Quotes

Dramatic School

Pasquel Sr.: No, my son... they'll be no Pasquel the XVI in our family.
Pasquel Jr.: Father, please. I'll learn. I'll improve.
Pasquel Sr.: No, my boy. You can't improve. It breaks my heart, but you've no talent, and you never will have. You're not to blame; I accuse myself. Your mother was a saint, but she was the daughter of a critic. You were doomed from your birth!

Simone: It's so grand to see them. They're really in love.
Nana: Love. Real love. Nice and sweet and sticky, right off a valentine.
Simone: Oh, but, Nana, love is *so* good.
Nana: You can have it.
Mado: Well, I'll take it anytime. I can't seem to find it. Real love - with a millionaire. Just never seems to come my way. The more I give, the less I get.
Nana: Reverse it. The less you give, the more you get. I know.
Mado: Is that your technique, Nana?
Nana: I give nothing, I say nothing. I let them rave and I don't even listen. That makes me a glamorous mystery. Try it sometime. It's very practical.

Pasquel Jr.: Can't you girls think of anything but your silly bodies? The noble traditions of the theater were not founded on legs.
Ramy: A shapely limb never hurt the box office. I shall judge. My pulse is normal and I shall not be swayed biologically.

Pantomimic Teacher: Thérèse, my dear, you and I still actresses; but, now that we're teachers too, we can't be jealous of talent just because it's young and on the way up, can we?

Boulin: You see, Gina darling, the shells open, a girl steps out of every shell, wearing a uniform - with a gun, aiming at the audience.
Gina Bertier: Wait a minute, were do I come in?
Boulin: Oh, in the center, my dear, wearing very little and waving a flag.
Gina Bertier: Yes! I like that.

Boulin: Come in, my dear. Sit down. So, you're the little girl I've been hearing about. Stand up, Louise. Turn around, slowly. Show your legs. Marvelous. Your friends were right.
Louise Mauban: My friends?
Boulin: Oh, yes, you have friends, my dear, and they talk about you. I've heard great things - great things!
Louise Mauban: You have?
Boulin: In deed I have. Now, tell me, my dear. Do you sing?
Louise Mauban: No.
Boulin: Do you dance?
Louise Mauban: No.
Boulin: Well, it doesn't matter. You're just what we want.

Louise Mauban: Nana, I know you love him and it makes you unhappy. But, why must you be so hateful to him?
Nana: What do you mean?
Louise Mauban: You love him.
Nana: Why, I love him? Fleury in the chorus revue?
Nana: [sarcastically] Of course, everyone knows that. Haven't you noticed how nice I am to him. How I...
Louise Mauban: I know acting when I see it, Nana.

Boulin: What shall it be, Louise, your first staring part?
Louise Mauban: I may choose?
Boulin: Anything.
Louise Mauban: Electra!
Boulin: Ele... Electra? Well, let me see. That's funny. I don't seem to be able to recall...
Louise Mauban: The great Greek tragedy, Monsieur Boulin. Electra's mother kills her father, so, Electra has to kill her mother.
Boulin: Oh, I see. Of course, it all comes back to me now. Well, if that's your choice, my dear, that's what we do!

Pasquel Jr.: He doesn't make love to Juliet, he makes love to the audience!
Pasquel Sr.: That's enough, my son. To criticize is easy. To be better or not to be, that's a question for actors.

Nana: We started and we're finished!
Fleury: Nana, what's the matter?
Nana: Get Gina Bertier to rehearse with you! Or, can she read?
Fleury: Gina Bertier?
Nana: Yes. Gina, Gina, Gina! You remember her: the star that kissed the chorus boy.

André D'Abbencourt: What's the joke?
Nana: Nothing.
André D'Abbencourt: Look at her, Georges. She has seven devils in her eyes. Make her tell it.
Georges Mounier: Oh, I can't make her do anything.

Nana: We're going to have a party. Georges Mounier's invited us for dinner at Armenonville.
Mado: Georges Mounier, the jeweler? Is he the new one Nana?
Nana: This week, it's Mounier.
Simone: What about next week?
Nana: I'm no prophet.

Alphonse: It would be a sad day for everyone of us if we had to face the consequences of everything we have done.
André D'Abbencourt: Alphonse, I've known you for years and I'm sure your life has been as blameless as a babies.
Alphonse: Monsieur knows me only officially. After hours, I too am a Parisian.

Georges Mounier: Wish first and then drink. That's the rule here.
Louise Mauban: Very well. I wish to become a great actress! To show people the beauty of emotions, to stir their hearts, and awaken their minds. So, that because of me, their lives might be happier ever after.

Louise Mauban: Do you really hate me that much?
Nana: Hate you? I don't even dislike you. Of course, I must admit it does annoy me slightly to see you breeze through life with those cooked up dreams of yours. Putting your head under the guillotine and never having the knife drop.
Louise Mauban: Supposing now it should drop, will it make you glad, Nana?
Nana: Maybe.

Louise Mauban: We're in love with each other and we're going to be married.
Nana: How charming; but, excuse me if I don't order my dress for the wedding just yet. Styles change completely every five years.

Yvonne: Actors - the poor things. Darling, we'll start our love scenes where the actors have to stop there's.

Louise Mauban: I'll always be grateful to you for that hurt. If I am to be a better actress, if I am to grow and give people more joy, to make them forget their mixed up, everyday lives; if I am to do that, then I shall have to be hurt even more.

Nana: Go on dressing, girls, and no wise looks from any of you. Do you understand?

Simone: Make way! Make way for Venus rising from the waves.
Mado: Venus. Get it? That's just a cue so that she can talk about her legs again.
Simone: Why not? There's only one other leg like this in all Paris.
Mado, Yvonne: And that's this.
Mado: Well if mine weren't any better, I'd sell 'em for sausages.

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Top Gap

What is the English language plot outline for Dramatic School (1938)?