“American society to me and my brother was thrilling because, first of ...” — Mike Nichols Quote

“American society to me and my brother was thrilling because, first of all, the food made noise. We were so excited about Rice Krispies and Coca-Cola. We had only silent food in our country, and we loved listening to our lunch and breakfast.”

“The reason that most British actors are better than most American actors in the end is that they don't make any money. At the very end of their lives, they get into a space movie and they make a lot of money, but until that happens, basically, they don't have bank accounts. They live from day to day.”

“Chicago is not a very fashion-driven place. Nobody says, 'Oh, you've got to come see these fabulous people!' Nobody cares.”

“The reason you do this stuff - comedy, plays, movies - is to be seized by something, to disappear in the service of an idea.”

“My father wasn't too crazy about me. I loved him anyway. One of the things I regretted for a long time was that he died before he could see that he would be proud of me. I was actually more what he wished for than he thought.”

“The prison industrial system, things like that are cleverly put in place to attempt to marginalize a certain group of people - and it's not only black, it's replete across the American society.”

“The belief that the good in American society will finally win out... I don't believe any more.”

“I've come to see the mosh pit as an apt description of American society - and of my childhood home. I was number nine of ten creative, mostly loud kids competing for airspace.”

“I think as an American society, when we're paying too many taxes or dealing with war, we don't want to see sad things at the movies.”

“If you came from Mars and tried to analyse British or American society through novels, you'd think our society was preponderantly full of middle-aged, slightly alcoholic, middle-class, intellectual men, most of whom are divorced from their families and have nothing to do with children.”

“The American society around me looked at me and saw Japanese. Then, when I was 19, I went to Japan for the first time. And suddenly - what a shock - I realized I wasn't Japanese; they saw me as American. It was an enormous relief. Now I just appreciate being exactly in the middle.”