126 Quotes By John Malkovich You Should Pay Heed To

I wouldn't describe myself as lacking in confidence, but I would just say that - the ghosts you chase you never catch.

Never

  

You can't take a play someone has directed and do whatever you want with it.

  

Anybody doing something brings something to it.

  

Well, I design costumes because I started with the theater in Chicago, but somehow a few lines just sort of fell to me to do it. And I studied it in school and I always liked it.

Me

  

It never occurred to me to be an actor.

Me , Never

  

I was never a fanatical movie person.

Never

  

Imagine how asleep or utterly unperceptive and clueless you would have to be not to see yourself as absurd for the most part.

Yourself

  

I don't wake up drenched in sweat because I haven't been on stage in years.

  

Most films, it doesn't matter if you see them or not.

  

I go around the world, working with all kinds of people who I love.

  

I prefer to conduct my life based on how I treat people.

Life

  

If you don't interfere with me, I'll always do something really good.

Me

  

I don't have a saviour or a royal family.

Family

  

I've permitted myself to learn and to fail with some regularity. And that is probably the one thing I was given, and that I'm still grateful for.

  

I believe in humans.

  

When you think of how history is revealed, we know certain things to be facts at certain periods of time, which turn out not to be so factual as time marches on.

Time

  

I don't remember my life before I had children.

Life

  

I'm a little bit phobic about stains on my clothes, so I never travel without a little packet of organic stain remover.

  

I grew up in the Midwest, quite far from any ocean or any beach, a million miles. I think for kids who grew up where I did, the idea of California, surfing and beach life was so exotic and glamorous.

Life

  

Fashion is chaotic, and it can be an aggravation, too, but it is at its best when it allows you to express yourself.

Yourself

  

I know fashion can be intensely goofy, but it is something I've always taken pretty seriously.

  

I have at times spoken with my peers and the head of the actors' union about why we're not paid when we appear in, say, a 'TMZ' production, but there seems to be no real interest in combatting it.

  

Most of the women that I like have a haunted quality - they're sort of like women who live in a haunted house all by themselves.

  

I can see how, given a certain degree of sensitivities, proclivities and rage, I could have ended up differently.

  

My father was an exceptionally strong influence on me.

Me

  

Theater is so ephemeral, and I love that.

  

I love to watch good actors who surprise and amuse me.

Me

  

We're all animals.

  

The most evocative thing to me is probably when a writer and a group of performers can collectively put together something compelling that asks the really simple question: 'How do we live?'

Together

  

I don't really go through a process, it goes through me.

Me

  

I'd hate to see any film I'm involved in fail, especially artistically but also business-wise.

  

The projects I look for to produce or direct would not be ones in which I would want to act.

  

I don't like things too overstated in the cut or too perfect.

Like

  

I'm more boring and more conservative.

  

As an actor there are no drawbacks.

  

I'm not a very skeptical person.

  

I mean, a lot of time rehearsals are taken up with other things other than preparing a character.

Character , Time

  

I never really did a western western.

Never

  

Things are so much global and Americanised.

  

Every country has their problems.

  

Actors generally get to do things you probably shouldn't do in real life - well, at least as much as one might like to or be tempted to. Though I suppose a lot of actors just go ahead and do it, don't they?

Life

  

Politics is not really my thing.

  

If you're too smart it can limit you because you spend so much time thinking that you don't do anything.

Time

  

I think with actors, if you just don't set about trying to crush their confidence immediately, you're usually OK.

Think , Trying

  

I think I was born at a time when an American male had so many advantages and opportunities that weren't available to men before or after, just a very brief period.

Time

  

I'm very much a typical midwesterner, and I don't think the condition is curable.

Think

  

I don't throw things or yell.

  

I'm not a control maniac.

  

It's tough to figure out how do we compete in Europe and North America, when obviously a living wage for us is very different than a living wage in Indonesia.

  

I always wanted to be fashionable.

  

I've done quite a few big American films.

