Twentieth Century (1934)

Roscoe Karns: Owen O'Malley

Photos 

Quotes 

• Lily Garland, aka Mildred Plotka : Is Oscar Jaffe on this train? You'd better tell me.

  Owen O'Malley : Right in there. The Little Corporal is returning from another Moscow, his head bloodied but still unbowed.

• Owen O'Malley : Oh, Max, which one of these foul guinea hens is named Lily Garland?

  Oliver Webb : Not so loud, Owen. We're discussing something.

  Owen O'Malley : Hey, listen, you foul Corsican, these are orders from on high. I just encountered Mr. Jaffe in the lobby, all of a twitter.

  Oliver Webb : Oh, is he here?

  Owen O'Malley : Yes he's here and he wants the pulsing life story of this Lily Garland wench trumpeted through the press by tomorrow morning. Where is the little baggage?

• Owen O'Malley : Say, Sadie, get me a bottle of gin. I've only got an hour to live.

  Sadie, Lily's maid : Oh, I wish that were true.

• Oliver Webb : "Joan of Arc." There was absolutely no excuse for that show. I told him so!

  Owen O'Malley : He's going to end up in the breadline unless he finds out that these jittery horse operas with a lot of people staggering around in foul iron suits ain't entertainment.

• Owen O'Malley : [referring to a policeman]  This demigod thinks he's in darkest Russia.

• Oliver Webb : I don't know whether you realize it or not, Owen, but I've always had a terrific influence with her.

  Owen O'Malley : Me too. Once I actually compelled her to admit it looked like rain.

• Owen O'Malley : O.J., I'm in no mood for a lot of fuzzy lamentations.

• Oscar Jaffe : Owen, something tells me you're not educated enough for this sort of thing. I'll have to hire some professor.

  Owen O'Malley : Save your dough, sire. I yield the lamp of learning to no one.

• Owen O'Malley : What are you talking about? That's not a contract - it's a coronation. Barrels of rubies, enormous carpets for your pretty feet, pearl and onyx bathrubs, slews of myrmidons at your beck and call... Come on, sign it now while the sap is flowing.

• Oscar Jaffe : What did she say? Tell me everything!

  Owen O'Malley : You know her. She screamed like a fishwife.

  Oscar Jaffe : That' s a good sign! She blew up, eh? That shows the battery isn't dead.

• Oscar Jaffe : From the grave of someone you loved yesterday. How's that?

  Owen O'Malley : A little on the sad side, isn't it?

  Oscar Jaffe : It's perfect. I wish I could get playwrights to write like that.

• Oscar Jaffe : Who is that?

  Owen O'Malley : Who?

  Oscar Jaffe : That fellow kissing her. This is the final irony. Mousing around with boys - after Oscar Jaffe. I always knew she'd head for the gutter.

• Oscar Jaffe : Where's Oliver?

  Owen O'Malley : You fired him.

  Oscar Jaffe : Oh, he's taking advantage of that, is he?

• Oscar Jaffe : Get Oliver with that contract.

  Owen O'Malley : I'll do my best sire, but we've crossed the river and I've lost the scent.

• Oliver Webb : What is it? What' s the matter?

  Owen O'Malley : Hold your bonnets. The all-highest is on his way down amid a shower of meteors.

• Oliver Webb : I'm not talking to His Highness. If I was, I'd tell him something.

  Owen O'Malley : About what?

  Oliver Webb : About a million dollars' worth. A million bucks if Jaffe and that girl could get together again.

  Owen O'Malley : Yes, Russia and Japan might get together, too.

• Owen O'Malley : If you want privacy, why don't you travel in a balloon?

• Oscar Jaffe : I'll make the supreme gesture.

  Owen O'Malley : You mean you're gonna let Lily Garland work for you again?

  Oscar Jaffe : How did you guess that?

• Oscar Jaffe : Shhhh. We're before Waterloo with Sheridan 20 miles away... but we can't wait for that now. Stand by Owen.

  Owen O'Malley : What's the program, Richelieu?

• Owen O'Malley : Say, listen, sire, there's only one blonde roosting on this foul stage.

• Owen O'Malley : Hey! Hey, you. You, with the legs, what' s your name?

• Owen O'Malley : Chicago, what a town. They should never have taken it away from the Indians.

  Doorman : It's a good town for a good show. The World's Fair proved that.

  Owen O'Malley : Yeah, fan dances and flea circuses.

• Oliver Webb : Where did you leave Jaffe?

  Owen O'Malley : At the Morrison Hotel under the name of Hemingway, which he's adopted in his grief.

  Oliver Webb : What are his plans, further than returning tomorrow?

  Owen O'Malley : He's going to shoot himself - with a gun.

  Oliver Webb : If he gets on that trapeze again, I'm going to hand him the revolver!

  Owen O'Malley : He won't kill himself. It'd please too many people.

• Oliver Webb : Do you know how much he paid for long-distance calls to Hollywood last year? Eighteen hundred bucks! And she hung up on him every time.

  Owen O'Malley : In some Humpty Dumpty way, that was true love.

  Oliver Webb : Yeah, Romeo and Juliet.

• Owen O'Malley : [to the pullman porter]  Redskin, me, want firewater. Plenty wampum. Quick.

• Owen O'Malley : [to Oliver]  Well, come on, Hiawatha. Let' s tell His Highness they've pitched their wigwam next door.

• Owen O'Malley : Are you down, O.J.?

  Oscar Jaffe : And almost out. What was the name of the minnesinger who cracked about: "It' s always darkest before the dawn?"

  Owen O'Malley : I don't know, Owen, but he was an ass!

• Owen O'Malley : [to Lily]  That' s not a contract. It' s a coronation. Barrels of rubies, enormous carpets for your pretty feet, onyx bathtubs, slews of myrmidons at your beck and call.

• Owen O'Malley : The Black Watch, sire, with their bagpipes.

  Oscar Jaffe : I suppose you're both drunk.

  Oliver Webb : Drunk or sober, I'm here, ain't I?

• Owen O'Malley : Here we go again, Oliver, with Livingstone through darkest Africa.

• Owen O'Malley : D'Artagnan rides again!