Anthony Hopkins Quotes & Sayings

It will be the kiss by which all others in your life will be judged ... and found wanting. — Anthony Hopkins

I'm composing and writing music. — Anthony Hopkins

I just wanted to be a composer; I became an actor by default, really. I got a scholarship to a college of music and drama, hoping to take a scholarship in music. But I ended up as an acting student, so I've stuck with that for the last 50-odd years. — Anthony Hopkins

I'm very much a loner. I don't like long relationships with people and I always keep people at a distance. — Anthony Hopkins

If you have high expectations you're going to get resentments and all kinds of tension. — Anthony Hopkins

I think the first British actor who really worked well in cinema was Albert Finney. He was a back-street Marlon Brando. He brought a great wittiness and power to the screen. The best actor we've had. — Anthony Hopkins

By giving up 'the need' and 'the want', things begin to happen for you — Anthony Hopkins

Acting is about listening and reacting. John Wayne was right: Acting is just reacting. You don't have to do much - as long as you stay out of the way of others. That's why it works. — Anthony Hopkins

Every time I try to retire, or even think of retiring from acting, my agent comes up with a script. — Anthony Hopkins

I've got a great sense of humor. — Anthony Hopkins

I'll do anything to keep everyone laughing. Things get too intense on film sets. I remember on The Elephant Man, I used to imitate a cat without moving my lips. David Lynch would say, "Cut! Sorry, we've got a noise somewhere on set." Everyone would be looking around for this cat. — Anthony Hopkins

No expectations. Ask nothing, expect nothing and accept everything, and life is very well. — Anthony Hopkins

I hope I would not be so arrogant as to doubt anyone's religion or belief. — Anthony Hopkins

If you don't follow through on your dreams, you might as well be a vegetable. — Anthony Hopkins

Sometimes I feel tired and think I ought to give it up, I don't want to just retire. No, I enjoy it all and you just keep going until the day comes when you can't do it anymore. And that's what I want to do. — Anthony Hopkins

This industry has been really good to me. It's been a great life. I'm not through yet. I'm ready when you are, Mr. DeMille. — Anthony Hopkins

I worked with Steven Spielberg on Amistad ... he seemed so very secure in himself that he let me do things. — Anthony Hopkins

Oh, the truth, oh yeah, lot of trouble that got us into, didn't it, over the last maybe thousand years? Hitler knew the truth, so did Stalin, so did Mao Zedong, so did the Inquisition. They all knew the truth and that caused such horror. Certainty is the enemy. — Anthony Hopkins

Guilt is the thief of life. — Anthony Hopkins

I don't have people following me around, like bodyguards. I don't know how people live like that. Maybe the young movie stars have to live like that, I don't know. But it seems a little crazy to me. I don't think you need all that stuff. — Anthony Hopkins

Jonathan Demme is a very sharp editor of his movies. — Anthony Hopkins

I do my job. I do what I'm paid to do and I show up and I'm always prepared. I prepare by learning the text so well that when I show up, I'm relaxed and focused for the part. Now, whether that's good or bad I don't know. Whatever I'm going to say is going to sound very egocentric and self-centered so I'd better shut up. — Anthony Hopkins

When you're young, you're very insecure. And if I could learn, if I could revisit my own past I could say to myself, don't think too much, just get on and do it. — Anthony Hopkins

There are people who are convinced supernatural forces are at work, but I've no idea. I suspect 'possession' might be a psychological thing, like schizophrenia. We all think we know things, but we don't know a damn thing. Whether God exists, why we're here ... Nobody really knows any of it. — Anthony Hopkins

I thought I did play one villain, Hitler, [who is] like Lecter in some ways, but he's a mythical figure, anyway. — Anthony Hopkins

My life turned out to be beyond my greatest dreams. — Anthony Hopkins

Some nights you might go through an entire performance and not feel a thing, and the audience may have a much better time, 'cause if you're enjoying yourself on stage too much, they're having a terrible time because they can't hear you. And if you're a woman your mascara's running. — Anthony Hopkins

