149 quotes found
"To be a character who feels a deep emotion, one must go into the memory's vault and mix in a sad memory from one's own life."
"It seems to me a long way to go just to sit in a non-drinking, non-smoking environment on the offchance your name is called. … It's as if you are entered into a race you don't particularly want to run in. All the hoops you have to jump through on these occasions: it's not my favourite occupation. Walking around in the spotlight having to be me is not something I'm particularly comfortable with or desire. I'd sooner pretend to be someone else."
"I don't think that we necessarily lie. I mean, we make our living by pretending that we're someone else. I don't tell tall tales. I always tell the truth."
"It's true that old actors don't die, their parts get smaller. You're less likely to get the part, many parts, if you're playing people your age as opposed to people who are younger. There are fewer parts around."
"My dad was great. He was very droll, very dry. The first time that he came to London when I was in the theatre and my name was in lights for the very first time and we had the same name, and he passed the theatre with me on the way, he was going to see a matinee and me, and my mother and he passed the theatre, and I said, 'Look,' and he looked up at my name in lights, and stood there for five minutes, and I'm going, 'I want to have lunch and get back for the matinee,' and I'm with my mother, and he still stood there and so, I went back to get him and he just said, 'I never thought that I'd see my name in lights.'"
"Unlike writers or painters, we don't sit down in front of a blank canvas and say, 'How do I start? Where do I start?' We're given the springboard of the text, a plane ticket, told to report to Alabama, and there's a group of people all ready to make a film and it's a marvelous life."
"I can remember seeing the movie for the first time at a revival house in L.A. and laughing with everyone else, and never imagining that I would be doing Max one day, even though by then I had already memorized the entire movie."
"I think of myself as an actor and not a movie star. I like doing movies; I enjoy it. But, essentially, I'm a theater actor. That's the only place I feel like I actually am a star. In the theater, I can put people in the seats and sell tickets."
"I had to develop a sense of humor I'm sure it's a defense mechanism. It was, 'Before they make fun of me, I'll make a joke.' Being funny is just a point of view about life in general. Sometimes it's born out of difficult childhoods, where you have to develop a sense of humor. Ultimately, it's a gift."
"There's a freedom there and an understanding of my career and the things I've done. I'm seen here as primarily a comic actor, which is OK, but I can go to New York and I do something that's very emotional. It would be lovely at some point to do something like that on film."
"But in order for anyone to become successful, sometimes you have to be that driven and focused, and maybe there isn't a lot left over for personal relationships—although I certainly have had them. It's not as if I cut myself off, but it makes them very difficult. This profession is very hard on relationships."
"I guess there's some sort of unspoken show business rule, [speaks in British accent] 'You do the theater, and then you move into television, and then, of course, that is your steppingstone to film stardom.' I've done it every which way. I've done theater for many, many years and then had some success in films. I would do television sporadically. I thought this was a good time to try it."
"A sitcom is the closest thing for me to doing stage because you work in front of an audience, and if it's well written it can be very satisfying."
"My oldest brother used to take me to the theater. The first play he took me to see was 'Black Comedy,' then he took me to see 'Butley.' We'd see all these British plays. And 'Hello, Dolly,' with Pearl Bailey. I was unconsciously thinking, 'Gee, I would love to be able to do that.'"
"I was at a dinner party at Steve Martin's house not too long ago. Some very funny people were there - Steve, Marty Short, the whole gang. We sat around the table, like eight of us, and we laughed so hard that we were just sitting there laughing and crying. And I thought, 'This is great. This is what it's like when life is really good. Sitting around with people of that quality and that caliber, people being funny. Smart and funny.' It's great."
"I'll always go back to the stage."
"The more competition, the better. I hope to get snubbed again this year."
"Yes, I've been compared to Jackie Gleason often. I've been often compared to Lou Costello. … But after a while you start to go, 'Well, geez. Do I have a personality in there?' The funny thing about Gleason is, he always used to talk about watching Jack Oakie. And if you ever watch Jack Oakie in an old movie, it's very similar to Gleason. … I think we all steal from one another."
"There isn't anyone else like Nathan. He is able to express more in a look or a word than most actors I've ever worked with."
