Clive Brook credited as playing...
Robert Marryot
- Master Joey: [from upstairs] Mum! Mum!
- Jane Marryot: Oh, the children.
- Ellen Bridges: There, it's Master Joey.
- Robert Marryot: How very impolite of the twentieth century to wake up the children.
- Robert Marryot: Nineteen Hundred! Happy new century.
- Jane Marryot, Ellen Bridges, Alfred Bridges, Master Edward: Nineteen Hundred.
- Master Joey: Nineteen Hundred!
- [first lines]
- Jane Marryot: [as the Marryots return home from an outing] Thank you Bridges.
- Robert Marryot: Everything ready, Bridges?
- Alfred Bridges: Yes sir.
- Jane Marryot: Thought we should never get here in time. I'm sure that cabby was tipsy Robert.
- Robert Marryot: So am I; he called me his old coccolare.
- Jane Marryot: Oh, what did you say?
- Robert Marryot: Gave him another shilling.
- [they laugh lightheartedly]
- Jane Marryot: [on New Year's day of 1933] Well Robert, here we go again.
- Robert Marryot: One more year behind us.
- Jane Marryot: One more year before us.
- Robert Marryot: Mm, do you mind?
- Jane Marryot: [they sit down on the sofa together] No. Everything passes, even time.
- Robert Marryot: That means you too.
- Jane Marryot: And you don't?
- Robert Marryot: I still believe in the future.
- Jane Marryot: Ah, that's your strength my dear. I believe in the future too but, not quite in the same way.
- [last lines]
- Robert Marryot: [upon the dawn of the new year] In one minute it will be 1933.
- Jane Marryot: Well Robert, what toast have you in mind for tonight? Something gay and original I hope.
- Robert Marryot: No, just the future - our old friend the future: the future of England. But first of all my dear, I drink to you.
- Jane Marryot: [they drink a toast of champagne] And I drink to you Robert, loyal and loving always. Now, let's couple the future of England with the past of England: the glories, the victories, and triumphs that are over, and sorrows that are over too. Let us drink to our sons, who made part of the pattern, and to our hearts that died with them. Let us drink to the spirit of gallantry and courage that made a strange heaven out of unbelievable Hell. And let us drink to the hope that one day this country of ours - which we love so much - will find dignity, and greatness, and peace again.
- [a whirlwind montage of 'new-age' social norms and trends flashes before them]
- Robert Marryot: Dignity, greatness, and peace.
- [they drink another toast of champagne and go out on the balcony to witness the crowd outside ringing in the New Year with Auld Lang Syne]
- Joe Marryot: If there is a war, how long do you think it'll last?
- Robert Marryot: Oh, three months at the outside.
- Joe Marryot: We shall win.
- Robert Marryot: We shall win.
- [Robert uncorks a bottle of wine]
- Joe Marryot: [eagerly] Perhaps it'll last six months.
- Robert Marryot: Economically impossible. Have you any idea what a war costs?
- Joe Marryot: Hell of a lot I suppose.
- Robert Marryot: A Hell of a lot. The Germans can afford it even less than we can. Then there's Russia...
- Joe Marryot: Good old Russia!
- Robert Marryot: ... France, Italy, and America...
- Joe Marryot: ... Japan, China, Nicaragua, Guatemala; huh, why, we got 'em licked before we start.
- Robert Marryot: Don't be silly Joey.
- Joe Marryot: [lightly laughs] Sorry.