79+ Gary Oldman Quotes (Charismatic, Versatile And Intense)

Gary Oldman is an English actor who has had a long and successful career in Hollywood. He is known for his roles in films like The Dark Knight, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, and The Professional. He has also been nominated for several Academy Awards and won an Oscar for Best Actor in 2018 for his role in Darkest Hour.

Top 10 Gary Oldman Quotes

1. Any actor who tells you that they have become the people they play, unless they’re clearly diagnosed as a schizophrenic, is bullshitting you.
2. I had a guitar when I was 6 or 7, a plastic guitar with the Beatles' faces on it. It would be a collector's item now. It would fetch a hefty sum, I imagine.
3. Reality TV to me is the museum of social decay.
4. We're given a code to live our lives by. We don't always follow it, but it's still there.
5. Getting sober was one of the three pivotal events in my life, along with becoming an actor and having a child. Of the three, finding my sobriety was the hardest thing.
6. I applaud anything that can take a kid away from a PlayStation or a Gameboy. That is a miracle in itself.
7. Wanting to be a good actor is not good enough. You must want to be a great actor. You just have to have that.
8. I like these calm little moments before the storm, it reminds me of Beethoven
9. It's been said that alcoholics are egomaniacs with low self -esteem. It's the prefect description. Being larger than life and yet your pride is crushed with self- loathing.
10. To be able to do this job in the first place you've got to have a bit of an ego.

Gary Oldman Short Quotes

• Being a good director is knowing sometimes when not to say something.
• If one could have a wish, or an alternative life, I would've liked to have been John Lennon.
• I know I'm pretty, but I ain't as pretty as a couple of titties.
• You always hope that the cloak of inspiration will fall, and you'll be O.K.
• I went and lived in Chicago for a year , and I studied at the police academy.
• I got obsessed with classical music, I got obsessed with Chopin, with playing the piano.
• There are roles that you chase sometimes.
• But you see, I have played more good guys than I have played villains.
• My big love was the Beatles. I was more into music.
• Shakespeare doesn't really write subtext, you play the subtext.

Gary Oldman Famous Quotes And Sayings

I was quiet, a loner. I was one of those children where, if you put me in a room and gave me some crayons and a pencils, you wouldn't hear from me for nine straight hours. And I was always drawing racing cars and rockets and spaceships and planes, things that were very fast that would take me away. — Gary Oldman

It's always hard when you're playing someone for a lot of people out there who are going to see the movie after reading the books. There's a communion between a reader and the writer, so people will have an idea who Sirius Black is and I might not be everyone's idea of that. — Gary Oldman

In the past, I’ve had my share of good reviews, but it’s always the crazy, scary, weirdo guy. I don’t even know how it happened. Look at me. I mean, when I’m naked, I look like a bald chicken. How did I get to be a scary bad guy? — Gary Oldman

And of course I've got kids of my own now, and they love me being in the Harry Potter films. I'm now part of a phenomenon. You become incredibly cool to your kids, and you get a young fan base. So you became the cool dad at school. You're suddenly hip. — Gary Oldman

I don't see a great difference between someone sending a robot or a drone to bomb people and controlling it on a PlayStation from another country. It's thousands of miles away as opposed to someone in an airplane who is thousands of feet away releasing a bomb. — Gary Oldman

When you play a character that is so emotionally closed there are times when you ask yourself if you are doing enough and if it's reading. That is where you have a director, who is the barometer of what you are doing. — Gary Oldman

I don't go to premieres. I don't go to parties. I don't covet the Oscar. I don't want any of that. I don't go out. I just have dinner at home every night with my kids. Being famous, that's a whole other career. And I haven't got any energy for it. — Gary Oldman

People imagine that actors are being offered everything and you are not. So things come in and sometimes there are things that I want and can't get a meeting on, or go to a different actors. — Gary Oldman

Well, I needed the work - that's the honest answer. I haven't worked for a while, a couple of years. So I thought it would be nice to get back to work and earn some money. — Gary Oldman

I didn't do drugs. It wasn't my thing. But the drink was terrible. Today when I look back, it's like I was another person. You could call it a coping mechanism, but that would be an excuse. I just drank too much. — Gary Oldman

