Katharine Hepburn Quotes - Page 5

I think everyone is an opportunist if they have an opportunity.

Everyone thought I was bold and fearless and even arrogant, but inside I was always quaking.

You can say or write anything about me you like. Just don't, for any reason, ever tell the truth.

A boy sows a wild oat or two, the world winks. A girl does the same -- scandal.

The terrible thing about acting in the theater is that you have to do it at night.

People who want to be famous are really loners. Or they should be.

We were brought up in the school that teaches: You do what the script tells you. Deliver the goods without comment. Live it-do it-or shut up. After all, the writer is what's important. If the script is good and you don't get in its way, it will come off okay. I never discussed a script with Spence [Spencer Tracy]; we just did it. The same with Hank [Henry Fonda] in On Golden Pond. Naturally and unconsciously we joined into what I call a musical necessity-the chemistry that brings out the essence of the characters and the work.

The lack of work destroys people.

If you survive long enough, you're revered - rather like an old building.

I was fearless...and lawless.

Why slap them on the wrist with feather when you can belt them over the head with a sledgehammer.

Only when a woman decides not to have children, can a woman live like a man. That's what I've done.

Bogart was like Henry Fonda - proud and happy to be an actor.

It's a rather rude gesture, but at least it's clear what you mean.

It's life isn't it? You plow ahead and make a hit. And you plow on and someone passes you. Then someone passes them. Time levels.

Now how can anybody look at that and not believe in God? I mean, how can anybody look at this and not believe there is some higher power, some divine force at work in the universe greater than Man, some god that created it, that created all this, that created us?

The calla lilies are in bloom again. Such a strange flower—suitable to any occasion. I carried them on my wedding day, and now I place them here in memory of something that has died.

I think all good actors are personalities. If they're not, they're not stars. What makes you a star is horsepower.

A sharp knife cuts the quickest and hurts the least.

I've always thought men and women are not too well suited to each other. It's inevitable that they should come together, but, again, how well suited are they to live together in the same house?

What acting means is that you've got to get out of your own skin.

It's a bore - B-O-R-E - when you find you've begun to rot.

Acting is the most minor of gifts. After all, Shirley Temple could do it when she was four.

I don't think that work ever really destroyed anybody. I think that lack of work destroys them a hell of a lot more.

Life is full of censorship. I cant spit in your eye.