Murder by Death (1976)

David Niven: Dick Charleston

Photos 

Quotes 

• Dora Charleston : Thank you. You are?

  Jamesir Bensonmum : Bensonmum.

  Dora Charleston : Thank you, Benson.

  Jamesir Bensonmum : No, no, no, no, no... Bensonmum. My name is Bensonmum.

  Dick Charleston : Bensonmum?

  Jamesir Bensonmum : Yes, sir. Jamesir Bensonmum.

  Dick Charleston : Jamesir?

  Jamesir Bensonmum : Yes, sir.

  Dick Charleston : Jamesir Bensonmum?

  Jamesir Bensonmum : Yes, sir.

  Dick Charleston : How odd.

  Jamesir Bensonmum : My father's name, sir.

  Dick Charleston : What was your father's name?

  Jamesir Bensonmum : Howard. Howard Bensonmum.

  Dick Charleston : Your father was Howard Bensonmum?

  Dora Charleston : Leave it be, Dickie. I've had enough.

• Dick Charleston : Be careful on this road. It's treacherous.

  Sidney Wang : Treacherous road like fresh mushroom. Must always...

  [son drives car away from Charleston] 

  Sidney Wang : Idiot! Not finish mushroom story! Idiot!

• Dick Charleston : Up there, Dora, look - a blind butler.

  Dora Charleston : Don't let him park the car, Dickie.

• Dick Charleston : [after noticing that he is incorrectly seated next to his own wife, Charleston asks to switch places with Wang. An instant after they both stand up, two rapiers fall from the ceiling to bury themselves in the gentlemen's chairs]  ... Just as I thought: another test that could have cost us our lives, saved only by the fact that I am ENORMOUSLY well-bred.

  Sam Diamond : ...Lucky it wasn't me, or I'd be chopped liver by now.

• Dick Charleston : Another diversion. He gives us meaningless clues to confuse us, dangles red herrings before our eyes, bedazzles us with bizarre banalities, while all the time precious seconds are ticking away towards a truly terrible murder still to come.

  Sam Diamond : You're good, Charleston. You're not my kind of cop, but you're smart and you smell good. You're not a pansy, I know that, but what the hell are ya?

  Dick Charleston : Classy, I suppose.

• Dora Charleston : I don't understand. Why would anybody want to steal a dead, naked body?

  Dick Charleston : Well, dear, there are people who, um...

  [whispers rest into her ear] 

  Dora Charleston : Oh, that's tacky! That's REALLY tacky!

• [Playing a game of deduction] 

  Sidney Wang : And you Mr. Charleston, did not approve of Mrs. Charleston dying her hair blond?

  Dick Charleston : What do you mean?

  Sidney Wang : Mrs. Charleston's hair red. You have blond hairs on shoulder. This means she has dyed red hair blond, then back again to red, or else you have been... So sorry, Wang is wrong.

• Dick Charleston : Now let's see what we have here. We have one missing, dead, naked butler, one host with a butcher's knife in his back, and one poisonous scorpion crawling up our sheets.

  Dora Charleston : Is that what that is?

  Dick Charleston : Yes. They can kill instantly. I suggest we don't move.

  Dora Charleston : For how long?

  Dick Charleston : Quite possibly for the rest of our lives.

• Dick Charleston : [Cutting-room floor-scene of the Charlestons driving through heavy fog to Twain Manor]  ... You know something, darling? I smell crime in the air.

  Dora Charleston : I'm not surprised. You just ran over a small animal.

  Dick Charleston : Did I? Oh, sorry about that... LOOK OUT!

  [he slams on the brakes to avoid hitting Tess] 

  Dick Charleston : ... Hello out there! Are you hurt?

  Tess Skeffington : [exhausted from walking]  ... Oh, I'm fine - I just hiked five miles back this way from the gas station. Thank Heavens you saw me when you did.

  Dick Charleston : Oh yes, I wouldn't want blood on my hands twice in one night. Well, keep to the side of the road.

  [he drives off, leaving Tess standing there!] 

• [Hearing a knock at the door] 

  Dora Charleston : Oh, that's probably the cook. Come in!

  Dick Charleston : Darling, the poor woman is stone deaf.

  Dora Charleston : I'm sorry, I forgot. COME IN!

• Dick Charleston : [inspecting their room]  This dust is baking flour. And those cobwebs. Candied sugar. All placed here recently for the sole purpose of frightening us. And that mouse. Obviously a mechanical toy.

  [picks up mouse and laughs] 

  Dick Charleston : Silly.

  Dora Charleston : What is?

  Dick Charleston : I am. It's real.

• Dick Charleston : How lovely dear! We're in Wang's wing!

• Sam Diamond : I don't get it. First they steal the body and leave the clothes, then they take the clothes and bring the body back. Who would do a thing like that?

  Dick Charleston : Possibly some deranged dry cleaner.

• Dora Charleston : What a godforsaken spot to get lost!

  Dick Charleston : I'm sure I saw a much better spot a few miles back.

• Dick Charleston : [hanging up telephone]  Sounded as though somebody snipped the wire.

  Dora Charleston : Really? What did it sound like?

  Dick Charleston : Snip.

• Sidney Wang : Quiet, please. Observe strange sounds.

  [the room is filled with hideous death-groans] 

  Dora Charleston : Good God! The face! It's coming from the face!

  [Sure enough, that agonized moaning issues from the African death-mask on the wall] 

  Dick Charleston : The victim of that tribal ritual, actually going through his final moments of death! What could it mean?

