Grey Gardens "Not today, Geraldine" quote?

[EthelMinnelli]

Posted: 3/30/13 at 7:12pm

From Act Two of "Grey Gardens":

BIG EDIE: You need to get a mop and clean this place up.
LITTLE EDIE: Not today, Geraldine.

What's the Geraldine reference? Anybody know??

[PalJoey]

Posted: 3/30/13 at 7:21pm

Yes

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 3/30/13 at 8:02pm

Please share, PJ. I'd like to know, too.

[EthelMinnelli]

Posted: 3/30/13 at 9:39pm

Can you educate the rest of us?

[blaxx]

Posted: 3/30/13 at 9:41pm

Lol, you asked if anybody knew and he said yes.

[TheatreDiva90016]

Posted: 3/30/13 at 9:47pm

LOL, Blaxx pointed it out.

[eperkins]

Posted: 3/30/13 at 10:42pm

"Some Like It Hot."

[jpbran]

Posted: 3/30/13 at 11:36pm

"Well, I never did like the name 'Geraldine.'"

[PattyO'Furniture]

Posted: 3/30/13 at 11:58pm

In the documentary, Big Edie says this line. Isn't she addressing one of the cats?

[EthelMinnelli]

Posted: 3/31/13 at 12:02am

I don't recall this from either of the documentaries... Do you recall when she said it? I remember it getting a big laugh when Christine Ebersole said it -- can someone explain ??

[PalJoey]

Posted: 3/31/13 at 12:38am

Not tonight, Geraldine.

[EthelMinnelli]

Posted: 3/31/13 at 9:28am

PalJoey - can you explain?

[goldenboy]

Posted: 3/31/13 at 12:14pm

Geraldine could be a Flip Wilson Reference. He played a wonderful drag character named Geraldine. It used to make me laugh!

[newintown]

Posted: 3/31/13 at 2:38pm

Girls. The question has been answered. It's a quote from "Some Like It Hot."

[followspot]

Posted: 3/31/13 at 3:25pm

I've always taken it to be Little Edie's play on "Not tonight, Josephine" -- a comic catchphrase still common in the 1970s (see link) derived from a popular early-century vaudeville song by that name.

"Not tonight, Josephine" as a catchphrase came to mean something along the lines of "That's not going to happen" -- a sarcastic response to a request to do something you have no desire or intention to do.

As for "Some Like It Hot" -- "Not Tonight, Josephine" was that film's original working title, and the phrase is said with the meaning above by Jerry to Joe in the film as a double-meaning gag (Joe's female identity is "Josephine"). "Not today, Geraldine" is not a quote from the film, but it's definitely possible that Little Edie was combining her references.


Not Tonight, Josephine

Updated On: 3/31/13 at 03:25 PM

[ghostlight2]

Posted: 3/31/13 at 3:32pm

Another, topical quote from that film. It was a joke then - now, not so much:

Joe: "-but you're not a girl! You're a guy - why would a guy wanna marry a guy?"

Jerry: "Security!"


eta: re followspot's commercial: Napoleon was said to have sent a message to Josephine "Home in three days. Don't wash!" If that was true, hard to believe he'd turn her down for some mussed-up hair
"Don't wash!" Updated On: 3/31/13 at 03:32 PM