ALI MACGRAW (1939 – )                          

[On Steve McQueen]: ‘One thing about Steve, he didn’t like the women in his life to have balls.’

[On the surprise success of her second starring role, the 1970 film Love Story]:’If you’re a baby about the media, as I was, you can’t imagine what it’s like when the great approval machine shines its beam on you, when every time you cross the street someone comes out of a manhole to talk about your haircut. I’ve since learned that surviving stardom depends on doing the work to find out who you are, so that you don’t define yourself by what people say about you. But nothing can prepare you for that kind of avalanche. The mistake is to take it for the end of the story.’

EDWARD NORTON (1969 – )                    

[After not voting for George W. Bush in 2004]: ‘I almost forgot what it was like to be proud of my government. Do tax breaks for movie stars make any sense to you?’

GINA LOLLOBRIGIDA (1927-2023)               

[The Italian beauty turns ninety-six in 2023]: ‘I’ve had many lovers and I still have romances. I am very spoiled. All my life, I’ve had too many admirers. A woman at twenty is like ice, at thirty she is warm and at forty she is hot. I have experience seducing nephews.’

WILLIAM H. MACY (1950 – )                   

[On making Boogie Nights in 1997]: ‘One of my first days was the scene in which Dirk Diggler wins the Golden Phallus Award. In the audience were 100 extras who had been told to wear their finest 1970s clothes. All they knew was that this was a Burt Reynolds film. They’re sitting there, and the director says, ‘All right, let’s give it a shot. When she announces the winner, you all applaud.’ Melora Walters walks up to the microphone, opens the envelope and, with that fabulous little voice of hers, says, ‘And the winner is – and I can’t wait to get his big cock in my mouth and my ass and my pussy – Dirk Diggler!’ There was a stunned silence, and literally half the extras walked out, got in their cars and drove home. We were shut down for a while until they could get another set of extras. The next time, the director described the scene and told them what they were in for.’

CHUCK NORRIS (1940 -)                          

‘It’s the bullies who are afraid; are the ones that do all the fighting. It’s not the secure kids that get out there and fight. It’s the insecure kids. And when you develop the security in these youngsters and all of a sudden they have no reason to fight…this to me is the most gratifying thing I’ve ever been able to do’

‘I haven’t always been warmly welcomed for holding my conservative positions in Hollywood. Then again, I’ve never been very good at being politically correct, either on or off the screen. So why start now?’

[On Bruce Lee]: ‘Bruce Lee had bad eyesight and one leg that was shorter than the other. But he had a mental image of that he wanted, and he became the quintessential martial artist and the first Chinese superstar in American films.’

‘There has always been violence on the screen, and certain groups claim that anti-social behaviour can be traced to these violent films. I believe that’s hogwash! The violence on television news programs is much more harmful because it’s real. We all have the potential to be violent, but we must learn to control these impulses.’

[On the 2008 Presidential election – Obama and Biden vs McCain and Palin]: ‘My choice would be John McCain and Sarah Palin, mainly because, with Sarah, I think she’d make a good president because she’s a no-nonsense gal and has much more experience than Barack Obama. Europe now is not infatuated with Barack Obama anymore. They are infatuated with Sarah Palin.’

SHEREE NORTH (1932 – 2005)                            

[In a 1983 interview]: ‘There’s still the same reaction when producers hear my name. They remember me as the blonde who was to have taken over from Marilyn Monroe.’

[On the ego of fellow actors]: ‘Of all the actors I’ve worked with, the three most ego-less, most humane, real people, were Robert Ryan, Karl Malden and Tom Selleck.’

TIM MATHESON (1947 – )                                     

[He discussed starting out as a teenager in Hollywood back in the late fifties and early sixties on the popular sitcom Leave it to Beaver]: ‘I was so star-struck, meeting Jerry Mathers. He invited me to his house for a party after I did like three episodes over the course of a season, and I remember thinking, ‘This is it, man. This is the Hollywood life! I’m an actor and I’m going to Jerry’s party. This is how it begins!’ I was thirteen or fourteen, and I thought this was the beginning of something. And I kept thinking that with all those first jobs, ‘This is the beginning of something!’ And then nothing would happen. That’s the real Hollywood.’

YVETTE MIMIEUX (1942-2022)               

‘Have you noticed that they write parts for mute women but not for mute men? It must be a masculine dream: a woman who can feel and hear but not talk!’

WARREN OATES (1928-82)                      

‘I feel most uncomfortable in a western role, because my image of the western man is John Wayne and I’m just a little shit.’

[On working with director Sam Peckinpah]: ‘Sam has always believed, and I believe rightly, that he is there to make the film and that anyone who stands in his way is dead. They’re in deep, deep trouble. And anyone who does not come up to snuff and do their job absolutely perfectly is in deep trouble with Sam. I don’t think he’s a horrible maniac; it’s just that he injures your innocence, and you get pissed off about it.’

FRANCO NERO (1941 – )                           

[Regarding his paltry two-month stint at acting school]: ‘They wanted to teach me to act. But to act is natural. It is ten percent acting and ninety percent being smart.’

FELICITY HUFFMAN (1962 – )                

[The actress wife of actor William H. Macy, and star of Desperate Housewives, commented on the events of 9/11]: ‘I feel ashamed of us. We had an opportunity to lead the world in a different way after 9/11 and we blew it. And I don’t know if we’ll ever recover. And then we re-elected that bonehead! I want to walk around saying, ‘I’m so sorry.’ America’s a dichotomy. It’s binge and purge. It’s really right-wing, and also the left is coming up. It’s stuff yourself and then starve yourself.’