An Ideal Husband (I) (1999)

Rupert Everett: Lord Goring

Photos 

Quotes 

• Lord Arthur Goring : Fashion is what one wears oneself. What is unfashionable is what other people wear. Other people are quite dreadful. The only possible society is oneself.

• Lord Caversham : What are you doing here, sir? Wasting your time, as usual?

  Lord Arthur Goring : My dear father, when one pays a visit, it is for the purpose of wasting other people's time and not one's own.

• Lord Arthur Goring : Gertrude, it is not the perfect, but rather the imperfect who have need of love.

  Gertrude : You seem to know a great deal about it all of a sudden.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Oh, I hope not. All I know, Gertrude, is that it takes great courage to see the world in all its tainted glory, and still to love it. And even more courage to see it in the one you love. Gertrude, you have more courage than any woman I have ever known. Do not be afraid now to use it.

• Mabel : You are very late!

  Lord Arthur Goring : Have you missed me?

  Mabel : Awfully!

  Lord Arthur Goring : Then I am sorry I did not stay away longer. I like being missed.

  Mabel : How very selfish of you!

  Lord Arthur Goring : I am very selfish.

  Mabel : Lord Goring, you are always telling me about your bad qualities.

  Lord Arthur Goring : I haven't told you half of them as yet, Miss Mabel.

  Mabel : Really? Are the others very bad?

  Lord Arthur Goring : Quite dreadful! When I think of them at night, I go to sleep at once.

• Mabel : Lord Goring, I gather you're to be congratulated.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Well, there's nothing I like more than to be congratulated, though invariably I find the pleasure immeasurably increased when I know what for.

• Lord Caversham : Married yet?

  Lord Arthur Goring : Ask me again in half an hour.

• Lord Caversham : I don't know how you stand society. A lot of damned nobodies talking about nothing.

  Lord Arthur Goring : I love talking about nothing, Father. It's the only thing I know anything about.

  Lord Caversham : That is a paradox, sir. I hate paradoxes.

  Lord Arthur Goring : So do I, Father. Everyone one meets is a paradox nowadays. It makes society so - obvious.

• Lord Caversham : You are 36.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Shh! Father! I only admit to 32.

  Lord Caversham : You are 36 and you must get a wife.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Wife?

• Gertrude : Yes, Arthur, it is Robert himself who wishes to retire from public life.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Rather than risk losing your love, he would do anything. Has he not been punished enough?

  Gertrude : We've both been punished. I set him up too high.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Do not set him down now too low.

• Lord Caversham : Now, if you don't make her an ideal husband, I'll cut you off with a shilling.

  Mabel : An ideal husband? Oh, I don't think I should like that.

  Lord Caversham : What do you want him to be then, my dear?

  Mabel : I think he can be whatever he chooses.

  Lord Caversham : You don't deserve her, sir.

  Lord Arthur Goring : My dear father, if we men married the women we deserved... we should have a very bad time of it.

• Lord Arthur Goring : I love you... I love you.

  Mabel : Is that your reason then?

  Lord Arthur Goring : Mmm. Mabel, I said...

  Mabel : I know.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Well? Couldn't you you love me just a little bit in return?

  Mabel : Arthur, you silly! If you knew anything about anything, which you don't, you would know that I absolutely adore you.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Really?

  Mabel : Mmm.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Well, why didn't you say anything before?

  Mabel : Because, dear boy, you never would have believed me.

• Lord Arthur Goring : To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance.

• Countess : Aren't you going to congratulate me?

  Lord Arthur Goring : Congratulations.

  Countess : Aren't you going to ask what for?

  Lord Arthur Goring : What for?

  Countess : I've made a great decision. I've decided to get married.

  Lord Arthur Goring : My God! Who to?

  Countess : That part is yet to be decided.

• Lord Caversham : Do you always understand everything you say?

  Lord Arthur Goring : Yes... if I listen attentively.

  Lord Caversham : Conceited young puppy!

• Lord Arthur Goring : Mrs. Cheveley.

  Laura : Call me Laura.

  Lord Arthur Goring : I don't like that name.

  Laura : You used to adore it.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Yes, that is why.

