Peter O'Toole Quotes

I should be soaring away with my head tilted slightly toward the gods, feeding on the caviar of Shakespeare. An actor must act.

Someday I'd love to do Shakespeare.

If I'm serious, yes, I'd like to have done what Shakespeare did... to act and write. You learn so much from acting. One of our great writers, Alan Bennett, does both supremely well. When I write a story, I tend to speak it aloud as I'm writing it.

I was in 20 Shakespearean plays by the time I was 20.

I think my strength is always been in being very natural. I think Shakespeare and things like that would be more a stretch for me.

I think it's always funny when you see kids do Shakespeare.

Even Shakespeare gives you a scene off.

I've always wanted to play 'Lady Macbeth' and Strindberg's 'Miss Julie'.

I don't fool myself. I can't see myself doing Shakespeare.

I'm into parlor dramas. I'm into theatre. I'm trained for the stage. I trained to do Chekhov and Shakespeare, I was trained for the stage.

I want to do theatre. I love theatre.

Before acting, I was always attracted to words, to literature - be they the words of Williams, Arthur Miller, Shakespeare or Moliere.

There are a lot of roles in Shakespeare, basically. If I feel that the script is a movie, I would be interested in doing any role of Shakespeare's.

I'm an infant with Shakespeare; I'm kind of learning how to walk. I am trying to decipher the code, you know? I do my research. And I get a clear understanding of what the language is. It is a tremendous process I have to go through as I am sure all actors do, finding the gems hidden in his language.

I love to sing more than anything - more than acting, even.

When I'm acting I don't sing, and when I'm recording I'm not acting.

I would love to be remembered as one of the greatest Lears or Hamlets.

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

Doing Shakespeare on stage with Kenneth Branagh, I don't think it gets better than that.

I'm just an entertainer. All I want to be is funny. I never aspired to play Hamlet.

You'd never play Hamlet if you started worrying about who's played it before you.

I think going from doing TV and straight plays to Shakespeare is weird enough because you have this heightened language, and you are telling a story through metric poetry. But I think music is that place beyond poetry.

I think the theater is where you stand up, and you say, 'Here is what I have to offer.'

I can relate to anything. I once played Macbeth. I got a lot of laughs, so I quit.

My mother taught Shakespeare and used to act.