For Colored Girls (2010)
Thandiwe Newton: Tangie, Orange
Photos
Quotes
-
Tangie : You can't love somebody with that much hurt in them. I'm learning that more and more. I don't know what's wrong with me. My dependency on other human beings for love. I survive on intimacy, and tomorrow that's all I've got going. It's all I've got!
-
[opening lines; all in voiceover]
Yasmine : [as she dances] Dark phrases of womanhood, of never having been a girl. Half-note scattered without rhythm.
Juanita : [as she waters her plants] ... without rhythm. No tune distraught. Laughter falling over a black girl's shoulders. It's funny...
Gilda : [as she cleans dust away with her broom] ... funny. It's hysterical. The melodylessness of her dance. Don't tell nobody, don't tell a soul. She's dancing on beer cans and shingles.
Jo : [as she readies herself for bed] She's dancing on beer cans and shingles. This must be the spook house. Another song with no singers, lyrics no voices and uninterrupted solos, unseen performances. Are we ghouls? Children of horror?
Alice : [as she prays in her closet] Children of horror? The joke? Don't tell nobody, don't tell a soul. Are we animals? Have we gone crazy?
Kelly : [as she looks at a pregnancy test] ... gone crazy? I can't hear anything but maddening screams and the soft strains of death. And you promised me. You promised somebody. Anybody. Sing a black girl's song.
Nyla : [as she walks to the stage for her diploma] ... a black girl's song. Bring her out to know herself. To know you, but sing her rhythms caring...
Tangie : [as she reads over unseen documents] ... caring, struggle. Hard times, sing her song of life. She's been dead so long, closed in silence so long.
Crystal : [as she has sex with Beau Willie] ... so long.She doesn't know the sound of her own voice, her infinite beauty. She's half-note scattered without rhythm, no tune. Sing her sighs... Sing the song of her possibilities. Sing a righteous gospel. Let her be born.
Yasmine , Juanita , Gilda , Jo , Alice , Kelly , Nyla , Tangie , Crystal : [simultaneously] Let her be born and handled warmly. And this is for colored girls who have considered suicide but moved to the ends of their own rainbows.
-
Man #2 : Wait, wait, wait. Look, I got something to tell you. I only have about $80 on me.
Tangie : What are you talking about?
Man #2 : That's all I have. If you want to go to the ATM, we can do that.
Tangie : You think I'm a hooker?
Man #2 : Aren't you?
Tangie : No!
Man #2 : I'm sorry. I'm drunk.
[starts laughing]
Tangie : What is so funny?
Man #2 : I guess I'm just old-fashioned. What kind of woman picks a man up in a bar and brings him back to her place if she's not a hooker?
Tangie : One that likes to fuck.
[the man starts laughing again]
Tangie : Don't laugh at me.
Man #2 : I'm sorry.
Tangie : Don't laugh at me.
Man #2 : This is some sick shit.
Tangie : You men with your double standards. You can do it, but a woman can't. Get out. *Get out*!
Man #2 : That's a good idea. You seem to do this too often to be healthy.
Tangie : You think I have some kind of disease?
Man #2 : If it ain't in your body, it is definitely in your head.
Tangie : You ain't one to judge me you son of a bitch!
-
Tangie : Being alive and being a woman is all I got, but being colored is a metaphysical dilemma I haven't conquered yet.
-
Juanita : Now, how many times have you heard your man say it don't feel the same? My love is too beautiful to have it thrown back on my face.
Yasmine : I like that.
Juanita : Try one.
Yasmine : What?
Juanita : Well, I do it all the time in my class. You just say, "My love is too ____," and you just fill in the blank.
Gilda : My love is too sanctified to have it thrown back on my face.
Kelly : My love is too magic to have it thrown back on my face.
Tangie : My love is too "Saturday Night" to have it thrown back on my face.
Jo : My love is too complicated to have it thrown back on my face.
Yasmine : My love is too music to have it thrown back on my face.
Juanita : Yes, and you remember that when a man tries to walk off with all your stuff!
