Judy Holliday quotes:

I am not a member of any organization listed by the Attorney General as subversive. In any instance where I lent my name in the past, it was certainly without knowledge that such an organization was subversive. I have always been essentially and foremost an American.

Lovers have a right to betray you... friends don't.

I've always loved words. I ate up all the books I could get my hands on, and when I couldn't get books, I read candy wrappers and labels on cereal and toothpaste boxes.

You have to be smart to play a dumb blonde over and over again and keep the audience's attention without extraordinary physical equipment.

Now with all this movie business, everybody's coming around wanting to know everything that's happened since I was four. It's like going to an analyst.

I'm a born and bred New Yorker. I belong here. Everytime I leave it's like losing a leg.

People have a hard time making me dress up to look like a classy gal.

I was bargaining for time away from Hollywood, and Columbia was bargaining for money. I got what I wanted and they got what they wanted. They knew I was so anxious to do Born Yesterday that I'd have done it for a dollar. They gave me the next best thing.

I get very nervous whenever I think about it. I've never done a serious play, and I have such awe of the woman - she's really my only idol. It's going to be a big stretch - certain people come out on stage and your face muscles automatically tense and you get ready to smile.

I thought I was learning about show business. The more painful it was, the more important I thought the experience must be. Hating it, I convinced myself it must be invaluable.

I think Billie is the kind of girl who would let her hips swing loose.

He didn't maintain my illusion of myself, he gave me an illusion of myself. Before I met him, I never thought of myself as an actress. Boy, he sidetracked me in a great way!

Nobody can give a good performance unless the authors and composers have written a good part, a fact which is often overlooked.

Never do nothing you wouldnt want printed on the front page of The New York Times.

I'm trying to eliminate every vestige of my own personality, style, approach and get into somebody else's skin. Sometimes I feel I've accomplished it. But when I don't, I'm nobody at all, having left myself at home.

If you can handle a nightclub audience successfully, you can handle anything

We were wavering around like a ship without a sail.

If you can handle a nightclub audience successfully, you can handle anything.

I'm trying to eliminate every vestige of my own personality, style, approach and get into somebody else's skin. Sometimes I feel I've accomplished it. But when I don't, I'm nobody at all, having left myself at home

I could talk about him all day. He's one of the most wonderful things that ever happened to me.

I want a part where I can use my own hair, my own voice, and maybe even be literate.

Of course I work hard. Why shouldn't I? Who am I to think I should get things the easy way?

I hated the whole idea of being an actress. I used to throw up before every performance and cry afterward.

It's tough when take 1 is technically okay and take 2 has better acting. Out here (Hollywood) they print the first one. That's the one where we all hit the mark on the floor and who cares about the acting.

In repose, my face looks as though I had gone through a terrible deal in the last five minutes. I have to disguise the expression and get a glassy-eyed look. That's something I learned from my dog.

We gained a great deal of prestige, but not much money. We liked to work so much we couldn't hide it and the club owners paid us accordingly.

I suppose that if I could have quit, I would have, because in those days I never wanted to be an actress, the acting was something to do while I waited for a chance to study writing and directing. But I guess I was just meant to be an actress. Because, here I am.

I am not an 'instant' actor... to really do anything, I've got to try it five or six or a dozen times.

Acting is a very limited form of expression and those who take it seriously are very limited people. I take it seriously.