Jean-Claude Van Damme Quotes

I've often stood silent at a party for hours listening to my movie idols turn into dull and little people.

I longed for literary celebrity even as I saw with my own eyes how little happiness it brought.

Fame, on its best day, is kind of like a friendly wave from a stranger by the side of the road. And when it's not so good, it's like a long walk home, all alone, with nobody in when you get there.

If I wanted to be famous, I could have been famous before. I mean, I produced a Frank Sinatra special - Elizabeth Taylor, with Michael Jackson, Gregory Peck, I won't even take a picture.

I don't think that I want to meet any of the icons. I don't think that anybody can quite live up to your expectations.

Walking down the red carpet, suddenly I felt very special and different. All the flashlights from cameras and requesting voices from the media, the scene, it was just like what I remembered seeing on TV or a movie when I was a little girl - the scene only when movie stars appeared.

There are some famous people, and I've met them, who you might think are great, and then you meet them, and you discover that they not only have feet but heads of clay.

I'm not Elvis. I don't get chased by paparazzi.

If you want to be a star, don't bother doing it because it ends up being very empty.

I'm tired of the industry, tired of playing the whole game - the dressing up, the red carpet. I hate talking about myself.

Being famous was extremely disappointing for me. When I became famous it was a complete drag and it is still a complete drag.

I used to say that winning the Oscar means being back at the Beverly Hills Hotel at 1 A.M. feeling empty. It's the industry voting. It doesn't come from God. It doesn't change your life, really.

Look, I'm not a blockbuster star.

I'm glad to know that I can host the 'Today' show for 16 years and not be a trending topic. And all the sudden I'm on 'Royal Pains,' and I'm a trending topic. There's something a little strange about that.

The more celebrities I meet, the more disappointed I get in celebrity culture.

Everybody wants to be on the front cover of 'People' and 'Rolling Stone.'

It isn't always simple when America discovers you at 11 years old. Suddenly, it's not just homework that you're responsible for. Your name becomes a hashtag, and if you're lucky, you might even get invited on 'Ellen.'

Before you're famous it's stuff that seems like it'd be really cool, but once you get it, you realize it's not bad, but it's kind of hollow and meaningless.

America has a genius for the encouragement of fame.

It's so sad, you get less starstruck when you start realizing that it's not a big deal.

Fame — the aggregate of all the misunderstandings that collect around a new name.

If I was a singer who won those Grammys, I'd be gracing all the magazine covers... I barely got asked to do an interview.

It stirs up envy, fame does.

So in that way, fame has become a weirder thing to go after, but the thing about me is I've never been after fame. That sounds cliché, but it's true. I think fame sounds uncomfortable to me, but being able to like write this book and make my living doing very exciting, creative stuff sounds really amazing. It has been really amazing.

Fame puts you there where things are hollow.