Intellectualism came very late to America. That's why Americans are so proud of it. I found very few real intellectuals in America. But there are so many pseudo-intellectuals.

Rock Hudson was not an educated man, but that very beautiful body of his was putty in my hands.

You have to think with the heart.

If I couldn't read, I couldn't live.

My idea at this time, which was slowly developing, was to create a comedie humaine with little people, average people - samples from every period in American life.

In the 19th century, you had bourgeois art without politics - an almost frozen idea of what beauty is.

Your characters have to remain innocent of what your picture is after.