Bell, Book and Candle (1958)

Shepherd 'Shep' Henderson: Hasn't this cat got anything better to do? Couldn't you give him something to read?

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Merle Kittridge: Are you trying to say you're... *jilting* me?
Shepherd 'Shep' Henderson: W-well, that's a very heavy word, Merle. It's a very heavy word. Let's just say that we're... uncoupling.

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Gillian 'Gil' Holroyd: [to James Stewart, who lives one floor above her] It's nice having you over me.

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Cary Grant actively sought the lead role.
James Stewart felt that he was miscast as Shepherd Henderson.
Gillian's cat is named Pyewacket. This name has become a popular one for cats because of this movie, but few know its origin: Pyewacket was one of the familiar spirits of a witch detected by the "witchfinder general" Matthew Hopkins in March 1644 in the town of Maningtree, Essex, UK. He claimed he spied on the witches as they held their meeting close by his house, and heard them mention the name of a local woman. She was arrested and deprived of sleep for four nights, at the end of which she confessed and named her familiars, describing their forms. They were:

• Holt
• Jarmara
• Vinegar Tom
• Sacke and Sugar
• Newes
• Ilemauzer
• Pyewacket
• Pecke in the Crowne
• Griezzel Greedigutt
• Hopkins says he and nine other witnesses saw the first five of these, which appeared in the forms described by the witch. Only the first of these was a cat; the next two were dogs, and the others were a black rabbit and a polecat. So it's not clear whether Pyewacket was a cat's name or not. As for the meanings, Hopkins says only that they were such that "no mortall could invent." The incident is described in Hopkins's pamphlet "The Discovery of Witches" (1647).

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