The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone

Paolo di Leo:
Rome is a very old city. Three-thousand years. How old are you? Fifty?

Karen Stone:
You see... I don't leave my diamonds in the soap dish... and when the time comes when nobody desires me... for myself... I'd rather not be... desired... at all.

Meg:
Do you want to talk about it?

Karen Stone:
There's really nothing to say; except, I should have learned my lesson the first time I tried to play Shakespeare.

Contessa Magda Terribili-Gonzales:
Believe me, Paulo, nothing touches me more deeply than human loneliness. The first time I met Signora Stone, almost a year ago, I could hardly stop myself from weeping.

Paolo di Leo:
I think its bad to be alone, so much.

Karen Stone:
I know.

Paolo di Leo:
It makes you sad.

Karen Stone:
It makes you drift.

Paolo di Leo:
Drift?

Karen Stone:
Yes, drift.

Paolo di Leo:
Like a flower on a river.

Karen Stone:
When I told you I was drifting, did you understand?

Paolo di Leo:
Not why it made you sad. I too am drifting, Signora. The whole world, everybody, the stars, everything is drifting. Is it so bad to drift? Is it so unhappy?

Karen Stone:
Yes, when you have no where to go.

Paolo di Leo:
Your hand's a fist. Open it. Give it to me.

Meg:
Of all the people in Italy, why did you have to pick on that bunch? Oh, the young ones are pretty, of course, and I'm told they make love very nicely. But, is that enough to ask of a whole human society?

Meg:
Is this yourself? Or, rather, what you've become. A figure of fun. The stock character of a middle aged woman, crazily infatuated with a succession of young boys!

Meg:
Isn't it odd how women of our age, suddenly start looking for beauty in our male partners? But, I suppose after you've been married to that elderly invalid for 20 years...

Karen Stone:
I loved Tom Stone.

Meg:
Oh, did you? Everyone thought you married him to avoid...

Karen Stone:
What?

Meg:
Love. I think you depended on him. But, that's different. Anyway, now he's dead, what have you got to fall back on, except for his filthy millions?

Meg:
Oh, Karen, there isn't anybody who ever knew you and who ever loved you...

Karen Stone:
Who are these people who love me? I want names.

Meg:
I can give you thousands. You represented...

Karen Stone:
Various parts. Parts in the theater. Never, ever, myself.

Paolo di Leo:
Do you know her?

Stefano - The Barber:
She's not for you. She only does it for money.

Contessa Magda Terribili-Gonzales:
Listen, Paolo, there's no such thing as a great American lady. Great ladies do not occur in a nation less than 200 years old.

Barbara Bingham:
It's such a thrill to meet you, even though I never saw you on the stage. Isn't that terrible?

Karen Stone:
Why not at all. I'm afraid I've never seen you on the screen.

Karen Stone:
You see, Contessa, Americans aren't as romantic as their motion pictures.

Contessa Magda Terribili-Gonzales:
What a pity.

Campbell Kennedy:
Did you see Meg before she left?

Karen Stone:
Meg? Where'd she go?

Julia McIlheny:
Oh, some place in the Middle East. She says its a big trouble spot.

Karen Stone:
I thought everywhere in the Middle East was a big trouble spot.

Karen Stone:
Paolo, why have you done nothing but...

Paolo di Leo:
Please, I have a terrible headache.

Karen Stone:
And you can't stay tonight? That's it, isn't it! But, not because of any headache. It's because you made a date with that cheap little...

Paolo di Leo:
Cheap is not a word, I think, that you should use.

Karen Stone:
Your friend, the Contessa, is nothing but a female pimper with a stable of handsome boys she sells to the highest bidder. I won't deal in that ugly traffic. And so she passes you on to someone who will!

Paolo di Leo:
I had no idea your mind was such a cess pool.

Woman Theatergoer #1:
My God, what's happened to Karin Stone?

Woman Theatergoer #2:
Yes, isn't it strange?

Woman Theatergoer #1:
She used to be so wonderful.

Man Theatergoer #1:
Well, you know the time comes when Mother Nature catches up with all you old gals.

Woman Theatergoer #1:
Oh, come now, she can't be that old.

Woman Theatergoer #2:
Oh, she's forty-five.

Man Theatergoer #2:
And then some.