I was hell bent on destruction ... it was like being possessed by a demon. — Anthony Hopkins

I've reached a happy stage in my life - you can call it "happy" - but I have no expectations anymore. I'm glad I'm not young anymore. — Anthony Hopkins

When you are at the right age to play Hamlet you are still to young and immature to play it. It is much later, when you get the life experience and the emotional power, that you understand Hamlet or Macbeth. — Anthony Hopkins

I've got no need to prove to myself that I can do Shakespeare. I've done it. — Anthony Hopkins

I do the best I can - I know my way around [Russian method acting pioneer] Stanislavski, but I can't take myself seriously like that. I respect people who do it, of course. I just think I'm lucky to still be working at 73. You reach a point in life where you just think, "Show up, do your job, make sure the cheque's on the way," and that's it. I'm not hungry to do anything more, really. — Anthony Hopkins

I'm more and more convinced that life is a dream. What has happened to me is surely a dream. — Anthony Hopkins

I worked with Lawrence Olivier some years ago. He was a great mentor. — Anthony Hopkins

I never cling on to hope or certainty. They're the enemies of peace. — Anthony Hopkins

It created in me a yearning for all that is wide and open and expansive. Something that will never allow me to fit in in my own country, with its narrow towns and narrow roads and narrow kindnesses and narrow reprimands. — Anthony Hopkins

The knighthood was a tremendous honour, I don't dismiss it. But I feel embarrassed by the flowery, theatrical stuff that goes with being an actor. — Anthony Hopkins

If you're in a successful play and the play is working well - I mean successful because the audiences like it, the audiences respond well - it's a pleasure. — Anthony Hopkins

I don't know what I believe. — Anthony Hopkins

The trick is not to get too fanatical about getting the accent too accurate because then that becomes a mask. What I try to do is just painting and sketching some of the sounds without obliterating my own voice. — Anthony Hopkins

What is so liberating about this whole business is when you see that big movies are going to come out and then you see them up in Malibu in the little triplex theatre a week later and you think, this is show business. This is the great movie career. And it's all funded in the shoe box. — Anthony Hopkins

My weak spot is laziness. I have a lot of weak spots - cookies, croissants; my wife is always lecturing me about this, I tend to put it all down as habit or it's just acting. — Anthony Hopkins

People forget that Mozart wrote for commissions. There's a thing in psychology where they think if it's popular, it can't be serious. — Anthony Hopkins

I have no interest in Shakespeare and all that British nonsense ... I just wanted to get famous and all the rest is hogwash. — Anthony Hopkins

I'm one of the slowest drivers on the road. I mosey along. If you're doing anything too fast, including living life too fast, that creates sudden death. If I have to be somewhere on time, I make sure I leave early enough. — Anthony Hopkins

I was called 'Dumbo,' like the elephant, as a child because I couldn't understand things at school. — Anthony Hopkins

My philosophy is: It's none of my business what people say of me and think of me. I am what I am and I do what I do. I expect nothing and accept everything. And it makes life so much easier. — Anthony Hopkins

I still don't know what the film was about because all I remember is a whole lot of technical dialogue about a body in a suitcase. — Anthony Hopkins

Actors I admire? Ed Harris, or course, I think he's terrific; because I know he always had to fight being what he looked like a lot, but I think he's a terrific actor. — Anthony Hopkins

Acting is constricted because you have the lines. But I improvise with it and what I learn on the set. I improvise rhythms and just changes. — Anthony Hopkins

I'm not a health freak. I just work out every day. — Anthony Hopkins

I think all those actors from that generation, like Bogart - they were wonderful actors. They didn't act. They just came on and they did it, and the characters were wonderful. — Anthony Hopkins

I found a way into the acting business because I thought, well, it beats working for a living, and so that's what I do. But I still feel like a bit of a stranger in it all. I've never really belonged anywhere. — Anthony Hopkins

