The quality of nothing hath not such need to hide itself
Fare thee well, king: sith thus thou wilt appear, Freedom lives hence, and banishment is here.
Shakespeare wrote all there is that we need to know about dementia in 'King Lear.
To watch King Lear is to approach the recognition that there is indeed no meaning in life, and that there are limits to human understanding.
As I get older and I get a few more years experience I become more like Dad, you know, King Lear.
After we did [All In The Family], that ended up being a real love fest all around. Me and Norman, Norman [Lear] and me, Rob Reiner, everybody liked everybody. So about six or seven months later I moved out to L.A. and I got a call that Norman wanted to see me. I came in and he said "ABC has given me a property that they just optioned to make into a TV series. It's from a play called Hot L Baltimore, and I want you to be in it."
You have to get through the Hamlet hoop as a young actor. Your classical qualifications are based on the quality of your Hamlet. And then, as an older actor, you have to get through the Lear hoop. And I'm approaching the Lear hoop.
I walk into office, which is the casting office for CBS in New York. Mainly what they cast out of this office was the CBS daytime shows. I go in and walk into this room which every seat is filled with young African-American boys and girls and they were in their teens. I went, "I'm in the wrong place. Why am I here? What's going on?"So I go in and meet Norman [Lear].
Any idiot would know women's needs are simple. All we want is your basic millionaire brain surgeon criminal lawyer great dancer who pilots his own Lear Jet and owns seafront property. On the other hand, things being what they are today, most of us will settle for a guy who holds down a steady job and isn't carrying an infectious disease.
People talk about the difference between radio acting, TV acting and stage acting, but I think it's all the same. For instance, when I played Vultan in 'Flash Gordon,' I put as much energy into it as I would with 'King Lear' - it's all part of the same thing.
A laughing Lear would be monstrous. Not so a laughing Romeo and Juliet.
I want to keel over on stage playing King Lear at age 99 or something like that.
I'm still producing scripted features, and I am already working on a new documentary project with Norman Lear and Lara Bergthold. It is about the Declaration of Independence and the relevance of the document today. And it will be fun and engaging - I promise!
When I closed in "King Lear" I went into a period of depression for about three weeks, and every actor I've talked to who's ever played a major, major Shakespeare role has done this.
Gentle and low, an excellent thing in woman.
If I had written King Lear, I would regret it all my life afterwards. Because that work is so big, that its defects show as huge, its monstrous defects, things even minimal in between some scenes and their possible perfection. It's not the sun with spots; it's a broken greek statue.
The Oresteia, King Lear, Dostoevsky's 'The Devils' no less than the art of Giotto or the 'Passions' of Bach, inquire into, dramatize, the relations of man and woman to the existence of the gods or of God.
I feel like I've been on EastEnders all my life and now I'm playing King Lear.
I think that's an important part of art in general. Especially in literature, in stories, we play with eventualities that may put us through a lot of intense negative feelings - say, in horror films or tragedies as intense as King Lear - but we come out feeling richer. We've lived to the fullest, we've tested ourselves in these environments.
I think I have a finely tuned sense of humor. I think just being around it and growing up in it... my dad and Mel Brooks and Norman Lear. These are the people I grew up around.
I think I'm going to have to get a flying license very soon, and maybe one of those Lear jets. It beats motorcycles all to hell.
I've been lucky to get some path-breaking films, which proved to be the turning point in my career. Be it 'Rock on!' 'The Last Lear' or 'Raajneeti,' directors started working in a different way.
The good parts are the people who don't make do. They're the interesting people. Lear doesn't make do.
I guess if they ever do a remake of 'Sophie's Choice,' I could play the Meryl Streep part. I've got to work on my Polish accent. Maybe I'll be the definitive King Lear one day. You know, if they ever feel that King Lear should be more Jewy.
I've played Lear three times, I would love to do it again.
Follow AzQuotes on Facebook, Twitter and Google+. Every day we present the best quotes! Improve yourself, find your inspiration, share with friends
or simply: