Orson Welles as The Third Man

The Third Man

The Lives Of Harry Lime

Harry Lime-Orson Welles
Zither music -Anton Karas
Number of episodes -52
Date of run -August 3, 1951 to July 25, 1952Opening music

Announcer: "Presenting Orson Welles as the Third Man. "The Lives of Harry Lime," the fabulous stories of the immortal character originally created in the motion picture The Third Man, with zither music by Anton Karas."

Zither music ending with a gunshot.

Orson Welles: "That was the shot that killed Harry Lime. He died in a sewer beneath Vienna, as those of you know who saw the movie The Third Man. Yes, that was the end of Harry Lime. But it was not the beginning. Harry Lime had many lives, and I can recount all of them. How do I know? Very simple. Because my name is Harry Lime."

Short music bridge
Orson introduces story line.
Longer music bridge.
Announcer: "And now, Orson Welles as Harry Lime, the Third Man, in today's story, [title]."

Orson Welles returns to the role he made famous in the 1949 movie The Third Man. In this series, Harry Lime recounts other exploits he had before that fateful day in Vienna. We are shown further insights into this thief and conman -- with a heart.

Date - Title - Introduction
08-03-51 -Too Many Crooks "Don't get me wrong, I love Budapest. Before calling at the bank I stopped at a cute little flower shop I happened to notice across the way.'

08-10-51 - See Naples and Live [no introduction] 'Once upon a time, there was an exquisite, a huge emerald locket which spent most its life looking out at the world from the rather fleshy neck of a Mrs. Donaldson as she waddled like a golden duck across the international social horizon'.

08-17-51 - Clay Pigeon 'Say what you will about Harry Lime. He at least was honest in his desire for money and the good things in life. In 1942, my fortunes being for the moment being at ebb tide, it pleased me to return to America; to New York, specifically, because I'd heard that an old and important enemy of mine was in difficulties and wanted to see me.'

08-24-51- Ticket to Tangier 'I was down on my luck; way down, scrapping the bottom. While I was brooding about how to raise the price of the ticket to Tangier, my eye happened to wander down the personal column of the newspaper. . . .'

08-31-51 - Voodoo 'I've known many places and left them, made many friends and lost them, won many fortunes and spent them. My fate seems to be linked to a cosmic yo-yo. I am sorry, Mr. Harry, no more.'

09-07-51 - Bohemian Star 'the A diamond as big as a hen's egg. Change that to a duck's egg. London, 1938. One of those quaint old English pubs.'

09-14-51 - Love Affair 'Friends, the story of my marriage. My first marriage, and believe you me, my last. Nicaragua, Saudi Arabia, Harry Lime, that's me, a happy young bachelor strolling along the narrow street that led from the Grand Hotel to the native bazaar.'

09-21-51 - Rogue's Holiday 'Did I ever tell you about the time when I outwitted three very suspicious Wall Street investors at a net profit of to yours truly of 55,000 American dollars?Very pleasant, a day or so out of New York on the Queen Anne bound for Southampton.'

09-28-51 - Work of Art 'Buenos Aires, July 1944. The Argentine papers were full of the attempted assassination of Adolph Hitler.Yes, there I was in Buenos Aires, just a clean-cut young American boy looking for a chance to hustle an honest buck.'

1010-05-51 Operation Music Box 'Now kiddies, London, which is the capital of England, is noted for a number of curious historical events.Good afternoon, Mr. Dudley, I'm interested in a music box.'

10-12-51 - Golden Fleece The First line of introduction: missing 'Well, it's a queer story no matter how you look at it. It begins with a bull fight; it ends with a naval engagement on the China Sea. There's a woman in it, of course. Have another drink?'

10-19-51 - Blue Bride ;Now here's a little anecdote taking place in the city of Bordeaux. It has to do with a phase of my hectic career which was almost exclusively a chase.Now, this little cautionary tale took place, oh, a couple years ago in the French port of Bordeaux.

10-26-51 - Every Frame Has A Silver Lining 'Fellow I knew once told me I was a poet, but he was so wrong.It was in Tehran. That was some years ago. I had just come there, and I was pretty sure in a country with all that oil and all that intrigue, so many people playing the game of empire building and empire busting, I could promote something that suited my special talents.'

11-02-51 - Mexican Hat Trick 'Me, I don't approve of gambling, at least not the legitimate kind. It's not the gambling I dislike; it's the losing I detest.There is no human affliction worse than poverty.'

11-09-51 - Art Is Long And Lime Is Fleeting 'I won't burden you with sordid details about how I met two very lovely Brazilian women named Inez and Aurora.Bon jour, monsieur. Bon jour. Please, can I help you?'

11-16-51 - In Pursuit of A Ghost 'You come into the theater just as the curtain is going up.There's no sense in identifying the Central American country where I found myself in the fall of '45.'

