- Spencer Tracy was the first actor I've seen who could just look down into the dirt and command a scene. He played a set-up with Robert Ryan that way [in Bad Day at Black Rock (1955)]. He's looking down at the road and then he looks at Ryan at just the precise, right minute. I tell you, Rob could've stood on his head and zipped open his fly and the scene would've still been Mr. Tracy's.
- The trick is not to become somebody else. You become somebody else when you're in front of a camera or when you're on stage. There are some people who carry it all the time. That, to me, is not acting. What you've gotta do is find out what the writer wrote about and put it into your mind. This is acting. Not going out and researching what the writer has already written. This is crazy!
- Everything I do has a moral to it. Yes, I've been in films that have had shootings. I made The Wild Bunch (1969), which was the beginning of the splattering of blood and everything else. But there was a moral behind it. The moral was that, by golly, bad guys got it. That was it. Yeah.
- Ever since they opened the floodgates with Clark Gable saying, "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn", somebody's ears pricked up and said, "Oh boy, here we go!". Writers used to make such wonderful pictures without all that swearing, all that cursing. And now it seems that you can't say three words without cursing. And I don't think that's right.
- [on Brokeback Mountain (2005)] I didn't see it and I don't care to see it . . . If John Wayne were alive, he'd be rolling over in his grave.
- [on his $5,000 salary for playing the eponymous lead in Marty (1955), which won him a Best Actor Oscar] . . . I would have done it for nothing.
- Robert Ryan was a craftsman from start to finish. He was an actor first, a star second.
- Where can we find the great actors we had yesteryear, guys like Spencer Tracy and Gary Cooper and Edward G. Robinson? You know, I was talking to Lee Marvin the other day and we agreed that we were the last of a breed. We're the last who had the opportunity of working with these fine actors. I feel very humble. It makes me feel that I've got to try that bit harder.
- [reflecting on Paul Newman's passing] What can you possibly say about such a wonderful, dedicated man? He was a great guy. I feel he is much better off, God bless him, I feel so sorry for his wife, Joanne Woodward, who is just the most lovely person, too. But, hey, he left his mark, God bless him, and you can't say no more than that, by golly. He left not only that, but he left a wonderful thing that he'd been doing for everyone--I mean, donating all his money from different things that he's done to help children.
- I think you have to keep going. Otherwise, you know these fellas that say, "Boy I can't wait to retire. Boy, I'm going to be 65 years old, and I'm retiring and I'm quitting and that's it." Well, two weeks later they're saying to themselves, "What the hell am I gonna do?" And first thing you know they find themselves in a wheelchair or in a rocking chair going back and forth, back and forth, and that's the end of it. And suddenly you're dead.
- [on his popularity while playing the 40-something Lt. Cmdr. Quinton McHale on McHale's Navy (1962)] It's not exactly the Navy I remember. I don't think we could have won the war if we'd had one like this. But it's a lot more laughs.
- [In 1962] In 1941 I quit the Navy to go to work in a factory in New Haven, Connecticut . . . 1941, what a year to quit the Navy. I was back in a few months. In the beginning, we had only three boats patrolling the entire Atlantic Coast and I was on one of them. Then they sent me to Hollywood, Florida. I was assigned to a PY, patrol yacht. The PY was a converted yacht, the S.S. Intrepid. It used to be owned by the Murphy who invented Murphy beds. He took it to Europe and all over before the war. You should have seen what the Navy did to it!
- [In 1963] Somebody said there was no such as small roles; only small actors. I think it was Mickey Rooney. Anyway, it ain't true.
- I've got to treat my throat like a broken leg and let it get strong again. My shouting and "har de har har" days are over.
- [on why he wanted to star in McHale's Navy (1962)] Theater business was disappearing and so were night clubs, which I don't like to play anyway because they keep me up too late. There were TV guest shots, but how many times can you play Ed Sullivan? My biggest pay was from industrial shows, but they don't come along too often.
- [In 1971, promoting Who Killed the Mysterious Mr. Foster? (1971)] Research is a crock. All the necessary research is done by the author. Why should I do the research on his research? The only thing I did was bring my characterization to Cook [director Fielder Cook] and then we worked on it. Sam Hill is a good, likable guy, but you can also get mad at him. The character should have a controversial quality.
- McHale [his character on McHale's Navy (1962)] was always trying to put one over on the captain. Sam Hill [his character in Who Killed the Mysterious Mr. Foster? (1971)] isn't trying to put one over on anybody. He's a man who takes no guff from anyone. He can get disorderly when faced with trials and tribulations. When he does wrong, he admits it. People can see themselves in this character.
- Everybody says all you have to do is get a television show that will last three years and you can retire. Lemme tell you something, I was in McHale's Navy (1962) for four years and I owned a third of the show.
- I don't care whether a part is 10 minutes long, or two hours, and I don't care whether my name is up there on top, either. Matter of fact, I'd rather have somebody else get top billing; then if the picture bombs, he gets the blame, not me.
- [In 1973, about being under contract to a studio] No, thanks. I was under contract once, to Hecht-Hill-Lancaster. It cost me $500,000 to get out of it.
- [in 1965 of his off-camera feud with McHale's Navy (1962) producer Edward Montagne] When Universal told me that [he] was not going to produce but direct the movie, I told them that my price would be triple. So, they made a story about "McHale's Navy" without "McHale".
- [in 1966 about his reputation for being temperamental] Yes, I'm a hot-tempered Italian, but I don't think I am ever unfair or unjust.
- [In 1972] I think we all have the urge to be a clown, whether we know it or not. The clown we see is a fascinating person, expressing pathos, poignancy, joie de vivre. It's an opportunity to express one's innermost feelings while hiding behind a mask.
- Please, for heaven's sake, if anybody lives next to a hospital, a veteran's hospital or something, take a half-hour, take an hour, take two hours, and go down there and visit our veterans. They would love to see you. Bring 'em flowers or something. Just to say hello. Believe me, they're hungry for people to come and see them . . . we owe freedom and opportunity to them. It's the least we can do.
- No Stanislavsky. I don't chart out the life histories of the people I play. If I did, I'd be in trouble. I work with my heart and my head, and naturally emotions follow ... If none of that works, I think to myself of the money I'm making.
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