• Lord Arthur Goring : Excuse me a moment. I'm in the middle of my performance of the attentive son.

• Lord Arthur Goring : [to statue]  It is a great nuisance. I can't find anyone else to talk to. I'm so full of interesting information, I feel like the latest edition of something or other. Well, after some consideration... so much to do, there's only one thing to be done. There comes a time in every son's life when he must, indeed, follow his father's advice: I shall go to bed at once.

• Sir Robert Chiltern : Do you know, Arthur, I sometimes wish I were you.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Do you know, Robert, sometimes I wish you were too. Except that you would probably make something useful out of my life, and that would never do.

• Lord Arthur Goring : My dear Mrs. Cheveley, I should make you a very bad husband.

  Laura : I don't mind bad husbands. I've had two. They amused me immensely.

• Lord Arthur Goring : Yes, but the fact is, father, this is not my day for talking seriously.

  Lord Caversham : What do you mean, sir?

  Lord Arthur Goring : I mean that, during the season, father, I only talk seriously on the first Tuesday in every month. Between noon and three.

• Sir Robert Chiltern : Anyway, what's that saying about the sea and there being plenty of fish in it?

  Lord Arthur Goring : Ah, yes, but I couldn't possibly marry a fish. I'd be sure to land an old trout.

• Laura : We were quite well suited, as I recall.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Well, you were poor, I was rich, it must have suited you very well. And then you met the Baron, who was even richer. And that suited you better.

  Laura : Have you forgiven me yet?

  Lord Arthur Goring : My dear woman, it's been so long, I'd all but forgotten you.

• Lord Arthur Goring : Shouldn't you be in bed, Miss Mabel?

  Mabel : Lord Goring!

  Lord Arthur Goring : My father always tells me to go to bed, so I don't see why I shouldn't give you the same advice. I always pass on good advice. It is the only sensible thing to do with it.

  Mabel : Well, it's very kind of you to offer, Lord Goring.

• Gertrude : Lord Goring, you are talking quite seriously.

  Lord Arthur Goring : You must forgive me, Lady Chiltern. It won't occur again.

  Gertrude : No, I like you to be serious.

  [Enter Mabel] 

  Mabel : Gertrude, please don't say such a dreadful thing to Lord Goring. Seriousness would be very unbecoming to him. Good morning, Lord Goring. Pray be as trivial as you can.

• Lord Arthur Goring : I am glad you have called. I am going to give you some advice.

  Laura : Oh pray, don't. One should never give a woman something that she can't wear in the evening.

• Sir Robert Chiltern : You could always get married.

  Lord Arthur Goring : It's the "always" bit that alarms me.

• Laura : Then I take it you reject my proposal?

  Lord Arthur Goring : I'm afraid I must. For you see, as tempting as it may be, in truth it's little more than blackmail.

  Laura : True.

• Laura : As a betting man, you must concede there is a certain thrill to it. Consider also how elegantly I've moved from proposal to proposition.

  Lord Arthur Goring : With hardly any loss of face. I'm most impressed, indeed.

• Gertrude : Oh, Arthur... what a good friend you are to him, to us.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Yes, but we're not out of danger yet. In fact, I believe there's a rather popular saying about frying pans and fires, except now it is you and I, dear Gertrude, who are to be roasted.

• Lord Arthur Goring : There's somebody I want you to talk to.

  Lord Caversham : What about?

  Lord Arthur Goring : About me, sir.

  Lord Caversham : Not a subject on which much eloquence is possible.

• Sir Robert Chiltern : Is it fair that some act of youthful folly should be brought up against me now - all these years later? Is it fair?

  Lord Arthur Goring : Robert, life is never fair! Perhaps it's a good thing for most of us that it is not.

• Mabel : Do you have anything you wish to say to me, Lord Goring?

  Lord Arthur Goring : Um. No. No, I don't think so.

  Mabel : Then I don't want to hear it. Good night.

• Lord Arthur Goring : Bit of a long day today, I'm afraid. Distressingly little time for sloth or idleness.

  Phipps : Sorry to hear it, sir.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Well, not entirely your fault, Phipps. Not this time.

