Deliverance Quotes

(on Deliverance (1972) author/co-star James Dickey): "He`s the kind of man that, after he has had 4 martinis, makes you want to drop a grenade down his throat."

(on the rape scene of Deliverance (1972) (from the book "My Life" published by Hyperion.)): The day before we shot the scene I noticed McKinney hovering beside Ned (Ned Beatty) and sat down between them. I wanted him to see I was Ned`s friend. No different than in the script. Then I asked him how he planned to handle the rape scene. McKinney turned out to be a pretty good guy who just took the method way too far. Staring straight at Ned, he whispered, "I`ve always wanted to try that. Always have." Ned shouted, "John! Oh, John!". In his brilliance, Boorman (John Boorman) reassured Ned but also brought in several additional cameras, knowing Ned wasn`t going to give him a second, third or fourth take. Ned was only going to do the brutal scene once. When it came down to shooting it, Cowboy and McKinney were hands-down brilliant. Scared the shit out of everybody who saw the movie. People crawled out of the theatre. None of that creepy "squeal, piggy, piggy" stuff was in the script. But McKinney, I swear-to-God, really wanted to hump Ned. And I think he was going to. He had it up and he was going to bang him. It`s the first and only time I have ever seen camera operators turn their heads away. Finally, I couldn`t stand it anymore. I ran into the scene, dove on McKinney, and pulled him off. Boorman, hot on my tracks, helped hold him down. Ned, who was crying from both rage and fear, found a big stick and started beating him on the head. Half a dozen guys grabbed Ned and pulled him away. We separated the two of them and let things cool off.

(on Bill McKinney, with whom he worked in the drama Deliverance (1972) (from the book "My Life" published by Hyperion.)): I thought the other guy, Bill McKinney, was a little bent. I used to get up at five in the morning and see him running nude through the golf course while the sprinklers watered the grass. A strange dude, he moved to L.A. after Deliverance (1972) and worked in a lot of pictures of Clint Eastwood. He always played sickos, but he played them well. With my dark sense of humor, I was kind of amused by him. But as we got closer to the rape scene, I caught him staring at Ned Beatty in an odd, unnerving way. Ned would see it, and look away.

Deliverance is about what I went through the first time. And I chalk it up as a learning experience.

Sickness and healing are in every heart; death and deliverance in every hand.

God will lead you into a deliverance where the means that delivers you will be those who would destroy you.

The deliverance of the saints must take place some time before 1914

We must not be frightened nor cajoled/ into accepting evil as deliverance from evil./ We must go on struggling to be human,/ though monsters of abstractions/ police and threaten us.

I think the violence will continue. Alas, we have learned not to believe that deliverance is around the corner. We are at the end of year three of this war and every hope that the violence has subside, has been betrayed.

The promised land guarantees nothing. It is only an opportunity, not a deliverance.

Our God and soldiers we alike adore ev`n at the brink of danger; not before: After deliverance, both alike requited, Our God`s forgotten, and our soldiers slighted