The Joy Luck Club

June (Age 9)(Melanie Chang) You want me to be someone I'm not. I'll never be the kind of daughter that you want me to be. Suyuan (Kieu Chinh) Only two kinds of daughter: obedient or follow-own-mind. Only one kind of daughter could live in this house: obedient kind. June (Age 9) Then I wish I wasn't your daughter. I wish you weren't my mom. Suyuan Too late to change this.

Lindo (Tsai Chin) This one moment would decide for my whole life whether fear would rule or I would. I decided. Underneath I knew who I was. I promised myself never to forget.

Lindo (age 15) (Irene Ng) before seeing her husband for the first time. I have prayed to the gods many days for you, so that you were not too ugly or too old. (She sees her husband and realizes he is a boy.) I must have prayed too hard.

Huang Tai Tai (Guo-Rong Chin) Where are my grandsons, huh? My son says he's planted enough seeds in you to fill a basket, plenty for ten thousand grandsons! It's all your fault, always running around, letting my son's seeds spill out. From now on you lie in bed all day. Lie down! Lie down! Until my grandson comes! Do you hear me? Disgusting little thing!

Lindo I told them the matchmaker had made the wrong match on purpose, just for money. Huang Tai Tai Matchmaker, how could you? How could you? Matchmaker (Hsu Ling Yi) Well, mistakes happen in heaven.

Waverly (Tamlyn Tomita) Even at that age, I knew I had an amazing gift: this power, this belief in myself, to be better than anyone else. If someone was bigger than me, older than me, it didn't matter. And if they were mean, I could make 'em sorry.

Waverly (Age 6-9) (Vu Mai) I've decided to play chess again. Lindo You think it is so easy. One day quit, next day play. Everything for you is this way: so smart, so easy, so fast. Not so easy anymore. Waverly What she said, it was like a curse. This power I had, this belief in myself, I could actually feel it draining away. I could feel myself becoming ordinary. All the secrets I once saw, I couldn't see them anymore. All I could see was, were my mistakes, my weaknesses. The best part of me just disappeared. But I can't put it all on my mother. I did it to myself. I never played chess again.

Waverly As is the Chinese cook's custom, my mother always insults her own cooking, but only with the dishes she serves with special pride. Lindo This dish not salty enough. No flavor. It's too bad to eat, but please. Waverly That was our cue to eat some and proclaim it the best she'd ever made.

Lindo I could see her face looking at me but not seeing me. She was ashamed, so ashamed to be my daughter. Waverly Mom, what's wrong? Lindo Nothing, nothing. Only thinking, thinking about my mother, how much I wanted to be like her.

Waverly Mom, why don't you like Rich? Lindo Is Rich you afraid I not like? If I don't like your Rich, I act polite, say nothing, let him have big cancer, let my daughter be a widow. I like Rich, of course I do. To allow him to marry such a daughter! Waverly You don't know, you don't know the power you have over me. One word from you, one look, and I'm four years old again, crying myself to sleep, because nothing I do can ever, ever please you.

Lin-Xiao's Opera Singer (Grace Chang) Who is this? Lin Xiao (Russell Wong) referring to his wife. This person is a whore--just like you.

Lena (Lauren Tom) Why do you have to be so goddamn fair?

Ying Ying (France Nuyen) All around this house I see the signs. My daughter looks but she does not see. This is a house that will break into pieces. It's not too late. All my pains, my regrets, I will gather them together. My daughter will hear me calling, even though I've said no words. She will climb the stairs to find me. She will be scared because at first her eyes will see nothing. She will feel in her heart this place where she hides her fears. She will know I am waiting like a tiger in the trees, now ready to leap out and cut her spirit loose.

Ying Ying Losing him does not matter. It is you who will be found--and cherished.

An Mei (Lisa Lu) It was an old tradition. Only the most dutiful of daughters would put her own flesh in a soup to save her mother's life. My mother did this with her whole heart even though my grandmother had disowned her. This is how a daughter honors her mother. The pain of the flesh is nothing. The pain you must forget. This is the most important sacrifice a daughter can make for her mother.

Ted (Andrew McCarthy) You know, I always knew you were a, a jerk, but shit, this is the first time in my life I am ashamed of you. Mrs. Jordan (Diane Baker) How dare you use that language! I think you better apologize right now. Ted I'm sorry, Mom, you made a fuckin' asshole out of yourself in front of the woman I love.

Rose (Rosalind Chao) I like being tragic, Ma. I learned it from you.

An-Mei I tell you the story because I was raised the Chinese way. I was taught to desire nothing, to swallow other people's misery, and to eat my own bitterness. And even though I taught my daughter the opposite, still she came out the same way. Maybe it is because she was born to me and she was born a girl, and I was born to my mother and I was born a girl, all of us like stairs, one step after another, going up, going down, but always going the same way. No, this cannot be, this not knowing what you're worth, this not begin with you. My mother not know her worth until too late--too late for her, but not for me. Now we will see if not too late for you, hm?

Rose You're not taking my house, you're not taking my daughter, you're not taking any part of me, because you don't know who I am. I died sixty years ago. I ate opium and I died for my daughter's sake. Now get out of my house!

June (Ming-Na Wen) I'm just sorry that you got stuck with such a loser, that I've always been so disappointing. Suyuan What you mean disappoint? Piano? June Everything: my grades, my job, not getting married, everything you expected of me. Suyuan Not expect anything! Never expect! Only hope! Only hoping best for you. That's not wrong, to hope. June No? Well, it hurts, because every time you hoped for something I couldn't deliver, it hurt. It hurt me, Mommy. And no matter what you hope for, I'll never be more than what I am. And you never see that, what I really am.

Suyuan That bad crab, only you tried to take it. Everybody else want best quality. You, you're thinking different. Waverly took best quality crab, you took worst, because you have best quality heart. You have style no one can teach. Must be born this way.

June's Father (Chao Li Chi) You know, ever since Mommy died, it's like a mystery where everything is. She hides everything, jewelry, even fake stuff. For three years she tried to tell me where she hides everything in case she died. I guess I wasn't listening.

June's Father She thought: Better not die next to my babies. Nobody saves babies with such bad luck. Who wants two babies with ghost mother following them? Very bad luck, very.