Private Lives Quotes

Amanda: I think very few people are completely normal really, deep down in their private lives. It all depends on a combination of circumstances. If all the various cosmic thingummys fuse at the same moment, and the right spark is struck, there's no knowing what one mightn't do. That was the trouble with Elyot and me, we were like two violent acids bubbling about in a nasty little matrimonial bottle.

Movie: Private Lives
Amanda: I was brought up to believe it was beyond the pale for a man to strike a woman.
Elyot: A very poor tradition. Certain women should be struck regularly, like gongs.

Movie: Private Lives
Amanda: I was brought up to believe it was beyond the pale for a man to strike a woman.

Elyot: A very poor tradition. Certain women should be struck regularly, like gongs.

Movie: Private Lives
Amanda: Extraordinary how potent cheap music is.

Movie: Private Lives
Amanda: I was brought up to believe it was beyond the pale for a man to strike a woman.

Elyot: A very poor tradition. Certain women should be struck regularly, like gongs.

Movie: Private Lives
Amanda: I think very few people are completely normal really, deep down in their private lives. It all depends on a combination of circumstances. If all the various cosmic thingummys fuse at the same moment, and the right spark is struck, there's no knowing what one mightn't do. That was the trouble with Elyot and me, we were like two violent acids bubbling about in a nasty little matrimonial bottle.

Movie: Private Lives
Amanda: Extraordinary how potent cheap music is.

Movie: Private Lives
Amanda: Have you known her long?

Elyot: About four months, we met in a house party in Norfolk.

Amanda: Very flat, Norfolk.

Movie: Private Lives
Amanda: Have you known her long?

Elyot: About four months, we met in a house party in Norfolk.

Amanda: Very flat, Norfolk.

Movie: Private Lives
Chris Nadeau: What are you thinking?

Pippa Lee: I was just thinking that you seem like...

Chris Nadeau: What?

Pippa Lee: ...Just that you seem, you seem so bright.

Pippa Lee: It's a pity you never settled on any real work. It would make your life so much easier.

Chris Nadeau: Okay. Well, thank you...

Pippa Lee: I didn't mean to offend you.

Chris Nadeau: I suggest that you go back to that little life you've puffed up for yourself. I'm sure you're very happy underneath all that anxiety.

Pippa Lee: You're right. You know, you... you are an asshole.

Chris Nadeau: Told you.

Movie: Private Lives
Elyot: What are you doing here?

Amanda: I'm on my honeymoon.

Elyot: Hope you're enjoying it.

Amanda: It hasn't started yet.

Elyot: Neither has mine.

Movie: Private Lives
Elyot: What are you doing here?

Amanda: I'm on my honeymoon.

Elyot: Hope you're enjoying it.

Amanda: It hasn't started yet.

Elyot: Neither has mine.

Movie: Private Lives
Elyot Chase: You don't hold any mystery for me darling; do you mind? There isn't a part of you I don't know, remember, and want.

Movie: Private Lives
Elyot Chase: You don't hold any mystery for me darling; do you mind? There isn't a part of you I don't know, remember, and want.

Movie: Private Lives
Pippa Lee: What made you lose your faith?

Chris Nadeau: I just stopped believing God was a mystery you could nail down with one book.

Movie: Private Lives
Pippa Lee: [after leaving hospital where her adulterous husband who wanted a divorce has been declared brain-dead, she is sitting in bed with Chris, eating french fries after having climbed through his window] So... it's official, nobody needs me anymore.

Movie: Private Lives
Queen Elizabeth I: And when he takes you in his arms again, thank heaven you are not a queen.

Mistress Margaret Radcliffe: But I thought to be a queen...

Queen Elizabeth I: To be a Queen is to be less than human, to put pride before desire, to search Men's hearts for tenderness, and find only ambition. To cry out in the dark for one unselfish voice, to hear only the dry rustle of papers of state. To turn to one's beloved with stars for eyes and have him see behind me only the shadow of the executioner's block. A queen has no hour for love, time presses, and events crowd upon her, and her shell, an empty glittering husk, she must give up all the a woman holds most dear.

Movie: Private Lives
Queen Elizabeth I: ...the necessities of a queen must transcend those of a woman.

Movie: Private Lives
Queen Elizabeth I: ...the necessities of a queen must transcend those of a woman.

Movie: Private Lives
Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex: And now, may I go? This dying sticks in my mind and makes me poor company.

Movie: Private Lives
Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex: And now, may I go? This dying sticks in my mind and makes me poor company.

Movie: Private Lives
Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex: [after being slapped hard by Queen Elizabeth I] I would not have taken that from your father the King; much less will I take it from a king in petticoats!

Movie: Private Lives
Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex: [after being slapped hard by Queen Elizabeth I] I would not have taken that from your father the King; much less will I take it from a king in petticoats!

Movie: Private Lives
Sam Shapiro: [beginning of film: toasting Herb at dinner party] I have known Pippa Lee for 25 years and I think that I will really ever know her. She is a mystery... an enigma... giving, caring, beautiful, intelligent... the very icon of an artist's wife.

Movie: Private Lives
Sam Shapiro: Writers are vampires. I'm waiting for the right girl to come along and make me a human being.

Movie: Private Lives