Interesting things come your way but as you get older, your lifestyle changes. I don't want to travel; I don't want to be in a hotel room away from my family. — Gary Oldman

I was brought up by my mother and my two sisters, although they're older than me and fled the nest very young, so I was technically raised as an only child, but I was very much loved. — Gary Oldman

It's a shame about California, and particularly about L.A., where they've demolished so many landmarks. It's a bit of a disease there, where if anything is over 30 years old, they sort of knock it down and replace it. It's a strange town, it's this sprawling suburb, and then there's a city, the old town. — Gary Oldman

I never told my father I loved him before he died, and I have a lot of issues about that. They're all swimming around in my head, in my heart, unresolved, and in a way it felt fitting to dedicate the film to him. — Gary Oldman

I think filmmaking should be a wonderfully free collaborative process, and it so very rarely is. I often see directors as jailers of my talent. — Gary Oldman

The script is your map of the world, isn't it? And if someone knows that if it's well-written, you get all of the beats, it will tell you everything you need to know. — Gary Oldman

I like celluloid, I like film, I like the way that when a movie is projected it sort of breathes a little in the gate. That's the magic of it to me. — Gary Oldman

The great thing about Google is that you type in neuro-surgery and somehow you end up with Peter Sellers or watching Frank Sinatra. Google is a great resource. — Gary Oldman

I did have a knack for playing weirdos. There's still sort of this perception of me out there as being this crazy guy. — Gary Oldman

Your own barometer is all you have to go by, and often what makes a good director is knowing when not to say something. On occasions you can find yourself on a film set where the person who is wearing the director's hat is only trying to justify his position. — Gary Oldman

The industry has changed. Two years ago I could tell a company I've got Russell Crowe and that would get the film made. Now they'd ask 'And who's the girl?' Just one famous face isn't enough any more. — Gary Oldman

Rather like Batman, I embody the themes of the movie which are the values of family, courage and compassion and a sense of right and wrong, good and bad and justice. — Gary Oldman

There will always be spies. We have to have them. Without them we wouldn't have got Osama bin Laden - it took us years, but it happened. — Gary Oldman

I'm not the best audience for that because I'm not a great science-fiction fan. I just never got off on space ships and space costumes, things like that. — Gary Oldman

Growing up in a particular neighborhood, growing up in a working-class family, not having much money, all of those things fire you and can give you an edge, can give you an anger. — Gary Oldman

By the way, the Harry Potter series is literature, in spite of what some people might say. The way J.K. Rowling worked that world out is quite something. — Gary Oldman

One of my career ambitions was fulfilled working with John [Hurt]. I loved his work long before I ever had the idea of being an actor, so I was nervous to meet him. I was like a fanboy, like that annoying character on 'Saturday Night Live'. I'm sitting there. 'Do you remember when you were in 'Midnight Express'? Remember that scene you were in?' And he doesn't disappoint. — Gary Oldman

It's becoming increasingly harder and harder; there's no such thing as independent film anymore. There aren't any, they don't exist. In the old days you could go and get a certain amount of the budget with foreign sales, now everybody wants a marketable angle. — Gary Oldman

I drank for about 25 years getting over the loss of my father and I took the anger out on myself. I did a good job at beating myself up at sometimes. I don't drink anymore but my alcoholic head occasionally says different. 'Nil By Mouth' was a love letter to my father because I needed to resolve some issues in order to be able to forgive him. — Gary Oldman

Impressionists have to paint with a very broad stroke because you've got to see it within a couple of seconds. You go, "That's a really funny Robert De Niro." As an actor, though, you look at different aspects of a character. I try to completely surround myself with the assignment. It's like being in a big cloud and then some of it rains through. — Gary Oldman

Speaking very generally, I find that women are spiritually, emotionally, and often physically stronger than men. — Gary Oldman

The work I enjoy is when the camera rolls, and I like the work in the moment. — Gary Oldman

Each role you play, they set a bar of challenges that you meet. And in the past, I've played characters that emotionally expressed themselves a bit more in a physical way. It was a joy, actually. — Gary Oldman

