Woman Chases Man (1937)

Miriam Hopkins: Virginia Travis

Photos 

Quotes 

• Virginia Travis : I know what you're thinking. That I'm a girl. Yes, Mr Nolan, but I've a man's courage, a man's vision, a man's attack.

  B.J. Nolan : Well, don't attack me.

  Virginia Travis : For seven years I've studied like a man, researched like a man. There's nothing feminine about my mind. Seven years ago I gave up a perfectly nice engagement with a charming, wealthy old man because I chose a practical career. I left him at the church to become an architect. Now, I'm ready and he's dead.

• B.J. Nolan : What's the matter with your mouth?

  Virginia Travis : Hmm?

  B.J. Nolan : Take a look in the mirror.

  Virginia Travis : Lipstick, huh?

  [looks in the mirror, sees her expression as if she were talking out of one side of her mouth] 

  Virginia Travis : Oh, it's a habit I got into when I was an usher at the Casino Theater. They only showed gangster G-Men pictures and I saw so many of them I got to talking out of the side of my mouth like this. Only the manager of the theater, he talked out of the left side of his mouth like this and Judy and I talked out of the right sides of our mouths like this. And one day he came up and he said, "What do you girls think you're doing, mimicking me?" And Judy said, "No, Mr Shelby, we're only talking," and I said, "Honest, Mr Shelby. I mean honest, Mr. Shelby, we're only talking." He said, "You're fired! You're both fired!"

  B.J. Nolan : Wait! Wait!

  Virginia Travis : Well, about that time, Hunk came up. He was the ticket taker. Only, he was studying to be a construction engineer and he socked Mr. Shelby and we all landed in the park. And that's how I got in the habit of talking out the side of my mouth like this.

  B.J. Nolan : I see.

  Virginia Travis : But it was a lucky day after all; because, Hunk and Judy decided then and there to get married, because two can starve as cheaply as one.

• B.J. Nolan : I'll turn you over my knee and spank you.

  Virginia Travis : Mr Nolan! You're not the BJ Nolan I expected to work for.

• Virginia Travis : I'm sorry. I'm going. But this last noodle goes with me.

  [picks up a long noodle, holds it over her head, opens her mouth, sticks out her tongue, feeds herself the noodle] 

  B.J. Nolan : You finish your noodle. You're going home with me.

• Virginia Travis : He won't lend you the money anyway as long as he knows you want it. So, you must make him think you don't want it. If you were a woman, you'd know that.

  B.J. Nolan : I thought you had a man's mind.

  Virginia Travis : Of course, but, I think like a woman when I have to.

• Virginia Travis : BJ will cook, you two will serve, and I'll help eat.

• Virginia Travis : You're an old crud.

  B.J. Nolan : What?

  Virginia Travis : A crud.

  B.J. Nolan : What's a crud?

  Virginia Travis : An old man who puts shoes on backwards and crawls round on newspapers.

  B.J. Nolan : Yeah? Well, you're a flab.

  Virginia Travis : What's a flab?

  B.J. Nolan : A young snip who climbs ladders upside down blindfolded.

  Virginia Travis : Hooray, this is fun! Isn't it fun? Don't you like me? I like you. Well, what can we lose?

• Virginia Travis : Beat it, BJ!

• B.J. Nolan : He'll be a different man. A happy man.

  Virginia Travis : All right, BJ. We'll try. For his sake.

• Kenneth Nolan : My father, God bless him, is a bit of a screwball.

  Virginia Travis : What? Is he really screwy?

  Kenneth Nolan : I didn't say "screwy". I said "screwball".

• Virginia Travis : Hunk, run down to the store and get 13 cents worth of ham.

• B.J. Nolan : I haven't always been a helpless old man. He told you of the money I lost. Did he tell you of the money I made?

  Virginia Travis : You made?

  B.J. Nolan : I made a million in Florida! My wife dragged a half million for a rainy day. I made another million in Oklahoma and my wife dragged another half a million for another rainy day. Two million dollars! And now when It's finally raining, my son's got the only umbrella.

• Kenneth Nolan : Do you look at everybody like that or just me?

  Virginia Travis : What?

  Kenneth Nolan : You know you ought to do something about your eyes.

  Virginia Travis : My eyes?

  Kenneth Nolan : Yes. You shouldn't look at young men like that.

• Virginia Travis : Do you like to walk up an escalator that's going down?

  Kenneth Nolan : Why yes, I do! Do you like to hold your breath in the bathtub?

  Virginia Travis : This is uncanny. Do you like to read backwards to yourself?

  Kenneth Nolan : Why yes! I recite the alphabet backwards. Z-Y-X-W-V-U-T-S-R-Q.

• Virginia Travis : Oh, don't you feel in a mood?

  Kenneth Nolan : Yes. I - I feel in a mood; but, I don't know exactly what it is.

• Kenneth Nolan : Gosh almighty.

  Virginia Travis : Gosh almighty, me too.

• Virginia Travis : Yoo Hoo.

  Kenneth Nolan : Yoo Hoo.

  Virginia Travis : Yoo Hoo!

  Kenneth Nolan : Yoo Hoo.

  Virginia Travis : Yoo Hoo.

  Kenneth Nolan : Yoo Hoo. Yoo Hoo. Yoo Hoo. Yoo Hoo.

  [opens the door, surprised to see Nina] 

  Kenneth Nolan : Oh, you.

• Kenneth Nolan : Virginia, are you all right?

  Virginia Travis : Boy, oh boy, oh boy.

  Kenneth Nolan : Well, now, you just get a good night's sleep and you'll feel fine in the morning.

  Virginia Travis : Tuck me in.

  [Kenneth tucks and turns out the light] 

• Virginia Travis : First, I've got to save him from that woman. And then I'll save him from himself.

• Virginia Travis : [drunkenly]  You don't know, Kenleth. You *just* don't know. You don't know how you feel. And you don't know how I feel. Specially, you don't know how I feel that I can't remember what I was going to tell you.

• Kenneth Nolan : People don't know what they're missing, staying out of trees.

  Virginia Travis : Monkeys know.

• Virginia Travis : Is somebody else coming?

  Kenneth Nolan : I didn't invite anybody else. Did you?

  Virginia Travis : Only you.

  Kenneth Nolan : Only us. And a tree. All night. Ah, we'll build a new world of our own. And the sun of a new day will rise on that new earth. We'll be Adam and Eve in a tree!

  Virginia Travis : Adam and Eve.

  [smiles, closes her eyes, snuggles up to Kenneth] 

• Virginia Travis : It looks pretty hanging there.

  Kenneth Nolan : Mighty pretty, mighty pretty. Yeah. Very pretty, very pretty. Mighty pretty, mighty pretty. It certainly does.

• Kenneth Nolan : You know, you're the first night tree climber I ever saw.

  Virginia Travis : Oh, anybody can climb a tree in the daytime.