Wakefield (2016)

Bryan Cranston: Howard Wakefield

Photos 

Quotes 

• Howard Wakefield : People will say that I left my wife and I suppose, as a factual matter, I did, but where was the intentionality? I had no thought of deserting her.

• Howard Wakefield : I never left my family. I left myself. Unshackled, I will become the Howard Wakefield I was meant to be.

• Howard Wakefield : [Narrating]  "The quality of mercy is not strained. It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven upon the place beneath." Your whole life you hear that quoted. I never got it till now. Mercy is not something you ever get to request. Not strained means not forced. It's given freely. No reason. Just a gift drops from the sky. Twice blessed. Blessing him that gives and him that takes, if I remember it correctly. The giving and the taking all in one.

• [last lines] 

  Howard Wakefield : I'm home.

• Howard Wakefield : Our town police are well-paid and polite and not so different from the rest of us in their distant relationship to actual crime.

• Howard Wakefield : Suburban life, so much is the same, week after week. Who hasn't had the impulse to put their life on hold for a moment, just vanish completely?

• Howard Wakefield : How far am I willing to let this go?

• Howard Wakefield : I no longer seem to require those things that only days ago were so indispensable. The armor of a clean shirt, the smooth shave, credit cards, cellphones, clients. There will be no more getting on that train. I'll take nothing more from her. Nothing from that house. Ever.

  Howard Wakefield : I'll sustain myself like a castaway. A survivor. Undetected. Unshackled. I'll become the Howard Wakefield I was meant to be.

• Howard Wakefield : I ask you what is so sacrosanct about a marriage and a family that you should have to live in it day after day however unrealized that life may be? Who hasn't had the impulse to just put their life on hold for a moment? I ask you.

• Howard Wakefield : "In the suburbs, we live in nature." That's a quote from my realtor, the selling phrase she used when Diana and I first looked at this place. And you do see deer, rabbits, crows. But we don't live in nature. That's the point of the suburbs. You live apart from humans. And you're protected from what's wild.

• Howard Wakefield : Oh my god, Ben Jacobs. Oh, yes, yes, yes, here we go. Coffee and cookies, come on in. He's going to need some whitener for his coffee, Diane. 'Uh, you don't have any soy milk do you?' Of course she's got soy milk. She's got everything. Please, Ben, please tell her about your tragic lactose intolerance, all the bloating and flatulence. Ah, aha, a little pro bono work on behalf of the firm. How nice of you. 'I'm impressed with my attorney, Bernie. I'm impressed with his influential friends. He's got very big connections and I follow his directions.' You know, I never used to sing. I think that's worth noting.