The Diplomat is a thoroughly engaging series that had me hooked from the get go. It is such a well crafted show that I wanted to create a place where I could index its subtly epic dialogs (and share it with fellow Diplomat fans). I have watched the series “cover-to-cover” a couple of times now and here’s why I highly recommend it:
- The show is not only entertaining but also educational, as it portrays how diplomatic, geopolitical decisions move through bureaucracies. You don’t have to take my word for it, you can take the Belfer Center, The Washington Post, and Foreign Policy‘s word for it.
- An intelligent portrayal of the complexities of marriage between two intellectual equals, highlighting the nuances of balancing personal and professional advice within a relationship. I have rarely seen this captured in cinema but this series finally gives this a worthy, intelligent treatment. It explores themes such as:
- Trusting a partner’s advice while maintaining individuality.
- The gendered conditioning that influences how men and women approach their work differently.
- In fact, the main premise revolves around Hal, a diplomat whose career stalls after a significant misstep, forcing him to support his wife Kate’s career progression. This shift in their dynamic requires major adjustments from both characters, bringing to light issues of career ambition, gender roles, and personal growth.
So lets go! Here are some noteworthy dialogs from Deborah Cahn‘s masterpiece:
- S1E1
- ====
- Hal: Did you or did you not ask me to help get your feet on the ground or your ass in the saddle or whatever it was?
…
What are you gonna say to him? The prime minister. - Kate: I am a listener on the call.
- Hal: That is the opposite of ass in the saddle, Kate.
- Kate: More than once, I’ve told you, when you land in a new post, there is some wisdom in spending a week or a month with your mouth shut, listening.
- Hal: I never did it. It was a dumb idea.
- Kate: I’m not doing this the way you would.
- Hal: That’s fine. Just don’t do it wrong.
- Hal: Did you or did you not ask me to help get your feet on the ground or your ass in the saddle or whatever it was?
- ====
- Assistant: Have you and Ambassador Wyler arranged for the shipping of your art, or is that something with which I could be of assistance?
- Hal: Our art? Kate’s a career officer. Not a political appointee. Ronald Vayle, he became ambassador, because he raised $2 million for the president.
Like most American ambassadors in gorgeous European posts.
Kate and I are like British ambassadors. Lot of experience in crisis zones. No art. - Asst.: I’m so sorry.
- Hal: We’re okay with it.
- ====
- Hal: You had a driver in Beirut, right?
- Kate: Yes
- Hal: This place has six gardeners, and the wife doesn’t get a car?
- Kate: We were not married in Beirut. I had a driver because I was a deputy chief of mission.
- Hal: I need to get out, let people know you’re here.
- Kate: No, you don’t. Neither of us can do anything, because Ganon isn’t calling the Brits till this afternoon.
- Hal: If you think the foreign secretary needs attention, call him.
- Kate: Ganon would shit a live ostrich. Any idea how much planning went into the batting order on your phone sheet? It sounds scintillating. The president calls, the secretary of state calls, the Pentagon calls.
- Hal: Jesus Christ!
- Kate: Don’t act like it’s bullshit. It’s about fundamental respect for institutional norms.
- =====
- Brit PM: You know the last female ambassador to the Court of St. James’? Long time ago. Over a hundred years.
- Kate: Fifty, but yes.
- Brit PM: What a proud tradition you’ve had (smirk). Captains of industry spending a year on holiday whilst we’ve got work to do.
- =====
- Stuart: Ma’am you are not gonna be here in a week. But maybe it’s all right.
- Kate: What does that mean?
- Stuart: You don’t seem to be all that thrilled to be here. It’s not Jalalabad.
- Kate: Even I can get it up for averting another bloodbath – in the mtherfcking Gulf.
- Stuart: Sorry. I was just asking.
- …
- Kate: You know, who you can’t fire? Cinderella.
- =====
- Hal: A media darling by sunup. Told you you were ready. You and I did all the things we do to launch you.
- Kate: You drop-kicked me into the center of the action, so I can make promises I can’t keep, while alienating my superiors for a strategically insignificant moment of access. And now we’re distracting from the clusterfck with a media splash designed to make me more attractive to women.
- Hal: You’re a snob and a misogynist. You’re the prime minister’s new best friend and you’re gonna be famous. I should be getting a blow job for that phone call.
- Kate: I didn’t wanna be famous. You’re so famous nobody wants to work with you.
- =====
- Stuart: Is Mr. Wyler leaving?
- Kate: Yes
- Stuart: Is he coming back?
- Kate: He will get me on my feet, and then he will go.
- Stuart: It is a two-person job.
- Kate: The president asked me to do him a solid. At what point do you think I should have raised the epic failure of my marriage?
- =====
- Hal: I do things that make her want to leave me, and I will not do them again.
- Stuart: You were here two hours, made one call. The secretary of state wants to fire her.
- Hal: I’m a big pain in the ass but it doesn’t work without me. She hates cameras and microphones and people. Right now, she is cutting a f*cking ulcer because she has to make nice with a reporter.
- Stuart: Then who the f*ck thought she should be vice president?
- Hal: She is the one you want. Not Grace Penn, not me. No one with the temperament to win a campaign should be in charge of anything. It’s the most obvious rule in the world. No one who likes power should have it.
- ====
- S1E2
- ====
- Kate: If you call a country with whom we have no diplomatic relations…it’s a federal offense. Neither of us would work for the government again.
- Hal: Well, the pay is sh*t. It might be worth it. I didn’t call him.
- K: Why not? It’s what I would have done. It’d be a smart move.
- H: You think I’m that shallow, you throw “smart” out there, I roll over?
- K: You are absolutely that shallow.
- ====
- Hal: Shahin and I worked on the Iran Deal together.
- Stuart: He was your counterpart?
- H: Lot of time spent hanging out while our principals talked past each other, in rooms we felt would’ve benefited from our presence. It’s bonding.
- … Tried to get a hotline going, once upon a time, like the red phone with the Soviets. it died on the vine.
- ====
- Roylin (to Kate): You shouldn’t, with all the cameras. Your deputy was not entirely wrong. I always find clasping hands behind the back, along with a vague head tilt, gets the job done. Polite but illegible.
It’ll be Christmas before you get anything from this government beyond bromides so assiduously scrubbed of meaning, you’ll think you were hearing the wind.
You have a place. It means something. And fix your blouse.
- Roylin (to Kate): You shouldn’t, with all the cameras. Your deputy was not entirely wrong. I always find clasping hands behind the back, along with a vague head tilt, gets the job done. Polite but illegible.
- ====
P.S.
- S1E3
- Cinema is rife with stories of “great” men with an array of irrelevant domestic relationships, predatory romantic interests or unhealthy partnerships of skewed power dynamics. Personal lives are depicted as yet another dimension to demonstrate power, one where they can pick the rules and discard those that don’t maximize their domination. This is why ‘The Diplomat’ is such a rarity in that sea of beaten-to-death nonsense. A breath of fresh air.
- If you actually watch the series, the extra material on Netflix’s fan website TUDUM is a great companion as well.
- Some useful links on women and their relationship with work over the past decade:
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