Ted Danson Quotes & Sayings

Looking out at the ocean, it's easy to feel small - and to imagine all your troubles, suddenly insignificant, slipping away. Earth's seven oceans seem vast and impenetrable, but a closer look tells another story. — Ted Danson

To the naked eye, our oceans are beautiful. But scientists tell us that all of the world's fisheries will collapse by 2048, unless we change how we manage them. Help protect our oceans so the next generation can also enjoy their bounty. — Ted Danson

To grow up knowing you're loved is astounding. It's a huge gift to a child. — Ted Danson

Most of us can now record a whole series with the click of a button. We all have DVD players, and the rise of the DVD box-set means we watch this stuff in two, three-hour sessions. So there is this real appetite out there for lengthy, pretty intricate drama. All that is great news for writers. — Ted Danson

We're not trying to reinvent the wheel; for any environmental organization to claim sole responsibility for any kind of victory is insane, because everybody attacks these problems as a group. — Ted Danson

One person goes off and works in Houston the other person goes off to London and you're on the phone to each other and somebody is paying you to kiss somebody else. It's very bizarre being an actor. — Ted Danson

My lessons didn't come at my father's knee. Like all good lessons, they were learned from example. — Ted Danson

The poor are too busy working to need justice. — Ted Danson

At the time, my 6-year-old kept thinking my character's name was "Sam Alone," which is kind of brilliant. The funny came out of Sam's sad core: the alcoholic, the sex addict, the person who thinks he's God's gift. — Ted Danson

It's not enough to have good thoughts for the world. You must get out there! It is also really important that each person realise their own worth. If you don't think you're good enough, how can you turn around and help save the world? — Ted Danson

Humor can bring people under the tent. And a good joke can deflect some of the intensity surrounding a serious subject. — Ted Danson

I'm almost tempted, when I'm playing a real person, not to meet them. Afterwards, maybe. But, the job is the same. You still have to show up on screen and be alive and real and all that stuff. — Ted Danson

I tell you, the difference for me is between being victimized, terrorized, numbed by reading about different disasters, or reducing the anxiety by getting up and doing something about it, at whatever level. — Ted Danson

I moved into this neighborhood, and I was walking on this beach with my kids, and we came across a sign that said, 'Water's polluted, no swimming.' And I didn't have any answers. — Ted Danson

I was at our beautiful home in Martha's Vineyard, near Boston, sitting on the porch looking at the ocean when I got a phone called and was asked, 'Would I like to do 'CSI'?' A week later, I'm at a coroner's office in Las Vegas, participating in a quadruple autopsy. — Ted Danson

If you actively do something, it will stop making you feel like a victim and you'll start feeling like part of the solution, which is just a huge benefit to your body and your psyche. — Ted Danson

I think there are probably a handful of real character actors in this business. The rest of us are recycling. So now I'm Sam Malone the editor. I'm Sam Malone the billionaire. — Ted Danson

To do something funny, you have to have experienced it in real life and digested it in a way that amuses you. — Ted Danson

The environmental movement, like all political processes, reacts best to disasters. But these are very slow, very gradual disasters in the making. — Ted Danson

Sharks are in real trouble, and they need all the help they can get. — Ted Danson

You reach a certain age, and you realize, 'Wow: there are younger people doing this better than I can, and don't leave me out - I don't want to be left behind. I want to do it, too. Where are you going? I want to be part of it.' — Ted Danson

Centuries-old habitats such as coral gardens are destroyed in an instant by bottom trawls, pulverized by weighted nets into barren plains. And global carbon dioxide emissions from human activity affect the ocean, changing the pH balance of the waters in a phenomenon known as ocean acidification. — Ted Danson

The industrial way we fish for seafood is harming the marine habitats that all ocean life depends upon. Indiscriminate commercial fishing practices that include miles of driftnets, long lines with thousands of lethal hooks and bottom trawls are ruining ocean ecosystems by killing non-seafood species, including sea turtles and marine mammals. — Ted Danson

If you take one rivet out of an airplane, it will be all right, it'll keep flying. You take another rivet out of the airplane and it still flies. So what the heck, let's take more rivets out of the airplane, and sooner or later, the airplane drops from the sky. — Ted Danson

I don't get a sense that Cheers is revered the way it should be by [younger viewers]. In my mind, it's a show that should always, always, always be in the pantheon. But can it ever mean to future generations what it meant to us? — Ted Danson

I'm basically a know-it-all, and I'm writing a book about it. I want it to be called 'Danson on Water' and have me on the cover in this Christlike pose, standing on the water. — Ted Danson

Around year seven or eight, you'd kill yourself when you realized Norm had to enter and you had to come up with a new beer joke. — Ted Danson

You use and lose a lot of energy being grumpy. — Ted Danson

Cloning, wow. Who would have thought? There should be a list of people who can and cannot clone themselves. — Ted Danson

