A Welcome to Britain (1943)

Burgess Meredith: Self

Quotes 

• Burgess Meredith : Now look men - you heard that conversation. It's not unusual here. That happens quite a lot. Now let's be frank about it. There are coloured soldiers as well as white here and there are less social restrictions in this country. Just what you heard - an English woman asking a coloured boy to tea - she was polite about it and he was polite about it. Now, look - that might not happen at home, but the point is, we are not at home.

• Burgess Meredith : Here's a little lesson for you about how not to behave when invited out for supper in a British home.

  [He proceeds to help himself liberally from the table] 

  Burgess Meredith : . Don't grab a handful of tomatoes - they are rare luxuries. Go easy with meat - they each get only 25 cents' worth a week - you can eat it all in one gulp, but don't. Butter - go slow with the butter, very slow - two ounces a week plus eight ounces of margarine is the lot. Green vegetables aren't so bad, and all the potatoes you want. Crockery is mighty scarce. Tea - two ounces per person per week is always get. They can't have it as often as they want. And sugar - each person gets eight ounces a week - they've almost given up having it in their tea. Jams and preserves - four ounces week.

  [the English hosts look rueful as their guest eats their week's ration, but don't say anything] 

  Burgess Meredith : . So this is a particularly horrible example what you're seeing, but you get the idea. It isn't that they are starving, it's just that they have very little to give to other people. Remember - they won't tell you these things.

• Burgess Meredith : Is your name really Mr Chips?

  Schoolmaster : Oh no no no. They think I'm like some cinematograph character.

• Burgess Meredith : Men, You remember Bob Hope - he used to play in those Bing Crosby pictures.

  Bob Hope : You're still so funny - goodbye.

• Burgess Meredith : Now that was the wrong thing to do!