Paris Blues (1961)

Joanne Woodward: Lillian Corning

Photos 

Quotes 

• Ram Bowen : This romance is doomed.

  Lillian Corning : Why?

  Ram Bowen : You get up too early.

• Lillian Corning : Well, a vacation certainly goes awfully fast, doesn't it, when you're having a good time. I want to do something, though. I'd like to give you a going away present. You may not like it, but I don't care. It's just this: You're never gonna forget me. You're gonna walk down the street of wherever you happen to be, and you're gonna see me, even when you know I'm not there. And nobody in this whole world is ever going to be as right for you as I was. For 12 days, in Paris, in the Autumn. 'Cause that's been your gift to me.

• Ram Bowen : You just picked the wrong guy for what you wanted.

  Lillian Corning : Yeah?

  Ram Bowen : Yeah. I'm not on the market.

  Lillian Corning : I wasn't shopping.

• Ram Bowen : You just do anything I say, don't you?

  Lillian Corning : Well, I want to stay.

  Ram Bowen : You're a nut. Well, I ain't gettin' involved with no nut!

• Lillian Corning : You know something? Everybody is always waiting for everybody else to take a chance, because they're so afraid. Me, I'm more afraid of not taking a chance than taking it and getting

  [thumbs down] 

  Ram Bowen : Well, you can get kicked in the teeth that way.

  Lillian Corning : My brother's a dentist.

• Connie Lampson : So, you think it's all right for two girls to go out to a nightclub alone?

  Lillian Corning : Of course, this is Paris. Anything is all right.

• Connie Lampson : I know these jazz musicians. If we go tonight, he's gonna think we're eager.

  Lillian Corning : I suppose so. You know something?

  Connie Lampson : What?

  Lillian Corning : I am eager.

• Ram Bowen : Kid, you don't want me for what you want. Now, in the States, when you got nothing to do, maybe. But in Paris, I'd just be a waste of a good vacation. There are companies that take care of tourists. You know, I'm not the Travelers Aid.

  Lillian Corning : Well, I'm not looking for any help, so you don't have to worry about me.

  Ram Bowen : I'll tell you the truth, honey. I worry about me, not you.

  Lillian Corning : Honestly, you're in no danger from me.

  Ram Bowen : That phrase does not exist coming from a female, especially a female on a two-week vacation. It's like a job I had when I was a kid in camp. Boy, the dames just came up like sharks.

• Ram Bowen : What do you do with yourself? Back home, I mean.

  Lillian Corning : Small town, small job, small life.

• Lillian Corning : I can always eat. You wouldn't know it, but I eat like a horse.

  Ram Bowen : I'd know it.

  Lillian Corning : It shows?

  Ram Bowen : Not in public.

  Lillian Corning : Not in private, either.

  Ram Bowen : It's all right. I like a girl with a little, eh...

  Lillian Corning : A little what?

  [laughs] 

• Ram Bowen : You like this all the time?

  Lillian Corning : Like what?

  Ram Bowen : I don't know. In my league, the guy usually makes the pitch. You not only pitch, you pick up the bat and hit for one. You come on like this with all the guys?

  Lillian Corning : No. Only with the special ones.

• Lillian Corning : What's Paris Blues?

  Ram Bowen : Hey, you'd better get dressed.

  Lillian Corning : Do you write music, too?

  Ram Bowen : Honey, I live music. Morning, noon, the whole night. Everything else is just icing on the cake. You dig?

  Lillian Corning : I dig.

• Ram Bowen : Come on, let's cut out.

  Lillian Corning : Home?

  Ram Bowen : Yeah, home.

• Lillian Corning : It's such a crazy life.

  Eddie Cook : Yeah, well, that's because you're one of the day people. We are the night people and it's a whole different world.

• Lillian Corning : You'd think he'd be exhausted after working all night.

  Eddie Cook : Not him. I've seen him go like this for a week. Ten days, just balling it up. And then.

  [collapses] 

• Lillian Corning : There's not much time.

  Ram Bowen : There's time enough.

  Lillian Corning : Friday is so close.

  Ram Bowen : We got time for a cup of coffee?

  Lillian Corning : It's just that all these mornings I've watched you sleeping and I've cleaned the apartment and I've made coffee, and I haven't done that for a man in a long time.

  Ram Bowen : What do you want to do, wrap me up and take me home? How are you gonna declare me at Customs? A souvenir of Paris?

• Lillian Corning : What did we come to Paris for? To be run out of town by two kooks just because we got our feelings hurt?

• Ram Bowen : I got no time for what you want.

  Lillian Corning : I want you. And I think you want me.

• Lillian Corning : I want. I'm no martyr. I want you.