Costner Quotes & Sayings

They say I can open movies, and that's nice in that it puts into people's minds that women can do it. It's not just Kevin Costner, not just Arnold Schwarzenegger. Not just the guys. — Julia Roberts

You have to try to dismiss the loudness of cynicism. It's certainly going to come. — Kevin Costner

I split my time between Santa Barbara and Aspen. I live on a pretty fast horse. — Kevin Costner

I've never changed my approach to acting. I've always felt like I've gotten better. I think that all of us can get better. I feel like, in my acting, I'm better than I was three pictures ago. I think about it. I'm a slow study. It takes me a long time to grasp the material, in order to perform it. But when I come to the set, on the first day, I know the whole movie. That's why I have to start early. — Kevin Costner

I am a really writer-oriented actor. — Kevin Costner

When I do a Western, I often wonder what I would have really done in that situation. — Kevin Costner

You can spend your life trying to be popular, and that's a tricky business. You can just try to be true to yourself. — Kevin Costner

Broken people say awful things and do incredibly absurd things. — Kevin Costner

I like when my face tingles, when the hair on the back of my neck stands up. — Kevin Costner

If you don't understand your limitations you won't achieve much in your life. — Kevin Costner

In America, politicians do whatever to get re-elected, and a lot of decisions that were being made at that time by Kennedy were certain not to get him re-elected. — Kevin Costner

Lincoln was the greatest speaker and he was ridiculed for how he looked, you know? — Kevin Costner

I'm getting those familiar feelings, and I'm just going to enjoy the process of getting to know someone again. — Kevin Costner

I deal with pressure. I have a tendency to probably be at my best under pressure. — Kevin Costner

I can't remember any of the films I've done. You go from one to another, and they all blend in to a big mass. You remember the costumes because you remember how you felt - that Western I did with Kevin Costner where I wore the big hat and the two guns, I remember that. — Michael Gambon

You just do the things that you love and see if other people can like them too. — Kevin Costner

I think I just wanted to work when I finally came to Hollywood. That's what it was. I wanted to get a job, and then I wanted to get the second one. — Kevin Costner

I think there's true drama in the formation of everything that we know and are standing on the shoulders of. — Kevin Costner

I think it's hard for people to suspend the era they live in and understand the decisions that had to be made often during the western [frontier era] were life and death. You had to be resourceful and on your feet to try to figure out somebody. You didn't have the benefit of knowing who somebody was. — Kevin Costner

You're just as good, and if you work harder, you can be better and you can be more than you think you can. — Kevin Costner

I think if you want to make a good sports movie, you've got to cut down on the sports. You have to make it about people. You can't try to impress people with your knowledge and the X and O's and all the details and the technicalities. — Kevin Costner

I've always felt that failure was a completely underrated experience. — Kevin Costner

I've always known that I'm a little out of vogue. — Kevin Costner

I think the greatest star in American at the moment is Kevin Costner. — Jeremy Brett

What is it you want? That's a question that we all get posed sometimes internally and sometimes externally. — Kevin Costner

What sealed the deal for me was that the cloak wouldn't come off without a generous donation of my tears. Those used to be almost impossible for me to summon, I admit, until I watched Field of Dreams. When Kevin Costner asks his dad at the end if he'd like to have a catch, I just completely lose my shit. — Kevin Hearne

It's never bothered me to work hard. I've probably worked on some of the longest schedules in movie history. — Kevin Costner

My cinematic crush has been pretty much the same since I was 12: Kevin Costner. — Emma Watson

I work for the public, for the people who are paying to go to the cinema, rather than for the critics. — Kevin Costner

Sometimes it takes a partner to say, "What is it you want?" because I think we operate in life and sometimes we don't know. We're all in some kind of maze going after the cheese at the end, and we get it and we go, "What is it that we want?" — Kevin Costner

Money isn't a major motivating force in my life. Nor is my profession. There are other things that I care more about than being an actor. — Kevin Costner

When I see my children, and when I see the people who value me, I know how lucky I am. — Kevin Costner

In my younger days, I used to pick up sluts, and I don't mean that nastily. It's more a term of endearment, really, for girls who know how to speak their minds. — Kevin Costner

I was sucked into this vortex of a very conservative upbringing. — Kevin Costner

Audiences trust Westerns when you hit the right tone. I think they're not in vogue, but they will always be in vogue when you hit the right note. — Kevin Costner

If you want to make a great sports movie, don't put too much sports in it. It's the backdrop. It's the environment. — Kevin Costner

I try to please myself. I don't try to anticipate what people want to see. — Kevin Costner

Great stories don't often make great movies. Its' a crafted art form. — Kevin Costner

I'm probably one of the few people that liked 'Water World' with Kevin Costner. — Bert Blyleven

