Dick Van Dyke famous quotes

We should never judge a day by its weather.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Weather #Judging #Should

Emotionally, I'm about 13.
-- Dick Van Dyke

Women will never be as successful as men because they have no wives to advise them.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Success #Funny Inspirational #Women

I got into a Broadway show before I ever sang and danced. I learned how after I got in the show.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Broadway #Shows

I've made peace with insecurity... because there is no security of any kind.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Insecurity #Kind #Made

I grew up in Danville, Illinois, right in the middle of the state.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Illinois #Grew Up #States

I have four children and I have seven grandkids.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Children #Four #Seven

I get little kids who recognize me from 'Mary Poppins,' and it just delights me because it's our third generation.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Kids #Generations #Delight

I found out retirement means playing golf, or I don't know what the hell it means. But to me, retirement means doing what you have fun doing.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Retirement #Fun #Mean

I don't play golf. I have more fun singing and dancing.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Fun #Golf #Play

I don't have any children; I have four middle-aged people.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Children #People #Four

I did a 'Golden Girls' once, which shot in front of an audience, and that went well. I had a good time. But I need an audience, for comedy at least.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Girl #Needs #Golden

I can't work with my brother without laughing.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Brother #Laughing #My Brother

Today, if you're not an alcoholic, you're nobody.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Today #Alcoholics

A lot of violence, a lot of gore in it, and I just didn't want to do that kind of thing.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Want #Violence #Kind

All of us involved say 'The Dick Van Dyke Show' was the best five years of our lives. We were like otters at play.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Years #Play #Otters

Bob Hope, like Mark Twain, had a sense of humor that was uniquely American, and like Twain, we'll likely not see another like him.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Bob #Sense Of Humor #Mark

Do you know that I was the anchor on the 'CBS Morning Show?' And my newsman was Walter Cronkite.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Morning #Anchors #Shows

I've retired so many times now it's getting to be a habit.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Habit #Retired

I cannot tell you what it means when children recognize. This is about the third generation for me. And when kids that small recognize me, it really pleases me, very gratifying.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Children #Mean #Kids

I asked Fred Astaire once when he was about my age if he still danced, and he said 'Yes, but it hurts now.' That's exactly it. I can still dance, too, but it hurts now!
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Hurt #Age #Said

It means you never know what's going to happen,' I said. 'You do your best, then take your chances. Everything else is beyond our control.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Mean #Chance #Said

I didn't know the answers, but I could feel that the things that gave life meaning came from a place within and from the nurturing of values like tolerance, charity, and community.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Community #Tolerance #Meaning Of Life

I have also heard and read various accounts of why they [Sheldon Leonard and Carl Reiner] liked me. My favorites? I wasn't too good-looking, I walked a little funny, and I was basically kind of average and ordinary. I guess my lack of perfection turned out to be a winning hand. Let that be a lesson for future generations.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Winning #Average #Hands

Life is like a box of chocolates, I'm a nerd and I read books
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Book #Chocolate #Nerd

Hope is life's essential nutrient, and love is what gives life meaning
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Love Is #Giving #And Love

Probably one of the happiest moments, outside the birth of all of my kids, was the first time we won an Emmy, that the show won an Emmy. That was a big night.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Kids #Night #Firsts

The secret to keeping moving is keeping moving.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Moving #Secret

When I was a kid, I had ambitions for being a television announcer, which was before television took off, you know, in the late 40s. And just through necessity, going out looking for work, I was starting to sing, and dance, and act, and I never expected to do that, nor to have any success at it at least.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Ambition #Kids #Going Out

I was lucky to get the kinds of parts I wanted. I always said I didn't want to do anything my kids can't see.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Kids #Lucky #Want

So I think we're kind of an alternate choice for people who have had it with sex and violence.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Sex #Thinking #People

I wanted to be a radio announcer.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Radio #Wanted

I never wanted to be an actor and to this day I don`t. I can`t get a handle on it. An actor wants to become someone else. I am a song-and-dance man and I enjoy being myself, which is all I can do.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Song #Men #Actors

Stan said he used to keep Hardy late, make him miss his golf game, and really get him mad.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Golf #Games #Mad

My kids are so much better parent than I was.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Kids #Parent #Parenthood

No, no, it was the relationships. That was that group. People believed that Rob and Laura were really married in real life. You know, a lot of people believed that.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Real #People #Groups

There's a lot of very funny people I'd love to work with that I've never met, of course. I love Steve Martin and Jim Carrey.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#People #Funny People #Mets

So as my kids will tell you, they had a pretty normal life.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Kids #Normal #Normal Life

In my seventies, I exercised to stay ambulatory. In my eighties, I exercise to avoid assisted living.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Exercise

I've won several Emmys, a Tony and a Grammy, so maybe somebody will let me have an Oscar, and then I'll have a full set.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Oscars #Let Me #Grammy

I'm really in retirement. My career is over. I'm just playing now and having a great time. I like to keep busy, and I'm doing what's fun for me.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Retirement #Fun #Careers

I'm always announcing my retirement. I'm still not retired.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Retirement #Retired #Stills

I watch 'Al Jazeera.' They have news that you can't find anywhere else. They do great documentaries, too.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Watches #News #Als

