William Holden
(as Joe Gillis)
Betty Schaefer:
I've been hoping to run into you.
Joe Gillis: What for? To recover that knife you stuck in my back?
Joe Gillis: What for? To recover that knife you stuck in my back?
Fred Clark
(as Sheldrake)
Betty Schaefer:
Oh, I'm sorry, Mr. Gillis, but I just didn't think it was any good. I found it flat and trite.
Joe Gillis: Exactly what kind of material do you recommend? James Joyce? Dostoyevsky?
Betty Schaefer: I just think that pictures should say a little something.
Joe Gillis: Oh, one of the message kids. Just a story won't do. You'd have turned down Gone With the Wind.
Sheldrake: No, that was me. I said, "Who wants to see a Civil War picture?"
Joe Gillis: Exactly what kind of material do you recommend? James Joyce? Dostoyevsky?
Betty Schaefer: I just think that pictures should say a little something.
Joe Gillis: Oh, one of the message kids. Just a story won't do. You'd have turned down Gone With the Wind.
Sheldrake: No, that was me. I said, "Who wants to see a Civil War picture?"
William Holden
(as Joe Gillis)
Betty Schaefer:
Oh, the old familiar story. You help a timid little soul cross a crowded street, she turns out to be a multimillionaire and leaves you all her money.
Joe Gillis: That's the trouble with you readers, you know all the plots
Joe Gillis: That's the trouble with you readers, you know all the plots
William Holden
(as Joe Gillis)
Betty Schaefer:
Perhaps the reason I hated "Bases Loaded" is that I knew your name. I'd always heard you had some talent.
Joe Gillis: That was last year. This year I'm trying to earn a living.
Joe Gillis: That was last year. This year I'm trying to earn a living.
William Holden
(as Joe Gillis)
Betty Schaefer:
Where have you been keeping yourself? I've got the most wonderful news for you.
Joe Gillis: I haven't been keeping myself at all, lately.
Joe Gillis: I haven't been keeping myself at all, lately.
William Holden
(as Joe Gillis)
William Holden
(as Joe Gillis)
Joe Gillis:
[Joe is reading Norma's script] Sometimes it's interesting to see just how bad bad writing can be. This promised to go the limit.
William Holden
(as Joe Gillis)
Joe Gillis:
[narrating] Come think of it, the whole place seemed to have been stricken with the kind of creeping paralysis... out of beat with the rest of the world... crumbling apart in slow motion. There was a tennis court... or rather the ghost of a tennis court... with faded markings and a sagging net... And of course she had a pool. Who didn't then? Mabel Norman and John Gilbert must swum in it ten thousand midnights ago... It was empty now. Or was it?
[cut to close-up of rats]
[cut to close-up of rats]
William Holden
(as Joe Gillis)
Joe Gillis:
[narrating] How could she breathe in that house full of Norma Desmonds? Around every corner, Norma Desmonds... more Norma Desmonds... and still more Norma Desmonds.
William Holden
(as Joe Gillis)
Joe Gillis:
[narrating] The poor dope - he always wanted a pool. Well, in the end, he got himself a pool.
