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The Truth Is, The Older You Get, The Less Variety Of Parts You Are Offered. If You're A Star And You've Spent Most Of Your Career Being Able To Take Your Pick Of The Litter, You Notice When The Offers Start To Diminish. You're Too Old To Play Leads, So You're Offered The Supporting Role - But Many Stars Don't Want To Make That Transition. They See It As A Sign Of Symbolic Impotence. And That The Audience Will No Longer Regard Them As A Star. I Love Acting, And I'm Not Going To Determine What I Do Based On What I Fear Other People Might Think. I Do What I Want To Do.

-Dustin Hoffman

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The Truth Is, The

Dustin Hoffman

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The Truth Is, The Older You Get, The Less Variety Of Parts You Are Offered. If You're A Star And You've Spent Most Of Your Career Being Able To Take Your Pick Of The Litter, You Notice When The Offers Start To Diminish. You're Too Old To Play Leads, So You're Offered The Supporting Role - But Many Stars Don't Want To Make That Transition. They See It As A Sign Of Symbolic Impotence. And That The Audience Will No Longer Regard Them As A Star. I Love Acting, And I'm Not Going To Determine What I Do Based On What I Fear Other People Might Think. I Do What I Want To Do.

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If You're Waiting For The Job, You're Dead.

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God Knows I've Done Enough Crap In My Life To Grow A Few Flowers.

I Feel Cheated Never Being Able To Know What It's Like To Get Pregnant, Carry A Child And Breast-feed.

Well First Of All, It's Hard To Shoot A Movie And Break For A Long Time And Then Come Back And Do, In A Sense, One Of The Biggest Scenes That Each Character Had.

I'd Like To Thank My Parents For Not Practicing Birth Control.

This Is Not A Movie About Smelling The Urine! It's Another Kind Of Movie." Volker Schlöndorff Got Billy Wilder To Agree To These Conversations - You Can Buy It - Because Volker Spoke German At Times. And He Said To Billy Wilder: "what Is In Your Mind?" And He Said: "if You're Going To Try To Tell The Truth To The Audience, You'd Better Be Funny Or They'll Kill You." And I Haven't Forgotten That.

The Better You Are As A Parent, The Richer The Nest You've Built, The More Difficult It Is For Your Kids To Leave. So They Have To Invent Things To Dislike About You. And They're Brilliant At It.

The Academy Awards Are Obscene, Dirty . . . No Better Than A Beauty Contest.

Blame Is For God And Small Children.

One Thing About Being Successful Is That I Stopped Being Afraid Of Dying. Once You're A Star You're Dead Already. You're Embalmed.

I Love Acting, And I`m Not Going To Determine What I Do Based On What I Fear Other People Might Think. I Do What I Want To Do.

I Wanted To Find My Limitations So I Decided To Do Shylock. And If I Fail? I've Never Been Afraid Of That. I Have Other Fears - Doing Bad Work Knowingly Is The Worst Fear.

There's A Rebirth That Goes On With Us Continuously As Human Beings. I Don't Understand, Personally, How You Can Be Bored. I Can Understand How You Can Be Depressed, But I Just Don't Understand Boredom.

I Think One Of The Things You Have To Be Aware Of As An Actor Is That If You Come On The Set And See The Director Standing There Mouthing All The Words While A Scene Is Going On, That's Usually A Very Bad Sign Because It Means The Director Has Already Shot The Scene In His Head. He Knows Exactly The Rhythm And The Nuances That He Wants Delivered In The Line And You're Not Going To Dissuade Him.

There Were A Few Things That Went Into It. When You're Doing Something You're Trying To Be Your Audience At The Same Time, So If Somebody Tells Me That This Is A Movie About Retired Opera Singers, You Think 'maybe I'll Wait For It To Come To Dvd'. You're Not Rushing Off To See It.

I Knew That We Had An Obligation And That Was To Keep An Energy In It And Try To Keep The Audience Interested. In Fact, I Asked Some Of The Actors To Take A Look At His Girl Friday, A Howard Hawks Film With Rosalind Russell And Cary Grant, Because They Talk Over Each Other And There's A Great Energy.

The Truth Is, I've Made About 30 Movies In 30 Years, And I've Been Criticized For 30 Years For Not Making More Movies.

Usually, Those People Don't Even Like Actors And They Can't Wait Until They Get In The Cutting Room. They Kind Of Break Down In Categories: Directors Who Like To Be Surprised And Some Of Them Abhor Being Surprised. As Far As Directing, We All Direct When We're Acting In Movies... Every Single One Of Us.

