Robert Benchley Quotes in The Reluctant Dragon (1941)

[after watching a sound effects recording session for a cartoon train]

Doris: How did you like it?

Robert Benchley: Oh, fine, fine. Only after all, wouldn't it be a lot easier just to wreck a real train?

Robert Benchley: [about Donald Duck; chuckling] He kills me. Only I can't understand a thing he says.

Robert Benchley: Very good. I like the way you handle that fowl language.

Clarence Nash: [as Donald Duck] Foul language? Why the very idea!

[first lines]

Mrs. Benchley: [Reading] "So they set off up the hill, arm in arm, the knight, the dragon, and the boy. The lights in the little village began to go out one by one."

[Is interrupted by a toy rifle going off]

Mrs. Benchley: "But there were stars and a late moon as they climbed the downs together."

[Toy rifle again]

Mrs. Benchley: Robert, please.

[Pan to Robert Benchley lying on a raft in the pool, with the toy rifle]

Robert Benchley: Go on, I can hear in any position.

[Shoots a dart at a duck decoy in the pool]

Mrs. Benchley: [Continues reading] "And as they turned the last corner and disappeared from view, snatches of an old song were borne back on the night breeze. I can't be certain which of them was singing, but I think it was the dragon."

Robert Benchley: Go on, I'm listening.

Mrs. Benchley: That was the end, and a very lovely end, too.

Robert Benchley: Yeah, charming, charming. It's funny. No matter which way I aim, I always hit the same duck.

Mrs. Benchley: Robert, I have a wonderful idea. We'll sell this book to Walt Disney.

Robert Benchley: Well, you can't. It belongs to your nephew.

[Looks at rifle]

Robert Benchley: So does this, too. I wonder what he'd take for it.

Mrs. Benchley: I mean the idea, for a movie. I'm sure if you went to his studio and suggested it to him, he'd jump at it.

Robert Benchley: Me suggest a story to Walt Disney? Why, I hardly know him.

Mrs. Benchley: Well, you hardly knew me when you suggested marriage.

Robert Benchley: Yeah, look at the trouble I got into. He can't listen to every crackpot with a wild idea.

Mrs. Benchley: You might be the exception. All you would have to do would be to go to his studio and show him the book.

Robert Benchley: I wouldn't dream of it!

Mrs. Benchley: They're always open to new ideas. Get your things on, and stop shilly-shallying.

Robert Benchley: [Stands up on raft] I am not shillying and I am not shallying. But once and for all, I will not go to the studio. I will not make myself look ridiculous.

[Falls through]

Robert Benchley: [Bubbles come out of his mouth] And that's final.

Doris: [Holding up a cel of Bambi in front of her] Like it?

Robert Benchley: I'd be all right if you could get that reindeer out of the way.

Doris: I'll see if I can scare up the background that goes with it.

Robert Benchley: Nothing wrong with the one I just saw.

Doris: [a man hands her a painting] Thanks. This is his background. He fits right on top of it, like this. There.

Robert Benchley: And very cunning, too. I'd like to take him home with me.

[Bambi suddenly comes to life and hides behind a rock in the background]

Robert Benchley: What do you know? He took me seriously.

[Benchley is watching a camera man shooting cels of Donald Duck]

Robert Benchley: Yeah, but he still doesn't move.

Donald Duck: Just a minute, big boy. Give me time, give me time!

[Benchley laughs in astonishment]

Donald Duck: Look, I'll show ya. I'll show ya. Now look. First my foot is up here, see?

Robert Benchley: Uh-huh.

Donald Duck: Then, it's down here, understand?

Robert Benchley: Now I get it.

Donald Duck: Like this...

Robert Benchley: Yeah.

Donald Duck: And this...

Robert Benchley: I see.

Donald Duck: And that. See?

Robert Benchley: Sure.

Donald Duck: When I do it faster, I'm walking. Get it?

Robert Benchley: Yeah, certainly.

[last lines]

Mrs. Benchley: So while you were shilly-shallying, they made the picture. I never knew it to fail. In all the years that I've known you, you've always been too late. Really, Robert, I can't understand why you're forever letting these opportunities slip through your fingers. Anyone would've thought of it in time, months ago. But you...

[sighs]

Mrs. Benchley: Well, why don't you say something?

Robert Benchley: [as Donald Duck] Aw, phooey!

[quacking furiously]

Robert Benchley: Phooey!

[Robert Benchley and his wife are driving to the Disney studio]

Robert Benchley: It's a wild goose chase, that's what it is. I don't imagine he's out here in the first place.

Mrs. Benchley: Where else would he be?

Robert Benchley: You know these movie producers; New York, Saratoga, Palm Beach...

Mrs. Benchley: Hollywood.

Robert Benchley: You'd have to wear out a pretty large hole in your pocket to lose me, Mrs. Parker.

Dorothy Parker: I may have him mounted.

Robert Benchley: One would assume.

Dorothy Parker: It's as if I were a spoiled virgin, and no one will have me!

Robert Benchley: You're not spoiled. Just highly seasoned.