Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Darkness might seem to obscure what's happening, but I find it's always pretty revelatory: it brings out the awe in us, the fear in us, the excitement of exploring the hidden or unknown. It seems to conceal, but it really shines a light on what we want, what we need, and what we'll do to get it. Especially when we think no one can see us.
My proudest thing in my career is that I was able to change it three times. And I'm happy about that. I couldn't have done the same thing my whole life; I would've gone nuts. I couldn't do it, because I do things based on impulsive excitement, and I'm just not that guy that can do something for 50 years and be excited about the same thing.
I couldn't believe just how emotional I was about the London Olympics. Before the Games even started, I was reading a newspaper sitting in a hair salon and my mom looked over at me and I was just sobbing, because something about seeing the rings and hearing the athletes' excitement and just kind of knowing exactly what they were going through.
I would love to do Doc again, no question. It's tough to come up with an idea that contains the excitement of the original three. So it would be a real challenge for the writers to come up with an original 'Back to the Future' story that has the same passion and intensity and excitement as the other three. But it could be done. You never know.
Peter Fleming was a famous English traveler, explorer and adventurer, whose non-fiction books were hugely successful. My father owned signed copies of all of them - he and Peter Fleming had become acquainted over some detail of set design at the Korda film studio in Shepperton - and I had read each of them with breathless adolescent excitement.
I have a very big phone book and a very long reach around the world. And I think - I don't think, I know - that 95 percent of the people who I know who weren't born into success who have become successful and done things that are different and made a lot of money and had a lot of excitement in their life are people who never hear the word 'no.'
As an MC, I come from a background where the onstage experience is freestyle-based: you never know who's going to join you on stage, or what you're gonna do, or how long you can stay on. You kind of lose that, once you get on to recording albums and going on tour. Doing Africa Express has brought me back to that excitement - for the unexpected.
I personally find it difficult to accept that there could be anyone on earth insensitive to the comic abilities of Laurel and Hardy, Sid Caesar, Woody Allen, Mel Brooks, or Martin Short. But no matter who the comic entertainer is, there is always at least a minority prepared to say, 'What's all the excitement about? He doesn't seem funny to me.'
If you are wearing the right jersey, people rallying in around you, and hugging each other when you win, and there's so much love and excitement when you're together. And then people seem to walk away, take their jerseys off, and start focusing on the color of your skin. It didn't matter for that couple hours at the game - why does it matter now?
I was friends with Salvador Dalí until the day he died. Lucky me. I can't say why. I didn't live to be noticed, I lived to enjoy the excitement of doing right that day, and I knew I was doing it right when they would have me back. That was the thrill for me. I yearned to be validated because my mother was stern and I never did much right, that's how I perceived it.