The Scoundrel (1935)

Noël Coward: Anthony Mallare

Photos 

Quotes 

• Anthony Mallare : I'm never nice.

• Anthony Mallare : How I wish that I were as nice as you think I am...

• Anthony Mallare : She's the only woman I've ever met who seems shallower and more superficial than I am. It'll be a perfect match: two empty paper bags, belaboring each other.

• Anthony Mallare : I don't approve of child labor as a rule, but so much depends on the child.

• Anthony Mallare : I'm afraid I can't share your loyalty on my behalf.

• Anthony Mallare : You contemptible fools. Sitting snug and dry in your taxidermist window. Self-satisfied with your crackling egos, looking at life with beady eyes.

  Julia Vivian : What's the matter with you?

  Vanderveer Veyden : Tony, are you ill?

  Anthony Mallare : No. Not anymore. But you are. You're sick - all of you. Little scribblers. Sick with your greedy pursuit of trifles. Sick with making life small.

• Anthony Mallare : I never do anything, but exist - in my own way and not theirs.

• Anthony Mallare : Nothing I touch ever blooms.

• Maggie : Tony, pull yourself together. We're your friends.

  Anthony Mallare : Quite right. I was one of you. I wore that same smirk that's in all your faces. That same cheap sneer of God and man.

  Vanderveer Veyden : He's mad.

  Anthony Mallare : No, I'm horribly sane. Too sane to be able to make myself understood by you.. But wait. Wait till he wind blows over you and the night comes down on your head. Wait till you want rest.

• Anthony Mallare : I'm sorry I'm so late, but I stopped to throw snowballs at some little boys.

  Cora Moore : Tony, don't take off your things - I want to go.

  Anthony Mallare : Where?

  Cora Moore : We could walk in the park.

  Anthony Mallare : On Sunday? It's full of butlers.

• Anthony Mallare : Cora, get off your knees. Tears always make me crueler than I really am. I've never lied to you. I have loved you, but it's over. It's over.

  Cora Moore : No, no.

  Anthony Mallare : Yes.

  Cora Moore : Tony, dear, I'm begging. I'll die if you leave me.

  Anthony Mallare : Exactly. And I won't.

• Anthony Mallare : I'm awful sorry if I annoyed you. I came here to find something. Something that none of you have. There's only one I know who has it.

• Anthony Mallare : I seem to have the knack for making people unhappy. You know, I can think of at least nine who are unhappy at this moment because I exist. Yet, I've done nothing.

• Anthony Mallare : Would you say, my dear, that Mr. Decker was madly in love with you?

  [Cora nods her head] 

  Anthony Mallare : That settles it. I'm not. I never will be. The most I can offer you is one month's diversion and six months of farewell.

• Anthony Mallare : How I wish that I was as nice as you think I am.

  Cora Moore : You are.

• Cora Moore : Why did you lie to her? It's painful to be lied to.

  Anthony Mallare : My dear, women shoot you or drag you into court if you refuse to lie to them and pretend that you still love them.

• Maggie : What is it, Tony? What do you want?

  Anthony Mallare : Tears. Tears. A heart that can cry.

• Anthony Mallare : God, it was no use - my coming back. No use. I have no way to ask for tears. I am as I was - unchanged, unreturned. I want no mercy. I ask for none for myself. But I do ask for them. Give them back what I took.

• Anthony Mallare : I had hoped that if you forgave me, that foolish, generous heart of yours might cry for me. I know that's silly. I know there are no eyes to weep for me but my own. But, you see, there's a legend that those who die unmourned never find rest. Never. Never. Never.

• Anthony Mallare : Out of the hell I go to, hear my first prayer. God, show your face in this room. Let them have the peace that I can never hope.

• Anthony Mallare : I've been wanting you to forgive me.

  Cora Moore : Oh, I don't want to listen to you.

  Anthony Mallare : I didn't mean to do wrong. But evil never knows itself. And it seems that I'm evil.

  Paul Decker : And now everything is going to be all sweet and smoothed out, eh?