A Quote by Billy West

Robert Mitchum sounded different from John Wayne, and John Wayne sounded different from Clark Gable.

Billy West

Quote Topics

Clark Different John Robert Wayne

Quote Author

Billy West
American - Actor
Born: April 16, 1952

In a black-and-white world, back in the '50s, were voices from another era. All actors used to sound different. Robert Mitchum sounded different from John Wayne, and John Wayne sounded different from Clark Gable. They were like men's voices, but they weren't Everyman, it was them.

Billy West

You're not going to be able to look like anyone else, no matter how hard you try, unless you're a mimic, then you're not acting, you're just mimicking. You can't go on being John Wayne, that's John Wayne. So you're not going to steal from John Wayne. I'm not going to steal from John Wayne and you're not going to come back and say 'Didn't you get that from the circus?' You know. But he is one of those people who instructs me, whom I look up to - whom I think is one of the masters of his craft that I am so enamoured of.

Morgan Freeman

I never have really become accustomed to the 'John.' Nobody ever really calls me John... I've always been Duke or Marion or John Wayne. It's a name that goes well together, and it's like one word - John Wayne.

John Wayne

John Wayne is not just an actor, and a very fine actor - John Wayne is the United States of America.

Maureen O'Hara

We [with John Logan] started talking about The Searchers, and then he went on to tell me a story about when he first met John Wayne, and he said, "Hey, you be me and I'll be Wayne," and I said, "No, let me be Wayne!" Anyway, it was a very pleasant conversation, it was clear to him that I was a big movie fan, and by the time I got home, there was a phone call, asking if I'd mind doing one scene in the movie [The Aviator].

Brent Spiner

I definitely remember doing 'The Alamo' with John Wayne and Lawrence Harvey and Linda Cristal. We'd work six days a week, and then John Wayne would invite us down to a little place in Texas called Del Rio, and we would break bread and have some wine and tell stories.

Frankie Avalon

Oh my God... I worked with George C. Scott, way before 'Chips,' in 'The New Centurion.' I co-star in that movie. It was great working with him. I worked with Charlton Heston, Glenn Ford, Robert Mitchum. Stacy Each. The old Hollywood. I met John Wayne, and that was a thrill. I was working next door to him.

Erik Estrada

Television sounded really different than the Ramones sounded really different than us sounded really different than Blondie sounded really different than the Sex Pistols.

David Byrne

Television sounded really different than the Ramones sounded really different than us sounded really different than Blondie sounded really different than the Sex Pistols

David Byrne

John Fiedler's voice was kind of like the wind blowing through tall grass. It sounded homey and it sounded comforting.

Jim Cummings

I've never been typed. John Wayne played 'that guy' all the time - mostly because that's all he could do. Gable played Gable parts, and Bob Taylor played Bob Taylor parts, whether he was in armor or a full-dress suit. I resisted that.

Robert Preston

When did Jimmy Stewart not play Jimmy Stewart? When did John Wayne not play John Wayne? But that's what we like about them. When you talk about acting, you really have to respond to somebody's personality.

John Mellencamp

Two of the great leaders of the past - Booker T. Washington and Frederick Douglass - had White fathers - who deserted them. Now Margo Jefferson, who is hard on me and the fellas, wrote in the Times that she has nocturnal, erotic fantasies about John Wayne. What's up with these feminists? Do you see these double standards these feminists have? They dream about John Wayne, but they're hard on us [Black men].

Ishmael Reed

After my father had seen me in five or six things, he said, Son, your mother and I really enjoyed your recent film, and I must say that you're a lot like John Wayne. And I said, How so? And he said, Well, you're exactly the same in all your roles. Now, as a modern American actor, that's not what you want to hear. But for a guy who watched John Wayne movies and grew up in Iowa, it's a sterling compliment.

Dermot Mulroney

John loved celebrity. We attended an American Film Institute dinner honoring James Cagney, and the room was filled with famous actors like Mae West, Kirk Douglas, John Wayne and Steve McQueen. John was like a kid in a candy store.