Richard Dreyfuss Quotes

I decided at age 9, but I was reinforced at age 13 when a teacher told me I had talent. I can't say she really motivated me because I already knew. I knew I had talent. I went to the Jewish community theater and got in plays there. Then I went for the movies.

By telling my own story, I hope to help remove the stigma. It never should be something to hide.

It must be remembered that the Bush White House has a separate talent for character assassination that must not be confused with a talent for governance.

My worst fear is that I'll end up living in some run-down duplex on Wilshire wearing pants hiked up to my nipples and muttering under my breath.

Happiness has a bad rap. People say it shouldn't be your goal in life. Oh, yes it should.

Civics is not only how to run the country before it's your turn to run the country; it is, in fact, the study of power, practical political power. And you must start that process at an age level when kids' brains are still open and malleable.

Theater is completely different from film or television. It has a beginning and a middle and an end and it's different every night. And it's far preferable to any other except in the sense of not getting paid, people who want to eat should do film and television.

Part of me is still waiting to grow up, to be an adult, and the other part knows there is no such thing.

It is an obvious and blatant stupidity beyond my ability to articulate how dumb it is for us not to teach our children how to run the government.

Wake up and live. It's a fast world out there.

Civility is not not saying negative or harsh things. It is not the absence of critical analysis. It is the manner in which we are sharing this territorial freedom of political discussion. If our discourse is yelled and screamed and interrupted and patronized, that's uncivil.

In a way, J.F.K. was the high point of the American dream. In order to go to the moon and back, all we did was say we could - and we did.

You don't have to act as if you care; you just have to care enough to act.

I don't know what its like for most actors, but really clearly for myself acting has always been the fulfillment of personal fantasies. It isn't just art, its about being a person I've always wanted to be, or being in a situation, or being a hero.

I really think that living is the process of going from complete certainty to complete ignorance.

The happiest I ever been was when I was a struggling actor. I've had big houses and small houses. I always had work available for most of my career. When I actually had to find jobs to make money, that's when I was happy.

I never had a role that I set out for. I always wanted to have a body of work that I'm proud of. Save for two projects, which will never pass my lips, I'm happy with what I've done.

When you Google me, you'll find a lot of people don't like Richard Dreyfuss. Because I'm cocky and I present a cocky attitude. But no one has ever disagreed with the notion I represent, that we need more civic education. So far there's 100 percent support for that.

It's fun to see the light in someone's eyes. It's fun to give your own eccentric experience and have it land. That's fun.

There is one solution to all of our problems: Teaching our kids clarity of thought and political representation in democracy. That's it.

I spoke so much about being a manic-depressive. I want to bring everyone back to my earliest memories of this companion of mine. Some people call this companion I have an ailment, or worse a terrible nightmare from which some people cannot awaken. I know that I have nothing to be ashamed of. I have nothing that should garner a stigma.

I didn't understand 3-D in the fifties and I can't say I get it now either. I just don't see what the big deal is.

If I wasn't an actor, I'd be a teacher, a history teacher. After all, teaching is very much like performing. A teacher is an actor, in a way. It takes a great deal to get, and hold, a class.

I'm nothing if not honest.

John Kennedy really did extend the reach of the American people and said, like Lincoln said in a way, that our reach is farther than our grasp - and we should aim high.

Jaws, first time I saw it, I forgot I was in it. True. Totally forgot, and got as scared as everybody else, and it's a great movie.

Tabouli is the best salad, but still, you don't win friends with salad

Power never turns power down, ever, unless institutionally demanded.

In my experience, it's usually up to the actor how a character is portrayed.

The rules are all wrong today. The mandate of the media really does pre-date the founding of the United States.

I believe that a nation that allows music to be expendable is in danger of becoming expendable itself.

Well, I can't (sing or dance). Actually, I sing like a seal and dance like your Uncle Leo at that wedding where he got up and went 'ya, ya, ya'.

I have more fun and more grand and glorious moments of my life than anyone I've never known. I know that some people call that manic-depress, and that other people call that being touched by God. I just call myself lucky.

Let's give some substance to patriotism. It may take a generation.

The bad guy always gets the best scene and the best lines in the film, and they usually get the most days off.

People who commit adultery must die. Everyone knows that. Any movie tells you that!

We mistake politics for legislative debate. You can be passionate without being personal.

To teach our kids how to run our country, before they are called upon to run our country... if we don't, someone else will run our country.

When you work in front of the people, either in a film or in television, the people who are in the room with you are not watching you work, they're working so you'd have to light a fire to get them to watch what you were doing.

I said to my doctor, 'You gotta testme, there's something wrong with me that I would be behaving this way.'