Samuel L. Jackson Quotes - Page 4

The thing I get the most [in public] is, 'Hey, Eugene.' You know what I mean? There's no catch phrase like: 'What a week I'm having.' People will actually just say, 'Hey, Eugene' or 'Hi, Eugene.' It's a great thing; they feel that comfortable calling me by my first name. It's not being forward. It depends how you say it. I think they can't help themselves. They think they know me. I find it gratifying.

When I'm not working, I like to play golf.

But Medicine is a demonstrative Science, and all its processes should be proved by established principles, and be based on positive inductions. That the proceedings of Medicine are not of this character, in to be attributed to the manner of its cultivation, and not to the nature of the Science itself.

Long Kiss Goodnight has a huge cult following. They could make another version of that movie right now and make a lot of money.

I think the biggest challenges for franchises are keeping them fresh and exciting, and most times, you need a good bad guy to make that thing continually work, and sometimes they don't.

When I saw the script [of The Man], I saw the character and knew I could do the character. It's a relationship movie, which is also what I love to do. That's what attracts me to projects.

If there's an interesting role that comes up as a great support role in a decent picture, then I'll do that.

I don't get the great story line, action, mystery scripts; I get comedies. And relationship comedies are what I do. It's what attracted me to American Pie.

I was desperate on Coming To America set - not to buy drugs or anything, but I had a person at home, a girlfriend who's telling you, "You're out the bills and food. You need this, you need that. And you either get it, or don't come back." That was me.

I’ve consequently played a lot of different cops from a lot of different kind of law enforcement agencies.

The Romans had, like other Pagan nations, a nature festival, called by them Saturnalia, and the Northern peoples had Yule; both celebrated the turn of the year from the death of winter to the life of spring - the winter solstice. As this was an auspicious change the festival was a very joyous one... The giving of presents and the burning of candles characterized it. Among the Northern people the lighting of a huge log in the houses of the great and with appropriate ceremonies was a feature.

Quentin Tarantino was talking about Ordell a little bit, and I was like, "I'm sure Ordell is one of those people who thought Superfly was the greatest movie ever made." So he cuts his hair and straightens it, but he never has enough money to maintain it perfectly. So it's kind of nappy around the edges, straight and kind of puffed up. That's why he'd always keep it in a ponytail or a braid. We were just having fun and creating a distinctive character.

Hair is very, very distinctive. I started that with that boxing movie I did, The Great White Hype. The director wanted me to look like Don King, and everybody knew who Don King was. But I didn't want to be Don King. I wanted the man to be Rev. Fred Sultan, so I decided to make him look like Julius Caesar. And from that point on, I just decided, I had this great wig-maker, so I just found hairstyles that I felt would be distinctive for every character. Like an adventure.

It's often hope, hopeful movie making. You're always looking for catchphrases. That's always funny, when you're looking for that future line. "Uh oh, future line. Okay."

I said to George Lucas, "I'd like a purple lightsaber." And he said, "Why?" and I said, "I just want to be able to find myself. I'm the most powerful Jedi in the universe, and I think it would be an interesting thing for me to have a different color lightsaber than anybody else."

I often think, "How many ways have I died in the movies?" I guess I can find out now. I'm always thinking of ways that I haven't died. "Well, I've been killed this way in this movie, but I haven't died this way yet." I don't think I've ever been guillotined, or anything like that.

We [me and Eugene Levy] both try to play the reality of a moment and don't try to impose humor on something where it doesn't belong. Contrary to what other people seem to think sometimes.

There are a lot of little kids, amazingly enough, that see me. Their parents go, 'That's Mace Windu.' They go, 'Oh, right. Well, you know, Jedi can fall from really high places. So you're probably not dead, but you only have one hand now.' That's good. There's hope.'

I never thought I'd be working with Sam [L.Jackson] .That's about as good as it gets.

[The Man] was a case where it was a funny role teamed up with another actor. It's a great teaming. And the role was a bigger role. It wasn't so much that it was a co-starring role. This is not a new direction. I'm not saying, 'No. I'm only now co-starring.' It just happens it's a co-starring role.

When you start to talk about comic books, a lot of the time, people forget about the comic part of it. They need to be funny.

I'm sure there are a lot of Italians who refer to themselves as goombahs and greaseballs and whatever. That's what people do. It gives them a sort of familiarity that other people don't have.

I met [ Samuel L. Jackson ] for the first time on The Today Show. He came out of an elevator. I was promoting A Mighty Wind and he was promoting something else. He said, "I hear we're going to be working together." I said, "On what?" He said, 'The Man.' I hadn't heard his name mentioned before. I made a few calls and found out he had the script and was interested. That was it.

I did play a dentist in Waiting for Guffman. I wrote the speech at the conference. In the original script, when it got to that scene, it was, 'Thank you very much. Good night.' Literally. I just thought, 'He keeps talking about this speech. The keynote address is the big thing in his life and this is too important to say, "Thank you. Good night." I think we have to see and hear him doing what he does.' So I got together with my dentist and we worked through a few things.

I love coming in for quick pops. You come in. You score. You leave. You're on the golf course. It's great. You don't carry any story.