Top 123 Quotes & Sayings by Hugh Grant

Strangely enough I'm better on a stage. I love that I feel like I blossom in front of a whole bunch of people.

For any new technology there is always controversy and there always some fear associated with it. I think that's just the price of being first sometimes.

In 'The Sound of Music,' I was a von Trapp daughter in a white dress with a blue satin sash, and my line was, 'I'm Brigitta. I'm 12, and all I want is a good time.' I got a laugh. And I was so delighted, I laughed, too. Sadly, that's a problem I still have - onstage, I laugh hysterically at how funny I am.

I'm a laugh tart. I make no secret of that fact.

The emphasis in 'Notting Hill' was perhaps, I thought, slightly more on the romance than on the comedy. But I think 'Mickey Blue Eyes' is maybe slightly more on the comedy. And the tone on 'Mickey Blue Eyes,' it's a far sillier film.

I'm not a hopeless romantic. I'm quite the reverse. I'm a nasty piece of work, an ego maniac.

As it is, I have a limited range as an actor - light comedy. I have never been a fan of romantic comedies, and yet that is what I have ended up mostly doing.

Theater has always been much more fun. You get a laugh, and it's really encouraging.

The only reason my work seems to be eclectic up to a certain period is because I was a failure as an actor.

The reason I turn down 99% of a hundred, I mean a thousand, scripts is because romantic comedies are often very romantic but seldom very funny.

My laziness is really profound. I'm really interested in where it comes from - it almost feels chemical. And we've all got ADD now, short attention span and all that.

I get very annoyed when people think I'm nice or diffident or a polite English gentleman. I'm a nasty piece of work, and people should know that.

The moral of filmmaking in Britain is that you will be screwed by the weather.

I cling to the fantasy that I could have done something more creative. Like actually writing a script, or writing a book. But the awful truth is that I... probably can't!

Plus, teaching brings home to you very fast that you actually know nothing. I didn't realize that before.

Basically, my life is so boring, it's embarrassing.

You know everyone loves to be the villain.

The truth is, I'd never seen a Cary Grant film. Since then I have watched his stuff and it's astounding, but I don't see any similarity between us. Except for the fact that I'm told he used to wear ladies' underwear, which is something I also do.

I had Courtney Love's left bosom out of her dress on my plate in front of me. It was extraordinary. I didn't know where to look.

But when you're a celebrity, you discover that you're no longer the pursuer, but the one being pursued. That's one of the disappointments I have had since becoming a single man.

'Notting Hill?' Does that poke fun at being British? Maybe it does. In 'Mickey Blue Eyes,' that's kind of the point: the clash of worlds, the unlikely combo of a respectable Englishman and a mob guy. If you take out the Britishness, you don't really have much.

I have no doubt that I'd be a marvelous father. Maybe not when they're tiny, but when they're a little bit older, I think I'd be rather good.

Courage is soldiers fighting on the front line, or people living on the bread line.

I frequently dream of having tea with the Queen.

Women are frightening. If you get to 41 as a man, you're quite battle-scarred.

It's very true that you can be both selfless and selfish at the same time. What we tend towards, particularly in filmmaking, is this binary sort of, 'This is a good guy, this is a bad guy.' And I quite like the fact that life is a bit more complex than that.

I don't particularly like babies. I don't mind them for about four minutes. That's my max. After that I can't quite see what everyone's fussing about.

Japanese women have always loved my films, even when no one else did. Ever since I made 'Maurice' in the 1980s, I've been getting hundreds of letter from Japanese girls. They definitely have a special place in my heart.

If you have a smothering parent, the effect it can apparently have on a child is to give them, in equal doses, a sense of too much self-esteem, because they are mummy's little princess or prince, and low self-esteem. It affects future relationships.

I couldn't put my hand on my heart and say I think that being in a relationship is a natural state for a human being.

I've certainly had a bad attitude to my job on many occasions. Not since 'Four Weddings and a Funeral'. I've been rather a good boy and really given it everything when I've accepted a part since then, because I've been given much better parts in films.

I always admire the French and the Italians who are very devoted to their marriages. They take them extremely seriously, but it is understood that there might be other visitors at 5 o'clock in the afternoon. You just never boast about. They never say anything, but that's what keeps marriages together.

When I think about actors I know, I'd much rather hear about who they're shagging than what film they're doing next.

I think I'm rather young and sprightly, but then you see pictures of yourself and think, 'Who is that old man?' and I realise I'm not as young as I thought I was.

I'm a terrible vacillator; I can be sure of something one day and change my mind the next.

And film acting is incredibly tedious, just by its nature. It's incredibly, mind numbingly slow.

I had a kiss with Raquel Welch's daughter - she was a very naughty kisser.

'The Lair of the White Worm' is quite a strange film. It's difficult to be good when you're saying lines that have been translated from Spanish to English by someone who speaks French.

Most actors really love it, that's what they want to do. They burn to do it. And so they'll read a script and think, that's an interesting part. And because they love acting, that blinds them to the fact that the rest of it is pretentious nonsense, which it very often is.

Throughout my life, whenever I thought I'm dancing welI, I'm not.

But I just know from experience that accent wise, even if you're an accent genius, crossing the Atlantic is the hardest thing in the world either way.

I look at life and I see some very happy relationships, but I also see the vast majority as not being that happy.

And I particularly like the whole thing of being boss. Boss and employee... It's the slave quality that I find very alluring.

This guy Simon Helberg, who's in 'Florence Foster Jenkins,' I might have been vaguely patronizing to him because he hadn't done films before. Gradually, you realize, not only is the guy a much bigger star than me, he's maybe the richest man I've ever met.

A free press is the cornerstone of democracy; there is no question about that.

I just don't believe in love at first sight anymore, even though I've based my whole career on the concept. In my experience, power, money and influence always attract the opposite sex. It's something that I've always exploited - with good results.

Some newspapers in Britain have become closer to these kind of mafia families. They wield an incredible power. They choose our governments, they choose our prime ministers, and they live above the law.

Well, you know I have an office, my film offices. So I know that syndrome. I fancy offices, so there must be something wrong with me. Even the window cleaner intrigues me. It's a very sexy environment.

I think that's the whole point of Bridget Jones. It's all about that it's okay to fail.

I was fat-shamed the other day on a British newspaper. The headline was 'Four Bellies and a Turkey Neck.' They weren't wrong. I looked shocking.

I think maybe in a way it gets worse because you come in with a real reputation and they've paid you lots of money and all that.

With 2 movies opening this summer, I have no relaxing time at all. Whatever I have is spent in a drunken stupor.

I never meant to be in romantic comedies; it's just what ended up happening. But they are tricky, in a post-1960s sexual revolution way. It was easier when you couldn't have sex scenes: everything crackled very nicely. They're not easy.

I find it hard to understand why Scorsese has never called. You know, given the natural menace I bring to the screen.

I don't think there's much point in putting me a deep, dark, heavy, emotional film because there are people who do it so much better than I do.

Brexit was a fantastic example of a nation shooting itself full in the face.

At my school, which was all boys, I played almost exclusively lady parts. When I say lady parts, I mean parts that were ladies. To actually play lady parts would be weird, even by English standards.

I don't have any particular burning desire to go back to being cuddly. Not really.

I dreaded the dance scene in 'Love Actually' more than having my teeth extracted.

Neither Elizabeth or I are keen to do a real-life couple on the screen. It's not very electric.