Acting is not a competition; everything must be done for the good of the film or else everybody loses.

I have never seen it (Jaws 4) but by all accounts it is terrible. However, I have seen the house that it built and it is terrific.

You must always steal, but only from the best people. Steal any trick that looks worthwhile. If you see Vivien Leigh or Robert DeNiro or Meryl Streep do something stunningly effective, and you can analyze how he or she did it, then pinch it. Because you can be sure that they stole it in the first place.

It's much harder to act in a bad film than in a good one. A terrible script makes for very difficult acting. You can win an Academy Award for some of the easiest acting in your career, made possible by a brilliant script.

If you think you're going to be up for an Oscar, you schedule your moviemaking.

One of the great things with comedy is that there's no such thing as a mediocre comedy; it's either uproarious or crap. That's the problem.

By the time the Oscars are on I'll be seventy. How many more chances am I going to have to get nominated for an Oscar?