Laurence Olivier Quotes

Don't waste your time striving for perfection; instead, strive for excellence - doing your best.

The humility to prepare and the self-confidence to bring it off.

Have a very good reason for everything you do.

Striving for perfection is the greatest stopper there is. You'll be afraid you can't achieve it. It's your excuse to yourself for not doing anything. Instead, strive for excellence, doing your best.

Don't be afraid to be outrageous; the critics will shoot you down anyway.

The art of persuasion. The actor persuades himself, first, and through himself, the audience.

No matter how well you perform, there's always somebody of intelligent opinion who thinks it's lousy.

Acting is an everlasting search for truth.

Use your weaknesses; aspire to the strength.

What is acting but lying and what is good lying but convincing lying?

Shakespeare - The nearest thing in incarnation to the eye of God.

Above all, you must remain open and fresh and alive to any new idea.

Acting is a masochistic form of exhibitionism. It is not quite the occupation of an adult.

Surely we have always acted; it is an instinct inherent in all of us. Some of us are better at it than others, but we all do it.

I'd like people to remember me for a diligent expert workman. I think a poet is a workman. I think Shakespeare was a workman. And God's a workman. I don't think there's anything better than a workman.

I am far from sure when I am acting and when I am not or, should I more frankly put it, when I am lying and when I am not. For what is acting but lying and what is good acting but convincing lying?

We have all, at one time or another, been performers, and many of us still are - politicians, playboys, cardinals and kings.

I believe that in a great city, or even in a small city or a village, a great theater is the outward and visible sign of an inward and probable culture.

I don't know what is better than the work that is given to the actor-to teach the human heart the knowledge of itself.

Acting is illusion, as much illusion as magic is - and not so much a matter of being real.

In spite of a heavy disguise, a few days' growth on my face, dark glasses, a beret and one of William's jackets that fitted me not at all, as I emerged from a hotel in Lecce, a young fisherman pointed me out to his friends and said "Lavrenche Olivaire." It was not all that amazing; if you're not known in Italy, you're not known anywhere.

Living is strife and torment, disappointment and love and sacrifice, golden sunsets and black storms. I said that some time ago, and today I do not think I would add one word.

What is the main problem of the actor? It is to keep the audience awake, and not let them go to sleep, then wake up and go home feeling they've wasted their money.

Life is enthusiasm, zest.

You think you're an artist; prove it