GoodFellas
written by Nicholas Pileggi & Martin Scorsese

Henry (voice over): It was easy for all of us to disappear. My house was in my mother-in-law's name. My cars were registered to my wife. My social security cards and driver's licenses were phonies. I never voted. I never paid taxes. My birth certificate and my arrest sheet, that's all you'd ever have to know I was alive. See, the hardest thing for me was leaving the life. I still love the life. And we were treated like movie stars with muscle. We had it all, just for the asking. Our wives, mothers, kids, everybody rode along. I had paper bags filled with jewelry stashed in the kitchen. I had a sugar bowl full of coke next to the bed. Anything I wanted was a phone call away. Free cars. The keys to a dozen hide out flats all over the city. I bet twenty, thirty grand over a weekend and then I'd either blow the winnings in a week or go to the sharks to pay back the bookies. [Henry leaves the witness stand and speaks directly to the camera.] Didn't matter. It didn't mean anything. When I was broke I would go out and rob some more. We ran everything. We paid off cops. We paid off lawyers. We paid off judges. Everybody had their hands out. Everything was for the taking. And now it's all over. (back to voice over.] That's the hardest part. Today everything is different. There's no action. I have to wait around like everyone else. Can't even get decent food. Right after I got here I ordered some spaghetti with marinara sauce and I got egg noodles and ketchup. I'm an average nobody. I get to live the rest of my life like a schnook.
[The film concludes here with Henry looking straight into the camera bitterly, with a sneer, "what the hell are you looking at?.]

Kudos and much thanks go to Jeff for the donation of this monologue, it is very very much appreciated.

[ please return to the main movie monologue page ]