The Handmaid's Tale (TV Series)

Useful (2019)

Elisabeth Moss: June Osborne

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Quotes 

• June Osborne : Mother, I think, wherever you may be - can you hear me? You wanted a women's culture. Well, now there is one. It isn't what you meant, but it exists. And here's what we do. We watch them. And then... we study them. We feed them. We please them. We can make them feel strong... or weak. We know them that well. We know their worst nightmares. And with a bit of practice... that's what we'll become. Nightmares. One day... when we're ready... we're coming for you. Just wait.

  [final lines] 

• June Osborne : Martyrs inspire. Heretics are just stupid. I wonder if I was stupid?

• June Osborne : We have five new Marthas for the Resistance: an engineer, an IT tech, a journalist, a lawyer, and a thief.

  Beth : How do you know?

  June Osborne : I chose them.

• Joseph Lawrence : Here's what I don't get. If women don't want to be defined by their bodies, why are they always using them to get what they want?

  June Osborne : Maybe they aren't. Maybe men are just too easily distracted.

• June Osborne : [first lines, voiceover]  Heresy. That's what they're hanging for. Not for being part of the Resistance, because officially, there is no Resistance. Not for helping people escape, because officially, there's no such thing as escape. They hang for being heretics, not martyrs. Martyrs inspire; heretics are just stupid. Was I being stupid?

• Serena Joy Waterford : Remember how she used to raise her hand?

  June Osborne : It's like she had a point to make. That's the politician in her. I think she gets that from you.

  Serena Joy Waterford : She isn't mine.

  June Osborne : Serena... only a mother could do what you did.

• Serena Joy Waterford : Do you think about her?

  June Osborne : Every minute.

  Serena Joy Waterford : How do you stop?

• June Osborne : There was a time when women were able to choose. We were a society dying, as Aunt Lydia would say, of too much choice. We know the sacrifices you are expected to make, she'd say. It is hard when men revile you.

• June Osborne : You know what, I get it. I get why you would do this - I suppose you would hole yourself up in a house like this, playing games with people's heads, doing a good deed or two every once in a while, so that you can fuckin' sleep at night.

  Joseph Lawrence : How tempting it is to... invent a humanity... for anyone at all.

• Joseph Lawrence : You think if you get me to like you, I'll help you.

  June Osborne : I think that you might try. I think that you might try to do the right thing.

  Joseph Lawrence : What do you know about the right thing?

  June Osborne : I know you helped Emily escape with that baby. And I know you let the marthas run a resistance movement out of your house.

  Joseph Lawrence : You have to let the rabble rousers blow off a little steam or they'll smash everything to bits.

• June Osborne : What do you know about him?

  Fred Waterford : He's an interesting man. Instrumental in Gilead's creation. Our visionary.

  June Osborne : What else?

  Fred Waterford : We've always found him a bit hard to read.

  June Osborne : Well, if you can't read him, I don't know who can.

  Fred Waterford : Lawrence is a survivor.

  June Osborne : Aren't we all, sir?

• June Osborne : [voiceover]  If I'm going to survive this, I'll need allies. Allies with power.