Michael Caine Quotes - Page 9

I just try to play more and more difficult roles.

If you're a gardener you don't need a gym. [...] You're always carrying large sacks of manure all over.

If you held a pistol at my head, I couldn't tell you who they're going to vote for Best Actor.

To be a movie star, you have to carry a movie. And to carry a movie where you play the title role is the supreme example.

I regard myself as someone who is retired but who occasionally goes out to work. In fact, I'm offered so much good stuff that it's not so occasional.

You don't make any money when you're my age. The stars get it all. That's a lie, actually.

Comedy is underrepresented in every actor's life, because it's so bloody difficult to write.

I feel that I helped the working class by just saying there are no barriers, which I consider to be true.

You must always steal, but only from the best people. Steal any trick that looks worthwhile. If you see Vivien Leigh or Robert DeNiro or Meryl Streep do something stunningly effective, and you can analyze how he or she did it, then pinch it. Because you can be sure that they stole it in the first place.

As an actor, I'll play anything.

I didn't know what I knew. I wasn't aware of what I knew.

If you think you're going to be up for an Oscar, you schedule your moviemaking.

Sometimes, in a part, everything comes together.

You get paid the same for a bad film as you do for a good one.

I've got a lot of back-up because my father was a Catholic, my mother was a Protestant, I was educated by Jews and I'm married to a Muslim. So I won't lose out on a technicality.

I used to get the girl; now I get the part. In 'The Quiet American' you may have noticed I got the part and the girl. It's a milestone for me, because it's the last time I'm going to get the girl.

I had an extraordinary belief in myself. For years people told me to give it up and even though I was poverty- stricken, I never thought I should give it up.

Obsession is a young man’s game.

The standing ovation threw me. ... To be held in such regard in a town so full of talent is quite something.

You can see all sorts of things in film acting if you know where to look and what to look for. One thing I often notice is that the actor is looking for his mark, the place where he has to stand to be in the right place in the shot.

My dialogue coach said to do a Texas accent, you lean on the next word, and that was the clue to me.

My view of actors is that basically they're all harmless lunatics who'd be on the psychiatrist's couch.

There are loads of black actors.You can't say: I'm going to vote for him, he's not very good but he's black, [so] I'll vote for him. You've got to give a good performance.

You're never too old to be crazy.

You can write shorthand and still look at the guy you're talking to.