Russell Crowe Quotes

I'm fundamentally quite shy, so that thing of taking on another character is quite a liberating thing to do if you're a shy person, because within that character framework you can now go to all these other places. [pauses] And I never found another job that I was actually that good at.

Oh yeah, there was a point where they said they thought the threat had probably or had possibly been overstated, and then they started to question their sources, and blah, blah, blah. But I don't know how it was resolved, you know? But they were serious about it. And what can you say? I mean, gee, there were a lot of man-hours spent doing that gig, so the least I can say is, "Thank you very much."

It was a 100 percent fucking home run, except the central character of William Shakespeare was not a fucking writer— he was not smelly enough, he was not unshaven enough, and obviously hadn't had enough to drink. He was some prissy pretty boy. What the fuck? That's so disrespectful.

This is not belittling it, because I do think it's a very emotionally and intellectually complicated physical performance, and it's the combination of those things that made it a little unusual, I suppose. But I definitely rate The Insider and A Beautiful Mind above that. I probably rate Romper Stomper above it. And there's a hell of a lot of nuance going on in L.A. Confidential as well.

It's really hard to explain, because it's a fucking prick of a job, you know? Particularly when you get successful with it.... People don't understand why your life suddenly changed when, hey, to them it's fucking ten bucks at the movies, it's over in a couple of hours. They dont understand the prep, they don't understand the real physical shit that you put yourself through. I mean, the last movie's an example— shoulder surgery partway through preparation. And it's a $100 million train, man, and I'm the fucking guy that drives the train. And I've got to get back on that train and make sure that this thing is completed.

Probably the biggest difference— the thing that really took my life and changed it , and made my relationship with the press a defensive one instead of one of tolerant amusement or whatever— was Meg Ryan. And, gee whiz, I'm not going to apologize for that situation in my life. It's just there. Well, actually, that's wrong— I would apologize if there are people that were directly hurt from that situation. There was never any intention like that. Quite frankly, it was in the papers before it was a reality, you know? So we were already having to deal with the bullshit, and that possibly brought us close together, because we were both dealing with what it meant to be put in that situation.

I've always had a thing about being accused of something when I'm not guilty of it, you know? That goes right back to a primary school thing. It's the thing that scares me the most— being blamed for something that I didn't do... And there's that "If you get accused of something and you get angry, then you must be guilty."

I'm the sort of bloke that will have stand-up arguments with producers, saying, "Look, mate, I know you're product-placing that fucking thing' If I can see it, I'm just not going to allow it to happen... You lose all of your integrity as soon as you cross over into that sort of crass commercialism.

Every now and then I say something like this and it just sounds so self-righteous— but if there's anything I'm aiming at, it is that I want there to be a trust between me and an audience. I want them to absolutely know that if I've done it, there's some really good fucking reasons; there's something special about it. Sooner or later, the press, the magazine shit, the tabloid sort of shit, that'll all go away, because no matter how many times they say it, it's still not going to be true. What is true is what I put down in movies. Even though it's pretend, that's the truth.

People accuse me of being arrogant all the time. I'm not arrogant, I'm focused. I don't make demands. I don't tell you how it should be. I'll give you fucking options, and it's up to you to select or throw 'em away. That should be the headline: If you're insecure, don't fucking call.

I have a temper. My mum's got a temper. My brother's got a temper. You've got to have one. You know what happens if you don't have one? One day you're walking down the street and you just pop. You're lying there dead on the pavement because you've been holding and suppressing all this bullshit, you know.

I don't follow anybody in particular. When people talk about Laurence Olivier or something, I go, "Fuck, man, once you've had De Niro with Raging Bull, that's where you begin."

I went shopping with Danielle yesterday, and we were in a bookstore. And this woman actually said, "Look, Russell Crowe reads— who'd have known?"

To be honest, when you're younger and cooler, you say those sort of things don't mean anything, but then on the day when they pat you on the back and they say, "Look, mate, we're noticing what you're doing-thanks very much;' you think of the people who spent a life in the cinema and didn't receive that kind of accolade, and it's sort of a humbling experience. And it's very nice and all that. But it doesn't change the way I do things.

I get a very deep sense that the generation after Generation X is a very conservative generation, and I'm not sure they understand the commitment part of what I do. I'm not sure if we'll ever be able to regain that ground.... I quite often feel like I'm the youngest of the old guys, where I've got some really old-fashioned philosophies about what's credible and what's not.... Suddenly, someone like me seems like a dinosaur from a different age, but I hope it's the opposite of that. I hope I'm at the forefront of thinking and it'll all come back to that at some point.