Great stories teach you something. That’s one reason I haven’t slipped into some sort of retirement: I always feel like I’m learning something new.
I’m always trying to tackle subjects that tax me and make me think. That’s the key to staying young at heart. The brain has to be exercised the same as the rest of the body.
I always liked characters that were more grounded in reality.
When you’re making a movie, you can’t think anybody will ever see it. You’ve just got to make a movie for the values it has. The greatest films were made because someone really wanted to make them. And, hopefully, the audience will show up, too.
People love westerns worldwide. There’s something fantasy-like about an individual fighting the elements. Or even bad guys and the elements. It’s a simpler time. There’s no organized laws and stuff.
There’s a rebel lying deep in my soul. Anytime anybody tells me the trend is such and such, I go the opposite direction. I hate the idea of trends. I hate imitation; I have a reverence for individuality.
Fate pulls you in different directions.
My old drama coach used to say, ‘Don’t just do something, stand there.’ Gary Cooper wasn’t afraid to do nothing.
The guys who won World War II and that whole generation have disappeared, and now we have a bunch of teenage twits.
It’s always fun to talk about jazz.
Everything that you do is a challenge. And acting is just building up your concentration and being able to listen and to do the ridiculous.
You have to teach yourself to act but Michael Chekhov will give you the necessary tools – and for me, Psychological Gesture and Centers are extremely valuable They work like a charm. I’ve used them all along and still do.
We don’t even know who’s in the Academy.
The prospect of dating someone in her twenties becomes less appealing as you get older. At some point in your fife, your tolerance level goes down and you realize that, with someone much younger, there’s nothing really to talk about.
You see, in this world, there’s two kinds of people, my friend – those with loaded guns, and those who dig. You dig.
Crimes against children are the most heinous crime. That, for me, would be a reason for capital punishment because children are innocent and need the guidance of an adult society.
Let’s take the work seriously, and not ourselves seriously.
Don’t look at me like I’ve gotten old or something like that.
With people in high office, the old – you go into the extreme, which is absolute power and absolute power corrupts.
Participating in a gun buy-back program because you think that criminals have too many guns is like having yourself castrated because you think your neighbors have too many kids.