I come from - I came from Wales, and it's a strong, butch society. We were in the war and all that. People didn't waste time feeling sorry for themselves. You had to get on with it. So my credo is get on with it. I don't waste time being soft. I'm not cold, but I don't like being, wasting my time with - life's too short. — Anthony Hopkins

I'm just an actor. It's the way the script is written, and it's easy. I don't have think about it. When you receive the script, you know pretty well how to play it, apart from little technicalities like the accent. — Anthony Hopkins

You have to be pretty tough to be an actor, and you have to be pretty certain what you want. You can't waffle through this business. — Anthony Hopkins

Israel means war and destruction and we Americans are behind this war and I am ashamed of being American. — Anthony Hopkins

I read a lot, that's my main hobby. I've got an iPad which I store books on and I read voraciously. I'm a slow reader but I'm obsessive. I make references, underline things, cross-reference. I'm an autodidact. — Anthony Hopkins

I am not very good with relationships. With anyone. I can't be locked up with anyone for too long. — Anthony Hopkins

Acting is a creative process, and directing and music. I think creative people - and I take myself as a creative person and it doesn't mean you have to be an actor, a musician, or a painter - but I think if you are in a creative profession or a creative business you do have a heightened awareness. — Anthony Hopkins

I drank a lot, but I wouldn't have missed it. I look back on it as sort of dreary enjoyment, because I don't have to be there anymore. — Anthony Hopkins

I always had a knack for improvisation. I can write down the notes I play, but never really had a proper academic musical background. I suppose I'm blessed and cursed by the fact I have that freedom. — Anthony Hopkins

I'm interested in the dream and subconscious mind, the peculiar dream-like quality of our lives, sometime nightmare quality of our lives. — Anthony Hopkins

Once you accept the fact that there's nothing to fear, you drill into the primal oil well. I believe when we do things without fear, we can do anything. As long as you don't worry about the consequences ... — Anthony Hopkins

For me, time is the greatest mystery of all. The fact is that we're dreaming all the time. That's what really gets me. We have a fathomless lake of unconsciousness just beneath our skulls. — Anthony Hopkins

My father was grounded, a very meat-and-potatoes man. He was a baker. — Anthony Hopkins

Shakespeare's so bloody difficult, and I don't like failure. You can fail on film, but there's nobody actually there in the flesh to watch you failing. — Anthony Hopkins

Why love if losing hurts so much? I have no answers anymore; only the life I have lived. The pain now is part of the happiness then. — Anthony Hopkins

There is nothing to be scared of in movies. It's a bit scarier going on stage. — Anthony Hopkins

You still wake up sometimes. You wake up in the dark and hear the screaming of the lambs. — Anthony Hopkins

You relax within the verse. You realize the structure of the verse and relax into it. It's like swimming. Or riding a bike. You can't make it sound real if you are thinking it through as you go. You can't think through Shakespeare, you have to speak it. And listen to the rhythm of it and then it takes you over. And to make it sound real you speak as if you believe it. Don't act it. Just be it. — Anthony Hopkins

You have to have humor. If you don't have humor and you take yourself seriously, you're dead in the water. You have to be jostled. I love it. You've gotta have a laugh. It's better than working for a living. — Anthony Hopkins

I love life because what more is there? — Anthony Hopkins

The movie industry is full of crazy people who think that they are god. — Anthony Hopkins

We are fascinated by the darkness in ourselves, we are fascinated by the shadow, we are fascinated by the boogeyman. — Anthony Hopkins

I think Julianne Moore is very, very good. I've worked with her. We did Surviving Picasso. I remember one scene we did together. She had to have a nervous, a mental, breakdown in this one scene.I didn't have many lines. I just had to make sure I knew I came in on cue all right. And I was just watching her walking though the rehearsal. I thought I know what she's doing, "This is going to be terrific." So they said, "Are you ready" and she said, "Yeah," "Ok, roll the camera." And all in one take. — Anthony Hopkins