  Jamesir Bensonmum : It means dinner is ready, sir. We have no gong.

• [stumbling around during a blackout] 

  Dora Charleston : Dickie, don't. You know how I get when you touch me there.

  Dick Charleston : Me, darling? I've got my hands in my pockets.

  Sam Diamond : I'm afraid they're my pockets.

  Dick Charleston : Oh, sorry about that.

  Dora Charleston : Dickie, behave yourself.

• Lionel Twain : I trust you've all been made comfortable?

  Dick Charleston : Comfortable, Mr. Twain? You call poisoned wine and near decapitation comfortable?

  Lionel Twain : No. I call it inspiration.

• Dick Charleston : [about Sam]  Bizarre little twit.

• Dick Charleston : Now see here, Diamond. That's a pretty tacky thing to say, isn't it?

  Sam Diamond : Well, it's a pretty tacky world, Mr. Charleston.

• Dick Charleston : [introducing them]  My wife Dora. Inspector Perrier.

  Milo Perrier : Très charmant.

  [kisses her hand, then coughs] 

  Dora Charleston : I'm sorry. Our room is so dusty.

  Milo Perrier : My fault. I should have blown first.

• Milo Perrier : What is it? What's happened?

  Sidney Wang : Something wrong in kitchen.

  Milo Perrier : With our dinner!

  Sidney Wang : No, patience, patience.

  Sam Diamond : Is someone in there?

  [pointing to kitchen] 

  Dick Charleston : Someone in the kitchen with dinna?

• Sidney Wang : Very interesting theory, Mr. Charleston, but you overlook one very important point.

  Dick Charleston : And that is?

  Sidney Wang : Is STUPID! Is most stupid theory I ever heard.

  [laughs] 

• Dick Charleston : Excuse me, I was wondering if you've seen a white... Wang!

  Willie Wang : A white wang?

• Sam Diamond : Did ya ever make it with a waitress?

  Dick Charleston : I beg your your pardon?

  Sam Diamond : A waitress. Big, fat waitress. I don't know what them society dames are like in the kit, but you ain't never had it 'til you made it with a big, fat, blondie waitress. If you're ever interested, you give me a call.

• Jamesir Bensonmum : Ah, here we are. The late Mrs. Twain's room. She died in here.

  Dora Charleston : Oh, dear.

  Dick Charleston : Died of what?

  Jamesir Bensonmum : She murdered herself in her sleep, sir.

  Dick Charleston : You mean suicide?

  Jamesir Bensonmum : Oh, no. It was murder all right. Mrs. Twain hated herself.

• Sam Diamond : Shut up, all of youse! Nobody move! Stay where you are! Everybody.

  Dick Charleston : What is it?

  Sam Diamond : I have to go to the can again. I don't wanna miss nothin'.

  Tess Skeffington : I'm going too, Sam.

  Sam Diamond : I'd rather do this alone, Tess. Thanks. anyway.

• [everyone holds hands to prevent themselves from being killed] 

  Sam Diamond : Stop that. Stop it, I said.

  Dick Charleston : What is it, Diamond?

  Sam Diamond : The nurse is giving my palm the finger, the dirty old broad.

  Jessica Marbles : Naughty! Naughty, Miss Withers!

  [Miss Withers giggles] 

• Jamesir Bensonmum : We keep this room locked.

  Dick Charleston : Why is that?

  Jamesir Bensonmum : Mr. Twain loved her very much. He's kept her room just as it was the night she choked herself nine years ago.

• Dora Charleston : You didn't tell me how I look, Dickie.

  Dick Charleston : No different than always look, darling. Absolutely, ravishing.

  Dora Charleston : Do you love me and adore me?

  Dick Charleston : I love you and adore you. You till have the best tush in high society.

  [Pats Dora's behind] 

  Dora Charleston : Years of horseback riding, darling.

  Sidney Wang : [Wang enters]  Getting to bottom of things, Charleston?

• Dick Charleston : You know Wang.

  Milo Perrier : Ah, yes. I had the pleasure of dining in Shanghai many years ago with Inspector Wang. Ah: Hong Ching Chu Kow Dung Woo Fong.

  Sidney Wang : Oh, you remember. Yes. You had "Hong Ching Chu" and I had "Kow Dung Woo Fong."

• Dick Charleston : I heard the gunshots; but, I don't see any bullet holes. Not on his head, his neck, his back, or his chest.

  Sam Diamond : Look all over him.

  Dick Charleston : All over his body?

  Sam Diamond : Well, somebody's got to do it. I'm busy standing guard.

  Dick Charleston : Well, why don't I stand guard. You look all over the body.

  Sam Diamond : All right. We'll take turns. You look over the first dead naked body that we find and I'll look over the second. Hurry up. We only got eight minutes. You see anything?

  Dick Charleston : No, I don't see a bullet hole anywhere. -Hold it. I see something.

  Sam Diamond : What is it?

  Dick Charleston : Oh, forget it. My mistake. Not a bullet hole.

• Dora Charleston : I will not stay in this horribly filthy overnight.

  Jamesir Bensonmum : Flithy? Very well, Madam. I'll attend to it during dinner.

  Dick Charleston : Thank you, Benson, sir.

  Jamesir Bensonmum : Mum!

  Dick Charleston : What?

  Jamesir Bensonmum : Bensonmum. Ma'am.

• Dick Charleston : Goldman was killed last month while skiing. He jumped 200 feet into a low-flying plane.