"I think it really is all about technique, but it's where the intersection of acting and singing sort of meets. There has to be a musicality to the delivery of a line of dialogue that gives it impact. Somebody like Nathan Lane understands that. It's in his bones really. He can deliver a line five different ways, and each one has incredible impact and intonation and rhythm."
"When Nathan read aloud one of his lines, 'I'm a lying, despicable crook, but I have no choice. I am a Broadway producer,' they all howled. And then they started to throw money at the project. They all wanted to produce the show."
"He is a theater animal who is ignited by his synergy with an audience. Audiences are only beginning to see the tip of the iceberg of what Nathan can do."
"I've seen most of Nathan's work, but it was seeing both 'Lisbon Traviata' and 'Laughter on the 23rd Floor' that I realized just what a superb physical comic he was."
"People were dealing with CGI for the first time, so I think we were really unsure as to whether it would be a huge success or a big flop. … I thought the scripts were so good. It had a kind of domestic element which I'm not sure it ever had before. I think we were feeling quite confident about that. … In terms of whether it had a place in the world when it aired, I think everyone was quite unsure. I didn't know until it aired and people really seemed to like it."
"I was freakishly ambitious. I didn't want to be a child. I wanted my own flat, to work and be a grown up."
"I think people have common sense and can tell what's real, what's right or what's wrong and work it out."
"I think it must be hard being David. I get a certain level of attention but — I've seen it in action — he can't move for attention."
"I don't think anyone understands anyone's job … We all have the same hang-ups. I get jealous if I know Laurence is kissing someone else."
"I believe in being with someone for ever. Even though my marriage to Chris didn't work, I still don't consider it a failed marriage — it just came to its natural end. It didn't make me feel like I never wanted to get married again. I like sharing things with somebody."
"I just feel really content at the moment … I've done quite a lot of stuff and I don't have to feel desperate to do anything that radical or wild. I've set myself all these challenges and worked through them. I just feel I'm ready to be a mum now."
"I hate being the subject of photographs."
"That's not girth. That's a para-umbilical hernia."
"I've always hated the way I looked, and I've never complained about my brains."
"Now, Piers Morgan is a bit of a ****."
"My family wasn't troubled by much dysfunction. The most hotly contested issue was probably 'Who is going to have the most peas?'. Consequently, I haven't got much time for angst. Anything that happens to you is your own responsibility."
"Mel and I genuinely get on. It's like another marriage. He is very straightforward and never loses his rag. I run around in a frenzy most of the time. London cabbies will say to me, 'Your mate Mel's a miserable bastard', but he's far more grounded than me."
"We need a corrective on who is a genuine artist. I'm an opportunist. I have no talent. That's true of 99 per cent of people in the British media. Ricky Gervais or Graham and Arthur who wrote Father Ted or Armando Iannucci are God-like as they have talent. Everyone else is a drone."
"For me real peace is lying on a river bank in summer with a sprig of grass in my mouth. I have friends who jet off to a luxury hotel. I think, 'How can you enjoy such ghastly luxury?'"
"It did something to me. I thought it was the most glorious melody."
"It was the most terrible feeling. I'd had enough and I'd felt I'd lost something so very important to me. I thought it had died and gone away. And I was frightened it might not come back. I just didn't seem to be able to shake off this feeling of doom and gloom. I had to come home. But to what? I was tired. I missed New York and the show and the people. It was like a grieving process."
"I never for a moment considered not doing the show. When I did the show I became very emotional. Some of the lyrics suddenly took on an entirely different meaning. Words like, 'as if we never said goodbye' became more real."
"I couldn't tell anyone about it. I didn't want anyone to know. It's only now that I've survived, I'm able to speak about it. As far as I know I'm clear and completely well - but it never leaves you completely. It's made me learn a lot about myself. When you're on your own, you've just got to get on with it, grit your teeth and think, 'Right, I'm going to beat this.' I did have my dear friend and, without him, I don't know what I would have done."
"My first singing role was as Susanna in a school production in a shortened form of Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro. I loved to sing and I was given lots of encouragement by a wonderful music teacher Mrs Ann Hill and by my parents who suggested I go to drama school."
"I have been fortunate to play some fantastic roles in musicals and I find it difficult to say which is my favourite. It's generally whichever I am playing at the time. However playing Eva Peron in Evita will always be particularly special to me. Being chosen to originate the role in the premiere of a much sought after and what became a ground-breaking, award-winning musical which launched my career was a great challenge and it gave me the opportunity to play more great roles in the future."
