Being There

"I like to watch."

"This is just like television, only you can see much further."

"That was a very small room."

"[while watching Chance on television] It's for sure a white man's world in America. Look here: I raised that boy since he was the size of a piss-ant. And I'll say right now, he never learned to read and write. No, sir. Had no brains at all. Was stuffed with rice pudding between th' ears. Shortchanged by the Lord, and dumb as a jackass. Look at him now! Yes, sir, all you've gotta be is white in America, to get whatever you want. Gobbledy-gook!"

"Life is a state of mind."

"There's an exhilaration in seeing artists at the very top of their form: It almost doesn't matter what the form is, if they're pushing their limits and going for broke and it's working. We can sense their joy of achievement — and even more so if the project in question is a risky, off-the-wall idea that could just as easily have ended disastrously. Hal Ashby's Being There is a movie that inspires those feelings. It begins with a cockamamie notion, it's basically one joke told for two hours, and it requires Peter Sellers to maintain an excruciatingly narrow tone of behavior in a role that has him onscreen almost constantly. It's a movie based on an idea, and all the conventional wisdom agrees that emotions, not ideas, are the best to make movies from. But Being There pulls off its long shot and is a confoundingly provocative movie."

"What is Being There about? I've read reviews calling it an indictment of television. But that doesn't fit; Sellers wasn't warped by television, he was retarded to begin with, and has TV to thank for what abilities he has to move in society. Is it an indictment of society, for being so dumb as to accept the Sellers character as a great philosophical sage? Maybe, but that's not so fascinating either. I'm not really inclined to plumb this movie for its message, although I'm sure that'll be a favorite audience sport. I just admire it for having the guts to take this weird conceit and push it to its ultimate comic conclusion."

"The movie presents us with an image, and while you may discuss the meaning of the image, it is not permitted to devise explanations for it."

"Getting there is half the fun; being there is all of it!"

"A story of chance."

"Peter Sellers - Chance the Gardener, a.k.a. Chauncey Gardiner"

"Shirley MacLaine - Eve Rand"

"Melvyn Douglas - Ben Rand"

"Jack Warden - The President"

"Richard A. Dysart - Dr. Robert Allenby"

"Richard Basehart - US Soviet Ambassador"

"David Clennon - Thomas Franklin"

"Fran Brill - Sally Hayes"

"Ruth Attaway - Louise"

"Denise DuBarry - Johanna"

"Sam Weisman - Colson"

"Alice Hirson - the First Lady"

"Arthur Rosenberg - Morton Hull"

"Jerome Hellman - Gary Burns"

"James Noble - Kaufman"

"John Harkins - Courtney"

"Elya Baskin - Karpatov"

"Richard McKenzie - Ron Steigler"

"Oteil Burbridge - Lolo"