Fran: Okay, if I told you that the walls of my flat were actually moving in, would you think that I was strange?
Bernard: No, I'd ask you to come 'round and look after my small children.
Fran: Look, if you don't believe me, you can come 'round tonight and we'll watch the wall.
Manny: Don't be ridiculous. We'll be staying in watching the thermometer, won't we, Bernard? Eh? Will we?
Bernard: I don't know, it's an impossible choice. Walls, thermometers... I'll just have to hope that when I flip the coin, it somehow EXPLODES and kills me.
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Fran: Do you know that in Tibet when they want something they give something away?
Bernard: Do they? That must be why they're such a dominant global power.
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Manny: Is space hot?
Bernard: Of course it is, where do you think we get pineapples from?
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Bernard: I'm a quitter. I come from a long line of quitters. It's amazing I'm here at all.
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Security Man: This is a really good security system. You know the CIA?
Bernard: Yeah.
Security Man: Well, they don't use this stuff. They've probably got something a lot better.
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Bernard: I've never said it before because I'm too nice, but your son has the cold, dead eyes of a killer.
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Bernard: You can find work and sort your life out anytime. The pub closes in five hours.
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Bernard: [phone rings] Manny? Manny, phone. Manny.
[sigh]
Bernard: Oh, I'll get it, shall I?
[picks up]
Bernard: Hello?
Manny: [on phone] Bernard?
Bernard: Manny. Where are you? The phone's been ringing.
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Fran: Do you know nothing about modern culture, Bernard? Beckham, Posh, Pokemon...
Bernard: Pacman. It's pronounced Pacman.
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Fran: You said he had a funny smell.
Bernard: He did. He did. He had a living beetroot smell.
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Manny: I've swallowed the Little Book of Calm.
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Manny: Right now, I'm eating scrambled eggs, with a comb, from a shoe.
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Bernard: It's all rubbish! Nobody is prepared to admit that wine doesn't have a taste.
Manny: Of course you can't taste anything, you smoke eighty bajillion cigarettes a day. What's that you're eating?
Bernard: It's some sort of delicious biscuit.
Manny: It's a coaster!
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Bernard: [to angry skinheads] Which one of you bitches wants to dance?
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Bernard: Look at his face. I bet his cornflakes try to crawl out of the bowl.
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Fran: Oh, would you just look at these breasts...
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Bernard: He's a midget. A tiny midget.
Manny: What if he overheard?
Bernard: He won't. His ears are too small.
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Fran: So Manny, tell us about yourself.
Manny: Well, I was born in London...
Bernard: Not so fast, David Copperfield. If you're going to go that far back we're going to need popcorn or something.
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Bernard: [gibbering] They'd all laugh at me if they knew what I was trying to do... to create a new strain of super-wine in a half an hour with a fraction of nature's resources and a FOOL for an assistant. "Bernard Black, he's mad," they'd say. "He's insane. He's dangerous." Well I'll show them! I'll show them all!
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Bernard: You know what you are? You're a beard with an idiot hanging off it.
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Manny: Do you think I should wash my beard?
Bernard: I think you should, yeah. You should wash your beard, then shave it off, nail it to a Frisbee and fling it over a rainbow.
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Bernard: I'm a happy-go-lucky scamp.
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[Manny and Bernard are drinking wine]
Bernard: It's like looking into the eye of a duck...
Manny: And sucking all the fluid from its beak.
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Bernard: Who are you?
Man: I'm a customer.
Bernard: Oh, right.
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Bernard: [to Manny] Right. We are going to this party, because I'm trying to picture the sort of girl who would be interested in you, and all I can see is you. In a dress.
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[Manny reads "The Elephant and the Balloon", the children's book he and Bernard have spent all night writing]
Manny: There's the elephant. He's happy with his balloon. Oh no! It's gone! Where is it? It's not behind the rhino. Look in the alligator's mouth. It's not there either. Ohhhh... the monkey's got it in the tree! He brings it back. They all drink lemonade. The end.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fran: I am a giant ear, waiting for your songs of niceness.
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[On a girl Manny is interested in]
Bernard: Who is she then, this so-called person?