"Actors already striving in the theatre wouldn't dream of putting themselves on these shows; it means that only about 10% of the talent out there is being auditioned for parts."
"Learn to take rejection, keep fit and work only with the best in your field."
"My dad always told me that perseverance furthers. He was right."
"If you’re a serious actor, you wouldn’t put yourself up for one of those shows in case you got bumped off the first week and all your colleagues saw it."
"I did miss the music a bit - but only in the wings, when I was waiting to go on. It seemed dreadfully quiet, rather unnerving. But the wonderful thing was that one didn't have to be quite so obsessive about one's health, and one's voice."
"Oh, it was awful, and I vowed to myself I would never, ever push myself to the edge that much again. It was really frightening. Because absolutely everything seemed to be impossible to deal with, just little things became major - noise, if someone had a radio on, or even the sound of traffic, or being in someone's company for longer than 10 minutes - I started to find it all too much."
"I thought: "Gosh, it really has been worth the wait." And I think had I gone with Evita, I probably wouldn't have been ready to deal with it. It was just the most perfect time to go with that particular show."
"And so one becomes, or I become, anyway, slightly obsessive, particularly about my health, because you wouldn't want to read the letters people write when you're off and they're disappointed - it's so awful, the guilt one feels for not being there."
"On the very rare occasion when they don't all jump up out of their seats I'm always mortified."
"I loved it. We would rehearse in this dark theatre, unaware of the sunny day outside, and be immersed in the magic of creating something from our imaginations."
"It was terribly difficult. It's not something I ever wanted in my life. Naively I just thought, 'oh I've got this great part'. I never thought about the reality of all the stuff that went with it. I'm actually quite a shy person when I'm not on stage."
"I would have liked to have had kids, and had a family, but I think in my profession it's quite difficult to achieve because you're always working. I think I'm the kind of person as well, had I had kids, I wouldn't have gone on working. I would have jacked it all in. But it's a wonderful life I have, so I'm very fulfilled in other ways. Am I ever bothered by it? Well it's too late now, (laughs)."
"The lush sound and the sheer power of her voice are, to put it simply, incredible."
"I never expected to like her at all - she has quite a reputation for being difficult and once told a male interviewer that she would no longer give interviews to female journalists because 'I don't trust other women in these situations. They establish a sisterhood with you and then betray it every time.' But actually I found her chatty, friendly, good humoured."
"She is confident when she talks about singing and stagecraft, surprisingly diffident when it comes to anything outside her field."
"I used to get nervous for Elaine before a show, but not any more. She likes to be really well prepared for a role; she's very hard on herself. I'd never want to put myself through that kind of stress."
"Three years ago, around Christmas, when she was starring in The King and I in London, Mum was diagnosed with cancer. Elaine thought she should come out of the show, but Mum wanted her to finish her contract. That was very hard for Elaine, having to go on stage night after night knowing she wanted to be with Mum."
"Although no one could question her zealous work ethic (she drove herself to breakdown performing in Pam Gems’s Piaf in 1993), Paige is not exactly known for her humility. In newspaper profiles, that dread word "difficult" is often applied, and yet here she is in the chorus line, cheerfully taking on a modest role in a musical with far more credibility and less bombast than the shows that made her name."
"Few women care to be laughed at and men not at all, except for large sums of money."
"There are very few people on top of life, and the rest of us don't like them very much."
"A comedy is just a tragedy interrupted, I once said. Do you finish with the kiss or when she opens her eyes to tell him she loves him and sees blonde hairs on his collar?"
"The darker the subject, the more light you must try to shed on the matter. And vice versa."
"They've started this filthy floodlit cricket with cricketers wearing tin hats and advertisements for contraceptives on their boots."
"Plays by Alan Ayckbourn have been attracting larger audiences in the regional theatres than those of Shakespeare."
"The theatre is the best way of showing the gap between what is said and what is seen to be done, and that is why, ragged and gap-toothed as it is, it has still a far healthier potential than some poorer, abandoned arts."
"The act of writing is the act of discovering what you believe."
"A weak mind sinks under prosperity, as well as under adversity. A strong and deep mind has two highest tides – when the moon is at the full, and when there is no moon."
"Children always turn toward the light."
