Quotes

[9/14/73, delivering the address at the memorial for Jack Hawkins] The man who gave... he was always ready to help, listen, sympathize, advise and he always picked up the chips. He was popular and loved by the British public, and he earned and held their respect. He lost a gallant fight to recapture an actor's most precious gift [his voice].

[about the long relationship he had with his agent Harry Dubens] We never had a contract or written agreement. We did not even have an exchange of letters between us, only what lawyers like to call "mutual trust", and the feeling that we could work together and achieve something worthwhile together.

[recalling his failed attempt to join the military in 1939, having been told that the navy had all the men it needed] I left feeling very puzzled and very disappointed. I thought they would be welcoming men into the services, but it wasn't like that at all. I just thought that defending my country was more important than being an actor, and I wanted to join the navy because my father had been in the navy.

[paying tribute to Lewis Gilbert, who directed him in four films at the height of his film career] He is a very simple person with no side or pretense, and a great technician. He is also extremely efficient, and so extracts efficiency from others. This is not a gift in the possession of all directors.

[recalling the start of his career at the Windmill Theatre] After my father died, my mother had virtually nothing, and she gave me £150 and said, "That's all I can afford, Kenny. You see what you can do". So I came to London and recalled that Vivian Van Damm, who ran the Windmill Theatre, was a friend of my father's, so I went to see him. "Are you Bertie More's son?" What can I do for you?" I loved him. A lovely man. "I want a job". "Start on Monday". "What doing, sir?" "I'll teach you. I need somebody to take over from me. Then eventually you can run the theatre. But don't ever come to me and say you want to be a bloody actor".

[6/16/73, in The Times] Actors are as old as they appear to the public. I'm now in the last stages of playing the romantic fellow caught up with the girls. This will probably be my last play ["Sign of the Times"] as a leading man that's got a couple of girls after him. Frankly, this kind of part is too easy for me. But I have no ambition, you see, to play any particular part. It's just the one that comes along. My wife is well aware. She said, "Look. Kenny, this'll probably be a huge commercial success, but don't go patting yourself on the back, because it's just like falling off a bloody log for you".

[3/22/63, in the Montreal Gazette, speaking of his role as Chick Byrd in "The Comedy Man"] The public wouldn't accept me as a stevedore or as a Liverpool truck driver, so I've been prevented, until now, from making a realistic subject, although it's something I've been longing to do.

[7/16/79, interview in The Desert News, Salt Lake City UT] I guess that my life has featured some things that didn't happen as well as those that did. For instance, I was offered the role of the father in Mary Poppins (1964) more than 15 years ago. I had to turn it down due to other commitments. I was thinking Disney would never offer me another part again, so when Unidentified Flying Oddball (1979) came along I jumped at the chance.

[9/16/67, in the Daily Mirror, describing the story of Wing Commander "Tommy" Yeo-Thomas GC in The White Rabbit (1967)] It can be seen on three levels -- a "Boy's Own Paper" story of a man with great courage and guts. It can also be something much deeper -- the battle of wits between a Gestapo officer and a Briton he is determined to break by torture to get the information he wants . . . and it can be something far more important -- a deep-down, soul-searching document of what we have forgotten of Auschwitz and Buchenwald.