Edward Hoagland Quotes

Any time you're working in the world of taming animals, you're going to get hurt. But it's a rush that we get.

We argued about how hard it would be to ride a bear, assuming said bear was muzzled.

Well, I quite like animals, but theyre unpredictable. I mean, look at old whats-his-name in Vegas. Tiger dragged him off the stage, you know? The guy brought up tigers. Theyre quite unpredictable.

But I've worked where they've had animals before, and animal wranglers, the people who raise animals and train animals for films and television, they're all very, very professional.

When I was little, one of my father's friends owned a circus. For four absolutely incredible summers, I found myself being the only boy in Ireland who didn't dream of running away with the circus. I was in it!

There is that thing about not working with animals and children - I don't think that's true. Although you should never work with donkeys.

You know, having raised animals all my life for 50-something years, I would say that you know, I'm fascinated by cats.

My dream pet? I like a couple of them, man: monkey, I love dogs. See, tigers, I don't know - I can't be playing with something like that. A monkey, I can handle it. A dog, yeah; I would get a monkey.

I've got a friend who is a lion tamer. He used to be a school teacher till he lost his nerve.

It is hard working with animals, I've got to say.

When I was a kid, I worked in the circus. It was a touring circus that was owned by a man named Terrell Jacobs. It was just one big tent, and he was a lion tamer. He didn't have any kids, but the bit was that I would dress up as his son in an identical outfit.

I don't think people would climb mountains or jump off bridges with parachutes or kayak Class V rapids if those things didn't offer the brief and horrible illusion of imminent death. They would just be complicated, time-consuming endeavors that we'd steer well clear of because they got in the way of real life.

Living as an actor is rather like living life on the trapezes in a circus. Every time you jump on, you have to pray that, when the time comes for you to jump off, there is another trapeze swinging your way.

I grew up on a farm and my grandfather quit school when he was 12, but when it came to common sense and animals, he was the smartest person I've ever met, before or since. He taught me that to touch an animal is an earned privilege. It's not a right.

I learned how to change a cloth diaper on a raccoon. I was maybe 8 or 9.

I seem to be landing a lot of roles with animal interactions, which is amazing.

It's not that I don't value my life. It's just that I love taking chances, testing myself, stepping over the line.

A guy running, you know, fifteen, twenty stallions that are two years of age, never been touched by a human before, and you've got to start castrating them, that's pretty intimidating.

In 'True Grit,' we had a vulture, a trained vulture... that was a pain and that was - even by vulture standards - probably a stupid vulture, and that was frustrating.

Can't all beasts be tamed?

Success is loving life and daring to live it.

Sometimes we even have to risk making fools of ourselves.

You can walk as carefully as you want through a mine field; it is still a mine field. But it's also true that if you step up to the plate worrying that you're going to strike out, the odds are that you're going to strike out. Not doing a large ambitious work because you're convinced that Danger Lurks Around Every Corner, the old 'I might be dead this time next year,' is a waste of the Inner Radiance that found you. It's like life insurance. It's betting against yourself. It's blowing out your own flame before someone beats you to it.

Often people who are wonderful with animals aren't always terribly good with human beings.

You don't cast the animal, per se. You have an animal trainer who looks for several of them. That is a different experience than dealing with actors. That is just difficult. It is what you expect from an animal on the set. You just run a lot of film and prompt it to do the right thing, but sit through it doing all the wrong things first. It's just unbelievably boring, frustrating and painstaking to shoot.