John Mahoney Quotes

There are lots of actors out there who are hugely, hugely talented and haven't got the breaks I've had.

There are great actors we'll never see just because they haven't had my luck.

There are such pretty faces and so many more talents and people with more potential, but they never get their chance because they are not at the right place at the right time.

If you hang around long enough to show these people what you can do, you have a chance in this acting business.

When I was in acting classes early on, there were so many people in these classes who were doing great work, and you'd just look at them and say, 'Wow, I hope to someday be like that.' And yet these people never worked. You never saw them.

You can be the best actor in the world, but if you don't have that one lucky moment, it kind of doesn't matter. There are a lot of amazing actors who will never get the chance to prove themselves because they won't have that one lucky moment.

So many actors who are really gifted and talented just don't get the opportunity. I happened to get that opportunity.

Before 'New Girl,' I had just been grinding in TV for a really long time. I had been testing for so many shows and not getting them. You don't know how difficult it is or how lucky you have to be - and I only say lucky because there are so many people out there - to get a show on the air and keep it going.

There never were any roles for my kind of acting. That's the story of my life.

You have a lot of guys who've been given opportunities in the league. I'm not one of those guys.

There are so many actresses who struggle for years to get where I am. It's luck that's worked for me more than hard work.

There are plenty of people I've seen and thought that person is funny, or that person is really talented, and they've got something, but maybe the buying public doesn't see the same thing I see, or the stars don't align in the right way for them.

I have so many really gifted friends, actors who I thought deserved as much as I did to get an agent or a job, or deserved more, and just never made it through somehow. I've always been really fiercely tethered to that. You know, I've been very lucky. All the filmmakers I've worked with have taken my desire to educate myself very seriously.

I was 16 when I quit gymnastics and decided to start acting. I started booking immediately after. I was very lucky and fortunate, but I also did the hard work. Half of it's hard work and half of it's luck. It's been working out so far. Fingers crossed for the future.

The luck of having talent is not enough; one must also have a talent for luck.

I'm not saying people shouldn't apply themselves and work hard. You do have to try to make your own luck. But I know people firsthand who worked incredibly hard, who were really smart, who never got into trouble, and still didn't get a break.

I feel like I have just been really, really lucky to meet some of the most successful and great actors alive today.

I know I've been lucky. But it's what you do with that luck afterwards that really defines whether you stick around.

I've been quite lucky in that I've managed to tick off a few of my dream roles, really. Beyond that, you wait for the next script to come in that will have the dream role that you don't know exists yet, I suppose.

I feel like it has gone very fast for me, but I feel like it wasn't instantaneous, at all. I was getting a lot of rejections. I just got very lucky and it happened quickly for me. I don't feel like I'm a prodigy or something.

Once you've gotten the job, there's nothing to it. If you're an actor, you're an actor. Doing it is not the hard part. The hard part is getting to do it.

I think you have to be really lucky to pick the sort of roles you want to do.

I think that I was lucky that I was 30 when I did 'Love Story', which came with this extravagant pop celebrity. I had already done 15 years of what I call 'real' work.' I was a waitress, chambermaid, and a photographer's assistant, so I knew that I was tremendously lucky as a novice actor to have that big hit.

There are a lot better musicians than me out there that just haven't had the luck to fall into everything like I have.

I haven't really ever had to audition for anything.