Time For Orson Welles Quotes

"Only very intelligent people don't wish they were in politics, and I'm dumb enough to want to be in there." Orson Welles

"At twenty-one, so many things appear solid, permanent, untenable." Orson Welles

"A good artist should be isolated. If he isn't isolated, something is wrong." Orson Welles

"Movie directing is a perfect refuge for the mediocre." Orson Welles

"The enemy of art is the absence of limitations." Orson Welles

"Everybody denies I am a genius - but nobody ever called me one!" Orson Welles

"I have an unfortunate personality." Orson Welles

"I hate television. I hate it as much as peanuts. But I can't stop eating peanuts." Orson Welles

"Ask not what you can do for your country. Ask what's for lunch." Orson Welles

"Gluttony is not a secret vice." Orson Welles

Welles in 1937 (age 21)
photographed by Carl Van Vechten

George Orson Welles (May 6, 1915 – October 10, 1985) was an American actor, director, writer and producer who worked extensively in theater, radio and film. He is best remembered for his innovative work in all three media, most notably Caesar (1937), a groundbreaking Broadway adaption of Julius Caesar and the debut of the Mercury Theatre; The War of the Worlds (1938), one of the most famous broadcasts in the history of radio; and Citizen Kane (1941), which is consistently ranked as one of the all-time greatest films.

After directing a number of high-profile productions in his early twenties, including an innovative adaptation of Macbeth and The Cradle Will Rock, Welles found national and international fame as the director and narrator of a 1938 radio adaptation of H. G. Wells' novel The War of the Worlds performed for the radio drama anthology series Mercury Theatre on the Air. It was reported to have caused widespread panic when listeners thought that an invasion by extraterrestrial beings was occurring. Although these reports of panic were mostly false and overstated, they rocketed Welles to instant notoriety.
Read more about Orson Welles at Wikipedia

"When you are down and out something always turns up - and it is usually the noses of your friends." Orson Welles

"Man is a rational animal who always loses his temper when called upon to act in accordance with the dictates of reason." Orson Welles

"Race hate isn't human nature; race hate is the abandonment of human nature." Orson Welles

"The best thing commercially, which is the worst artistically, by and large, is the most successful." Orson Welles

"Did you ever stop to think why cops are always famous for being dumb? Simple. Because they don't have to be anything else." Orson Welles

"Personally, I don't like a girlfriend to have a husband. If she'll fool her husband, I figure she'll fool me." Orson Welles

"I don't pray because I don't want to bore God." Orson Welles

"They teach anything in universities today. You can major in mud pies." Orson Welles

"Now we sit through Shakespeare in order to recognize the quotations." Orson Welles

"I don't say we all ought to misbehave, but we ought to look as if we could." Orson Welles

"Fake is as old as the Eden tree." Orson Welles

"If you want a happy ending, that depends, of course, on where you stop your story." Orson Welles

"I've always found it very sanitary to be broke." Orson Welles

"Nobody gets justice. People only get good luck or bad luck." Orson Welles

"The essential is to excite the spectators. If that means playing Hamlet on a flying trapeze or in an aquarium, you do it." Orson Welles

"I passionately hate the idea of being with it; I think an artist has always to be out of step with his time." Orson Welles

"The laws and the stage, both are a form of exhibitionism." Orson Welles

"Ecstasy is not really part of the scene we can do on celluloid." Orson Welles

"I think an artist has always to be out of step with his time." Orson Welles

"The enemy of society is middle class and the enemy of life is middle age." Orson Welles

"Every actor in his heart believes everything bad that's printed about him." Orson Welles

"Create your own visual style... let it be unique for yourself and yet identifiable for others." Orson Welles

"My doctor told me to stop having intimate dinners for four. Unless there are three other people." Orson Welles

"A film is never really good unless the camera is an eye in the head of a poet." Orson Welles

"I feel I have to protect myself against things. So I'm pretty careful to lose most of them." Orson Welles

"I started at the top and worked my way down." Orson Welles

"Nobody who takes on anything big and tough can afford to be modest." Orson Welles