  

I like very much to do movies.

Like

  

I think 1973 was the nadir of fashion. When you watch the coverage from that era, you're struck by the astonishing ugliness of the clothes.

Think

  

'Secretariat' was such a magnificent animal, unbelievably beautiful and powerful. It's always nice to see something that close to perfection, a reason to celebrate.

  

You know, I'm really not interested in someone telling me that something's good or bad.

Me

  

I'm not a psychiatrist. I'm not treating patients.

  

I mean, anything that money can be made off will never be a problem to make, no matter what it is.

  

I like to direct movies, but I don't like to goof around for eight years talking about it.

Like

  

I find it hard to pre-plan every element of everything I do. It's not my thing.

  

I don't mind what I play, really.

  

I'm an atheist.

  

I don't care what other people think. I don't think it matters.

Think

  

I don't want a trillion-dollar empire to run.

  

My father was a very contradictory man.

  

I think people seem to sort of associate me with danger. And I don't see that at all.

Me , Think

  

I was a very good baseball player and football player as a kid.

  

I still have a temper, I suppose.

  

Where women are concerned, the rule is never to go out with anyone better dressed than you.

  

I only have two rules for my newly born daughter: she will dress well and never have sex.

  

I wasn't really raised to be the type of person to have doubts.

  

I don't think my parents know what I do.

Think

  

You have to do things people see or you don't get to do anything.

  

You can't work in the movies. Movies are all about lighting. Very few filmmakers will concentrate on the story. You get very little rehearsal time, so anything you do onscreen is a kind of speed painting.

Time

  

Some directors expect you to do everything; write, be producer, psychiatrist. Some just want you to die in a tragic accident during the shooting so they can get the insurance.

  

Of course it's trivial, but then most things are.

  

My life before children I don't really remember. I've heard references to it, but I really don't remember.

Life

  

I'm supposed to be a pretty good theater actor.

  

I'm more likely to lose my temper on a film set than almost anywhere. Often the level of idiocy is so exalted that it's impossible to comprehend.

  

I'm more comfortable with whatever's wrong with me than my father was whenever he felt he failed or didn't measure up to the standard he set.

Me

  

I wouldn't say anything I ever did in film would be something I'd use the word proud about. I've done better work in the theater.

  

I was a very good baseball and football player, but my father always told me I was much more interested in how I looked playing baseball or football than in actually playing. There's great truth in that.

  

I haven't physically attacked anyone in a couple of years.

  

Even if you do succeed most people wouldn't notice anyway.

  

I always liked clothes; since I was very, very young, I was interested. I studied costume as part of my theatre education.

  

I don't need to be liked.

  

I brought my first fall/winter line to New York, and it was confiscated by U.S. Customs. They asked, 'What is the value of this?' I said, 'I'm not so good with existential questions.'

  

I probably have more female friends than any man I've ever met. What I like about them is that almost always they're generally mentally tougher, and they're better listeners, and they're more capable of surviving things.

  

A dog that has rabies probably will do things it wouldn't do if it didn't have rabies. But that doesn't change the fact that it has rabies.

  

In New York in the Forties or Fifties, everybody's in a suit, an overcoat and a hat.

  

You can be a mason and build 50 buildings, but it doesn't mean you can design one.

  

You have to play your characters, not like them.

Like

  

Scary monsters are like Hula Hoops. They come in and out of fashion.

Like

  

The world is ruled by violence, or at least the imminent threat of violence. It always has been.

  

Quite often - a lot of the work I had done had been extensively with women. Most especially in the theater, but also quite often in the movies. That has its own delights, and maybe pitfalls too.

  

I don't mind tracksuits. At the track.

  

It's not a gift of mine, but one given to me, to be able to criticise myself and not be crushed, by myself or by others.

Me

  

Well, I like to have fun at work.

  

I'm a little bit of a fabric lunatic.

  

Failure's a natural part of life.

Life

  

I don't understand how somebody wouldn't have a sense of humor about themselves.