But I Would Reinvent Myself If I Could. As A Sexy Leading Man! We All Would Like That, But I Don't Know How To.

I Don't Believe In Hell. I Believe In Unemployment, But Not Hell.

I Lived Below The Official American Poverty Line Until I Was 31.

American Poverty

Someone Once Said To Me, 'some Of Us Choose To Live With A Lifeboat Just A Little Bit Out Of Our Reach.' I'd Like To Reach A Point Where I No Longer Bullshit Myself. I Think That's The Natural Human Condition - To Lie To Yourself. Because The Truth Is Painful.

We Need To Band Together As A Unit Every Day, Especially To Conquer The Strength Of The Aids Virus.

Euthanasia Is Legal In Hollywood. They Just Kill The Film If It Doesn't Succeed Immediately.

A "take" Is An Opportunity To Fail ... And We Think That We Have To Get It Right All The Time.

For Me As An American, The Most Painful Aspect Of This Is That I Believe That Administration Has Taken The Events Of 9/11 And Has Manipulated The Grief Of The Country And I Think That's Reprehensible.

Canada Is Like A Nice Family Living Over A Biker Bar . . . They Keep Telling The Downstairs Neighbors To Keep Down The Noise, People Are Trying To Sleep.

Humanity Seized To Exist When Israel Was Established.

One Of The Things You Can Do As An Actor, Is Compensate For The Things You Can't Do In Life.

Life Is An Occasion...rise To It.

Next To That Kid, We All Look Like Onions.

What Makes Divorce Happen Is That You Can't Be In The Same Space Any More, For Whatever Reason - But The Love Stays. And That's The Killer. That's Where The Vehemence And Anger And Rage Comes From.

I Think The Most Insulting Thing You Can Do To A Director Is To Challenge When He Or She Is Satisfied With Your Interpretation.

You're Always In A Tunnel That You Can't See The End Of. But There's Something That Took Place On This Movie That I Don't Think We Expected And That Was That Once We Decided That The Entire Cast Would Be Real Retired Opera Singers And Retired Musicians... And These People The Phone Hadn't Rung For Them For 20 Or 40 Years Even Though They Can Deliver.

Now, I'm Simply Working With People I Want To Work With. I Just Want To Have Good Working Experiences And Let The Dice Fall Where They May.

So, Most Of It Was Done Over The Phone. But One Of The First Things I Did As A Director, Because It's One Of The First Things You Should Do, Even Though Most Don't, Is To Ask Good Actors Who They Think Is Right For The Part. They Know Better Than Anybody. But Without Missing A Beat Maggie Said Pauline Collins. I Didn't Know Pauline Because I Hadn't Seen Shirley Valentine, But Then I Saw This Thing That She Did With Woody Allen [you Will Meet A Tall Dark Stranger], In Which She Was Wonderful As A Psychic, And I Said To Her On The Phone: "the Dialogue Seemed Improvised."

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Tom [courtenay] And Albert Finney Met Ron Harwood On The Dresser, So That's How It Started. It's A Wonderful Documentary. It's Called Tosca's Kiss And Mr Hardwood Told Me About It When I Asked Him What The Genesis Was. It Was Made In 1983 And Verdi, Who Was Rich And Successful, Toward The End Of His Life Decided To Build A Mansion For Himself In Milan, Where He Lived, And He Stipulated That When He Died Opera Singers And Musicians - Because He Knew So Many Who Were No Longer Playing At The Scala And Some Were Poor - Could Live There.

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You Spend So Much Of Your Life Basing Yourself On What You Think Other People Think Of You. Then You Realise That Maybe One Of The Purposes Of Life Is Not To Care.

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You Go To The Cinema And You Realize You're Watching The Third Act. There Is No First Or Second Act. There Is This Massive Film-making Where You Spend This Incredible Amount Of Money And Play Right To The Demographic. You Can Tell How Much Money The Film Is Going To Make By How It Does On The First Weekend. The Whole Culture Is In The Crap House. It's Not Just True In The Movies, It's Also True In The Theater.

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Look At The Studio Filled With Glamorous Merchandise. Fabulous And Exciting Bonus Prizes. Thousands Of Dollars In Cash. Over $150,000 Just Waiting To Be Won As We Present Our Big Bonanza Of Cash On Wheel Of Fortune.

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If You Have This Enormous Talent, It's Got You By The Balls, It's A Demon. You Can't Be A Family Man And A Husband And A Caring Person And Be That Animal. Dickens Wasn't That Nice A Guy.

