Babes on Broadway (1941)

Mickey Rooney: Tommy Williams

Photos 

Quotes 

• Penny Morris : I don't think I like you.

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Thank you.

  Penny Morris : Your welcome!

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : I was a failure yesterday, now look at me today!

  Penny Morris : You mean you even looked worse yesterday?

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Will ya sing me a song?

  Penny Morris : How do you know I can?

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Because you sing when you talk. When you walk. Why your eyes, why their singing right now

  Penny Morris : They are? Well I'll be darned.

  [singing] 

  Penny Morris : When a girl meets boy, Life can be a joy...

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : I saw 14 Producers, but nobody's producing.

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams , Morton 'Hammy' Hammond , Ray Lambert : [singing]  Once Mr. Woolworth, Didn't have a dime, And Irving Berlin, Didn't have a rhyme, And Thomas Dewey, Didn't have a crime, But anything can happen in New York

  Morton 'Hammy' Hammond : Once Rockefeller, Didn't have that oil

  Ray Lambert : And Tiffany, He didn't have a purl

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : And Ziegfeld, Didn't even have a gurl

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams , Morton 'Hammy' Hammond , Ray Lambert : But anything can happen in New York

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Look here, Shorty, if this is a gag, you've seen your last banana split.

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Miss Jones from Wisconsin. You've been darn swell to us. If you ever need a couple of fellows to show you around the city or anything like that, why - well, here, I'll give you one of our cards. There you are.

  [presents the card for his trio singing act] 

  Miss 'Jonesy' Jones : Which of the "Three Balls of Fire" are you?

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : And *I* was gonna show you New York.

  Miss 'Jonesy' Jones : Maybe you will someday. You know, I've never really seen it all.

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Those are 14-karat tears and you don't wanna waste them because someday, they'll come in awfully handy at the curtain of the second act.

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : You have talent. Why, you're steaming with it. It's coming out all over you. And don't say you can't act, because you can act. You're not unhappy, you're only making yourself believe you are. And that's acting! And that's why it's wonderful.

• Penny Morris : I just haven't got any talent.

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Well, you cry awfully pretty.

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Well, now that I've straightened your life out, what's your name?

  Penny Morris : Penny.

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Penny, just like that?

  Penny Morris : No puns.

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : All right, one-cent.

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : I've been pedaling that hocus-pocus about talent and ambition. Talent, huh. They don't want talent. They wouldn't know talent if it was wrapped up in the mailbox. I guess it's back to the bulrushes. Maybe I don't belong in show business. I don't know. It's all right, so I'll do something else. I'll drive a truck, I'll dig ditches, I'll sell shoes, anything!

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : We've got a satchel full of talent and no place to display it! So we'll build our own showcase.

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : A cause. A great, big beautiful cause. Something that'll tug at their heartstrings, make them dig down in their jeans and bring tears to their eyes.

  Ray Lambert : You better stop eating that salami.

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Don't you realize that America is cause-crazy? Why, they give shows for everybody: China, the Red Cross, Bundles for Britain. Surely, there must be some place they haven't thought of.

  Ray Lambert : Right here.

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Now you're talking!

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : What's the matter?

  Penny Morris : Nothing. I just don't think you're Abraham Lincoln anymore, that's all.

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : I'm so ashamed at myself that it took a bunch of six-year-olds to make me realize that there's more to life than just a song, a dance and an encore.

• Penny Morris : It's kind of like a haunted house.

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Penny, every theater is a haunted house. Ghosts with greasepaint, ghosts that sing and dance, and laugh and cry. Gosh, think of all the shows that have been in this theatre. Flops, successes, bad shows, great shows. You can't tell me that that ever dies. It's all around us right now, all the laughter and applause, cheers. Why, it's on every inch of this old stage up here. Do you see what I mean?

  Penny Morris : Yeah, I see what you mean.

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Then when new ones come along, kids like us, that love the theatre just as much as they did, they're glad and they're rootin' for us. They're saying, "This is your chance. Go on out there, we've had ours, now it's your turn. There's your audience. They're waitin' for you!" Oh, can't you just see it now?

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Helping people's hard work, isn't it? Don't you worry. You'll find it's worthwhile at the oddest times and the strangest places.

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : What a swell gang you are!

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams , Penny Morris , Morton 'Hammy' Hammond , Jenny , Ray Lambert , Barbara Jo : [singing]  We're babes on Broadway, We're goin' places, When our new faces appear, It's a wonderful street, For babes like us to be on, We're here because, We want our names in neon, We left Topeka, We left Eureka, And came to seek a career, Oh, we're milkin' applause, Instead of milkin' a cow, 'Cause we're babes on Broadway now!

• Morton 'Hammy' Hammond , Jenny : [singing]  Every southern lass, Is gonna cook with gas, And boy, that southern cookin's okay

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams , Penny Morris : And when you hear that moan, On the slide trombone

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams , Penny Morris , Morton 'Hammy' Hammond , Jenny , Ray Lambert , Barbara Jo : You'll wanna black up, For that blackout over Broadway...

  [proceeds to put on blackface makeup] 

• Penny Morris : I'm just a failure.

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Oh, well, I was a failure yesterday. Now look at me today!

  Penny Morris : You mean, you even looked worse yesterday? I'm sorry, I didn't mean that. But I was a success yesterday.

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : You mean, you even looked better yesterday?

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : I'll bet at this minute I've got more talent than Barrymore. At least, that's what you've got to keep dreaming and thinking. And when things get so bad that you just wanna holler murder; well, that's when you sell yourself a bill of goods. And if you can do it then, you can sell anybody!

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Oh, I could say "I love you" just like all the rest of 'em.

  Penny Morris : That's still good, you know.

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : But it wouldn't tell you what I really mean.

  Penny Morris : Well, I'll settle for it.

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Oh, no, you're not gonna talk me out of my love scene. Were you ever in a rainstorm and you felt like you were the only person in the world that wasn't getting wet? Did you ever look up and see a full moon and, well, it only looked like a half a moon to you because you were looking at it all alone? Penny, did you ever find someone and - and all of a sudden, you felt like you were taking off, right out into space, like a propeller going round, round and round, 30,000 revolutions a minute and there wasn't any landing fields left in the world?

  Penny Morris : Uh-huh. I've had that feeling. And it all started in a drugstore.

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Penny.

  Penny Morris : Yeah?

  [kiss] 

  Penny Morris : Tommy.

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Oh, isn't it wonderful what you can find these days in drugstores?

  Penny Morris : Yeah!

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Oh, gosh!

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : [singing]  I'm a Yankee Doodle Dandy, Yankee Doodle do or die, A real live nephew of my Uncle Sam, I was born on the 4th of July, I've got a Yankee Doodle sweetheart, She's my Yankee Doodle joy, Yankee Doodle came to London, Just to ride the ponies, Say, I am a Yankee Doodle Boy

  Penny Morris : He's a Yankee Doodle Dandy, A Yankee Doodle do or die...

• Tommy 'Tom' Williams : [singing - dressed in drag like Carmen Miranda]  Mamãe eu quero, Mamãe, Dá chupeta, dá chupeta, dá chupeta pro bebê não chorar, Mamãe, Mamãe, Mamãe, Mamãe

  [shouting] 

  Tommy 'Tom' Williams : Hey, Ma!