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Fran: Can't you just call her up and say 'I really enjoyed talking to you last night and I'd like to see you again'?
Manny: [giggling nervously] Don't be stupid! I don't want her to think I'm gay!
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Bernard: Don't make me get sick into my own scorn.
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Evan: I took a risk when I hired you, Manny. Many people would have said 'Who is this rudderless hippy? How do I get away from him? Has he got a hunting knife strapped to his shin?'
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Evan: Don't eat muffins when I'm developing you.
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Manny: Bernard, it's hot in the worm.
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Bernard: Beat it, flaps.
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[to his previous boss in an accounting firm]
Manny: Should I be doing something? Do you need the Gleeson accounts? I have them on disk, I would have emailed them, but there was a lot of... clink on the... stuffer expander. And the plug went in some Tizer.
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[Whilst vainly trying to fill in his tax return form]
Bernard: If you live in a council flat... next to a river... but are not blind... WHAT?
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Bernard: We've got a special offer on this one. It's free if you break my legs.
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[to violent, Millwall F.C supporting skinheads]
Bernard: Millwall! That's the one. Do you know this chant? 'Millwall, Millwall, you're all really dreadful, and all your girlfriends are unfulfilled and alienated... '
[the skinheads punch him in unison]
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Manny: That was the last film you went to see? 'Planet of the Apes'?
Bernard: Yeah. Amazing effects, you know. You really believed that monkeys could have meetings.
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[When working in a fast food restaurant]
Bernard: Hello. Welcome to... the thing. Whatever this place is.
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Landlord: Girls! Girls! Girls! You're both such lovely girls! Don't fight. And if you do, fight nice. With pillows. And jim-jams.
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[On learning that his summer girlfriend doesn't fancy him]
Bernard: No! No! You're my summer girlfriend - you don't get angry. You throw your hair back and laugh as we bicycle around the Cotswolds in a taxi. You flick the cherry off the pie and only eat the cream because that's what Aunty Nibs used to do.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[after Manny has swallowed "The Little Book Of Calm"]
Doctor: Well, it's bad news I'm afraid, Mr. Bianco. 'The Little Book of Calm' has become lodged between the small intestine and the pancreas. If it rotates a centimetre or two to the left, you'll be dead in seconds.
Manny: Oh my God!
Doctor: No no, hold on a moment, that's just the worst case scenario. The other possibility - and this is far more likely - is that 'The Little Book of Calm' will move to the right, where it will enter the renal canal. If this happens, you could live for anything up to, ooh, ten years, one year, who knows?
Manny: Oh my God!
Doctor: Because of the massive scarring caused by 'The Little Book of Calm', however, it is possible that you will be in a massive amount of pain...
Manny: [interrupting] Oh my God! Oh, sorry.
Doctor: ...during that time.
Manny: Oh my God!
[the Doctor's beeper goes]
Doctor: Sorry, I'm going to have to go. We'll operate tomorrow, see if there's anything we can do about it. There's a good chance you'll survive - a thirty percent chance, I'd say - so try not to worry about it. As the book itself says,
[holding the X-Ray up to the light]
Doctor: 'whenever you're in a tight spot, try to imagine yourself marooned on a beautiful desert island'.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[Fran's landlord is in his office, eating. Bernard walks in]
Bernard: Not so fast. I represent Fran Katzenjammer from room 2. She's my client, and I'm a hotshot lawyer like you would've seen on... television.
Landlord: So what's the problem, exactly?
Bernard: My client's room is smaller. And as you know, it is illegal to sell space under the European Legislation act, which happens... in a court.
Landlord: Her room's the same as it's always been. I can give you the measurements if you want?
Bernard: Don't evade the question.
Landlord: Eh?
Bernard: Just answer the question!
Landlord: What question?
Bernard: Huh? Oh, right, sorry. Um... where were you when the rooms were measured?
Landlord: Oh, I was...
Bernard: Ahahahaha! Ah, so if that's the case, then where was the room?
Landlord: 2B has always been there, you can see it for yourself.