All my buddies over the years, like Kevin Costner and the guys - I see 'em go here, I see 'em go there - but I just do my work. — Jeff Fahey

...either I'm losing my mind, or I saw mermaids." --Alec Costner, The Mermaid Coast — Robert Woolcott

The news media reported the $250 million as an unthinkably huge waste of money and proclaimed that something was wrong with NASA. The result was an investigation and a congressional hearing. Not to defend failure, but $250 million is not much more than the cost to produce Kevin Costner's film flop Waterworld. — Neil DeGrasse Tyson

It's nice to be wanted. That's a really good feeling. I'm not immune to it. — Kevin Costner

I've had some movies that have been ridiculed, but that's OK with me. I don't feel that really defines me. Should I change who I am to be popular? — Kevin Costner

We still live with this unbelievable threat over our heads of nuclear war. I mean, are we stupid? Do we think that the nuclear threat has gone, that the nuclear destruction of the planet is not imminent? It's a delusion to think it's gone away. — Kevin Costner

I think religion is a funny thing because, when you see somebody who can really break it down, sometimes it feels foolish what you believe. — Kevin Costner

I stand up for what I believe. I don't know if it's always paid off for me, because I've been ridiculed and humiliated.
— Kevin Costner

You're this rat in the American maze, working your way towards the cheese, which is a job. — Kevin Costner

I'm glad movies aren't going to please everybody, they can't. But what they have to be is recognisable. I don't equate myself with a master painter, but I think you can recognise my films. — Kevin Costner

You have to pick the stories that you want to be involved with and the end game is you'd like to be a part of a hit. But I think your moral obligation is to follow your own heart. — Kevin Costner

If I had a choice of having a woman in my arms or shooting a bad guy on a horse, I'd take the horse. It's a lot more fun — Kevin Costner

The kind of love that these young men have and the respect that they have for their fathers, I don't see that as much in America as you see in the Latino community, and it's really something to behold. — Kevin Costner

I don't want the giant ego. I don't want to become Kevin Costner, singing on the soundtrack to The Postman. — Joss Whedon

I'm only interested in being a good actor and in being remembered for my best films, not for the way I look. But it seems inevitable in this line of work that I have to care about the way I look without getting obsessed about it. — Kevin Costner

I believe in the soul ... the small of a woman's back, the hanging curveball, high fiber, good scotch, that the novels of Susan Sontag are self-indulgent, overrated crap. I believe Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. I believe there ought to be a constitutional amendment outlawing Astroturf and the designated hitter. I believe in the sweet spot, soft-core pornography, opening your presents Christmas morning rather than Christmas Eve, and I believe in long, slow, deep, soft, wet kisses that last three days. — Kevin Costner

When I make a film I'm away from home for two to three months. So I want my kids to look at my films one day and say, I love his movies, I love his choices-because he loved them. — Kevin Costner

I'm a coach's coaching player. I like to be on the floor. So, if the coach tells me what to do out on the floor, I can get it done. I'm really comfortable being directed. — Kevin Costner

Here's the thing - the accent is cool. It's like a girl with big breasts - they get your attention first. — Kevin Costner

Dry land is not a myth. I've seen it. Kevin Costner. Waterworld. I don't know what the big fuss is about. I saw that movie nine times. It rules! — Jim Carrey

You have to decide if you're going to wilt like a daisy or if you're just going to go forward and live the life that you've been granted. — Kevin Costner

I always thought the leading actor should be the best supporting actor, because you're the only person that can help every other actor on the set. — Kevin Costner

There's actually a big difference between story and character. A great story doesn't make a great movie. A great script, which defines its moments and characters can become a great movie. You can make a movie that makes a lot of money and it may or may not have great story or great characters. — Kevin Costner

Being a celebrity is probably the closest to being a beautiful woman as you can get. — Kevin Costner

It's still a trip for me to see somebody that I've only seen on television or in a movie. When they are there in real life, it's very different. When we played Detroit, Kevin Costner played before us. — Rodney Atkins

I haven't lived a perfect life. I have regrets. But that's from a lifetime of taking chances, making decisions, and trying not to be frozen. The only thing that I can do with my regrets is understand them. — Kevin Costner

When you try to portray people's lives, you try to make sure you don't portray them as clowns and that you give them a level of dignity. You don't try to change their persona, but you try to understand that they had unique problems, set in a century that you don't live. — Kevin Costner

I believe people who go into politics want to do the right thing. And then they hit a big wall of re-election and the pettiness of politics. In the end, politics gets in the way of the business of people. — Kevin Costner

I'm a pretty convenient foil for a lot of people. — Kevin Costner

I feel like I've been able to live a dream life, but my view of things is absolutely inside behavior about how I behave and how I count on other people behaving. — Kevin Costner

