Phrases

-I keep going because if you stop, you stop. Why retire? Inspire.

-You always pass failure on the way to success.

-Someone once asked me what I want on my epitaph when I pass away. Just the words ‘I tried.’ That’s what this game of life is all about. Trying. There’s the tryers, the criers, and the liars.

-Always get married in the morning. That way if it doesn’t work out, you haven’t wasted the whole day.

-Dont retire – inspire…Theres a lot to be done

-Had I been brighter, the ladies been gentler, the Scotch been weaker, had the gods been kinder, had the dice been hotter, this could have been a one-sentence story: Once upon a time I lived happily ever after.

-Hey kids! Let’s put on a show!

-A lot of people have asked me how short I am. Since my last divorce, I think I’m about $100,000 short.

-I don’t regret anything I’ve ever done. I only wish I could have done more.

-Hollywood has unfortunately become a memory. It’s nothing but a sign on the side of a hill.

I’m the only man in the world with a marriage licence made out to whom it may concern.

-Look, I come from vaudeville, I come from burlesque, I come from heartaches, I come from sadness, I come from gladness, I come from work and sweat and respect for the craft.

-I buy women shoes and they use them to walk away from me.

-Life is an infiltration course. We all try and get through it. We all try and get through it unscathed – maybe not hurt, not bruised. No bones broken, maybe a few hearts here and there.

-And that’s the way I have always lived, for the laughs – today. N-O-W. No Other Way.

-I hear Jerry Falwell every Sunday here talking about the devil and Hollywood. . . . I’m gonna write him a letter. Hollywood wasn’t built on filth and dirt – it was built on talent.

-Now. Now is the most important time of all of your young lives. And what does now stand for – N-O-W? No Other Way. That’s the only time – NOW!

-When I was 19 years old, I was the number one star of the world for two years. When I was 40, nobody wanted me.

-On Hollywood turning its back on him: I wasn’t in the club. You see, I’m not going to be a stroker. I never have been all my life.

-Women liked me because I made them laugh.

-To those seniors, and especially elderly veterans like myself, I want to tell you this: You are not alone, and you having nothing to be ashamed of. If elder abuse happened to me, it can happen to anyone. I want you to know that you deserve better.

-I don’t pick the roles. Your agent gets a call for you and you go and they all get together, everybody has fun at the reading, and they say, “There’s chemistry here.” So that’s how it happens.

-The audience and I are friends. They allowed me to grow up with them. I’ve let them down several times. They’ve let me down several times. But we’re all family.

-God bless the universe, God bless Japanese, Chinese, Indians, all of them and let’s have peace.

-Clark Gable once said to me, “‘Acting school?’ [If you go,] I’ll kill ya!”

-When I open a refrigerator door and the light goes on, I want to perform.

-I belong to the public. The public made me. The public can break me. I owe them my life.

-It’s confusing. I’ve had so many wives and so many children I don’t know which house to go to first on Christmas.

-I’ll never make another Hardy picture . . . I’m fed up with these dopey, insipid parts. How long can a guy play a jerk kid? I’m 27 years old. I’ve been divorced once and separated from my second wife. I have two boys of my own. I spent almost two years in the army. It’s time Judge Hardy went out and bought me a double-breasted suit.

-My marriage license reads, ‘To whom it may concern,’

-I’ve been coming back like a rubber ball for years.

-I’m 74 but I feel like I’m 35. And it isn’t work. You know what it is? It’s fun, absolute fun. I don’t know many people who are fortunate enough to be in a business like that.

-The film The Last Temptation of Christ, no matter what its defenders say, was a slap in the face to Christians everywhere.

-I was a thirteen-year-old boy for thirty years.

-If I ever complain to an agent about anything, he always has a pained look on his face, like, “How can you be so ungrateful? Why, Mick, I just named my yacht after you!”

-. . . children – not kids. Kids are goats. I’ve always spoken of my children as children.

-I’ve been short all my life. And if anyone wonders what my dying wish will be, they can stop wondering. That will be easy. I’ll just tell them, ‘I’ll have a short bier.’

-Nowadays, it is fashionable for agents to be out. When you call them, they’re always “out.” It’s in, you see, to be out. If they’re in, they’re out. So, they’re always out. That way, they’ll be in.

-John Frances, Entertainment Chair, of the Friars Club: Of all the roasts that I have produced for the Friars Club, this is the one that I am most excited about. Mickey is one of the Club’s dearest friends, and we wanted to honor him in the way we know best.

-There were times when I was broke, when I was down in Florida and I had to go to cocktail parties for 500 bucks – to see the guy that used to be in pictures. I’m not ashamed of that. I’ve never done anything that I was ashamed of. I’ve done a lot of things I didn’t mean to do.

-Meadowlark Lemon is one very clever man, unique and truly one of a kind.

-I just want to be a professional. I couldn’t live without acting.