Sean Penn Monologues

It's freedom, Mrs. Merrett. I can fly out of this place on the backs of books. I've gone to the end of the world on the wings of words... . When I read, no one is after me. When I read, I am the one who is chasing--chasing after God.

Have you gotten to the "I's" by now? I had some to add to your words. But I can't seem to... I can't seem to find my pens.

The brain is wider than the sky, for put them side by side, the one the other will include, with ease and you beside.

The brain is just the weight of God, for, heft them pound for pound, and they will differ if they do as syllable from the sound.

You can leave the lunatic to his delusions.

I am no man's friend, I am a murderer. Everything else is make believe. So leave, leave, leave!

Thank you. I've never been called a son of God before.

I've been called a son of a you-know-what plenty of times, but I've never been called a son of God.

Why? 'Cause you're a nun?

Thank you for loving me.

I just wanna say I think killin' is wrong, no matter who does it, whether it's me or y'all or your government.

It's quiet. Only three days left. Plenty of time to read my Bible and look for a loophole.

Yes, I do.

Mr. Delacroix, I don't wanna leave this world with any hate in my heart. I ask your forgiveness for what I done. It was a terrible thing I done, taking your son away from you.

Mr. and Mrs. Percy, I hope my death gives you some relief.

I like rebels. Some blacks is ok. Martin Luther King, he led his people all the way to DC and kicked the white man's butt.

He put up a fight. He wasn't lazy.

Don't like 'em.

Hitler got things done!

I was just fucking chicken.

The responsibility of a country is not in the hands of a privileged few. We are strong, and we are free from tyranny as long as each one of us remembers his or her duty as a citizen. Whether it's to report a pothole at the top of your street or lies in a State of the Union address, speak out! Ask those questions. Demand that truth. Democracy is not a free ride, man. I'm here to tell you. But, this is where we live. And if we do our job, this is where our children will live. God bless America.

They'll bury us if we don't. Listen Valerie.

No, Valerie, Valerie, Valerie! Do I, does that make me right if I shout louder than you? If I shout louder than you am I right? If I'm the White House and I shout a million times louder than you, does that make me right? They lied Valerie, they lied. That's the truth.

Niger has two uranium mines in the Sahara desert. One's flooded. The other is run by COGEMA, a French subsidiary jointly controlled by the Japanese and Germans. Five hundred tons of yellowcake is not an off-the-books size transaction. It represents a 40 percent production increase in the nation's annual output of uranium. A sale that size would leave a huge paper trail. Any documentation would, by law, have to be signed by the Prime Minister, Foreign Minister, and the Minister of Mines. But say it was an off-the-books deal. How do you hide the transportation of 500 tons of anything, let alone lightly-refined uranium. You're talking 50 semi-tractor trucks on one road through villages where nothing passed for months except maybe one bush taxi. It would be the biggest event for months. To say they forgot is like kids forgetting Christmas.

When Benjamin Franklin left Independence Hall just after the second drafting, he was approached by a woman in the street. The woman said, "Mr. Franklin, what manner of government have you bequeathed us? And Franklin said, " A Republic madam. If you can keep it."

Absolutely not. I'd be terrified of exposing my children to what adds up to a clearinghouse for crap merchandise and disappointing rides.

Everything a lie... Everything you hear, everything you see... So much to spew out... They just keep coming, one after another... You're in a box... A moving box... They want you dead, or in their lie. Only one thing a man can do - find something that's his, and make an island for himself. If I never meet you in this life, let me feel the lack; a glance from your eyes, and my life will be yours.

In this world, a man, himself, is nothing. And there ain't no world but this one.

We're living in a world that's blowing itself to hell as fast as everybody can arrange it. In a situation like that aII a man can do is shut his eyes and let nothing touch him. Look out for himself.

If I never meet you in this life, let me feel the lack. A glance from your eyes, and my life will be yours.

There's not some other world out there where everything's gonna be okay. There's just this one, just this rock.

This army's gonna kiII you. If you were smart, you'd take care of yourself. There's nothing you can do for anybody else. You're just running into a burning house where nobody can be saved.

I don't have that feeling yet. That numbness. Not Iike the rest of you guys. Maybe cause I knew what to expect. Maybe I was just frozen up already.

Captain, you say one more word to thank me, I'II knock you right in the teeth. You mention me in your fuckin' orders and I'II resign so fast and Ieave you here to run this busted-up outfit by yourself. You understand?

There's nothing wrong with you - listen to me: You just get on a bus, to the nearest big city, to Los Angeles or New York or San Fransisco, it doesn't matter, you just leave. You are not sick, and you are not wrong and God does not hate you. Just leave.

My name is Harvey Milk and I'm here to recruit you!

All men are created equal. No matter how hard you try, you can never erase those words.

This is Harvey Milk speaking on Friday, November the 18th. This is only to be played in the event of my death by assassination. During one of my early campaigns I began to open speeches with a line that became kind of a signature. "My Name is Harvey Milk and I want to recruit you." If I was speaking to a slightly hostile audience, or a mostly straight one, I might break the tension with a joke. "I know, I'm not what you expected, but I left my high heels at home." I fully realize that what I stand for, an activist, a gay activist, makes himself a target for someone who is insecure, terrified, afraid and disturbed themselves. It's a very real possibility, you see, because in San Fransisco, we have broken the dam of a major prejudice in this country.

I am here tonight to say that we will no longer sit quietly in the closet. We must fight. And not only in the Castro, not only in San Francisco, but everywhere the Anitas go. Anita Bryant did not win tonight, Anita Bryant brought us together! She is going to create a national gay force! And the young people in Jackson Mississippi, in Minnesota, in the Richmond, in Woodmere New York, who are hearing her on television, hearing Anita Bryant telling them on television that they are sick, they are wrong, there is no place in this great country for them, no place in this world, they are looking to us for something tonight, and I say, we have got to give them hope!

Without hope, life's not worth living.

I ask this... If there should be an assassination, I would hope that five, ten, one hundred, a thousand would rise. I would like to see every gay lawyer, every gay architect come out - - If a bullet should enter my brain, let that bullet destroy every closet door... And that's all. I ask for the movement to continue. Because it's not about personal gain, not about ego, not about power... it's about the "us's" out there. Not only gays, but the Blacks, the Asians, the disabled, the seniors, the us's. Without hope, the us's give up - I know you cannot live on hope alone, but without it, life is not worth living. So you, and you, and you... You gotta give em' hope... you gotta give em' hope.