- Calvero: What do you want meaning for? Life is a desire, not a meaning. Desire is the theme of all life! It makes a rose want to be a rose and want to grow like that. And a rock want to contain itself and remain like that.
- Calvero: I believe I'm dying, doctor. Maybe, I don't know. I've died so many times.
- Dr. Blake - Calvero's Doctor: Are you in pain?
- Calvero: No more.
- Terry: What is there to fight for?
- Calvero: Ah, you see, you admit it. What is there to fight for? Everything! Life itself, isn't that enough? To be lived, suffered, enjoyed! What is there to fight for? Life is a beautiful, magnificent thing, even to a jellyfish. Huh, what is there to fight for? Besides, you - you have your art, your dancing!
- Terry: I can't dance without legs!
- Calvero: I know a man without arms who can play a scherzo on a violin and does it all with his toes. The trouble is you won't fight! You've given in, continually dwelling on sickness and death. But - there's something just as inevitable as death, and that's life. Life, life, life! Think of the power that's in the universe, moving the earth, growing the trees. That's the same power within you if you only have courage and the will to use it!
- Calvero: I'm through clowning. Life isn't a gag anymore. I can't see the joke. From now on, I'm a retired humorist.
- Calvero: What a day! The sun's shining, the kettle's singing, *and* we've paid the rent. There's going to be an earthquake, I know it, I know it, I know it.
- Calvero: We'll have to get you well! It isn't the ideal spot for convalescing, but you're welcome to it. That is, if you can put up with being Mrs. Calvero. Of course, in name only!
- Terry: Won't it inconvenience you?
- Calvero: Not at all! I've had five wives already, one more or less makes no difference to me. Moreover, I've arrived at the age where a platonic friendship can be sustained on the highest moral plane.
- [last lines]
- Calvero: Where is she? I want to see her dance.
- Postant: Bring the - bring the couch into the wings.
- Dr. Blake - Calvero's Doctor: I must see about that ambulance.
- Terry: Why didn't you let me die?
- Calvero: Are you in pain? That's all that matters. The rest is fantasy. Billions of years it's taken to evolve human consciousness and you want to wipe it out. Wipe out the miracle of all existence. More important than anything in the whole universe! What can the stars do? Nothing! But sit on their axis! And the sun, shooting flames 280,000 miles high. So what? Wasting all its natural resources. Can the sun think? Is it conscious? No, but you are!
- [notices Terry has fallen asleep]
- Calvero: Pardon me, my mistake.
- Calvero: I want to forget the public.
- Terry: Never. You love them too much.
- Calvero: I'm not so sure. Maybe I love them, but I don't admire them.
- Terry: I think you do.
- Calvero: As individuals, yes. There's greatness in everyone. But as a crowd, they're like a monster without a head that never knows which way it's going to turn. It can be prodded in any direction.
- Terry: It's more than pity. It's something I've lived with, grown to. It's his soul, his sweetness, his sadness. Nothing will ever separate me from that.
- Calvero: They walked out on me. They haven't done that since I was a beginner. The cycle's complete.
- Mrs. Alsop: She's not going back to her old room!
- Calvero: Well then, she'll just have to stay where she is.
- Mrs. Alsop: What? And scandalize my whole household?
- Calvero: What's the difference? We could be man and wife for all anyone knows.
- Mrs. Alsop: Oh, could you? Well, you'd better not be. You'd better get rid of her and quick too. Man and wife! You watch out for that hussy. She's no good.
- Calvero: The meaning of anything is merely other words for the same thing. After all, a rose is a rose is a rose. It's not bad. It should be quoted.
- Calvero: As a man gets on in years he wants to live deeply. A feeling of sad dignity comes upon him, and that's fatal for a comic. It affected my work. I lost contact with the audience, couldn't warm up to them.
- Calvero: [drunkenly] Yes, I shouldn't drink. It's bad for the heart. What about the mind? I suppose that should be clear and alert so I can contemplate the future. The prospects of joining those gray-haired nymphs that sleep on the Thames embankment at night.
- Calvero: All the world's a stage. And this one is the most legitimate. However, I must get on, otherwise, my confrères will think I've run off with the takings.
- Calvero: [dream sequence, performing on stage] My ode to a worm. Oh worm, why do you turn into the earth from me? 'Tis Spring! Oh worm! Lift up your head, Whichever end that be, And smile at the sun, Untwine your naked form, And with your tail, fling! High the dirt in ecstasy! 'Tis Spring! 'Tis Spring! 'Tis Spring!
- Calvero: We're all grubbing for a living, the best of us. All a part of the human crusade, written in water.
- Calvero: Well, you've done it. How's it feel to wake up famous? That's right, have a good cry and enjoy it. It only happens once.
- Terry: Cheer up. Look! The dawn is breaking. Oh, that's a good omen. I know it. It will be. It must be!