All About Eve (1950)

George Sanders: Addison DeWitt

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Quotes 

• Addison DeWitt : [voiceover]  Margo Channing is a star of the theater. She made her first stage appearance at the age of four in Midsummer Night's Dream. She played a fairy and entered, quite unexpectedly, stark naked. She has been a star ever since. Margo is a great star, a true star. She never was or will be anything less or anything else.

• [a butler passes by] 

  Miss Casswell : Oh, waiter!

  Addison DeWitt : That is not a waiter, my dear, that is a butler.

  Miss Casswell : Well, I can't yell "Oh butler!" can I? Maybe somebody's name is Butler.

  Addison DeWitt : You have a point. An idiotic one, but a point.

  Miss Casswell : I don't want to make trouble. All I want is a drink.

  Max Fabian : Leave it to me. I'll get you one.

  Miss Casswell : Thank you, Mr. Fabian.

  Addison DeWitt : Well done! I can see your career rise in the east like the sun.

• Addison DeWitt : That I should want you at all, suddenly strikes me as the height of improbability. But that, in itself, is probably the reason. You're an improbable person, Eve, and so am I. We have that in common. Also, our contempt for humanity and inability to love, and be loved, insatiable ambition, and talent. We deserve each other.

• Addison DeWitt : And what's your name?

  Phoebe : Phoebe.

  Addison DeWitt : Phoebe?

  Phoebe : I call myself Phoebe.

  Addison DeWitt : And why not? Tell me, Phoebe, do you want someday to have an award like that of your own?

  Phoebe : More than anything else in the world.

  Addison DeWitt : Then you must ask Miss Harrington how to get one. Miss Harrington knows all about it.

• Addison DeWitt : [voiceover intro]  To those of you who do not read, attend the theater, listen to unsponsored radio programs, or know anything of the world in which you live, it is perhaps necessary to introduce myself. My name is Addison DeWitt. My native habitat is the theater. In it, I toil not, neither do I spin. I am a critic and commentator. I am essential to the theater.

• Miss Casswell : Tell me this, do they have auditions for television?

  Addison DeWitt : That's, uh, all television is, my dear, nothing but auditions.

• Addison DeWitt : You could sleep now, couldn't you?

  Eve : Why not?

  Addison DeWitt : The mark of a true killer: sleep tight, rest easy, and come out fighting.

• Addison DeWitt : Why not read my column to pass the time? The minutes will fly like hours.

• Addison DeWitt : There never was, and there never will be, another like you.

• Addison DeWitt : What do you take me for?

  Eve : I don't know that I'd take you for anything.

  Addison DeWitt : Is it possible, even conceivable, that you've confused me with that gang of backward children you play tricks on, that you have the same contempt for me as you have for them?

  Eve : I'm sure you mean something by that, Addison, but I don't know what.

  Addison DeWitt : Look closely, Eve. It's time you did. I am Addison DeWitt. I am nobody's fool, least of all yours.

  Eve : I never intended you to be.

  Addison DeWitt : Yes you did, and you still do.

  Eve : I still don't know what you're getting at, but right now I want to take my nap. It's important...

  Addison DeWitt : It's important right now that we talk, killer to killer.

  Eve : Champion to champion.

  Addison DeWitt : Not with me, you're no champion. You're stepping way up in class.

  Eve : Addison, will you please say what you have to say, plainly and distinctly, and then get out, so I can take my nap?

  Addison DeWitt : Very well - plainly and distinctly - though I consider it unnecessary because you know as well as I do what I'm going to say: Lloyd may leave Karen, but he will not leave Karen for you.

  Eve : What do you mean by that?

  Addison DeWitt : More plainly and more distinctly: I have not come to New Haven to see the play, discuss your dreams, or pull the ivy from the walls of Yale. I have come here to tell you that you will not marry Lloyd, or anyone else for that matter, because I will not permit it.

  Eve : What have you got to do with it?

  Addison DeWitt : Everything, because after tonight, you will belong to me.

  Eve : Belong? To you? I can't believe my ears!

  Addison DeWitt : What a dull cliché.

  Eve : Belong to you - why, that sounds medieval, something out of an old melodrama!

  Addison DeWitt : So does the history of the world for the past twenty years. I don't enjoy putting it as bluntly as this. Frankly, I'd hoped that somehow you would have known, that you would have taken it for granted that you and I...

  Eve : Taken it for granted that you and I...

  [laughs] 

  Addison DeWitt : [slaps her]  Now, remember, as long as you live, never to laugh at me - at anything or anyone else, but never at me.

  Eve : [walks to the door and opens it]  Get out!

  Addison DeWitt : You're too short for that gesture. Besides, it went out with Mrs. Fiske.

