Thirtysomething (TV Series)

South by Southeast (1988)

Timothy Busfield: Elliot Weston

Quotes 

• Michael Steadman : [after falling asleep on a stakeout]  We used to be able to stay up all night. What happened to us?

  Elliot Weston : We're over the hill. How did we get over the hill? I haven't climbed the hill yet. I haven't even seen the hill.

• Michael Steadman : This is breaking and entering.

  Gary Shepherd : All the offices look the same. I was preoccupied, I didn't watch where I was going, I walked into the wrong office.

  Michael Steadman : And we were preoccupied, too?

  Gary Shepherd : You saw my error and came in to tell me I was in the wrong office.

  Elliot Weston : You realized your mistake, you felt embarrassed, so you typed the note telling Professor... what's his name?

  Gary Shepherd : Vandamm.

  Elliot Weston : ...Vandamm that you stumbled into his office by accident. You know, only you forget you take the note with you. We compare the typeface to the note on the rat and we prove he's our man.

  Gary Shepherd : Right.

  Michael Steadman : We are breaking into a man's office, and why are we doing that? All because you believe there is some insidious rat connection.

• Michael Steadman : Nine women, all of whom have hated Gary within the past six months.

  Elliot Weston : Okay, we've got to start paring this down.

  Michael Steadman : Well, first off, we can eliminate the ones with no last names.

  Gary Shepherd : I remember their names. I remember all their names.

  Michael Steadman : We can also eliminate anyone described as "the girl who has a great tan."

  Elliot Weston : That's two of those.

  Gary Shepherd : So I forgot a couple of names. Big deal.

• Gary Shepherd : And if it is love, what does that mean? I mean, what is loving someone, actually loving someone, mean? Okay, let-let's start with the obvious. Caring. Being open.

  Hope Murdoch Steadman : Committing.

  Gary Shepherd : Committing. Hope, I said it! I said the "C" word. Just because I can say it doesn't mean I can do it.

  [cut to him at Michael and Elliot's office] 

  Gary Shepherd : Anyway, how am I supposed to know if she's the one I want to spend the rest of my life with?

  Elliot Weston : Is she, like, enormously endowed?

  Gary Shepherd : No.

  Elliot Weston : Why can't things ever be easy?

• Michael Steadman : What do we got?

  Elliot Weston : Okay, we got Mary, Dianne, Trina, Karen, Karen Jenny, and the Culbert twins.

  Gary Shepherd : Why does it have to be a woman? These women don't hate me. It had to be a man.

  Elliot Weston : Were any of them married?

  Gary Shepherd : Yeah, sort of.

  Michael Steadman : "Yeah, sort of"?

  Gary Shepherd : They were separated.

  Elliot Weston : Who?

  Gary Shepherd : Jenny Vandamm.

  Elliot Weston : Do you think her husband did it?

  Gary Shepherd : That's it!

  Michael Steadman : That's it?

  Gary Shepherd : He's a professor at my college. He's in the psych department. He'd have access to rats.

  Elliot Weston : Of course. Why didn't I think of that?

• Elliot Weston : Okay, okay, look. We got slashed tires, we got a trashed apartment. We got a dead rat with a note. Now, is he trying to tell us something by choice of items? Let's take another look at the note.

  Michael Steadman : The note.

  Elliot Weston : Oh, the note.

  Michael Steadman : [going to the kitchen and taking it out of the freezer]  Here it is! "I know who you are. I know what you did. You're dead."

  Elliot Weston : Okay, what can we read into that? "I know who you are." Someone you know.

  Michael Steadman : Or who knows you.

  Elliot Weston : Who you don't know?

  Michael Steadman : So we're down to friends or strangers.