11-23-51 - Horseplay 'If I were an honest man, which would be silly on the face of it, this would be my sermon: 'Any character who gets swindled is asking for it. You can't swindle a man unless he is so full of larceny that his very breathing is crooked.'My game of horse play began in a bar. '

11-30-51- Three Farthings for Your Thoughts 'I have in my hand here, a farthing. This is the smallest of small coins. Well, here I was in Liverpool, sitting in a pub, which is English for bar, or grill, or saloon, to you, having myself a drink and mulling over a few little business possibilities.'

12-07-51 - Third Woman, the 'Yes. Major? Yes, yes, come on, speak up! You know something, Corporal Lime? No sir. If we could prove half of this stuff in this file, you'd be celebrating your hundredth birthday in a military prison.'

12-14-51 - Old Moorish Custom, An 'This is a love story. But don't worry, there's action in it: Arab chieftains, international gangsters, and a buried treasure. But essentially this is a tale of one of the times I fell in love. Valerie, Valerie Derouche, that was her name.'

12-21-51 - It's a Knockout 'The world, the poet says, is so full of a number of things, he's sure we should all be as happy as kings. Point him out to me, Harry.'

12-28-51- Two Is Company 'Now, Italy, my children, as you probably know, is shaped like a boot. Hello. Hello. Can I buy you a drink?

01-04-52 - Cherchez la Gem 'I always say money isn't everything. That's what I say. It all began on a slow boat to China, and I mean a slow boat to China. Just like the song, only without the music.'

401-11-52 - Hand Of Glory 'Yes. That was me, Harry Lime, making my way through a side alley in Paris. I wanted to get away from gold, and away from France.

01-18-52 -Double Double-cross, The 'She's beautiful, beautiful, tres chic, tres French. Monte Carlo, 1936. The sucker season was at its peak, and by an odd coincidence my pockets were fuller than they had been for a long time.

01-25-52 - 5000 Pengoes and A Kiss 'At various times in various countries I have been called many things, most of which I'd rather not repeat here. In Hungary, various political events after the war brought about new and very strict laws about getting in and out of the country.'

02-01-52 - Dark Enchantress 'I once thought I knew all about women. Ah, Algiers, Algiers. You've all heard of it, Algiers, the port of mystery and intrigue, invaded by the Phoenicians, the Carthaginians, Romans, Vandals, the Byzantines, the Arabs, the Turks, the French, and Harry Lime.'

02-08-52 - Earl on Troubled Waters, The 'The single most pernicious influence on the growing English boy is the shocking behavior portrayed in the American cinematograph.' To which, at one time, I would have uttered a hearty Amen. Not so very long ago I was sipping a rather dubious Pernod with a rather dubious British character; the sort known locally as a spiv.'

02-15-52 - Dead Candidate, The 'Here now is a story of power politics and international intrigue. Hello. Sea is nice and calm, isn't it?

02-22-52 - It's in the Bag 'Hello. This is your old friend, Harry Lime. I've got a story for you. It all happened on a train going through the Balkans, from Istanbul to Belgrade. The Orient Express, the central line, that is, runs between Istanbul and Paris. I wanted as much mileage between me and Turkey as possible, so I had my ticket booked all the way.'

02-29-52 - Hyacinth Patrol, The 'The hyacinth is a flower. A rum swizzle is a drink. And the Panama Canal, let's face it, is a ditch. Well, the canal belt. Notice please, that despite wartime improvements and sanitation, an air of fetid decay hangs heavy over this whole area.'

03-07-52 - Turnabout Is Foul Play 'In my youth, after serious study of all the good causes that can lay just claim to a man's attention, I decided to work for the best cause of all, the cause of Harry Lime. It was in Bern, Switzerland, where a number of people in the international set had come for a half year's rest, to make them fit for a half year of weekending.'

03-14-52 - Violets, Sweet Violets 'You know, I've always believed in saying it with flowers. It's a nice, expensive language. It is passing strange that a city like Marseilles, about as wicked as they come, should be so abloom with churches and cathedrals.'

03-21-52 - Faith, Lime and Charity 'Folks, the name of this story is faith, Lime, and charity. Wealthy tourists have always been attracted by the romance of India and the beautiful Taj Mahal, and Harry Lime has always been attracted by the romance of beautiful and wealthy tourists.'

03-28-52 - Pleasure Before Business 'You know, there are two kinds of men who should be wary and suspicious of women. The serious businessman, because women can be so frivolous, and the frivolous seeker after pleasure, because women can be so serious. It was in Venice, not long after the war was over, that I found myself with a problem on my hands, and it wasn't the old Venetian one about finding a place to park my car.'

04-04-52 - Fools Gold 'Now, right from the very outset, friends, I want it clearly understood that I do not believe in Santa Claus. If a man offers to sell me a gold brick, I do not reach for my billfold except to make sure that I still have it. It began, as I told you, in the bar of the George Cinq, in Paris. Ironically, I didn't even want to meet the man. I didn't want to see him at all, when he called the make the appointment. I was even rude to him.'

