James Dean Quotes

1. Dream as if you'll live forever. Live as if you'll die today.


2. If a man can bridge the gap between life and death, if he can live on after he's dead, then maybe he was a great man.

3. Only the gentle are ever really strong.

4. Trust and belief are two prime considerations. You must not allow yourself to be opinionated.

5. Studying cows, pigs and chickens can help an actor develop his character. There are a lot of things I learned from animals. One was that they couldn't hiss or boo me.

6. I want to be a Texan 24 hours a day.





7. An actor must interpret life, and in order to do so must be willing to accept all the experiences life has to offer. In fact, he must seek out more of life than life puts at his feet.

8. Being an actor is the loneliest thing in the world. You are all alone with your concentration and imagination, and that's all you have.

9. I also became close to nature, and am now able to appreciate the beauty with which this world is endowed.

10. The gratification comes in the doing, not in the results.

11. Being a good actor isn't easy. Being a man is even harder. I want to be both before I'm done.





12. There is no way to be truly great in this world. We are all impaled on the crook of conditioning.

13. When an actor plays a scene exactly the way a director orders, it isn't acting. It's following instructions. Anyone with the physical qualifications can do that.

14. The only greatness for man is immortality.

15. To grasp the full significance of life is the actor's duty; to interpret it his problem; and to express it his dedication.

16. To me, acting is the most logical way for people's neuroses to manifest themselves, in this great need we all have to express ourselves.

17. To my way of thinking, an actor's course is set even before he's out of the cradle.

18. Eternity? ... That is one hell of a movie.

19. There is no way to be truly great in this world. We are all impaled on the crook of conditioning. A fish that is in the water has no choice that he is. Genius would have it that we swim in sand. We are fish and we drown.

20. Since I'm only 24 years old, guess I have as good an insight into this rising generation as any other young man my age. And I've discovered that most young men do not stand like ramrods or talk like Demosthenes. Therefore, when I do play a youth, such as in Warner Bros. Rebel Without A Cause, I try to imitate life. The picture deals with the problems of modern youth. It is the romanticized conception of the juvenile that causes much of our trouble with misguided youth nowadays. I think the one thing this picture shows that's new is the psychological disproportion of the kids' demands on the parents. Parents are often at fault, but the kids have some work to do, too. But you can't show some far off idyllic conception of behavior if you want the kids to come and see the picture. You've got to show what it's really like, and try to reach them on their own grounds. You know, a lot of times an older boy, one of the fellows the young ones idolize, can go back to the high school kids and tell them: "Look what happened to me! Why be a punk and get in trouble with the law? Why do these senseless things just for a thrill?" I hope "Rebel Without A Cause" will do something like that. I hope it will remind them that other people have feelings. Perhaps they will say: "What do we need all that for?" If a picture is psychologically motivated, if there is truth in the relationship in it, then I think that picture will do good.

21. It breezes along quite quickly.

22. The only thing I've seen so far are just raccoons running all over.

23. It's a nice acting challenge for me because the character's much older and he's Jewish and he's quite lonely. At first he feels like his home is being invaded by this person and they have a few spats, but then he discovers the younger character is also Jewish and he grabs a hold of that. (Gardiner) has other secrets that at first tear us apart then bring us together at the end.

24. Live fast, die young, and have a beautiful looking corpse.

25. When told he was too short to be an actor: "How can you measure acting in inches?

26. Remember:
Life is short, break the rules (they were made to be broken)
Forgive quickly, kiss slowly
Love truly, laugh uncontrollably
And never regret anything that makes you smile.
The clouds are lined with silver and the glass is half full (though the answers won't be found at the bottom)
Don't sweat the small stuff,
You are who you are meant to be,
Dance as if no one's watching,
Love as if it's all you know
Dream as if you'll live forever,
Live as if you'll die today.

27. I can't let in the light. It will destroy my performance like light destroys film.

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