"In oratory the will must predominate."
"None but a fool is always right."
"Nothing is further than Earth from Heaven: nothing is nearer than Heaven to Earth."
"Our poetry in the eighteenth century was prose; our prose in the seventeenth, poetry."
"Poetry is the key to the hieroglyphics of Nature."
"Purity is the feminine, Truth the masculine, of Honour."
"Smiles are the language of love."
"Some people carry their hearts in their heads; very many carry their heads in their hearts. The difficulty is to keep them apart, and yet both actively working together."
"Sudden resolutions, like the sudden rise of the mercury in the barometer, indicate little else than the changeableness of the weather."
"The virtue of Paganism was strength: the virtue of Christianity is obedience."
"The ultimate tendency of civilization is toward barbarism."
"Thought is the wind, knowledge the sail."
"To those whose god is honour, disgrace alone is sin."
"I hear that the no-smoking crowd are now operating at the National. Surely that sort of mentality doesn't belong in a theatre, it isn't a place where you impose rules on people, it's a dirty radical place where an actor can work with a fag in his hand."
"Like a heartbeat. Something inside me. Some dream. I think it's being a dreamer as a child. Dreamy kids become actors, don't they?"
"Frank: There, you see, an example of assonance. Rita: Oh, it means getting' the rhyme wrong."
"Rita: Will they sack you. Frank: [lying flat on the floor] The sack? God no; that would involve making a decision. Pissed is all right. To get the sack, it'd have to be rape on a grand scale; and not just with students either. [Rita gets up and moves across to look at him] That would only amount to a slight misdemeanour. For dismissal it'd have to be nothing less than buggering the bursar."
"Rita: Have they sacked y'? Frank: Not quite. Rita: Well, why y' – packing your books away. Frank: Australia. [After a pause] Some weeks ago – made rather a night of it. Rita: Did y' bugger the bursar? Frank: Metaphorically."
"She divorced her husband, y' know. I never knew him, it was before I met Jane. Apparently she came back from work one mornin' an' found her husband in bed with the milkman. With the milkman, honest to God. Well, apparently, from that day forward Jane was a feminist. An' I've noticed, she never takes milk in her tea."
"Marriage is like the Middle East, isn't it? There's no solution."
"I'm not sayin' she's a bragger, but if you've been to Paradise, she's got a season ticket."
"Well, I flung the window open an' I shouted, "Yes, that's right Millandra – I'm goin' to Greece for the sex; sex for breakfast, sex for dinner, sex for tea, an’ sex for supper." Well, she just ignored me but this little cab driver leans out an' pipes up, "That sounds like a marvellous diet, love." "It is," I shouted back, "have y' never heard of it? It's called the 'F' Plan.""
"As a child in North London it never crossed my mind that I would ever play the Wicked Witch of the East."
"I was kind of a tomboy climbing trees so it never crossed my mind, no."
"I think the only way you can successfully be a mum and an actress is by not carrying around the burden of the character. Between the time the director says "Action" and "Cut," it's all true for me. But when I stop saying the lines, it's not true anymore."
"So many of the very funny things are very natural, we do them all every day. They’re just that little bit heightened, which is what makes you fall on the floor when you’re doing it. Sometimes we can’t finish a take because we’re laughing too much, and sometimes you see the cameraman chuckling and we have to do it again. Not having done many comedies, that must be the sign of a very funny script!"
"I was aged about five and I went to see Oliver!. I remember announcing to my family something very cliched like, I want to be up there one day."
"I have three older sisters who definitely encouraged me to lark around. I’m pretty sure they spent their Sundays dressing me up (in suitably androgynous clothing) and forcing me to sing Sister Sledge. They were my heroes growing up."
"I've never gone in as the overdog, and that's liberating and I don't want that to ever change. I just want to allow my own experiences to come through."
"Theatre is all about people. You can love a play and character and can be the right person to tell that story. But if you don’t click with the other people in the play, it won’t work."
"I’ve never doubted I would have children. It’s not something I’ve ever wavered on."
"It is a private matter [sexuality], but if there are opportunities to say something . . . I wonder if, if it would be beneficial to someone else, that responsibility is on you. It’s complicated."
"Theatre has often saved the day for me and that’s why I’ll forever think I’m a theatre actor more than anything else."
