Bette Midler Quotes
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One of my first role models was Eugene Lang, a wealthy businessman who went back to his elementary school in East Harlem and addressed the sixth-grade class. He looked out at that sea of faces and said, "If any of you wants to go to college, I will pay for it." When I read that, I burst into tears. It was so generous and so basic. Not fluffy. I can't understand why we scrimp on education and shortchange our kids. Why would the citizenry do that to the people who are going to inherit its republic?
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I mean, can I really create a full, three-dimensional character? I don't know anymore. I'm certainly going to try.
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You have to be alert. When my daughter, Sophie, came out of the womb, she was instantly alert, as if she had been here before. And she was a little disappointed that she was here again.
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Unfortunately, every time there's a budget crunch in New York, the Parks Department is usually the first to be cut. So they need all the help they can get.
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I don't like violence. I get sick from violence. Do you think people are excited by violence?
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When the movies first started, audiences were dumbstruck to see actresses walking around in evening gowns. They'd never seen anything like that. They wanted to be like those actors and actresses, so the movies informed their behavior. A lot of people started drinking martinis and smoking cigarettes because they felt it was cool.
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Do I understand this right? I'm being marked down?
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Most people are walking around the city like corpses; they aren't alive enough to notice the trash. They come from other places and they see it as a big garbage dump. Do you want to live and work in a garbage dump? I don't. That's partly because I grew up in the most pristine environment possible - Hawaii, where it is sacrilege to leave your garbage on the ground.
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When you have a steady job you're more inspired to broaden yourself.
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I've always said we got married because there was nothing on TV.
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I tried to charm the pants off Bob Dylan, but everyone will be disappointed to learn that I was unsuccessful. I got close - a couple of fast feels in the front seat of a Cadillac.
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That's our mission: to clean and green New York City - one block at a time.
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The outside world doesn't have a lot to offer. You have to make your own heaven in your own home.
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There's the media-driven universe, in which the public perceives you in a superficial way. Then there's the universe that you actually inhabit, where you have to get up even if you didn't sleep so well, and you feel like crap and your face is swollen.
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Some say love it is a river that drowns the tender reeds. Some say love, it is a razor that leaves your heart to bleed. Some say love, it is a hunger, an endless aching need. I say love, it is a flower and you, its only seed.
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When my daughter was younger we showed her all the great musicals. And the great dramas and great comedies, and the one that she took to the most was Some Like It Hot.
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I bear no grudges. I have a mind that retains nothing.
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If they [at the audition] don't like the way you sound they won't buy you anyway, ripped dress or no ripped dress, ass hanging out or no ass hanging out.
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The first time I saw a picture of [fabled actress] Ethel Barrymore - she was on Broadway and she was wearing pearls. I thought, "That's who I should grow up to be." It's odd, because it was her physical image that I wanted; I had no idea what it was like actually to be her. In those days, we weren't bombarded by images the way we are now, and the ones we did have were more vivid in people's minds.
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My whole life had been spent waiting for an epiphany, a manifestation of God's presence, the kind of transcendent, magical experience that lets you see your place in the big picture. And that is what I had with my first [compost] heap.
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As you age, feelings do diminish.
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My parents taught me: Do not rely on a man. Not rely on it that you get married and it pays for you. That's what I figured. I have always paid my own bills.
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I'm confident that I'm as intelligent as many people, but I know that I'm not as intelligent as some. So in the presence of hyperintelligent people, I'm a shrinking violet because I don't want to look like a fool. I know a little about a lot and a lot about a little.
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When you reach a certain age, you have fulfilled your childhood dream and whatever your first or second adulthood led you to do. Then you're in your third adulthood, the one that leads to the grave, and you ask yourself, "What will I do between now and then?" Instead of thinking in terms of glamour, you start thinking in terms of reform - your contribution to the world.