Leslie Caron Quotes

The studio system collapsed only when Elizabeth Taylor charged $1 million for Cleopatra.

When I did small films like Lily and Buenos Vista, everyone thought my career would be ruined.

Cinema will always have an important role to play in society.

It`s the first film that I made where the director was not present under the camera, and it threw me.

I went to the Tokyo Film Festival in Japan because I love Japanese cinema.

I regret not doing a film that I was offered with Clark Gable because the script was not good enough.

The most important thing is to remain active and to love what you are doing.

I`m not a ballerina. I`m a hoofer.

The French? Upper class. Now, this is not all of France, it`s just the French upper class, and it`s very true. That`s the way that they are, yes.

I hate biographies which say, I was called to such and such an office, and he offered me so and so, and I got so and so money. I find that very tedious. The best biographies are written by other people.

I know a lot of Americans in Paris who have married Frenchmen. They keep bringing up their experience, the clash of civilizations, the clash of personalities.

The American is wholeheartedly for love and romance at any cost.

I think it`s the end of progress if you stand still and think of what you`ve done in the past. I keep on.

Even now I feel furious with myself because whenever there`s a camera pointed towards me my MGM training makes me smile. I don`t like it. You can see it on all the people who came from that era because there was no question of them not smiling for the camera. Even Katharine Hepburn -- and God knows she was a dramatic actress -- if the camera is on her she smiles.

We were all ruled by the studio system. I signed a contract for seven years.

It`s very difficult to marry into another civilization.

I was trying to be very at ease in this arrogant person, and very worldly, but something human came into the part. I hate to say that. I wanted to be totally worldly.

James Ivory is very, very subtle in his study of human behavior. I think that he`s very aware of the subtleties of women behavior.

(on Warren Beatty) Anyone who has come close to Warren has shed quite a few feathers. He tends to maul you.

In order to have great happiness you have to have great pain and unhappiness - otherwise how would you know when you`re happy?

There were many good actresses in my time like Jane Powell and Debbie Reynolds, but I was the only dancer.

I longed to break out of the system and do different roles.

No matter what you do, your person comes through. You can`t completely change yourself on the screen. I had in mind someone colder and more in control, but I couldn`t do it. This human note just crept in and maybe it`s better.

Fred Astaire was a more formal, trained dancer who loved waltzing and only danced with the girls.

I noticed that when I went to see the rushes or the first showing that there was something quite human in this desperation, and I hadn`t planned it.

I got as little as a $75 a week when I started.

You have actresses like Meryl Streep and Julia Roberts, who have roles specially written for them.

I toured the Middle Eastern countries with the ballet.

I seemed to belong to three countries: I had an apartment in Paris, a house in Hollywood, and when I married British theater director Peter Hall, I moved to London.

I went to Kerala in India, to learn Ayurveda, which was fantastic.

I had two children. I had a nanny to manage my kids.

James Ivory comes close to the actors for the first rehearsal. He more or less lets you direct yourself and then will only correct you if he finds it incorrect.