Peter O'Toole Quotes

Booze is the most outrageous of drugs which is why I chose it.

My dear sir, it haunted me for the rest of my life.

One time in the late '50s, when Peter Finch, Laurence Harvey, and I were all offered the same movie role - the assumption being that we weren't friends - we marched up to producer Dino De Laurentiis's door and declared in unison, 'We don't think we're suitable for the part.'

Films were never in my budget. Didn't occur to me till much later. I hoped for a long, good life, which I've had and I'm having as an actor. I didn't expect the rest.

I don't go for this auto-cannibalism. Very damaging.

I woke up one morning to find I was famous. I bought a white Rolls-Royce and drove down Sunset Boulevard, wearing dark specs and a white suit, waving like the Queen Mum.

I love working with young people, which is to me a big kick.

When did I realize I was God? Well, I was praying and I suddenly realized I was talking to myself.

I'm not an actor, I'm a movie star!!!

The moment you start dividing thought and feeling, the ratio of sinitive from the intuitive, you're dead. There is no difference between emotion and thought. You can be unreasonable.

We were in the Arabian Desert for nine months. And I was having the time of my life. It could have been an archeological expedition, a military expedition.

The only exercise I take is walking behind the coffins of friends who took exercise.

I did quite enjoy the days when one went for a beer at one's local in Paris and woke up in Corsica.

I have no memories I'm prepared to share with you.

There is a legend. And to protest is daft.

Acting has been described as farting about in disguise.

No one can take Jesus away from me.... There's no doubt there was a historical figure of tremendous importance, with enormous notions. Such as peace.

You talk about auteur de cinema having things in their heads and putting them all across, can you imagine Shakespeare writing screenplays?

It's such a relief for me to sit in front of a tape recorder and not be using it to learn my lines.

I'm a very physical actor. I use everything - toes, teeth, ears, everything. I don't simply mean physical in the sense of movement and vigour. I find myself remembering the shape of a scene by how I'm standing, what I'm doing.

If you cannot say what you mean, your majesty, you will never mean what you say and a gentleman should always mean what he says.

It is time for me to chuck in the sponge. To retire from films and stage. The heart for it has gone out of me: it won't come back.

People're artists they're doing something, taking a hunk of chaps, giving it some order, some form, and presenting it saying here is my little song and dance, my chaos.

I can't stand light. I hate weather. My idea of heaven is moving from one smoke-filled room to another.

Everyone praises Sachin Tendulkar. He may be a genius in his own right but in my book, Rahul Dravid is the artist. Dravid's defence tactics, his strokes, his cuts, his grace are truly amazing. I'd like to meet the chap sometime and take my hat off to him.

I tell my children to avoid theatre and go into cinema and TV.

I can make the best French toast.

I can't tell you about acting. You can develop all the skills, voice, gesture, movement, you can develop by exercise and practice but finally fundamentally it's mining from yourself, from your own personality, from what you know. If you can't know it you can have a good guess by people you know or books you've read.

There may be honor among thieves, but there's none in politicians.

I have no intention of uttering my last words on the stage. Room service and a couple of depraved young women will do me quite nicely for an exit.

My professional acting life, stage and screen, has brought me public support, emotional fulfillment and material comfort. It has brought me together with fine people, good companions with whom I've shared the inevitable lot of all actors: flops and hits.

I'm the most gregarious of men and love good company, but never less alone when alone.

I will not be an ordinary man, because I have a right to be extraordinary.

It was around 1985 before I heard the news of President Kennedy's assassination.

I wish to hazard my soul to opportunity.

There are only two things one has to bear in mind. One has to be credulous - able to believe - and skeptical - able to not believe, because if you are not skeptical, you will believe rubbish. If you are not credulous you will learn nothing and the only way to balance those two is to recognize the mystery of things.

I do not choose to be a common man…it is my right to be uncommon—if I can…I seek opportunity—not security…I want to take the calculated risk; to dream and to build, to fail and to succeed… to refuse to barter incentive for a dole… I prefer the challenges of life to the guaranteed existence, the thrill of fulfillment to the stale calm of utopias….

I wouldn't mind being a lord.

I'm a professional and I'll do anything - a poetry reading, television, cinema, anything that allows me to act.

Life turned out much better than I thought. I knew after a little while that I could act.

Where do I begin? I loved working with Kate Hepburn, which was one of the highlights of my life; Working with Richard Burton in Beckett was another great joy.