04-11-52 - Man Of Mystery 'One late afternoon a couple of years ago, a plane was sighted about seventy miles out of Orly Airport in Paris. It was a private plane, medium sized, and nobody was in it; nobody at all. The plane, keeping its course steadily toward Paris, was flying itself. Why was it empty? Who had been flying it? And why, and under what circumstances, had they left it? Why? Thereby hangs a tale. telephone rings, operator says: Monsieur Gregory Arkadin calling Monsieur Harry Lime.'

04-18-52 - Painted Smile, The 'I've got a story for you; a story about a canvas cloud, a tinsel world, a bloody murder. I've always had a fondness for the exception that breaks the rule, maybe because I like to break rules myself.

04-25-52 - Harry Lime Joins the Circus 'The scene is Rome. The time is not so very long ago. A hundred bells in the eternal city have just finished announcing midnight when. . . .Just answer me this. I come back to my hotel room and find you in possession. How did you get in?'

05-02-52 - Suzy's Cue 'Her name was Suzy, and she was very, very far from being a floozy. She was lovely, and she was a countess. What brought me to Vienna was a hint that for an astute financier like myself there was an honest buck or two to be made on the international currency market. Not black, you understand, just a pale shade of gray."'

05-09-52 - Vive la Chance 'Put a man in a Palm Beach suit, sling a camera over his shoulder, give him a cigar and an American accent, and anywhere on the continent of Europe he's marked down at once by the smart boys as a sheep ready for slaughter. It happened, as I've said, in Paris. In a casual sort of way, I got to know a couple of the local boys named Paul and Pierre.'

05-16-52 - Elusive Vermeer 'Have you ever tried looking for a needle in a haystack? Well, I did a bit of needle searching in London myself not so long ago, only this was no ordinary needle.I first met Horace St. John [pronounced 'sinjin'] Windemeer oh yes, that really was his name in Cannes'.

05-23-52 - Murder On The Riviera 'This little story of frustrated love and violent death just happened to happen on the Cote d'Azur. Well, I went back to my truck and turned it around. Don't ask me why, I'm just telling you what I did.'

05-30-52 - Pearls Of Bohemia 'The police of Milan, like the police of any other town of the world, can sometimes be mistaken. Melody Johnson wasn't home when I got to the address on the hill above Richardis (sp?). Melody Johnson, that was the name given in the ad.'

06-06-52 - Night In The Harem, A 'Most people, you know, spend their lives searching for something. ell, when I ran into Sam I felt as though I'd struck oil myself. He was sitting in the Tour d'Argent all alone.'

06-13-52 - Blackmail Is a Nasty Word 'I've messed around in a lot of messy things. You know me, I'm no angel. It all started in Marseilles back in '47. I was running cigarettes into France in those days; cigarettes and a few other commodities, as I think I've told you before.'

06-20-52 - Professor Regrets, The 'I'm not by any manner of means the hero of this story, nor the villain, which is just as well since it concerns one of the great traitors of our time. But I was around when it happened, and for a bit when it was over. Well, it really started in the casino, or rather on the terrace that leads off it. I'd been playing chemin-de-fer, or maybe 'playing' is the wrong word.'

06-27-52 - Hard Way, The 'You know, I've tried everything in my time. Just about everything. Confidence rackets, smuggling, the black market. Once, believe it or not, I even tried going straight, and here's the story of what happened to me then. It's called 'The Hard Way.' Stick around. I figure it like this, Harry, the good old days is over and past. Things here in Europe is not what they was, not like just after the war.'

07-04-52 - Paris Is Not the Same 'Sooner or later, one way or another, crime is at the seat of every human story. Some ordinary little mugg telling a lot of other ordinary little muggs how he once rubbed elbows with Jack the Ripper, or Jack himself. Not that I approve of Jack. Murder is usually a mistake and always messy. Personally I never indulge. It all started on the Geneva express. A fat little character with very little charm and no hair to speak of was giggling at one of my jokes.'

07-11-52 - Honeymoon 'This time, just for a change of pace, I've got a yarn for you about a honeymoon. This all happened in Sicily, which is as good a place for a honeymoon as there is anywhere in the world, all sunshine, full moons, and orange blossoms. Ideal.

07-18-52 - Blue Caribou, The 'I don't know if you know the Republic of San Marino. That little fortune teller that came up to my table at the bar of the Hotel Lido. . . .'

07-25-52 - Greek To Greek 'A short while ago, I decided to pay a visit to Greece. I've always been interested in art objects, especially if they're the expensive, easily portable sort, and that's why sculpture isn't normally my line.Say ah. Ah. Again. Ah. Say twenty-two.'