Jockey Quotes

(answering a Chris Matthews question about why Hollywood actors sometimes presume to be sophisticated about politics) Everyone`s entitled to express their political beliefs. I don`t presume to tell anybody who to vote for. I am comfortable telling people what my opinions are. But you have to look also to the media, where you have a vast majority of the loudest and most influential political voices in America media from people who came from the entertainment world. You have Rush Limbaugh, was a radio disc jockey. Bill O`Reilly came from "Inside Edition" (1988). Michael Moore`s a filmmaker. Al Franken was on "Saturday Night Live" (1975). The line is increasingly blurred between news and entertainment. Secondarily, the media`s also shoving celebrities down our throats all the time. As a person, I`m much more interested in what an actor has to say about something substantial and important than who they`re dating or what clothes they`re wearing or some other asinine, insignificant aspect of their life.

"I love working with the dedicated people at this theater. They are pursuing this for truth and beauty, not just as a springboard to the next job. Before I decided to be an actor, I wanted to be a jockey, but then I realized I wanted to be more than a Texan cowboy." - Von Dohlen, interviewed by Travis Michael Holder, June 25th, 2004

"I wanted to be a jockey when I was growing up. But I grew too tall. I grew to be six-one. It was devastating. Somehow acting came up, and that became my obsession. When that devastation happened with the jockey business I thought, `Okay, I don`t want to be the kind of actor who does just one thing.` So I thought, `I`ve got to get rid of my Texas accent.` I saw an ad in the back of Life magazine for John Gielgud doing Shakespeare - `The Ages of Man`. It came on a record, so I sent away for that. I listened to it until I completely exorcised my Texas accent. I moved to New York, and I got `Tender Mercies` and I had to get a Texas accent! I had to play a good ol` boy! So I called my brother. I would just talk to him!"

My biggest publicity stunt was that famous five-minute television kiss I engaged in with disk jockey Jack Eigen. Our lips met for all of five minutes on the TV screen, and that cost poor Jack his job. The station was flooded with protesting phone calls and telegrams.

Before I was an actor I was an apprentice jockey, and now I`m out there racing against boys, sort of the spokesperson for people over 50 that they can do it.

I was so anxious to succeed that I made a practice of appearing on all the disc jockey shows I could, in order to publicize the band.

I was too heavy to be a jockey and too honest to be a producer, so I became a writer.

At first I wanted to be a jockey. I rode horses in Cleveland but I kept falling off and I was afraid of horses. So there wasn`t much of a future in it.

The frustrating events involving some Jockey Club charges concerning my conduct, which were dropped then re-formed, have dealt a fatal blow to my chances of securing more than a couple of regular rides this year and made my decision inevitable. I`m proud to have ridden winners all over the globe including most of Europe, Barbados, Canada, Hong Kong, India and Singapore.

The inherent risks of being a jockey are there whether you`re 16 or whether you`re 60.

It`s the best you`re going to find. You can`t handpick a better jockey colony than this. And I know going into it that I`m going to be in the deep ocean here.

I love my jockey. Put it this way, if anybody can (relax the horse), he can.