Michael Keaton

In our family, my brothers and I shared toys. In other words, just because it was mine didn't mean my brothers and I didn't play with it.

I liked 'Robocop' because of the director, and it was an intelligent, big-action studio movie.

I was a really involved dad - not because I'm such a wonderful person. I like being a dad.

I guess I'm probably a Method actor; I don't know... I just think of it as staying in the zone.

I reached a point where I didn't think I was that great. I'm not being humble. I was looking at things and thinking: 'You're not really good in that'. I think I was becoming boring as well as bored. It was nobody's fault except mine - probably - and it might not even be my fault.

Anesthesia is quite remarkable. It's lost time. And you wake up kind of refreshed.

Have I ever been to a party with a ton of famous people in it? Yes, several times, so I guess that's a Hollywood lifestyle.

I always think that I'm not going to be right for a movie or that there's someone else who can do it better.

If you look at what I do, there's no consistency. The consistency is that there is no consistency. I do projects that are good and not so good.

In the household in which I was raised, the themes were pretty simple. 'Work hard. Don't quit. Be appreciative, be thankful, be grateful, be respectful. Also, never whine, never complain. And always, for crying out loud, keep a sense of humor.'

I get kinda self-conscious. I don't want to know about my eyebrows. I'm born with them.

I have a lot of energy, and I move around a lot in my club act.

'Beetlejuice' was a romp, man. 'Beetlejuice' was fun. I've never had so much fun in my life.

Show business is, essentially, a fear-based industry.

Anyone can be a celebrity now; this is not a big deal anymore.

You don't get bored with stuff like 'Birdman.'

To say directing was a long-stewing ambition doesn't cover it. If you cut me open, you'd see it.

People always make these generalized statements about Hollywood, and there's all kinds of people in Hollywood.

The vast majority of Pittsburghers don't come from any kind of serious dough.

I really believed that Batman had the potential to be one of the coolest guys in cinema.

I'm envious of writers and musicians. I think it must be so difficult. Not just the frustration, but the discipline.

I was raising a child full time, sharing the responsibility with his mom. He lived with me half the time, so I chose not to go away and make certain movies.

Historically, I'm not a great patient when it comes to slowing down.

I'm the seventh child of George and Leona Douglas, and I don't ever remember a time when my father didn't work two jobs. When my mother was going to the grocery, or going to Mass, or trying to take care of seven kids in a run-down farmhouse.

There is the theory... that you live in two places: You either live in fear, or you live in love.

Guys who go on and on about loving women usually don't.

I try to not be or associate with elitists.

When I was in improv workshops or doing stand-up or writing comedy with others, or just doing comedy, I just laughed. Funny was funny; I loved to laugh. I always liked people I found generally funny.

The first feature film I did, when I did 'Night Shift,' I improvised quite a bit because I would improvise at the audition, so sometimes I would return to the original lines, and then when I was on set, I would improvise even more.

Sometimes I do movies that aren't any good, or sometimes I might not be any good in them, or sometimes they don't do very well.

I'm usually pretty good in front of a live audience. I usually like that.

Will Ferrell makes me laugh a lot when he gets out there and gets crazy.

There are very few jobs where you're held up to public scrutiny.

I don't know how to not be outside since I was a little kid.

There's this thin line between knowing something is going to be really hard and saying, 'Yeah, you know, but I still gotta see if I can pull it off.'

My first manager, he had left Germany when he was five, but he would joke about the Nazis. And I'd laugh, but I'd look at him, and he was the first one who told me, 'You know, funny is a powerful thing; it's a wonderful weapon.'

People, when they talk or write about comedy, they don't really get it.

I always thought what made 'Beetlejuice' look so great was because it looked like some genius kid made it in his basement.

I liked going to Catholic school.

There're only a few photographers I've ever felt really comfortable with.

I think one reason I really like women and like working with women is because of my sisters.

If you're a dope like me, you get every sports channel you can get. I'm watching, you know, Netherlands soccer.

My work is distinct and definitive and specific, and hopefully it is so that every single character is different, and they are - but there's probably an underlying element that's me.

I read that John Hughes script for 'Mr. Mom,' and I thought, 'This guy is a funny writer.' I went: 'You ought to stick around and direct this thing.' But he didn't; he left, and look what he became. A really legendary comedy director.

If I'm going to meditate, there is a little church up in Montecito, California. It's an old Spanish mission, actually. I find it comforting in there.

To this day, I have the most fond memories of some of my old toys.

There are times when I consciously give the character something physical - a walk, the way he sits, how he talks, or his lack of physicality, which is like a physicality.

If I didn't do 'Batman,' 'Birdman' wouldn't have happened.

I can't sleep the first night in a hotel room.

I have some tremendous, tremendously loving, generous friends all over the world.

I never knew anyone who was cloned, but I played one in 'Multiplicity.'

I've got six wonderful brothers and sisters.

There just is not one person in my family who is not funny.

I always knew the way in was Bruce Wayne. It wasn't Batman. It was never Batman. That was the key.

