My old drama coach used to say, 'Don't just do something, stand there.' Gary Cooper wasn't afraid to do nothing.

If somebody's dumb enough to ask me to go to a political convention and say something, they're gonna have to take what they get.

I love every aspect of the creation of motion pictures and I guess I am committed to it for life.

When you're making a film you start living with it, and I find myself sitting down and figuring out a sound or melody that would go with a film, or a particular period. It's not brain surgery, you just kind of feel it along.

I don't mind telling a dark side.

When I used to be a contract player in 1954 at Universal, I wasn't getting good roles. I was getting one-liners, and then I'd be gone. But I'd hang around; I'd watch guys. And when I had days off, which was most days, I'd go down and watch other sets while they were shooting. Watch Joan Crawford or whomever. Just watch how they worked and how the director handled them. I didn't know anything about making movies, and there's a lot to learn.

[FBI] philosophy is "Go ahead and make the story you want to make, and hopefully we'll love it." So that's that.