I was the worst game show host that ever lived, and I knew it.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Games #Host #Worst

I turned down some movies that were quite good. mainly on the basis of taste.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Taste #Turned Down #Bases

I think, the 'Van Dyke Show' and 'Mary Poppins' are two of the best periods of my life. I had so much fun, I didn't want it to end.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Fun #Thinking #Two

I think it's being thrown at the wolves, we call it in our business.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Thinking #Thrown

I sing and dance. That's my job.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Jobs

I played a killer twice. Once on 'Matlock,' on Andy Griffith's show, I got to play the killer.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Play #Killers #Shows

I never made a good movie.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Good Movie #Made

I never had a lot of drive, but because I had family responsibilities, I had a lot of tenacity - the tenacity of a drowning man.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Responsibility #Men #Tenacity

But once we got on the air, everybody except Morey Amsterdam pretty much stuck to the script.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Air #Amsterdam #Scripts

In the best of all worlds, the producers would take some responsibility for the kinds of things they're putting out. Unfortunately, they don't.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Responsibility #World #Kind

But I wish they would make a musical of some kind. I miss musicals so much. You don't see them anymore.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Missing You #Musical #Wish

Rob Petrie is who I really am - in personality and general ineffectiveness.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Personality #Ineffectiveness

Oh, well, my first love is comedy or singing and dancing.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#First Love #Love Is #Dancing

I wanted to be Stan Laurel, then I wanted to be Fred Astaire and then Captain Kangaroo. I actually started out as a radio announcer when I was 17 and never left the business, so that's literally 70 years.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Years #Kangaroos #Radio

I think the saddest moment in my life just happened two months ago. My old nightclub partner passed away, Phil Erickson down in Atlanta. He - I owe him everything. He put me in the business and taught me about everything I know.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Thinking #Atlanta #Two

I think most people will tell you that. They can go along and, while they're denying that they are addicted, say it's stress this, it's this, it's that. But I - it's - I think - I really believe there is a gene. Some people become addicted and others don't.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Stress #Believe #Thinking

I do miss the rhythms of comedy. And I've never been able to perform very well without an audience. The sitcoms I've done had them. It was like doing a little play.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Play #Missing #Littles

I was always in show business but in many ways was not really of show business. I didn't move in show business circles, particularly, still don't do it.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Moving #Circles #Way

I loved to fall down.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Fall #Falling Down

You know, I'm almost out of the habit of watching episodic television now.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Television #Habit

I have four kids, seven grandkids, and four great-grandkids. Maybe I can become a great-great-grandfather if I hang on!
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Kids #Grandfather #Four

I was a 'Laurel and Hardy' nut. I got to know Laurel at the end of his life, and it was a great thrill for me. He left me his bow tie and derby and told me that if they ever made a movie about him, he'd want me to play him.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Nuts #Play #Ties

I've always been a bit of an orphan, because actors say, 'Well, he's more of a dancer.' And dancers say, 'No. He's really a singer.' And singers say, 'No. He's an actor.'
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Dancer #Actors #Singers

When I auditioned for 'Bye Bye Birdie' on Broadway, Gower Champion said, 'You've got the job!' I said, 'Mr. Champion, I can't dance.' He said, 'We'll teach you what you need to know.'
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Jobs #Bye #Champion

When I was a kid, I loved all the silent comedians - Buster Keaton, Laurel and Hardy, Chaplin. And I used to imitate them. I'd go to see a Buster Keaton movie and come home and try things out I'd seen. I learned to do pratfalls when I was very young.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Home #Kids #Comedian

You can spread jelly on the peanut butter but you can't spread peanut butter on the jelly.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Peanut Butter #Jelly #Peanuts

So at 16 I got a job at the local radio station. And I was working after school and weekends. I did the news; I did everything. I did - played records.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Jobs #School #Weekend

One day in '61, I was looking in the Santa Monica phone book for a number, and there it was: Stan Laurel, Ocean Avenue in Santa Monica. I went over there and spent the afternoon with them. And pumped him with questions. I must have driven him crazy. I spent a lot of happy hours at Stan's house on Sundays just talking about comedy.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Crazy #Ocean #Book

Once you get the kids raised and the mortgage paid off and accomplish what you wanted to do in life, there's a great feeling of: 'Hey, I'm free as a bird.'
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Kids #Bird #Feelings

Oh, I had an idea for a pilot of my own at the time, and then Carl sent me about eight scripts and simply I threw my idea out the window because the writing was just so good.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Writing #Eight #Ideas

No, I did night clubs right here in Los Angeles. My partner, Phil Erickson, put me in the business, a guy from my home town, a dear friend who we just lost a couple of months ago.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Couple #Home #Night

My son Barry, of course, has been on from the beginning. And his son Shane is playing now a med student regularly on the show. And at one point or another, I've had all four of his kids on the show.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Kids #Son #Four

I've been talking about retiring for years. It's my standard answer to the question, 'What are your future plans?' The truth is, I'll always want to do things that are worthwhile or fun.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Fun #Talking #Years

We had all week to rehearse. An audience would come in at the end of the week and we'd our little show. Most of the ad- libbing happened during the week on the show.
-- Dick Van Dyke

#Littles #Week #Ends