[Reflecting upon a Mozart score]
Salieri:
I was staring through the cage of those meticulous ink strokes - at an absolute beauty.


Katerina Cavalieri:
I heard you met Herr Mozart.
Salieri:
News travels fast in Vienna.
Katerina Cavalieri:
And he's been commissioned to write an opera. Is it true?
Salieri:
Yes.
Katerina Cavalieri:
Is there a part in it for me?
Salieri:
No.
Katerina Cavalieri:
How do you know?
Salieri:
Do you know where it's set, my dear?
Katerina Cavalieri:
No.
Salieri:
In a harem.
Katerina Cavalieri:
What's that?
Salieri:
A brothel!
Katerina Cavalieri:
Oh-h-h-h.
Salieri:
Come. Let's begin.
Katerina Cavalieri:
What does he look like?
Salieri:
Mozart? You might be disappointed.
Katerina Cavalieri:
Why?
Salieri:
Looks and talent don't always go together, Katerina
Katerina Cavalieri:
Looks don't concern me, maestro. Only talent interests a woman of taste.


[repeated line]
Emperor Joseph II:
Well, there it is.


Salieri:
My plan was so simple. It terrified me. First I must get the death mass and then, I must achieve his death.
Father Vogler:
What?
Salieri:
His funeral! Imagine it, the cathedral, all Vienna sitting there, his coffin, Mozart's little coffin in the middle, and then, in that silence, music! A divine music bursts out over them all. A great mass of death! Requiem mass for Wolfgang Mozart, composed by his devoted friend, Antonio Salieri! Oh what sublimity, what depth, what passion in the music! Salieri has been touched by God at last. And God is forced to listen! Powerless, powerless to stop it! I, for once in the end, laughing at him!
[beat]
Salieri:
The only thing that worried me was the actual killing. How does one do that? Hmmm? How does one kill a man? It's one thing to dream about it; very different when, when you, when you have to do it with your own hands.


Emanuel Schikaneder:
Look, I asked you if we could start rehearsals next week and you said yes.
Mozart:
Well, we can.
Emanuel Schikaneder:
So let me see it. Where is it?
Mozart:
Here. It's all right here in my noodle. The rest is just scribbling. Scribbling and bibbling, bibbling and scribbling.


Mozart:
I actually threw the score on the fire, he made me so angry.
Salieri:
You burned the score?
Mozart:
No, no. My wife took it out in time.


Constanze Mozart:
Is it not good?
Salieri:
It is miraculous.


Salieri:
Are you sure you can't leave these and, and come back again?
Constanze Mozart:
It's very tempting sir, but it's impossible, I'm afraid. Wolfgang would be frantic if he found those were missing, you see they're all originals.
Salieri:
Originals?
Constanze Mozart:
Yes, sir, he doesn't make copies.
Salieri:
These, are originals?


Salieri:
But they showed no corrections of any kind. Not one. He had simply written down music already finished in his head. Page after page of it as if he were just taking dictation. And music, finished as no music is ever finished. Displace one note and there would be diminishment. Displace one phrase and the structure would fall.


Emperor Joseph II:
My dear young man, don't take it too hard. Your work is ingenious. It's quality work. And there are simply too many notes, that's all. Just cut a few and it will be perfect.
Mozart:
Which few did you have in mind, Majesty?


Salieri:
Mozart, it was good of you to come!
Mozart:
How could I not?
Salieri:
How... Did my work please you?
Mozart:
[hesitantly] I never knew that music like that was possible!
Salieri:
[uncertainly] You flatter me.
Mozart:
No, no! One hears such sounds, and what can one say but... "Salieri."


Salieri:
I heard the music of true forgiveness filling the theater, conferring on all who sat there, perfect absolution. God was singing through this little man to all the world, unstoppable, making my defeat more bitter with every passing bar.