Harvey Lembeck credited as playing...
Sgt. Harry Shapiro
- [Shapiro received 7 letters at mail call]
- Animal: What do all those broads say?
- Shapiro: What do they always say?
- Animal: Lemme read one.
- Shapiro: It's not good for you, Animal.
- Animal: Hey, this is with a typewriter... it's from a finance company.
- Shapiro: So it's from the finance company. So, it's better than no letter at all. So they want the third payment on the Plymouth.
- [dropping each letter on the floor in turn]
- Shapiro: So they want the fourth... the fifth... the sixth... the seventh... So they want the Plymouth.
- Animal: Sugar Lips Shapiro. Amazing, ain't it?
- Hoffy: They ought to be under the barbed wire soon.
- Shapiro: Looks good outside.
- Animal: I hope they hit the Danube before dawn.
- Price: They've got a good chance. The longest night of the year.
- Duke: I'll bet they make it to Friedrichshaven.
- Animal: I bet they make it all the way to Switzerland.
- Sefton: And I bet they don't get out of the forest.
- Duke: Now what kind of crack is that?
- Sefton: No crack. Two packs of cigarettes say they don't get out of the forest.
- Hoffy: That's enough, Sefton. Crawl back in your sack.
- Shapiro: He'd make book on his own mother getting hit by a truck.
- Sefton: Anybody call?
- Shapiro: Tea is being served on the veranda. Animal, where are the napkins?
- [Animal puts down some napkins as Dunbar and Bagradian approach the table]
- Bagradian: [Imitating Ronald Colman talking to his real-life wife, Benita Hume] Do be seated, Benita. Hwah, hwah, what a perfectly charming table arrangement. They must have copied the pattern from "House Beautiful."
- Animal: [watching Sefton cook an egg] Are you gonna eat it all by yourself?
- Sefton: Mm-hmm. The yellow and the white.
- Animal: Is it all right if we smell it?
- Sefton: Just don't drool on it.
- Shapiro: You're not gonna eat the shells?
- Sefton: Help yourself.
- Animal: [Harry gives him half the shell] Hey, thanks. What are we gonna do with it?
- Shapiro: We're gonna plant it, Animal. We're gonna grow us a chicken for Christmas.
- Duke: Come on, Trader Horn, let's hear it. What'd you give the krauts for that egg?
- Sefton: 45 cigarettes. Price has gone up.
- Duke: They wouldn't be the cigarettes you took us for last night?
- Sefton: What was I gonna do with them? I only smoke cigars.
- Duke: Niiice guy. The krauts shoot Manfredi and Johnson last night, and today he's out trading with them.
- Sefton: Look. This may be my last hot breakfast on account of they're going to take that stove out of here, so would you let me eat it in peace?
- Animal: Now ain't that too bad? Tomorrow you'll have to suck a raw egg.
- Shapiro: Oh, he don't have to worry. He can always trade the krauts for a six-burner gas range. Maybe a deep freeze, too.
- Sefton: What's the beef, boys? So I'm trading. Everybody here is trading. So maybe I trade a little sharper. That make me a collaborator?
- Duke: A lot sharper, Sefton. I'd like to have some of that loot you got in those footlockers.
- Sefton: Oh you would, would you? Listen, stupe. The first week I was in this joint, somebody stole my Red Cross package, my blanket, and my left shoe. Well, since then I've wised up. This ain't no Salvation Army - this is everybody for himself, dog eat dog.
- Sefton: Okay, Herr Preisshoffer, let's have the mailbox.
- Price: The what?
- Sefton: The one you took out of the corner of your bunk and put in this pocket!
- [pulls a black queen out of Price's jacket]
- Sefton: Let me show you how they did it. They did it by mail.
- Harry Shapiro: Mail?
- Sefton: That's right. Little love notes between our Security officer and Von Scherbach, with Schulz the mailman.
- [gestures to a lightbulb hanging above a table]
- Sefton: Here's the flag. They used to put a loop in the cord.
- [does so]
- Sefton: Did you ever notice? And here's the mailbox. Hollow black queens.
- [pops the two queens open]
- Sefton: Cute, huh? They delivered the mail or picked it up whenever we were out of the barracks, like for appell. And when there was a special delivery, they'd pull a phony air raid to get us out of here, like last night for instance. There wasn't a plane in the sky. Or was there, Price?
- Marko the Mailman: Today's camp news. Father Murray announces that due to local regulations, the Christmas midnight mass will be held at 7:00 in the morning. He also says, quote, "All you sack rats better show up for services, and no bull from anybody." Unquote.
- [muttering]
- Marko the Mailman: At ease.
- Animal: At ease!
- Marko the Mailman: Next. Monday afternoon, a sailboat race will be held at the cesspool. See Oscar Rudolph of barracks 7 if you wish to enter a yacht.
- [laughter and boos]
- Marko the Mailman: All right, at ease.
- Animal: At ease!