I try not to see Woody Harrelson because he has become this big movie star, and it grates, so I try and stay away from him. — Ted Danson

We need to start looking at having a way of managing the whole ecosystem, because you can't pick away at it piece by piece, you have to truly start being coordinated and managing our resources as a system. We haven't gotten to that point yet. — Ted Danson

I was going through so many changes in my life - separation with my wife, having an affair - that was all very messy and public. It felt like if I really wanted to rock my boat and make changes in my life and who I am and how I am, that would also mean moving on from Cheers. — Ted Danson

One of the ingredients that made Cheers work so well was the great ensemble of actors we had. That's the case with any good series. — Ted Danson

We are all in this together. We will all make it or none of us will make it. If everyone cleans up their act except one big ole country, it isn't going to work. — Ted Danson

I don't know if I went to the gym, [but] Woody [Harrelson] was 24, and at that point I was like 37, which is when you realize you're no longer 24. So in walked Woody, who was instantly great, but offstage, it was [all] testosterone. We'll arm-wrestle. I still have, like, tendinitis in my elbow.Woody cleaned everybody's clock in everything. Then we got less physical and went to chess, and he whipped our asses with chess. — Ted Danson

One of the hardest things for me to do is watch myself. The first time I see it, I am obsessed with my left ear or my right ear or some other physical attribute, or the fact that I'm 60 or whatever shallow ego thought is running through my head. I'm just destroyed that I'm not Cary Grant or whatever. — Ted Danson

My reward in life for growing up a little bit was that Mary Steenburgen came into my life, and we have been together for 19 years. — Ted Danson

Individuals of all ages can make an important difference in the overall health of our ocean by the actions they take every day. Simple things like picking up trash on the beach, recycling and conserving water can have a big impact on the health of our ocean. — Ted Danson

You should always carry string, according to my archaeologist father, because then you could at least make a trap to catch animals to survive. According to my grandmother, it was clean underwear. — Ted Danson

My most annoying habit is complaining about my aches and pains. It's the new ones that I haven't identified yet that make me nervous. According to my wife, I complain way too much. I may be a borderline hypochondriac, or you could say I am fascinated by the body - at least by mine. — Ted Danson

I'm at the right age to work with dead people, but you have to be smart to be a CSI. — Ted Danson

I eat less, stretch, and work out. — Ted Danson

We only have ten years to save the oceans — Ted Danson

To be successful, you have to be willing to be successful. You have to believe in the law of attraction - that you create your own life. — Ted Danson

I was three. My father in jest said that he'd tell the doctor to give me a shot if I didn't behave. Good heavens, I have a mental picture of the living room and the doctor approaching the door. I was terrified. — Ted Danson

We are so arrogant, we forget that we are not the reason for evolution, we are not the point of evolution. We are part of evolution. Unfortunately, we believe that we've been created to dominate the planet, to dominate nature. Ain't true. — Ted Danson

I'm from L.A. I'm an actor. I'm a flake. — Ted Danson

I feel like I enjoy the company of Whoopi deeply, and my private life is my private life. — Ted Danson

I think the struggle, whenever you make a film or television movie based on a real person's life, is finding a dramatic arc that will hold an audience's attention. — Ted Danson

I used to have a little silent prayer: 'Dear God, let my ability to get work be the same as my celebrity.' That would be a hard burden: to be a household name and not be able to get work. — Ted Danson

You have to work with the auto industry, the oil companies, you have to work to develop renewable fuel, whether it's solar or different kinds of fuel or whatever. — Ted Danson

The pressure isn't on my brain, but on my mouth. I realized Sam Malone said very little, he spoke in little sentences. Which is much more comfortable for me for some reason. — Ted Danson

When you have brothers, you learn to be fiercely competitive with someone you love so they won't kill you and you won't kill them. — Ted Danson

I don't think it's a matter of, do you win the game or not, it's how gracefully do you play it. — Ted Danson

I've never been that guy who says, 'Ooh, I have to play King Lear'. First off, that'd be a disaster anyway. I tend to read something and see who's involved, and then know I want to be part of it. But I don't think I'm through with comedy. I still love to make people laugh. — Ted Danson

California is responsible for selling, trading and distributing large amounts of shark fins that come from all over the world. — Ted Danson

I am so grateful that I accepted the offer to do 'CSI,' but it was like being shot out of a cannon, and it was so different from anything that I have ever done. — Ted Danson

My temperament is not the adventuresome sort that enjoys starting new projects every six months. I love ensemble, nine-to-five stability. There's a family dynamic in making a television show that you don't get on a movie, where you're a hired gun for a few months. — Ted Danson

My day goes from one embarrassing moment to the next. — Ted Danson

You have to be an optimist, right? You have to be critical, then you have to be an optimist. Or else you're really stupid. — Ted Danson

