Night Court (season 4)

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Seasons: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 | Main

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Night Court (1984–1992) is an American sitcom, airing on NBC, about the night shift of a Manhattan court, presided over by the young, unorthodox Judge Harold T. "Harry" Stone.

The Next Voice You Hear... [4.01]

Bull: This is Rozalind Russell.

Dan: Hello! I'm Mr. Ed!

Harry: Rozalind Russell, that's a neat name.

Roz: My mother was a show business freak.

Harry: Ah.

Roz: I do consider myself more fortunate than my sister, Zsa Zsa.

Christine: Oh, the poor thing.

Roz: That's what my brother says.

Harry: Your brother...?

Roz: Slappy.

[a few minutes later, when Harry receives his mother's letter]

Bull: Harry's mother left him when he was a child. He hasn't seen her in thirty years.

Roz: My brother hasn't seen my mother in thirty years.

Bull: Your brother...?

Roz: Topo Gigio.

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Buddy: [about Harry's mother] Harry, she went into a psychiatric institution after she left you. That's where we met.

Harry: I'm gonna go out on a limb here... you weren't on the staff, were you?

[Buddy grins and shakes his head]

Buddy: But I'm feeling much better now.

Giving Thanks [4.02]

Harry: He saved Christine?

Bull: It's true. If Dan hadn't been carrying this card, she wouldn't be with us today.

Harry: [reads card] "Wanda's Whip Emporium"?

Dan: The other side.

Harry: Oh. [reads] "Step 1, give a swift blow to the victim's back to clear air passage. Step 2, clear the mouth of any foreign objects."

Mac: "Step 3, loosen constrictive clothing."

[Christine looks beneath the trench coat she's wearing, and shrieks. Dan pulls her undergarments out of his pocket.]

Dan: Better to be safe than sorry.

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Dan: You know, this could be the greatest night of my life...

Hotel Manager: Mmm.

Christine: [storms into the room] Okay, I want this over with before I vomit!

[She disappears into the bathroom.]

Hotel Manager: [leaving] Let the good times roll.

Author, Author [4.03]

Dan: [runs to the bench] Your Honor, a sudden emergency has occurred, and forces me to ask for a recess.

Harry: [not looking up] Sex or money, Dan?

Dan: [feigning offense] Oh, I'm hurt! Oh, I'm offended! I mean, did it ever occur to you that I could be in pain, could be in the throes of some personal tragedy?

[Harry gives him a look]

Dan: Sex.

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[after Bull has an emergency]

Harry: Well, under the circumstances, I guess it would be appropriate to call...

Dan: Yes?

Harry: A short...

Dan: Yes.

Harry: Recess.

Dan: YES!

Dan's Operation: Part 1 [4.05]

Dan: I'm quite all right, I don't need this ridiculous operation!

Dr. Flick: What are you going to say when your ulcer perforates and you start hemorrhaging?

[Dan lies back in bed and gurgles sarcastically.]

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Morgue Attendant: [rolling a gurney in] I'm here to take Dan Fielding to the morgue.

[Everyone tells him there must be some mistake.]

Christine: He's just here for a minor operation.

Morgue Attendant: [smiles] I'll check back later.

Dan: Yeah, over my dead body.

Morgue Attendant: It's a date!

Dan: Yes, and please give my regards to the lovely Mrs. Dracula.

Dan's Operation: Part 2 [4.06]

Christine: Sir, would you please tell him that I am not a pervert?

Harry: [starts to speak, but turns back] How exactly are we defining pervert?

Christine: Sir!

Morgue Attendant: Look, folks, "pervert, prude," it's not my job to label people. Wait a minute... [pulls out toe-tag] I guess it is! [laughs]

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Dan: I don't have a life, Harry. I have a lifestyle. Do you know how many women I have slept with?

Harry: It doesn't matter how many women you've slept with! [pause] More than a hundred?

Dan: You know the slogan under the Golden Arches? "Over four billion served"? Let's just say I'm competitive.

The New Judge [4.07]

[the defendants are an elderly couple who have been disturbing the police by having sex in their own apartment, very often, and very loudly]

Judge Mike Watson: I don't mean to pry, Mr. MacNulty, but why are you so loud during these romantic interludes?

Mr. MacNulty: [cupping a hand to his ear] What?

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Dan: ...And when the police arrived, Mr. MacNulty attacked the arresting officers.

