- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: I have razor blades, ball point pens. I have pencils with erasers for those who admit mistakes. Shoe laces, needles, pins, safety pins, sharp pins, dangerous pins. I have the knowledge of history for sale.
- Barbara Holloway: If you're going to look like you're going to kiss me then you really ought to do it.
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: I was just thinking of the beauty and charm of life here on West Madison.
- Wart: Yeah, you'll get used to it Judge, when you've been here as long as we have.
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: Some place to bring up a boy. Deadbeats hanging round every corner. Hopheads, begging, borrowing, stealing to buy a few cc's of delirium.
- Fran: Come on, Judge, don't do that.
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: Nick won't have a chance. By the time he's twelve he'll have the soul of toadstool. Somebody has to tell her. Nellie needs help, if Nick's gonna make it.
- Fran: Well, I will, I'll help.
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: Why don't you all? I, I mean, why don't we...
- Flora: What have we got to give a boy? Just our own miseries.
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: Who knows more about miseries, Flora? Who knows more about life than you or Wart or me?
- Wart: Yeah but what kind of a life?
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: The kind of life we don't want Nick to have.
- Goodbye George: Judge, you mean you want us all to, er, kind of adopt Nick?
- Max: You know, he's right.
- Wart: Maybe you got something.
- Nellie Romano: Hey, are you all serious?
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: Who else is there to help you, Nellie?
- Wart: Are you for it, Nellie?
- Nellie Romano: Yes, I am for it.
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: A toast! A toast to the future of Nick Romano!
- Nellie Romano: Boy, am I ever sick of this joint.
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: Leave it. Get another job.
- Nellie Romano: One job's as good as another. I mean, if you don't know anything, like me.
- Flora: [singing] Dream a while, Scheme a while, We're sure to find, Happiness, and I guess, All those things you've always pined for, Gee I'd like to see you looking swell, baby...
- Fran: You're nice George.
- Goodbye George: Fran, you're gettin' drunk.
- Fran: Nah! I just feel good. I feel like I could just *love* everybody!
- Nellie Romano: I'm sick of lousy bars. I'm sick of drunks. I'm sick of everything and everybody around here. Now, leave us alone. All of you!
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: Merry Christmas to all.
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: This is the first bit of Christmas cheer that hasn't completely depressed me.
- Goodbye George: Flora Belle, let me tell you somethin', baby sweets. I didn't have no papa. My Mama walked off and left me on somebody's doorstep when I was four.
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: Orphan, illegitimate and black. That's what I call starting at the top.
- Goodbye George: That's where it's at. But, you dig it, Judge. I was up there once, when I was in the ring. I fought the champ. Almost had him!
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: Almost. Just about the saddest word of all.
- Fran: I always meant to ask you Judge, how come you, you know, you wound up here?
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: Oh, I think perhaps a road I choose went downhill more rapidly than I realized.
- Fran: My dear and saintly mother told me I'd end up here. She used to say, "Comb your hair, you look like a slut!" She was right.
- Nellie Romano: Nicky, pretty soon this will all be over. You'll have your education and then maybe you'll be playing the piano with a symphony orchestra and everyone will be applauding and I'm gonna sit in the audience and just get fat.
- Nick Romano: Maybe I can bring in some money so you wouldn't have to do so much, so you wouldn't have to wear dresses like that.
- Nellie Romano: What's the matter? You don't like this dress?
- Nick Romano: You know what I mean. It's a kind of a dress.
- Nellie Romano: It's a kind of a dress I have to wear for a kind of a job.
- Nick Romano: Yeah, but, maybe I can make enough money so you wouldn't have to work in those clip joints, so you wouldn't have to go around dressed like a b-girl.
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: You look worried.
- Nellie Romano: Does it show that much?
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: Well, I see all and know all. I'm a Genie that lives in a brown bottle.
- Nellie Romano: Yeah, I know. I can smell it.
- Flora: I need a fix. I don't want to ask you but I can't help it. I need it. I can't sing. I can't - I can't do anything without it. I get paid tomorrow. I'll pay you. I'll pay you. They want me to be a pusher. But, I can't do that. I can't do it that way.
- Nellie Romano: Why haven't I ever seen you around before?
- Louis Ramponi: You want to buy me a drink?
- Nellie Romano: You're supposed to buy me a drink. That's the way it goes here, you know.
- Louis Ramponi: Well, time out, baby.
- Nick Romano: I wasn't fighting because of my father. I was fighting because of you. It's always been because of you, Mom. Everybody knows what you are. Even the teachers, everybody at school knows what you are. Kids come up and ask me dirty questions, they think I know, because, I'm your son. I can't even have a girlfriend, Mom. They won't even let me see their daughter, because, you're my Mom. What do you expect me to do, huh?
- Grant Holloway: I understand that some of you have tattoo marks to show how tough you are. Well, I'm going to show you how tough I am. The sentence is $50 each or 10 days in jail.
- Grant Holloway: Who is this Goodbye George?
- Goodbye George: Me! That's me, Your Honor.
- Grant Holloway: You got a name?
- Goodbye George: That's where it's at. Dig it. Goodbye George.
- Grant Holloway: You a prize fighter? I used to be.
- Goodbye George: That's why they call me Goodbye George. Cause I hit 'em one time and - it's goodbye.
- Goodbye George: This gang of guys jumps my Nick. You think I'm just gonna stand up there and pick my nose?
- Barbara Holloway: You look a little like Laurence Olivier.
- Nick Romano: You mean we both have two eyes, two ears and one head.
- Barbara Holloway: No, I mean it, really. Right in there, around the eyes.
- Nick Romano: Is that good?
- Barbara Holloway: I'm crazy about him.
- Nick Romano: How does he feel about you?
- Nick Romano: You should see where they live. A penthouse. You can see the whole city from there. And they had this grand piano and I think I played like Arthur Rubinstein. I could hear it, Mom.
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: Forgive me, my boy. Some people need vitamins, some prayers; but, I need bottle courage.
- Louis Ramponi: We are good together, Nellie, you know that? I knew it would be. I knew when I first saw you.
- [notices the bottle in Nellie's hands]
- Louis Ramponi: Gin, huh? How come? Are you one of these quiet drinkers? Never drunk. Just a little suck every few hours.
- Barbara Holloway: See you later.
- Grant Holloway: Where are you going?
- Barbara Holloway: To take a bath, to get dressed, to smell like a rose, and to meet my Nick and to go to a concert - and maybe elope to Persia, Paris, Singapore.
- Flora: [singing in a bar] So drink up all you people, Order anything you see, Have fun you happy people, The laugh's and the joke's on me...
- Judge Bruce Mallory Sullivan: [sitting at a table with Fran] Flora sounds like the whole world's weeping.
- Fran: Yeah. She's had a fix.
- Flora: [singing] No matter how many times it seems, That dreams are not for you, Reach for tomorrow, And make them all come true...