William Powell credited as playing...
Nick Charles
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: A couple of weeks on this cider and I'll be a new man.
- Nora Charles: I sort of like the old one.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Why, darling, that's the nicest thing you've said to me since the time I got my head caught in that cuspidor at the Waldorf.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Right there was the little old schoolhouse.
- [laughs]
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Once on Halloween I burned it down - slightly.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: The fact that the boy's dead doesn't seem to have made very much of an impression on you.
- Bill Burns: Why should it? Death hasn't endowed him with any new virtues, has it?
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: That's a little brutal, but honest. Do you, eh... You know of anyone who might have had cause to kill him?
- Bill Burns: The way he was cutting throats at the plant, it might have been a number of people.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: What about you?
- Bill Burns: Mr. Charles, when you've got anything on me, you can serve your papers. But until that time, I figure my time is my own.
- Laurabelle Ronson: Poor Peter. At least he has outsoared the shadow of our night. Envy, pain and hate can touch him not. That's Shelly. I always turn to the poets for comfort, in all my sorrows.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Me too.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Thank you very much. Goodbye, now.
- Willie Crump: I beg your pardon?
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: I said goodbye, now.
- Willie Crump: Goodbye - now? There's no sense to that? Obviously, it's now. I mean, you wouldn't say goodbye, tomorrow. Or, goodbye, two hours ago.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: You've got ahold of something there, brother.
- Willie Crump: I've got ahold of some? I haven't got ahold of anything. And I'm not your brother!
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Wait here.
- Nora Charles: Where are you going?
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: I want to do a little business with a blonde.
- Nora Charles: Do you think she'll give it to you?
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Well, I can try darling. Anything for art.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Now, about Peter, I just wanted to ask you a few things about his friends, his family.
- Laurabelle Ronson: He was alone. He had - only me.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Oh, well, eh, he must have talked about his family though, his childhood.
- Laurabelle Ronson: He talked of nothing. Our souls and spirits communed. The words would have been empty, meaningless.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Yes. I can understand that.
- Nora Charles: Nicky, do you really like cider?
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Like it? I love it. Just the pure, natural juices of the apple. What could be better, for instance?
- Nora Charles: A dry martini, for instance.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: That horrible stuff. It almost took the lining off my stomach.
- Nora Charles: Why do you care? It didn't show.
- Nora Charles: Oh, Nicky, you're driving me crazy. This case is serious and all you do is fuddle around and guzzle cider.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: I'll switch to prune juice.
- Nora Charles: I'll be waiting for you, darling. Good luck.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: I'll need it, sister.
- Nora Charles: And don't call me sister.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Well, we're very much obliged to you. Buy yourself a little smoke.
- [presses a bill into the attendant's hand]
- Baggage Attendant on Train: Thanks, but...
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Compliments of the pup.
- [motions to Asta]
- Baggage Attendant on Train: Spitz?
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: No, just growls.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Now you're going to get it! You're going to get it...
- Nora Charles: Oh, no Nick, not here in front of your parents!
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: [Nick bends Nora over and starts spanking her behind with a newspaper and starts quoting Nora's statement to the press] But you can draw your own conclusions!
- Nora Charles: Ouch! Nicky!
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: This will teach you the power of the press!
- Nora Charles: Oh! A fine son you brought up. A wife-beater!
- Dr. Bertram Charles: A brave boy!
- [laughs]
- Dr. Bertram Charles: I wanted to do that to mother for 40 years.
- Mrs. Charles: I dare you!
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: I was just thinking about a little gal by the name of Alice Brody. We used to come out here often on hot summer nights and play on her banjo.
- Laurabelle Ronson: A cigar?
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: I rather lost interest in cigars.
- Laurabelle Ronson: Oh, father has some very good ones. A special brand he keeps all for himself.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Oh, a special brand.
- Laurabelle Ronson: Yes. Won't you try one?
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Cubana Perfecto. Well, yes, yes. This does interest me.
- Tom's Wife: Why, I always said something would happen to that boy.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Yes? Why?
- Tom's Wife: Bad tempered and ornery. He had a fight the other night.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: A fight, huh? With whom?
- Tom's Wife: Don't know the name. The other fella ended up with two black eyes like a raccoon.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Oh, Studs, let's have those other four paintings.
- Studs Lonnegan: Here they are Nick.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: And, eh, tell them where you got them.
- Studs Lonnegan: Why, where you told me. At Anthony Kroner's Art Gallery in New York.
- Nicholas 'Nick' Charles: Anthony Kroner, known to his intimates as Tony.