- Nick Rocco: Whatever happened to Dianetics and all that other nonsense?
- Emily Rocco: It's not nonsense. It's why you need semantics. It helps you learn about the true meanings of things.
- Nick Rocco: This house if full of life. Babies to be born, books to be written.
- Emily Rocco: How many, Nick?
- Nick Rocco: You give me the babies and I'll give you the books.
- Delia: Expectant mothers should feather their nest. That's natural. But, that wife of yours is gonna knock the nest clean outta the tree with all this crazy cleanin' and polishin' and washin'.
- Nick Rocco: It's coming out of me like a blowtorch.
- Emily Rocco: Go on. Go on!
- [Nick spanks Emily's behind]
- Emily Rocco: Don't you ever dare do that again!
- Nick Rocco: What? What did I do?
- Emily Rocco: You know very well what you did and I don't like it and I want you never to do it again.
- Nick Rocco: Relax, Sweetheart. I know how you feel about cleanliness - and it's beautiful. But, we need the dust and the dirt too. It's what we're made of.
- Emily Rocco: We're not made of broken gin bottles and beer cans and soggy tea bags.
- Nick Rocco: I know, honey.
- Emily Rocco: I like clean dirt, Nick. It's the dirty dirt I hate.
- Emily Rocco: [to Nick] I should think she'd have more sense of propriety. Doesn't she know you're gonna have a baby?
- Emily Rocco: I hope it's a boy.
- Nick Rocco: That doesn't matter - whatever it is.
- Emily Rocco: Oh, I hate girls. They're all right when they're little. They grow up to be treacherous.
- Nick Rocco: [in Papa passing out while telling a story] He never got to bandits.
- Emily Rocco: What do you care? Make them up.
- Nick Rocco: I can't. It's impossible.
- Emily Rocco: Why? You're a writer. Invent them.
- Nick Rocco: What do I know about Italian bandits?
- Emily Rocco: What's there to know? They're like any other bandits, only they eat pizza.
- Emily Rocco: Papa, look.
- Papa Vittorio Rocco: Look what?
- Emily Rocco: A liquor store. Come on, the drinks are on me.
- Emily Rocco: Appearances are very deceiving. For instance, who am I?
- Papa Vittorio Rocco: You are Nick's wife.
- Emily Rocco: Yes. But, I'm more than Nick's wife. I'm my mother's daughter. I'm my Uncle John's niece. I'm American. I'm female. A consumer. A doctor would say I'm a patient. The Bureau of Internal Revenue would say I'm a dependent. I'm a lot of things. More than just a wife.
- Father Gondolfo: Why don't you go to church anymore?
- Nick Rocco: Well, I don't know. Lots of things. I've changed. My thinking has changed. The church never changes.
- Father Gondolfo: Seems to me that should be one of it's great attractions.
- Nick Rocco: The world has changed too, Father.
- Father Gondolfo: Oh, we have atomic energy and the hydrogen bomb. But, mankind, the same.
- Nick Rocco: There's no birth control in the church.
- Papa Vittorio Rocco: Birth control?
- Nick Rocco: Well, we gotta draw the line some place.
- Papa Vittorio Rocco: I don't like that kind of talk.
- Emily Rocco: I can't become a Catholic because you want me to. It wouldn't be fair to me or to the church. You asked me a question before, you said, "You don't want God in your house?" I do. I - I want God in my house and I want him for my child. But, it took years to make me what I am today. Whatever that is and I can't change overnight.
- Papa Vittorio Rocco: You don't like the Pope?
- Emily Rocco: Sure, I like the Pope. I don't mean that. I mean, people can't change so quickly. It's not the way you change the brand of cigarettes that you smoke.
- Nick Rocco: I don't know. Whatever it is, I don't know what it is. At first I feel good about it - and then I feel like I'm being pushed and I don't like the feeling. It's no good, no good at all. It's - it's very hard, very hard.