Michael Caine Quotes
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If I work with a bad actor, my reaction is to immediately become worse than they are.
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In my opinion, everybody is getting older and older. We have a great deal of dementia because nobody grew old enough to get it.
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No matter what the reason, if you start to scream and shout, you look a fool, and you feel a fool, and you earn the disrespect of everyone.
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I don't worry about the last shot or the next shot. I concentrate. Every shot gets a clean slate. And when a shot is over, I wipe it out absolutely. Tell a joke or something. If you worry about how you looked, how well you did, you'll go insane.
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At age 11, I went to a Jewish school. I speak Yiddish. I'm Church of England Protestant. My father was Catholic, and my mother was Protestant. My wife is a Muslim.
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Obsession is a young man's game, and my only excuse is that I never grew old.
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I was so poor for so long that I didn't use anything. I didn't drive cars, I didn't eat very much. So, I figured the world owed me a debt, so I've been eating very well and have had a very big car for a long time. But I still haven't caught up with my youth.
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Every magic trick consists of three parts, or acts. The first part is called the Pledge. The magician shows you something ordinary. The second act is called the Turn. The magician takes the ordinary something and makes it into something extraordinary. But you wouldn't clap yet, because making something disappear isn't enough. You have to bring it back.
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I'm trying to work only with established, respected directors. I took a lot of bad scripts and worked for a lot of lazy directors, and it was discouraging to go to the screenings and see that the director had added nothing, the editor had added nothing, there was nothing to see.
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If someone is very upper-class, you have a stereotype of him which is probably true. If someone has a working-class accent, you have no idea who you're talking to.
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I don't meet stockbrokers or carpenters or coal miners; I spend all day with actors, composers and photographers.
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As an actor, my attitude towards using of film versus digital is, if you have film, filmmakers have to cut eventually so you don't have to learn all that dialogue. With digital, they can just go on forever and it's a nightmare. So, I like film - nice short takes.
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I'm a frustrated stand-up comic. If you hand me a microphone and I get one laugh, then I'll go on for 20 minutes.
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My view is that you should always remake failures because then you've got nowhere to go but up.
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I read books like mad, but I am careful to to let anything I read influence me.
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I used to get the girl; now I get the part. In 'The Quiet American' you may have noticed I got the part and the girl. It's a milestone for me, because it's the last time I'm going to get the girl.
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I don't want to sound like Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells, but I do think there should be some sort of national service for young men.
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If you're blond, as I am, and you have blond lashes, you have to wear mascara, otherwise you're invisible on stage.
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It's funny, people ask me, 'What would you consider the most romantic track on your record Mr Caine?' And I say 'Swollen' by Bent, and they say 'I think he's off his rocker!'
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Youre only supposed to blow the bloody doors off!
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You don't retire from the movies. The movies retire you.
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Since I was 19, I've had the most fun possible every single day, even when I had a rough life. It was the army which taught me about life, and the theater which taught me how good it could be.
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If you held a pistol at my head, I couldn't tell you who they're going to vote for Best Actor.
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My circle of friends are not actors at all. None of them are actors, really, because they're are not available. They're always off somewhere.