James Earl Jones Quotes

Acting is not about anything romantic, not even fantasy, although you do create fantasy.

James Earl Jones



And I think, on the other end, there were actors who were not as good as I was, perhaps who could have hung in too, but began to blame everything on race.

James Earl Jones



And it was the idea that you can do a play - like a Shakespeare play, or any well-written play, Arthur Miller, whatever - and say things you could never imagine saying, never imagine thinking in your own life.

James Earl Jones



And nothing embittered me, which is important, because I think ethnic people and women in this society can end up being embittered because of the lack of affirmative action, you know.

James Earl Jones



Before my grandpa built his own church, we went to the neighboring town, and it was a white community. You know, up north, mostly middle European people and Indians, Chippewa Indians. We were welcome to that church, but once we got in, they didn't know what to do with us.

James Earl Jones



Even during the rationing period, during World War II, we didn't have the anxiety that we'd starve, because we grew our own potatoes, you know? And our own hogs, and our own cows and stuff, you know.

James Earl Jones



I don't ever want to be a sentimentalist. I prefer to be a realist. I'm not a romantic really.

James Earl Jones



I got out of the Army - in my world - I came to New York, for instance, when the civil rights movement was just beginning, and that created a certain energy, a certain rumble, a certain impetus for black actors.

James Earl Jones



I happened to happened to land in a time, in the middle '60s, that without knowing it, and without being told by the history of theater - which we now see from a historical point of view was an explosive time.

James Earl Jones



I knew real show business from my father, who had been an actor since he left the world of boxing.

James Earl Jones



I mean, my people were very, very simple. They were peasant people, you know?

James Earl Jones



I really think I ambled through a lot of my life, or ambled from one thing to the other.

James Earl Jones



I think the extent to which I have any balance at all, any mental balance, is because of being a farm kid and being raised in those isolated rural areas.

James Earl Jones



I was an adopted child of my grandparents, and I don't know how I can ever express my gratitude for that, because my parents would have been a mess, you know.

James Earl Jones



I was as content Off-Broadway as I was in a big Hollywood movie, and, I just try to be content wherever I am, you know.

James Earl Jones



I was preparing myself for the theater, and... I got a little job here and a job there, but it wasn't going well, and I considered some time before the mid-60s that maybe I should consider something else.

James Earl Jones



In the wintertime, in the snow country, citrus fruit was so rare, and if you got one, it was better than ambrosia.

James Earl Jones



It has to be real, and I think a lot of the problems we have as a society is because we don't acknowledge that family is important, and it has to be people who are present, you know, and mothers and fathers, both are not present enough with children.

James Earl Jones



More and more, when I single out the person out who inspired me most, I go back to my grandfather.

James Earl Jones



My grandmother had the most dramatic effect on my life because she set me in one direction, and I had to go back the other direction for my sanity, and for my ability to be a social human being.

James Earl Jones