Daily Dialogue — July 18, 2019

“It’s past ten. My daughter is in pain. I don’t understand why she has to have this pain. All she has to do is hold out until ten, and IT’S PAST TEN! My daughter is in pain, can’t you understand that! GIVE MY DAUGHTER THE SHOT!”

— Terms of Endearment (1983), screenplay by James L. Brooks, novel by Larry McMurtry

The Daily Dialogue theme for the week: Hospital. Today’s suggestion by @Neo_girl08.

Trivia: Jennifer Jones originally owned the book rights, and wanted to play the part of Aurora. Sissy Spacek was originally scheduled to play the Debra Winger role. Jones and her husband, millionaire Norton Simon, originally commissioned the screenplay from Brooks as a comeback film. The writer subsequently decided that the character of Aurora should not have to be tailored to suit a particular actress, and persuaded Paramount Pictures to purchase the rights from the Simons. On accepting the Screenplay Adapted from Another Medium Oscar, Brooks especially thanked Jennifer Jones Simon.

Dialogue On Dialogue: Mother and daughter have a lifelong contentious relationship, but here Aurora rises to the occasion for her terminally ill daughter.

It brings to mind another hospital scene — from the movie Juno — in which a mother figure (in this case, step-mother) gets on the nurses.