Norma Rae (1979)

Ron Leibman: Reuben

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Quotes 

• Reuben Warshowsky : On October 4, 1970, my grandfather, Isaac Abraham Warshowsky, aged eighty-seven, died in his sleep in New York City. On the following Friday morning, his funeral was held. My mother and father attended, my two uncles from Brooklyn attended, my Aunt Minnie came up from Florida. Also present were eight hundred and sixty-two members of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers and Cloth, Hat and Cap Makers' Union. Also members of his family. In death as in life, they stood at his side. They had fought battles with him, bound the wounds of battle with him, had earned bread together and had broken it together. When they spoke, they spoke in one voice, and they were heard. They were black, they were white, they were Irish, they were Polish, they were Catholic, they were Jews, they were one. That's what a union is: one... Ladies and gentlemen, the textile industry, in which you are spending your lives and your substance, and in which your children and their children will spend their lives and their substance, is the only industry in the whole length and breadth of the United States of America that is not unionized. Therefore, they are free to exploit you, to cheat you, to lie to you, and to take away what is rightfully yours - your health, a decent wage, a fit place to work. I would urge you to stop them by coming down to room 207 at the Golden Cherry Motel, to pick up a union card and to sign it... It comes from the Bible - according to the tribes of your fathers, ye shall inherit. It comes from Reuben Warshowsky - not unless you make it happen.

• [last lines] 

  Reuben Warshowsky : I don't say goodbye. I have been known to cry.

  Norma Rae Webster : Well, whadda you say?

  Reuben Warshowsky : [sighing]  Be happy. Be well.

  Norma Rae Webster : Same to you.

  Reuben Warshowsky : [stuttering]  Best wishes don't seem hardly enough, but I'd like to thank you. I do. I, I thank you for your companionship, your stamina, your horse sense, and a hundred and one laughs. I also enjoyed very much looking at your shining hair and your shining face.

  Norma Rae Webster : Reuben, I think you like me.

  Reuben Warshowsky : I do.

  Norma Rae Webster : I was gonna buy you a tie clip or some shaving lotion or something, but I didn't know what you'd like.

  Reuben Warshowsky : Norma, what I've had from you has been sumptuous.

  [they shake hands, and stare long and hard at each other before Reuben gets in his packed up car and drives away] 

• Reuben Warshowsky : I know the first time you're in is bad. It comes with the job. I saw a pregnant women on a picket line get hit in the stomach with a club. I saw a boy of 16 shot in the back. I saw a guy blown to hell and back when he tried to start his car in the morning. You just got your feet wet on this one.

• Reuben Warshowsky : Gentlemen, your average working man is not stupid. He just gets tired.

• Norma Rae Wilson : You a Jew?

  Reuben Warshowsky : I beg your pardon?

  Norma Rae Wilson : Are you a Jew?

  Reuben Warshowsky : Born and bred.

  Norma Rae Wilson : [look of total surprise on Norma's face]  I never met a Jew before.

  Reuben Warshowsky : [laughs, puts out hand for Norma to shake]  How you doing?

  Norma Rae Wilson : I heard you all had horns.

  Reuben Warshowsky : Heh. Circumcised, yes. Horns, no.

  Norma Rae Wilson : Well, as far as I can see, you don't look any different from the rest of us.

  Reuben Warshowsky : Well, we are.

  Norma Rae Wilson : Yea? Well, what makes you different?

  Reuben Warshowsky : History.

  Norma Rae Wilson : Oh...

  Reuben Warshowsky : You got it now?

• Norma Rae Webster : Reuben, you need yourself a woman.

  Reuben Warshowsky : Funny you should mention it - tonight's the night.

  Norma Rae Webster : My, my, what would Dorothy say?

  Reuben Warshowsky : Wear a rubber.

• Vernon Wichard : [addressing the man at his front door]  Who are you?

  Reuben Warshowsky : My name is Reuben Warshowsky.

  Vernon Wichard : Warshowsky... what kind of name is that?

  Reuben Warshowsky : The kind you have to spell for telephone operators and head waiters.

• Norma Rae Wilson : [Reuben walks with Norma after witnessing an argument between her and an ex-beau]  I guess it seems like every time you run into me, I'm hassling with some other guy.

  Reuben Warshowsky : That's what it seems like.

  Norma Rae Wilson : What you think of me, I wonder.

  Reuben Warshowsky : I think you're too smart for what's happenin' to ya.

• Norma Rae Webster : Who's this? Dylan Thomas?

  Reuben Warshowsky : He was a poet. A genius and a drunk.

• Reuben Warshowsky : [hands Norma a bag of ice to put on her nose after being punched by her date]  Here, put this on. I thought everybody down South was Ashley Wilkes.

  Norma Rae Wilson : You lie down with dogs, you get fleas.

• Norma Rae Wilson : [handing back the ice pack for her bloodied nose caused from being punched by a date]  Thanks a lot for the ice.

  Reuben Warshowsky : Anytime.

  Norma Rae Wilson : Christ, I hope not.

• Sonny : She had one call and she called you. She knew I could make bail. You come in here, you mix her up, you turn her head all around. She's all changed. I didn't want that. I didn't want her to be a frontrunner. What's gonna happen to us now?

  Reuben Warshowsky : She stood up on a table. She's a free woman. Maybe you can live with it, maybe you can't.