Quote

I'm an actor. My life as an actor depends on who sends me what. I'm just taking the best stuff that I can find that's sent my way, regardless of how big or little the paycheck is. I don't want to work for scale anymore. I'm at a point now where, no matter how good something is, I'm not going to kill myself and end up in the hole.

Alan Arkin

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Alan Arkin
Age: 90
Born: 1934
Born: March 26
Actor
Character Actor
Film Actor
Film Director
Film Producer
Musician
Science Fiction Writer
Screenwriter
Singer
New York City
New York
Alan Wolf Arkin
Little
Point
Sent
Matter
Actors
Scales
Going
Bigs
Holes
Work
Stuff
Anymore
Something
Ends
Kill
Sends
Way
Littles
Depends
Hole
Good
Best
Actor
Regardless
Life
Find
Taking
Scale

More quotes by Alan Arkin

Image
I played guitar. I've always considered myself an actor, but I wasn't making a living as an actor. So I was in a couple of folk groups that managed to keep me in underwear and burritos.
Alan Arkin
Image
I gotta keep busy. I'm not happy unless I'm working on two, three things.
Alan Arkin
Image
I used to watch the world as if it was a performance and I would realize that certain things that people did moved me, and certain things didn't move me, and I tried to analyze, even at that age, six and seven and eight, why I was moved by certain things they did
Alan Arkin
Image
All I can say is if the part doesn't delight me in some way, or I can't feel any compassion for it, I just can't do it.
Alan Arkin
Image
There's a familiarity that sometimes shocks and annoys the hell out of me. People want a relationship with you that they haven't earned.
Alan Arkin
Image
I don't believe in competitions between artists. This is insane. Who has the authority to say someone is better?
Alan Arkin
Image
If I'm doing a fake movie, it's gonna be a fake hit.
Alan Arkin
Image
Truth is always unfolding. It's not an absolute.
Alan Arkin
Image
If you want to be an actor and you love acting, you can do it whether you're doing something else or not. You can be connected with community theater or make your own little movies. But, if you want to be a movie star, you've got a tough road ahead of you.
Alan Arkin
Image
For many years my acting came from a place of surmounting some enormous obstacle, confronting some stern and faceless judge who would condemn me to a pit of hell if I didn't achieve the zone, if even for a moment. Not a particularly happy place to work from.
Alan Arkin
Image
Creativity means learning where the rules exist, and then breaking them! Saying, It's better this way. But you have to know the rules in order to break them with any grace.
Alan Arkin
Image
You can begin to see an amalgamation of cultures, the real beginning of one world. Ten years ago, it would have been impossible to imagine a Cockney singing group with a Southern Negro style and Indian and electronic music. I wonder if people have even noticed what a tremendous cultural signal the Beatles are.
Alan Arkin
Image
Two-thirds of American movies are extensions of commercials -- they tell you how to feel and they tell you how to think -- rather than letting you figure it out on your own.
Alan Arkin
Image
What I've learned about teaching is to refer back to the root of that word, which is educo, which means to pull from. Education does not mean jamming information into somebody's head. Rather, it's that ancient idea that all knowledge is within us to teach is to help somebody pull it out of themselves.
Alan Arkin
Image
Things are never going to turn out how you think they will.
Alan Arkin
Image
TV has taken reflection out of the human condition. People didn't use to have a ready answer for everything, whether they knew something about it or not. People think they have to have an answer for everything because the guys on TV have an answer for everything. But it's bullsh**t! Reflection is crucial.
Alan Arkin
Image
'Catch-22' was a huge failure, and it rubbed off on everybody connected to it. I had a bunch of lean years where I had to do things, a lot of which I wasn't wildly enthusiastic about.
Alan Arkin
Image
No matter how much time you spend reading books or following your intuition, you're gonna screw it up. Fifty times. You can't do parenting right.
Alan Arkin
Image
Is it possible to have an endless series of successes without falling on our faces? I suppose it is, but I think it would entail doing the same things over and over again without taking chances, without taking risks or exploring our limits, without finding out what we can and can't do.
Alan Arkin
Image
I don't believe there's anything in life you can't go back and fix. The ancient Vedas - the oldest Hindu philosophy - and modern science agree that time is an illusion. If that's true, there's no such thing as a past or a future - it's all one huge now. So what you fix now affects the past and the future.
Alan Arkin