Born Yesterday is a 1950 film based on the play of the same name by Garson Kanin and directed by George Cukor.
Plot
A corrupt tycoon brings his showgirl mistress with him to Washington when he tries to buy a Congressman. He hires a journalist to educate his girlfriend, and in the process, she learns just how corrupt her boyfriend is.
Uncouth tycoon Harry Brock (Broderick Crawford) goes to Washington, D.C. with his brassy mistress, Emma 'Billie' Dawn (Judy Holliday), and his crooked lawyer, Jim Devery (Howard St. John), to "influence" a politician or two. The lawyer also presses Harry to marry Billie on the grounds that a wife cannot testify against her husband.
Harry becomes disgusted with Billie's ignorance and lack of manners (though he himself is much worse) and hires a tutor for her, journalist Paul Verrall (William Holden). Blossoming under Paul's encouragement, Billie turns out to be much smarter than anybody knew and begins thinking for herself. The two fall in love.
Meanwhile, Devery had persuaded Harry to sign over many of his assets to Billie to hide them from the government. When Harry needs to get them back, he comes into conflict with Billie's new-found independence. She and Paul use her leverage to escape from Harry's domination; she promises to give him back his property little by little as long as he leaves them alone. Billie and Paul marry.
Billie Dawn: Could have saved yourself the trouble. I don't read papers.
Paul Verrall: Never?
Billie Dawn: Yeah, once in a while the back part... the funnies.
Paul Verrall: I think you should. The, the front part... the not-so-funnies.
Billie Dawn: He always used to say, "Never do nothing you wouldn't want printed on the front page of The New York Times."
Paul Verrall: Nobody's born smart, Billy. Do you know what the stupidest thing on Earth is? An infant!
Billie Dawn: Whadaya got against babies all of a sudden?
Harry Brock: What's a peninsula?
Billie Dawn: Shhhh.
Harry Brock: Don't gimme that "shush." You think you're so smart, huh - what's a peninsula?
Paul Verrall: It's a ...
Harry Brock: Not you, her.
Billie Dawn: It's that new medicine...
Billie: Would you do me a favor, Harry?
Harry Brock: What?
Billie: Drop dead!
Harry Brock talking to a hotel official: Look, when I say I want the whole floor, I don't want one wing and I don't want two wings. I want the whole bird.
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