New Orleans (1947)

Arturo de Córdova: Nick Duquesne

Quotes 

• Miralee Smith : And now I know the King of Basin Street. May I visit you?

  Mrs. Rutledge Smith : Miralee...

  Colonel McArdle : Young ladies of quality don't visit Basin Street.

  Nick Duquesne : Perhaps the Colonel will bring you along on one of his slumming parties.

• Nick Duquesne : While Dr. Jekyll conducts the classics in the concerts, Mr. Hyde comes down to Basin Street to play ragtime. Is it to get away from something?

  Henry Ferber : Maybe it's to - come back to something.

• Nick Duquesne : I suppose you think ragtime is all right as long as its locked up down here.

  Henry Ferber : No, that's the trouble. You can't lock it up. It leaks through everywhere. It's as though I caught some virus. Except that a virus makes one ill and this music doesn't make me ill. It makes me feel very well!

• Miralee Smith : Basin Street! What a wonderful street to be King of.

  Nick Duquesne : But, there's an ugly and sordid side of Basin Street too.

  Miralee Smith : From who's point of view?

  Nick Duquesne : Sometimes, even from mine.

• Mrs. Rutledge Smith : I'd like to give you a chance to get even.

  Nick Duquesne : Trying to get even has ruined many a man.

• Miralee Smith : Why, they almost make their instruments talk. Where does such music come from?

  Nick Duquesne : Well, it came from - Miss Smith, you're going home.

  Miralee Smith : Not until you tell me.

  Nick Duquesne : Well, it comes from work song, Gold Coast of west Africa, little Christian churches, river boats.

  Miralee Smith : You want to make up words to it as you go along.

  Nick Duquesne : They made up the music as they went along.

  Miralee Smith : Mr. Duquesne, why don't we hear more of this kind of music?

  Nick Duquesne : There's a wall around it, Miss Smith. A big, invisible wall you can't climb over.

  Miralee Smith : But why? Because it's new? All the wonderful music I've been singing is so traditional now. It was new once too. Well, it sprang up in so many places that I've been learning to make it mine. But this! This music's mine already. Oh, Nick, I feel I'm exactly where I want to be and on my way to where I want to go, for the first time in my life.

• Mrs. Rutledge Smith : I'll return this money if you will promise to discourage my daughter's interest in you.

  Nick Duquesne : Interests in me?

  Mrs. Rutledge Smith : When I learned she'd been down here last night, she quite frankly admitted it. Apparently you were more successful in attracting her than I thought you'd be.

  Nick Duquesne : Well, that's quite flattering, Mrs. Smith, but, I'm sure its the music here that interests her.

  Mrs. Rutledge Smith : One is just as distasteful to me as the other, Mr. Duquesne. I have plans for Miralee, and they do not include this kind of music or it's environment.

• Miralee Smith : Am I being - bounced?

  Nick Duquesne : Deported.

• Nick Duquesne : How's the newspaper business, Miss Vigil?

  Constance Vigil : Fine. I'm surprised you recognized me.

  Nick Duquesne : I make it my business to know everyone who comes here.

  Constance Vigil : Well, aren't you going to eject me from your...

  Nick Duquesne : Quagmire of corruption?

  Constance Vigil : You have me at a disadvantage.

  Nick Duquesne : Not at all. A good host always makes his guests feel at home.

• Nick Duquesne : Don't let that music go to your head.

  Miralee Smith : Oh, it isn't only the music, Nick, and it doesn't go to my head.

• Nick Duquesne : Miralee, do you know why I took you on that little tour?

  Miralee Smith : You didn't want me to have any illusions about you. Well, I haven't.

  Nick Duquesne : Think it over carefully Miralee. From my point of view, I'm a reckless, unscrupulous, man. I'm older than you. Experienced.

  Miralee Smith : With women, I suppose. If you, a notorious Don Juan, were to snare an innocent little girl, the whole thing would look sordid.

  Nick Duquesne : Now, wouldn't it?

  Miralee Smith : But, if a rich, young heiress, talented, with the world at her feet, throws her life away on some society chump...

  Nick Duquesne : And it turned out that she was happy. And then lived like other people - only better.

  Miralee Smith : That ought to be sung to music from "La Tosca".

  [kiss] 

• Nick Duquesne : The order was supposed to delivered this morning.

  Blonde Cashier : Well, now, what kind of toys was it? Balloons? Marbles? Monkeys-on-a-Stick?

  Nick Duquesne : Can the stalling. When do I get that gambling equipment.

  Blonde Cashier : Gambling equipment? I'll have you know this is the Biff Lewis Enterprise. We don't handle no unlegal merchandise.

  Nick Duquesne : Oh, I get it. No tables. No wheels. No layout. Not for Nick Duquesne. Right?

  Blonde Cashier : Anything else you wish?

  Nick Duquesne : Yeah, that you were a man.

• Louis Armstrong : We shore on our way, boss.

  Nick Duquesne : Give 'em what they want, Satchmo. From you men from New Orleans, they turned you into missionaries. Go to it, Satchmo. Convert the Philistines!

• Nick Duquesne : It seems I left everything in New Orleans, including my credit.

  Louis Armstrong : You're credit is good with me. That is if I ever get something for you to use it on.

  Nick Duquesne : Well, its a far cry from the Orpheum Cabaret.

  Louis Armstrong : Don't you worry, boss. It won't be long before you the King of Chicago.

• Nick Duquesne : How did you know where to find us?

  Drummer : We heard Satchmo's horn wafting through the town. So, we jes followed dem notes.

  Louis Armstrong : I was callin' the childr'n back home.

• Drunk : Jazz it up, boys! Jazz it up.

  Nick Duquesne : What did you say?

  Drunk : Jazz it up, boys! Jazz it up.

• Nick Duquesne : Every spot in the country wants you.

  Woody Herman : Every spot?

  Nick Duquesne : Every spot but that one. Don't worry, fella. You're gonna play jazz in Symphony Hall if it's the last thing I ever do. It'll work out some way.

  Woody Herman : I'm sure it will.