The Facts of Life (TV Series)

Read No Evil (1982)

Charlotte Rae: Edna Garrett

Photos 

Quotes 

• Blair Warner : If you can't get a book in the library you can always go into town and buy one.

  Dorothy 'Tootie' Ramsey : Or wait for the movie to come out.

  Edna Garrett : No, that's not the point.

  Dorothy 'Tootie' Ramsey : It's just that with all the stuff we HAVE to read, what's a few less books?

  Natalie Green : Nice attitude, Tootie!

  Edna Garrett : What did I do?

  Natalie Green : This is America! Books are ideas and ideas have a right to circulate! Think of the First Amendment: Freedom of speech, freedom of thought.

• Mr. Parker : You should read some of the letters I've been getting demanding change in curriculum, in text books, in staff! And in the face of all that we should consider ourselves that we only lost four books.

  Edna Garrett : THIS time. What're you going to have to give up next month, Mr. Parker?

• Mr. Parker : You know there are parents here whose names I've only seen on checks? And I've been getting angry phone calls from them all week. They are furious I allowed those books to be removed from the library. I mean Edna, they hate me.

  Edna Garrett : Oh that's wonderful!

• Edna Garrett : What's the problem, Natalie?

  Joanne 'Jo' Polniaczek : Please, don't get her started.

  Natalie Green : Okay, I'm IN the library!

  Joanne 'Jo' Polniaczek : Too late.

  Natalie Green : And I'm doing research for a paper, right? OKAY! So I go to the shelf to get last month's Ms. Magazine, and it isn't there!

  Edna Garrett : So?

  Natalie Green : So, I go to the front desk and ask Miss Muldoon if it's been checked out. She tells me the subscription to Ms. was cancelled, isn't that strange?

  Edna Garrett : A little, considering all the feminists on campus.

  Natalie Green : That's what I said! Then she tells me that certain elements of Ms. Magazine were considered offensive!

  Edna Garrett : Offensive?

  Natalie Green : That's what I said! Then I find out books have been taken out of the library too for reevaluation!

  Geri Tyler : What does that mean?

  Natalie Green : I'll tell you what that means!

  Edna Garrett : Censorship.

  Joanne 'Jo' Polniaczek : That's what I said!

• Edna Garrett : Are you sure about this?

  Natalie Green : [hands her a list]  If you're thinking about checking any of these books out of the library, forget about it.

  Edna Garrett : The Fixer, Catch-22, and Slaughterhouse-Five?

  Blair Warner : Slaughterhouse-Five, I wrote my term paper on that last year. It was brilliant.

  Geri Tyler : That was a good book!

  Blair Warner : I was talking about my paper.

  Joanne 'Jo' Polniaczek : Well nobody's going to be writing about it this year.

  Dorothy 'Tootie' Ramsey : How come?

  Natalie Green : Because it's offensive!

  Geri Tyler : Sounds like book-banning to me.

  Dorothy 'Tootie' Ramsey : Isn't that illegal?

• Geri Tyler : Sounds like book-banning to me.

  Dorothy 'Tootie' Ramsey : Isn't that illegal?

  Blair Warner : Or at least a Ms.-demeanor.

  [laughs] 

  Blair Warner : Get it? Ms.?

  Edna Garrett : Well, I know it happens in a lot of other places, but I never thought it would happen here.

• Edna Garrett : Well I'm going right to the library and talk to Miss Muldoon.

  Joanne 'Jo' Polniaczek : Don't waste your time. Mrs. G, you know the way things are, you can't beat the system.

  Edna Garrett : Jo, if something's going on here that I feel is wrong, I have to speak out. It's a responsibility, not an option.

  Natalie Green : You see, Jo? We can't take this lying down.

  Edna Garrett : That's right, what're you going to do about it, Natalie?

  Natalie Green : What?

  Edna Garrett : Come on Natalie, you're the editor of the school paper. Print headlines, write editorials, take it to the people, make some noise, make a lot of noise!

• Edna Garrett : Forget my strudel, Mr. Parker, this is serious!

  Mr. Parker : Edna, you're overreacting, now trust me. A few books being removed from the library is hardly cause for panic. Now, what follows vanilla extract?

  Edna Garrett : It was four books, four! And I'm not the only one who's upset. Our librarian has been trained to make book selections and suddenly people without qualifications are overriding her decisions!

