- Ida Corwin: [to Wally about his lustful looks in her direction] Leave something on me. I might catch cold.
- Veda Pierce: With this money I can get away from you. From you and your chickens and your pies and your kitchens and everything that smells of grease. I can get away from this shack with its cheap furniture. And this town and its dollar days, and its women that wear uniforms and its men that wear overalls.
- Ida Corwin: [to Mildred] Personally, Veda's convinced me that alligators have the right idea. They eat their young.
- Veda Pierce: You think just because you made a little money you can get a new hairdo and some expensive clothes and turn yourself into a lady. But you can't, because you'll never be anything but a common frump whose father lived over a grocery store and whose mother took in washing.
- Veda Pierce: [kissing the check from the Forresters to keep Veda's pregnancy quiet] Well, that's that!
- Mildred Pierce: I'm sorry this had to happen; sorry for the boy, he seemed very nice.
- Veda Pierce: Oh Ted's all right really. Did you see the look on his face when we told him he was going to be a father?
- [Veda laughs]
- Mildred Pierce: I wish you wouldn't joke about it.
- Veda Pierce: Mother, you're a scream, really you are. The next thing I know you'll be knitting little garments.
- Mildred Pierce: I don't see anything so ridiculous about that.
- Veda Pierce: If I were you, I'd save myself the trouble.
- Mildred Pierce: [pause] You're not going to have a baby?
- Veda Pierce: At this stage, it's a matter of opinion. And in my opinion, I'm going to have a baby. I can always be mistaken.
- Monte Beragon: Oh, I wish I could get that interested in work.
- Ida Corwin: You were probably frightened by a callus at an early age!
- Mr. Jones: Why do you always interrupt?
- Ida Corwin: It's only because I want to be alone with you. Come 'ere and let me bite you, you darling man! Ruff!
- Veda Pierce: It's the dress. It's awfully cheap material. I can tell by the smell.
- Kay Pierce: What did you expect? Want it inlaid with gold?
- Veda Pierce: Well, it seems to me, if you're buying anything, it should be the best. This is definitely not the best.
- Kay Pierce: Oh, quit. You're breakin' my heart.
- Mildred Pierce: Cut it out, Wally. You make me feel like Little Red Riding Hood.
- Wally Fay: And I'm the Big Bad Wolf, huh? Now, Milly, you've got me all wrong. I'm a romantic guy, but I'm no wolf.
- Mildred Pierce: Then quit howling!
- Mildred Pierce: You've been snooping around ever since I got this job, trying to find out what it is... and now you know. You know, don't you.
- Veda Pierce: [innocently] Know what? Know what mother?
- Mildred Pierce: You knew when you gave that uniform to Lottie that it was mine didn't you.
- Veda Pierce: [feigns surprise] Your uniform!
- Mildred Pierce: Yes, I'm waiting tables in a downtown restaurant.
- Veda Pierce: [contemptuously] My mother - a waitress.
- Policeman on Pier: If you take a swim, I'd have to take a swim. Is that fair? Because you feel like killing yourself, I gotta get pneumonia.
- Mildred Pierce: Wally, you should be kept on a leash! Now why can't you be friendly?
- Wally Fay: But I *am* being friendly!
- Mildred Pierce: No, I mean it. Friendship's much more lasting than love.
- Wally Fay: Yeah, but it isn't as entertaining.
- [last lines]
- Inspector Peterson: You know, Mrs. Beragon, there are times when I regret being a policeman.
- Mildred Pierce: That Ted Forrester's nice-looking, isn't he? Veda likes him.
- Monte Beragon: Who wouldn't? He has a million dollars.
- Monte Beragon: Drink?
- Mildred Pierce: You drink too much.
- Monte Beragon: I know, I do too much of everything. I'm spoiled.
- Mildred Pierce: You've too many sisters... They all seem to be my size too.
- Monte Beragon: I know, I like them your size.
- Monte Beragon: [raises a glass to toast] To brotherly love.
- Wally Fay: My client feels, and I am in complete accord with her, that she has been irrep - ih...
- Mrs. Forrester's Lawyer: 'Irreparably'?
- Wally Fay: ...unduly damaged. Therefore there is one more little formality that we should discuss first.
- Mrs. Forrester's Lawyer: What's that, Mr. Fay?
- Wally Fay: The financial settlement. You see, my client would like ten thousand dollars.
- Mrs. Forrester's Lawyer: I think I'm safe in observing that almost anyone would like ten thousand dollars, Mr. Fay. But ih -...
- Wally Fay: But ih - ?
- Mrs. Forrester's Lawyer: We see no necessity for a financial settlement of any kind.
- Wally Fay: You don't, huh?
- Mrs. Forrester's Lawyer: No.
- Wally Fay: [smirking] You will.
- Mildred Beragon: [to Inspector Peterson] I was always in the kitchen. I felt as though I'd been born in a kitchen and lived there all my life, except for the few hours it took to get married.
- Veda Pierce: That's what I like about you, Ida. You're so delightfully provincial.
- Ida Corwin: [sarcastically] And I like you, too.