I've been very lucky. I've had my problems in the past, I've had my troubles, but you move on. I had a great life and I am really thankful for it. — Anthony Hopkins

The magical, supernatural force that is with us every second is time. We can't even comprehend it. It's such an illusion, it's such a strange thing. — Anthony Hopkins

As a Welshman that can't sing, I never feel more proud to be Welsh than when I hear the Treorchy Male Choir - the Master Choir of them all. If I could sing I would apply for membership myself. — Anthony Hopkins

My weak spot is laziness. Oh, I have a lot of weak spots: cookies, croissants. — Anthony Hopkins

Ryan Gosling. He was a good kid, good actor. I like him very much. What was the name of the movie? I've forgotten it. Fracture. — Anthony Hopkins

I was bullied as a boy - lots of kids are, but hopefully most of us get on with our lives and grow up. — Anthony Hopkins

I don't have any expectations about my films. If they're good, they're good - if they're not, they're not. About 10 years ago, I remember going to see one of my movies - I can't even remember which one now - and everyone was jumping up and down, getting excited, saying what a great film it was going to be. We all went in and watched it, and it was the slowest movie I've ever seen. The next day, the reviews were terrible and half the studio was fired. — Anthony Hopkins

I'm having a great life. And I'm 73 and they still phone me up and ask me to do a job here and there. — Anthony Hopkins

Women never really care to face the truth when their hearts are involved. — Anthony Hopkins

Most of my last 30 years have been like that. Results and manifestations of things I'd dreamed of as a young kid and wanted as a child and as a young man. I realized it maybe 30 years ago. I thought, "This is unreal. This has happened as I expected it to, as I'd pictured it." My whole life has been like that and I'm fascinated by that power that we all have. That we create our lives as we go. — Anthony Hopkins

I love the hour in makeup. It gives you time to think and have a cup of coffee. It's my favorite part of the day. — Anthony Hopkins

A conductor can't be too arrogant with an orchestra and try to impose himself too much. — Anthony Hopkins

I visualized a lot of things happening to me, because I was a lonely kid because I didn't understand anything about school. — Anthony Hopkins

I believe I am quite amiable and affable and quite fair, and I've rarely worked with people who are the opposite. Moodiness scares me. What gets to me is unkindness. Madness. Unwarranted cruelty through words. People who scream and shout at work. I hate confrontation and violence. I've done it in the past and I don't want to do it again. I guess I want a perfect world. — Anthony Hopkins

Oliver Stone is a great director and I've seen many films over the years, but I try to create stuff out of my own imagination. I want to break all the rules and mess about with it and make a different movie just for the fun of it. — Anthony Hopkins

I wanted to be a musician but I didn't have the talent for it, so I decided I wanted to be famous, so I became an actor. — Anthony Hopkins

The reward is in the doing of it. — Anthony Hopkins

I once asked a Jesuit preist what was the best short prayer he knew. He said "Fuck it." as in "Fuck it, it's in Gods hands. — Anthony Hopkins

I'm devious, cruel, cunning and addictive. — Anthony Hopkins

Today is the tomorrow we feared yesterday. — Anthony Hopkins

The way to make better decisions is to make more of them. Then make sure you learn from each one, including those that don't seem to work out in the short term: they will provide valuable distinctions to make better evaluations and therefore decisions in the future. Realize that decision making, like any skill you focus on improving, gets better the more often you do it. — Anthony Hopkins

I used to be a bit obsessed by acting but not anymore. I do enjoy acting but I probably enjoy it more now because it's easier. I can't work in the theater because to me it's too serious. It's like being in prison for me. I admire people that can do that but I can't do it. I'd rather live my life and do a bit of acting in between. — Anthony Hopkins

You're not more than one generation from poor white trash, are you, Agent Starling? — Anthony Hopkins

The art of acting is not to act. Once you show them more, what you show them, in fact is bad acting. — Anthony Hopkins