Ethel Barrymore Quotes

"For an actress to be a success, she must have the face of a Venus, the brains of a Minerva, the grace of Terpsichore, the memory of a MaCaulay, the figure of Juno, and the hide of a rhinoceros."
- Ethel Barrymore
(Related: Success, Grace, Memory)

"The best time to make friends is before you need them."
- Ethel Barrymore
(Related: Time, Friends)

"When life knocks you to your knees, and it will, why, get up! If it knocks you to your knees again, as it will, well, isn't that the best position from which to pray?"
- Ethel Barrymore
(Related: Life, Will)

"The great actors are the luminous ones. They are the great conductors of the stage."
- Ethel Barrymore
(Related: Actors)

"The face of Garbo is an Idea, that of Hepburn an Event."
- Ethel Barrymore
(Related: Idea)

"The arts are not just instantaneous pleasure - if you don't like it, the artist is wrong. I belong to the generation which says if you don't like it, you don't understand and you ought to find out."
- Ethel Barrymore
(Related: Artist, Pleasure, Wrong)

"That's all there is; there isn't any more."
- Ethel Barrymore

"Our achievements speak for themselves. What we have to keep track of are our failures, discouragements and doubts. We tend to forget the past difficulties, the many false starts, and the painful groping."
- Ethel Barrymore
(Related: Difficulties, Forget, Past)

"Fundamentally I feel that there is as much difference between the stage and the films as between a piano and a violin. Normally you can't become a virtuoso in both."
- Ethel Barrymore
(Related: Difference)

"You must learn day by day, year by year to broaden your horizon. The more things you love, the more you are interested in, the more you enjoy, the more you are indignant about, the more you have left when anything happens."
- Ethel Barrymore
(Related: Love, Day)

"I never let them cough. They wouldn't dare."
- Ethel Barrymore