My history in show business spans over a quarter of a century, and I have seen many people in the industry struggle with coming out, only to find much more success after they finally did.

For a few years, I thought I was putting show business behind me. I was busy doing other things in life, particularly with politics. I was not out looking for films, really. I lost interest.

Politics isn't a reality show or a gong show. It's not show business for ugly people. It's the arena where we define our common life in a rough and ready contest that has winners and losers.

I just remember always wanting to make things. That was what was really interesting to me, but I had no career goal in sight. I didn't know anybody that had anything to do with show business.

My wife, as proud as she was of me, hated show business for good reasons. There was something about the spouse always being pushed out of the way, shoved aside. She wanted to get away from it.

Yes, I have a good sense of humor to sort of last a long time in show business, and I think to be able to find comedic value in who you are and the people that you work is always a good thing.

Years ago I wanted to buy an apartment in New York City. I was a single female - I had gone through my divorce - I had three children, I was in show business and black. It was, like, impossible.

Julianne Moore and Michael Keaton began in 1980s soap operas and 1970s sitcoms, respectively, such ancient history by show business standards that you need carbon dating to measure their careers.

The whole gist of 'All That Jazz' is Faustian. It's about a man who sells his soul to show business - which Bob didn't do. He understood the dangers of glamour and falling into that kind of life.

I could've always worked shows, clubs, Las Vegas and Atlantic City, but I was successful in business ventures, and things weren't happening in show business, so I said, 'Let me see what I can do.'

I think the fact that I grew up in show business had a real effect on my personality. If you were born in New York during the golden age of television, and you grew up on Broadway, that marks you.

If there's any business that instructs you in the strong hand of fate, it's show business. You can plan and plan, but it's what happens to you that really determines what your career will be like.

My name was originally John Collins, but I just didn't think it had the flair I needed. I found out the poet laureate of Poland was named Krasinski and so it seemed like a shoe-in for show business.

I just wanted to be in show business. I didn't care if I was going to be an actor or a magician or what. Comedy was a point of the least resistance, really. And on the simplest level, I loved comedy.

I began painting well before I started doing comedy. In fact, when I came out of the war in 1946, I enrolled in art school in Dayton, Ohio. I painted for three years, and then show business took hold.

Show business is like a bumpy bus ride. Sometimes you find yourself temporarily juggled out of your seat and holding onto a strap. But the main idea is to hang in there and not be shoved out the door.

My parents didn't want me to go into show business. They were afraid of what would happen if I didn't succeed. They wanted me to get married and have babies. I never saw marriage and family in my life.

I haven't had to do anything outside of show business my whole life. I've never been a waiter. I've only worked and gotten paid. It hasn't been a classic example of someone slogging through the business.

I started trying to be a writer and failed for years. I tried novels, short stories, sitcoms, movies, plays, anything. And then, to support myself, I had millions of jobs on the fringes of show business.

Show business is one of the few businesses that the devil will actually agree to own just a portion of your soul because he knows if you have a performer's ego you were probably working for him all along.

My parents were both in show business. My father was an actor, my mom an actress, and both singers, dancers and actors. They met in Los Angeles doing a play together and so I grew up in a show biz family.

I looked at longevity in show business when I was about 13, and the people who seemed to have longevity were the ones who'd spent quite a bit of time learning about what they were doing before they made it.

I'm a fan of odd meters. For example, I've decided to sing 'No Business Like Show Business,' but I'll be doing it in constantly changing 5/4, 7/4 and 11/4 time signatures. I've found a way to make that work.

Going to New York to do whatever - show business - it just seemed fun. It seemed fun to go to the big city and meet all kinds of different people and maybe be famous. It was just exciting. So I wasn't scared.

Making a success in show business is like getting a big promotion on a job. You get more prestige, more authority, more money - and you also get longer hours, more work, and more responsibility. It evens out.

Show business is a struggle. I certainly wish that I had just blasted on the scene and not had quite such a hard time. But there's a great sense of the relief in that you don't have to prove yourself anymore.