I'll always stand by the first 'Batman'. Even for its imperfections, people will never know how hard that movie was to do. A lot of that still holds up.

I'm just shocked at how blatantly shallow people are sometimes.

Generally, I move in the direction of art.

Unpredictability means what it means. I don't know how you define it. It is what it is.

I'm in a business that invites narcissism, self-involvement, and egos being blown out of proportion.

I had a real strong fantasy life as a kid. But then you grow up and think about real jobs.

I worked at a PBS station called WQED in Pittsburgh.

I really like to hear actors talk about acting, but I don't really like hearing myself talk.

Unless you're flat out dead, you have to think of some other questions like: what's on the other side? It brings up issues of God, or no God. How does he play into this? Or he, or she, or it? How does it all play into this?

I was an altar boy, which I loved and am very proud of. It was strict, but also really nice.

There are certainly producers I hang with and directors I hang with and actors I hang with.

Actors will say 'yes' to anything.

In high school, I was too shy to perform. It's one thing to get laughs from your family, to be funny at parties and in class. It's another thing to get up on the stage.

From an art perspective, I don't know how you get better than 'Beetlejuice.' In terms of originality and a look, it's 100% unique.

Guys never really get over their toys.

No, I don't see many movies. I don't even see my own movies.

Chris Nolan is great, but I've never seen any of the 'Batman' movies all the way through. I know they're good. I just have zero interest in those kinds of movies.

Weirdly, for someone who wanted to be funny, I didn't like a lot of attention.

I come from a background where you don't really talk about yourself much.

Westerns were always my favorite things when I was little. And it always bothered me when cowboys were too clean in movies, or when they wore their guns like they had an outfit on. It always worked better when a guy looked sweaty and smelly; I hadda believe, I hadda believe that.

My limited theater experience was when I was a kid starting out: two or three plays. I was good in one and mediocre in the other. My problem is that I have other interests.

I used to work on a survey crew, because my dad was an engineer, but he was also a surveyor.

I played a lot of sports when I was a kid so I get in that ballgame mindset of being really, really respectful, but at same time saying to yourself, 'Don't back down a single inch, hang with these guys if you can.' If they throw it high and tight you have to stand in there, you can't take yourself out of that moment.

Sometimes I don't feel like an actor. Sometimes I speak about it like it was another job, and then I go, 'Wait a minute - I am one!'

I don't know - sometimes I catch myself being dark, and it's annoying. I think, 'Get over it.' I bore myself. But sometimes, like everybody, I'm sure I am obsessive.

Filmmaking is the ultimate team sport.

I've got a statue of St. Francis in my front yard, and I'm not even a practicing Catholic.

High energy creates more energy, more energy, more energy. It kicks off synapses, I guess. It opens up your brain and you think of one thing after another thing, after another. You can really open yourself up comedically, which is fun.

David Letterman used to say, 'I wasn't the class clown, but I wrote for him,' and that's exactly it. You want to be known to be funny without having it pointed out.

One thing my mother had a nose for was inauthenticity.

Actors don't get to be well-known if they're horrible.

There comes a point in your life when you realize how quickly time goes by, and how quickly it has gone. Then it really speeds up exponentially. With that, I think you start to put a lot of things into context; you start to see how huge the world is, and really, the universe.

I took my play very seriously, and I got way, way lost in my play world.

I'm getting more and more bored with professional sports, but I still watch.

I remember my mom threatening me, half-serious: 'You know what? I should take you to Pittsburgh and put you in dance lessons just to keep you occupied.' Well, that brought everything to a screeching halt. 'Jeeze, dance lessons.' In retrospect, it would have been awesome, but then, 'Ugh, dancing - dancing's for sissies.'

I'm just shocked and thankful that I've gotten away with everything - experimenting here, trying at this, failing at that, being good in some things, not so good in others. It's kind of amazing that people are still sticking by me. When they come up to me in the street, I just want to write them all cheques.

I hope this doesn't sound pretentious, but I very often like the way Europeans make movies. I think sometimes that don't they care about having to clean certain things.

I saw some Pixar movies like 'The Incredibles' and thought, 'This is extraordinary. These are some of the best movies I've seen.'

Chris Guest movies are funny.

Leaving a lot of movie sets, I've gone home and said, 'How come my hands are clean?' I should finish something and go home with dirt in my fingernails, because then you really feel that you've done something.

I was never a huge 007 fan, but I sure liked Sean Connery. I'm sure Pierce Brosnan is good and has his moments, but I've not seen him; I've only seen bits and pieces on TV, so I can't really judge. Pierce looks very natural in the role.

I'd get scripts and think: 'What's the point of this?'

I saw 'Wild,' and I thought, 'Wow, this is a lot of things, but one of the things is it's a therapist's dream and a climate-change denier's nightmare.'

I didn't go to church all the time, just 'cause I was an antsy kid.

My brothers were tremendous shack builders. My shacks were horrible. My brothers once built a two-story shack from the ground up that was awesome!

I was so gullible as a kid.