Top 46 Quotes & Sayings by Jack Lemmon

It's hard enough to write a good drama, it's much harder to write a good comedy, and it's hardest of all to write a drama with comedy. Which is what life is.

If you think it's hard to meet new people, try picking up the wrong golf ball.

When I'm reading material, if I'm a little bit afraid of a part and I'm willing to admit that to myself, then I'll do it, definitely. If I'm worried about being able to do it, to get it - I absolutely just love it.

I remember trying to be funny, and both of my parents were terribly funny. My father was also very dignified, but my mother was an absolute ding-a-ling, a ripper.

My career has been full of remarkable coincidences that have nothing to do with me.

If you really do want to be an actor who can satisfy himself and his audience, you need to be vulnerable. You must reach the emotional and intellectual level of ability where you can go out stark naked, emotionally, in front of an audience.

In very simple language, Morrie always seems to be able to explain something that other people would take a chapter for, you know.

I would rather play Hamlet with no rehearsal than TV golf.

I'd rather make the cut in the Crosby than win another Oscar.

Stay humble. Always answer your phone - no matter who else is in the car.

In general, I think comedy is more difficult to write, to direct, and to act successfully.

I won't quit until I get run over by a truck, a producer or a critic.

I have lost someone I loved as a brother, as a closest friend, and a remarkable human being. We have also lost one of the best damn actors we'll ever see.

I have been fortunate to be able to have a career playing comedy and drama. And it's awfully hard - it's like apples and pears to compare the two.

I think luck is a great part of it because I think that the particular makeup of the person that you are attracted to, and that you fall in love with, is very important. Even down to that old bromide of a sense of humor and all of that.

Once I had started film, I suddenly said, 'Wow, I love it.' I moved there from New York. But I've always gone back to the theater, and it is more satisfying, really, because you get to give a continuous performance - no sequels.

If I'd been bright, I'd have realized that I was horribly uncomfortable, amazingly frustrated, and like any sensible person, I'd have quit. But it never occurred to me that I wouldn't be successful eventually.

Nobody deserves this much money - certainly not an actor.

I think it's great fun sometimes when I am playing golf, just to give it a little uch, is to bet the other guy five bucks a hole or something like that.

Failure seldom stops you. What stops you is the fear of failure.

I had already played a lead on Broadway before I ever did a film. I had had three, four seasons of stock with good, fat parts, good supporting and leading parts. And I had done, oh, God, over 400 live TV shows.

The trouble is that, while my parents were great when they were apart, they were terrible together.

I'll tell you God's truth: I think that this script that Neil has written - 'Odd Couple Two,' I think, is superior to the original one - to the first one.

I don't think Ed Horman could be dishonest if his life depended on it.

People are probably correct when they see me as the so-called Everyman. I'm attracted primarily to contemporary characters. I understand them and their frustrations.

Everything that is truly worthwhile - I think passion is involved in your approach to it. No matter what it is.

She has never messed up a single take yet. Recently I was in a scene and there was a table covered with a cloth. When the director said cut, I saw a black nose and two paws inching out from under the cloth. She had hidden there without making a sound until we were done with the scene. She wanted to be nearer to me.

When I'm reading material, if I'm a little bit afraid of a part and I'm willing to admit that to myself, then I'll do it, definitely. If I'm worried about being able to do it, to get it -I absolutely just love it.

Dying is not a sin. Not living is.

Success is always somebody else's opinion of you; but it doesn't amount to a damn compared to your own opinion of yourself.

If you really do want to be an actor who can satisfy himself and his audience, you need to be vulnerable.

How do you know that God didn't speak to Charles Darwin?

Death ends a life, not a relationship.

If you really do want to be an actor who can satisfy himself and his audience, you need to be vulnerable. [You must] reach the emotional and intellectual level of ability where you can go out stark naked, emotionally, in front of an audience.

Anything truly worthwhile does not come easy. If it did, it would not be all that worthwhile.

how she moves. That's just like Jell-O on springs. She must have some sort of built-in motors. I tell you, it's a whole different sex! Joe: What are you afraid of? Nobody's asking you to have a baby.

Acting doesn't have anything to do with listening to the words. We never really listen, in general conversation, to what the other person is saying. We listen to what they mean. And what they mean is often quite apart from the words. When you see a scene between two actors that goes really well you can be sure they're not listening to each other - they're feeling what the other person is trying to get at. Know what I mean?

I think whatever you do, if you are going to do well or even if you don't do it well, you have to have a passion for it, and I am passionate about it. I love it. I respect it and it gets me. I get off on acting.

It can be a simple sentence that makes one single point and you build for that. You zero in on one moment that gets that character, you go for it, that's it, man, and if you fail the whole thing is down the drain, but if you make it you hit the moon.

No matter how successful you get, always send the elevator back down.

If you've been fortunate enough to live out your dream in the profession of your choice, then you have an obligation to send the elevator back down.

Part of an actor's job is to actually adopt the world-view of the character she is playing and to tell the story from that vantage point. If an actor represses large aspects of their personality, they will have a severely limited range and castability. Great actors cultivate effortless access to their subpersonalities. Many acting teachers call this 'freeing your instrument.'

I was born in an elevator, and - as my mother said - naturally it was going down. She said, "All I remember is telling your father, 'That's it! Never again!'" That's why I'm an only child.

I had no desire to be in the movies. All my training had been in the theater, thank God.

I have never lost a total passion for my work.

I was lying ten and had a thirty-five foot putt. I whispered over my shoulder: "How does this one break?" And my caddie said, "Who cares?"