Top 127 Quotes & Sayings by Noel Coward - Page 2

I can take any amount of criticism, as long as it is unqualified praise.

If he (Peter O'Toole) had been any prettier it would have been Florence of Arabia.

In the first act, you get the audience's attention - once you have it, they will repay you in the second. Play through the laughs if you have to. It will only make the audience believe there are so many of them that they missed a few.

Sunburn is very becoming - but only when it is even - one must be careful not to look like a mixed grill.

Acting is not a state of being ... but a state of appearing to be. You can't be eight times a week without going stark staring mad. You've got to be in control.

At twelve noon, The natives swoon And no further work is doneBut mad dogs and Englishmen, Go out in the midday sun.

As one gets older, one discovers everything is going to be exactly the same with different hats on.

Of course, the age-old tradition that a star must appear even if he or she is practically dying is an excellent one, but it can be carried too far. I one played a performance of The Knight of the Burning Pestle with a temperature of 103 and gave sixteen members of the company mumps, thereby closing the play and throwing everybody out of work. There may be a moral lurking somewhere in this, but I cannot for the life of me discover what it is.

Everybody was up to something, especially, of course, those who were up to nothing.

AMANDA: I think very few people are completely normal really, deep down in their private lives.

Good heavens, television is something you appear on; you don't watch.

I never cared who scored the goal, or which side won the silver cup. I never learned to bat or bowl; but I heard the curtain going up.

I don't much care for Hollywood, I'd rather have a nice cup of cocoa.

I'm over-educated in the things I shouldn't have known at all.

Madame Bovary is the sexiest book imaginable. The woman's virtually a nyphomaniac but you won't find a vulgar word in the entire thing.

The Stately Homes of England, How beautiful they stand, To prove the Upper Classes, Have still the Upper Hand.

I write at high speed because boredom is bad for my health.

Fifty-four years of love and tenderness and crossness and devotion and unswerving loyalty. Without her I could have achieved a quarter of what I have achieved, not only in terms of success and career, but in terms of personal happiness.

To know you are among people whom you love, and who love you – that has made all the successes wonderful, much more wonderful than they'd have been anyway.

My life really has been one long extravaganza.

Passion in a dromedary doesn't go so deep; a camel when it's mating never sobs itself to sleep.

Las Vegas: It was not cafe society, it was Nescafe society

Hollywood is a place where some people lie on the beach and look up at the stars, whereas other people lie on the stars and look down at the beach.

She had much in common with Hitler, only no mustache.

An infant prodigy of nine is shoved upon the stage in white. She starts off in a dismal whine about a dark and stormy night, a burglar, whose heart is true, despite his wicked-looking face, who puts the little child in doom, to save her mamma's jewel case. This may bring tears to every eye; it does not set my heart on fire. I'd like to stand serenely by and watch that horrid child expire.

How about slipping out of those wet things and into a dry Martini?

There isn't a particle of you that I don't know, remember, and want.

It's no use to go and take courses in playwriting any more than it's much use taking courses in acting. Better play to a bad matinée in Hull, it will teach you much more than a year of careful instruction.

If by any chance a playwright wishes to express a political opinion or a moral opinion or a philosophy, he must be a good enough craftsman to do it with so much spice of entertainment in it that the public get the message without being aware of it.

I also avoid green vegetables. They're grossly overrated.

I'll go and see anything so long as it amuses me, or moves me. If it doesn't do either I want to go home.

Star quality: I don't know what it is, but I've got it.

Wit is like caviar - it should be served in small portions and not spread about like marmalade.

I'm an enormously talented man, and there's no use pretending that I'm not.

I have always been very fond of them (drama critics) . . . I think it is so frightfully clever of them to go night after night to the theatre and know so little about it.

Wouldn't it be dreadful to live in a country where they didn't have tea?

Dear 338171 (May I call you 338?)

My philosophy is as simple as ever - smoking, drinking, moderate sexual intercourse on a diminishing scale, reading and writing (not arithmetic). I have a selfish absorption in the well-being and achievement of Noel Coward.

I see her as one great stampede of lips directed at the nearest derriere.

Any part of the piggy Is quite all right with me Ham from Westphalia, ham from Parma Ham as lean as the Dalai Lama Ham from Virginia, ham from York, Trotters Sausages, hot roast pork. Crackling crisp for my teeth to grind on Bacon with or without the rind on Though humanitarian I'm not a vegetarian. I'm neither crank nor prude nor prig And though it may sound infra dig Any part of the darling pig Is perfectly fine with me.

He must have been an incredibly good shot.

Goodnight, my darlings, I'll see you tomorrow.

Your motivation is your pay packet on Friday. Now get on with it.

Running is the classical road to self-consciousn ess, self-awareness and self-reliance. Independence is the outstanding characteristic of a runner. He learns the harsh reality of his physical and spiritual limitations when he runs. He learns that personal commitment, sacrifice and determination are his only means to betterment. Runners get promoted only through self-conquest.

You ask my advice about acting? Speak clearly, don't bump into the furniture and if you must have motivation, think of your pay packet on Friday.

It is not the eyes of others that I am wary of, but my own.

The pleasures that once were heaven look silly at sixty-seven.

Christopher Marlowe or Francis Bacon The author of Lear remains unshaken Willie Herbert or Mary Fitton What does it matter? The Sonnets were written.

You always ought to have tom cats arranged, you know - it makes 'em more companionable.

Comedies of manners swiftly become obsolete when there are no longer any manners.

Mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the mid-day sun; The Japanese don't care to, the Chinese wouldn't dare to; Hindus and Argentines sleep firmly from twelve to one, But Englishmen detest a siesta.

It's such a surprise for the Eastern eyes to see, That though the English are effete They're quite impervious to heat.

Labour leaders lead us all, though we know they bleed us all. Cheer our new Decline and Fall, Gibbon might have dreamed it all.

It's like this, dear boy, the one in front is blind and the kind one behind is pushing him.

Though the fact that they have to be rebuilt And frequently mortgaged to the hilt Is inclined to take the gilt Off the gingerbread, And certainly damps the fun Of the eldest son.

For gin, in cruel sober truth, supplies the fuel for flaming youth.

I want a horse and plough, Chickens too, Just one cow, With a wistful moo.

Here ends the story of a ship, but there will always be other ships, for we are an island race. Through all our centuries, the sea has ruled our destiny. There will always be other ships and men to sail in them. It is these men, in peace or war, to whom we owe so much. Above all victories, beyond all loss, in spite of changing values in a changing world, they give to us, their countrymen, eternal and indomitable pride.

You kissed me because you were awfully nice and I was awfully nice and we both liked kissing very much. It was inevitable.

Everybody worships me, it's nauseating.