Bernard: You're damn right I will, before I send this whole building downtown to the boys in the lab. I'm confiscating these as evidence...
[he picks up a packet of buns]
Bernard: And I'm issuing you with a decree of sub... dew... dee. Subjudy! You are under legal subjudy to stay in that chair until such time as, erm... until Simon says stand up!
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Bernard: Up with it I will not put!
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Bernard: Excuse me, there seems to be some mistake. I bought some popcorn and a drink and now I have no money left.
Cashier: That's how much it costs.
Bernard: What is it, magic popcorn? Does it produce some kind of dizzying high?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bernard: Fran and I are going out for drinks. We've bought some absinthe, it's the drink that makes you want to kill yourself instantly.
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Bernard: The only thing that's going to bring me inner peace is a beard-seeking missile.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bernard: I don't trust him. He has no nasal hair.
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Manny: I ate all your bees.
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Beranrd: You've got yourself a case, you should get a lawyer.
Manny: Expensive though. Maybe get someone to pretend to be a lawyer.
Bernard: Yeah, get someone who's a bit like a lawyer - arrogant, cruel, crooked, a real bastard.
[Manny and Fran stare at Bernard]
Bernard: No, I'm not doing it.
Fran: Oh, go on! And then when you get a girlfriend, I'll give you a reference! I'll lie, I'll say you were... okay.
Bernard: Alright, deal.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Manny: Will you stay with me?
Bernard: No, I'm a boyfriend now. I have duties. Lots of sighing, holding hands, not finishing sentences properly...
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Manny: Mum, dad there's something I need to tell you. Fran isn't my girlfriend... in fact I'm just a middle-aged man who works in a book shop and spends his evenings eating cereal.
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Manny: Let's paaaaar...
Bernard: Don't use "party" as a verb in this shop!
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Bernard: Where's my cure?
Manny: It's not my fault you're hungover.
Bernard: It is your fault! If I lived with a normal person, there wouldn't be so much to block out.
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Manny: I want the weekend off. I want a life.
Bernard: This is life! We suffer and slave and expire. That's it!
Manny: We have needs! Fran wants to learn the piano, I want some time to myself, you want to go out with a girl...
Bernard: Don't make me laugh... bitterly. Fran will fail, you'll toil your life away, and I'll die alone, upside down on the floor of a pub toilet.
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Bernard: [speaking through a megaphone] Right, the shop is closed, everybody get out! Time to go home, come on!
Old lady: But it's only quarter to three!
Bernard: Yes but it's my shop.
[now shooing them out with a broom]
Bernard: Come on, go home, bye bye, get out...
Old lady: That's hardly fair!
Bernard: It isn't fair at all. Get out!
Man: I expect better service!
Bernard: Well expect away. Goodbye! Come on, all you time-wasting bastards, back on the streets. Thank you!
[slams door]
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Bernard: [to Fran] You! What have you been telling Kate? She thinks I'm the renaissance. I have to go along with all this "reclusive genius" stuff... she's going to be very upset when she finds out I'm just a reclusive wanker.
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Manny: [while assimilating the Little Book of Calm] When you sleep, you are a king surveying your estate. Look at the woodland, the peacocks on the lawn. Be the king of your own calm kingdom.
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Fran: I've got a date. Ben - divorcee, very good-looking. Nice arse. Which is a first for me.
Bernard: Never had a nice one?
Fran: No, never. And I know they exist because I've seen them on the telly. You had one?
Bernard: Well, there was this one woman, Janine. I don't know if it was "nice", but it was... huge! With an enormous sense of value.
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Customer: Those books. How much?
Bernard: Hmmm?
Customer: Those books. The leather-bound ones.
Bernard: Yes, Dickens, the Collected Works of Charles Dickens.
Customer: Are they real leather?
Bernard: They're real Dickens.
Customer: I have to know if they're real leather because they have to go with the sofa.
[Bernard looks confused]
Customer: Everything else in my house is real. I'll give you two hundred for them.
Bernard: Two hundred what?
Customer: Two hundred pounds.
Bernard: Are they leather-bound pounds?
Customer: No.