• Margo : I'm being rude now, aren't I? Or should I say, ain't I?

  Addison DeWitt : You're maudlin and full of self-pity. You're magnificent!

• Addison DeWitt : Too bad, we're gonna miss the third act. They're gonna play it offstage.

• Margo : I distinctly remember, Addison, crossing you off of my guest list. What are you doing here?

  Addison DeWitt : Dear Margo, you were an unforgettable Peter Pan. You must play it again, soon. You remember Miss Casswell.

  Margo : I do not. How do you do?

  Miss Casswell : We've never met. Maybe that's why?

  Addison DeWitt : Miss Casswell is an actress, a graduate of the Copacabana school of the dramatic arts.

  [Eve enters] 

  Addison DeWitt : Ah, Eve.

  Eve : Good evening, Mr. DeWitt.

  Margo : I'd no idea you two knew each other.

  Addison DeWitt : This must be at long last our formal introduction. Until now, we've only met in passing.

  Miss Casswell : That's how you met me... in passing.

  Margo : Eve, this is an old friend of Mr. DeWitt's mother. Miss Casswell, Miss Harrington.

  Eve : Miss Casswell.

  Miss Casswell : How do you do?

  Margo : Addison, I've been waiting for you to meet Eve for the longest time.

  Addison DeWitt : It could only have been your natural timidity that kept you from mentioning it.

  Margo : You've heard of her great interest in the theater.

  Addison DeWitt : We have that in common.

  Margo : Then you two must have a long talk.

  Eve : I'm afraid Mr. DeWitt would find me boring before too long.

  Miss Casswell : You won't bore him, honey. You won't even get a chance to talk.

  Addison DeWitt : Claudia, come here.

  [takes her aside] 

  Addison DeWitt : You see that man, that's Max Fabian, the producer. Now, go do yourself some good.

  Miss Casswell : Why do they always look like unhappy rabbits?

  Addison DeWitt : Because that's what they are.

  [taking her coat] 

  Addison DeWitt : Now, go and make him happy.

  [goes back to Margo and drapes the coat over her arm] 

  Addison DeWitt : Now, don't worry about your little charge, she'll be in safe hands.

  [walks off with Eve] 

  Margo : [watches them go, then lifts her martini]  Ah-men.

• Addison DeWitt : We all have abnormalities in common. We're a breed apart from the rest of humanity, we theatre folk. We are the original displaced personalities.

• Addison DeWitt : We all come into this world with our little egos equipped with individual horns. If we don't blow them, who else will?

• Addison DeWitt : [voiceover]  The minor awards, as you can see, have already been presented. Minor awards are for such as the writer and director, since their function is merely to construct a tower so that the world can applaud a light which flashes on top of it. And no brighter light has ever dazzled the eye than Eve Harrington.

• Margo : Why so remote Addison? I should think you'd be at your protégé's side lending her moral support.

  Addison DeWitt : Miss Casswell at the moment is where I can lend no support, moral or otherwise.

  Margo : In the lady's, shall we say, lounge?

  Addison DeWitt : ...being violently ill to her tummy.

• Addison DeWitt : Well, Max has gone to a great deal of trouble. This is going to be an elaborate party, and it's for you.

  Eve : No it isn't.

  [raises the award statuette] 

  Eve : It's for this.

  Addison DeWitt : It's the same thing, isn't it?

  Eve : Exactly. Here, take it to the party instead of me.

  [hands it to him] 

• Margo : Please don't play governess, Karen. I haven't your unyielding good taste. I wish *I* could have gone to Radcliffe, too, but Father wouldn't hear of it... He needed help behind the notions counter.

  Margo : [continues]  I'm being rude now, aren't I? Or should I say "ain't I"?

  Addison DeWitt : You're maudlin and full of self-pity. You're magnificent.

• Margo : How was Miss Casswell?

  Addison DeWitt : Frankly, I don't remember.

  Margo : Just slipped your mind?

  Addison DeWitt : Completely. Nor I am sure anyone else can tell you how Miss Casswell read or whether Miss Casswell read or rode a pogo stick.

• [first lines - voiceover] 

  Addison DeWitt : The Sarah Siddons Award is perhaps unknown to you. It has been spared the sensational publicity of such questionable honors as the Pulitzer Prize and those awards presented annually by that film society. The distinguished-looking gentleman is an extremely old actor. Being an actor, he will go on speaking for some time. It is not important that you hear what he says.

• Addison DeWitt : Margo, I have lived in the theatre as a Trappist monk lives in his faith. I have no other world, no other life. And once in a great while, I experience that moment of revelation for which all true believers wait and pray. You were one. Jeanne Eagels another, Paula Wessely, Hayes. There are others, three or four. Eve Harrington will be among them.

