Trivia and Quotes
Quotes
 Aunt Abby: Now Mortimer, you behave. You`re too old to be flying off the handle like this! Dr. Einstein: Johnny, why did you kill that man? He was being nice to us and gave us a ride.
Jonathan Brewster: He said I looked like Boris Karloff!
Jonathan Brewster: Teddy, I think it`s time for you to go to bed.
Teddy Brewster: I beg your pardon. Who are you?
Jonathan Brewster: I`m Woodrow Wilson. Go to bed!
Teddy Brewster: No, you`re not Wilson, but you`re face is familiar. Let me see. You`re not anyone I know right now - perhaps later on my hunting trip. Yes, you look like someone I might meet in the jungle.
Jonathan Brewster: The home of my youth... As a child, I wanted to escape it. Now, I want to escape back into it.
Mortimer Brewster: Certainly there are thirteen bodies in the cellar and there are hundreds more in the attic!
Mortimer Brewster: Even the cat`s in on it!
Mortimer Brewster: Look, Aunt Martha, men don`t just get into window seats and die!
Abby Brewster: Of course not, dear. He died first.
Mortimer Brewster: But how?
Abby Brewster: The gentleman died because he drank some wine with poison in it. Now, I don`t know why you`re making such a big deal over this Mortimer. Don`t you worry about a thing!
Mortimer Brewster: You didn`t want the reverend to see the body?
Aunt Abby: Well, not at tea. That wouldn`t have been very nice.
Mortimer Brewster: [on the telephone] Yes, operator, I`d like the Happy Dale Sanatorium, Happy Dale, New York. Come on, operator, what`s taking so long? They`re just across the river. I could swim it faster! No, I don`t want the Happy Dale Laundry. I want the Happy Dale Sanatorium. Sanatorium, sanatorium, sanatorium. Yes, yes, like a broken record. Hello - what? They`re busy? Busy? Look, they`re busy and you`re dizzy. No, I am not drunk, madam, but you`ve given me an idea.
[throws down the phone in disgust]
Reporter: Seems like the same suckers get married everyday.
Aunt Martha: For a gallon of elderberry wine, I take one teaspoon full of arsenic, then add half a teaspoon full of strychnine, and then just a pinch of cyanide.
Mortimer Brewster: Hmm. Should have quite a kick.
Elaine Harper: Well, that`s a fine thing. We`re married one minute and you`re throwing me out of the house the next.
Mortimer Brewster: I am not throwing you out of the house, I am not throwing you out of the house, I am not throwing you out of the house. Will you get out of here?
[pushes her out and slams the door; Mr. Gibbs is standing on the porch holding a newspaper]
Elaine Harper: Well how do you like that...
Mr. Gibbs: I read that there was a room for rent here...
Elaine Harper: Oh, shut up!
Jonathan Brewster: We better not leave the car parked in the street. It might be against the law.
Martha Brewster: One of our gentlemen found time to say `How delicious!` before he died.
Mortimer Brewster: Aunt Abby, how can I believe you? There are twelve bodies in the cellar and you admit you poisoned them.
Aunt Abby Brewster: Yes, I did. But you don`t think I`d stoop to telling a fib.
Mortimer Brewster: Insanity runs in my family... It practically gallops.
Teddy Brewster: Mr. Witherfork!
Mr. Witherspoon: Spoon!
[Mortimer hands him a spoon]
[Elaine is impatient to leave on the honeymoon]
Elaine Harper: But, Mortimer - Niagara Falls.
Mortimer Brewster: It does? Well, let it.
[to Jonathan]
Mortimer Brewster: Where did you get that face? Hollywood?
[to Mortimer]
Elaine Harper: We were married today. We were going over Niagara Falls in a barrel. Your brother tries to kill me. A taxi is waiting and now you want to sleep on a window seat. You can take the honeymoon, your wedding ring, your taxi, your window seat, and put `em in a barrel and push `em all over Niagara Falls!
Dr. Einstein: At least people in plays act like they`ve got sense.
Mortimer Brewster: Oh, you think so? Did you ever see anybody in a play act like they got any intelligence?
Dr. Einstein: [agonizing] How can anybody be so stupid!
Elaine Harper: But Mortimer, you`re going to love me for my mind, too.
Mortimer Brewster: One thing at a time!
Mortimer Brewster: The name Brewster is code for Roosevelt.
Teddy Brewster: Code for Roosevelt?
Mortimer Brewster: Yes. Don`t you see? Take the name Brewster, take away the B, and what have you got?
Teddy Brewster: Rooster!
Mortimer Brewster: Uh-huh. And what does a rooster do?
Teddy Brewster: Crows.
Mortimer Brewster: It crows. And where do you hunt in Africa?
Teddy Brewster: On the veldt!
Mortimer Brewster: There you are: crows - veldt!
Teddy Brewster: Ingenious! My compliments to the boys in the code department.
Mortimer Brewster: This is developing into a very bad habit! I don`t know if I can explain it to you. It`s not only against the law, it`s wrong!
Mortimer Brewster: Yeah, yeah, I know that bromide. Something borrowed, something blue - old, new! Rice and old shoes, carry you over the threshold, Niagara Falls - all the silly tripe I`ve made fun of for years. Is this what I`ve come to? I can`t go through with it. I won`t marry you and that`s that!
Elaine Harper: [Adoring] Yes, Mortimer.
