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The applause of all but very good men is no more than the precise measure of their possible hostility.

Alec Guinness

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Alec Guinness
Age: 86 †
Born: 1914
Born: April 2
Died: 2000
Died: August 5
Actor
Autobiographer
Character Actor
Film Actor
Screenwriter
Stage Actor
Television Actor
Alec Guinness de Cuffe
Measure
Possible
Good
Men
Applause
Hostility
Precise

More quotes by Alec Guinness

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Styling is designing for obsolescence.
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I shrivel up every time someone mentions Star Wars to me.
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A superb tenor voice, like a silver trumpet muffled in silk.
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All creative people hate mathematics. It's the most uncreative subject you can study.
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We live in an age of apologies. Apologies, fake or true, are expected from the descendants of empire builders, slave owners and persecutors of heretics, and from men who -in our eyes- just got it all wrong. So, with the age of 85 coming up shortly, I want to make an apology. It appears I must apologize for being male, white, and European.
Alec Guinness
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An Actor is an interpreter of other men's words, often a soul which wishes to reveal itself to the world but dare not, a craftsman, a bag of tricks, a vanity bag, a cool observer of mankind, a child and at his best a kind of unfrocked priest who, for an hour or two, can call on heaven and hell to mesmerize a group of innocents.
Alec Guinness
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Failure has a thousand explanations. Success doesn't need one.
Alec Guinness
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An actor is at his best a kind of unfrocked priest who, for an hour or two, can call on heaven and hell to mesmerize a group of innocents.
Alec Guinness
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There seems to be no end to the senseless wickedness done on this little planet in a minor solar system, and we puny mortals appear to be decreasing in importance so far as the universe is concerned.
Alec Guinness
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Much of the day I have busied myself making notes on the small parts in Shakespeare, often nameless, which are rewarding to the actor if only he'll not dismiss them as beneath his dignity. If I can work it up into a talk I might call it, 'Only a cough and a spit ' -the phrase so often used by actors to explain away a lack of opportunity.
Alec Guinness
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I don't know what else I could do but pretend to be an actor.
Alec Guinness
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I never knew how good it is to be unknown until now. The last time I was unknown I was too busy trying to become known to realize the advantages of obscurity.
Alec Guinness
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Essentially, I'm a small-part actor who's been lucky enough to play leading roles for most of his life.
Alec Guinness
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That's no moon. It's a space station.
Alec Guinness
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Best performance of the year: Aston Villa v. Milan, September 1994
Alec Guinness
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Young men make wars, and the virtues of war are the virtues of young men: courage, and hope for the future. Then old men make the peace, and the vices of peace are the vices of old men: mistrust and caution.
Alec Guinness
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My contribution to film has always been negligible.
Alec Guinness
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A person who is keen to shake your hand usually has something up his sleeve.
Alec Guinness
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An actor is totally vulnerable. His total personality is exposed to critical judgment - his intellect, his bearing, his diction, his whole appearance. In short, his ego.
Alec Guinness