- Marko the Mailman: Next. Jack Cushingham and Larry Blake will play Frank de Notta and Mike Cohen for the pinochle championship of the camp.
- Shapiro: That's a fix.
- Marko the Mailman: [mutters of agreement] All right, at ease.
- Animal: At ease!
- Marko the Mailman: Next. Tuesday afternoon at 2:00, all men from Texas will meet behind the north latrine.
- [laughter and boos]
- Marko the Mailman: All right, at ease.
- Animal: At ease!
- Marko the Mailman: Next. A warning from the kommandant.
- [boos]
- Marko the Mailman: Anybody found throwing rocks at low-flying German aircraft will be thrown in the boob.
- [boos]
- Sgt. Schulz: Well, well, gentlemen, am I interrupting something?
- Hoffy: Yeah, Schulz, we were just passin' out guns.
- Sgt. Schulz: Guns?
- [realizing he's kidding]
- Sgt. Schulz: Ah, you're joking. Always with the visecrackers.
- Shapiro: Visecrackers. Where did he pick up his English, in a pretzel factory?
- Sgt. Schulz: You always think I'm a square. I've been to America. I've been wrestling there. I wrestled in Milwaukee and St. Louis, in Cincinnati, and I will go back. The way the war is going, I will be there before you.
- Shapiro: You should live so long.
- Sgt. Schulz: [sharing a laugh, then stopping] Here. That's me in Cincinnati.
- Animal: [taking a picture] Who's the other wrestler? The one with the mustache?
- Sgt. Schulz: That's my wife.
- Animal: Hey, look at all that meat. Ain't she the bitter end?
- Sgt. Schulz: [taking the picture back] Oh, give it back. You must not arouse yourself.
- Animal: It ain't fair, Harry. I'm telling you, it ain't fair. My Betty. Ain't she beautiful? She married an orchestra leader.
- Shapiro: So what? There's other women.
- Animal: Not for me.
- [kissing the picture]
- Animal: Betty. Betty.
- Shapiro: Forget Betty, Animal. I'll get you a date with some of those Russian women.
- Animal: You'll get me a date?
- Shapiro: Sure. I'll get you into the Russian compound.
- Animal: How? Pinky Miller from barracks 8 tried getting over there and they shot him in the leg.
- Shapiro: It... it takes a gimmick, Animal. I figured us a little gimmick.
- Animal: You did?
- Shapiro: [pointing to his temple, indicating his brain] Sharp. Sometimes I'm so sharp, it's frightening.
- Hoffy: I called a meeting of the barracks chiefs this morning, Sefton. I thought maybe I could get you transferred to another barracks. But it turns out that nobody likes you any more than we do.
- Sefton: So you're stuck with me, huh?
- Animal: Maybe the Russian broads would take him.
- Shapiro: Not with that kisser. Not anymore.
- Duke: You got off lucky last night, Sefton. One more move, and you'll wake up with your throat cut!
- Price: You listening, Sefton?
- Sefton: Yeah, I still got one good ear.
- Shapiro: Good morning, Animal. What would you like for breakfast? Scrambled eggs with little sausages? Bacon and eggs sunny-side up. Griddle cakes. A waffle.
- Animal: Stop it, Harry. I'm warnin' you.
- Shapiro: Coffee, milk, or maybe a little cocoa.
- Animal: Why do you do this to me every morning?
- Shapiro: Hamburgers and onions, strawberry shortcake, gefilte fish, chopped liver...
- Animal: [grabbing his scarf like a garrotte] I'll kill you, Harry, so help me.
- Shapiro: ...chicken a la king. Let go, Animal, it's roll call!
- [getting Animal to release him]
- Shapiro: Hitler is waitin' to see us.
- Animal: As long as you're gonna move somebody in, how about a couple of them Russian broads?
- Sgt. Schulz: Russian women prisoners?
- Shapiro: Jawohl.
- Sgt. Schulz: Some are not bad at all.
- Animal: Ja. Just get us a couple with beautiful glockenspiels.
- Sgt. Schulz: [sharing a roar of laughter, then stopping] Droppen sie dead!
- Harry Shapiro: [after a shot of schnapps Sefton brewed] Mr. Management, what are you tryin' to do? Embalm us while we're still alive?
- Sefton: What'd you expect for two cigarettes? Eight-year-old bottle-in-bond? All the house guarantees is you don't go blind.
- Animal: Blind? Harry! Harry! Harry, I'm blind, Harry. Harry, where are you? I can't see you. I'm blind, Harry. Harry. Harry, I'm blind.
- Harry Shapiro: Blind? How stupid can you get, Animal?
- [he raises takes Animal's hat, which has been covering his eyes]
- Animal: [opening Sefton's foot locker] Of all the hoarding cruds.
- Hoffy: It looks like Macy's basement, don't it?
- Lt. James Skylar Dunbar: That kid's richer than my mother.
- Shapiro: [as he picks up a cuckoo clock, the bird pops out and "chirps"] Ah, shut up!