On set I keep myself to myself; I'd rather the director speak up. I'm not gonna direct a younger actor. I think the power of example works best, actually. — Gary Oldman

The book tells you everything you need to know. The book is the map of the world that you're in with the character. — Gary Oldman

People have an idea that one is in control of a career, a lot more than you really are. You can engineer things to an extent. But you are at the mercy of what comes in across the desk. — Gary Oldman

We lived in a flat that you could pretty much fit in my current kitchen. No wonder people drink! I can't understand why they don't throw themselves off the balconies. — Gary Oldman

I had what AA calls 'a convincer' - which made me realize that I couldn't do it any more. I went out drinking for about 70 hours here in London. At the end I knew I was done. — Gary Oldman

I still don't have a publicist. If I'm in a film, you have an obligation to promote it, I'll do as much as I can. — Gary Oldman

'Nil By Mouth' was a bit autobiographical, but as I always pointed out at the time, that's not my dad. — Gary Oldman

I wasn't ever a huge fan of comics. Just not one of those kids, you know? — Gary Oldman

To be honest, Im a little tired of playing bad guys. I long to do a comedy. But it was fun knocking Indiana Jones around. — Gary Oldman

I'm still a member of the Empire! Although I sometimes feel like an American with a British accent - you get contaminated after so long. — Gary Oldman

I took a bit of a back seat, I had kids and I wanted to focus on them. There's that period in the late '90s, the early 2000s, where I didn't do a great deal. — Gary Oldman

What's fascinating is that when you write a script, it's almost a stream of consciousness. You have an idea that it means something, but you're not always sure what. Then when you get on the set, the actors teach you. — Gary Oldman

As an actor, you people-watch, you observe. And the more famous you become, the sad thing is you lose the ability to do that. Instead of people-watching, you become the focus of attention. — Gary Oldman

Sometimes directors feel like they have to justify that hat that they are wearing they've got on as a director, and they come in and they tweak and interfere. — Gary Oldman

So Harry Potter came in and it is nice that I have kids of the right age. I took them to London and they walked around the set and met Harry Potter and that is thrilling. — Gary Oldman

People who know me , they know I have a sense of humor, I'm a bit of a joker, a bit of a clown really, and I would love someone to exploit that side of me and send me a romantic comedy. — Gary Oldman

Over the years, I have been asked to play these sort of scary frenetic characters that express their emotions physically. — Gary Oldman

At 23 it was all about acting. Today it's getting my kids to school, making sure that they've done their homework. I'm in my fifties, and I'm turning into a square. I saw a kid walk into a restaurant the other day and his belt was below his backside. I would have turned him away. — Gary Oldman

At the Oscars, if you didn't vote for '12 Years a Slave' you were a racist. — Gary Oldman

I want my weekends off and I want to put my kids to bed. Those are good reasons to want to be in 'Batman 2'. — Gary Oldman

The great thing about having been in a lot of make-up, and stuff like that, is that when you're working with someone who's in it, and you've been there and done it, but you're not in it anymore, you feel so good. — Gary Oldman

I drank for about 25 years getting over the loss of my father, and I took the anger out on myself. I did a good job at beating myself up sometimes. — Gary Oldman

I hadn't worked for a couple of years so I thought it would be nice to earn some money and pay the bills. — Gary Oldman

How many movies do you see when you can say this director really knew what film he wanted to make? I can count them on the fingers of one hand. — Gary Oldman

How do you remember all those lines? By forgetting everything else. — Gary Oldman

I have three kids who like Harry Potter so I was sort of aware of it. You can't really move from it: it's on buses, in stores, it's everywhere. One of my kids has read the books; the other two are too small but they like the movies. — Gary Oldman

Life Lessons by Gary Oldman

1. Gary Oldman's career is a lesson in resilience and determination; despite facing many challenges, he has persevered and become one of the most acclaimed actors of his generation.
2. He has also demonstrated the power of hard work and dedication; by mastering his craft and continuously striving to improve, he has achieved great success.
3. His story also teaches us to never give up, no matter how difficult the odds may seem; with dedication and perseverance, anything is possible.