Bernard: Sorry. I need leather bound pounds to go with my wallet. Next.
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Fran: I do sell a lot of wank, don't I?
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[on being a pregnant woman's 'birth partner']
Bernard: Urk. That's going to be intense, a lot of blood, a lot of shouting, and urm...
Fran: Oh, no no no, I'll just get drunk. In fact, she'll be on drugs, I'll be drunk, it'll be just like the old days.
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[when being asked to explain his 'filing system' by his accountant]
Bernard: I don't know, Nick! I'm not... Wonder Woman.
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[to a pregnant woman in labour, having assimilated "The Little Book of Calm"]
Manny: When you're feeling under pressure, do something different. Roll up your sleeves, or eat an orange.
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[having assimilated "The Little Book of Calm"]
Manny: Be on the look out for things that make you laugh. If you see nothing worth laughing at, pretend you see it, then laugh.
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[having assimilated "The Little Book of Calm", after being punched by a skinhead]
Manny: Add a dab of lavender to milk; leave town with an orange, and pretend you're laughing at it.
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[to three violent skinheads]
Bernard: Hey, you know when you're doing the usual threesome thing you do of a weekend, and the moonlight's bouncing off your heads and your arses and everything, does that not get a bit confusing?
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[attempting to fill in his tax return form]
Bernard: "What is your mother's maiden name?" What's her first name? I just knew her as "Ma"! That'll have to do.
[writing on the form]
Bernard: 'Ma. Possibly deceased'.
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Bernard: [describing his friends Gerald and Sarah] And she's an interior designer, she's on that show "Pet Surprise".
Manny: Haven't heard of it.
Bernard: You know, you know. They take the dog out for a walk, he thinks it's a normal walk and when he gets back the kennels got a patio and french doors!
Manny: Ah yeah...
Bernard: And he's like, "Oh my god!"
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[discussing what film to see at the cinema]
Bernard: What's this? "'Blue Tunes' - Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Minnie Driver...
Fran: Oh, I hate her.
Bernard: ...Grouchy Leonard Blue runs a second hand record shop with his half-wit mustachioed assistant Danny...
[Manny tuts]
Bernard: ...when this zany pair team up with bitchy, neurotic neighbour Pam things are sure to be a riot of laughs". Where do they get this crap?
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[the shop has been robbed]
Bernard: So, what did you tell them? They got in through the back?
Manny: Yeah.
Bernard: Yeah, it wouldn't do to let them know that we went out and you left the front door open, would it?
Manny: Yeah, well, what sort of world is it that you can't go away and leave the front door open without getting robbed?
Bernard: It's this sort of world, Gandalf!
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Fran: Look Bernard, look at my new phone! Look, look, look, look, look! It's got web access, it's got a camera, it can do everything...
Bernard: Daaggh! Can it stop boring conversations?
Fran: No, none of them can do that.
Bernard: Mine can.
[Bernard picks up his phone receiver and speaks into it]
Bernard: Shut up about your phone.
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[having been arranged as an "escort" to a visiting Japanese businessman by a photographer]
Manny: There is no way I'm going to the casino, alright? Now look, you have given me everything that money can buy. Yes, I've slept on satin sheets, I've eaten crinkle-cut chips from a silver bowl, I've been driven all over town in minicabs. But there are some things that money can't buy. Like the love I found in a little bookshop off Russell Square. Yes, love. You know, not, well, not love so much more... more... freedom! You know, fre... well, not really freedom, more a largeness of heart. Well, not really a largeness of heart... or freedom... or love. But I was never contractually obliged to sleep with foreign businessmen, alright? And that is not nothing, that is something.
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Customer: Look, there's no other way to say this, but I didn't come in here to be insulted.
Bernard: Well, I didn't ask for the job of insulting you. In another life, we could have been brothers. Running a small, quirky taveria in Sicily. Maybe we would have married the local twins instead of wasting each other's time here in this dump. But it was not to be. So hop it.
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[after Manny has ran away and suffered a series of unfortunate calamities over the phone]
Fran: Well, where is he? How can I find him?
Bernard: Well, you could become a terrible event and happen to him.
