The Ghost Writer

The Ghost:
You wouldn't happen to know if there are any flights leaving the airport tonight, would you?

Motel Receptionist:
Not unless you've got your own private jet.

The Ghost:
Ah, I lent it to my butler.

Motel Receptionist:
Haha, oh you Brits!

Amelia Bly:
Are you ill?

The Ghost:
No, I'm aging. This place is Shangri-La in reverse.

The Ghost:
Did you ever want to be a proper politician in your own right?

Ruth Lang:
Of course, didn't you want to be a proper writer?

Ruth Lang:
[to bodyguard] If we meet any terrorists, I'll text you.

Ruth Lang:
I feel like the wife of Napoleon on St. Helena.

The Ghost:
[on phone to agent] Some peace protesters are trying to kill me!

Paul Emmett:
[reacting to an old picture of Lang, taken in his college days with a marijuana joint] Let's hope he didn't inhale.

Paul Emmett:
[about his wall of framed photos] Oh yes, the wall of ego. We all have one, our equivalent of the dentist's fish tank.

Adam Lang:
[to Rycart on television] You cheeky f***!

Robert Rycart:
He can't drown two ghost writers, for god sake. You're not kittens!

Island Ferry Attendant:
Single or return?

The Ghost:
Return. I hope.

[first lines]

The Ghost:
You realize I know nothing about politics.

Rick Ricardelli:
You voted for him, didn't you?

The Ghost:
Adam Lang? Of course I did, everyone voted for him. He wasn't a politician, he was a craze.

The Ghost:
Well all the words are there, they're just in the wrong order.

Ruth Lang:
Who are you?

The Ghost:
I'm your ghost.

Adam Lang:
Right...

Ruth Lang:
Don't worry, he isn't always such a jerk.

The Ghost:
I'd never guess you smoked.

Amelia Bly:
I only allow myself one. In times of great stress or contentment.

The Ghost:
Which is this?

Amelia Bly:
Very funny.

The Ghost:
Forty thousand years of human language, and there's no word to describe our relationship. It was doomed.

The Ghost:
[into mirror] Bad idea!

The Ghost:
You ought not to be written out of history.

Ruth Lang:
Why not? Most women are.

The Ghost:
Then I'll reinstate you. I'll put in all the occasions that he's forgotten.

Ruth Lang:
How kind, like the boss's secretary who remembers his wife's birthday for him.

Paul Emmett:
A less equable man than I might start to find your questions impertinent.

The Ghost:
Well don't tell me you're going to read it now.

Richard Rycart:
Not all of it, just the beginning. There's something very important about it.

The Ghost:
Yeah, it's the cure for insomnia.

The Ghost:
It's my first time in a private jet.

Amelia Bly:
Let's hope it's not your last.

Paul Emmett:
I doubt it very much. The gate will open automatically. Be sure to make a right at the bottom of the drive. If you turn left, the road will take you deeper into the woods and you'll never be seen again.

The Ghost:
I really don't think this is a good idea.

Richard Rycart:
You have no choice.

The Ghost:
Emmett must have told Lang I've been to see him.

Richard Rycart:
So what's he going to do about it? Dump you in the ocean?

The Ghost:
Well it happened before.

Richard Rycart:
Which means it can't happen again. He can't drown two ghost writers, for God's sake. You're not kittens.

Adam Lang:
Spare me the bleeding-heart bullshit! Do you know what I'd do if I was in power again? I'd have two queues at airports: one for flights where we'd done no background checks, infringed on no one's civil bloody liberties, used no intelligence gained by torture. And on the other flight we'd do everything we possibly could to make it perfectly safe. And then we'd see which plane the Rycarts of this world would put their bloody kids on! And you can put that in the book!

The Ghost:
[reading the first words of Adam Lang's manuscript] "Langs are Scottish folk originally and proud of it. Our name is a derivation of 'long', the Old English word for tall, and it is from North of the border that my forefathers hail." Fuuuck.

Amelia Bly:
How's it going?

The Ghost:
[beaming] Pretty well. He keeps calling me 'man'!

Amelia Bly:
He always does that when he can't remember someone's name.

The Ghost:
Look, l'm sorry. l should never have stayed in a client's house. lt always ends up with...

Ruth Lang:
With you f***ing the client's wife?