Auntie Mame (1958)

Rosalind Russell: Mame Dennis

Photos 

Quotes 

• Mame Dennis : Oh, Agnes, where is your spine? Here you've been taking my dictation for weeks and you don't get the message of my book. Live, that's the message!

  Agnes Gooch : Live?

  Mame Dennis : Yes! Life is a banquet and most poor suckers are starving to death!

• Patrick Dennis : Is the English lady sick, Auntie Mame?

  Mame Dennis : She's not English, darling... she's from Pittsburgh.

  Patrick Dennis : She sounded English.

  Mame Dennis : Well, when you're from Pittsburgh, you have to do something.

• Gloria Upson : Oh, my, what a stunning apartment.

  Mame Dennis : Thank you.

  Gloria Upson : Books are awfully decorative, don't you think?

• Mame Dennis : Exclusively what and restricted to whom?

• Mame Dennis : That's a B. It's the first letter of a seven-letter word that means your late father.

• Sally Cato : [before a fox-hunt]  Well? Shall we to the hounds?

  Mame Dennis : [muttered]  Yeah, I'd love to meet your family.

• Mame Dennis : Please dear, your Auntie Mame's hung.

• Mame Dennis : Widdicome, Gutterman, Applewhite, Bibberman and Black. You want to talk to Mr. Gutterman? One moment, sir. I'll connect you. Widdicome, Gutterman, Applewhite, Bibberman and Black. Oh, yes Mr. Bibberman. You'd like to talk with Mr. Applewhite? Oh, yes, sir, he's in. I'll connect you. Widdicome, Gutterman, Applewhite, Bib-bib-bib-blib-bibman and Black? Oh yes, long distance, how are you? Oh. Mr Widdecome? I have your San Francisco call for you. Yes, Mr. Bibberman? Oh. Did I connect you to Mr. Gutterman instead of Mr. Applewhite? I'm sorry, Mr. Bibbicome, Bibbibibbib.

  [She pulls the jack out of the plug and shakes it] 

  Mame Dennis : Oh Mr. Applewhite, what are you doing in that hole with Mr. Gutterman? Yes, Mr. Widdicome? Oh, I'm sorry, sir. I'll try to reconnect you again with San Francisco. Let me see, Mr. Bibibib is in there talking to Mr. Bubbawhite. Where on earth is Mr. Applewhite? Oh, there you are, Mr. Applewhite!

  [She starts to cross cords and desperately plug jacks into holes] 

  Mame Dennis : Mr. Widdicome, there's no such place as San Francisco. Please!

  [She lifts up her console and is horrified to see that it's glowing] 

  Mame Dennis : Mr. Bibibib? Mr. Widdicome?

• Vera Charles : If you kept your hair natural like I do...

  Mame Dennis : If I kept my hair natural like yours, I'd be bald.

• Mame Dennis : Oh, you know I really am fascinated by aviation. I never knew they did it all with rubber bands.

• Mame Dennis : [to Patrick who has unleashed sunlight on a very hung-over Mame]  Child, how can you see with all that light?

• Dwight Babcock : I dropped by the Bixby School. And what do I find? I find he isn't even registered there - he never has been. So I've been hunting through every low, crockpot school in this town, and I finally found him, in the lowest of them all!

  Mame Dennis : Mr. Page is a progressive educator...

  Dwight Babcock : There they were, a schoolroom full of them: boys, girls, teachers, romping around stark naked, bare as the day they were born!

  Mame Dennis : I assure you that the children under Mr. Page's care were engaged in normal, healthful, broadening pursuits.

  Dwight Babcock : Broadening? You show 'em what you were doing when I broke into that place. Go ahead, show them.

  Patrick Dennis : We were just playing Fish Families.

  Dwight Babcock : Fish Families!

  Patrick Dennis : It's part of "constructive play".

  Dwight Babcock : Now, listen to this.

  Mame Dennis : Show me now, darling - show me.

  Patrick Dennis : Well, we do it right after yogurt time. Mrs. Page and all the girls crouch down on the floor under the sun lamps. And they pretend to be lady fishes, depositing their eggs in the sand. Then Mr. Page and all the boys do what gentlemen fish do.

  Mame Dennis : ...What could be more wholesome or natural?

• Mame Dennis : Well, now, uh, read me all the words you don't understand.

  Patrick Dennis : Libido, inferiority complex, stinko, blotto, free love, bathtub gin, monkey glands, Karl Marx... is he one of the Marx Brothers?

• Mame Dennis : [Mame has just gotten fired from Macy's]  Don't forget the skates for the little nippers. Get 'em at Gimbel's!

• Gloria Upson : And, of course, it's completely restricted.

  Mame Dennis : I'll get a blood test.

• Mame Dennis : ...to make him an Aryan... from Darien?

• Mame Dennis : [Meeting her nephew's snobbish dumb-blonde fiancee for the first time]  You're, er, you're at school, dear?

  Gloria Upson : I am an Upper Richman Girls School girl.

  Mame Dennis : Now, how did you get that lovely tan, so early in the spring?

