Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American actor Adam West.
Last updated on November 25, 2024.
William West Anderson, professionally known as Adam West, was an American actor. He portrayed Batman in the 1960s ABC series of the same name and its 1966 theatrical feature film, reprising the role in other films and television shows until his retirement from live-action appearances. West began acting in films in the 1950s. He played opposite Chuck Connors in Geronimo (1962) and The Three Stooges in The Outlaws Is Coming (1965). He also appeared in the science fiction film Robinson Crusoe on Mars (1964) and performed voice work on The Fairly OddParents (2003–2008), The Simpsons, and Family Guy (2000–2018), playing fictionalized versions of himself in all three.
When I got the part, I tried to remember Batman as I knew him when I was a kid - with emotional recall.
How many actors have a shot at being a part of something that became a part of pop culture? It's been very rewarding. I'm not getting the 20 million bucks for the new movies, but at least I'm getting warmth and recognition from people wherever I go.
I've been almost everywhere. But I've never been to the steppes of Latvia. It's something I've always wanted to do.
When you wear a mask and create a character, nothing will pigeonhole you faster.
I like Christian Bale. I've heard he's a big fan of mine, but I certainly reciprocate. I think he's really very good.
Life is full of ironies and absurdities.
To be an icon... I guess that's a privilege.
I think our Batman had to be fun, light-hearted, funny, tongue-in-cheek... and I think that made kind of an homage to those earlier comic books, where Batman always had a quip or something.
I don't paint butter dishes, doilies, or hummingbirds in my garden. It's more raw, I suppose. But it always creates a reaction.
The Batmobile wasn't a stickshift, and it was a challenge to drive, believe me.
I used to spend hours just sitting in an old wreck of a car with a stickshift; I'd just sit there and shift.
I like to make people laugh and have fun.
The wonderful thing with some of the things I've done - most of them, really - is to be trusted. To be able to do your thing, to work on it, hone it into my gem of creativity!
Playing Batman is an actor's challenge. First, it's different; then, you have to reach a multi-level audience. The kids take it straight, but for adults, we have to project it further.
People love Batman, and I would be stupid, I would be a fool if I didn't love Batman.
I've always shied away from 'Where are they now?' shows, because I've been lucky enough to keep working, and people know where I am.
When I got to Hollywood, there wasn't even a Boulevard. I'm that old. It was just a little dirt trail. I'm kidding.
My art, like my acting, is a profound expression of poetic license.
My grandfather and my father had wheat ranches, so we had quite a few trucks around and a lot of mules. Talk about horsepower - we had mule power.
The new 'Dark Knight' movies, they're wonderful in their own way.
The word that scares the hell out of me is 'frail.' I don't want to be frail.
Burgess Meredith taught me a lot about wine.
I love to go home and do the chores and read.
I have no patience with dinosaurs.
Anything that triggers good memories can't be all bad.
When I was getting started, I was so busy just fighting my way through, and I was under contract at Warner Brothers. I did 40 hours of color television with the late Robert Taylor as a young cop.
You can't play Batman in a serious, square-jawed, straight-ahead way without giving the audience the sense that there's something behind that mask waiting to get out, that he's a little crazed; he's strange.
When 'Family Guy' came along, it was like a gift, and it expanded my fan base.
Over the years, I've learned that if you can just hang in there and, regardless of what's presented to you, take it as a challenge and try to bring in something fresh, then it works.
When you go to the Sistine Chapel with Sophia Loren, it can be quite some time before your thoughts turn to the ceiling.
I'm a fan of anything that's good, especially when it's conscientiously good.
I think I've said I'm the luckiest actor in the world. I mean that.
I would hate to be a bitter, aging actor.
It's part of my character not to take myself too seriously. That's one of the reasons I've been able to survive.
Look at 'Batman' - that was theater of the absurd, as is 'Family Guy.'
I've been able to reinvent myself and to keep an audience going at whatever age. This is terrific. I mean, how many actors get that chance?
I was a maverick. I went to five different colleges looking for I don't know quite what.
I love to do voiceover because, for me, if you know what you're doing, it's simple. No makeup, no costuming, none of the baloney. None of the egos - you don't have to deal with all that crap. I love voiceovers.
There were definitely times when I regretted ever being Batman.
If you're a plumber, you plumb. I'm an actor. I act.
All I know is that my fans have been really wonderful and affectionate.
To play the leading man in a 'Three Stooges' movie, you've got to think funny. Thank God I think funny.
Batman had a certain speech pattern that I established because he was always Sherlock Holmes-ian. He was Basil Rathbone. In other words, he was always musing about something.
I have become convinced that everything that is classy doesn't go away.
I don't want to be Batman. Let Val Kilmer do it. I just want to be Uncle Batman. I have this whole 'warm relationship' plot in my mind. In the final scenes, the new Batmobile breaks down, the new Batman's stranded on the side of the road. We grab our old Batmobile, pick him up and drive away.
I did a character called Captain Q for Nestle's Quik. Those commercials were kind of funny.
If you hang around long enough, they think you're good. It's either my tenacity or stupidity - I'm not sure which.
Anything with 'Family Guy' is great.
Maybe we could find some way to send barges of trash to the sun and incinerate it all. Hey, it's an idea. It's an idea!
You have no idea the people I meet when I do these Comic-Cons. When I go sign autographs and say hello to people, I see everything!
'Batman' was a colorful and wild ride.
My paintings capture the humor, zaniness, and depth of the Batman villains as well as the Freudian motivations of Batman as an all-too-human, venerable, and funny vigilante superhero.
I think it's an actor's job, if you can, to keep working and to keep using that muscle. First of all, you've got to pay the bills, but it also helps you develop.
I was victimized by the old Hollywood typecasting thing. I had to really fight to get out of it, so I was uncomfortable with it.
In the late '60s, there were the the three B's: The Beatles, Batman, and Bond.
I'm like Madonna: I keep reinventing myself.
I'm very lucky. I do voiceovers, 'Family Guy,' on and on, and quite frankly, I'm one of the luckiest actors in the world. I was able to create a character who became iconic.
Isn't it fun to be nuts? Isn't it fun to be crazy?
I've always tried to fit what I do professionally into my family, rather than the other way around.