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I Love Working, I'd Be Dead If I Hadn't Found Myself As An Actor I Didn't Have To Be Successful.

I Believe - Though I May Be Wrong, Because I'm No Expert - That This War Is About What Most Wars Are About: Hegemony, Money, Power And Oil.

I'm Sixty-eight, I Cry Every Chance I Can.

I Knew I Finally Made It As A Performer When I Began Hearing Rumors That I Was Gay.

Somehow I Think It Was Declared Very Early On That I Was The - If Not The Black Sheep Of The Family, Not A Very Good Student.

If You Can Get Out There And Say I'm Going To...i'm Willing To Fail At What I Feel Is Right, That's It.

I Wanted To Be A Jazz Pianist, But I Wasn't Good Enough. I Got Into City College Because I Didn't Have The Grades To Get Into University. I Took Acting Because It Was A Way To Get Three Credits. I Just Needed Three Credits And My Friend Told Me To Take Acting Because It Was Like Gym - Nobody Fails You. I Took It And That's Literally How I Got Involved In Acting.

So When I Told My Parents I Wanted To Go Into Acting Because I Was Flunking Out Of My First Year Of Junior College, They Were Relieved That I Had Picked Something Other Than Joining The Army. But I Can't Imagine How They Had High Hopes For Me.

I Think We All Felt It On This Movie - Crew And Cast. You Never Know When You're Making A Movie... No One Is Saying In The Middle Of Casablanca That This Is Going To Be A Classic. The Lead Actors Had Turned It Down And I Think They Wound Up With B-list Actors At The Time.

If There Is No Direct Threat Why Are We Invading?

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My Wife Always Says That I Will Be Stuck With This Forever: I Am The Difficult One. With Jack Nicholson They Always Said It Was Drugs. Warren Beatty Is Supposed To Have Screwed Everything That Jumped Off The Curve. I'll Tell You, In Reality A Few Of Us Had As Many Girls As Warren.

Well, 45-odd Years Of Doing It, So We All Pile Up The Things We Like About Directors And The Things We Don't Like About Directors. And Sometimes They're Very Similar.

The Two Basic Items Necessary To Sustain Life Are Sunshine And Coconut Milk.

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The Trumpet Player, Ronnie Hughes, Has Still Got His Chops Today But For Some Strange Reason The Culture Doesn't Call Him Because He's 83-years-old. And These People Are In Their 70s And 80s And 90s And Came With Such Verve Every Day And Would Still Be Shooting These 10 And 12 Hour Days. So, That In Itself Made This An Extraordinarily Special Occasion For All Of Us. It Wasn't A Job For The Crew After A Few Days, It Took On Another Tone.

This Is Your Life. Now Go Make It The One You've Always Wanted.

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Lightbulbs Die, My Sweet. I Will Depart.

Stories? We All Spend Our Lives Telling Them, About This, About That, About People … But Some? Some Stories Are So Good We Wish They’d Never End. They’re So Gripping That We’ll Go Without Sleep Just To See A Little Bit More. Some Stories Bring Us Laughter And Sometimes They Bring Us Tears … But Isn’t That What A Great Story Does? Makes You Feel? Stories That Are So Powerful … They Really Are With Us Forever.

I Got Into Acting So That I Could Meet Girls. Pretty Girls Came Later. First, I Wanted To Start Off With Someone With Two Legs, Who'd Smile At Me And Look Soft.

There's Too Many Interesting Women I Have…not Had The Experience To Know In This Life Because I Have Been Brainwashed.

Peter Pan, Prepare To Meet Thy Doom.

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Many Actors Want To Play Hamlet And Macbeth. Ever Since I Became An Actor, From The Very Beginning I Just Wanted To Play A Shetland Pony. I Cannot Explain Why

There's A New Medical Crisis. Doctors Are Reporting That Many Men Are Having Allergic Reactions To Latex Condoms. They Say They Cause Severe Swelling. So What's The Problem?

I Came In On This Movie After There Had Been A Director And I Came In After Tom Courtenay Had Talked To Ron Harwood About Making A Movie. So, You Know Tom And Albert Finney Had Been Friends Since The Beginning Of Their Career As They Became Stars Around The Same Time - Tom Always Reminds Me That Albert Was First With Saturday Night And Sunday Morning And Then Tom With The Long Distance Runner.

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In My Room As A Kid... I'd Play A Fighter And Get Knocked To The Floor And Come Back To Win.

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