I've found that eating vegan the last five or six months has really given me energy, I feel good and I look fabulous. — Ted Danson

How much do you engage yourself in what's truly real and important in life? That's the individual question. — Ted Danson

Years ago, we all talked about recycling and not dumping things down your drain and all of that, but talking doesn't help much. Basically, it's going to have to be legislation because the impact is so huge and diversified. — Ted Danson

Many people continue to think of sharks as man-eating beasts. Sharks are enormously powerful and wild creatures, but you're more likely to be killed by your kitchen toaster than a shark! — Ted Danson

My joints hurt. I'm slower. But I remember what it was like to run and play with the boys. I want to be one of the boys. — Ted Danson

I'm an actor, so I am always scared. You never know if you are on vacation or that you have been retired and they just didn't tell you. — Ted Danson

The biggest danger we face is overfishing. We literally could fish out our oceans, some scientists believe, in the next 40, 50, 60 years. We are fishing out the top of the food chain, and it's pretty crucial because about 200 million people depend on fish and fishing for their livelihood, and about a billion people, mostly in poorer countries, depend on fish for their protein. So this is a big problem. Good news is, it's fixable. — Ted Danson

I first saw the ocean as a kid. We would drive from Arizona in the summer and arrive as the sun was starting to come down over the hill near Laguna in southern California. We would always sing a song, and it was a big joyous family moment when we came over the hill. — Ted Danson

Address these environmental issues and you will address every issue known to man. And we keep dabbling in things that aren't really that important in the long term. — Ted Danson

I became interested in ocean issues in the 1980s when I couldn't take my daughters swimming because of pollution at our local beach. Twenty-five years later, I'm a board member of Oceana, the world's largest international organization dedicated to ocean conservation. — Ted Danson

When people are in the midst of really heavy stuff and still have a sense of humor, I admire that. — Ted Danson

Everything I am, everything I've been allowed to do, career-wise, has come out of the opportunity I had with 'Cheers'. I think it's one of the funniest shows ever. They are some of my best friends. — Ted Danson

My job playing Sam Malone was to let the audience in, to love my bar full of people. And that informed my life. — Ted Danson

I don't think I'm as educated as Whoopi, so I'm lifting myself to her level. But you know, our view of the world, our view of what we can do, our sense of what it means to be here, are similar. — Ted Danson

Usually if you're the center of a show, part of your job is to host its energy. — Ted Danson

As a people, we value family, education and success. Hunger is an enemy to all three. Scientific studies have demonstrated that even brief periods of hunger can permanently inhibit a child's mental, emotional and physical growth. Kids who are hungry do poorly in school and are unlikely to grow into productive adults. For families, experiencing hunger means living in a world of isolation and shame. Caring citizens must put an end to this disgrace. — Ted Danson

It is particularly appropriate that we unveil this campaign on this first day of the annual international coastal clean-up effort, ... Beach cleanups are something each of us can do any time of the year. I'm proud to be participating in the cleanup efforts today and I encourage everyone to make the time for these types of activities. — Ted Danson

I feel very strongly that you can't just beat people up anymore; you have to work hand in hand and find ways to compromise, and get big business involved, because it won't happen otherwise. — Ted Danson

I had trouble hanging around [Shelley Long] until we stood onstage together, and then I was in heaven. — Ted Danson

I think it's the actor's job - when you think of being typecast or getting out of the shadow of whatever you've had success in - it's up to you as an actor. The industry will always want to hire you for what you were successful in last and what made money. But you can say no to that and look for other parts. — Ted Danson

Sharks have swum the oceans for over 400 million years, but we're threatening this critically important species for the purpose of making soup - it's sad and wasteful. — Ted Danson

I am a bit of a Pollyanna - I spend most of my day happy. — Ted Danson

My father went to work every day, and it's my job to go to work, too. Some days will be good, some won't be so good, but I have to go to work. — Ted Danson

These are some huge donuts... — Ted Danson

I got my first television at Stanford when I was 20, and I used to watch 'The Dick Van Dyke Show'. He played my father on 'Becker,' and he's still one of my heroes. Along with John Cleese, he's my favourite physical comedian. — Ted Danson

'Cheers' was great. They paired me up with Shelley Long on this tiny bar set for the final audition. That was my first really big one, and we just clicked instantly - I still think I got the part because of Shelley. — Ted Danson

The planet will survive. Whether we get to be here and enjoy it, or enjoy life as we've known it, is what's questionable. — Ted Danson

I let my [past] life in peripherally, because I'm interested in what's over there; I want to keep going forward. — Ted Danson

I am forever grateful for 'Cheers.' — Ted Danson

We have a project with Unocal here in Los Angeles, where we as an environmental organization, the oil company, and the state all get together to promote the recycling of used motor oil. — Ted Danson

A friend is someone who will allow me to be a really bad friend and not hold it against me. — Ted Danson