Quotes by Walter Matthau - Page 1

I retired once a couple of times.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Retired
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The first girl you go to bed with is always pretty.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Girl
Bed
Firsts
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To be successful in show business, all you need are 50 good breaks.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Break
Needs
Successful
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There's no such thing as 'too late!' That's why they invented death!
Walter Matthau / Actor
Late
Too Late
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I always had one ear offstage, listening for the call from the bookie.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Ears
Listening
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I have more talent in my smallest fart than you have in your entire body.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Body
Fart
Talent
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Perfection, to me ,means you spend much too much time trying to be perfect.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Too Much Time
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It's very easy to live here. You're anonymous here. Nobody knows who you are.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Easy
Knows
Nobody Knows
Anonymous
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I can relate to anything. I once played Macbeth. I got a lot of laughs, so I quit.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Laughs
Macbeth
Quit
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I don't mind my wife having to last word. In fact I'm delighted when she reaches it.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Funny Relationship
Mind
Wife
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Why don't you do the world a favour. Pull your bottom lip up over your head and swallow.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Lips
Over You
World
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We're writing a book together. She just finished one. Did you read it? Among the Porcupines?
Walter Matthau / Actor
Book
Together
Writing
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Working for the screen is almost like being in the Army: you set your mind to it, and you do it.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Army
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My doctor gave me six months to live, but when I couldn't pay the bill he gave me six months more.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Funny
Hilarious
Life
Medical
Months
Pay
Six
Witty
Live
Me
Bill
Medical Doctor Me
Doctor
He
Gave
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I've made $50 million over the years as a movie star, if you'll pardon the expression, and I've given most of it to the bookies.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Movie Star
Pardon
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You see, my father was a Catholic priest, Greek Orthodox, but I think he started out as a Jew, then he became a Catholic priest.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Catholic
Father
Thinking
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Of course I gamble, to make the games interesting. But five hundred dollars a game, tops. Or sometimes a thousand. No heart attack bets.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Gamble
Hundred
Thousand
Bets
Tops
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Doing a good play on the stage is like eating a good meal at home - assuming your wife is a great cook or that she's hired a great cook.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Assuming
Eating
Stage
Good Home Great
Cook
Good Meal
Great Cook
Hired
Meal
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I still think I'm 28. I'm 73. I think I'm 28, though, except that I won't get into a fight with anybody because I just had a pacemaker put in.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Pacemaker
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I never worked with Marilyn Monroe, but if she'd lived, I think she would have been all right. She would have been President of the United States.
Walter Matthau / Actor
President
Thinking
United States
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My mother paid eight dollars a month for rent. When she had it. Mostly we were evicted, because she couldnt afford to pay the eight dollars a month.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Dollars
Eight
Mother
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Get out of show business. Its the best advice I ever got, because Im so stubborn that if someone would tell me that, I would stay in it to the bitter end.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Advice
Bitter
Stubborn
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I lay 11-10 because I know the bookie needs that 5 percent that I give him. Otherwise, he wouldn't be able to make a living and go down to Florida with his family.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Florida
Lay
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I told Simon, 'I don't want to play Oscar. I want to play Felix because Oscar is too easy. He gets all the laughs. Felix is a hard part; that's the part I want to play.'
Walter Matthau / Actor
Hard Part
Laughs
Simon
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Doing a movie is like eating five hundred canapes at a cocktail party - you're never really full. You don't feel as though you've eaten a meal, and yet you can't eat any more.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Cocktail
Eaten
Meal
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Every actor looks all his life for a part that will combine his talents with his personality... 'The Odd Couple' was mine. That was the plutonium I needed. It all started happening after that.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Couple
Odd
Personality
Plutonium
Combine
Talents
Happening
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I wanted to be a pharmacist. I liked the way our local pharmacist was always dressed in a nice white coat; he looked very calm, you'd give him money, and he'd give you something that you wanted to buy.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Calm
Giving
Nice
Pharmacist
White
Coat
Dressed
Local
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Sometimes it takes me six months before I find out what a line means, even if the writing is superficial... To do a play right, really, I'd like to take two years of rehearsal. You study the character by living with him.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Rehearsal
Superficial
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If you're sitting around and doing Chekhov and the cat walks in, you must pay attention to the cat. You cannot continue the dialogue of Chekhov without including the cat. So on live television, we'd automatically go into ad-lib gear.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Cat
Chekhov
Live Television
Pay Attention
Walks
Automatically
Gear
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I wasn't handsome. I didn't have good clothes. I used to wonder why people would hire me when they could get college graduates and Oxford scholars. Then it became apparent that when I got up on a stage, people actually wanted to look at me.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Clothes
College
Graduates
Handsome
Oxford
Stage
Wonder
Good Me Handsome
Apparent
Became
Good Look Me
Hire
Scholars
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I was playing Russell Long, the senator from Louisiana. I had 12 speech teachers watching me. All the other passengers on the airplane were speech teachers, and every time I got it wrong, one of the speech teachers would jump up and correct it.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Airplane
Louisiana
Passengers
Speech
Time Me Long
Teachers
Time Long Me
Senator
Correct
Every Time
Jump
Russell
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I don't know how you can tell a good actor in the movies. I really don't. I think you simply just do the part and hope to God that the director has a good cutter and a good editor, and it'll all get cut and put together so that you look good in it.
Walter Matthau / Actor
God Hope Good
Cut
Editor
Good Actor
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When I was about eighteen, I saw myself as a rather sensitive, delicate, poetic, romantic figure. And then I got into the Civilian Conservation Corps and into the army, and I started smoking and drinking and being tough and getting muscles, and I had a whole different image of myself.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Army
Conservation
Delicate
Drinking
Eighteen
Muscles
Poetic
Sensitive
Smoking
Civilian
Corps
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The only guy that was ever affected by climactic conditions in his acting was Kirk Douglas. He did a superb job in 'Lonely Are the Brave' because we were shooting that picture up at about 12,000 feet, and the rarefied atmosphere sapped him of any energy or strength that he had. That was his best performance.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Atmosphere
Conditions
Lonely
Superb
Douglas
Rarefied
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I could play a cop, I could play a crook, I could play a lawyer, I could play a dentist, I could play an art critic-I could play the guy next door. I am the guy next door. I could play Catholic, Jewish, Protestant. As a matter of fact, when I did The Odd Couple, I would do it a different way each night. On Monday I'd be Jewish, Tuesday Italian, Wednesday Irish-German-and I would mix them up. I did that to amuse myself, and it always worked.
Walter Matthau / Actor
Art
Couple
Monday
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Walter Matthau Quotes - Page 1

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