• Mabel : Are you coming to the music room?

  Lord Arthur Goring : No. Not if there's any music going on, Miss Mabel.

  Mabel : Well, the music is in German, so you would not understand it.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Quite so. Quite so.

• Laura : And so, my dear Arthur, are you not just a little bit pleased to see me?

  Lord Arthur Goring : Oh, my dear woman, possibly even less than that.

  Laura : Should you wish to avoid me entirely, I am at Claridge's until Friday, when I shall return to Vienna.

• Lord Arthur Goring : Phipps, a well-made buttonhole is the only link between art and nature.

• Laura : Are you still a bachelor?

  Lord Arthur Goring : Resolutely so.

• Mabel : Well, I must tell you that I like your bad qualities and I would not have you part with a single one.

  Lord Arthur Goring : It shows your admirable good taste.

• Sir Robert Chiltern : I wonder what kind of a woman she is.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Who?

  Sir Robert Chiltern : That woman - Mrs Cheveley.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Smallish.

• Lord Arthur Goring : I'm afraid I really must go. I have an extremely pressing engagement.

  Laura : Really? Well, as you know, I hate to stand between a man and his affairs.

• Lord Arthur Goring : I see you are quite as willful as you used to be.

  Laura : Far more! I've greatly improved. I've had more experience.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Too much experience can be a very dangerous thing.

• Lord Arthur Goring : By the way, have you been talking to my father?

  Sir Robert Chiltern : Why? Should I?

  Lord Arthur Goring : Certainly not. He was foolish enough to suggest that I model myself on you.

  Sir Robert Chiltern : I have always said he was a man of exquisite taste and rare judgment.

• Lord Arthur Goring : I'm only talking in the most general terms on a subject about which I know absolutely nothing.

  Gertrude : I thought those were your favorite subjects, Arthur.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Yes, indeed. Indeed.

• Lord Arthur Goring : Once a man has set his heart and soul on getting to a certain point, if he has to climb the crag, he has to climb the crag. If he has to walk in the mire...

  Gertrude : Well?

  Lord Arthur Goring : Well, then, he has to walk, my dear Gertrude, in the mire.

• Lord Arthur Goring : My dear Robert, secrets from other people's wives are a necessary luxury in modern life. But no man should have a secret from his own wife. She invariably finds it out.

  Sir Robert Chiltern : If I were to tell her, Arthur, I would lose the love of the one woman in the world I worship. I couldn't tell her.

• Mabel : Lord Goring, what dreadful manners you have, leaving just as I arrive. I'm sure you were badly brought up.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Mm, I was.

• Lord Arthur Goring : What is your price for it?

  Laura : My price. I've arrived at the romantic stage.

• Lord Caversham : Marriage is not a matter of affection, sir, it is a question of common sense.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Yes. But women who have common sense are always so curiously plain, aren't they, father? Of course, I'm only speaking from hearsay.

  Lord Caversham : No woman, plain or pretty, has any common sense at all, sir. Common sense is a privilege of our sex.

  Lord Arthur Goring : Quite so.

• Lord Arthur Goring : Surely there must be some sin in her past life, any sin, weakness, perhaps, that might, well, help her to understand yours.

  Sir Robert Chiltern : No, I don't believe Gertrude knows what weakness or temptation is.

• Lord Arthur Goring : I'm sorry, but, I don't seem to be able to stop myself. And I'm going to tell you that love - about which, I admit, I know so little - love cannot be bought, it can only be given. And I sense it is not in my power to give to you, nor is it in yours, I suspect, at all.

  Laura : Dear boy, you underestimate us both.

  Lord Arthur Goring : To give - and not expect return, that is what lies at the heart of love. I fear, though, the notion is a stranger to us both. And yet, if we are honest, it is something we both long for. Something that it takes great courage to do. Yes, that is our *dark* secret. Your coming here tonight is the first whisper of it. And for that, I admire you.

• Mabel : It certainly didn't look that way.

  Lord Arthur Goring : There's a great deal of difference between looking and seeing, isn't there, Miss Mabel?

• Lord Arthur Goring : The fact is your assumptions are presumptuous.