  Gloria Upson : Oh, I played hooky for a couple of weeks. Mums and Dadums and I went down to our place in Fort Lauderdale. We have a place in Fort Lauderdale.

  Patrick Dennis : I was out of my mind until she got back. I am insanely jealous of this kid. Sheer torture and I love it.

  Gloria Upson : [Coyly]  Silly...

  Mame Dennis : Tell me dear, have you, er, have you chosen your major yet?

  Gloria Upson : [With a blank stare]  Chosen my major?

  Mame Dennis : What courses are you taking at college?

  Gloria Upson : Ah, well, just a general sort of liberal arts things, you know, English lit and like that. Upper Richman's a top drawer. *Really* top drawer.

• [Pouring Agnes a drink] 

  Mame Dennis : This will calm you down.

  Agnes Gooch : Oh, no! Spirits do the most horrible thing to me. I'm not the same person!

  Mame Dennis : What's wrong with that?

  Agnes Gooch : Will it mix with Dr. Pepper?

  Mame Dennis : He'll love it! Drink!

• Mame Dennis : Run along to Ito and tell him to bring me a light breakfast - black coffee and a side car. Oh, oh. And a cold towel for your Auntie Vera.

  Patrick Dennis : Is she in the guest room again?

  Mame Dennis : Since Sunday, dear. Now run along to Ito and hurry my tray, darling. Your Auntie needs fuel.

• Mame Dennis : What an honor it is to have you in our little home... though I wonder if it does make the best first impression on a sensitive young mind to see you drinking during business hours.

• Mame Dennis : [pointing to Agnes]  And what is this?

  Agnes Gooch : I'm your sponge!

• Mame Dennis : Spitting distance? How vivid!

• Mame Dennis : Such talented fingers... what he did to my bust! That's a word for my head, you know.

• Vera Charles : It's unoriginal to do such a thing! To dash away together like this would be mad! Quite mad, quite devastating mad! Quite devastating mad!

  [Mames bracelet bells ring while putting makeup on which causes a distraction on stage] 

  Mame Dennis : Ah ha ha ha! Oh lord Dudley, your flattery would turn a young girls head. Come now hurry to the ball, if we tarry, we shall be late.

  Vera Charles : No Reginald it would be madness! I belong to one world you to another! It's better we part now, now! While we cherish this excellency! We known!

  [Agnes walks over to the side of the stage] 

  Vera Charles : What the hell have you got back there Reindeer? This is goodbye monsieur. I hear the others coming.

  [Mame and the man walks on stage] 

  Mame Dennis : Oh lord Dudley, oh no more champagne or I shall forget myself all together. I'll say you're the funniest man.

  Vera Charles : I have, I have, I have something to tell you all! I have been unexpectedly called back home. Prince Alex needs me and my place is by his side. It has all been so lovely this whole summer, but after all it has only been midsummer madness.

  [Auntie pats the man on the back] 

  Vera Charles : Lady Alice would you be good enough to ring for my ref?

  Mame Dennis : Certainly princess.

  Vera Charles : Get rid of those damn cowbells!

  Mame Dennis : May I help you princess?

  [Throws the scarf over Agnes face and puts on the robe and the audience laughs] 

  Vera Charles : Thank you lady, Alice. Goodbye, goodbye I shall always feel a strong attachment to you all. Let go I'm stuck! Let go!

  [Mames bell bracelet gets caught on Agnes robe and they walk off stage] 

  Mame Dennis : They are stuck it's my bracelet! They are on you!

• Mame Dennis : Darling! I'm your Auntie Mame!

• [Mame is hosting a dinner party for the snobbish Upsons. Her butler, Mr. Ito, serves the hors d'oeuvres] 

  Gloria Upson : [tasting one]  Mmm, this is spicy! Try one of the little striped ones, Moms.

  Dwight Babcock : These *are* tasty!

  Doris Upson : What are they, dear?

  Mame Dennis : Oh, just plain old pickled rattlesnake.

  [Mr. Upson spits out his hors d'oeurve into his flaming drink. Everyone looks disgusted] 

  Mame Dennis : They're pure protein. And they always marinate them after they remove the fangs.

• [Patrick reads a list of words he doesn't understand] 

  Patrick Dennis : ...Neurotic, heterosexual...

  Mame Dennis : Oh, my my my my, what an eager little mind.

  [takes the list] 

  Mame Dennis : You won't need some of these words for months and months.

• Patrick Dennis : [walking with Mame after her remarkable sidesaddle horseback ride during a fox hunt]  Can I ask you just one question? How did you stay on that horse?

  Mame Dennis : It was just like New Haven with the bracelets. I got stuck, but at the other end.

• Claude Upson : I got this recipe from a bartender I met in Havana. You'll never guess the secret ingredient. I'll give you one hint: there's no sugar in a Claude Upson daiquiri!

  Mame Dennis : And yet it's so... sweet.

  [weakly] 

  Mame Dennis : Whatever do you use?

  [brightly] 

  Mame Dennis : Chocolate ice cream!

• Mame Dennis : Quick, Brian. Hang those furs on the Gooch. Hurry!