Latest John Ratzenberger Quotes from Interviews

Quotes about:

• I don't want to go back to sitcoms - I'm a middle-aged, white guy - the high school principal who's a buffoon. It's hard enough raising kids now a days, and I don't want to be a part of a show that I'll be embarrassed watching shows like that with my kids and my mother. A lot of shows feel they need to get that for humor. You've have to have had a life experience; otherwise, it's toilet humor. If you've had a job before or experienced something, you get it. Some of these people haven't and they look for the cheap laugh.

  John Ratzenberger

  Mother, School, Kids

  Source: www.movieweb.com

• What I've learned from the Pixar guys is 'If you work for the love of what you're doing, it's always going to come out right.' Cause if you're working for a paycheck then it's not going to work in the long run; it's not going to feed your heart and soul.

  John Ratzenberger

  Running, Heart, Long

  Source: www.movieweb.com

• All over the US, there is a need to teach young people to, really, get them out in the backyard, building treehouses, fixing bicycles, because you become a better, more well-rounded, Renaissance personality if you actually know how to do things with your hands. If you can fix the screen door or replace your old garbage disposal, even change the tire on a car, a lot of people don't even know how to do that. We're literally running out of people who know how to do those things, the essential things like plumbing, carpentry, stone masonry, we're literally running out of them.

  John Ratzenberger

  Running, People, Car

  Source: www.movieweb.com

• I speak to women's groups, Chambers of Commerce, manufacturing organizations. Just did the Mike Huckabee Show. I do about two speaking engagements a month. I still enjoy travelling.

  John Ratzenberger

  Organization, Two, Engagement

  Source: www.starwars.com

• I wrote another wrestling film script. And we finished the shooting [with Lloyd Phillips]. But Henry Winkler came out with his own wrestling film, which did poorly. So the studios passed on ours, and it never got released.

  John Ratzenberger

  Wrestling, Scripts, Shooting

  Source: www.starwars.com

• That was actually Lloyd Phillips who was a Kiwi film producer in L.A. And it was about Gorgeous George, not Haystacks Calhoun. I was in a couple of Lloyd's films and got approached to write the story. People don't realize it, but Gorgeous George had this flamboyant, camp stage persona that had a tremendous influence on other celebrities, like Elton John, Liberace, Elvis Presley, and Mohammed Ali, who all wanted to establish their own outlandish stage personas. The project died because Gorgeous George's wife refused to give up the rights.

  John Ratzenberger

  Giving Up, Couple, Writing

  Source: www.starwars.com

• I look at the calendar. If it's a nice place, I go, like I did in London when it came to choosing to do a film. I always choose the best locations. New Orleans. That's fun. I'm available. Let's go.

  John Ratzenberger

  Fun, Nice, New Orleans

  Source: www.starwars.com

• [At Conventions] they give me all the photos to sign. Star Wars, Superman. And Hammy the Pig is right up there.

  John Ratzenberger

  Stars, War, Pigs

  Source: www.starwars.com

• It was when Boston invited us to do a parade one November, and I was the only [Star Wars] cast member skeptical of the willingness of people to come out to see us five actors drive by in antique cars in the Boston rain. Well, it was the first time I really understood the show's popularity.

  John Ratzenberger

  Stars, War, Rain

  Source: www.starwars.com

• Maybe, I got a sense when [Star Wars] came out, and there were always these lines around the block. We didn't understand the popularity of Cheers until maybe five years into the series.

  John Ratzenberger

  Stars, Cheer, Block

  Source: www.starwars.com

• I don't know that I ever did see Star Wars as any different. I was certainly proud that I did it.

  John Ratzenberger

  Stars, War, Different

  Source: www.starwars.com

• Really, improv is all about creating for what's around you, in the moment, so it fits in a way that you can't see the seams. It's like a great jazz combo. I still do it.

  John Ratzenberger

  Creating, Way, Jazz

  Source: www.starwars.com

• One of the high points in my career came from a time I had with Tim Conway on a film when I had him fall down with laughter. I had this scene with him where I was this mechanic down fixing his car. I can't remember what my line was as written, but they were okay with me doing a made-up line. So Tim asks me what's wrong with his car, and I look up and say, "Well, looks like you got a squirrel caught up in there."

  John Ratzenberger

  Laughter, Fall, Squirrels

  Source: www.starwars.com

• My uniform [in Star Wars] was cool. Not much else I can think of at the moment. You know, you don't know the enormity of these kinds of films until well after you're done.

  John Ratzenberger

  Stars, War, Thinking

  Source: www.starwars.com

• I mean, Cheers [from the Star Wars] was just a job while we were doing it. All of us were really only hustling to pay the rent, weren't we.

  John Ratzenberger

  Jobs, Stars, Cheer

  Source: www.starwars.com

• Of course, I had a crush on Princess Leia. I really wanted to ask her out, back to my place, or something. But at the time, I was living in a squat on Fitzroy Road in Primrose Hill. It was pretty derelict. So what was I going do? Ask her to come back with me and watch me catch mice?

  John Ratzenberger

  Crush, Princess, Watches

  Source: www.starwars.com

• I never went to drama school, so that was more like I was getting away with it.

  John Ratzenberger

  Drama, School, Get Away

  Source: www.starwars.com

• I remember being fascinated by the graduated sizes and perspective on the sets [of Star Wars]. And how they put shorter people and kids in the uniforms and placed them in the distance to give the idea that these sets had more depth than they really did.

  John Ratzenberger

  Stars, War, Distance

  Source: www.starwars.com

• I'm still really into set design and construction when I do films. I notice that stuff.

  John Ratzenberger

  Design, Stuff, Film

  Source: www.starwars.com

• I don't know how many days I worked there [on Star Wars]. The thing I do remember was I somehow got a parking space next to Kermit the Frog. It was Jim Henson's space, with this Kermit the Frog sign. I took a photo of it and sent it to my mom with a caption that read, "Look, Mom. I made it. I got a parking space next to Kermit the Frog." I was always fascinated by the film-set infrastructures.

  John Ratzenberger

  Mom, Stars, War

  Source: www.starwars.com

• [ Oval House] director, Peter Oliver, gave you the right to fail. He had a philosophy that came from Winston Churchill that you go from failure to failure with enthusiasm. So Peter gave us a go and that's how Ray [Hassett] and I ended up starting Sal's Meat Market at the Oval House.

  John Ratzenberger

  Philosophy, House, Rays

  Source: www.starwars.com

• I was a carpenter in Northern Vermont and got this tax refund check that just about covered a one-way airfare to London. So this I saw as a sign from God. So I went over to see Ray [Hussett] for a couple of weeks and ended up staying 10 years. I got work as a stage carpenter at the Oval House in Kennington, South London.

  John Ratzenberger

  Couple, Years, House

  Source: www.starwars.com

• It was the last generation of writers [ the Cheers] that had grown up reading books instead of watching TV. So you weren't getting anything that was derivative of I Love Lucy or Happy Days. You were getting real characters [like those] they read in P.G. Wodehouse or Dickens or somewhere along the line, because they had all grown up with a love of literature.

  John Ratzenberger

  Cheer, Real, Book

  Source: www.gq.com