A Nero Wolfe Mystery (TV Series)

The Next Witness (2002)

Maury Chaykin: Nero Wolfe

Photos 

Quotes 

• Archie Goodwin : By 8 o'clock Wolfe had put away three orders of chili con carne at a little dump in Harlem, where a guy named Dixie knew how to make it.

  Nero Wolfe : Chili is one of the great peasant foods. It is one of the few contributions America has to world cuisine. Eaten with corn bread, sweet onion, sour cream, it contains all five of the elements deemed essential by the sages of the Orient: sweet, sour, salty, pungent, and bitter. It begins...

• D.A. Mandelbaum : Did Leonard Ashe say anything else to you?

  [pause as Wolfe is contemplating his answer] 

  D.A. Mandelbaum : Mr. Wolfe?

  Nero Wolfe : I would like to be sure I understand the question. Do you mean, what he said that day, or on a later occasion?

  D.A. Mandelbaum : That day, of course. But... what other occasion?

  Nero Wolfe : Are you asking me?

  D.A. Mandelbaum : In your deposition, you swore you hadn't met Leonard Ashe before or after July 13th.

  Nero Wolfe : That was true then. We met again.

  D.A. Mandelbaum : When?

  Nero Wolfe : In this building at half past eight this morning.

  D.A. Mandelbaum : You met and spoke with the defendant in this building at half past eight this morning, today?

  Nero Wolfe : His wife arranged to see him, and she allowed me to accompany her.

  D.A. Mandelbaum : Was Mr. Donovan, the defense counsel, present?

  Nero Wolfe : No,sir.

  Jimmy Donovan : Your Honor, I would like to state for the record that I knew nothing of this.

  D.A. Mandelbaum : Don't you know that it's a misdemeanor for a witness for the state to speak with a defendant charged with a felony?

  Nero Wolfe : We didn't discuss my testimony.

  D.A. Mandelbaum : What did you discuss?

  Nero Wolfe : Matters which I thought would be of interest to him.

  D.A. Mandelbaum : What exactly did you say, Mr. Wolfe?

  Archie Goodwin : *narrating* The fat son of a gun had put it over. Having asking him directly, Mandelbaum couldn't possibly keep Wolfe's theories from the jury unless Jimmy Donovan was a sap.

  Judge Corbett : Do you wish to withdraw the question, Mr. Mandelbaum?

  D.A. Mandelbaum : Oh, no, no, no, no, no. I'm absolutely fascinated, you didn't discuss your testimony, what did you discuss?

• Nero Wolfe : [demanding to know about the Van Gogh painting on the wall]  I'm the inquisator, Miss Hart, not you! Where did you get that piece?

  Alice Hart : That's none of yer business!

  Nero Wolfe : [indignantly]  It most certainly is not, but I will tell you that there will be no limit to my impertinence with you!

• Nero Wolfe : We can't be expected until we arrive.