How to Kill Your Neighbor's Dog (2000)

Kenneth Branagh: Peter McGowen

Photos 

Quotes 

• [Larry is dressed as a priest] 

  Peter McGowan : Oh Father... I seek Benediction!

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

• 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.

• 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.

• 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*.

• [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.

• Cop #2 : Did you write that one about the opera singer? Phantom...

  Peter McGowen : [for the Nth time]  That's Andrew Lloyd Weber.

  Cop #2 : What? Why isn't this guy stalking Andrew Dice Weber? He seems famous.

• 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] 

• [last lines] 

  Melanie McGowan : [in back of limo]  You ever done it in a vehicle?

  Peter McGowen : Well... that time in Idyllwild, remember? But... I'm not driving this time...

• 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?