Acting is the most minor of gifts and not a very high-class way to earn a living. After all, Shirley Temple could do it at the age of four.
Life is hard. After all, it kills you.
Without discipline, there’s no life at all.
I remember as a child going around with “Votes For Women” balloons. I learnt early what it is to be snubbed for a good cause.
I welcome death. In death there are no interviews!
I’m what is known as gradually disintegrating. I don’t fear the next world, or anything. I don’t fear hell, and I don’t look forward to heaven.
The terrible thing about acting in the theater is that you have to do it at night.
If motherhood doesn’t interest you, don’t do it. It didn’t interest me, so I didn’t do it. Anyway, I would have made a terrible parent. The first time my child didn’t do what I wanted, I’d kill him.
You suddenly realize what a tremendous opportunity it is just to be alive. The potential. If you can keep a-goin’ – you actually can do it. So just keep a-goin’ – you can win. It’s when you stop that you’re done.
Connecticut. Aren’t we lucky? We have wonderful wildflowers – parks – hills – lovely old houses. We have a pace that we like – sometimes slow – sometimes fast. Rivers – reservoirs – Long Island Sound. A wonderful climate – trees – gardens – snow – rain. And it’s a good size – not huge – not small.
Personal charm is a great help. You can sit there and be an awful ass, but if you have personal charm, you can really put it over on the general public.
Dad always said if you want to get something, don’t write. Don’t telephone. Be there yourself. In person. Harder to turn down a living presence.
It seems to me I discovered what “I love you” really means. It means I put you and your interests and your comfort ahead of my own interests and my own comfort because I love you. What does this mean? I love you. What does this mean? Think. We use this expression very carelessly. LOVE has nothing to do with what you are expecting to get – only with what you are expecting to give – which is everything.
He was Irish to the fingertips. He could laugh and he could create laughter. He had a funny way of looking at things – at some things, I should say.
To learn responsibility – each of us has to learn responsibility.
If you are a member of a big family, you always have someone at hand for golf, tennis, walks, movies. You never have to “find company,” so to speak.
He summed me up very accurately for what I was: a lady, so called-a sort of a snob-and totally insecure.
Because you suddenly realize what a tremendous opportunity it is just to be alive.
So just keep a-goin’-you can win. It’s when you stop that you’re done.
I’d always wanted to be a boy. Jimmy was my name, if you want to know.
Also, I was not in the business of capturing anyone into a marriage. I just did not want to marry anyone. I liked the idea of being my own self. Even when I was living with Spencer Tracy and he and I were together for twenty-seven years, we never really thought about or discussed marriage. He was married and I wasn’t interested.