"Oh my God, are you kidding? I’m not saying for one second that I’ve been this sort of candyfloss gay who has cartwheeled around London. It’s completely brutal. And at moments really confusing. [But] there’s absolutely no way I’m not going to be visibly out. Even four years ago there wasn’t any actor in my peer group, really, that you could see playing straight roles."
"LGBT people are not that different - we're just as anxious and just as flawed and just as desperate to fall in love as everyone else."
"It’s about redressing the balance of access to roles. There just aren’t that many gay roles, so when straight actors go to take that space up, it’s eliminating the chance for other [gay actors]. We know there has been a history of needing to be closeted to succeed and be famous, especially in acting. And the idea of not being able to believe heterosexual relations and narrative, if you know one of the actors is gay… everyone should be able to play absolutely everything. But let’s blow away all the cobwebs, and one of the hang-ups and shadows of the past is that we need to be a lot more open to the idea of sexes playing different sides. There have been amazing performances by straight people playing gay and by gay people playing straight."
"I knew that I wanted to be visible about my sexuality, because in all the territories that Netflix goes out in, there might be a boy somewhere that goes, “Wait, what?” Which is what I didn’t have when I was young. All I know is that I’m happy to keep working really hard and if there are opportunities for representation, and to make that point, then that’s something I’ll always strive to do."
"In 20 years, you don't want to be famous. You want a sustained career."
"Any actor who thinks they're a sex symbol? Cringe."
"Of course I thought that in order to be happy I needed to be straight. I reached a point where I thought, Fuck this, I'd much prefer to hold my boyfriend's hand in public or be able to put my own face picture on Tinder and not be so concerned about that than getting a part."
"It is good to see a romance story getting the respect it deserves — people can relate because everyone gets the chance to fall in love at some point. Hopefully."
"I think there’s something incredibly sexy about consent generally."
"When you’re working with a genre like romance, which is about something fundamental which connects all humans, it’s so important that we can allow everyone to see themselves in that story, and that wasn't necessarily there for me growing up."
"Leadership is about authenticity and transparency. And being there. Being there as much as you can. There's a fearlessness to it."
"[I loved] the romance genre being given this platform — it’s always been seen as quite a lightweight literature. Of course, it’s fluffy because it’s accessible and it’s hopefully something that you can bathe in. But at the same time, it can really tap into very human, very private and very high-stakes human experiences."
"But with every job I’ve done that I’ve really enjoyed, I’ve never really ‘seen’ myself in it. If you can see yourself in something, you’ve probably already worked out your performance or the why. But if there’s that friction, then it means you’re going to come up with something new."
"There’s a lot of pressure on romance, I think, because you have to be so truthful. But that’s what you want, isn’t it? You just want to find the truth in everything."
"It's thrilling from beginning to end. And the last scene of Act I (which is now two guys) will completely shatter you, as well as it being one of the funniest scenes on record. All due to [Jonathan Bailey], the guy who plays Jamie, the Amy-equivalent."
"Jonny operates at a different voltage. He's a meteorite of fun with an incredible amount of energy and playfulness. Smoldering at one turn and then utterly innocent at the next, but all the time playing with this sense of untapped danger. That is the quality I love most about Jonny as a person and as a performer: his danger."
"He's quite open as a human being. I love him."
"He’s the nicest person you could ever hope to meet. But when he acts, he can have an edge, which can feel dangerous in a great way. An unpredictability."
"I happened to be seeing my doctor the next day for a check-up so while he was down there I said, 'By the way, my wife and I have had a little disagreement, I am circumcised, aren't I?' He took a closer look and said, 'Not! I am Jewish, and definitely know the difference!'"
"I think I'm going to be overexposed after total anonymity."
"Peggy joked in an interview in 1984."
"I never thought I was subject matter for an Oscar. How wonderful to be given it, I’ve been killed with kindness."
"Peggy while receiving oscar award in 1985."
"It was as if all the lights had suddenly gone up. It is true even in her own living room."
"a quite wonderful woman and actress, which were indivisible in her case."
"While we watch her, we view the world through the eyes of a great person."
"For an era when women were expected to conform, these women are totally in charge of the show. To read a piece of material from a period drama told from the woman’s perspective is just so unique."
