McGowan: [during wife's gyn exam] You know, to me sex education was always missing the answer to that key question, which was, yeah, how do I get me some?

Peter McGowan: [starts walking around] O-B-G-Y-N. What kind of acronym is that? Oh-bee guy'n. It's not really imaginative, I mean, you should come up with something that spells vagina - Vaginal Association of Gynecological Interns Navigating...

Melanie McGowan: Peter, give the doctor some quiet.

Peter McGowan: [now alongside the doctor] I'm sure it was an oversight on God's part when He positioned the gateway to paradise so dangerously close to the...

Melanie McGowan: Peter! Don't stand there and stare at my crotch!

Peter McGowan: Well, anything else would be considered inappropriate, my dear.

Larry: This is just his way, Peter. He's like a buzzard circling. They spend a lot of time circling, and then finally they land.

Peter McGowan: When it's *dead*.

Passerby: You need a hand?

Peter McGowan: [hobbling along] I already have one, thanks.

Peter McGowan: I hated being a kid.

Amy Walsh: Do you like being a grown up?

Peter McGowan: Well now, I like being adult. As for being grown up, that's uh rather elusive. But the truth is that most adults tend to romanticize childhood, which is absolutely delusional. I mean, most childhood fears are as great or more so than adult fears. Don't you think?

Amy Walsh: [stunned affirmative]

Peter McGowan: ...But maybe that's everything in writing - a catchy title.

Debra Salhany: So is that why you decided to call your first novel How to Kill Your Neighbor's Dog?

Peter McGowan: Oh, that isn't mere affectation. That's a practical guidebook full of juicy bits on suburban terrorism.

Debra Salhany: ...but, uh, what if somebody reads this and goes out and kills their neighbor's dog?

Peter McGowan: Oh, well, what are you gonna do?