Christine: He was merely protecting his wife!

Dan: Burn this image in your mind, sir: this man, standing stark naked, swinging a baseball bat.

Mrs. MacNulty: My Louisville slugger.

Mr. MacNulty: [tilting his head] What?

Dan: SHE SAID SHE LIKES YOUR BAT!

Contempt of Courting [4.08]

Judge Eve Gardner: [on Dan] Is he always such a boot-licker?

Mac: Shine-O is Dan's favorite flavor.

New Year's Leave [4.11]

Harry: So you really believe you're responsible for everything that happens in the next year?

"1987": I'm gonna make NBC the number-one network again!

Harry: [bangs gavel] Held over for a psychiatric evaluation.

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Lieutenant Gerard: Say, Judge, stop by the prison any time. I'd love to...

Harry: Drop me in the hole with a psycho killer for about an hour?

Lieutenant Gerard: Is Thursday good for you?

[Harry lifts his hand and fire flashes between his fingers. Gerard takes a step back.]

Harry: Fine.

Murder [4.12]

Dan: [enters courtroom angrily] You don't know what you're talking about, lady!

Alice Beeker: Please, Mr. Fielding, it happens to a lot of men.

Dan: Not to me, it doesn't!

Christine: Dan, what happened?

Dan: They rejected me.

Alice Beeker: Many are called, but few are frozen.

Christine: They rejected you? Why?

Alice Beeker: His sperm is slow and immature.

Christine: [fighting not to laugh] Oh... I'm so sorry I asked.

Dan: That's great. Why don't you just go ahead and tell the whole world while you're at it?

Bull: [excitedly] I'll start with the cafeteria! [runs out of the courtroom]

Harry: Miss Beeker, is this something abnormal?

Alice Beeker: Oh, not at all. He just doesn't fit within our semen parameters.

Harry: Which are?

Alice Beeker: Sixty million per cc.

Dan: I demand a recount!

Alice Beeker: You know Mr. Fielding your problem could be attributed to fatigue. How recent was your last sexual encounter?

Dan: ...What time is it now?

Alice Beeker: It would be no problem to retest you. But to be sure we have an accurate result I suggest you abstain for two weeks.

Harry: ...From sex?

Christine: ...Dan?

Mac: I got twenty, says he doesn't make it back to his car.

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Dan: I haven't had sex in two weeks. It's 3:00 in the morning, and I don't have a date...

[He begins looking obsessively around the cafeteria.]

Roz: Run for your lives, girls!

[All females flee the cafeteria. Dan still looks around obsessively.]

Harry: Better safe than sorry, guys!

[All males flee.]

Baby Talk [4.13]

Lorna Huebner: Your Honor, my father's dying words were, "No matter what, don't make me go with Arlene."

Arlene Huebner: Why, you lying...!

Harry: Whoa, whoa, whoa! "Dying words"? Is Dad dead?

Dan As a kipper on a cracker! [shocked looks] I'm sorry to say.

Harry: Well, the way you were just talking about him, I kind of got the impression that he was, you know, here.

Bull: He is, Your Honor.

[Bull holds up a small urn and places it on Harry's desk.]

Bull: This is Mr. Huebner.

Harry: Gee, he's a lot shorter than I pictured.

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Bull: Your Honor, the Hubner sisters are waiting to see you.

Harry: Herb's kids? What do they want?

Bull: Apparently they settled their differences and had some kind of reconciliation.

Harry: So what about the ashes?

Bull: They say whatever you decide to do with them is fine with both of them.

Harry: [picks up the urn] Oh. Well, okay. I hadn't really... [opens the urn] Hey, this thing's empty!

Art: Oh that, yeah I'm sorry, Your Honor, I had to use that herb tea to test the coffee maker.

Harry: Art, this wasn't herb tea! This was Herb!

[they look over and see Dan standing at the coffee maker, his mug frozen against his lips]

The Modest Proposal [4.14]

Roz: [deadpan] Quite a day today.

Mac: [deadpan] Yep, quite a day. We almost had a wedding here.

Roz: Yep, almost. But we didn't.

[They sit impassively for a moment, then make Harry's "crazy" face at each other.]

Christine's Friend [4.17]

Christine: Are you two done mentally undressing my friend?

Dan: Hold it a sec.

[He and Harry close their eyes and lean back their heads, smiling blissfully.]