I've been around where I knew other actors were going to steal the scene, and I don't compete with them. — Kevin Costner

When a defining moment comes along, you define the moment, or the moment defines you. — Kevin Costner

There's nothing more noble than a father and mother making an opportunity for their child, knowing that their life is gonna be hard. There's something incredibly heroic about that. — Kevin Costner

I wait and take on projects that I think can work. — Kevin Costner

I am not a cynic. — Kevin Costner

I asked if I could read for the role of Kevin Costner's caddy in Tin Cup. It was a fun learning experience, even though Cheech Marin got the part. — Garth Brooks

On the one hand, you have these huge budget films that cost millions of dollars. They are effects driven, they don't have well known actors in them, and they are making money. Well, some of them are. One the other hand, you have Stallone and Statham, and guys like DeNiro and Pacino, and Costner, who are all trying to make movies about real people. They are interested in character driven projects. — Dolph Lundgren

My first paid acting job was a movie called Fandango. It also starred Kevin Costner. — Judd Nelson

I've always been distracted when somebody is coming after me and saying, "You're the only person who can play this part." — Kevin Costner

I want to be a part of something, and when we define movies now based on how they do on the weekend. We live in a society of "thumbs up, thumbs down." — Kevin Costner

I dream of big things. I work for the small things. If you're going to dream, you might as well dream big. A lot of that came from my mother. She was adamant about the work ethic
about how you can't just dream things. — Kevin Costner

President Kennedy was willing to go to war. He was not a coward. The man had been in war and so had Ken O'Donnell. He was ready to protect this nation, but he was not ready for a military solution just because it was being rammed down his throat. — Kevin Costner

Some people come to you because if you're in their movie, it'll help them raise money. And some people come to you because they think you're the person to play the part. — Kevin Costner

I think one of the first things to go as people's lives start to go down is their dreams. Dreams should be the last thing to go - dreams are the things you go down with. If you're left clinging to a piece of driftwood in the middle of the ocean, I'd put on it the word dreams. — Kevin Costner

I can't say I really see much difference between my son and daughters except that my girls will occasionally make me a sandwich and my son won't. — Kevin Costner

I haven't tried to buffer myself. I like rolling the dice. — Kevin Costner

I don't have a seller's remorse about how I've lived. — Kevin Costner

We really don't rest if we think our kids are drifting, or if we think they don't have the right work ethic. It drives us crazy. Because we ultimately want them to succeed and, until they do, we feel in some way that something is not complete. — Kevin Costner

We're at a point in history where everyone needs to pay attention to politics. Too much is at stake for us to be apathetic. — Kevin Costner

If developing ties to this world and exercising love and compassion are not the very point of us
I cannot presume to know
then we are at least better occupied in this way, I feel, than with the riddles of other worlds, which only prove impossible for us to solve and unhealthy even to ponder. — Kevin Costner

I know I have this level of celebrity, of fame, international, national, whatever you want to call it, but it's a pretty surreal thing to think sometimes that you're in the middle of another famous person's life and you think to yourself, 'How the hell did I get famous? What is this some weird club that we're in?' — Kevin Costner

A good idea is something like an emotion, you just can't keep it in. — Kevin Costner

When I read Thirteen Days I was moved by it. It was just a great time for the world, in terms of looking back in history and seeing how we got ourselves into trouble and how we got ourselves out of trouble. — Kevin Costner

This January, Kevin Costner will be honored by the Palm Springs International Film Festival for his contribution to film. This gives Costner just two months to make a contribution to film. — Tina Fey

I was in the show for 21 days once-the 21 greatest days of my life. You know, you never handle your luggage in the show, somebody else carries your bags. It was great. You hit white balls for batting practice, the ballparks are like cathedrals, the hotels all have room service, and the women all have long legs and brains. — Kevin Costner

Failure doesn't kill you ... it increases your desire to make something happen. — Kevin Costner

I don't feel the need to direct. I tried to get other people to direct Dances, but they wouldn't do it. They all thought it was too long. One director wanted to cut the Civil War sequence. Another thought the white woman was very cliched. — Kevin Costner

I don't think I'd have been as good as Bruce was. He was a better JFK than I would have been. — Kevin Costner

I want to live forever, and I know I won't. I'm not afraid of dying. I'm only afraid of one thing: not being able to raise my kids. — Kevin Costner

I think these movies are as much for people of that time as for people who weren't born. For people who weren't born, they see how leaders must act under a crisis situation, not trying to be re-elected or not trying to check polls, that they go from their gut check. — Kevin Costner

I had a difficult time hearing my own inner voice about what I wanted to be in this life, because there were all these perfect examples of what a man actually does. The notion is that he goes to college, gets married and provides. That's what a man does. — Kevin Costner