- Brass McGannon: Now that you've seen the great, wide, wonderful world, you're coming back to the big menagerie, huh?
- Tina: Quaint but wrong. Any law against a girl going to see her father?
- Brass McGannon: Legally, I can't think of a loophole.
- Brass McGannon: Here's mud in your eye.
- Tina: That's the circus for you - and if it isn't mud, it's rain; if it isn't rain, it's dust.
- Tina: Does he still drink prune juice and gin?
- Brass McGannon: This may come as a shock to you, but your old man's on the wagon.
- Tina: Alonzo?
- Brass McGannon: It got so he was drinking more gin than prune juice. I'm glad you're coming back, Tina. You're just what the wagon ordered.
- Sam Hackett: McGannon, what in the name of Chibootie are you doin' here?
- Brass McGannon: They don't like your money in Cedarville - your plates are showin'.
- [Brass discusses his problems with the circus' fortune teller]
- Ma Hooper: You're worried - what is it?
- Brass McGannon: Oh, a little bit of everything, Ma - Tina, money, Alonzo. You know, Sam will can Alonzo if he gets looped again.
- Ma Hooper: Where'd he get that bottle?
- Brass McGannon: I thought you knew everything?
- Brass McGannon: I don't know why I beat my brains out tryin' to push this turkey around the country. Every time I turn around it's nothing but grief.
- Ma Hooper: You're an advance man, sweetie - that's your job: grief. You're a combination press agent, wet nurse and troubleshooter. Like you say, you gotta be tough, you gotta be soft, you gotta be a diplomat.
- Ma Hooper: You were vacinated with sawdust, sweetie. You'll bake in the summer, freeze in the winter, take the long hops and the short dough and you like it, 'cause there ain't no antidote for sawdust in the blood.
- Tina: If you've got any sense, you'll leave me alone, too.
- Brass McGannon: Are you brushin' me off?
- Tina: I'm an off-center character, Brass.
- Brass McGannon: And I'm a big boy now. I go to the barbershop by myself and everything.
- Brass McGannon: Nice homecoming for Tina.
- Alonzo: Stay away from her, Brass. She'll take you down with her.
- Brass McGannon: You should talk after the way you kicked her out.
- Alonzo: Oh no, nobody kicks Tina - remember that. I thought I was rid of her when she ran away and got married.
- Brass McGannon: Married?
- Alonzo: Didn't she tell you about that charming husband of hers? Probably an oversight. You know how those things are.
- Brass McGannon: Where is this phantom husband of hers?
- Alonzo: Alcatraz. Where else would Tina's husband be?
- Brass McGannon: What do you mean?
- Alonzo: Brass, my boy, you're naive.
- Brass McGannon: No, just sore. Now start makin' some sense.
- Alonzo: Alcatraz is a federal penitentiary where they send bright young engravers that have an uncontrollable desire to copy presidents' likenesses on paper money.
- Tina: I told you I wasn't very nice.
- Brass McGannon: You didn't sell it hard enough.
- Tina: What do you want - a written guarantee?
- Brass McGannon: Engraved - by Joe Webster.
- Tina: Shaefer's just business to me. You don't think I'd look at that blob, do you?
- Brass McGannon: Why not? You're versatile.
- [last lines]
- Boy: Hey, Mister - where do I go to get a job with this outfit?
- Brass McGannon: Go on, beat it, kid. Go back to your folks.
- Boy: But I've got their permission.
- Brass McGannon: Forget about the circus, kid. It's a rough, tough life - always on the move no matter how you feel, just so you can get that pile of canvas to the next town. Put it up in the morning; rip it down at night. No roots, no foundations - it's a hazard.
- Boy: But mister, I'm crazy about the circus. It's all I ever think of. I can hear the music in my head. I even dream about it.
- Brass McGannon: Why don't you go on back home and...
- [Brass sighs]
- Brass McGannon: The manager's in the ticket wagon. Tell him Brass sent you.
- Boy: Gee, thanks! Thanks a million!