Charlton Heston

Acting, taken to the highest level, requires a fierce, total focus of your time and energy at the cost of just about everything else.

You can be sure that they'll be showing 'Ben-Hur' somewhere for a long, long time to come.

When you are a young actor, you're imbued with the high purpose of your art. You think, 'They hire me for my talent; if that's not good enough, then they can hire somebody else.' Later, you realize that your body is as much a part of what you do as your talent.

All the good modern parts go to Jack Lemmon or Cary Grant.

The film itself, and my role as Moses, will always remain one of the creative peaks of my career.

I always thought of myself as inadequate. Kids of divorced parents always feel that way - that, on some subconscious level, they're responsible.

I've played three presidents, three saints and two geniuses - and that's probably enough for any man.

You could think of extraordinary examples to the contrary: The Grapes of Wrath... and even into the 70s.

Well, we have certainly produced great art before we did this. In my view, there are any number of areas of government which tax money should not be spent.

Undeniably the American art form, too. And yet more and more, we see films made that diminish the American experience and example. And sometimes trash it completely.

The big studio era is from the coming of sound until 1950, until I came in... I came in at a crux in film, which was the end of the studio era and the rise of filmmaking.

Shakespeare is the outstanding example of how that can be done. In all of Shakespeare's plays, no matter what tragic events occur, no matter what rises and falls, we return to stability in the end.

In recent years, anyone in the government, certainly anyone in the FBI or the CIA, or recently, in again, Clint's film, In the Line of Fire, the main bad guy is the chief advisor to the president.

As an artist, I understand that, and I value the creative input of the artist.

And their pals vote for their stuff when they're not on the panel, and it just keeps going that way. And they tend to be very fringe artists, so anything before the 20th century is not worth considering. This is out of date.

You cut their money back, for one thing... I go back a long way with the NEA.

What acting offered me was the chance to be many other people.

To the world, you are America.

Dirty Harry, for example. Clint Eastwood was not a rogue cop. He was a maverick cop, but he was a good guy.

Kids are the most conventional people in the world. It is more important than anything else for them to conform, and I was a kind of oddball. I was driven into being independent. I was very, very unhappy.