Grey Gardens "Not today, Geraldine" quote?
#1Grey Gardens "Not today, Geraldine" quote?
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??
#4Grey Gardens
Posted: 3/30/13 at 9:41pmLol, you asked if anybody knew and he said yes.
#5Grey Gardens
Posted: 3/30/13 at 9:47pmLOL, Blaxx pointed it out.
#8Grey Gardens
Posted: 3/30/13 at 11:58pmIn the documentary, Big Edie says this line. Isn't she addressing one of the cats?
#9Grey Gardens
Posted: 3/31/13 at 12:02amI 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 ??
#12Grey Gardens
Posted: 3/31/13 at 12:14pmGeraldine could be a Flip Wilson Reference. He played a wonderful drag character named Geraldine. It used to make me laugh!
#13Grey Gardens
Posted: 3/31/13 at 2:38pmGirls. The question has been answered. It's a quote from "Some Like It Hot."
#14Grey Gardens
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
ghostlight2
Broadway Legend Joined: 12/5/04
#15Grey Gardens
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
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