  Mr. Parker : Okay, I've got three large apples, one cup of flour.

  Edna Garrett : Mr. Parker something alarming is going on here and you don't seem concerned.

• Mr. Parker : Edna, a decision was made by the Board of Trustees to reevaluate some of our books, and I support that decision.

  Edna Garrett : How can you? I know how you feel about this.

  Mr. Parker : There are other factors involved here.

  Edna Garrett : Such as?

  Mr. Parker : You just don't understand what we're facing.

  Edna Garrett : Well then explain it to me. Explain how books that have been at this library for years suddenly have become offensive!

  Mr. Parker : Alright, picture yourself in a room full of angry people shouting about immoral influences and accusing you of corrupting their children.

  Edna Garrett : How long has that been going on?

  Mr. Parker : Over a year, at first the Board resisted, I resisted. Last month this group threatened to take their children out of Eastland, so we compromised.

  Edna Garrett : You mean you sold out.

  Mr. Parker : That's easy for you to say! What would you do if parents started to pull their children out of school? Would it make any difference what books were in the library if the doors were closed?

  Edna Garrett : That won't happen.

• Edna Garrett : One group of parents.

  Mr. Parker : Yes but those are the parents who attend every board meeting, they call my office, write letters.

  Edna Garrett : Yeah that's right, the wheel that squeaks the loudest always gets the oil.

  Mr. Parker : Come on Edna, you know they've got a point. You've read parts of Vonnegut, Joyce.

  Edna Garrett : Yes, and so have hundreds of other Eastland students. It's a complicated world out there, and what we teach these girls is supposed to help prepare them for it.

• Natalie Green : [Natalie's been fired as the school editor]  They can't do that, can they, Mrs. Garrett?

  Joanne 'Jo' Polniaczek : Sure they can, you're a kid, they want you to be quiet they tell you to shut up.

  Edna Garrett : And when you're an adult, they ask you to cooperate.

• Edna Garrett : I'm angry too, mostly at myself.

  Natalie Green : What did you do?

  Edna Garrett : I didn't do enough. Oh I encouraged you to write that editorial, I talked about responsibility, commitment, but when push came to shove, I didn't shove back.

  Natalie Green : You just thought things would work themselves out.

  Edna Garrett : Well... things DON'T just work out, people have to do that, THIS people.

  Dorothy 'Tootie' Ramsey : What're you going to do?

  Edna Garrett : What I should've done in the first place. The monthly Board meeting is next week: Mr. Parker will be there, the parents will be there, and I'll be there.

  Natalie Green : Mrs. Garrett, let's not be hasty.

  Dorothy 'Tootie' Ramsey : It's going to be just you against all of them.

  Edna Garrett : Well, I can be pretty tough when I'm fighting for something I believe in. Besides, what's the worst that can happen?

• Woman : Are the Pattersons here yet?

  Man #1 : They will be. We ran into them at the theater last week and we discussed that Studs Terkel book Cathy's class is reading.

  Woman : Oh yes, what's the name of it again?

  Edna Garrett : Working.

  Man #1 : Right, thank you. Anyway I said to Bob 'I read that book and I'd love my Cathy to read it, when she's 35 and it can't do any damage'.

  Woman : It's a simple matter of keeping improper values out of the classroom.

  Man #1 : She means filth.

  Edna Garrett : [inches away from them]  I'm dead.

• Joanne 'Jo' Polniaczek : Hey where'd you get the newsletter?

  Edna Garrett : Mrs. Schuster gave it to me. Oh girls it's so good to know there are more important things in your life than just 'oh Richard, Richard, Richard'.

  Natalie Green : How did you know it was us?

  Edna Garrett : Your style is unmistakable, Natalie.

  Natalie Green : Yeah. Buffy Klein, eat your heart out.

  Dorothy 'Tootie' Ramsey : We had to do something.

  Joanne 'Jo' Polniaczek : Yeah, we figured the parents had to know what was going on up here.

  Dorothy 'Tootie' Ramsey : So, we printed up a list of the banned books and Nat's editorial.

  Natalie Green : Signed your ex-editor.

  Joanne 'Jo' Polniaczek : And mailed copies to all the Eastland parents.

  Dorothy 'Tootie' Ramsey : Wait till Mr. Parker gets the Xerox bills.

  Natalie Green : And we put each of the letters in an envelope marked: Notice of Expulsion, so they'd be sure and be opened.