"I went through this period where I was just obsessed with makeup and I wore a ton of it, and then I suddenly realized how much I was wearing, and the fact that I was spending all this money. I think now I'm just trying to be more comfortable with what I have rather than having to cover up. But I do love putting makeup on for a night out."
"It was really shocking; it was the first time I had ever been dragged into something like that. And it wasn't just me, it was my family. I had seen the absurdity of what I was being accused of, and what my partner was being accused of. I decided for my own health that I was not going to try and convince these people otherwise. I just wasn't going to do it."
"I would sooner play in a good British picture than in the majority of American pictures I have seen."
"Relatives cannot help you in the studios. You stand or fall by your own efforts. My father and I have only ever worked in one picture together – that was Halfway House – and the producer was casting a father and daughter. Perhaps it was natural that he chose us, but my father did not get me that job, neither did I get him his."
"Acting is my highest form of intelligence, the time when I use the best part of my brain. I was always told, by my married friends, for example, that I could apply that intelligence to something else, some other aspect of living, but I can't. I don't have the same flair in other things."
"I'd tread very softly in that area. Very softly. I certainly wouldn't rush into anything again, and I'd have to have an awful lot in common with anyone I'd consider marrying next time. Why so many marriages? It was absolute conservatism on my part. I was brought up to feel that if you wanted to have an affair with a man, well, you married him. I have friends who, if they'd followed that rule, would have collected an awful lot of pieces of paper by now."
"I like being a woman, and it may be small‐minded of me, but I also like being given flowers, having the door opened for me, being cherished by a man. And a woman should look after a man, mother him. It's give and take. It evens out. I'm a complete romantic – and very happy to be one."
"For me, most relationships with men have been like pregnancies – they last only nine months. One of my marriages lated only three months. It wasn't a marriage at all but a serious mistake."
"There were situations that were hard for parents to turn down. It's difficult to turn down a chance to star with Laurence Olivier, to say, 'No, she has to go to school'. They had a big decision to make ... I was interested in everything. I wanted to be a scientist. I would've loved to go on and on at university. But you can't do everything in life."
"In classical theatre in Europe, everybody plays all kinds of parts. Juliets go on to play the Nurses; they don't want to play Juliet again. I think we've got to remember to grab onto our perks, whatever is the good thing about each age. Each stage of life should be a progression."
"I was quite an athlete, my muscles were strong from dancing, so the tail was just fine. I swam like a porpoise."
"I always said that 'Send In The Clowns' was the best gift I was ever given. But I've always thought before I decide I don't want to do theater anymore, I'd like to have a vehicle that gave me the scope to do something beautiful. Maybe this is it."
"Glynis Johns is already a professional actress. She got her chance two years ago when the child principal of a children's play fell ill and she took over the part without a rehearsal. Last year she made a hit in the emotional child's part in Elmer Rice's "Judgement Day," and her naturalness in putting over the temperamental storms of Midge Carne puts her high up in rank of child character actresses. Several London critics have compared her to Bonita Granville. She has an intelligent little face which has character without prettiness and, properly handled, should do interesting work."
"Glynis has light brown hair, blue eyes, and is five feet four inches in height. Dancing is still of great interest to her and is her favourite recreation, coupled with the collecting of good syncopated numbers: Glenn Miller's In the Mood is her favourite. Her favourite classical composers are Grieg, Mozart and Debussy. Riding, tennis and ice skating are her sports, and her ideal holiday is one spent in a mountain resort where there is plenty of night-life. Her favourite reading is autobiographies, preferably those of celebrities she knows personally."
"Glynis’s CV stands up strongly when compared to fellow actors of her generation and younger like Angela Lansbury, Judi Dench, Joan Collins and Maggie Smith, who all received Damehoods – so it would be nice if the government could make the same gesture for her as she turns 100."
"Of course, she came across as supremely confident, but in private she suffered quite crippling stage fright that she never really got over – only managed – so that makes her career even more remarkable."
"Glynis powered her way through life with intelligence, wit, and a love for performance, affecting millions of lives. She entered my life early in my career and set a very high bar on how to navigate this industry with grace, class, and truth. Your own truth. Her light shined very brightly for 100 years. She had a wit that could stop you in your tracks powered by a heart that loved deeply and purely. Today is a somber day for Hollywood. Not only do we mourn the passing of our dear Glynis, but we mourn the end of the golden age of Hollywood."