Jack Lemmon movie quotes

“Failure seldom stops you. What stops you is the fear of failure.”
Jack Lemmon

“Death ends a life, not a relationship.”
Jack Lemmon

“- Jerry: We can't get married at all.
- Osgood Fielding III: Why not?
- Jerry: Well, in the first place, I'm not a natural blonde.
- Osgood Fielding III: Doesn't matter.
- Jerry: I smoke! I smoke all the time!
- Osgood Fielding III: I don't care.
- Jerry: Well, I have a terrible past. For three years now, I've been living with a saxophone...” (continue)(continue reading)
Jack Lemmon - Jerry
Joe E. Brown - Osgood Fielding III

“- Grandpa Gustafson: Last Thursday, I turned 95 years old. And I never exercised a day in my life. Every morning, I wake up, and I smoke a cigarette. And then I eat five strips of bacon. And for lunch, I eat a bacon sandwich. And for a midday snack?
- John Gustafson: Bacon.
- Grandpa Gustafson: Bacon!”
Burgess Meredith - Grandpa Gustafson
Jack Lemmon - John Gustafson

“- John Gustafson: Did you hear, someone moved into the old Klickner place? A woman.
- John Gustafson: Yeah.
- Grandpa Gustafson: Did you mount her?
- John Gustafson: Oh, Dad!
- Grandpa Gustafson: Well the woman, does she have big thighs?
- John Gustafson: No!
- Grandpa Gustafson: No? Then what's the problem? If I was a young fella like you, I'd...” (continue)(continue reading)
Jack Lemmon - John Gustafson
Burgess Meredith - Grandpa Gustafson

“Jack Lemmon - in.”
Jack Lemmon

“- C.C. Baxter: It's a wonderful thing, dinner for two.
- Fran Kubelik: Do you usually eat alone?
- C.C. Baxter: Oh no. Sometimes I have dinner with Ed Sullivan. Sometimes Dinah Shore, or Perry Como. The other night I had dinner with Mae West. Of course she was much younger then.”
Jack Lemmon - C.C. Baxter
Shirley MacLaine - Fran Kubelik

“- Margie MacDougall: Night like this, it sorta spooks you, walking into an empty apartment.
- C.C. Baxter: I said I had no family. I didn't say I had an empty apartment.”
Hope Holiday - Mrs. Margie MacDougall
Jack Lemmon - C.C. Baxter

“- C.C. Baxter: The mirror... it's broken.
- Fran Kubelik: Yes, I know. I like it that way. Makes me look the way I feel.”
Jack Lemmon - C.C. Baxter
Shirley MacLaine - Fran Kubelik

“Miss Piggott! Please keep in mind that it's Sunday, and this is a Catholic country!”

Jack Lemmon - Wendell Armbruster, Jr.

“- J.J. Blodgett: We're appointing your father commercial attaché to the embassy in Rome, and that entitles him to all the rights and immunities of a diplomat.
- Wendell Armbruster: But wait a minute, we're going to appoint him...
- J.J. Blodgett: Why not?
- Wendell Armbruster: A dead man?
- J.J. Blodgett: Just proves that we don't...” (continue)(continue reading)
Edward Andrews - J.J. Blodgett
Jack Lemmon - Wendell Armbruster, Jr.

“- Wendell Armbruster: Is this how justice works in Italy?
- Carlo Carlucci: Shold we talk about Sacco and Vanzetti?”
Jack Lemmon - Wendell Armbruster, Jr.
Clive Revill - Carlo Carlucci

“- Pamela Piggott: I guess there is something to what it says in the tourist guide.
- Wendell Armbruster: What does it say?
- Pamela Piggott: It says Italy is not a country - it's an emotion.
- Wendell Armbruster: Well, it's certainly been an experience!”
Juliet Mills - Pamela Piggott
Jack Lemmon - Wendell Armbruster, Jr.

“- Carlo Carlucci: In Italy, the lunch hour is from one to four.
- Wendell Armbruster: Three hours for lunch?
- Carlo Carlucci: Mr. Armbruster. Here we do not rush to drugstore for chicken sandwich & Coca-Cola. Here, we take our time. We cook our pasta, we sprinkle our Parmigiano, we drink our wine, we make our love...
- Wendell Armbruster:...” (continue)(continue reading)
Clive Revill - Carlo Carlucci
Jack Lemmon - Wendell Armbruster, Jr.

“- Carlo Carlucci: While you are here, maybe you should take some mud baths.
- Wendell Armbruster: No thanks, I had one on the train.
- Carlo Carlucci: On the train?
- Wendell Armbruster: I drank it. They call it espresso.”
Clive Revill - Carlo Carlucci
Jack Lemmon - Wendell Armbruster, Jr.

“- President Russell P. Kramer: It's a kick in the balls. Sorry, sweetheart.
- Margaret Kramer: Please, I'm a politician's wife. I have a set of my own.”
Jack Lemmon - President Russell P. Kramer
Lauren Bacall - Margaret Kramer

“- Morrie Schwartz: My father was afraid of love. He couldn't give it and he couldn't receive it either. Maybe that's worse.
- Mitch Albom: Morrie, Morrie, we should stop.
- Morrie Schwartz: Not letting ourselves be loved because we're too afraid of giving ourselves to someone we might lose.”
Jack Lemmon - Morrie Schwartz
Hank Azaria - Mitch Albom

“Difficult? Yes. But she was a wonderful comedienne and she had a charisma like no-one before or since. She wasn’t that enormously talented, but her gift was knowing how to use the special kind of talent she had to great advantage.”
Jack Lemmon On Marilyn Monroe

“It's hard enough to write a good drama, it's much harder to write a good comedy, and it's hardest of all to write a drama with comedy. Which is what life is.”
Jack Lemmon

“Nobody deserves this much money - certainly not an actor.”
Jack Lemmon

“I won't quit until I get run over by a truck, a producer or a critic.”
Jack Lemmon

“If you really do want to be an actor who can satisfy himself and his audience, you need to be vulnerable.”
Jack Lemmon

“If you think it's hard to meet new people, try picking up the wrong golf ball.”
Jack Lemmon

“- Felix Ungar: How long was I asleep?
- Oscar Madison: I don't know. I didn't know you wanted me to time it.”
Jack Lemmon - Felix Ungar
Walter Matthau - Oscar Madison

“Dying is just one thing to be sad about. Living unhappily, that's another matter.”
Jack Lemmon - Morrie Schwartz