Quotes from Martin Landau

I still care about human behavior and the art that it takes to write a good piece and to get a cast together who cares enough to put 150 percent of their talent into a project.

I run the Actor's Studio on the West Coast, and one of the things I say all the time to the people I teach - many of whom are acting teachers - is that an actor needs to make choices that make him present.

I'm not speaking, you know, egocentrically at all, but I do have a very wide range.

I love an actor who comes in, ready to work. It's like a good tennis player. They hit the ball where you don't expect it, and it's great.

I'm very proud of Space 1999. Its success paved the way for other sci-fi shows to follow. My hope is that the DVD release will help it reach a new generation of fans

If I were a writer, the Pulitzer Prize would be important to me. This is my profession, so an Oscar is important.

I think we've all done things we're not particularly fond of. Everybody goes through it and comes out the other end, and goes on with his life as if it didn't happen.

Of course, I remember the Disney 'Pinocchio.' I was a little kid then... It was very instructive. Little boys who don't behave wind up in lots of trouble.

The winners shouldn't necessarily win, and the losers shouldn't necessarily lose.

I did theatrical caricatures.

I was being groomed to be the theatrical caricaturist. And I know if I got that job, I'd never quit. So I quit. I knew I wanted to go into the theater... I wanted to act.

In any age range, there are some limitations in terms of good, good parts.

My father was an Austrian, and he brought some Torahs over to this country, ancient Torahs that were slipped out of Germany.

Bad actors try to cry, and good actors try not to. Bad actors try to laugh, and good actors try not to.

Mankind, his brain has embraced so many amazing things, and yet we're still beating each other over the heads with clubs, excepting the bullets now, one bullet can wipe out an entire city.

I was very thin, exceedingly thin. If you look at 'North By Northwest,' you'll get a clue.

You can have immediate regrets, but if you look at stuff and say, 'Things happen for a reason', there's a fatalistic thing about it. Something will happen that will justify it in some way.

As a young actor, I was working much more readily and being offered more things.

I like a character that is still alive and is necessarily thinking, and either grows or diminishes or whatever.

I don't like to do what I call 'the grunters' - a character who sits at a table and grunts and young people make fun of. I turn a lot of those down.

Every young actor wants to do 'Hamlet' on the West End. Why? Because they can bring something to it.

There are not many A-list directors who get to make the movies they want to make. I know two: Woody Allen and Tim Burton. Two different textures, but both get to do what they want, and that's rare.

I've worked with a lot of wooden actors in my day, but Pinocchio is the best.

I've turned down a lot of roles. Some of them made stars out of the people. I have no regrets.