Top 70 Peter O'Toole Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Not everyone can become a great artist, but a great artist can come from anywhere.”

— Peter O'Toole

2. “I will not be an ordinary man, because I have a right to be extraordinary.”

— Peter O'Toole

3. “There may be honor among thieves, but there’s none in politicians.”

— Peter O'Toole

4. “When did I realize I was God? Well, I was praying and I suddenly realized I was talking to myself.”

— Peter O'Toole

5. “And maddest of all, to see life as it is and not as it should be.”

— Peter O'Toole

6. “If you cannot say what you mean, your majesty, you will never mean what you say and a gentleman should always mean what he says.”

— Peter O'Toole

7. “It distresses us to return work which is not perfect.”

— Peter O'Toole

8. “If you can’t do something willingly and joyfully, then don’t do it. If you give up drinking, don’t go moaning about it; go back on the bottle. Do. As. Thou. Wilt.”

— Peter O'Toole

9. “It’s my job, it’s what I do, it’s what I’m on earth to do and it’s who I am.”

— Peter O'Toole

10. “Everyone praises Sachin Tendulkar. He may be a genius in his own right but in my book, Rahul Dravid is the artist. Dravid’s defence tactics, his strokes, his cuts, his grace are truly amazing. I’d like to meet the chap sometime and take my hat off to him.”

— Peter O'Toole

11. “I wish to hazard my soul to opportunity.”

— Peter O'Toole

12. “Do you not know that King Kong the first was just three foot six inches tall? He only came up to Faye Wray’s belly button! If God could do the tricks that we can do he’d be a happy man!”

— Peter O'Toole

13. “I can’t stand light. I hate weather. My idea of heaven is moving from one smoke-filled room to another.”

— Peter O'Toole

14. “There’s a remedy for everything except death.”

— Peter O'Toole

15. “Question: How do you know you’re God? Answer: Simple. When I pray to him, I find I’m talking to myself.”

— Peter O'Toole

16. “I’m not an actor, I’m a movie star!!!”

— Peter O'Toole

17. “A victory? What have we won? We’ve won a rock in the middle of a wasteland, on the shores of a poisoned sea.”

— Peter O'Toole

18. “I am human, all too bloody human.”

— Peter O'Toole

19. “I loved doing My Favorite Year, which was great fun, and The Ruling Class, which I made with all my chums.”

— Peter O'Toole

20. “The only exercise I take is walking behind the coffins of friends who took exercise.”

— Peter O'Toole

21. “I will not be a common man. I will stir the smooth sands of monotony.”

— Peter O'Toole

22. “Being sober for so many years is getting interesting.”

— Peter O'Toole

23. “Actors have to stay optimistic. The moment we start thinking otherwise, we’re dead.”

— Peter O'Toole

24. “When I work with young people, I grab energy from them by the handsful.”

— Peter O'Toole

25. “The good parts are the people who don’t make do. They’re the interesting people. Lear doesn’t make do.”

— Peter O'Toole

26. “I’m a working stiff, baby, just like everybody else.”

— Peter O'Toole

27. “Always a bridesmaid never a bride my foot!”

— Peter O'Toole

28. “I have no intention of uttering my last words on the stage. Room service and a couple of depraved young women will do me quite nicely for an exit.”

— Peter O'Toole

29. “I did quite enjoy the days when one went for a beer at one’s local in Paris and woke up in Corsica.”

— Peter O'Toole

30. “Marriage is forever. It’s like cement.”

— Peter O'Toole

31. “George Eliot is my only steady girlfriend. We go to bed together every night.”

— Peter O'Toole

32. “He’s a scoundrel, young Brad Pitt, who led me, his elderly colleague, astray more than once.”

— Peter O'Toole

33. “It was around 1985 before I heard the news of President Kennedy’s assassination.”

— Peter O'Toole

34. “I became a professional cricket teacher about 20 years ago. I had a son born to me when I was 50, and I thought, he needs someone to bowl to him.”

— Peter O'Toole

35. “One time in the late ’50s, when Peter Finch, Laurence Harvey, and I were all offered the same movie role – the assumption being that we weren’t friends – we marched up to producer Dino De Laurentiis’s door and declared in unison, ‘We don’t think we’re suitable for the part.’”

— Peter O'Toole

36. “I woke up one morning to find I was famous. I bought a white Rolls-Royce and drove down Sunset Boulevard, wearing dark specs and a white suit, waving like the Queen Mum.”

— Peter O'Toole

37. “I can make the best French toast.”

— Peter O'Toole

38. “Pope Paul III was the greatest thief in the history of the church.”

— Peter O'Toole

39. “Booze is the most outrageous of drugs which is why I chose it.”

— Peter O'Toole

40. “Irish women are always carrying water on their heads, and always carrying their husbands home from pubs. Such things are the greatest posture-builders in the world.”

— Peter O'Toole

41. “I will not be a common man. I will stir the smooth sands of monotony. I do not crave security. I wish to hazard my soul to opportunity.”

— Peter O'Toole

42. “Life turned out much better than I thought. I knew after a little while that I could act.”

— Peter O'Toole

43. “I tell my children to avoid theatre and go into cinema and TV.”

— Peter O'Toole

44. “If you do not surrender, I shall be forced to shoot you through the head with a rather large bullet.”

— Peter O'Toole

45. “We were doing it under the most extraordinary circumstances, but the first out of the tent in the morning would be David Lean. He said to me on the very first day of shooting, Pete, this is the beginning of a great adventure.”

— Peter O'Toole

46. “My own favorite is something called Rogue Male.”

— Peter O'Toole

47. “Acting has been described as farting about in disguise.”

— Peter O'Toole

48. “I’m a professional and I’ll do anything – a poetry reading, television, cinema, anything that allows me to act.”

— Peter O'Toole

49. “My dear sir, it haunted me for the rest of my life.”

— Peter O'Toole

50. “There is a legend. And to protest is daft.”

— Peter O'Toole