Love Is Strange (2014)

John Lithgow: Ben Hull

Photos 

Quotes 

• Ben : When you live with people, you know them better than you care to.

• Ben : I have missed having your body next to mine too much to have it denied to me for reasons of bad engineering.

• [on a dinner table] 

  Elliot : You're not a boy anymore, son. You're a young man. Do you know how lucky you are this happened while you're in high school so the principal could call your mother? Because in the real world, you're in jail right now.

  Joey : I didn't steal anything.

  [cell phone rings] 

  Elliot : [answering]  Hello?

  Kate : Ben, would you like some more water?

  Ben : Yes, please.

  Elliot : [on the phone]  No. No, let's just leave the way it is. I don't want to change anything at this point.

  Kate : [whispering to Elliot]  Can we do this later, please?

  Elliot : [on the phone]  Yeah. I can't talk right now. I'll call you back in half an hour.

  [hangs up the phone] 

  Kate : Thank you.

  Elliot : Where were we?

  Ben : Jail.

• Bartender : Are you guys new in the neighborhood?

  Ben : Are you kidding? There was a famous "sip in" right here in this bar to challenge the New York State regulation that prohibited bars from serving homosexuals.

  Bartender : Yeah, we have a clipping from The New York Times framed here somewhere.

  Ben : 1966. Me and four other guys, we came in here accompanied by five reporters. When we were denied service, we denounced the State Liquor Authority.

  Bartender : Oh my God. You're that guy?

  Ben : Yeah, I was one of the guys.

  Bartender : Wow. Well, this round's on me, fellas.

  [Ben and George start laughing as soon as the bartender leaves] 

  George : You are such a liar!

  Ben : What?

  George : You'll do anything for a free drink!

  Ben : Well, I knew the guy who thought it up.

  George : Who, Frank?

  Ben : Yeah. That was his claim to fame.

  George : Oh, I thought his claim to fame was something entirely different.

  Ben : Well, that too.

  [both start laughing even harder] 

• Joey : What the fuck, Vlad?

  Vlad : I'm posing for your uncle's new masterpiece.

  Joey : That's so gay.

  Ben : People have been modeling for painters for centuries now, Joe. All kinds of people.

  Vlad : He doesn't mean homosexual, Uncle Ben. He just means stupid.

• Ben : What did you think of the Wieniawski?

  George : Not bad. I thought she milked it a bit.

  Ben : You think so?

  George : Well, when the piece is that romantic, there's no need to embellish.

  Ben : Oh. I don't know. I loved it. I kept thinking about him and his beloved Isabella.

  George : Oh yeah? But that's not true. You know that whole "he composed it to convince her parents to let him marry her," it's a myth.

  Ben : I'm not like you. I prefer a little embellishment.

• [Kate can't concentrate on writing because of Ben chatting] 

  Ben : I can't really work if there's someone else around.

• [first lines] 

  Ben : My glasses. I can't find my glasses.

• George : I had a wonderful time.

  Ben : Me too.