Citazioni

[to actress Joan Perry, when he signed her and Rita Hayworth at the same time in 1935] Hayworth will be a star, and you'll be my wife [he married Perry six years later].

Gower Street [location of Columbia Studios] is paved with the bones of my executive producers.

If I wasn't the head of a studio, who would talk to me?

It's not a business, it's a racket.

If you want to send messages, use Western Union [Telegram Company].

Let me give you some facts of life. Every Friday, the front door of this studio opens and I spit a movie out onto Gower Street . . . If that door opens and I spit and nothing comes out, it means a lot of people are out of work--drivers, distributors, exhibitors, projectionists, ushers, and a lot of other pricks . . . I want one good picture a year, and I won't let an exhibitor have it unless he takes the bread-and-butter product, the Boston Blackies, the Blondies, the low-budget westerns and the rest of the junk we make.

I kiss the feet of talent.

I don't have ulcers; I give them.

[on being a studio head] It's better than being a pimp.

I have never met a grateful performer in the movies.

All I need to make pictures is an office.

[Rejecting Peter Falk's screen test] For the same price I can get an actor with two eyes.

[on Julie Harris] She scares small children.

The word 'gratitude' is not part of the Hollywood dictionary.

I am the king here. Whoever eats my bread sings my song.