  Margo : I take it she read well.

• Addison DeWitt : It wasn't a reading, it was a performance. Brilliant! Vivid, something made of music and fire.

  Margo : How nice.

  Addison DeWitt : In time, she'll be what you are.

  Margo : A mass of music and fire. That's me. An old kazoo with some sparklers.

• Eve : It's not modesty. I just don't try to kid myself.

  Addison DeWitt : A revolutionary approach to the Theater.

• Eve : I won't play tonight. I couldn't, not possibly. I couldn't go on.

  Addison DeWitt : Couldn't go on? You'll give the performance of your life.

• Bill Sampson : I don't agree, Addison.

  Addison DeWitt : That happens to be your particular abnormality.

• Addison DeWitt : Hello. Who are you?

  Phoebe : Miss Harrington's resting, Mr. Dewitt. She asked me to see who it is.

  Addison DeWitt : Oh well, we won't disturb her rest. It seems Miss Harrington left her award in the taxicab. Will you give it to her? Tell me, how did you know my name?

  Phoebe : [coquettishly]  It's a very famous name, Mr. DeWitt.

  Addison DeWitt : And what's your name?

  Phoebe : Phoebe.

  Addison DeWitt : [incredulously]  Phoebe?

  Phoebe : [bristling]  I call myself Phoebe!

  Addison DeWitt : And why not? Tell me, Phoebe, do you want some day to have an award like that of your own?

  [noticing how enviously Phoebe holds and admires the trophy] 

  Phoebe : More than anything else in the world.

  Addison DeWitt : Then you must ask Miss Harrington how to get one. Miss Harrington knows all about it.

• Addison DeWitt : [voiceover]  Eve. Eve, the golden girl. The cover girl. The girl next door, the girl on the moon. Time has been good to Eve. Life goes where she goes. She's been profiled, covered, revealed, reported, what she eats and what she wears and whom she knows and where she was and when and where she's going. Eve. You all know all about Eve.

• Addison DeWitt : [voiceover]  There are, in general, two types of theatrical producers. One has a great many wealthy friends who will risk a tax-deductible loss. This type is interested in art. The other is one to whom each production means potential ruin or fortune. This type is out to make a buck.

• Addison DeWitt : [voiceover]  No brighter light has ever dazzled the eye than Eve Harrington. Eve. But more of Eve later. All about Eve, in fact.

• Addison DeWitt : Elder statesmen of the theatre or cinema assure the public that actors and actresses are just plain folks, ignoring the fact that their greatest attraction to the public is their complete lack of resemblance to normal human beings.

• Addison DeWitt : [voiceover]  Those who remained cheered loudly, lustily, and long for Eve.

• Addison DeWitt : I think the time has come for you to shed some of your humility. It is just as false not to blow your horn at all as it is to blow it too loudly.

• Addison DeWitt : Ah! Feeling better, my dear?

  Miss Casswell : Like I just swam the English Channel. Now what?

  Addison DeWitt : Your next move, it seems to me, should be towards television.

• Addison DeWitt : The audition is over.

  Margo : It can't be. I came here to read with Miss Casswell. I promised Max.

  Addison DeWitt : The audition was at 2.30. It's now nearly four.

  Margo : Is it really? I must start wearing a watch.

• Addison DeWitt : By the smartness of your dress I take it that your luncheon companion is a lady?

  Karen : Margo.

  Addison DeWitt : Margo lunching in public?

  Karen : Oh, it's a new Margo; but, she's just as late as the old one.

• Eve : I'm about to go into the shower. I won't be able to hear you.

  Addison DeWitt : Well, it can wait. Where would you like to go? We must make this a special night.

  Eve : You take charge.

  Addison DeWitt : I believe I will.

• Addison DeWitt : Now we must join our sunburned eager beaver.

• Eve : What a day. What a heavenly day!

  Addison DeWitt : D-day.

  Eve : Just like it.

  Addison DeWitt : And tomorrow morning, you will have won your beachhead on the shores of immortality.

  Eve : Stop rehearsing your column.

• Addison DeWitt : I had lunch with Karen not three hours ago. As always with women who try to find out things, she told more than she learnt.

• Addison DeWitt : Your name is not Eve Harrington. It's Gertrude Slescynski.

  Eve : What of it?

• Eve : It'll be a night to remember. It'll bring me everything I've ever wanted. The end of an old road, the beginning of a new one.

  Addison DeWitt : All paved with diamonds and gold?

  Eve : You know me better than that.

  Addison DeWitt : Paved with what, then?

  Eve : Stars.