- Eric Morecambe: Was it dark?
- Ernie Wise: Was what dark?
- Eric Morecambe: Hiding in Churchill's cigar box until the War was over.
- [Arthur is being carried off stage]
- Ernie Wise: Poor Arthur.
- Eric Morecambe: He must've tripped over Des O'Connor.
- [Eric and Ernie have just done their first television show and it has received very poor newspaper reviews. Even Eric's mother thinks it was a disaster]
- Sadie Bartholomew: [shouting] I can't show me face outside the house! I think we're going to have to move! I told you time and time again to trust your own material! I drummed it into you! And what do you do the moment me back's turned? You forget *everything*!
- [Eric walks off and finds his dad sitting alone]
- Eric Morecambe: Can I borrow your bike?
- George Bartholomew: Where are you planning on going?
- Eric Morecambe: Anywhere that they don't have televisions.
- George Bartholomew: You could try Barrow-on-Furness. You'll soon be back - people'll forget.
- Eric Morecambe: They won't forget this.
- [Eric shows George a newspaper cutting of a TV critic's article]
- Eric Morecambe: Here, read that.
- George Bartholomew: "Definition of a TV - the box they buried Morecambe and Wise in last night". You know what I think. There's nothing harder to find than yesterday's paper.
- [Eric and his mother discuss the disastrous TV series]
- Sadie Bartholomew: How long are you going to keep this up - this sulking malarkey. You used to sulk when I made you wear that schoolboy outfit - right up till when it got you a big laugh.
- Eric Morecambe: Television isn't about dressing up as a schoolboy and singing, you know.
- Sadie Bartholomew: Well it certainly isn't about being funny. Not if what I saw you two do is anything to go by.
- Eric Morecambe: [sarcastically] Don't go easy on me just because we're related, will you.
- Sadie Bartholomew: I don't know how to soft-pedal - it's not in me nature.
- Eric Morecambe: You don't have to tell me that.
- Sadie Bartholomew: I'm hard on you because you and Ernie are better than that. When I saw you on that television show, doing that *tripe*... Biggest break? Your chance? You forgot everything. You and Ernie *know* what's funny. You know what plays funny, you know what tells funny. You must have known deep-down that material was not funny.
- Eric Morecambe: What d'you want me to say?
- Sadie Bartholomew: You could start by telling me I'm right.
- [Ernie is lost for words. He knows his mother is right but he can't admit it]
- Eric Morecambe: I'm sorry if you feel we've let you down.
- Sadie Bartholomew: I'll get over it. Will you?
- [Eric's mother is pushing him into a career as a dancer, but his heart isn't in it. He has just won a children's talent competition doing an embarrassing song-and-dance routine]
- George Bartholomew: [conspiratorially, to Eric] Never mind, son. Happen you'll lose next time.
- Sadie Bartholomew: [grimly] I heard that!
- [Eric has just learned that he has won the Jack Hylton audition and will be taking part in the "Youth Takes a Bow" stage show, touring the country alongside Ernie Wise]
- Young Eric: Touring the country? When will I see my mates?
- Sadie Bartholomew: You'll make new mates - Variety mates - mates with a bit of something about them.
- Young Eric: I don't want Variety mates. I've got a gang here - *and* an air-gun!
- Sadie Bartholomew: Eric, d'you want to be tied to a whistle all your life, like your dad?
- Young Eric: Well...
- Sadie Bartholomew: Eric, listen to me. You make people laugh, you're a lovely dancer, and you can hold a tune. But *more* than that, and I mean this as the mother who carried you and nursed you and raised you, you aren't any good at anything else.
- [Sadie is searching frantically under the bed and emerges holding a suitcase full of papers]
- George Bartholomew: What the bloody hell are you doing?
- Sadie Bartholomew: Finding them new material. I'll get Eric to go round to Ernie's tomorrow. Bash their heads together.
- George Bartholomew: No, Sadie!
- Sadie Bartholomew: What do you mean, "no"? Push, push, push. That's what I do. It's what our Eric needs.
- George Bartholomew: Well maybe it's time you stopped pushing.
- Sadie Bartholomew: You saying I pushed him into it?
- George Bartholomew: Nobody's saying that, Sadie. You were right to push him and I'm glad you did. But... what I saying is... *He's* got to do the pushing now. *He's* got to go down to Ernie. He's got to do it for himself. He's got to *want* to do it himself.
- Sadie Bartholomew: Well, beggar me! You don't put your foot down for twenty-five years of married life, and when you finally do, you're wrong!
- [following their notorious TV show, Morecambe and Wise are now being placed *lower* on theatre bills than they were beforehand]
- Ernie Wise: [ironically] Fourth on the bill. That's the magic of television.
- Usherette: So, what went wrong with the telly show, lads?
- Eric Morecambe: Scripts, cast, music, director, lighting.
- Usherette: Apart from that, it were great, eh?
- [Sadie has turned up at the theatre without a ticket]
- Sadie Bartholomew: I'm Eric Morecambe's mother.
- Usherette: I'm afraid I can't let you in without a ticket.
- Sadie Bartholomew: I don't need a ticket - I'm his *mother*.
- Usherette: How do *I* know that?
- Sadie Bartholomew: Did you see their television show? D'you think I'd own up to that if it wasn't true.
- Little Eric: [pretending he got shot and is about to die, his mother standing next to him] Ma. I can see Ma!
- Sadie Bartholomew: And she's not laughing.
- Little Eric: Just entertaining the lads.
- Sadie Bartholomew: I'll entertain you in a minute!
- Sadie Bartholomew: You can't play Cowboys and Indians all your life.
- Little Eric: Can't I?
- Sadie Bartholomew: Home! Now! Or you'll be late for your dance class.