Caught Red-Handed [4.18]

Mac: First case sir, People vs. Trixie Dubois. She's charged with prostitution.

Harry: Mr. Prosecutor?

Dan: Ah yes, sir, familiar story: boy meets girl, girl asks for a C-note, boy flashes badge, girl offers discount, boy busts girl.

Harry: Ain't love grand?

Mac: Uh-huh.

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[Christine, Harry, and Bull storm into Thursby's office]

Harry: Thursby, you're scum!

Arthur Thursby: [into phone] You'll have to excuse me, Monsignor. The Good, the Bad and the Ugly just dropped by.

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Arthur Thursby: You're insane!

Harry Stone: They called me mad at the university!

Paternity [4.19]

Dan: Listen, pal, you can't make me pay for something I didn't do!

Pete Petey Peterson: But, Danny, I have affidavits on you from half the women in this town! And, may I add, you photograph quite well...

Dan: Yeah, you just prove that's me behind that mask.

Pete Petey Peterson: If you refuse to settle, you force me to launch a vicious, no-holds-barred smear campaign.

Dan: Listen, buddy, nobody drags Dan Fielding through the mud!

Harry: [looking through the photos] Not according to Action Photo Number Five, Dan.

Here's to You, Mrs. Robinson [4.20]

[swearing in a group of new citizens]

Harry: You've all gone through a lot to reach here. You've learned our history, our culture, our secret handshake...

[confused murmur]

Harry: Well, you have learned our secret handshake, haven't you?

[more confused murmuring]

Harry: Ha-ha-ha! No, there's no secret handshake! I was just kidding!

Clinton: I stuffed myself into the dashboard of a Datsun to get here, and he's kidding?

Roz: It's his inalienable right to make an ass of himself.

Vega: God, he's good!

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[on a busy night at the hospital, a podiatrist is sent to Mac and Quon Le's hospital room, while she is in labor]

Doctor Aidleman: Good lord, this woman is pregnant!

Christine: Oh, don't tell me you've never delivered a baby before?

Doctor Aidleman: [sarcastic] Well, just how many people who aren't obstetricians have?

[raised hands from Christine, Harry, Mac, Bull, and Dan (a reference to Season Three's "Hurricane: Part 2")]

Doctor Aidleman: What are you? Some kind of a cult?

Her Honor: Part 1 [4.21]

Mac: Dan's still trying to put on a good face for the Mayor's judicial selection committee.

Christine: Yesterday he actually taught a civics class at an orphanage. Can you picture Dan in a roomful of little kids?

Roz: Yeah. Ransacking their little lunch boxes for milk money...

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Bob Wheeler: Hello, it's us.

Harry: Bob and June Wheeler, ya Yugoslavian recidivist knuckleheads, you! What the heck brings you by?

Mac: They were picked up on a 509-B violation, sir.

Harry: 509?

Mac: Uh-huh.

Harry: B?

Mac: Yep.

Harry: I don't believe I'm familiar with that one.

Dan: Well, sir, it's not used in Manhattan very much. It refers to the illegal detonation of... poultry.

Harry: Excuse me, but I didn't think that chickens were among our more widely-used explosives.

Christine: Sir, the Wheelers were merely trying their hand at egg-farming. They ran into a bit of difficulty with a propane-powered incubator.

Harry: So all the would-be chicks are now...

Dan: Quiche, yes sir.

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[Dan is throwing a tantrum over being passed over for a judicial appointment.]

Dan: Maybe I'm just not cut out for this job!

Christine: Dan...

Dan: [to the courtroom] All right, who wants to share gas to Florida? Show yourself now!

[A flasher stands up and, taking Dan literally, opens his trench coat. Dan mulls it over for a second.]

Dan: ...Okay, but you gotta ride in the back.

Her Honor: Part 2 [4.22]

Mac: Oh, poor Harry. This whole thing must have him really depressed.

Harry: Gangway!

[Harry streaks out of the cafeteria kitchen on roller skates, wearing a jet pack made from a fire extinguisher. He speeds out of the cafeteria - CRASH! Everyone gets up and rushes to the exit.]

Bob Wheeler: Don't worry! Don't worry, he's all right. The girl scouts broke his fall.

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Christine: There's got to be a way to get your job back!

Harry: Like what? Like it turns out I'm on Dallas and I've been dreaming all this?