Mortimer Brewster: What do you mean, "Yes, Mortimer"? Aren`t you insulted? Aren`t you going to cry? Aren`t you going to make a scene?
Elaine Harper: [Adoring] No, Mortimer.
Mortimer Brewster: And don`t "No, Mortimer" me either! Don`t... Don`t you see, marriage is a superstition, it... It`s old-fashioned, it`s... I... Ohhhh...
[He kisses her and hauls her into the marriage license office]
Reverend Harper: Have you ever tried to persuade him that he wasn`t Teddy Roosevelt?
Abby Brewster: Oh, no.
Martha Brewster: Oh, he`s so happy being Teddy Roosevelt.
Abby Brewster: Oh... Do you remember, Martha, once, a long time ago, we thought if he`d be George Washington, it would be a change for him, and we suggested it.
Martha Brewster: And do you know what happened? He just stayed under his bed for days and wouldn`t be anybody.
Teddy Brewster: [His first line] I must be catching cold.
Abby Brewster: No, dear, it was Reverend Harper who sneezed.
[Discussing the body count]
Dr. Einstein: You got twelve, they got twelve.
[Angrily grabs Dr. Einstein`s necktie]
Jonathan Brewster: I`ve got thirteen!
Dr. Einstein: No, Johnny, twelve - don`t brag.
Jonathan Brewster: Thirteen! There`s Mr. Spinalzo and the first one in London, two in Johannesburg, one in Sydney, one in Melbourne, two in San Francisco, one in Phoenix, Arizona...
Dr. Einstein: Phoenix?
Jonathan Brewster: The filling station...
Dr. Einstein: Filling station? Oh!
[Slits throat]
Dr. Einstein: Yes.
Jonathan Brewster: Then three in Chicago and one in South Bend.
Dr. Einstein: You cannot count the one in South Bend. He died of pneumonia!
Jonathan Brewster: He wouldn`t have died of pneumonia if I hadn`t shot him!
Dr. Einstein: No, no, Johnny. You cannot count him. You got twelve, they got twelve. The old ladies is just as good as you are!
[last lines]
Mortimer Brewster: No, no. I`m not a Brewster. I`m the son of a sea-cook! Ha! Ha! Chaaaaarrrge!
[he runs off across the cemetary]
Cab Driver: And I`m not a cab driver, I`m a coffee pot!
[speaking of a character in a play he has seen]
Mortimer Brewster: He sits there just *waiting* to be trussed up and gagged!
[laughs]
Mortimer Brewster: The big dope!
Trivia
In the play, Mr. Witherspoon, the caretaker of Happydale Sanitarium, is himself poisoned with a glass of wine by the two aunts, but the censors forced the studio to change this because it would have meant that the two aunts would have gotten away with murder. However, Edward Everett Horton, who played Witherspoon in the movie, did pose for a publicity photograph with a glass of wine in his hand.
In the scene near the end of the film where Dr. Einstein (Peter Lorre) is pulling Mortimer Brewster (Cary Grant) down the stairs to try to get him out of the house before his brother Jonathan (Raymond Massey) can kill him, Grant ad-libs to Lorre, "Stop underplaying, I can`t understand you.
Mortimer`s repeated phrase at the end of the film declaring the secret of his birth was originally "I`m not a Brewster - I`m a bastard!" However, the censors demanded that it be changed, resulting in the phrase "I`m the son of a sea cook!"
According to various sources, Julius J. Epstein and Philip G. Epstein adapted the screenplay "with help" from Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse.
Arsenic and Old Lace opened at the Fulton Theater on January 10, 1941 and ran for 1444 performances. Jean Adair, John Alexander and Joesphine Hull reprise their roles in the movie.
Cary Grant considered his acting in this film to be horribly over the top and often called it his least favorite of all his movies.
Director Frank Capra enlisted in the U. S. Army Signal Corps in 1941 during filming. He received an extension of his order to report for active duty until late January 1942 so he could finish editing the picture.
Some 20 years before filming this movie, actress Jean Adair had helped to nurse a very sick vaudeville performer named Archie Leach back to health; by the time she was asked to reprise her Broadway "Arsenic and Old Lace" role as Aunt Martha for this film, Adair and Leach, now known as Cary Grant, were old friends.
The original Broadway play was very successful and ran for a record 1,444 performances in the early 1940s.
Ronald Reagan and Jack Benny were offered the role of Mortimer Brewster, but turned it down. Bob Hope was offered the part and was eager to do it but Paramount Pictures refused to loan him out to Warner Brothers for the project.
Cary Grant donated his entire salary, $100,000, to the U.S. War Relief Fund.
In "The Muppet Show: (#2.12)" (1977), a sketch called "Veterinarians` Hospital" makes a joke about Arsenic and Old Lace (1944): Nurse Janice: What do you think, Dr. Bob? Rolf: Simple, it`s arsenic poisoning. Janice: Arsenic? Rolf: Sure, just look at this old lace! Nurse Piggy: Arsenic and old lace? Dr. Bob, Dr. Bob, that`s an old show. Rolf: Well, that`s an old shoe! Janice: Well, that`s an old joke!
The film was made in 1941 but went unreleased for three years after it was completed, waiting for the Broadway play to finish its run. On stage, Boris Karloff played Raymond Massey`s character, Jonathan Brewster, who "looks like Karloff". Karloff was actually doing the stage play in New York during production of this film, so he was unable to do both.
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