Italian Quotes - Page 20

My family isn't really Italian. We're more like Olive Garden Italian.

Virginia," Billy said urgently. "Don't do this." "Shut up,Billy." "Think of the people in San Francisco." "I don't know any of the people in San Francisco," Virginia answered, then paused. "Well,actually I do,and I don't like them. But I do like you,Billy, and I'm not going to allow you to end up as lunch for some raggedy lion-monster-thingy." "A sphinx," Machiavelli corrected her. He was standing at the bars again. "Mistress Dare," the Italian said carefully. "I absolutely applaud you for what you want to do for your friend. But I urge you to think of the bigger picture.

It's all very Italian (and decidedly un-American): to insist that doing the right thing is the most pleasurable thing, and that the act of consumption might be an act of addition rather than subtraction.

I've played some gangster roles, but that's obviously not me. When you're an Italian-American New York actor, it's just an easy way to get cast.

I studied voice at Yale with Blake Stern from the music school, and he had me singing German lieder and Italian songs.

The founders were very worried that if parties developed in America, you might have something like the modern Italian system, where you have 20 different parties that divide Congress and the country and can't govern.

I never thought meeting you would be this boring. I thought we'd put our Italian emotion into gear and scream the place down. I never expected indifference.

My family, theyre story tellers. My mom is Irish, and my dad is Italian. In my family, we werent allowed to watch TV while we ate - we had to sit around the table and tell stories about our day.

My family, theyre story tellers. My mom is Irish, and my dad is Italian. In my family, we werent allowed to watch TV while we ate - we had to sit around the table and tell stories about our day.

Growing up, my grandmother did not want worldly music in the house. Then when I went out to California, I started listening to Spanish music, mostly Mexican music. But were I in Egypt, I would listen to the music of the people, or if I was in Italy, I'd listen to Italian music.

They would sort of keep you on your toes that way - that kind of Italian allergic reaction to eagerness. It's very bruta figura, bad form, to be eager. You sort of glide in and have a conversation and work things out, then it takes two days to get up and running.

I grew up within Italian-American neighborhoods, everybody was coming into the house all the time, kids running around, that sort of stuff, so when I finally got into my own area, so to speak, to make films, I still carried on.

My working-class Italian-American parents didn't go to school, there were no books in the house.

During Mr. Reagan's trip to Europe...members of the traveling press corps watched him doze off so many times--during speeches by French President Francois Mitterrand and Italian President Alessandro Pertini, as well as during a one-on-one audience with the Pope--that they privately christened the trip 'The Big Sleep.'

Italian culture is so deeply soaked in an appreciation of the good things in life.

I hope that my government can help change Italian mentality.

The Italian economy has been held back for decades.

[If] we can celebrate that in a way that celebrates our love for New England as well as our love for the Italian culture as well as the American culture, then we've done something that's really good and supporting these fishermen who are doing the right thing in sustainability . . . paying attention to make sure we don't overfish our world.

Even though you'll see gnocchi or linguine everywhere in some of the regions of Italy, each of those chefs has their own expression of that which expresses more about the place they were exactly born than it does about trying to be a part of the greater mass. And that's the Italian culture.

Day-old bread? Sadly, in America a lot of day-old bread just becomes nasty. Italian day-old bread, not having any preservatives in it, just becomes harder and it doesn't taste old. What I would warn people about is getting bread that's loaded with other things in it, because it starts to taste old.

I am proud to be Italian because I was born in Italy, I grew up in Italy, I went to school in Italy and I have worked in Italy. I'm Italian.

I have many, many editions of the books, and they are all rather different. In the end, the one I used was the most recent French translation. French suits the tales well, and it's a beautiful translation. The Italian one is good as well... English has fallen short.

80% of Italian cooking is done in a sauté pan.

I watched L'eclisse [1962] with Alain Delon and Monica Vitti. Changed my world. What a glamorous and modern film. This is what a genius is - the thing of a genius. The dresses, the tiny heels, the Cardin look, the boys dressed up as Italian gigolos - it was divine, very modern. [Michelangelo] Antonioni, I loved and I realized: how modern.

I came out here to do the acting, and then after a year of auditions and not getting anything, I met these Italian guys and they asked me to write lyrics for them. Then they said, "Why don't you just front the band?" I said, "Well, maybe because I can't sing. I've never sang before in my life."