- Ida Corwin: [to Monte] Don't look now, Junior, but you're standing under a brick wall.
- Monte Beragon: I don't get it.
- Ida Corwin: You will... when it falls on you.
- Inspector Peterson: Mrs. Beragon, being a detective is like, well, like making an automobile. You take all the pieces and put them together one by one. First thing you know, you got an automobile or a murderer. And we got him.
- Wally Fay: You know, you keep on refusing me, and one of these days I'm going to start thinking you're stubborn.
- Ida Corwin: Laughing boy seems slightly burned at the edges. What's eating him?
- Mildred Pierce: A small green-eyed monster.
- Ida Corwin: Jealous? That doesn't sound like Wally. No profit in it - and there's a boy who loves a dollar.
- Mildred Pierce: Get out Veda. Get your things out of this house right now before I throw them into the street and you with them. Get out before I kill you.
- Wally Fay: You know, this is a pretty big night for you.
- Policeman #1: Yeah?
- Wally Fay: Yeah, lots of excitement. There's a stiff in there!
- Policeman #1: Is that so? Oh and I suppose you were running right down to the station to report it?
- [Wally forces a laugh]
- Policeman #1: [to partner] Yeah... Say, he say's there's a dead guy in the house.
- Policeman #2: You never saw a deader.
- Mildred Pierce: [to Monte about his negotiation regarding them getting married] Sold...
- Mildred Pierce: [holds up glass to toast] One Beragon.
- Monte Beragon: In the Beragon family, there is an old Spanish proverb: one man's poison is another man's meat.
- Monte Beragon: You know, Mildred, in the spring, a young man's fancy lightly turns to what he's been thinking about all winter.
- Mildred Pierce: It's a good thing California winters are so short.
- Ida Corwin: Oh, men. I never yet met one of them that didn't have the instincts of a heel. Sometimes I wish I could get along without them.
- Monte Beragon: [as Mildred caught Monte and Veda in a romantic embrace] We weren't expecting you Mildred, obviously.
- Veda Pierce: It's just as well you know. I'm glad you know.
- Mildred Beragon: How long has this been going on?
- Inspector Peterson: I know. Everybody thinks detectives do nothing but ask questions... but detectives have souls, the same as anyone else.
- Mildred Pierce: And just what do you do, Mr Beragon?
- Monte Beragon: I loaf, in a decorative and highly charming manner.
- Mildred Pierce: Is that all?
- Monte Beragon: With me, loafing is a science.
- Kay Pierce: [talking about her derriere] You ought to do something about your sit-down.
- Veda Pierce: What's wrong with it?
- Kay Pierce: It sticks out.
- Bert Pierce: This'll only take a minute. It's, it's funny. It's harder to say than I thought. It's about the divorce, Mildred. You can have it. When I walked out on you that time, I told you to see if you could get along without me. I didn't think you could. When you asked me for a divorce, I still didn't think you could make a go of it alone. Now I know better. You're doing alright, Mildred. You're doing fine.
- Mildred Pierce: I never thought it would end like this.
- Bert Pierce: Who knows how anything is going to end? I'm sorry.
- Mildred Pierce: Yes, I'm sorry too.
- Bert Pierce: Well, that's that. That's what I came to say and now that I've said it, I just want you to know that I wish you all the luck in the world.
- Mildred Pierce: Thank you, Burt. Thank you.
- Mildred Pierce: You look down on me because I work for a living, don't you? You always have. Alright, I work. I cook food and sell it and make a profit on it. Which I might point out you're not too proud to share with me
- Monte Beragon: Yes, I take money from you, Mildred. But not enough to make me like kitchens or cooks. They smell of grease.
- Mildred Pierce: I don't notice you shrinking from a $50 bill because it happens to smell of grease.
- Mildred Pierce: [to the inspector] I was in love with him and I knew it for the first time that night. But now he's dead, and I'm not sorry. Wasn't worth it.
- Mrs. Forrester: Your daughter has somehow got the idea that... well, I understand it, of course... any girl wants to get married, but Ted had no such thing in mind. I want that made clear.
- Mildred Pierce: You mean they're engaged? Veda and your son?
- Mrs. Forrester: Yes, but I'm quite sure you will agree with me, Mrs. Pierce, that any discussion of marriage between them would be most undesirable.
- Mildred Pierce: Why should Veda want to marry your son if he doesn't want to marry her?
- Mrs. Forrester: I'm not a mind reader, Mrs. Pierce. But let me tell you one thing. If you or this girl or anybody employs any more tricks trying to blackmail my son...
- Mildred Pierce: Trying to what?
- Mrs. Forrester: Understand me, Mrs. Pierce. I shall prevent this marriage. I shall prevent it in any way that I can.
- Mildred Pierce: I don't think you need worry, Mrs. Forrester. Having you in my family is a pretty dismal prospect. Good afternoon.
- Monte Beragon: I always knew that someday we'd come to this particular moment in the scheme of things. You want Veda and your business and a nice quiet life. And the price of all that is me. You can go back to making your pies now, Mildred. We're through.