Women are usually only interesting to studio executives when they are fecund, between the ages of 15 and 30. I decided to get through the really tough patch, around 50, by just cutting my price and playing ten years older. I didn't want to have to wait until I was an old lady to play one.

When you look at me you don't immediately imagine a very very glamorous icon, so it's only in the theater that I get to do these experiments. I've been an actor about 51 years now. I've played everything from an 8-year-old black boy to a 72-year-old French matriarch, and they hardly hire you to do that on TV.

You know, my hair is very upsetting to people, but it's upsetting on purpose. It is important to look old so that the young will not be afraid of dying. People don't like old women. We don't honor age in our society, and we certainly don't honor it in Hollywood.

I went into the family business. To me, it was the norm and not the exception.

Love is as strict as acting. If you want to love somebody, stand there and do it. If you don't, don't. There are no other choices.

I'm interested in playing old ladies because I am becoming one. And I want to become a very good one!

I don't have a waist: I'm a breadbox on top of legs.