Quotes

A director is a ringmaster, a psychiatrist and a referee.

[on What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)] Judging by the initial press reaction. I wasn't sure whether I was going to produce and direct a motion picture or referee a fight.

The struggle for self-determination, the struggle for what a character wants his life to be . . . I look for characters who feel strongly enough about something not to be concerned with the prevailing odds, but to struggle against those odds.

The power is for the director to do what he wants to do. To achieve that he needs his own cutter, he needs his cameraman, he needs his own assistant and a strong voice in his choice of writer; a very, very strong voice on who's the actor. He needs the power not to be interfered with and the power to make the movie as he sees it.

I think I am a much more humorous and funny fellow, and I would like to do a comedy or a musical, and I think I could easily adapt to that because of my knowledge of music. But it has nothing to do with what you think of yourself, but only what others think of you.

[on Bette Davis] Now Davis is a tough old broad and you fight. But when you see what she puts on the screen you know it was worth taking all the bull.

[on Frank Sinatra] Unpleasant man. No one has yet worked out what really makes him tick. But he sings well.

[on Lee Marvin] Look, this feller is a pretty good boozer, he's got a short fuse, but he can be handled okay.

[on Burt Lancaster] He has matured gracefully, plays men his own age and understands the need not to win the girl. He is much more tolerant of other people's point of view.

[on Lewis Milestone] From Lewis Milestone I learned diplomacy in dealing with actors.

[1974 comment on Kim Novak] Is Kim Novak a joke in her own time?

[on Charles Chaplin, for whom he worked as assistant director on Limelight (1952)] He's the greatest actor in the world but he doesn't know how to direct.

[on Joan Crawford's withdrawal from Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964)] There's no doubt in the world that Crawford was sick, seriously sick. If she'd been faking either the insurance company would never have paid the claim or she would never have been insurable again. Insurance companies are terribly tough, there's no such thing as a made-up ailment that they pay you off on.

I can't imagine how people, certainly working people, can be Republicans. It amazes me.

I don't think violence on film breeds violence in life. Violence in life breeds violence in films.