If you want a job, do what I did: work for other people for 50 years; but the odds of you getting swallowed up by the blasphemous godless, decadent, deadly spirit of today's show business are thousands to one.

I didn't plan on going into show business. Show business picked me. And it's been fun. One of the best things about being in show business is people think they know me, and they feel like they grew up with me.

Kids are brought into show business because they are cute and see truth and they're very bright. But there's a sense of doing it because you want the adults to be approving of you. You want to make them happy.

I'm not sure if I've learned anything from show business. Life in general has taught me if you're kind to people, everything gets easier. Being a decent person really smoothes the way for you and everyone else.

I've got lots of great friends in show business, and that's all they are. Great friends. I'll never marry again - what's the point? I had the best. I've got friends all over the world, and that's enough for me.

When you're in New York City or Los Angeles, even if you're not dealing with show business, there's still this sense that it's the center of the universe. And I think that's a really dangerous, limiting mindset.

I was thrilled as a kid to point out my sister as she danced and sang on the stage, and she was pretty good artistically. She was a great inspiration to me. She was the one who sort of led me into show business.

I loved everything about show business, meeting the stars, the whole ambience. I was living every young kid's dream. I was told a pop singer's life was three years, but I was still making money seven years later.

I was supposed to go to Northwestern and become a dental hygienist, get married, have babies. My father was very against me being in show business. Usually in Chinese culture, education is the most highly valued.

I taught myself computer. Then Macintosh came along, and it became a really bad addiction. If I wasn't in show business, I'd have pocket protectors growing out of my chest. I do everything on it. It's kinda sick.

Well, we're in show business, and I have been making a living in this business a long time and inevitably it means taking what it is that you've done and hopefully you're showing it to a lot of people who like it.

I think I'm lucky having parents that have been in show business for a while, and they don't care about the shiny stuff so much. They raised me in that way - to stay grounded, not to chase the shiny, pretty things.

The minute you start the process of deciding to make a film and you're communicating that vision to anyone, you're in the process of selling. If you don't understand that, you're not in show business. You're just not.

I've always been one for show business. I like performing, and I used to get criticized for having production value. But now it's all that! People need to get what they pay for! Otherwise, just listen to recorded music.

I like being from a city that is not entrenched in show business. When you're in New York City or Los Angeles, even if you're not dealing with show business, there's still this sense that it's the center of the universe.

Los Angeles is such a town of show business, and I'm a terrible celebrity. I find it difficult - it's the beast that must be fed. There's this big wheel of pictures and articles that goes around, and you get pinned on it.

I don't think any of us would be who we are if our parents weren't who they were. People that are in show business, and their parents are not in show business, their parents probably motivated them to get in show business.

Show business is not conducive to mental stability. It's a constant rollercoaster of adrenaline spikes and devastating let-downs. There's something about seeing a face from the telly in real life that makes people deranged.

Like everybody in show business, you think you're going to wake up one day, and it's all going to be taken away from you. I think we all share an insecurity in that way, everybody in show business - the ones I talk to, anyway.

My eyes opened, and the first thing I thought of when I could put thoughts together was I want to be in show business. Never wanted anything else. I used to sneak in the costume room at my nursery school and smell the costumes.

The show business has all phases and grades of dignity, from the exhibition of a monkey to the exposition of that highest art in music or the drama which secures for the gifted artists a world-wide fame princes well might envy.

The challenge for a director - and I think a lot of directors feel the same way - is that today we have to put on a producer's hat, too. Meaning, you have to sometimes think of it being 'business show,' not just 'show business.'

Just because someone signed up for something or takes advice or has managers or works in entertainment or show business with other people doesn't mean they don't have a brain, okay? It doesn't mean that they're not a real person.

One of the things about working on stage - actually, about working in show business, that is - is that it's such a collaborative effort. I suppose that everything in life is - every endeavor where people are able to be successful.

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